Doosra (8 page)

Nods.

So much for the pep talk, it was time to assign responsibilities.

'Here's my plan: we look into Jogani. We begin with his residence and the office — what happened to the entire domestic and business set-ups when he didn't return? I want to know everything about Ron Jogani: age, place of birth, school, colleges, friends, medical history, financial status, bank accounts, properties, anything and everything. We need to comb through everything. At this stage, we simply don't know what won't add up and we'll keep digging till we find something.'

'What about his ex-wife?'

'We need to check her background thoroughly too. Although everything indicates that she has nothing to do with Jogani, we need to clear her. Her mobile number is on the file as the Belgian Police had contacted her, she shouldn't be difficult to track down.' Rita pointed towards the photograph of the alleged murderer on the wall. 'We need to find this guy — Sishir Singh, obviously not his real name, but we need to work with the informers. Someone has to know him.' She turned to Nene. 'I can leave you to talk to the informers...'

'Yes ma'am. No dearth of them, leave that to me. I know a lot of them, I'll ask around.' Nene was ready for action.

'Good. Let's divide the tasks then. We should split into two teams. Jatin, you come with me. Vikram, you partner with Nene, both of you take charge of the snitch network. We have to find Sishir Singh.' Rita knew from experience that neither of the two Senior Inspectors required any supervision.

The pairing seemed agreeable to all.

'If he is in Mumbai, consider him found, ma'am.'

It was fortunate to have a loyal team, but it was even luckier to have a confident one. Rita thanked her stars.

'We move to Jogani's house, you guys carry on and brief all those you think can help identifying Sishir Singh. We keep in touch, and if there isn't any emergency we meet back in the office tomorrow morning. Any questions?'

None.

'Watch your backs, guys.'

***

Rita and Jatin came out of the office building. Rita asked her driver to go home. She told him not to switch off his mobile in case she needed him later though.

'Keys, ma'am?' Jatin requested, his hand stretched out to receive the car keys.

'I'll drive.'

Rita drove calmly. They turned left on Lokmanya Tilak Marg and waited for the traffic lights to turn right on to Ramabai Ambedkar Marg. Mumbai had the quintessential distinction of twenty-four-hour rush hour traffic. A river of vehicles of every size and shape and colour and brand, on two, three and four wheels stopped and moved at various speeds. Driving was by pure instinct. Everyone had a gut feeling for who to let pass, who to rush ahead of. Horns blaring, music streaming out of open windows, smoke and pollution further begriming Mother Nature. As they idled at the junction they heard a thundering motorcycle roar from the rear. Someone was travelling towards them from behind. Rita looked in the wing mirror and saw a leather clad figure — who, presumably, hadn't seen that the traffic light was red — racing towards the junction. As the roar got louder and the motorcyclist got larger in the wing mirror Rita wondered how the idiot planned to brake at the last minute, as the signal still read thirty-one seconds to
go green.

The motorcyclist didn't decelerate. With a helmet covering a brainless head the rider jumped the signal at a speed that — God forbid — if it crashed into anyone, the rider's DNA would have to be scraped from the tarmac.

'Idiot,' Rita shouted aloud, not realising that windows of the car were up. 'Did you see that?'

'Nutter. There are many like him in the city these days, ma'am. Since these imported large engine motorcycles have come to India, and you know how we mete out driving licences in our country.'

The signal turned green and they turned right.

'He could have died…'

'Or killed someone.'

'That too. Did you read the registration plate?'

'5-7-6-4. But I couldn't catch the series, but I'll figure out a way.'

'Please. I want to meet this person, and some others like him. We should send out a notice to the local police stations. These guys shouldn't just be fined, we should take away their driving licences.'

***

Cuffe parade is one of Mumbai's crown jewels: luxurious, posh and la-di-da. Industrialists, businessmen, bureaucrats, politicians and corporate moguls reside here; it isn't a much favoured residence address for the Bollywood fraternity. Named after one Mr Cuffe, it is a dazzling example of human greed annihilating nature. 75000 square metres of land was reclaimed from the sea in the sixties to provide waterside residences and offices to those who could afford it. Apparently Ron Jogani's apartment was described as over 3700 square feet in one of India's richest housing societies: Jolly Maker One, where the societal reserve fund is so large that the residents get interest instead of paying maintenance. Jogani's apartment was on the fifteenth floor overlooking the sea. This was one of the prime residences in the country, not just in Cuffe Parade or Mumbai.

Money, diamonds, luxury apartment, fancy cars and a lot more besides, and then a bullet — a mere two centimetre metal shell — takes it all away. Kaput!

As neither of the car occupants was in uniform and there was no red light on the car, the security at Jolly Maker One stopped Rita's unmarked car at the barrier. The skinny uniformed guard came to the driver's side as Rita lowered her window.

'Yes, madam?' the guard spat out. 'Who you want?' he quizzed in his English-patois and peeked into the car to see if there were any more occupants besides the obvious two. He had his walkie-talkie ready to call the apartment resident and seek due permission before letting the visitors in.

'Mr Ron Jogani's apartment,' Rita responded politely.

The look on the guard's face was sceptical for a split-second.

'He no live here anymore. He gone.'

'Gone? Where?' Rita wanted to know if the people at this posh tower knew about Jogani's demise.'

'He go to heaven. Who you?' The guard looked doleful but carried on in his vernacular.

'Mr Jogani is no more?' Rita feigned a surprise.

'No more. Who you?'

Rita ignored him the third time. 'So who lives in his apartment now?'

'Madam lives. Who you?'

'Madam who?'

The guard, realising his questions weren't getting any response from the visitors, decided he wouldn't answer any more. 'First you tell, who you, then I tell.'

'I am DCP Rita Ferreira, and this is Inspector Jatin Singh. Does that answer your question?' Rita looked at Jain who showed the ID.

'Yes madam...' The guard looked disappointed and impressed simultaneously. His hand went up to his forehead to salute. Pure reflex.

'So who lives in Mr Jogani's apartment now?'

'Madam lives.'

'Which madam?'

'Madam Jogani.'

'Madam Jogani?' Hadn't Victor mentioned Jogani was divorced, single? 'But .Mr Jogani wasn't married.'

'He was married before the divorce,' he explicated innocently. 'Mrs Jogani come back to the apartment.' Despite his grammar, he conversed in English.

Horror vacui,
Rita pondered. Nature abhors a vacuum, doesn't it? Dig a trench and the river fills it in, pull out a shrub from its roots and the weeds appear within days. Depose a dictator and the coup leader becomes the next tyrant. Vacate an apartment in Cuffe Parade and Mrs Jogani — the ex Mrs Jogani — gravitates into it before rigor mortis sets in Ron Jogani's corpse. Rita and Jatin exchanged glances. This was getting interesting.

'OK, let us in, we need to see Mrs Jogani.'

The guard didn't flinch; he jinked and raised the barrier for the car to drive in. He courteously pointed towards the visitors' parking spot. The building, for all its financial value, looked worn out due to the harsh Mumbai weather. Being close to the sea — like Rita's own Bandra apartment —the salt and moisture had played their part too despite the large reserve funds in the kitty to upkeep the same. However, give the breadth of the towers it was evident that the apartments were leviathan by Mumbai standards where builders could sell a one-bedroom apartment in 400 square feet and a family of four could dwell in it. Certainly lavish. Considering the gentry that resided here anything smaller would have been embarrassing anyway.

Rita and Jatin didn't speak. Rita wondered if the return of Mrs Jogani was a coincidence or a consequence of Jogani's death. She leaned towards the latter. They silently took the elevator to the fifteenth floor.

Wouldn't Jogani have alarmed the apartment before he left for Belgium? If so, how did ex Mrs Jogani get into it?

Jatin Singh rang the bell and the maidservant opened the door instantly, like she was waiting for them. In all probability the pint-sized security guard would have called in to inform about the visitors. Jatin introduced them and showed the maid his ID. She ushered them into the house. They walked behind the maid into a broad entrance lobby and into the living room. She requested them to sit and informed them that “madam” would be out within minutes to see them. Before leaving the room she asked if they needed a drink.

Both asked for cold water.

The furniture in the living room was upholstered in beige and raw silk and tan leather. A potpourri of artefacts filled up every available space in the room. The living room had an unusually high ceiling that provided space for all his paintings to be displayed on the cream walls. Full marks for aesthetics. Almost zero on personal touch. It was the kind of house that screamed that it was done up by an interior designer, the kind they featured in magazines. Maybe some designer magazine had already covered it, but Rita didn't know. She had done her apartment herself in a minimalistic design.

Rita had no doubt that the ex Mrs Jogani would be unforthcoming, if not utterly inimical. But she was keen to know the how-and-why. The alternative theory was, once again, beginning to spin in her mind: was Ron Jogani actually killed for the diamonds?

'It took you quite some time to come by.' The ex Mrs Jogani arrived. An upright, tall woman — marginally taller than Rita — in her late forties with certainly more make-up than Shehnaz Hussain would recommend, but not too distasteful. She would have certainly been a stunner in her youth. She was casually attired in a white round-neck T that had The Beatles crossing the Abbey Road on the front peeping out of the knee length denim dungarees. She didn't appear to be mourning. She didn't appear defeated. Or lost or bereaved.

'Hello, I'm DCP Rita Ferreira, and this is Inspector Jatin Singh. And you are…?' Rita wanted to avoid calling her
Mrs Jogani.

'Anita. I was once married to Ronnie,' she said glumly.

Were you a widow if your spouse died after the divorce?

'Hello Anita, sorry I couldn't connect — what did you mean when you said it took us some time to come by...?'

'Oh, nothing. Ronnie died... I mean he was murdered,' Anita corrected herself, '…some months back. I'm surprised no one came around back then.'

'Wasn't the Indian Embassy in Belgium in touch with you?'

'They were, but no one came here personally.'

'Well, all I can say is we got the case only when Interpol got involved. But the information we have is that you declined to identify or take custody of the body, which is still unclaimed and freezing in some drawer in a morgue in Brussels. Am I correct?'

'You are. Ronnie… I mean Ron and I divorced over a decade ago, and it was because of his cheating on me. I have no feelings for him — dead or alive — and I don't want to have to do anything with him. Shouldn't talk bad of the dead but isn't it funny how people get what they deserve and, in my humble opinion, some people deserve a bullet.'

'So, if you don't mind me asking, how are you living in this apartment?'

'Well, I know Ron has no relatives, so when I got the news that Ron was no more, I thought I should come and take care of this property before one of his cunning whores got into it. We lived in this place, so I moved in.'

'Did you break the locks?'

'I didn't have to. I still have my set of keys.'

'What about the alarms? Surely, Mr Jogani would have alarmed the house before he went abroad…'

'That was the problem with Ron. He was so predictable. When we lived in this place together the alarm code was our wedding date. I was sure he changed it when we got divorced and I moved out, but I could guess what he would have changed it to. It was the date we got divorced. Easy.'

'Do you know of anyone who might have wanted to harm Mr Jogani or threatened him?'

'Don't know anyone else besides me.' Smirk. Wiseass.

'So I take it that your divorce with Mr Jogani was… acrimonious?' It was best to ask for it to be on record.

'The man couldn't keep his pants zipped. I caught him here, in our home, with a young bitch.'

'And you let him have this apartment at the divorce?' Rita rolled her eyes to emphasise the valuable property.

'I didn't want to live here visualising him with some whore all the time.'

'So you took the cash and moved out?'

'I suppose you can say that.'

'And now you're back in this very house and that doesn't bother you?'

'For one he's dead, and after so many years... I guess it doesn't matter anymore.'

'Do you have a legal right to be in this property?'

'Possession is nine-tenths of the law, isn't it?'

Gold-digger. Either Anita was a smart woman or there was a brain somewhere who was feeding her the intelligence.

'Am I a suspect?'

'Everyone's a suspect until the murderer is caught, so to that effect you are in the pool too, but you aren't convicted. Are you planning to leave the country in the coming weeks?'

'No, but are there any restrictions?'

'No, but it would be good if you let us know of any travel plans in case we need you for any questions that would help us get to Mr Jogani's killer.'

'But the murder happened in Brussels in some hotel, and I was told it was a burglary that went wrong…'