The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing

Twelve

Inspector Singh was not in the best of moods. When his aloo paranthas were placed in front of him, he scowled at the plate and growled, “Where’s the aachar?”

The Gymkhana Club waiters, a slothful bunch, had long since grown immune to the complaints of the club’s members, many of whom were professional whingers. Puri had often watched people yell at them with the contempt and abrasiveness of drill sergeants, to little or no effect. In Singh, though, they had met their match. The combination of his size, police uniform and menacing snarl had them flapping around like penguins.

In double time, a bowl full of mango pickle was fetched and placed on the table before him. The inspector did not look up or say thank you, but with an ill-disposed murmur ripped off a piece of parantha, scooped up a large lump of aachar, dunked it in his curd and then crammed the food into his mouth. As he began to chew, apparently satisfied, the waiters drew a collective sigh of relief, keeping a wary eye on him from behind their serving station.

Puri, who had arrived home from Haridwar late Thursday night and then set off at seven this morning for what had been billed by the inspector as an urgent meeting, was sitting across from his guest at a table in the Gym’s breakfast room.

He could tell that Singh had not enjoyed a good night’s sleep. The NCR had been hit by three hours of load shedding, and the inspector, who lived in modest housing in Mustafabad, northeast Delhi, didn’t have a backup inverter to run his ceiling fans.

Such systems did not come cheap. The police wallah, who had six mouths to feed, couldn’t afford one on his salary and wasn’t prepared to extort the price of one from the public. His ill temper, then, was a credit to him.

“I tried calling you yesterday but seems you were out of station?” he said, his mouth half full.

“Some family business was there,” lied Puri, who was keeping his visit to Haridwar, and the fact that he had planted an undercover operative inside the ashram, strictly under wraps.

The detective quickly changed the subject.

“Since last we met I’d a run-in with a cricket bat,” said Puri, who went on to describe how he had been ambushed in Dr. Jha’s office.

“Sir, I hope you weren’t breaking and entering again,” said Singh reproachfully. He took a dim view of some of Puri’s methods.

“Nothing of the sort. The side door was perfectly open, actually. Just I surprised some intruder engaged in going through Dr. Jha’s files. How he got the better of me remains a mystery. My reflexes are like lightning.”

The faintest hint of a smile flickered across Singh’s face as he took another bite of his parantha and then asked: “Did you see who did it?”

For a moment, Puri seemed lost for words.

“My memory of events is something of a fog,” he said. “It is like I had a dream but certain details are missing. I remember someone familiar to me saying something. Just I cannot put my finger on who or what.”

“I’m sure it will come back to you, sir,” said Singh helpfully. His breakfast and salty tea seemed to be improving his temperament.

“Just I hope it is not weeks or months. So frustrating it is.”

A waiter arrived bearing a plate of idlis arranged on a banana leaf and placed it in front of Puri. He immediately cut off a portion of one of the rice patties, drowned it in coconut chutney and some spicy sambar and devoured it.

“So tell me. What is so urgent I had to come into town so early, Inspector?”

Singh, who had finished his food, wiped his hands on his napkin and placed it on the table. “Sir, the chief knows you’re investigating the Jha case,” he said with solemnity.

Puri shrugged. “That is hardly a surprise, no? Delhi is like a village with women gossiping round the water pump. Eventually everyone gets to know everyone else’s business.” He took another bite of his food.

“He knows I took you to the murder scene and he’s furious. He ordered me to meet you this morning and warn you off.”

“Then I will consider myself warned,” said Puri with a grin.

Singh sipped his tea. “But tell me, sir – strictly between us. Have you made any progress?”

“Come now, Inspector, you know I don’t have the habit of sharing my theories until they are tried and tested,” answered Puri. The truth was, though, that he still had little to go on – just a few scraps of information and a hunch or two.

Not that Puri was worried. Not especially. He had solved many a case in the past with less evidence available to him at this stage in the investigation. In India, perhaps more than anywhere else in the world, the methodology of undercover intelligence gathering established by Chanakya nearly two and a half millennia ago was often the only surefire way of solving a mystery. Patience was required.

“I know, sir, but is it really necessary to keep me completely in the dark?” asked Singh. “We’re on the same side after all. I feel useless – impotent.”

“You had the same frustrations on the ‘Pickles’ Sansi case. And look how that turned out.”

Puri was referring to his capture eight months ago of the leader of the notorious Sansi clan, who had been wanted on murder and racketeering charges.

The official version was that Singh had single-handedly tracked him down. In fact, Flush had cloned the mobile phone signature of Pickles’s mistress, an exotic dancer known as Lovely. Using SMS text messages, the detective had then lured the elusive but unsuspecting don to a midnight dalliance at the Raj Palace. Pickles had arrived at the five-star hotel expecting to enjoy, in the words of one of the detective’s saucy missives, “the full thali, big boy!” Instead, he had found himself clapped in handcuffs.

Given the Sansi clan’s fearsome reputation, Puri had not wanted his name associated with the case and allowed the inspector to take all the glory. The coup had helped greatly to further Singh’s career.

“So tell me,” said the detective as he finished his meal and pushed away his plate. “That ‘ash’ found at the scene? You’re in receipt of the lab report?”

“It turned out to be ground charcoal,” answered Singh.

If this information surprised or excited Puri, he didn’t show it.

“And what about your laughing gas theory? Any progress?”

“Nitrous oxide – that’s its proper, scientific name,” answered Singh. “It’s easy to get hold of. Doctors, dentists, all kinds of food manufacturers use it. One other thing. I talked with a chemist friend of mine and he told me the term ‘laughing gas’ is misleading. It doesn’t make people burst out laughing automatically. But it does make them feel extremely happy. And under its influence people will sometimes get the giggles.”

“That could explain why Shivraj Sharma was the only one not to do laughter and feel like he could not move,” murmured Puri to himself.

“Oh, and I almost forgot,” added Singh quickly. “People under the influence of nitrous oxide are generally susceptible to suggestion.”

“Very good work, Inspector!” declared Puri before making a note of this.

Singh was struck for a brief moment by a sense of accomplishment. But this quickly passed.

While Puri was breakfasting at the Gym, a couple of Tube-light’s boys were keeping vigil across the street from Professor Pandey’s house in West Shalimar Bagh.

Shashi and Zia were disguised as ditchdigger wallahs, a cover they often adopted because of its simplicity and the anonymity it provided. A couple of picks and shovels and some especially dirty clothes were all that were required for props. The persona was uncomplicated, too: looking downtrodden and bored, they stared in awe at fancy cars passing by and adopted heavy Bihari accents, using phrases like “Kaisan bha?” and “Jai Ram ji ki.”

The sight of such wretched, pitifully paid laborers toiling on construction sites was common across the city, and residents paid them little heed. Delhiites had also become inured to their streets and pavements being constantly dug up. There was not a neighborhood, sector or colony where new gas lines, telecommunications cables, water mains and sewage pipes were not being laid. Trenches with corresponding piles of dirt running alongside them were as common as they had once been on the Western Front, and there was no point complaining about it. As everyone knew, Delhi’s three municipal corporations were utterly corrupt, and the police were in the pay of contractors who worked without proper licenses and in violation of basic safety standards. Even the wealthiest of Delhi’s residents had learned to save their breath and ink.

Indeed, only one of Professor Pandey’s neighbors had raised an objection when, at six o’clock yesterday morning, Shashi and Zia had started digging up the pavement outside his house. Major Randhawa – according to the brass plaque on the gatepost, formerly of the Rajput Regiment, Indian Army – had come charging out into the street in a sleeveless vest and, without so much as a ‘good morning’ or ‘sorry to bother you’, started cursing Tubelight’s operatives as if they were a couple of street dogs. He’d also seen fit to make repeated, unflattering remarks about their mothers and sisters.

In response, Shashi and Zia had struck the right balance of crushed subservience and gormlessness, and muttered something about a water-pressure gauge and working for a local contractor.

This had prompted Major Randhawa to refer unfavorably to the contractor’s mother and daughters.

“After I get hold of him he’ll not father any more children!” he’d shouted.

Pretending to be illiterate, Shashi had shown the gentleman a mobile number written down on a grimy piece of paper and told him that it belonged to their employer.

Grabbing it from him, Major Randhawa had stormed back inside his house to call the contractor – and, presumably, threaten him with a swift and brutal castration.

Shashi and Zia had not heard another peep out of him after that and, within a couple of hours, dug themselves a nice, sizable hole.

They had spent the rest of yesterday tailing Pandey, who had left at ten o’clock in a car driven by his elderly chauffeur. He had reached Delhi University thirty minutes later, remained there all day, gone and done some shopping and returned home at six.

Another of Tubelight’s boys had taken the overnight shift, which had passed without incident. Then at six this morning, Shashi and Zia had returned, refreshed and filthy again, for another day on the job.

By now, it was almost eight.

There was still no sign of Major Randhawa. But that was hardly surprising given that Tubelight, the contractor, had threatened to cut off his water, electricity and phone lines if he didn’t simmer down.

As for Professor Pandey, he had been up for an hour and was engaged in his ablutions. The sounds of him clearing his throat and exhaling through his nostrils, which were amplified by the tiled walls of his small bathroom, could be heard clearly out in the street.

Shashi and Zia carried on shoveling some dirt, smoking bidis and discussing the physical assets of their favorite Bollywood actresses.

“Katrina Kaif is as thin as a grasshopper,” said Shashi as they kept a surreptitious eye on the house across the way. “No meat on the bones, brother. For me it is Vidya Balan. Have you seen those eyes? Wah!”

He broke into a rendition of ‘Tu Cheez Bath Hai Mast Mast’.

From the Gym, Puri drove to Basant Lane, where he rendezvoused with Tubelight at nine o’clock.

The operative had been busy finding out all he could about Professor Pandey and archaeologist Shivraj Sharma – “putting them under the scanner,” in the detective’s parlance. Servants, drivers, neighbors and street sweepers had been consulted and bribed for gossip and information.

He had the following to report:

“Sharma’s wife died two years back in a car accident. Son was also injured. In a wheelchair, lives at home. Sharma’s a strict Brahmin: servants aren’t allowed in the kitchen. He fired one last month for drinking from one of his glasses. A Brahmin cook prepares the meals. Sharma’s very religious. A long-standing VHP member.” VHP stood for Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a right-wing organization that sought to turn India into a solely Hindu nation.

“And Pandey?” asked Puri.

“Nothing unusual, Boss. Eccentric – obviously. Always jolly. Never married. Lived with his mummy until she died last year. One thing: his servants – cook, cleaner, driver – all left last week. No one knows why. His current driver is a replacement.”

They discussed plans for breaking into Professor Pandey’s house to have a look around, but decided they needed a clearer picture of his schedule first.

“Tell your boys to keep him in their sights,” instructed the detective. “This laughing professor is involved somehow. Of that much I am certain.”

Tubelight’s phone rang. It was Shashi, reporting that Pandey had left the house and was on his way to the Garden of Five Senses, where he was due to hold his Laughter Memorial for Dr. Jha.

“While he is so occupied, I will take a look round his office at Delhi University. See what all I can turn up,” said the detective.

Puri drove through Civil Lines, where the British East India Company stationed its army before the War of Independence of 1847, to Delhi University. He passed the British Viceregal Lodge Estate with its whitewashed pillars and rose garden, now home to the Faculty of Science, and soon reached the School of Electrical Engineering.

A gaggle of male and female students milled around outside, joking and flirting. The detective made his way up the steps of the building, catching strains of Hindi rap playing on a mobile phone and snippets of current Delhi jargon – “What’s the funda, dude?” “He’s one of those art frat types!” “Nice half-pants!”

Inside, the main corridor was empty save for a couple of students walking toward him. He asked them for Professor Pandey’s office and was directed to the third door on the right.

While he waited for the corridor to empty, he read the notices pinned to the board. One announced the next topic of discussion at the debating society – ‘Can India afford to be an ally of the U.S.?’; another appealed for the ‘person or persons who removed the human skeleton from the biology lab to return it forthwith’.

The detective, whose key chain contained a pick and a set of tension wrenches, had little trouble opening the lock to Professor Pandey’s office.

The room was small but orderly, the shelves crowded with reference books and binders, the in-tray brimming with uncorrected exam papers. Puri opened drawers, searched the filing cabinet and sifted through the rubbish bin.

He then spent a few minutes reading Pandey’s notes for an upcoming lecture on signal processing.

“Signals can be either analog, in which case the signal varies continuously according to the information, or digital, in which case the signal varies according to a series of discrete values representing the information. For analog signals, signal processing may involve the amplification and filtering of audio signals for audio equipment or the modulation and demodulation of signals for telecommunications. For digital signals…”

The detective could feel his eyes glazing over and placed the notes back where he had found them. He sat back in Pandey’s chair and looked up at the photographs on the wall. One had been taken at an early morning Laughing Club session. The professor was standing with head tilted back, hands on hips and stomach pushed out.

Puri cast his eyes over the other pictures: parents, picnics, young nephews looking wide-eyed at the camera.

At the top of the wall hung an old black-and-white picture of nine men standing in front of an Indian satellite. There was a small brass plaque attached to the bottom of the frame. It read: DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS, INSAT IA, 1981.

Puri took it down to get a closer look. A younger Professor Pandey stood near the middle of the group.

The detective recognized the man standing next to him as well. It was Dr. Suresh Jha.

The two men had known each other for much longer than two years.

“Why Pandey told me otherwise?” murmured Puri to himself.