Chain of Custody

CHAIN OF CUSTODY

A
NITA
N
AIR
is the author of the novels
The Better Man
,
Ladies Coupé
,
Mistress
,
Lessons in Forgetting
,
Idris
and
Alphabet Soup for Lovers
.
Chain of Custody
follows on from the success of
A Cut-Like Wound
, the first Inspector Gowda novel, published in the UK by Bitter Lemon Press in 2014. Anita is also the author of
Goodnight & God Bless
, a collection of essays,
Malabar Mind
, a volume of poetry, and five books for children.

BITTER LEMON PRESS

First published in the United Kingdom in 2016 by Bitter Lemon Press, 47 Wilmington Square, London WC1X 2ET

www.bitterlemonpress.com

First published in India in 2016 by Harper Black

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

© Anita Nair, 2016

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission of the publisher

The moral right of Anita Nair has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

eBook ISBN 978-1-908524-75-1

Offset by Tetragon, London

Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CRO 4YY

‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.'

—Edmund Burke

Contents

Prologue: 14 March, Saturday

Part 1: Nine Days Before …

   
5 March, Thursday

   
6 March, Friday

   
7 March, Saturday

   
8 March, Sunday

   
9 March, Monday

   
10 March, Tuesday

   
11 March, Wednesday

   
12 March, Thursday

   
13 March, Friday

Part 2

   
14 March, Saturday

   
15 March, Sunday

   
16 March, Monday

   
17 March, Tuesday

Epilogue: 18 March, Wednesday

Acknowledgements

P
ROLOGUE

14 M
ARCH
, S
ATURDAY

7.30 A.M.

A
wall of mirrors. He could see himself reflected in it. A big-built man in a pair of mustard-coloured leggings and a navy blue t-shirt that just barely reached the top of his thighs. He had never seen anything more grotesque or disquieting in his life, he thought, staring at the multiple Borei Gowdas. The music began, and the instructor, a tall, thin young man who looked like he had been poured into his clothes and whose limbs seemed attached to his body with double hinges, swayed in time.

‘Go on, Inspector Gowda,' he said. ‘Get going, listen to the music, let it flow through you. Only then can you tango. Now remember, forward with your left, forward with your right, forward with left …'

Gowda stopped listening. What the fuck am I doing here, he asked himself, and the many Borei Gowdas in the mirror.

The mobile rang incessantly from the bedside table. Inspector Borei Gowda woke up with a start. What was that fucking dream all about, he wondered as he reached for the phone groggily.

His eyes widened at the sight of the time on the phone. It was almost eight. How could he have slept through an alarm that was set to ring every fifteen minutes from six to seven? But it seemed that he had drunk himself to oblivion last night. Something he had sworn never to do again. He sighed.

‘Hello,' he said into the phone.

‘Sir, there was a control room call. It was about someone in that gated community near Bible College. I think you should come,' Head Constable Gajendra said even as Gowda heard the Bolero pull up outside his home.

‘I will be there in fifteen minutes,' Gowda said, walking to the bathroom. He stood under the shower with a toothbrush stuck in his mouth. The water beat down on his head, stilling the hammering at the back of it. The incidents of the past night ran through his mind in vivid technicolour with Dolby surround sound. He closed his eyes. Later, later, he told himself. For now duty called.

Gajendra was waiting by the gate of the house when Gowda drove up to Shangri La. That was the name etched on the burnished brass plate embedded in the gatepost. The head constable's face was drawn.

A group of people had gathered outside the gate. Gowda nodded in greeting and walked towards the house. A small, thin man peeled himself from the group and hurried to catch up with Gowda. ‘Hello Inspector, I am the president.'

Gowda paused and stared at him, wondering if the man was mad. ‘President of which country?'

The man flushed. ‘President of the association.'

Gowda nodded. ‘Oh I see. I will have to ask you to step back.'

The man's face fell as he turned to leave.

The front door had been broken in by two constables. Gowda entered the house and paused. The door had opened into a vestibule like an old-fashioned club. In keeping with the style was a giant mirror in a gilt frame, and beneath it what looked like a table sawn in half. It must have a name. Urmila would know it.

He looked at the man sprawled on the floor on his face. He flinched. One side of his head had been smashed in. A pool of browning blood haloed his head. Near him lay a stone Buddha on its side. The marble floor was cracked like the skull.

The man wore navy blue Crocs on his feet and a t-shirt that had hiked up in the fall. Gowda could see a bruise below his ribs on the left side. Through the lycra shorts he wore, his flaccid penis was clearly visible. Who was this man? Gowda pinched the bridge of his nose thoughtfully.

A towel lay a few feet away. Gowda bent down and hoisted the end of the towel with his pen. It was still damp and smelled of chlorine. The man had gone swimming, he thought. He remembered a glint of blue on the left as he drove into the gated community.

‘He was supposed to have a video call with a client at eleven last night. Apparently, the client tried several times and finally called someone else. She couldn't reach him either. When he didn't respond to the calls or messages this morning as well, she had a colleague call the control room,' Head Constable Gajendra said.

‘And he lived alone?' Gowda asked. He could see the rest of the room was in order. No upturned furniture. Not even a piece of broken glass or a muddy footprint. It wasn't an intruder. It was someone the victim had known. That much was obvious.

‘What about his phone and laptop?' Gowda asked.

‘All there,' Gajendra said. ‘I don't think it is a burglary gone wrong.'

‘Where is the woman who called the control room?'

‘She was in Chennai last night. Apparently, she has taken the first flight out and is on her way here from the airport,' Gajendra said, turning at the sound of a car slowing down.

A young man and a woman came hurrying up the garden path. Gowda walked towards them.

‘Dr Rathore, is he all right?' the woman asked as the man tried to peer over Gowda's shoulder.

Gowda shook his head. ‘I am sorry.'

The woman's face crumpled. ‘Oh my god, oh my god,' she whispered, her hand going to her mouth.

‘What happened, Inspector?' The man's voice quivered in shock. ‘Dr Rathore took care of himself very well.'

‘He was a doctor?' Gowda asked.

‘Not a
doctor
doctor. A doctor of law,' the man said. ‘Can we see him?'

Gowda held up his hand. ‘Not now. It's a homicide. Till the forensics team arrives, I can't have the crime scene contaminated.'

‘Homicide! But who would want to kill Dr Rathore?' The woman's voice rose.

‘Obviously someone did. His skull was bashed in,' Gowda said.

They stared at him, horrified. Gowda held their gaze, not knowing what else to do. There was no easy way of announcing death, be it a suicide, an accident or a homicide. Policemen and doctors knew this. It was their lot to remain unmoved by the toll it took on everyone associated with the victim.

‘We need some details,' Gowda said.

Head Constable Gajendra examined the faces of the couple in front of him. He knew Gowda was doing the same.

Gowda figured the two would have nothing to contribute except perhaps what was already in the deceased's planner. He had seen the woman's gaze sweep the garden like she was seeing it for the first time. He saw the man's eyes settle and then linger on the bar counter in a gazebo in a corner of the sprawling lawns. Dr Rathore had never had a drink with his colleagues or invited them home. It seemed to Gowda that the lawyer had a very private life, far removed from what his employees and associates knew of him.

‘His family?' Gowda asked.

‘His wife and son live in London. She looks after the UK end of the law firm,' the woman said. There was a hint of disapproval in her tone. The young associate, Gowda realized, had been a little in love with the man.

‘I'll need to speak with you at length,' Gowda said suddenly.

The woman nodded. Her eyes welled up. ‘I still can't believe that …' The man put his arm around her.

Gowda's eyes met met Gajendra's. Get rid of them, he gestured with a slight tilt of his chin.

Police Constable Byrappa sidled up to Gajendra. ‘The security at the gate has a CCTV and a list of visitors.'

Gajendra smiled. He went looking for Gowda. ‘I think it will be an open-and-shut case,' he said.

Gowda stared at him. ‘You say?'

‘Yes, sir. PC Byrappa said there is CCTV footage and a guest register. Once we have the time of death, it's not going to be hard to know who killed the lawyer.'

Gowda said nothing. Deep down he didn't think it was going to be that easy. Gowda turned to look at the dead lawyer one last time. Something niggled at him. He wasn't sure what it was. But it would come to him.

The little man who had called himself the president of the association came in with two other men and a woman. ‘Do you think it's the Dandupalaya gang?' one of the men asked in a low whisper.

‘Apparently they choose lonely houses with few members. Isn't that the gang's modus operandi?' the woman said, stressing the words with the air of a clever child who has learnt a new phrase. The third man pulled his phone out to shoot pictures.

Gowda frowned. ‘No photography,' he said, not even bothering to respond to the query about the Dandupalaya gang. Ever since the release of the film
Dandupalaya
, based on the real lives of a family in a village in the outskirts of Bangalore, who had gone on a spree of looting, rape and murder, the Dandupalaya gang had assumed a mythical status. He was quite certain that, within the force too, there would be officers who found it convenient to assign this homicide to the resurgence of the Dandupalaya gang. After all, almost 112 cases had been registered against them more than a decade ago.

‘Who do you think did it?' the president asked.

‘The investigations have already begun,' Gowda said.

How had the murderer entered and exited the lawyer's house? Who else had keys to the house? There was something beyond these obvious questions that he was missing. Gowda reached for his phone. He needed a fresh pair of eyes. He needed Santosh.

Part 1

Nine Days Before …