by UD Yasha
He dialled the officer's number and heard the phone ring.
‘What’s the matter?’ Radha said.
‘He’s not answering the call.’
‘Let me check if I can spot him outside our house,’ Radha said and scampered to the balcony door.
She felt some resistance as she pulled it. A strong gust brought inside the rain. Radha leaned on the grill and looked at the road but was not able to spot the officer. She saw his car though, parked parallel to their compound wall. She went back inside, drenched in rain.
‘He could be in his car,’ Radha said but she felt something terrible had happened.
‘I’ll check,’ Rahul said.
‘I don’t have a good feeling about this,’ Radha said. ‘We’ll come with you.’
‘That’s probably not the best idea. Stay in this room and lock it from the inside. Only open the door when I return,’ Rahul said and started walking away. He turned back and was about to say something but then hesitated. ‘Also, call Siya and tell her what has happened.’
As Rahul turned on his flashlight and stepped outside the room, he saw a strange light emanating from the living room. It was not coming from a bulb or a tube light. As he realized what it was, he inhaled a very strong and strange odour of alcohol. Is that a fire? His suspicion was confirmed when he reached the landing of the stairwell. He immediately took a step back as blue flames coming from the living room licked the staircase.
He then heard the crackling sound of the fire, almost playing in tandem with the buzz of the rain outside. From the landing, he also saw the garage, up in flames.
He ran to the bedroom and cried out loud, ‘There’s a fire in the living room and the garage.’
Radha had turned on her flashlight by then and was on the phone with Siya.
‘Did I hear that right?’ Siya said.
‘Send a fire brigade here right now,’ Radha said instinctively. ‘We need to get out of here.’
'We can't afford to wait for help. We need to exit the house right now. The fire will only grow,' Rahul said. 'When I came up, the staircase was not lit up. There was a small area in the living room that didn't seem to be on fire. We can use that to get out of here.'
Radha leaned forward towards Rahul and said in a low voice, ‘How did the fire start? What if it’s Zakkal?’
‘I have no idea. But we can’t wait inside. We have to take the chance.’
Radha looked at Maa and asked her, ‘Are you holding up well?’
‘I am. We can make it out,’ Maa said, sounding confident.
Radha crossed to Siya’s room and opened her cupboard. She was hoping Siya wasn’t carrying her weapon, a Glock 9. She pulled out the drawer where she kept it. It’s right here! Radha did not have experience in using firearms apart from an incident a year ago in which she had been shot. But she figured having a gun in hand was better than being unarmed.
‘Let’s go,’ she said on returning to the room.
‘Hold on,’ Maa said. ‘We all better wear something with full-sleeves if there’s a fire downstairs. Open my cupboard and pull out any three cotton kurtas.’
Radha followed Maa's instructions and slipped into a kurta herself while tossing one each to Rahul and Maa. Maa's kurta was definitely a size smaller for Rahul but it served its purpose.
Rahul took the lead, while Radha was at the back with Maa in the middle. He was carrying the suitcases he had got from the garage. Maa had Shadow's leash and two flashlights. Radha was holding the Glock. They tiptoed down the stairs even though the real danger was in the living room. They could hear the fire crackle loudly as they made it to the landing of the stairwell.
‘That area in the living room still hasn’t lit up,’ Rahul said, ducking over the railing. ‘The front door’s on fire. But we can use the one at the back. That looks to be safe.’
They brisk-walked on the path that Rahul carved. The flickering fire spit at them every now and then. It almost made Radha and Maa jump, but the full sleeves of the kurta protected them. Soon, they were at the back door. Radha jumped in front of Rahul, ready with the Glock held arm-high.
Maa panned the flashlight across their small backyard. It was empty as far as they could tell. But they couldn’t be sure because it was raining heavily. Radha relaxed the grip over the Glock but still held it high enough to shoot a man in the chest. Once they were in the front yard, the light coming from the street lamps and other houses was sufficient for them to move without stumbling. Maa handed the mobile phones to Radha, who in turn slid them into her jeans pocket.
They heard a distant wail of the fire truck as they moved to the main door. Once outside, they turned back at the house and saw that the fire had moved to the staircase. The fire on the outer walls of the garage had been washed off by the rain.
Rahul ran to the police officer’s car. ‘He’s unconscious,’ he shouted. ‘But I can see that he’s breathing. He’s been hit on the head. I can see some blood.’
Radha looked around to watch out for the person who had set the fire to their house. But she saw no one. The rain piled on. They were drenched but they didn’t care because they were sure they had just evaded death.
In the next minute, the siren of the fire truck got louder. Radha saw its large headlights turn into their housing society, closely followed by two smaller pairs of headlights.
The fire engine screeched to a halt outside their house. Six men stepped out of it just as Siya and Rathod reached the house along with a mini ambulance.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I hugged Maa and Radha tightly. I was glad they were okay, having feared the worst until a few seconds ago. Maa was shivering, partly from the cold rain and partly from being afraid.
Two firemen put the injured police officer on a stretcher. They transferred him into the ambulance. The ambulance took off once the paramedic ensured that no one else was hurt.
The same firemen guided all of us to Rathod’s car. Rahul sat on the front seat while I slid in at the back with Radha and Maa. One of the firemen gave us some towels and energy bars.
A few minutes passed before anyone spoke. ‘We’re alright,’ Maa said. ‘That was scary, but we’re okay and that’s what is most important.’
‘I’ve no idea what happened,’ Rahul said. ‘The lights went off. At that time, I was downstairs in the garage. By the time I came up, it had been about a couple of minutes. Within two more, the house was on fire.’
‘And you heard or saw nothing?’ Rathod said.
'Absolutely nothing. It all happened too quickly. A total of three or four minutes would have elapsed before the house was lit on fire. I smelt alcohol when I started going downstairs and then saw the fire.'
‘It was raining hard then as well,’ Radha said.
I took an umbrella and walked up to the fire truck. The firemen had pulled out the hose and were spraying water inside our house from the veranda. I could see that the fire had spread to the first floor through the windows. Two firemen got on the elevated tower ladder of the fire truck and sprayed water through the windows on the first floor.
The fireman at the steering wheel peered out at me and said, ‘It’s not as bad as it looks. It’s already under control.’
‘What kind of damage do you think the house has suffered?’ I said.
‘The good news is that the structure has not been affected at all. But everything inside the house has been completely ruined. You’ll need to redo the entire place in a few days.’
‘Do you have an idea about what caused the fire?’
'My men informed me before you came that they smelt an industry-grade propellant inside. Their guess is ethanol as the fire's blue in colour. The smell was strong so the ethanol concentration must have been high. We'll have to file a police report as this is clearly an act of arson.'
I suspected as much after what Rahul had told us. ‘Would the fire have also caused the lights to go out?’
‘As standard practice, if there’s an option, we turn off t
he electricity at the site of the fire. In this case, when my men went to turn it off, they realized that the wires had been cut off. Someone deliberately cut the power and lit the house on fire,’ the fireman said.
I thanked him and headed to Rathod’s car. The grim expression on my face must have given me away because Rathod said, ‘Let’s go to the CID office for now. We’ll figure out what to do then.’
No one spoke during our drive to CID’s office. Two hawaldars escorted us into the building. We were taken to the waiting room on the first floor of the office. It was a square-shaped office with glass walls. The blinds were shut. A peon got us warm cups of coffee. A while later, Rathod got us some sandwiches. We ate in silence. We realized how tired we were when we took our first bites. The incident in the evening had sucked out our energy.
I thought about how the fire might have started. As per Rahul, the window of opportunity was too narrow. I was certain that Zakkal was behind it. But how had he pulled it off? For him to come to our house to set it on fire seemed too big a risk for him.
It was almost nine in the evening by the time we finished eating.
‘We’ll try to go to a safe house for the night but we might have to stay in the guest room upstairs,’ I said.
Radha and Rahul nodded.
I could make out from Maa's face that she was thinking hard about something.
'Was the fire related to the case you're working on?' Maa said.
I needed to make a decision. Maa had always known when I had worked on any case after we had gotten her back. She had once told me that as a family we had been through the worst possible situation anyone could have. Yet, we are together. Happy and healthy. Those words played in my mind. Maa was a pillar of strength. She had not complained even once about what had happened to her.
‘I need to tell you something,’ I said. ‘Kishore Zakkal is killing again. I’m working on his case. I’m trying to put him away for good.’
I realized when I said the words out loud, that somewhere deep down, we had been preparing for this day to come. We had always known it would. That’s why we had also been summoning up the will to fight it when it did come.
It was here now.
The moment was real. Scary. We couldn’t run away from it.
The dam of my emotions broke.
My eyes became watery. I hadn’t expected myself to react this way. Maa’s shoulders drooped and her face turned white. She leaned forward and took my hand in hers. She stared into my eyes. Then, she first pulled Radha close to her and then put an arm around me.
We said nothing.
We just sat that way, trying to make sense of it all. There was a certain calmness at that moment. We were together, still safe and that's what mattered. I don't remember how long we spent sitting like that, but I felt like we had all hit rock bottom that very moment. Knowing that I felt strong and courageous to take the fight to Zakkal. I was going to keep my family safe and I was clear I wouldn't stop at anything to make that happen.
A rap on the door snapped us out of our haze.
Rathod ducked in. ‘Siya, can I have a word with you?’ he said.
I joined him outside.
He said, ‘Dr Barve just called me. They’ve found the location of the pollen grain that was in the flower Zakkal sent you.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
We went to the conference room to prepare for heading to the coordinates that Dr Barve had shared with Rathod. It was a small plant nursery called ‘Blossoms’ and was just off the Pune-Mumbai highway.
Rathod said, ‘Dr Barve told me that Blossoms was not on the list of places that Zakkal visited earlier, but the pollens from Blossoms have been recorded in the central directory of pollens. That’s how he found the match.’
‘How’s Dr Barve doing?’
‘He is hurting but he told me to get his wife back.’
While I wanted to know what we were going to find there, I had one big concern.
‘What about Radha, Rahul and Maa?’ I said. ‘Can they stay at the CID office tonight?’
‘We haven’t decided yet. There are two safe houses that we can put them in for now,’ Rathod said.
‘Are they on the CID record?’
‘Yes, both are in Pune.’
‘We can’t place them there. Zakkal has been pre-empting our every step. I don’t know how, but he definitely knows about those safe houses. The fire would have been a part of his plan to drive them out of the house.’
Rathod was silent for a beat. 'Okay, how about this? I know a safehouse…it's not technically a safe house. It's my uncle's place in Pashan. So, it's not too far from here. My uncle lives in the US and he had told me that I could use it any time I wanted, especially if I needed to lay low for a few days. It’s in his wife’s name so not directly traceable to me. Nobody knows about it apart from me and Bhalerao.’
‘And he wouldn’t mind?’
‘Not at all. He’s a big crime buff and keeps watching murder mysteries on TV. He’d be fascinated to know that his place came in handy in a real-life criminal investigation.’
I considered the idea. ‘If it’s not a CID safehouse, then what about having an officer?’
‘I can pull some strings and have someone I know guard it.’
I opened my mouth to say something but it was like Rathod read my mind. He said, 'I trust this guy. His name is Shubman Dhawan. He's a veteran. Retired early because he got diagnosed with cancer. He has recovered fully and works with security consultants. I can ask him to take a few days off. With respect to deciding where you all could stay, there are three options. We can either keep you here, which won't be possible for too long. Anyway, we would need to move you to another safe house. I agree with you that the CID safehouse is risky right now. That leaves us with no other option but to go to the place I'm talking about.'
'Let's do it then,' I said, knowing that taking this decision was like ripping off a Band-Aid. 'We'll go there once we return from Blossoms.'
‘I’ll call Dhawan and let him know,’ Rathod said. ‘I’ll also ask a hawaldar to take you all to one of the more comfortable rooms.’
‘Did Bhalerao find out anything more about Aarti Lunkad, the prostitute whom Zakkal killed?’
‘Yes, he’s called us to the conference room to talk about it.’
We pushed through the door and found Bhalerao talking on the phone. ACP Shukla entered the room as well.
‘I have some news,’ Shukla said. ‘Meghan Mathew just found out that CCTV cameras around your house caught a white Maruti Suzuki Ertiga leaving your lane right after the fire.’
‘Wait, that can’t be right,’ Rathod said, turning to me. We remembered the Ertiga we had seen leaving Sudha Barve’s house
‘What’s the registration number?’ I said.
‘MH12 ZA 7327. I know you both tracked it today morning.’ He turned to Rathod. ‘I noticed the remote APB that you had put on the registration number.’
A remote APB is a precautionary measure that police officers can take. It shows up in the system if a suspected registration plate is seen at another crime scene within twelve months.
Shukla continued. ‘We’ve secured a warrant for the driver’s arrest; his name is Kumar Singhal. Meghan Mathew is on the way to Kumar’s house with two hawaldars as we’re speaking.’
It suddenly made sense. Zakkal had paid off Kumar Singhal to do his dirty work, first diverting our attention, and now making sure we wouldn’t be able to return to our house. I highly suspected that he believed our house was tough to crack when he had contacted me through Meena Kiran. I became uncomfortable, knowing that Zakkal had us where he wanted—outside the fortification of our house.
‘Wouldn’t it be a problem as Singhal is one of Shirole’s men?’ Bhalerao said, joining the conversation.
‘We won’t be pressing charges against Shirole. What’s made it easier is that the car is officially owned by Singhal. I’m sure it’s for tax evasion purposes. But that helps us. As the car is register
ed to Singhal, we won’t have to press for vicarious liability. Singhal is under suspicion for committing a crime while using his own car, which is his own property. I don’t care if Shirole himself was directly involved in this. We just need to get Singhal to talk.’ Shukla referred to his watch. ‘My estimate is that Mathew will have Singhal in for interrogation when we’re at Blossoms.’
I could feel a sense of urgency injected into the investigation.
Rathod rose from his chair at the conference table. ‘Blossoms is a small plant nursery past Hinjewadi. Based on what Dr Barve told me, it houses an extremely rare species of plant, the pollen of which Zakkal sent to Siya.’
‘Is there a chance that it is from anywhere else?’ Shukla asked.
‘Dr Barve told me that he found a total of three pollen. One is a Pune-variety of the Hibiscus flower. The two other pollen attached to it came from plants called the Whistling Thorn and Guabiroba. They come from the African savannas and a forest in Portugal. The only known location of those two plants in India is Blossoms. As per Dr Barve, it’s a quirky place run by a passionate woman named Smita Kale.’
‘Got it,’ Shukla said.
Rathod continued. 'A team of six will visit Blossoms. It includes ACP Shukla, Siya, Bhalerao, two guarded police officers as backup and myself. Blossoms is about four thousand metres in size and square in shape.' Rathod spread its floor plan on the table. 'The police officers coming with us already have a copy of this plan. It has only one entrance. Once inside, we'll search the place to see what Zakkal has left for us.'
‘Does Smita Kale know we’re coming?’ I said.
‘I tried calling her but she didn’t answer. Either way, we have a warrant to search the place,’ Rathod said. ‘Any more questions?’
None of us said anything.
‘Alright, let’s go then,’ Rathod said and we followed him out.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
If you lived long enough in the city of Pune, you'd observe something strange about its Monsoon season. When it rained in Pune, it absolutely hammered down for half an hour. Just when people would get worried about water-logging and other rain-related issues, the rain would subside. On the other hand, the rains in Mumbai—Pune's sister city—were relentless.
