The Astral Alibi Read online

  A wave of sympathy swamped Sonia. She recognised genuine, raw pain and emotion when she saw it. And she felt helpless. Helpless to comfort, to reverse actions and situations, or to advise.

  “I’m sorry. It’s just that I…feel so angry…” the young man stammered.

  “I understand,” Sonia cut in softly.

  “I thought that Vidya wanted to patch up things with me, that’s why she’d agreed to meet with me. But it wasn’t like that at all. When we met, I knew in my heart that her feelings for me hadn’t changed. She still cared for me. She was bound by honour to her husband, but a part of her heart would always be with me. I saw it in her eyes. And the way she stared at me, as if trying to etch my face into her memory. And the way she returned our college photograph to me. As if she sensed that something was indeed going to happen to her. And when she requested me to stop following her around. It surprised me that she was aware that I was following her!

  “I hate to admit it, but I hung around every night outside her house and spied on her. As long as I could see and hear something, I had to do it. To ensure that everything was fine with her. I knew that she had arguments with her in-laws and that she rarely complained to her husband. But last night was different. Last night, I know that she and her mother-in-law had a roaring argument. Mrs. Sahay was yelling at her, and for the first time Vidya yelled back. Last night, I saw the change in Vidya. The fighting spirit was back. Maybe if she had lived, she would have walked out on her husband in the morning!” Agony was written all over Kartik’s face. “Oh God, if I’d only known that it was her last night, that someone was going to murder her, I would’ve stopped it!”

  “Kartik…You had no idea that someone was planning to kill Vidya. You had absolutely no idea!” Sonia interjected harshly. But she understood. Hadn’t she experienced a similar guilt pang earlier? Only, Kartik’s burden was greater than hers. But if there stood even a slight chance of easing his burden, she would take it. For his sake and hers…

  After a quick lunch of Misal Pav, Sonia returned to the diary, reading the last entries once again. Something about them puzzled her. Something elusive. Was it Vidya’s words? Her emotions and observations? Or was it something else?

  Well, she would discover what it was eventually. Right now, her hands itched to hold the horoscopes, especially Vidya’s horoscope. Now was the time to begin the process of travelling the depths into Vidya’s psyche! Vidya was no more, but her horoscope would reveal the girl to Sonia as if she were still alive. She drew the booklet out of her handbag and opened it. It was traditional charting of the horoscope and Sonia quickly ran her expert eye over it.

  Minutes ticked by. Silent minutes which turned into musical beats as Jatin slipped into the inner office and, unnoticed by his Boss, turned on the music system. He knew that his Boss particularly liked non-filmy Hindi ghazals, romantic Hindi film songs, hard rock, and jazz. She’d repeated to him, time and again, the importance of her “I formula”—“Nothing like music and dance to inspire insight into intuition and instigate investigation!” The priority merely went to the volume, which had to be loud and heart-thumping! He quickly left the room, mercifully shutting out the jing-bang which screeched into his sensitive ears.

  Sonia’s foot automatically tapped along with the dance instrumental. A finger twirled a lock of silky brown hair, as her mind focused on the horoscope in hand. Zodiac sign Scorpio. Aries on the ascendant. Jupiter in the sixth house in Virgo, in conjunction with Saturn and the Sun. Mars, Harshal, Neptune, and the Moon in Scorpio in the eighth house. What an unfortunate combination of stars! Vidya’s life seemed to have been fraught with struggle. As a child and then as a youngster and certainly in marriage. The horoscope revealed a very unhappy marriage full of compromises. A very serious health patch was indicated. Vidya was victimised—not only a victim of dowry harassment, but a victim of murder!

  Sonia leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. Suddenly she stood up and swayed with the music, her eyes still closed. Nidhi opened one sleepy eye, watched her mistress in a detached manner. The cat was used to her mistress’s strange behaviour patterns, specially when loud ear-splitting rumblings seemed to rock the earth! The cat closed her eyes again, willing herself to ignore the sounds. If only her mistress was aware of what Nidhi endured for the sake of love!

  Sonia danced with the music, till finally the piece ended. Perspiration trickled down her forehead, but her eyes were gleaming with satisfaction. Excitement coursed through her body as she turned once again to the horoscope, studying it with intensity and then taking up the diary. Her eyes scanned the last few entries. My God, was it possible? She’d heard of dowry harassment and deaths. But this? She needed to see the other horoscopes. As soon as possible!

  She quickly opened the booklets handed over to her by the Inspector and laid them side by side. Mr. Sahay, Mrs. Sahay. Loud, blustering, greedy characters. Mercenary and careless. Prepared to go to great lengths to meet their ends. The horoscopes revealed vicious, cruel traits. But cruelty amounting to murder? Sonia moved to the fourth horoscope—Parmeet. Basically a weak person, detached, indifferent. Passive.

  Sonia matched Vidya’s horoscope with Parmeet’s and instantly realised that these two were a most unsuited couple. Despite Vidya’s level of tolerance, her horoscope revealed a strong-willed person. Parmeet’s, on the other hand, showed definite signs of submissiveness. Perhaps it was this submissiveness that was responsible for Vidya’s harassment. The young husband’s lethargy had allowed his parents to cruelly dominate his wife. But where did he fit in the murder?

  Sonia studied the four horoscopes again, trying out various permutations and combinations in her mind. Was she being biased? Was she being influenced, subconsciously, by Parmeet’s passionate declaration of his love for his wife? Jatin had said she was naïve. She wasn’t, of course. She knew exactly what Parmeet meant. More so, now that she had read all their horoscopes. But if her suspicions were right, she was going to have a tough time proving them. Inspector Shinde had been right. This case was really quite simple. Too simple to be proved! She couldn’t shrug off the strange feeling that she was walking on a road scattered with banana peels. And the danger of skidding off, every time she put a step forward, in whichever direction she chose!

  Sonia swept a last thoughtful gaze over the horoscopes and then shut them. She had seen enough.

  She buzzed the intercom and Jatin instantly popped his head in. In a glance, he read breakthrough written all over his Boss’s flushed face.

  “What is it, Boss?” he asked in anticipation.

  “Two things. Call up Renuka and tell her I need to have a look at the apartment again. Especially Vidya’s room. And then call Kartik. I wish to talk to him.”

  “Right, Boss!”

  Sonia closed her eyes. Be calm, she admonished herself. There was yet a lot to be done. A lot to be proved. But if she was right, she knew exactly which path to tread on!

  She rose and headed towards the computer in the outer office. Jatin was making the calls. He observed her as she connected to the Internet and surfed for a while. Finally she stopped and turned to her assistant.

  “What do you know about dowry deaths?” she asked him.

  Jatin shrugged. “Nothing.”

  “There were amendments made to the Dowry Prohibitions Act of 1961. Under a new section 304-B in the Indian Penal Code, dowry death is an IPC offence, punishable with not less than seven years, which may extend to imprisonment for life.”

  “Boss, what are you getting at?”

  “Jatin, could you please call up Inspector Shinde? I need to talk to him.”

  “Right, Boss,” her assistant responded promptly. Sometimes it was better to do these menial tasks than follow his Boss’s thought process.

  Sonia stood outside the Sahay house for a moment, then walked across the street, to the building opposite. Jatin followed her silently. She hadn’t uttered a word for the last half hour. At the foot of the building, she paused and stood gazing up a
t the window of the first-floor apartment. It was exactly opposite the Sahay bedroom window. So this was the place from which he had spied on her. She moved to the list of apartment owners printed on a black board. Her eyes travelled along the embossed names. Then she turned and Jatin saw her triumphant look.

  “What is it, Boss?”

  “Come and take a look.”

  Jatin frowned. “I…don’t understand….”

  “You will, soon.” Sonia smiled. “Come on. We promised to meet Kartik at five. Let’s go!”

  Bewildered, her assistant fell in step with her firm and determined stride.

  “Are you sure this is the place?” Sonia asked, gazing up at the building.

  Kartik nodded. Sonia, Jatin, and Kartik stood outside a gate in the Deccan area. The traffic crowded around the signal, honking impatiently at the two-wheelers, and the crisscrossing pedestrians. Gift and greeting-card shops stood at each corner of the wide intersection.

  “I would park my bike on the opposite side and she would stop her auto right by the gate. Every alternate day,” Kartik explained.

  “And you have no idea whom she went inside to meet? Or what she did?” Sonia reconfirmed.

  “No. I assumed it was some friend, or that she was taking tuitions—you know, teaching students for some extra cash? I didn’t feel the need to pry. I know it may sound odd, specially since I’d been following her around, but I did that only to ensure her safety! Not that it helped a bit!”

  “Don’t be too sure of that,” Sonia said in an enigmatic tone. “I believe your persistence may have helped—a lot!”

  Jatin quickly glanced at his Boss, but her face was non-committal.

  “You two wait here. I’m going in to find out what I can. But I don’t want a crowd,” she said, and the others nodded.

  Sonia opened the small gate which led up a path to a curved staircase. On the landing, she came across a shaded glass door with a nameplate. With a mouth gone suddenly dry, she read the name on the door.

  “What are you looking for?” Renuka asked again.

  With Inspector Shinde’s permission, Sonia had been foraging through cupboards and divans for the last half hour, her fingers determinedly probing hidden corners. Jatin studied his Boss for an explanation, but she gave none. He sympathised with Renuka’s exasperation. He had experienced similar feelings on many cases. But he had discovered that his Boss usually had a very good reason for her secrecy. And he had learnt to respect her investigative methods. Ultimately she was right.

  Mrs. Sahay followed them from room to room, glowering, her mouth spewing angry, ugly retorts and comments. “Messing around the house, disrupting my home! All because of that daughter-in-law of mine who had the misfortune of dying in the house! And they blame me and my family! Forgetting that we may be grieved, too, even though she was not the best of daughter-in-laws and had as many flaws as you could count! And the cheek of this…this stranger upsetting my sacred home! God knows which caste she is. She’s even touching my God! Hey Bhagwan—Oh God!—help us. Protect us from these invaders….”

  Sonia ignored the woman. She continued her search in a cool, detached, single-minded manner. Her mind remained focused. She knew exactly what she was looking for. If she could only ferret it out…Where could it be?

  Inspector Shinde arrived at that moment. His stance was severe as he announced, “I have an arrest warrant for Mrs. Sahay for murdering her daughter-in-law, Vidya!”

  Renuka gave a spontaneous triumphant chuckle.

  “No!” Mr. Sahay screamed. “These are all lies! You can’t catch the real murderer, so you’re arresting my wife!”

  “The residue in the glass of milk and the contents in the sleeping pill bottle found in your wife’s cupboard are the same. We don’t need further proof.”

  “You can’t do this to us. We need to see a lawyer,” Parmeet spoke up.

  “Go ahead and contact your lawyer. And say all you want to in the court,” Inspector Shinde retorted.

  Sonia cleared her throat. “Inspector Shinde, can I speak to you for a minute?”

  Renuka turned to her in surprise and even the policeman looked curious, but he nodded. He gestured to his constables to keep an eye on the Sahays, then followed Sonia and Jatin into the next room. Renuka stepped into the room, after them.

  “Yes, what is it, Ms. Samarth? You will have to hurry.” Shinde spoke a trifle impatiently.

  “Of course,” Sonia agreed readily. “Let me come straight to the point. I’m afraid you cannot arrest Mrs. Sahay for murder.”

  “What!” Renuka exclaimed.

  “We have proof, Madam,” the policeman reiterated coldly.

  “Let me explain. From the beginning I’ve had this feeling about the three M’s of investigation. The Motive was obvious enough. Harrassment for dowry. But the manner in which Vidya was killed and with the Material used—in this case, the sleeping pills—puzzled me. Why kill your own daughter-in-law in the house with your own pills and then leave the murder weapon around to be found? Also, I was curious about what Vidya’s horoscope had to say about all this. It told me that Vidya had not been murdered, but that she had committed suicide!”

  A gasp escaped the other three.

  “Suicide!” Renuka cried in disbelief. “But why?”

  “With Mrs. Sahay’s sleeping pills?” Jatin demanded.

  “But she didn’t leave a suicide note,” Shinde added.

  “Vidya didn’t leave a suicide note because she did not want anyone to discover that this was a suicide! As we all know, Vidya was terribly harassed by her in-laws for dowry for a car. She knew that there was no way out of this mess. Especially since Parmeet, her husband, was incapable of keeping his parents from making such demands. But she wasn’t going to give in without a fight. She was fed up with life, but she also desperately wanted to teach her in-laws a lesson. She planned it well. She had a loud argument with her mother-in-law, loud enough for Kartik to hear, for she knew he was following her and would prove a perfect witness. She planned it on a night when her husband would be away, because she did not wish to drag him into it. Even in her last moments, when she wrote in her diary, there was no malice or resentment towards her husband. After the argument, she dissolved his mother’s sleeping pills into the glass of milk, and replaced the bottle in Mrs. Sahay’s cupboard. Then, at peace because she would finally have her revenge, she drank the milk. In the morning her husband found her dead.”

  A heavy silence ensued, as each grappled with the narration.

  At length, Inspector Shinde sighed. “But why go to so much trouble? Had she simply lodged a complaint with the police, the Sahays would have been booked in no time.”

  “But for harassment. And not for long. They would’ve been back home within months and with an appetite for vengeance. No, Vidya had to do this right. For good,” Sonia pointed out.

  “But to kill yourself…” Renuka murmured.

  “You’d be surprised at the mental torture and low self-esteem of these girls who are harassed for dowry. Demands are difficult to be proved. And facing the same intensity of harassment day after day is an ordeal one can only imagine.”

  “What about proof?” Shinde asked.

  “When you checked the bottle for prints, you found Vidya’s fingerprints on it, didn’t you?” Sonia replied.

  “Actually, we did, but since Vidya usually gave her mother-in-law the dose…Perhaps what you say may hold some truth.” The policeman shook his head in amazement.

  “The Sahays will go scot-free,” Renuka pointed out gloomily.

  “Not exactly,” Sonia added with a half smile. “I said Mrs. Sahay cannot be arrested for murder, but she can be charged for provoking suicide! Isn’t the fact of the death of a woman, within seven years of her married life, under suspicious conditions reason enough for a good lawyer to make a case? Besides, we cannot ignore the cause of the suicide. Harassment. Vidya was frustrated and fed up with the harassment and she killed herself to escape the constant dowry dem
ands. Is that not reason enough for arresting Mrs. Sahay? Section 498-A? Section 498-A in the Indian Penal Code covers harassment—physical and mental torture, emotional torture through verbal abuse. Surely that could drive a woman to commit suicide. Under the law, if it is shown that soon before her death a woman was subjected to cruelty or harassment by her husband, or any relative of her husband, in connection with any demand for dowry, the persons are held responsible for this dowry death.”

  Shinde looked at Sonia and smiled. “You’re quite amazing!”

  Jatin glanced at his Boss in admiration. Didn’t he already know that?

  But anger flashed in Renuka’s eyes. “But Mrs. Sahay will be held for harassment, not a dowry death, thanks to you, Sonia. Why did you do this! Why did you spoil her plan?”

  Sonia reserved a dignified silence, allowing the girl to vent her feelings.

  “God knows they deserved the punishment! Now, because of you, Parmeet is a free bird—”

  “Vidya did not wish to involve Parmeet in this whole ugly business,” Sonia had to cut in. “Her diary is explicit proof of her devotion to her husband.”

  “My friend was a fool! Parmeet is as much to blame as his parents.”

  “Not in Vidya’s opinion.”