Was someone lying?
Chapter 11
‘The next thing I’d like to do,’ Athreya said, ‘is to understand the deceased. Please tell me what you know about Phillip. What kind of a person was he? What work did he do? What were his interests? Does he have any relatives nearby? Who is the next of kin? Anything that can help me understand him.
‘Some of you may have personal views on him, both positive and negative. I recognize that you may not want to air them in public. Please feel free to hold those back and tell me later. Let’s start with his age. Dora told me this morning that he was going to be sixty next year. Is that right?’
Bhaskar nodded. ‘That’s right.’
‘What work did he do?’
‘He painted for a living. You’ve seen some of his work.’
‘When did he come to the valley? Where was he before he came here?’
‘He came about seven years ago and wanted to rent that cottage. I don’t know where he came from.’
‘Any relatives nearby?’
‘Not to my knowledge. I think there is a sister somewhere in Pune or Nagpur, someplace like that.’
‘He has a sister in Pune,’ Jilsy confirmed. ‘He mentioned her to me a few times. But where in Pune, and what her name is, I don’t know.’
‘I recall him saying that his sister was a few years older than him,’ Abbas added. ‘And that she was involved in some sort of social work in Maharashtra.’
‘Name? Address? Phone number?’ Abbas shook his head.
‘Won’t it be on his mobile phone?’ Manu asked. ‘Do you know where it is?’
‘In his pocket,’ Athreya said. ‘Whatever evidence it carries will keep ‘til the police arrive. I would rather let the police deal with it. They are touchy about such matters.’
‘But we retrieved the dagger,’ Manu countered.
‘If we hadn’t, it would have been covered by sand by the time the police got it out. Estimating the time of death was similarly an urgent task. We had to do it.’ He turned to Jilsy. ‘Phillip was your neighbour. What can you tell me about the kind of person he was?’
‘A very nice man.’ Jilsy’s eyes brimmed with tears.
‘Soft-spoken and courteous. He never raised his voice. He was always willing to help Ganesh or me with a chore. He used to come over for dinner sometimes.’
‘What did he talk about when he visited you?’
‘That’s the funny thing about him. He spoke very little, but was always willing to listen to my ramblings. A brief word here and a one-liner there would keep me going. I have so few people in the valley to talk to, Mr. Athreya. I ended up talking to him quite often. He could listen for hours without getting bored. I’m going to miss him terribly.’
She fished out a tiny kerchief from her handbag and dabbed her eyes.
‘Did he have any…enemies? That’s perhaps a strong word, but you know what I mean. Was there anyone who might have wished him ill?’
‘I can’t imagine. He kept to himself and had very few friends. He said nothing controversial, and he was not the kind of man to pick fights. Abbas, you want to add anything?’
‘He used to come to the resort and play carom with the guests and the staff. He occasionally would drop by for a drink with me or with my father. He had a standing invitation to join us for any meal, any day. The resort kitchen cooks for so many people, one more makes no difference. And Phillip didn’t eat much.’
‘Let me add to what Varadan had earlier said about Phillip the painter,’ Bhaskar said. ‘A painter with zero creativity, Phillip had called himself. That is even truer than I have suggested. Remember the large painting of the mountain scene on the wall near the front door? The one that was painted by Phillip?’
‘Yes, I remember.’ Athreya nodded. ‘The one showing the hills at the far side of the vale.’
‘I had let you assume that Phillip had sat on a hill and painted the scene before his eyes. That is not true. That painting is a scaled-up version of a photograph that was taken with a high-resolution camera. Phillip drew a grid on the photo and reproduced it on canvas, square by square, making each square four-times larger as he painted it. If you remove the painting from its frame, you will see the markings of the grid at the edges of the canvas. So that was Phillip the painter, for you. He could reproduce paintings and photos perfectly. Yet, he could compose nothing.’
Ganesh and the others soon chimed in, and the picture of a reserved, taciturn man emerged—a man who was a threat to nobody and was at peace with his neighbours. None of them could think of anyone who may have wanted to harm him. They could think of no motive, not even the feeblest.
‘What stumps me,’ Manu said, ‘is what he was doing in Dad’s wheelchair.’
‘When we answer that question,’ Athreya replied softly, ‘we would be close to solving the crime.’
‘A related question is whether he was killed when he was in the wheelchair, or he was put there after he was killed?’
‘Another good question, Manu. One for which we don’t have an answer yet.’
‘And why was he in the chapel?’ Dora asked. ‘Was he killed there, or was he wheeled there after he was killed? Was he put in the chapel merely to delay discovery?’
‘That certainly is a possibility, Dora.’
‘If that is the case, where was he killed? Was he killed where you found him or somewhere else? Is that why the murderer borrowed the wheelchair? It would be far easier to transport a dead body on a wheelchair than to carry it,’ Dora said.
‘That brings us to the question of who the murderer could be,’ Manu said. ‘He—I am assuming it was a man—knew where the wheelchair was. He knew how to unplug it
