by UD Yasha
But something told us we could be very wrong.
Chapter Twenty-Two
We got Natasha Gill's address from the file, thanked Madhura and left Ad Astra at twelve thirty in the afternoon. She lived near Khadki, an area in Pune famous for its military establishments. Originally at the outskirts of Pune, it was now near the city's heart. Residential complexes and eateries had come up at breakneck speed. Natasha Gill lived in one of the older houses in Khadki along with her mother. It was fifty minutes from Ad Astra, twenty minutes from my house, fifteen from the CID headquarters.
I carried Natasha’s file with me. I read the notes Manohar had taken on Natasha and her mother, Sumeira. Her husband had passed away from a heart attack five years back when Natasha was five months old. Sumeira had opened up to Manohar about her struggles to raise Natasha by herself.
Sumeira had somehow gotten by, working two shifts in the beginning and then renting out her front yard to a café. She liked to bake and bought a part of the café through sweat equity. Natasha was four years old then. Their lives were looking up and stable for the first time. Until a hole was discovered in Natasha's heart. That meant constant trips to the hospital and rising bills. They had sold their house and moved into a smaller apartment to cover expenses. During all this time, Sumeira made sure that Natasha’s education did not suffer. The story had inspired Manohar. He had recommended Natasha for a full scholarship at Ad Astra.
Which made her no-show in the final round even more surprising. Coupled with the unanswered phone calls and their entry into Manohar’s life as his routine had changed, I had become suspicious. I wondered how a single mother and her ailing daughter would pose a threat to anyone.
I had a thought. Wasn’t Rucha Sinha also sick? Could the two be related? I called Rathod right away. He answered after the first ring.
I said, ‘Can you please check if anyone named Sumeira Gill or Natasha Gill had been treated by Malini Sinha or if they know each other?’
‘I sure will. What’s the matter?’ Rathod said.
I told him about our morning.
‘I’ll also look into the Gills,’ Rathod said. ‘Do you want me to come to their house?’
‘How long will you take?’
‘Another half an hour to get out of the office.’
‘In that case, we’ll go ahead. We’re almost there.’
‘Be careful, Siya. If you’re right about this, you’ll be ruffling the wrong feathers.’
‘I’ll tell you what happens.’
‘I’ll be looking out for your call. I’ll send backup if anything goes wrong,’ he said and hung up.
We reached Natasha Gill's house at half past one. She lived in an old three-storeyed building that was called ‘Apex'. Atharva pulled over in front of it. The Gills lived on the third floor. The building did not have a watchman or security cameras and was right at the end of the by-lane, away from any public attention.
I pulled out my Glock as we scampered up the stairs. Atharva was ahead of me. I felt safe knowing that he was there with me.
‘Stay a step lower,’ he said when we reached the top of the stairwell.
I backed down. Atharva approached the door of apartment 302. He pressed the doorbell but it did not ring. We waited for thirty seconds. Atharva tried the bell again. He knocked on the door. Still no response.
‘What do you want to do?’ he said.
I had an idea. I pulled out my phone and called Sumeira Gill. The call went through and the phone began ringing. Atharva put an ear to the door. He shook his head.
‘I can’t hear anything,’ he said.
I tried the landline which I knew would ring as it was not portable. I could hear the shrill bell inside. It kept ringing. No one answered it again.
‘Should I break the door?’ he said.
‘Go ahead,’ I said.
Atharva backed up in the narrow hallway. He took a start and slammed his leg on the wooden frame. The wood was old and rotting and Atharva was strong. He struck it again with his leg. The wood around the lock gave in.
We stepped into the house. I held my gun high, not knowing what to expect. An old soggy smell hit us and we had to cover our noses. It looked like the apartment had not been opened for a while.
The living room had a small sofa, no TV, no centre table or anything else. Atharva peeped in the small hallway that had two doors. Possibly two bedrooms. I went into one, while Atharva went into the other. They were both small in size and it looked like two bedrooms had been crammed into a space for one.
I looked around. I seemed to be in Sumeira’s room as I saw a saree and a salwaar kameez folded on a queen-sized bed. It had little in terms of personal décor. I opened the only cupboard to find more clothes. All belonged to a grown woman.
‘Find anything?’ Atharva called out from the other room.’
‘Nothing yet,’ I shouted back.
I opened the only drawer in the cupboard. I saw a thick file in it. It had all the medical records of Natasha from the past two years. I flipped through it, trying to find the latest medical report or test conducted. Maybe that could tell me something. Or at least I would find the last public record of Natasha and Sumeira. I flipped through the entire file.
Finally, I found it.
The most recent report had been filed last. A chill ran down my spine as I read it.
Just then, Atharva called out from the next room. ‘Siya, I’ve found something. You need to come here right now.’
Chapter Twenty-Three
Still reeling from what I had seen, a sense of trepidation rose through me as I ran to the other room. Atharva was on the floor, reaching for something under the bed.
‘What’s it?’ I said.
He looked up at me. ‘I don’t quite know how to describe it. You need to see it for yourself.’
I joined him on the floor as I slipped my hands into a pair of gloves. I squinted my eyes and used the flashlight to get a better view.
‘It looks like an old laptop that someone tried to burn,’ I whispered, feeling confused. I pulled it out. It was indeed an old laptop. Its screws had been taken off, and the insides had been set on fire. It had not burnt completely though. However, I wondered how much could be retrieved from it.
‘The only possible reason why someone would burn a laptop is probably because they wanted to erase the data on it,' Atharva said. ‘What could a mother-daughter duo be hiding?'
‘We can possibly recover something from it.’
‘How does this fit in though?’
‘There’s an even bigger question. Where the hell are Natasha and Sumeira Gill?’ I said.
I remembered Natasha’s most recent medical report. I sat up on the bed and opened the file again. I needed to be sure that I had read it correctly.
I showed the file to Atharva. ‘The blood pressure in Natasha’s lungs was fluctuating and she had to see her cardiologist. The doctor told Sumeira to be extra careful for the next eight weeks.’
‘When did they see the doctor?’
‘15th of April.’
‘That’s six weeks back.’
‘Maybe that’s why they missed their Ad Astra interview.’
‘The report before that one, dated 15th of March, was fine. All her vital counts were within limit then.’
‘What changed in that week?’
‘Her final round with Ad Astra was on the 16th of April. Maybe her health got worse and that’s why she could not appear for the interview. The doctor’s most recent report also states that she did not complain of any discomfort until the 10th of April.’
‘I’ll tell Rathod to send his team over here and collect all the evidence,’ I said, pulling out my phone.
Within fifteen minutes, Rathod arrived along with two crime scene analysts. In the meantime, we spoke to the residents living in apartments 301, 201 and 202. The ground floor was vacant. No one in the building knew where Sumeira and Natasha Gill were. They last remembered seeing them about five weeks back. It see
med like they had disappeared from the face of the planet, just like Rucha Sinha.
We left an hour later at three o’clock, letting the crime scene analysts do their job. As we walked to the car, I wiped the sweat off my brow. It had become humid. I glanced skywards and noticed more clouds than I had seen all summer. They were still high. I wondered if the pre-monsoon showers were going to kick in.
Atharva and I bought chicken burgers and Coke Floats for everyone from the McDonalds in Shivajinagar. I felt we needed to review everything we knew about the case so far. I checked in on maa while sipping on my Coke Float. She was doing much better than before, making me think about last night again. I found it incredible how she had made me think of a bad situation in good light while also assuring me that she was in a good place herself.
All of us—maa, Radha, Rahul, Shama, Shadow and I had lunch together. We did not discuss the case but reminisced about the old times. After lunch, Atharva and I went to the garage office. Radha was proactive and had already set up a water cooler in the garage. My phone buzzed. I pulled it out. A text message from Rathod.
No one has reported Natasha or Sumeira missing. We are working on the laptop. We are also tracking her finances.
I first needed to confirm if Natasha Gill was the trigger that changed Manohar’s routine for some reason. He could have met someone else during the admission process that instigated the change. There was also a chance that this change in his routine had nothing to do with anyone he had met during admissions. I had gone to Natasha’s house on a hunch. Both of them were missing. But had they taken an innocent trip somewhere or were they actually missing?
I saw Radha come towards us with a parcel in her hand. ‘This arrived when you were gone. Maa accepted the package and she just told me about it.’
‘Thanks, Radha,’ I said. ‘Can you try and find if Sumeira Gill and Malini Sinha knew each other? Check their histories, past finances, whatever. Let me know if you need access for anything. I’ll ask Rathod, or I can summon the records.’
I opened the package that Radha had given me. They were Malini Sinha's patient records from Healing Grace. The package also had Malini's home clinic records, a working copy of Manohar's cell phone and samples of other physical evidence that had been collected from Manohar. As a part of the defence counsel, I had the right to access all evidence being used against my client. The logic behind this was to make a case tamper-proof so that I could review the evidence independently.
‘Is Rahul home?’ I asked Radha.
‘Yes, he’s working upstairs.’
‘Please tell him that the samples taken off Manohar are here. He can take them back to his office when he goes today,’ I said and handed a box to her.
Radha walked away with the phone. I also sent a copy of the data from the mobile phone to a data retrieval specialist named Salim Khan. I knew him through my mentor Santosh Hegde. Salim was one of the most hospitable people I knew which was strange because he almost never spoke and kept to himself. He lived in Mumbai. He knew the best eateries in the city. But the most delicious food I had was always at his house. He knew that and always sent his homemade mutton biryani for me on Eid. Because of that, we spoke at least a couple of times a year.
Salim also had a soft spot for children. So, when I told him the data from the mobile phone could be useful to locate a missing girl, or potentially two, he told me he’d work on it on as a priority and send me the details by evening.
Rahul came down ten minutes later. ‘I’ve wound up my work for the day. I’m here for you now,’ he said.
‘Great, we need more eyes. We have to go through a lot of data,’ I said pointing to the patient records that we had just gotten. ‘Let’s do this well, guys. Remember, we’re trying to find something that connects Malini or Sumeira to Manohar.’
We started reviewing all the documents we had with us. I had asked for Malini’s patient records of the past two years. Luckily, Malini consulted only at Healing Grace Hospital, making the task of going through the records tedious but manageable. I reckoned it was going to take us at least two to three hours to go through it all. I also hoped that by then, CID’s Medical Examiner Dr. Sonia Joshi would have finished conducting the autopsies and going through the rest of the forensic evidence.
By the time Radha arrived with four cups of tea at four thirty in the afternoon, none of us had found anything of significance.
‘Break time,’ Radha said, serving us the tea.
I stretched in my chair. I was really glad to have some good adrakwali chai. Atharva went to the wash basin and splashed some water on his face. He came back and told us that he needed to go and check on Malini. He left after finishing his tea.
Just then, Rahul’s phone chimed. He read the text message and said, ‘A free slot has opened up at the lab at work. I’ll head there with the evidence to check it out in an hour.’
I wondered what Rathod and the CID had found. I pulled out my phone just as it started ringing.
‘I was about to call you,’ I said.
Rathod said, ‘Dr. Sonia has finished writing her report.’
‘What did she find?’
‘The same gun that Manohar was holding was used to kill the four members of the Sinha family. There was gunshot residue on his hands and clothes. It’s looking bad, Siya. The ACP is moving fast. He wants to speak to Manohar and see if he wants to cut a deal by telling us where the girl is.’
‘That means I need to be present there when it happens.’
‘That’s why I called you.’’
‘I’m on my way,’ I said, getting up.
Chapter Twenty-Four
There were four news vans outside the CID building. Journalists had set up their cameras, ready to film anything they could. Three news reporters whom I did not recognize ran in front of my car as I slowed down to enter the CID building. The guard at the gate was slow to open it, leaving me stranded with the reporters.
They knocked on my window. ‘Can we just get one statement from the defence lawyer?’ a male reporter said, shoving his face at my window, his breath condensing on it.
I wondered why the guard was taking so long. I knew delaying the opening of the gate could be a tactic used by the CID to wear down a defence lawyer. I looked out the window again and several flashes went off. I was sure one of these photos accompanied by a horrific caption would find its way on a news website.
The guard eventually opened the gate and it took me five minutes to get inside amid all the chaos. At fifteen minutes past five, I was bolting up the CID stairs. I headed straight for the detention room where Manohar was being held.
A female guard patted me down and let me in.
Manohar was once again looking out of the window.
‘I suppose they're going to take me to jail,' he said.
‘Yes, the evidence has added up.’
Manohar turned around and took a seat opposite me. ‘Do you believe them?’
‘I think you’re hiding something.’
‘You didn’t answer my question.’
‘As I told you earlier, it doesn’t matter. The ACP is going to offer you a plea bargain. They will give you a reduced sentence if you admit to committing the four murders and the taking of Rucha Sinha and then tell them where she is now.’
‘I told you I don’t know anything about it,’ Manohar said in a deadpan voice.
‘You wanted to know if I think you killed them and took the girl, right? I don't think you did. I think what you told me, about reaching the crime scene only after they were dead, is the truth. But at the same time, I refuse to believe you were there to meet Daksh Sinha. I also refuse to believe you don't know anything about the murders. I also don't believe it when you say you have no idea about what happened to Rucha Sinha. On those counts, you are lying. Even if you haven't committed the murders, by not telling us where Rucha is, you're putting her in danger.'
Manohar stayed silent.
‘I can’t help you beyond a certain point. Yo
u’ve got to give me something.’
‘Why did you take my case?’
That was the third time Manohar had asked me this question. I had deflected and lied to him about it so far. Why was he so interested to know why I had taken up his case? It was an odd question. No client had asked me that before.
‘Why do you keep asking me that?’ I said.
‘I have my reasons.’
I inhaled deeply and leaned forward, keeping my arms on the table. I was not sure how to answer the question. I decided to go with the truth.
‘I had no interest in taking you on as a client. Believe me when I say that. I quit practising law three years back. Even back then I only defended innocent people. But I made a mistake that put a young girl's life in danger. I was shattered and left the profession. Then, yesterday evening, my first ever boyfriend—Atharva Mehta—called me up and told me that his niece was missing. If you haven't connected the dots, he was talking about Rucha. He was desperate to find her. He got a sense from the police that they were not treating her kidnapping as a priority. So, he asked me to step in as your lawyer and find out what I could. As you were caught red handed, we believed you knew something about her.'
‘So, you lied to me initially?’
‘I am sure you can see why. I haven’t yet found the evidence to prove your innocence. I need more time. But Rucha doesn’t have much time. The odds of her getting killed go up with every passing hour that we don’t find her.’
Manohar got up and walked to the window again. He put his hands in his pockets. He appeared to be thinking. Had I done the right thing by telling him? He returned to his seat.
‘Let me think about it,’ Manohar said. ‘Can I ask the authorities here to call you if I want to see you?’
‘Why can’t you tell me whatever you know right now?’
‘I would have if I knew you were the right person.’
