Ellis Peters - George Felse 09 - Mourning Raga (10 page)

‘Come, you should look more closely,’ said the Sikh, and led the way, turning once to say with authority: ‘The lady must stay here.’

The lady stayed; she could not very well do anything else. But her eyes, which had excellent vision, followed them remorselessly across the sparkling white paving, across the beaten, rust-coloured earth, under the lightly-dancing clothes-line, to the shed and the lean-to roof in the corner, where Anjli…

No! There was no honeyed rose of Anjli’s skin there, and no midnight-black of her hair, and no silvery angora pink of her best jersey suit. There were two policemen and one dried-up little medical civilian sitting on their heels around something on the ground; and when the Sikh brought his accidental witnesses over to view the find, these three rose and drew apart, leaving the focus of all attention full in view.

He could not have been found there, any chance passerby in the side street might have looked over the wall and seen him; they must have brought him out into the light after measuring and recording his position on discovery, somewhere there in the corner shed, fast hidden from sight.

The dull brown blanket was gone. Only a thin, skinny little shape, hardly larger than a monkey, lay contorted on the darker brown earth of Satyavan’s yard, bony arms curled together as if holding a secret, bony legs drawn up to his chin, streaky grey hair spread abroad like scattered ash. There was so little blood in him that his face was scarcely congested at all; but there were swollen bruises on the long, skinny, misshapen throat to show that he had died by strangulation.

The eyes were open; blank, rounded and white as pearls.

Arjun Baba, that very, very old man, had quitted the world in the night, and left no message behind him.

Kishan Singh padded across the yard at the policeman’s heels, protesting: ‘I did not touch the old man, I swear it. Sahib, why should I touch him? All this year I have given him food, and brought him his
pan
, and been as his servant, as my mistress told me. Always when I rose in the morning he was sitting by his brazier… Today he was not there. I called him, and he did not answer, and therefore I looked within… Sahib, he was lying there in the dark, as you see him, so he was. I saw that he was dead… Also I saw how he had died, and therefore I ran for the police. Should I do that if I had killed him?’

‘It would be the best way of appearing blameless,’ said the Sikh officer drily, ‘if you had the wit.’

‘But why should I wish to harm him, I? What gain for me? You think such a person had money to be stolen?’

‘You may have grudged the effort of feeding him. Perhaps he was in your way. It would be easy to make away with some of the furnishings of this house, without a witness always in the compound…’

‘The old man was blind…’

‘But very quick of hearing,’ called the plump lady from next door, bright with excitement at the gate; and all the neighbours joined in in shrill Hindi, shouting one another down. ‘Everything he heard! I had only to set foot on my roof, and he would call up to me. He knew by my walk when I had my washing basket on my arm.’

‘This boy has been always a very trustworthy servant,’ Vasudev urged in agitation. ‘I cannot believe he would hurt the old man.’

‘You do not know what he might do, being master here as well as servant. Young people have no time now to care for the old… Arjun Baba was a trouble to him, that is how it was! Who else was here to do this thing, tell us that? In the night we are not minding our neighbours’ business here, we are good people. Very easy to make away with the old man in the night, and then find him – oh, yes, all innocently! – in the morning and run to the police.’

Other voices rose as vociferously, arguing against her. The two policemen, affronted by the steady surge of curious people across the threshold into the front garden, began to push them back outside the gate, were shrilled at indignantly in consequence, and shouted back no less angrily. The noise soared into a crescendo that was like physical pain. And all the while Dominic and Tossa gazed at the shrunken, indifferent corpse of Arjun Baba, old age torn and savaged and discarded where they had dreaded to see Anjli’s youth and grace. It is a terrible thing to feel only relief when you are brought face to face with a murdered man. They felt themselves, in some obscure way, responsible, if not for his death, yet for the absence of all mourning; if the world had not owed him a living, yet surely it owed him at least justice and regret now that he was dead.

‘If you did not do it, then who did? Who else would want to kill such an old man? Who were Arjun Baba’s enemies?’

‘He had no enemies… No friends now except me… and no enemies… I do not know who would do such a thing. But I did not… I did not…’

In the fine drift of dust along the lee of the old man’s hut a tiny gleam of whiteness showed. Dominic stepped carefully past the stringy brown feet, and stooped to pick up the small alien thing no one else had yet noticed. It lay coiled in his palm light as a feather, seven inches or so of fine green cord stringing a bracelet of white jasmine buds, threaded pointing alternately this way and that. After sixteen hours they were a little soiled and faded, one or two torn away from their places, but they were still fragrant. He saw that the green cord was not untied, but broken; and silk is very strong.

Anjli had been here!

He began to see, vaguely, the shape of disturbing things. Anjli had been here, and the flowers she had worn had been ripped from her wrist with some violence, perhaps in a struggle. And the old man, the only one remaining who had been here when Satyavan vanished in the night, was dead. Anjli had given him a token, and coaxed him to tell her whatever he knew. And last night Anjli had received a grubby note brought by a common messenger, a note which had sent her out secretly before dawn. To this place. For so the jasmine flowers said clearly.

He turned to the Sikh police officer, shouting to make himself heard. ‘Have your men examined all Arjun Baba’s belongings? May I know what you found?’

‘Belongings? Sahib, such a man has nothing… a brazier, a headcloth, a loincloth, a blanket…’

‘But you see he
hasn’t
got a blanket! And it was a cold night!’

It was true. The policeman cast one swift glance into the hut, and frowned, and looked again at Dominic, who was becoming interesting. With more respect he enumerated one by one the few poor items of Arjun Baba’s housekeeping.

‘Nothing more? Not even a tiny thing like a gold coin?’

A shrug and an indulgent smile. ‘Where should such a man get gold?’

Had the token been sent back, then, as bait to bring Anjli? And if so, by whom? By Arjun Baba in good faith? Or by his killer? A missing gold dollar to lure her to the meeting in the dark, a missing blanket to muffle her cries and smother her struggles…

‘I’ll tell you,’ he said, ‘where he got gold. From a young girl who came here with us a few days ago, and gave him the dollar she wears on a chain for luck. We came here looking for her, and I really think we’d better tell you the whole story, because it looks as if she has been here in the night, and whoever killed Arjun Baba has also taken Anjli away. Can’t we go into the house, where it will be quieter? This may take some time.’

It would have taken less time than it did if someone could have restrained Vasudev’s slightly hysterical commentary of pious horror and masochistic self-reproach. Wasn’t he, perhaps, protesting even a shade too much? Tossa’s thumbs were pricking painfully before the whole story was told. True, Vasudev had willingly brought them here, and in a hurry, too, but might not that be part of a carefully-laid plan? The anxious relative, conscious-stricken over his own shortcomings towards his young cousin… who was going to look there for a murderer and kidnapper? There was a lot of Kumar money, and this dutiful managing director of all that wealth had got into the habit of thinking in millions by now. Who could wonder if…? Some people would even have difficulty in blaming him!

‘It would seem,’ said the Sikh policeman, summing up with a good deal of shrewdness, ‘that this young lady is the child not merely of one very wealthy person, but of two almost equally subject to envy. If, as you say, she has indeed been kidnapped, the motive must be gain. There is almost no other known motive for kidnapping, unless the object is matrimony. For love, of course! One understands that gain may also be involved in matrimony, but that is by the way. Then the first question that arises is: how many people, here in India, knew that Miss Kumar is worth much money as ransom? All of the members of this film company, that is certain. Most are Indians, they would know that the Kumar family are millionaires. The others, the Americans, even if they were not so well informed about the Kumars, would know that the mother is famous and rich.’

‘They’d know more than that,’ said Dominic bluntly. ‘American film actresses don’t usually marry poor Indians.’

‘That is well observed. Money, Mr Felse, is inclined always to money, there is an affinity. So we have all the film company. And who besides? Your household, Mr Kumar, I think could hardly be ignorant of the young lady’s value, after her visit to Mrs Kumar’s death-bed. News is very quick to travel among servants, and you have many servants. Then also, let us not forget, this house-boy here, Kishan Singh, is not an idiot, and Miss Kumar had expressly revealed her identity to him…’

‘After I had already done so,’ said Dominic stoutly. Whatever happened, he could not imagine circumstances in which he would suspect Kishan Singh.

‘Very naturally. The fact remains, he was, by your account, the first after the film company to know of Miss Kumar’s value. But when we have said that, let us not be misled, we have not closed the number of our suspects. Film stars are news. For all we know there may have been paragraphs in the papers about Miss Kumar’s arrival in India. It would need only one observant person on the same flight. And once here, interested eyes may have observed your visit to Mrs Kumar’s villa. Also here.’

‘That lets nearly everybody in,’ admitted Dominic glumly.

‘Nevertheless, those with close personal knowledge – priority knowledge, one could say – must take precedence. Leave it to us, we shall investigate every person concerned. There remains the possibility that Miss Kumar is at liberty, and for her own reasons in hiding. This we can surely confide to you, Mr Kumar. Miss Kumar, I understand, is not familiar with Hindi. But a personal advertisement in the English-language press would be, I suggest, a good idea? She may very well read the papers! She will be unable to resist looking to see what they say about her! ’

Vasudev seized on it as on a lifeline in a very rough sea. Practicalities were his line. He was out of his chair in an ecstasy of enthusiasm, looking at his watch.

‘I shall see to it at once. There is the evening press… if you will pardon me, it would not be too late… But my guests… is it possible to arrange transport wherever they may wish…? Or perhaps I could return a little later…?’

‘It’s quite all right, thank you very much,’ said Tossa. ‘There’s a taxi rank just on the main road.’

‘Then if you will excuse me…! Please do get in touch if you should have any news, and naturally I will do the same. Your servant, Miss Barber!’

He had a small leather-bound notebook in his left hand as he galloped out of the room, and a ball-pen in his right, so anxious was he to get his come-home-all-is-forgiven advertisement framed for the evening papers. And it might be genuine, and it might not, and who could hope to tell the difference? The Sikh officer, perhaps. He stood at the window, frowning down towards the dusty frontage, until the Mercedes had started up and rushed away with aplomb in the direction of the main Delhi road. But by the sombre look on his face as he turned back into the room, he had come to no very definite conclusion about Vasudev. Nor, perhaps, about them? After all, if Anjli was a prize, who knew her worth better than they did, and who had been in a better position to manipulate her movements?

‘Now, Mr Felse, a few more questions.’ They turned out to be more than a few. Had he, had Tossa, ever previously been in contact with any of the Kumar family? What did they know of them? It was clear why Vasudev had been sidetracked out of the picture for the moment. Patiently they went over and over their very brief acquaintance with the Kumars, withholding nothing.

Had they had any undisclosed communication with Kishan Singh? They did realise that even if some other person with more sophisticated ideas conceived the plan of kidnapping Anjli and holding her to ransom, yet Kishan Singh was the obvious tool to use?

‘He’s the last tool
I
should use,’ said Dominic with conviction, ‘for anything dirty.’

‘An innocent face may be a gift from God even to the unworthy. But we were not – or did I not make that too clear? – speaking necessarily of
you
. Kishan Singh may even have conceived the plan himself after witnessing — you
did
say he witnessed it? – the scene between the young lady and the old man. How easy to send her the symbol and ask her to come here! About that I am sure you are right. She may, as it were, have originated the whole plot herself in that impulsive act.’

And had they anything to add to their account? Any forgotten detail? Dominic, by this time, had remembered that he had not mentioned hearing, or thinking he heard, Ashok’s morning raga whistled the previous night in the courtyard of Keen’s Hotel, at the very time when the note was being delivered to Anjli; but he had seen enough of the way the land lay to keep that item to himself now. The issue was confused enough already, why introduce into it what he might well have imagined, and what would certainly smell like a red herring to this suspicious person interrogating him?

‘Very well, let us leave it at that for the moment. You will be available, please, at Keen’s Hotel, you will not move from Delhi at present.’

‘We are not going anywhere,’ said Dominic steadily, ‘until Anjli is found. And I hope you are not thinking of detaining Kishan Singh, because he, too, will be available whenever you need him. He won’t leave here unless the Kumar family tell him to, and a word from you will take care of that.’