PART – TIME MURDER.

It was pitch dark inside the house. It was a moonless night and the nearest street lamp had been put out of commission by yours truly. The only means of navigation was to wait for a vehicle to pass along the road and use that enlightened moment to get an idea of the furniture layout. A car duly passed, I got my bearings and reached the bedroom easily. It is a popular misconception that entering a house is hard. Actually that’s the easiest past. As for me, I always use the door. I have yet to encounter a lock I cannot pick. The hard part is to locate the cash & get away on time without leaving any clues behind.

I think you must have guessed by now that I am a burglar. You see, story telling is not my strong point as is the opening of locks, so there always will be a lack of sequence in these memoirs of mine. Anyway, not much has been lost in the telling so far. I was on one of my routine jobs, a bungalow at Indiranagar, one of the localities that had sprung up recently in Nashik. The location was quite ideal. Not many houses nearby and not much traffic either. Only one thing bothered me. I hadn’t done my homework well enough. Usually, before every job, I make myself thoroughly aware of the whereabouts of the owners. I hadn’t done it this time and it weighed on my mind. Speed, therefore, was of the essence.

So I set about my task without losing any time. The owners hadn’t even bothered to hide the safe. It was an old fashioned Godrej model, one of most common ones available. It took me exactly three-and-a half minutes to open. The haul wasn’t much, but enough to justify the risk. I took all the cash and left the jewels & ornaments. Jewelry is the bane of thieves and the easiest route to jail. I always prided myself on my professionalism and believe that this one of the reasons that I haven’t been caught, yet. Greed wasn’t my motive anyway. I was in this profession for the kicks it gave me. The cash did help of course, but the thrill of pulling off a smooth job beats any other kind of intoxication. I then relocked the safe (a quirk that was part of my modus operandi) and was about to leave, when I heard the front door opening below.

There wasn’t any time to think. I jumped into the nearest closet and pulled the door shut from within. I was just in time, as the person or persons came straight up to the bedroom. I could hear stifled noises and imagined that he/she/they must be changing clothes. I didn’t move a muscle & praying that the closet wouldn’t be required, resigned myself to fate. Then I heard a creak from the bed and risked a look, through a gap between the closet doors. The room was dark, but my eyes were by now accustomed. The occupants of the bed were a young woman and a man. They were making love with a minimum of noise and a lot of haste. Actually, looking back, their behaviour was quite strange. I am a noisy lover myself and here I was, closeted (literally) in a room with two frantic and noiseless lovers. Weird. There was something clandestine about this, but I couldn’t put a finger on it, but the scene was highly erotic. Despite the dire circumstances, I was turned on, but there was nothing to do but wait…and watch.

Eventually, after what seemed like ages, they climaxed and she switched on a bedside lamp. The young man quickly dressed in the feeble light, as I watched through a crack in the closet door. He then kissed her and left as silently as he could. She pulled up the bed covers and sank back with a luxurious yawn into the downy pillow. I waited till I heard her regular breathing and stole out of the closet. Hardly had I reached the bedroom door, when I heard the front door opening again. The bloody place seemed worse than a Railway Station during the summer vacation.

This time, there wasn’t even there wasn’t even the option of the closet. I looked around and nipped behind the floor length curtains covering the window, hoping nobody would notice the unnatural bulge. I was painfully aware of my insecure position. The windows had a fixed M.S. Grill and jumping out from the first floor was ruled out. I am a thief, not an acrobat or a magician. No choice but to wait.

The second person came up the stairs. Strangely, I could barely hear his or her footsteps distinctly. It was as if, he or she was trying to come in by stealth. As the person entered, I could make out that it was a man. The first sign of something fishy flashed to me when he didn’t switch on the lights, but advanced toward the bed where the woman slept, unaware. I had a grandstand seat for the whole drama. The chap didn’t waste any time. Pulling out a kerchief, he gagged her as she awoke, struggling. He swiftly bound her hands and feet to the posts of the bed, leaving her nude and spread-eagled on the bed. He then leisurely began to take his clothes off.

All this time I had been paralyzed, but couldn’t take it anymore. My instincts for self-preservation told me to rush out of the house, but there was some vestige of ethics in me that won. I crept out silently, armed with a pair of heavy-duty wire-clippers from my tool-set. The woman’s eyes widened, seeing me come up behind him, but being gagged she didn’t make a sound. I let him have it with all I had, right on the cranium. The chap just didn’t know what hit him and went down like a log of wood.

Now came the tricky part. I sat down on the bed beside the woman and removed her gag, clamping my hand on her mouth in the same motion.

“Madam” I said, “Please do not be frightened. I’m no rapist. I’m just a thief”. Even to my ears this didn’t sound so reassuring, but I went on regardless. “I was in the process of robbing your house when you returned unexpectedly and have been in the room since then. I was hiding in the closet. My intention was to vanish after you fell asleep, but at that very moment this chap entered and I couldn’t leave. The rest, you know. So please don’t scream, I’ll untie you first and then let us see what’s to be done about villain No. 2 here”. Saying this I untied her.

She was more relieved than frightened and didn’t utter a word. Actually she looked quite a picture with not a stitch of clothes on. She was petite, with a flawless complexion, sharp features, lithe body and a flat belly. She did not bother to cover herself either. It was a struggle for me, to keep my eyes from wandering while we spoke, but she appeared not to notice my rising ardour. The presence of the fallen chap brought me back to more pressing worries and we proceeded to examine the fellow.

I crouched by the prone scoundrel. One touch of his wrists confirmed my worst fears.

“Bloody hell! The bastard’s dead” I said.

She screamed, with a hand to her throat

“Oh my God, what’ll happen now?” 

“Wait, let me think…”

“You shouldn’t have hit him so hard”.

“This is no time for accusations. Let’s think about what’s to be done”

“I’ll call the police!” she shouted

“No, No, not that!” I shouted, “I’ll take care of the fellow. What about the rest of the people in this house?”

“There’s only my husband, and he’s gone out of town. He won’t be back for two days”

“Good.  Now, here’s what we’ll do…wait, then who was that guy who came – literally – with you earlier?”

“Well…he...” she stammered, eyes suddenly downcast.

“Forget it. That’s your problem…and your husband’s. Do you recognize this fellow, this would-be rapist?”

“No, I’ve never seen him before”.

“All the better, Let’s do it this way. I’ll take the body and dump it in the river. Just forget about the whole thing. It just didn’t happen”.

“How can you be so casual about it? A man has been killed, for God’s sake!”

“Yes, but what else can be done? If the police get to know of this, I’ll be ruined. So will your marriage. I won’t go down alone, even if I want to. The police can prise out anything from anyone. The best thing is to forget all about it. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of every thing. Your part in this is to just keep your mouth shut”. Saying this, I lifted the fellow onto my shoulder and left via the back door.

The entire route to the river was a nightmare. I could go only part of the way in my car. It was too risky. Somebody could have spotted my registration number. So, the last kilometer or so, I did on foot. It was one long journey of hiding, running, stopping, all with that body on my shoulder weighing more and more by the minute. I managed to get to the river after what seemed like a lifetime. I must have died a thousand deaths on every step of that horrible journey. Once there, I unceremoniously dumped the body in & left for home. It was calm and deserted at that time of night. Come morning and there would be thousands of pilgrims here. Ironically, this was a place that pious Hindus from all over came to immerse the ashes of their dead in the holy Godavari. A surefire passport to heaven. The rapist must have done something good after all to merit this.

It was almost dawn by the time I reached my home in the mazelike rabbit warrens of the old city. I couldn’t sleep a wink and waited for sunrise, drinking cup after cup of scalding hot coffee. Desultorily going through with my toilet, I rushed back to the river. By then, a huge crowd had gathered, with the police in the forefront. I hung around at the fringes, asking supposedly innocent questions of bystanders. Nobody seemed to know anything specific. All they knew was that the body had been discovered by a dhobi and nobody had any clue whether it was murder or suicide.

I went home, breathing easily after a long long time.

For three days I didn’t even attend my job at the Municipal Corporation, where I’m an Engineer in the Town planning Section. All I did was pore through all the local newspapers for news about the murder. It made big news on the first and second day. It was relegated to the inner pages on the third & ceased to be news on the fourth day onwards. All I gathered was that the fellow was a convicted rapist, just out of a jail and that he hadn’t any relatives, for the body was kept for seven days and cremated at state expense.

To date, nothing has come up. It’s been more than three years. The woman, bless her immoral soul, has kept mum. Who says that women can’t keep secrets? They sure can, when there is teensy bit of guilt associated. The one positive fall out is that I have retired from my second profession. I’ve had enough thrills to last me a lifetime.