Night work (21 page)

She found Boyle and the Mehta brothers in the diminutive kitchen.
The room had no cooking facilities aside from a microwave oven and an
electric kettle, which Peter was filling with water at a bar sink too
narrow to hold a dinner plate. He put the kettle on the counter and
switched it on, and Kate had it on the tip of her tongue to ask Mehta
why he had not converted this room to a proper, if small, kitchen, when
she glanced at Laxman's bereaved face and let the question
subside for the moment.

Peter set four cups and a packet of tea bags on the sink and then turned to his brother.

"Laxman, these people would like to talk to you about, well--"

"Pramilla," said Laxman, and raised his lovely eyes to
Kate. "You want to talk about my wife and the way she died,
because you're policemen and that's what the police do when
a person dies, they talk to the family."

"Laxman watches a lot of television," Peter offered in
explanation. Kate nodded and she and Boyle sat down in the chairs
across the table from the boy-man. The tiny room was very full of
people.

"All right, Mr. Mehta," Boyle began, "tell--"

"I'm Laxman. Mr. Mehta is my brother."

Both detectives found themselves smiling. "Okay, Laxman. Tell me, how do you think Pramilla died?"

"I killed her," Laxman said. Their smiles died a sudden death and Peter nearly dropped the teapot he was holding.

"Mani!" he exclaimed. "What are you saying? Oh, I knew this was not a good idea."

Boyle put out a hand to shut him up, and said to the beautiful young
man across from him, keeping his voice even and gentle, "How do
you mean, you killed her?"

"They all said I would if I hit her again, because I'm
really very strong and she's so tiny. She was so tiny, I mean. So
I didn't hit her and I didn't, even when she made me so
angry with her teasing, but they said I would kill her and she's
dead now, so I must have done it. I don't remember, but I must
have."

"Did you hit her a lot, Laxman?"

"Three times. Three different times, I mean. I hit her one
time when she made me mad by turning off the television. And the second
time was when she... she was angry and she called me names. I hit
her two or three times then, I don't remember exactly. And then
the last time she was teasing me because she'd been talking with
some other men and I didn't think that was right and I told her
so and she laughed! She laughed at me and so I hit her and... and
hit her. That time I made her bleed really bad and it scared me, and
she cried and I told her I'd never do it again because if she did
have a baby I didn't want her to lose it. So then I promised I
would hit other things if I got mad, so I wouldn't hit her. And I
did that twice. Once I punched a hole in the wall. I hurt my
hand."

They looked at him, and he looked back at them. Finally Boyle
cleared his throat. "On the afternoon Pramilla died, Laxman? What
were you doing?"

Laxman gave Boyle a flat stare, not really seeing him, and Kate
thought he had either not understood the question or was zoning out
(was he on drugs, prescription or otherwise?), but after a minute his
eyes focused again. "She was making me
panir pakharas.
They're my favorite. I was angry at her in the morning--not
real mad but a little--and she went out and bought
something." He stood up abruptly and walked out of the room,
coming back with a small Chinese figure of a boy leading a water
buffalo, which he put on the table in front of Kate. "She said
she bought it because it was like me, and she was going to make me the
pakharas
so I would be happy. And I was, until I heard the sirens stop in front
of the house and people shouting. And I haven't been happy since.
I don't think I ever will be again."

Kate looked down at the crude little figurine, alone in the center
of the table, and it occurred to her that Pramilla could easily have
meant not that the boy in the statue reminded her of Laxman, but rather
the lumbering beast who was being led. If the latter, then the girl had
possessed a sharp sense of humor. Kate could well believe that this
dull-witted man could have been driven to fury until the girl relented
and made him his
pakharas.

"She smelled bad," Laxman added suddenly.

"Who," Boyle asked. "Pramilla?"

"She was burned up and they wouldn't let me see her, but
she smelled awful. Rani said that's how our people at home make
funerals, by burning, but I don't like it. It's
terrible."

"I agree, Laxman, it's not very pleasant. Tell me,
Laxman, what did you do while Pramilla went out to cook the,
er...?"

Laxman regarded the detective blankly, as if he hadn't heard
the question. It seemed to be a part of his thinking process, however,
because after a minute he said, "She went to cook the
pakharas.
Cheese
pakharas.
I tried to watch my television programs, only I couldn't because
I was still angry, and so I had a hot bath like she said to do when I
got mad, it would make me feel better. And it did. So I went back to
the TV. And then the sirens came."

"Laxman, did you happen--" Kate started to ask, but
this time Laxman was not listening, and went on with his thought.

"She was good to me, and she was so pretty, and her hair
smelled so sweet and her skin was soft. I miss her so much. If she came
back I'd never be angry at her ever again. But she's dead
and horrible and now I'll never be happy again." And with
that he dropped his head onto his arms on the tabletop and began to sob
as extravagantly as a child.

Embarrassed, Peter abandoned the tea he was trying to make and
awkwardly comforted his howling brother. Kate glanced at Boyle, and
could see in his face the agreement that they were not about to get a
lot more out of either Mehta tonight. Boyle thanked Peter and Laxman in
a loud voice, and they left.

They halted at the foot of the stairs.

"Do you want to try talking to Mrs. Mehta?" Boyle asked.

Kate shrugged. "We could try, and come back later with a translator if her English is too bad."

They found Rani Mehta in the kitchen with three of the children. A
boy of about thirteen was sitting at the table with a stack of books:
the eldest, Rajiv, no doubt. A girl of about six or seven occupied the
chair across from him; in front of her was a row of naked dolls with
frayed hair, some of them missing various limbs. She had two of them in
her hands, carrying on a loud conversation for them concerning, Kate
thought, swimming pools. The third child was of uncertain sex until it
turned and they could see the gold loops in her ears. She was seated on
the floor whining in a manner that indicated she had been there for
quite a while, and that she had no real hope of being rescued anytime
soon. Rani was crashing some pans into the sink, talking loudly in some
jerky language that Kate thought might be Hindi. She did not seem to
have an adult audience, but after a minute an elderly, stoop-shouldered
woman came in from the next room with a couple of bowls. She stopped
dead in the doorway and said something to the woman at the sink, who
spun around as if she was being attacked. The two female children went
silent in surprise, and even the oblivious Rajiv looked up from his
books and blinked.

"I'm sorry to bother you, Mrs. Mehta," Kate said
with a smile. "We've been talking with your husband and
Laxman, and I wonder if we might have a word with you before we go.
I'm Inspector Martinelli, this is Inspector Boyle."

Rani did not answer, but glanced across at the older woman as if in need of reassurance.

Boyle took a couple of steps over to where the boy was working. "Math?" he asked.

"Algebra," confirmed the boy.

"You must be Rajiv," Boyle said. "You're, what--thirteen?"

"Twelve," the boy corrected him shyly, looking pleased, and Kate recalled that Boyle had kids of his own.

"Does your mom speak English, Rajiv?"

"A little."

"She probably has trouble when she's surprised like
this. Would you mind telling her what Inspector Martinelli said?"

Rajiv spoke to his mother, but even in translation their greeting did not seem to reassure her much.

"Rajiv, whenever there's a death like that of your aunt,
we need to get a very clear idea of what was going on around the time
she died. Could you ask your mother to tell us what--"

"You not bother the boy," Rani interrupted. "Rajiv, take your sisters upstairs."

"Just a minute, Rajiv," Boyle said as the boy obediently
began to gather his books. "You were here, weren't you,
that night?"

Rajiv nodded.

"Right here?"

Another nod.

"You were the first one to see the fire?"

Nod.

Kate walked over to glance out of the window beside the boy. From
where he was seated, only the back half of the garden shed was
visible-- the fire would have been well and truly under way before
he had seen it.

"Did you see anyone near your aunt's cook shed a little while before you saw the fire?"

"I was working," Rajiv told them. Having seen the
boy's powers of concentration, Kate could well believe that a
troop of mounted police could have ridden through the backyard without
disturbing the scholar from his books.

"Go now, Rajiv," his mother said firmly, and waited
while all three children left the room before she drew herself up to
face the invading police.

Rani Mehta was a formidable woman, not tall but with rolls of brown
flesh at the edges of her brilliant orange sari and its short flowered
underblouse. She wore her hair in a heavy bun on the back of her head
and had a dozen solid silver bracelets on her wrists like shackles. The
red marriage mark on her forehead looked like a bleeding sore. Her
features were heavy, her teeth strong and white, and she had a black
mole on her face next to her nose. Not for the first time, Kate
speculated about the attraction that the lithe young Pramilla might
have had for her brother-in-law.

They discovered that the woman's understanding of their
questions was pretty close to complete, and Kate recalled from
someone's statement that Pramilla was accustomed to having the
television on all day. Probably Rani did as well, which might also
explain the paradox of her relatively clear understanding coupled with
the difficulty she demonstrated in putting together an English
sentence: A person does not generally carry on a two-way conversation
with the TV.

"Mrs. Mehta," Boyle went on, "could you tell us please what you were doing that afternoon?"

"I cook," she said, looking down her slightly upturned
nose at Kate as if understanding that this was a woman who neither
cooked nor cared for children. "I made
mutter panir
and
dhal
and
kaju kari
and
brinjal
and two
chatnis,
and I was cooking the
parathas
when I heard Rajiv shout. I ran to get my husband in his room. He went to look, and then he call the fire."

"Do you know what Pramilla was doing in the cooking shed?"

The fat rolls shrugged. "Cooking. She take
panir
--cheese--to make
pakharas.
I say leave some for the
mutter panir,
she leave small piece. I think, oh well."

The colloquial expression sounded odd in the heavy accent, but neither detective smiled.

"What do you think happened, Mrs. Mehta?"

The woman pushed out her lower lip and gave a small eyebrow shrug. "I think she spill the hot oil into the fire.
Pakharas
is not for foolish girls to make."

"The, um,
pakharas
are cooked in hot oil?"

"Boiling oil," she said with relish. "Very boiling."

"I see. Well, thank you, Mrs. Mehta. We may want to speak with
you again tomorrow, but we'll let you get on with your
work."

Rani dried her hands on a towel and accompanied them to the front
door--less, Kate thought, as a polite gesture than to ensure they
did not poke into things on their way out. They thanked her again, and
heard the lock turn behind them as they went down the front steps.

Boyle had driven, and would drop Kate home. As he put the car into
forward, he said, "That woman is really something."

"She must have hated Pramilla the minute she set eyes on her.
And to have the girl under the same roof as her husband. She might be a
great cook and the mother of his children, but she was never a
beauty."

"But Laxman loved the girl. Temper or no, he loved her."

Kate agreed; that bedroom shouted aloud the man's devotion,
heaping beauteous objects on his wife. Yes, Laxman's extravagant
grief had been real enough. However, love went hand in hand with
violence, as anyone who worked a domestic homicide could testify, and
especially with the jealous knowledge of Pramilla's illicit
conversations with other men riding in his mind. Grief in and of itself
was no proof that Laxman's had not been the hand that knocked the
girl down, any more than his disgust at her charred body could prove
that he had not in rage or confusion or childish petulance splashed her
with kerosene and set her alight.

No proof at all.

Chapter 12

IN THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED, Jimmy Larsen and Matty Banderas rode
squarely in the center of Kate's sight, with Pramilla
Mehta--who was, after all, Boyle's case--firmly pushed
slightly off to one side, while on the periphery of her vision lurked
all the other still-open cases, haunting the corners of her mind like
so many cobwebbed gargoyles. A call from Janice Popper revealed that
Matthew Banderas had made a pass at the manager of a software store,
and when she had canceled their purchase contract, he had threatened to
tell everyone that she was a lesbian. She just laughed and told him to
go ahead, since it happened that she was. The woman also told Popper
that she had been receiving an unusual number of wrong-number,
dark-of-the-night phone calls and two whispered obscenities on her
answering machine. None, incidentally, since Matthew Banderas had died.