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“What is she lying on?” asked Santosh.
“It’s a faux tiger skin,” replied Nisha. “Rather cheap. It’s certainly not part of the expensive decor.”
“So it’s a prop. Yet another clue left by our killer,” said Santosh grimly. What the fuck are you playing at? he thought. Faux tiger skin? Why are you messing with my head?
“Did you notice this?” asked Nisha as she bent down to take a close-up shot of the victim’s face.
“Is that a rupee coin on he
r forehead?” asked Santosh, gripping his cane firmly in order to bend down a little.
“Yes, it’s a one-rupee coin,” replied Nisha. “But it’s been sawed in half down the middle.”
“Is that brass or gold?” asked Santosh, pointing to a small bell-shaped pendant that hung around the victim’s neck on a chain.
“We will have to examine it in the lab to check the exact metallic composition,” replied Mubeen, who was scanning the body with a dermascope. “Although it’s unlikely that a woman occupying a twenty-million-dollar home with a three-million-dollar painting hanging on the wall would be wearing a brass pendant.”
“You are right,” said Santosh. “If the pendant turns out to be cheap, we can safely assume that it’s a prop left by the killer. Any rough estimate of the time she died?”
“Judging by lividity,” said Mubeen, continuing with his examination, “I’d say that she’s been dead for at least four hours. That’s all I can tell you at this stage. Let Zafar and me examine her in the lab and we should be able to give you a more precise answer.”
Santosh look at his watch—3:30 a.m. If Priyanka Talati had been killed four hours ago, it would make the time of death around 11:30. Turning to Rupesh, Santosh asked, “How was her body discovered?”
“There were complaints from neighbors that the music in her house had been turned up to full volume,” replied Rupesh. “The sanctioned noise limit in a residential area like Bandra is reduced from fifty-five decibels to forty-five by ten p.m. Her stereo was thumping out Bollywood numbers at over a hundred decibels. The neighbors called up the police control room to register a complaint. When the beat patrol got here there was no one to open the electrical gate. That’s when the beat sergeant called us.”
“What about her personal staff?” asked Santosh, eyes flitting around the room, mentally taking snapshots of everything. “Someone must have seen something.”
“Priyanka Talati had lived most of her life in Singapore,” explained Rupesh, who had already interviewed one of the neighbors. “She was uncomfortable keeping household staff, hence the high-tech security system in her house. She had a personal assistant who stayed with her for twelve hours in the day. A cook came in for about three hours in the morning to carry out the cooking for the entire day. A team of cleaners also arrived each day to do the housekeeping but they were usually out by eleven o’clock in the morning.”
“No security guard at the gate?” asked Santosh.
“It is remotely operated from within the house,” said Rupesh.
“In which case, there would be a CCTV camera at the gate, right?”
“Absolutely. There are two security cameras,” explained Rupesh, “one at the gate and the other at the entrance door. Both feed into a digital recording unit inside a closet. Unfortunately the hard drive containing the recorded material is missing.”
Rupesh was staring at Priyanka’s body. Even though she was fully clothed, he was seeing someone else … a naked woman, bleeding internally from wounds inflicted by objects inserted into her body. Repeatedly raped.
Santosh bent down to examine Priyanka’s forehead more closely. “Do you see what I see?” he asked Rupesh, breaking his reverie.
“A rupee coin cut in half …” said Rupesh tentatively.
“Yes, but look underneath,” said Santosh.
Rupesh bent down to take a closer look. “Ah, I see it now. It’s a single strand of hair.”
“Too much of a coincidence. I am convinced that the hair is a bogey—a prop left to mislead us,” said Santosh. “I’m pretty certain it will match the other two strands.” He stopped talking suddenly, squinted as he attempted to focus on the coin. “See the way that it has been placed … It looks like a half-moon. What day of the week is it today?” he asked animatedly. “Quick! What day?”
“Tuesday. But what does that have to do with anything?” asked Rupesh, wondering how many whiskies Santosh had downed before getting there. Very little remained secret among the members of Mumbai’s security establishment.
“If Priyanka Talati was killed at around eleven thirty then it means that the murder happened on Monday night, not Tuesday morning,” said Santosh, ignoring Rupesh’s impatience.
“What the fuck are you driving at, Santosh?” asked Rupesh, slightly annoyed by the trivial questions and statements.
Santosh turned to Nisha. “Do you have an almanac on your smartphone?”
“Yes,” she answered curiously. “What do you need to know?”
