private investigators.
A honk at the gate brought Puri to the front door with an expectant grin on his face.
His face fell when a red Indica with a crumpled bumper, a bashed-in fender and a Punjab number plate entered. It belonged to his sister’s husband, Bagga-ji, who lived in Ludhiana.
“Don’t tell me,” the detective moaned to Rumpi, who was standing next to him on the porch. By now she had changed into a light chiffon sari, which had been part of her wedding trousseau, and rubbed sindoor into the parting of her hair.
“Chubby, stop it. Be nice. They’ve got some good news.”
“They’re getting divorced, is it?”
“Now that’s enough. Be a good host and don’t get into any more arguments with him.”
Bagga-ji pulled up and stepped out of the car. Everything about him screamed cheapness, from his polyester shirt to the big gaps in his blackened teeth.
“Namaste-ji!” he cried, sounding as if he had cotton wool in his mouth. “How are you, Mr. Sherluck?”
Puri groaned inwardly. He hated people comparing him to Sherlock Holmes. Bagga-ji’s thick Punjabi pronunciation made it all the more irritating.
“Hello, sir-ji!” said the detective, pronouncing ‘sir’ ‘saar’. “Good journey?”
“Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine,” replied his brother-in-law.
The detective’s older sister, Preeti, alighted from the other side of the Indica. Of all the minor but nonetheless enfeebling ailments from which this large, quiet woman suffered, the most serious was acute Bagga- itis.
“Chubby, you’ve lost some weight, is it?” she asked as they greeted one another with a loose, sideways hug.
This was said with concern rather than admiration.
“Not that I’m aware,” said Puri, observing his belly, which spilled over his belt.
Bagga-ji had already gone inside the house.
Five minutes later, when Puri, Preeti and Rumpi reached the sitting room, he was sprawled on the floor. On the carpet in front of him lay a large glass of Royal Challenge and a collage of irregularly shaped pieces of paper with names and phone numbers in spidery writing. The backs of cigarette packets, old cinema tickets, strips torn from old envelopes – these served as Bagga-ji’s phone directory and lived, for the most part, as a big lump stuffed into the pocket of his half-sleeve shirts.
“Sorry, ji. Long-distance. Five minutes only. Don’t mind, huh?” he said, holding the receiver of the home phone to his ear.
“Please, sir-ji,” replied Puri. “Make yourself at home. You’d like a cushion? A foot rub?”
The detective’s sarcasm was lost on his brother-in-law.
“Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fine!”
The detective still found it hard to believe that his sister had married such a prize Charlie. But Preeti had never attracted many suitors thanks to her weight and bad skin. She’d been twenty-seven by the time Jaideep Bagga had come along in his secondhand three-piece suit.
“Good for nothing much, na,” had been Mummy’s appraisal after meeting him for the first time.
But Papa and Bagga-ji’s father had got along and Mummy had been overruled.
The family astrologer had sealed Preeti’s fate. Jaideep Bagga was a perfect match. Never mind that the young man had only displayed an aptitude for playing carrom board and eating large quantities of laddus.
During the thirty-three years that had passed since then, Bagga-ji – whom Puri privately referred to as ‘Baggage’ – had proven a constant embarrassment to the family. The detective dreaded inviting him to any family function, especially since his performance at Jaiya’s wedding. Tipsy on whisky, he had tried to ingratiate himself with the minister of chemicals and fertilizers and asked him for a job for his eldest son. Despite receiving a sharp rebuke, Bagga-ji had spent the rest of the evening trying to worm his way into all the photographs taken of the MP from Chandigarh.
Anecdotes about Bagga-ji’s business dealings abounded. His deceased father’s transport business was long gone. And acre by acre, he had sold off most of the land he had inherited, sinking the proceedings into harebrained schemes. At one point he’d even invested in a Nepali yak-burger joint. But like all his enterprises, the Big Yak had gone under.
Now, it seemed, he had something else brewing. No doubt it was ‘foolproof’ and was going to make him the richest man in all Punjab.
“Lakshmi has finally smiled on me!” he said in Punjabi with a grandiose sweep of his hands once he was off the phone.
The detective cast him a weary look. “What’s the plan this time?” he asked, switching to Punjabi as well. “Camel-milk ice cream again, is it?”
“Actually that was not such a bad idea,” interjected Preeti. It was rare for her to come to her husband’s defense; usually she suffered in silence. “The ice cream itself was quite delicious.”
“Problem was milking those bloody camels!” Puri chuckled.
“Laugh all you like,” said Bagga-ji. “But you’ll soon be congratulating me. A construction company wants to build a shopping mall on my land. They’re offering me one crore.”
“Which company?” asked the detective, sounding dubious.
“A big, respected one. I visited their offices. Very modern. They’re offering Western-style contract.”
Preeti added: “It all seems pukka, Chubby.”
Another horn sounded at the gate. Puri looked outside in time to see Jaiya being helped out of the car by her husband.
Her belly had grown large and round.
“Hi, Papa!” she said, waddling over to him with a big smile.
“Nikhee, beta, so wonderful to see you. Just look at you! How many you’ve got in there?” he joked.
“Well, actually, we’ve been waiting to surprise you, Papa,” she said with a grin, rubbing her bump.
His eyes widened. “Don’t tell me.”
“Yes, Papa, we’re having twins.”
“By God! My dear, you heard the news?” he called to Rumpi. “Nikhee has got two in the tandoor!”
“What wonderful news!” she replied, trying to sound surprised, although it was obvious she already knew. “All I can say is it’s a good thing we’re well prepared. Isn’t it, Chubby?” She gave Jaiya a mischievous wink.
“Yes, my dear,” intoned Puri.
Six
No one spotting the auto rickshaw driver who parked his three-wheeler down Basant Lane behind Connaught Circus would have guessed that he was a sattri – in ancient Chana-kyan terminology, a spy. Nor that he knew every brothel, illegal cricket-gambling den and cockerel-fighting venue in the city – not to mention most of its best forgers, fencers, smugglers, safecrackers and purveyors of everything from used Johnnie Walker bottles to wedding-night porn. Blind in one eye, with henna-dyed hair and tatty, oil-stained clothes, he blended into the cityscape as seamlessly as Delhi’s omnipresent crows.
Not even his family knew about his secret life.
Perhaps one day, when his three children were old enough, Baldev Pawar would tell them. But for now it was too risky. If word of his true identity ever leaked out, his life would be in jeopardy and his ability to operate seriously compromised.
Worse, he would be disgraced in the eyes of his father.
Papa Pawar had, in the best family tradition, spent his life working as a professional thief. And like his father and his father’s father, he had worked diligently to ensure that his sons became proficient, capable crooks themselves.
From the age of seven, Baldev had been trained to pick pockets and relieve aunties of their handbags. As a
