Grabbing it from him, Major Randhawa had stormed back inside his house to call the contractor – and, presumably, threaten him with a swift and brutal castration.
Shashi and Zia had not heard another peep out of him after that and, within a couple of hours, dug themselves a nice, sizable hole.
They had spent the rest of yesterday tailing Pandey, who had left at ten o’clock in a car driven by his elderly chauffeur. He had reached Delhi University thirty minutes later, remained there all day, gone and done some shopping and returned home at six.
Another of Tubelight’s boys had taken the overnight shift, which had passed without incident. Then at six this morning, Shashi and Zia had returned, refreshed and filthy again, for another day on the job.
By now, it was almost eight.
There was still no sign of Major Randhawa. But that was hardly surprising given that Tubelight, the contractor, had threatened to cut off his water, electricity and phone lines if he didn’t simmer down.
As for Professor Pandey, he had been up for an hour and was engaged in his ablutions. The sounds of him clearing his throat and exhaling through his nostrils, which were amplified by the tiled walls of his small bathroom, could be heard clearly out in the street.
Shashi and Zia carried on shoveling some dirt, smoking bidis and discussing the physical assets of their favorite Bollywood actresses.
“Katrina Kaif is as thin as a grasshopper,” said Shashi as they kept a surreptitious eye on the house across the way. “No meat on the bones, brother. For me it is Vidya Balan. Have you seen those eyes? Wah!”
He broke into a rendition of ‘Tu Cheez Bath Hai Mast Mast’.
From the Gym, Puri drove to Basant Lane, where he rendezvoused with Tubelight at nine o’clock.
The operative had been busy finding out all he could about Professor Pandey and archaeologist Shivraj Sharma – “putting them under the scanner,” in the detective’s parlance. Servants, drivers, neighbors and street sweepers had been consulted and bribed for gossip and information.
He had the following to report:
“Sharma’s wife died two years back in a car accident. Son was also injured. In a wheelchair, lives at home. Sharma’s a strict Brahmin: servants aren’t allowed in the kitchen. He fired one last month for drinking from one of his glasses. A Brahmin cook prepares the meals. Sharma’s very religious. A long-standing VHP member.” VHP stood for Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a right-wing organization that sought to turn India into a solely Hindu nation.
“And Pandey?” asked Puri.
“Nothing unusual, Boss. Eccentric – obviously. Always jolly. Never married. Lived with his mummy until she died last year. One thing: his servants – cook, cleaner, driver – all left last week. No one knows why. His current driver is a replacement.”
They discussed plans for breaking into Professor Pandey’s house to have a look around, but decided they needed a clearer picture of his schedule first.
“Tell your boys to keep him in their sights,” instructed the detective. “This laughing professor is involved somehow. Of that much I am certain.”
Tubelight’s phone rang. It was Shashi, reporting that Pandey had left the house and was on his way to the Garden of Five Senses, where he was due to hold his Laughter Memorial for Dr. Jha.
“While he is so occupied, I will take a look round his office at Delhi University. See what all I can turn up,” said the detective.
Puri drove through Civil Lines, where the British East India Company stationed its army before the War of Independence of 1847, to Delhi University. He passed the British Viceregal Lodge Estate with its whitewashed pillars and rose garden, now home to the Faculty of Science, and soon reached the School of Electrical Engineering.
A gaggle of male and female students milled around outside, joking and flirting. The detective made his way up the steps of the building, catching strains of Hindi rap playing on a mobile phone and snippets of current Delhi jargon – “What’s the funda, dude?” “He’s one of those art frat types!” “Nice half-pants!”
Inside, the main corridor was empty save for a couple of students walking toward him. He asked them for Professor Pandey’s office and was directed to the third door on the right.
While he waited for the corridor to empty, he read the notices pinned to the board. One announced the next topic of discussion at the debating society – ‘Can India afford to be an ally of the U.S.?’; another appealed for the ‘person or persons who removed the human skeleton from the biology lab to return it forthwith’.
The detective, whose key chain contained a pick and a set of tension wrenches, had little trouble opening the lock to Professor Pandey’s office.
The room was small but orderly, the shelves crowded with reference books and binders, the in-tray brimming with uncorrected exam papers. Puri opened drawers, searched the filing cabinet and sifted through the rubbish bin.
He then spent a few minutes reading Pandey’s notes for an upcoming lecture on signal processing.
“Signals can be either analog, in which case the signal varies continuously according to the information, or digital, in which case the signal varies according to a series of discrete values representing the information. For analog signals, signal processing may involve the amplification and filtering of audio signals for audio equipment or the modulation and demodulation of signals for telecommunications. For digital signals…”
The detective could feel his eyes glazing over and placed the notes back where he had found them. He sat back in Pandey’s chair and looked up at the photographs on the wall. One had been taken at an early morning Laughing Club session. The professor was standing with head tilted back, hands on hips and stomach pushed out.
Puri cast his eyes over the other pictures: parents, picnics, young nephews looking wide-eyed at the camera.
At the top of the wall hung an old black-and-white picture of nine men standing in front of an Indian satellite. There was a small brass plaque attached to the bottom of the frame. It read: DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS, INSAT IA, 1981.
Puri took it down to get a closer look. A younger Professor Pandey stood near the middle of the group.
The detective recognized the man standing next to him as well. It was Dr. Suresh Jha.
The two men had known each other for much longer than two years.
“Why Pandey told me otherwise?” murmured Puri to himself.
Thirteen
Facecream didn’t wake until long after it was light. She guessed it must have been around nine. Feeling groggy and dull-headed, she lay on the bedroll in the dormitory where she was staying and went over the bizarre events of yesterday in her mind.
She remembered entering the darshan hall along with Puri and Mrs. Duggal and being served a cup of papaya juice by one of the senior devotees. It seemed to her that he had handed her one from the back of the tray, whereas the others had chosen their own.
She’d sat down in front of the stage and Maharaj Swami had entered and been hailed by his adoring followers.
It had been about then that Facecream had started to feel woozy.
At first she’d put it down to all the incense smoke and the heat and noise. But soon her legs had started to feel heavy and her senses had become strangely heightened. The background din of devotional singing and chanting had faded and Maharaj Swami’s words had boomed in her ears. One minute she’d felt chilled to the bone; the next, the temperature in the darshan hall had seemed unbearably hot.
Everything around her with bright colors – the canary yellow kurta of the woman in front of her, the saffron banners hanging on either side of the stage – had started to bleed and pulsate.
She’d realized with alarm that the papaya juice had been laced with some form of hallucinogen. But her fear
