A Cut-Like Wound (4 page)

‘Sir?’ she had barked.
You haven’t heard of sexual harassment, have you?
the fire in her eyes demanded.

He had looked away, embarrassed. He had been petrified of the repercussions. For the next three months he had managed to avoid her till she was transferred to a station in south Bangalore.

‘Sir.’

The young man’s strident voice cracked his reverie. Gowda gave himself a mental shake.

‘Well, explain this to me.’ He jabbed at the file. ‘Case number 84/2011. The homicide at Horamavu. The pharmacy shop owner Kothandaraman. I thought the cause of death was strangulation.’

The young man straightened. He began by clearing his throat, but catching Gowda’s impatient glare, hurried on to recite almost word perfect the contents of the case diary.

Gowda’s eyes narrowed. ‘Do you think I can’t read? I said, explain. Are you saying a manja thread was used as the ligature? But a manja thread would snap. So it couldn’t have been a manja thread!’

The sub-inspector swallowed. A convulsive sound that made Gowda want to reach out and strangle him. Did he naturally attract fools? Or was it a conspiracy by the department to shunt the foolish and inept into his care?

‘Sir,’ SI Santosh began, having found his voice again, ‘the post-mortem report showed the ligature used was a string. From the tissue discolouration, the forensics department…’

A bark of laughter erupted from Gowda. ‘Forensics
department!’ He shook his head. ‘The only man who counts in the forensics lab is Dr Shastri.’

Santosh turned the pages of the file and said, ‘This is signed by a Dr Shastri.’

‘In which case, go on…’ Gowda said, leaning back.

Santosh cleared his throat again. ‘From the tissue discolouration, the forensics department thinks it to be a one-cm-thick string. The kind masons use at building sites to mark straight lines. But there were cuts on the victim’s hands as he tried to resist. Particles of glass were found in the cuts and in the throat wounds. In fact, there were cut-like wounds on the neck. It seems the string had been coated with glass in the manner manja threads are. So the ligature worked as a blade as well. It severed as it strangled.’

‘What have you discovered? Any possible motives? Business rivalry? Family feuds? Anything like that?’

‘No, sir, his son said he couldn’t understand it at all. The ACP thinks it is a robbery that went wrong.’

Gowda nodded. Somewhere deep within, he knew this would be one of the cases that was destined to be a C report. For lack of evidence it would stay in the pending file for months, years, and then be forgotten. Only in the dead man’s home would they remember how one horrific Friday night, he had been slaughtered for no apparent reason, and ask themselves, ‘Why?’

Gowda closed the file and asked, ‘Who found him?’

‘That was the strange thing, sir. His family, of course, was worried when he didn’t come home as usual and didn’t respond to their calls. They went to the medical shop but it was shut. A tailor across the road apparently saw him leave at about nine p.m. At about two in the morning, the son received a call saying his father was dead. The boy was frightened and
called his uncle who lived next door. At about five in the morning, a milkman noticed a car parked in Horamavu near the lake. He peered inside the car but couldn’t see anything. He tapped on the car window but there was no response. That’s when he came here. Head Constable Gajendra was there when they broke open the car window.’

Gowda looked into the middle distance to signify end of conversation.

‘Sir, there’s something else that’s come up,’ SI Santosh said.

‘What? One more of those land disputes?’

‘No,’ Santosh said, unable to hide the excitement in his voice. ‘A hospital report has come in of a man admitted last night. He was badly beaten up and then someone, or a group, tried to burn him alive. But because of the rain last night the fire must have died out, so he was still alive when he was found. It happened in the eucalyptus grove a little before Kannur. He was taken to JJ Hospital near Kothanur. That was the nearest hospital. Apparently, one of the witnesses insisted.’

Gowda sighed. ‘Shouldn’t it be taken up by the Yelehanka police station?’ he asked, unable to hide his irritation. It seemed to him that more and more police stations were showing less interest in investigating offences. All they wanted was the power of the uniform.

‘It comes under our jurisdiction. Fortunately for us, there are two eyewitnesses, three in fact. But the man died before regaining consciousness. The medico-legal report showed some complications. I have already signed for the body to be moved to the mortuary. This is our case, sir.’

The boy was almost puffing with pride. Us. City Police. One of these days he would discover for himself the slimy
stench of criminal investigation. I’d like to see how he feels about ‘us’ a year down the line, Gowda thought.

He pulled open a drawer in the table and took out a strip of Brufen. He popped out two of the tablets, threw them down his throat and drank deeply from a bottle of water.

Santosh looked at the seated man, studying him feature by feature. So this was Borei Gowda. A little over six feet tall and with what was once a big-boned muscular frame. But fat had come to pad what was once muscle, so he looked soft in the middle, blurred at the edges. Gowda’s greying hair was cut regulation short, lending a certain distinctiveness to what would otherwise have been a composite blandness of features. Eyes that were neither big nor small. A straight nose. A clean-shaven jaw with a cleft in the chin. Once, Borei Gowda must have been a striking figure. Now it seemed as if the air had gone out of him and his body had crumpled to its current stance of poor muscle tone and wilted ideals.

Santosh tightened his gut and squared his shoulders unconsciously.

Gowda felt Santosh’s eyes on him.

‘What?’ he snapped.

‘Shouldn’t we go to the scene of the crime, sir?’

‘Should we?’ Gowda asked querulously.

‘Sir?’ Santosh’s horrified tone rattled Gowda.

The boy was way too earnest. It was time to treat him to a reality check.

‘Let’s go,’ Gowda said, rising and pulling his Aviator shades on.

‘I didn’t mean to rush you, sir. But if we leave it too late, the crime scene will be contaminated,’ Santosh sought to explain, trying to keep abreast with Gowda.

Gowda didn’t speak for a moment. The fool thought
he was bloody Sherlock Holmes and Inspector Madhukar Zende rolled into one.

‘How long have you been in service?’ he asked carefully.

‘Three months; two weeks in this station. I asked for this posting, sir.’

Gowda looked at him. ‘Why?’

‘I wanted to work with you. I have heard so much about you. I know I can learn a lot from you.’ He paused and then added slowly, ‘And, sir, I am a Gowda too.’

Gowda felt his mouth curl. ‘And you think that will make a difference?’

‘I just want you to know that you can be assured of my complete loyalty. We are from the same caste, after all.’ Santosh tried to gauge Gowda’s reaction but his eyes were hidden behind his sunglasses and his silence gave away nothing of what he felt about Santosh’s troth of allegiance.

‘Santosh Gowdare, why did you join the police force?’ Gowda asked as they walked towards the jeep.

‘I always wanted to. So I did my BSc in Forensic Sciences from Karnataka Science College, Dharwad.’

‘You mean to say you didn’t want to be an engineer or a doctor?’

‘Like everyone else, I too had those as my first choices, sir. I wrote both the engineering and medical entrance exams but didn’t get the necessary marks. Then I decided that I would focus on becoming a police officer.’

‘You still haven’t told me why, Santosh Gowdare,’ Gowda murmured softly.

The young man flushed. Was his senior officer mocking him, he wondered. Why did he insist on calling him by his caste name and with a suffix of respect attached to it? He had done only as Head Constable Muni Reddy at his previous posting had advised him to.

He ran his fingers through his hair and said, ‘I wanted to do something meaningful. I didn’t want to be stuck in a job doing the same thing day after day. At the end of each day, I wanted to feel that I had done something worthy.’

‘You could have done that as a teacher,’ Gowda said.

‘No, sir, I want more than that.’

Gowda saw the glitter of excitement in the young man’s eyes, the fervour to do good in his stance and gait, the smooth, shaven cheeks and the precision of his movements. The innocence of the uncorrupted mind; the naivety of youth. Gowda felt a pang of regret. Once, Gowda had been that young man, seeking to protect the weak and needy, aching to scourge the world of its evils. Where had it all gone?

Gowda felt a great fatigue descend on him. That’s all he needed now. A bloody do-good bigot. Well, he’ll learn soon enough, Gowda told himself as he watched the young man talk to PC David, the driver.

‘Where’s Gajendra?’ Gowda snarled

‘Coming, sir!’ The head constable rushed out of the station house and got into the back of the Bolero along with Santosh. Gowda slid into the front seat and slammed the door shut.

As they waited at the traffic light, Gowda felt the heat of the day press down upon him. The din of traffic and the blare of horns, the dust, the hangover that refused to lift … Gowda’s gaze swooped on the reflection of Santosh in the rear-view mirror. Something made him want to wipe away the smugness in Santosh’s profile as he sat lost in thought. His face hardened.

He turned and asked, ‘Tell me something. Have you seen the body?’

Santosh almost leapt out of his seat. Then, struggling to find composure in a split second, he mouthed, ‘Sir?’

The young man’s puzzlement irked Gowda even further.

‘Is that a yes or a no?’ he drawled in a voice that was silky smooth.

Gajendra turned pale. This was how it always was when Gowda’s mean streak surfaced. A silkiness of tone that, instead of underplaying the viciousness, only heightened it. He felt a great sympathy for Santosh. Older, hardened men were known to have sniffled when Gowda chose to turn silky.

‘Yes sir, I mean, no sir, I haven’t seen the body yet,’ Santosh fumbled, thinking he had never felt so intimidated in his life. ‘I thought it could wait. Whereas the crime scene…’ His words trailed off as he caught Gowda’s expression.

‘So that’s what you think,’ Gowda said and then, turning his head to the driver, he muttered, ‘mortuary.’

Santosh opened his mouth as if to say something. Then he checked himself. Gowda saw him pull a small notebook from his pocket and flip through it surreptitiously.

‘What is it? What’s troubling you?’ Gowda asked slowly.

Santosh licked his lips. How had they got so dry?

‘No, sir, nothing sir. But the crime scene…’

Gowda sighed. ‘If you insist, we can go to the crime scene now. But has it occurred to you that it rained all night? And do you realize how many people would have walked all over the eucalyptus grove by now? Some of them may have even shat on what is your scene of crime! That’s what you’ll find there – a pile of shit! We will discover a lot more from the post-mortem than the scene of crime.’

Santosh didn’t speak. He looked down at his hands. It
seemed to him that no matter what he did, he just couldn’t seem to please Gowda. And he had so wanted to be part of Gowda’s team.

‘Look, we will get to the crime scene sometime later in the day, we have to. It’s part of the procedure. We will have to do a house-to-house, question nearby homes or shops to find out if anyone saw anything, noticed any suspicious movements, but trust me, this will be more conclusive,’ Gajendra whispered in Santosh’s ear.

Santosh had heard about Borei Gowda at the Meenakshipalaya police station in Bangalore Rural where he had been posted first.

The head constable was a man called Muni Reddy, who took it upon himself to educate Santosh when he protested about certain laxities at the station house.

Muni Reddy looked at him carefully as if sizing him up. ‘Please don’t be offended, sir. But you are a young man, and I have been around for a while. You must forget all that they taught you in the police college. Out on the streets, it is a different world altogether.’

Santosh had listened to him, unsure whether to be amused or irritated. ‘Are you saying I have to turn into a criminal to be able to deal with criminals?’

Muni Reddy twirled the end of his moustache, deep in thought, and said suddenly, ‘Ever since you arrived here, I have been wondering why you seem so familiar. Now I know who you remind me of. Borei Gowda!’

‘Who?’

‘Borei Gowda. He was posted here as SI a long time ago, when this was an outpost station. He was like you. Earnest and wet behind his ears. He thought the police had
a duty to protect the people.’ Muni Reddy shook his head incredulously at the mere thought.

‘Why? Don’t you think that’s what we are here for?’ Santosh said as he watched Muni Reddy ladle sagu onto his plate.

Meenakshipalaya was a village that had turned into a little town when a Japanese car company set up a factory nearby. Santosh had rented a small house near the police station, where he lived alone.