Word count - 3700 words

Target : 300

***

08 | The Burden Of Honesty & A Case of Serial Abductions

The chauffeur loaded all three polycarbonate luggage bags into the boot of a black Cadillac Escalade and shut it back.

Noticing this, Karim uttered his next command into the transmitter of the compact handheld transceiver held in his left hand while the phalanges of his tactical black leather glove-clad right hand reposed on the shell of the holster fastened to his waist with the help of a leather belt.

Immediately, a total of fifty-five beefy yet agile-looking armed security professionals decked out in black ensembles and Kevlar vests underneath them, standing erectly adjacent to a fleet of Mercedes Maybach S 650 Guards stationed behind and ahead of the Cadillac, got the car doors open and probed into them.

As if on record, the patriarch and the lady in power beside him wended their way out from the stately porch of the Dogra Manor, with a slumbering toddler cradled in the woman's arms.

Opening the rear door of the black Cadillac with his right hand, Mahadevan beckoned Hinduja with his other hand to get into the car. Nodding her head once, she slid into the luxurious automobile.

He bolted the door and then took a roundabout around the posterior side of the car, followed by Karim. Then Karim imitated the same gestures the patrirach carried out for the matriarch a few seconds ago.

Stepping foot into the passenger-side door, he then settled himself on the seat and awaited his boss's order.

Mahadevan tipped his chin at his bodyguard, following which the said bodyguard again muttered some directives on his walkie-talkie. The entire convoy of modern luxury sedans came to life in a trice.

As the chauffeur advanced the car onto the National Highway, Mahadevan discreetly rotated his head to the right side and thoughtfully gazed at his wife, who had her ebony-tinged orbs trained fixatedly at the passing scenes outside the clear windows of the operational Cadillac, while her dainty fingers gently stroked the tiny back of the toddler asleep in her arms.

It was a part of her behavioral pattern that he had taken notice of many times. While sitting in a moving car, she never looked in the front or in any other direction but rather out of the window at the surroundings that would pass by.

He adjusted his glasses as the unexpected encounter with the elderly woman from two days ago replayed in his mind again, her words reverberating in the fathomless vents of his troubled self.

After all, who better than him knew that there was something about her that no one could pinpoint exactly?

It made you feel that she was there, yet not there at the same time, as if even the magnitude of her own breaths were calibrated, as if her uncomplicated persona was a disguising cloak, an optical illusion—a glossed-over phantasmagoria perhaps—and the moment she would take a deeper breath than measured, that cloak camouflaging her pseudo self would slide down at a rate of knots.

In the end, he was aware that her life had a different obligation, a different aim altogether, shrouded under the capote of secrecy and reticence.

***

For a change, at night, during the dinner hour, the family of three was having their dinner in the living room of their home.

Shin Chan wiggled his bum and wagged his arms and limbs on the flat plasma display as Mahadevan looked on at his wife, deboning a piece of the crispy fried pomfret and putting it in his son's mouth.

The toddler had his clear, dark brown pupils fixated on the jiggling round buttocks of the five-year-old boy dancing on the idiot box as his mother again fed him a morsel of the coconut milk vegetable stew she had cooked along with some steamed rice.

"Inu, can you please pass me the remote?"

Nodding her head, Hinduja passed on the television remote to him. He pressed some buttons on the remote, and instantly the news headlines of the day started playing on the TV. From his peripheral vision, he noticed his son giving him a death stare.

"Listen, you imp! Stop glaring at me." Mahadevan admonished him.

The toddler continued giving him the stink eye.

"You brat, you can't expect me to gape at your Shin Chan's ass all day long like you do! Okay?"

"Dogra Sahib, language!" The female presence in the family room chastised him; she then turned to look at the child. "And you, finish your food now. No more cartoons for the day, okay?"

The father-son duo pivoted the synovial joints in their necks in each other's direction for a face-off, scowled at each other, looked back at the svelte feminine figure sitting amongst them, and nodded back at her instructions like lost puppies.

All of a sudden, the news headlines playing on television caught Mahadevan's attention. His eyes trailed on the T.V. screen as the news lady moved on to the next piece of news.

"News of the hour, ladies and gentlemen! Through the means of a trusted source, we have just received the information that Snigdha Patil, daughter of Vaikunth Patil, the honorable Minister of Communications, has been kidnapped this afternoon after her school timings under unnatural circumstances. Sources from within the police force also say that the union minister has not received any ransom calls till now. But the question that comes to light as of now is, is it really a classic case of a high-profile kidnapping, as it appears to be? Or is it the most terrorizing question of the current hour, the answer to which the whole nation wants to know—is the 'Serial Abductor of Maia's Month' back once again?" Just as the prime-time news anchor concluded her statement, Mahadevan heard his wife calling him out.

"Change the channel, Dogra Sahib."

An expression of incertitude crossed his features as he shrugged his shoulders and changed the channel once again. The toddler smirked at him and clapped in glee as Doraemon provided Nobita with another one of his gadgets on the television set.

An hour later, he saw her coming out of their bedroom after putting Anirudh to bed.

He opened the refrigerator and took out two of the chocolate ice cream bars stored in the freezer. Closing its door back, he walked out of the kitchen and advanced onto the rooftop deck.

He saw her sitting cozily on the outdoor swing, garbed in a long Indian skirt and a white t-shirt.

"What is it?" She asked, her eyes gazing at the dark sky above.

"Sorry?" Perplexity marred his visage as he walked closer to her.

"You think I won't notice that you have been staring at me at every chance you got in the last two days? Come on, Dogra Sahib, I am not an unobservant fool." She raised her right brow and peered at him. "So, what is the matter? Out with it now."

Mahadevan sighed, half defeated, half beguiled.

"Poornima Dixit, do you know who she is?" He tried to scrutinize the passing emotions on her countenance as he settled next to her on the swing.

Her eyebrows knitted together as a look of shock flashed across her face, which she tried to cover up almost immediately with a blank face.

"Poornima Dixit? My old neighbor." She faced him in an instant. "How do you know about her?" She gulped.

Something about her reaction didn't add up for him.

"On Wednesday, when we were in the supermarket, she saw both of us from behind when you were going to the second aisle. She tried to call out your name, but you didn't hear her in the hustle and bustle of the supermarket, I guess. So, instead, she came towards me thinking that I am your husband, and then after the initial introductions, we had a chat." He explained.

Hinduja tried to steady the palpitating organ inside her ribcage. "What did she say?"

"You never told me that you had mental health problems when you were in your mid-teens?" He asked her as he passed her the chilled Choco bar, his cognac eyes still perusing her pale clock.

Swallowing the knot in her throat, she said, "My maternal grandmother, breathed her last when I was sixteen. We were both really close. It was after her death that I started hallucinating her apparitions around me; panic attacks had become a common occurrence, and depression slowly consumed me whole. I had also failed my tenth standard board exam, due to which I had to repeat a year."

The grim reality thrived in the fact that the vulnerability demanded by honesty was a burden only a chosen few could shoulder.

Thus, lies became a refuge, allowing people to feel at ease in their own skin. 

Yet, the woman beside him, his wife and the matriarch of the Dogras, was not one to fabricate lies for her own comfort. 

Her lies, in reality, were a necessity, a means to keep her skin whole, unscathed and unripped. 

No, she did not employ lies as a shield for her own protection or ease.

For all he understood, this woman had little concern for her own safety; comfort and protection were far from her priorities.

Instead, she wielded lies as a tool to guard her true intentions and agendas, ensuring they remained hidden from naked eyes.

So, in a situation like this, he did what felt like doing. He slowly massaged her back to provide comfort, his eyes not leaving her visage even for a second. "She also said something about you running away to the nearest police station to complain about something like a murder." He probed further.

"Just a figment of my imagination. I told you right, I was hallucinating." She answered back, completely poker-faced.

"Were you on medications?" He asked, taking a bite of his chocolate bar.

"Yes, and I went for therapy as well, but now I am completely fine."

"You don't need to clarify anything, Inu; even if you had not been fine, nothing would have changed." Saying so, he cupped her left hand in his right palm.

"Okay," she said.

Mahadevan looked at his wife, an unconvinced guise still veiling his phiz. Business flowed in his family line, and if there was one skill that not all, but only some of the proficient business personnel like himself were absolutely adept at, it was the ability to decipher whether the person in front of them was lying or being truthful.

And he was a seasoned businessman—a very prescient one at that.

The fact that she had mental health issues was correct—the absolute truth—but the cause of her distress that she verbally provided him with, he knew was not the truth. After all, if not him, then who else?

She was trying to hide something. She was lying to him.

"Look at me." He said so, and she adhered.

Placing his half-eaten Choco bar on her still-packaged one, he propped down both bars on the rustic coffee table perched up on his side of the swing. He then wound his bulky right arm around her waist and tugged her towards himself. Clasping her warm hands against his cold ones, the difference in the sizes of their hands perspicuously discernible, he said, "Do you trust me?"

"I do." The truth flared like burning embers in her limpid onyx swirls.

He smiled placidly. "Then, do you know what my perception of you is?" He asked her in a calm tone.

Her lips upturned as she tipped her chin at him, a sign for him to continue.

"I perceive that the woman I am married to is not a liar, and I perceive that even if she is lying to me about something, there must be a valid reason she is lying to me for." He whispered.

A look of surprise passed across her face just as the deadpan mien melted down her countenance.

"Look, I don't know what caused your mental health to deteriorate so much back in your teen years. But the thing that matters to me the most is that you are fine now; you are healthy, smart, gentle, and a wonderful woman. That's it; that's what matters to me the most. So, if you feel that you would be uncomfortable while recounting to me the afflictions of the time gone by, it's fine. Take your time, but don't lie. Say it to me, say it to my face—that 'Dogra Sahib, I am not comfortable' or 'Dogra Sahib, I am feeling uneasy.' Just say it directly, but don't lie." He brought his right hand up to stroke her plump left cheek. "Please?" A gentle whisper left his lips at the end.

Her eyes gleamed, and her lips tugged up as she serenely gazed at the man holding her close to himself. "You knew I was lying?"

He nodded with a witty, lopsided smile. "Come on, I am a businessman. You should give me some credit for that.

After a thoughtful quietude of a minute, he finally heard her voice.

"Just know that I have a rationale behind this, okay?" She made direct eye contact with her husband. "And when the right time comes, you'll get to know everything." She concluded.

"As you wish."

***

It was around three a.m. at night when her phone vibrated from below her pillow. Peeking sideways, she quickly scanned the sleeping figures of her husband and her son. She then elevated the soft, satin-covered pillow by an inch and collected the vibrating device from under it.

She got out of bed and tiptoed out of the confines of the bedroom into the hall. She then advanced onto the rooftop deck.

Glancing back at the door once again, she answered the call.

"Madam." A male voice resonated from the other side.

"Is the work done?"

"Yes, madam. It was an old, dilapidated government safehouse to store the files of old cases. Let alone having CCTV cameras, it was not even sanitized properly. There were three security officials, madam, all of them sporting a potbelly each and snoring to their hearts' content at their respective duty stations. God forbid, even if a tsunami had occurred, those three gorillas still wouldn't have woken up. Moreover, I just had to put in a little physical effort while vaulting over the main fencing because the rest of it was easy."

"Good. Did you get the file?"

"Yes, madam, it's resting on my study table currently."

"Bravo! Bring it to my office tomorrow."

"Sure, Jai Hind, madam.

"Jai Hind."

Disconnecting the call, she gazed up at the sky, the distant darkness slowly calming her inch by inch.

***

A tall yet leanly muscular man carrying a brown satchel in his hands entered the premises of the Delhi NCR's Sub-Divisional Magistrate's office. Taking note of his presence, a constable strode towards him.

"Bakhtawar Sahib, Madam is waiting for you. Please go inside immediately." He said this, pointing his finger at the majestic ash-wood door situated in the farthest corner of the government building.

"Okay." Saying so, he strutted forward.

Reaching near the door, he glanced laterally at the designation plate on the wall, bold black capital letters carved on a silver background, showcasing the name of the lady inside.

He knocked twice.

A faint 'come in' resonated from behind the door in front of him.

He swiveled the doorknob, slightly pushed it ahead, and entered the office of his boss.

"Jai Hind, madam!"

"Jai Hind." Turning off her personal computer, the Dogra matriarch raised her head up to look at the man before her. "Settle down." She gestured at the guest chairs ensconced beyond her work table.

Bakhtawar heeded his boss's order.

He then took a navy blue-colored hard-bound cardboard file out of his satchel and passed it on to his boss.

Untying the white tag-thread from around the file, Hinduja opened it with her nimble fingers.

She then flicked through each folio of the file with whacking concentration.

Ten minutes later, she finally pivoted her neck joint up to latch her eyes with her assistant.

"So, they declared it a case of accidental death?"

"Yes, according to the testaments of both her parents and one of their cooks, she was last seen climbing up the stairs to the terrace. Exactly fifteen minutes later, at around eight-thirty p.m., the Purohit couple heard a loud scream from the terrace. They immediately climbed up the stairs to access the deck, but instead of finding their daughter on the terrace, they found her body lying down on the ground in a pool of her own blood. Apparently she smashed her face on a large piece of uneven rock because she collided with it headfirst. Her face was brutally mutilated, and her eyeballs were punctured due to the sharp edges of the rock. To be precise, her face was absolutely unrecognizable." Flexing his arms, he continued, "The Purohit couple was utterly inconsolable. She was their only child, after all. The police were summoned, and then her body was taken for an autopsy the very same night. Then, in the early hours of the next morning itself, Keshav Purohit and his wife, Nalini Purohit, carried out the crematory rituals of their daughter, Kadambini Purohit." He took a breath and then continued, "By the way, the autopsy report is inside the file as well." He concluded.

She hummed, her eyes trained on the file, and her brows knitted together.

Noticing this, Bakhtawar asked, "You find something odd?"

"Bakhtawar, don't you feel that all the events in this case following the death of the girl, like her autopsy and her cremation, were done in a very hush-hush manner?"

"You mean . . ." He trailed.

"It was as if the parents were trying to hide something, as if they were trying to keep it under wraps." She reopened the file again, flipped through its pages, and then pointed at a certain paragraph on one of the pages. "Just look at the timeline: As per the parents' testimonies, on May 1 at eight-thirty p.m., Kadambini goes upstairs to the terrace, and at eight-forty-five, the parents hear the child scream. They go up to check but instead find her dead on the ground below, as she supposedly fell down from the unfenced terrace onto a huge, uneven rock, her face not recognizable due to disfigurement. At eight-fifty, the same cook who was at their house at that time calls the police. The police jeep arrives by nine-fifteen p.m., investigates the accident scene, records the testimonies of the cook and both the parents, and takes the teen girl's body to the coroner's office for a post-mortem by ten p.m. The coroner begins the post-mortem at eleven p.m. and takes three hours to finish the post-mortem. He finishes up the autopsy at exactly one past two, after which the police deliver the dead body of the girl back to her parents' residence by two-fifty a.m. on May 2. And then exactly at four in the morning, the parents cremate the body?" Taking a sip from the glass of water kept for her on the table, she continued, "The Purohit couple didn't even wait for their close relatives to arrive for their daughter's cremation; it was as if they got done with it the moment they got the chance."

"You mean there was foul play involved? It was not an instance of an accidental fall after all?" He voiced out his words thoughtfully. "But the Purohit couple was absolutely grief-stricken. They were devastated as per the reports and their neighbors."

She smirked. "Of all the organs of the human anatomy, the human encephalon has the most sinister course of action. Do you know why?"

"Why?" Bakhtawar's eyes narrowed.

"It ploys humans to prioritize the positive acts and memories over others—the honeyed smiles, the shimmering eyes, the saccharine talks, and the treacly gestures. The brain manipulates us to create a mirage of our own perception of the person in front of us. Often, what we see is not reality, and whatever the reality is, it's not conspicuous to us."

"You mean a façade?"

"Who knows?" She shrugged as a mirthless chuckle left her lips. "There are eight billion mortals in this world, Bakhtawar, but sixteen billion faces at the same time."

Her pitch-black orbs kept staring unblinkingly at the file retained on the dark maple wood table while her pale, lissome fingers played with the paperweight stationed just next to the folder.

She sighed. "Okay, leave this aside. I'll study this case once again when I am at home." Closing the file, she tied the tag-thread around it again and said, "Now coming to the 'Serial Abductions of Maia's Month' case, I believe, now that the Communication Minister's daughter has been abducted, the higher-ups have already appointed a team for its investigation." She asked.

"Yes, Madam."

"Who has formed the team?" She inquired.

"Inspector General Neeraj Sathe has himself appointed the investigation team, madam. There is a lot of pressure on the Special Investigation Team this time, especially from the ministry."

"The pressure politics you are talking about were meant to happen, Bakhtawar, because the first victim of that serial abductor this year is a union minister's daughter herself. The minister's puppets are bound to quake in their own boots this time because in the last nine years, all of the abductor's victims were girls from mediocre households, but it's the daughter of a powerful man who is in danger this time. Now, these centipedes won't even sleep a wink until Snigdha Patil has been found and returned to her family safe and sound. This is how the power play works in the system." She snapped her finger joints and continued, "By the way, you said that IG Neeraj Sathe is the in charge of the S.I.T. himself this time?" She had her lips tugged up in a lopsided smile.

"Yes, madam." Bakhtawar answered back with a sneer.

"Who is the team lead?" She probed further.

"DCP Raghav Katoch, IPS batch of 2018."

"You know what you need to do next, don't you?" She asked, gyrating the paperweight with her deft fingers.

"Already on it, madam."

"Perfect."

***



Target : 300

***