Second Lives (33 page)

I went up to the console at the back. The entire show was being orchestrated from there. Roy stayed a few steps behind. It was quite dark. I hoped that we wouldn’t be seen by Karan’s men. They were bound to be around somewhere.

The event director hissed, ‘Where the hell were you, Neel? We’ve been looking all over since last night.’

I tried to keep my voice calm. ‘Sorry. I was…tied up.’

‘Have you brought the damned AV?’

I pulled out the envelope and extracted a slim DVD case. ‘Yes, here you go.’

‘Thank God! Just in time…We would have had to cancel it otherwise.’ He passed the DVD to one of the technicians standing behind him. ‘It’s too late to merge it with the other one. I’ll just set them to play in sequence, and hope it works.’

‘I hope so too.’ I had made a last-minute change in the video. There was no time to test the final version properly.

There was a burst of applause. The President had concluded his address. He stepped away from the podium. Walked across to the other side of the stage. A dais had been erected there for the chief guests. He sat down between the Chairman of the Board, who was a noted business tycoon and philanthropist, and the principal.

Karan leaned across to whisper something to the President. I guess he was complimenting him on his speech.

The emcee came on stage. A retired actor had been the original choice. He dropped out at the last minute. This man had been hastily brought in as a stand-in. He began in his faux American drawl, ‘The Founder’s Day event is a celebration of the glorious heritage of our school but it is also an opportunity for our alumni from around the world to return to these hallowed portals and take that nostalgic walk down memory lane. This year, we have the highest attendance ever, up almost fifty per cent from last year.’

There was the inevitable applause.

‘As you know, we traditionally commemorate the silver and golden jubilee batches but this time, given that we are celebrating a hundred and fifty years, the organisers have decided to include the batch completing twelve years since graduation.’ He paused. ‘The more the merrier, I say. And one thing is for sure…It’s definitely brought down the average age of this audience.’ There were some murmurs but the joke fell flat.

He cleared his throat and said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, before we proceed to the alumni service, let us take a few minutes to remember a few individuals from these batches who are no longer with us, but whose memories shall never fade from our hearts. I request your full attention to the audio-visual presentation we are about to play for you.’

The lights dimmed. The large screen on the stage, and two smaller ones halfway down the auditorium, came to life.

A long, profound quotation on life and death scrolled across the displays. Followed by the opening bars of a soulful tune. The slideshow began to roll. I watched impatiently. Each photo was accompanied by a name, occupation and date of passing. The golden jubilee batch had a larger number. For obvious reasons. I wondered how all the information had been tracked down.

The silver guys had also lost quite a few. There was a group of four who had died on the same day. I guessed they must have perished together in an accident or something. It was pretty ironical in the context of what was about to come.

Finally, the segment came to an end. The screens went blank. The music stopped abruptly. Then my voice rang out deep and clear over the speakers. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Neel and I want to tell you a story.’

I held my breath.

Showtime.

82

Roy

I saw the guys at the console look at each other, clearly surprised. They were expecting the last few slides from our batch and then the presentation to end. This wasn’t supposed to be in the script. No one in the audience knew that though, so they just kept watching, unmoved.

I glanced at Karan. He remained impassive.

Neel continued. ‘It’s unfortunate that we’ve lost five members of our batch, even though many of us are yet to turn thirty. Take a look.’

Photographs of Jo, myself, Rachel, Sara and Omar scrolled through. I was taken aback. Neel hadn’t told me that he had edited the video after our escape from the swimming pool.

I wasn’t sure how he had managed but it was a brilliant touch.

There was a collective gasp from the audience when they saw yesterday’s date on Omar’s photo. People looked at each other, especially those who knew him and had probably seen him around barely a few hours ago.

Neel’s voice came on again. ‘What’s really unfortunate is that all these five people, each of them a wonderful human being, were murdered.’ He paused. ‘Not only murdered, but murdered by the same man.’

This was the critical moment. Would someone, like the principal or the event coordinator or even Karan himself, stop the proceedings now? We had debated this point endlessly. But everyone was stunned into silence, wondering what was coming next.

Karan got up half-way from his seat, his face full of anger and confusion, then sat down again, perhaps realising that he couldn’t afford to react like that. But people would recall his reflexive action later.

The photos scrolled by again, slowly. ‘Jo, the whiz-kid of our batch, was brutally murdered in our pre-final year. A local sweeper was executed for the crime but he was innocent. Roy, one of the most popular students on campus, was knocked unconscious and pushed into a raging Himalayan river one cold winter night.

‘Rachel, the nicest and warmest person you could ever hope to meet, was hanged at her mother’s home in Goa just two months ago, because she had discovered the identity of the killer and the extent of his crimes. And not a week has passed since Sara, heart-throb of our batch, was shot in her own home for the same reason.’

‘And finally Omar, my dear friend Omar, who was chatting and laughing with several of us yesterday, was tortured and killed last evening.’ Another well-timed pause. ‘His mutilated body is lying in the swimming pool.’

It was Omar who had scripted and directed the whole thing. We had agreed that it was best for Neel to do the voiceover, for he had the legitimacy of his close involvement with the school alumni association. The bit about Omar’s death hadn’t been in the script, of course.

The audience listened on with rapt attention. Karan was clearly agitated, and shifted nervously in his chair. I could see that the event coordinator was torn between stopping the presentation, which probably should have been standard operating procedure, and the shock and awe of what he was hearing.

On cue, Neel said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, this is no hoax or prank. What you are hearing is absolutely true and you will realise why in a few moments.’

I guess that decided the event coordinator.

‘The most terrible thing of all is that the man who killed our friends is a vicious psychopath and serial killer. In a career spanning fifteen years, he has been responsible for the deaths of over fifty individuals, mostly women. Unlike his notorious predecessors, he has no localised area of operations, selecting victims in metros, small towns and even villages across the country.’

People began to get restless. This was sounding too fantastic, pretty much unbelievable. The President looked absolutely bewildered. The principal finally got up and signalled to someone next to the stage. Karan was speaking on his mobile phone, and I saw two men running towards the console.

‘…And that man, a monster living openly in our midst, is none other than Karan Singh, today’s guest of honour,’ Neel finished.

83

Neel

There was an uproar. All hell broke loose.

People were getting up. Shaking their heads and muttering to each other. Roy and I intercepted the two men. We had recognised them as Karan’s goons from the previous night. Omar’s killers. I hit the first one in the stomach. He went flying with his own momentum. I kicked him hard in the side hearing a rib crack. The second man was forced to stop. Roy punched him in the face with all his strength and fury. He went down. Thankfully, it was too dark for people to fully realise what was happening.

I rushed to the console. And dragged away the technician who was about to pull the plug on our little show. ‘Don’t try to stop anything!’ I shouted, and looked around threateningly. Daring anyone to make an attempt.

People had no idea what was going on. They were beginning to feel more than a little scared. Members of the audience started to walk towards the exit. Perhaps fearing that something was really wrong. Personnel from the President’s security detail climbed up on stage. Encircled him in a protective cordon. A couple of others spoke into their walkie-talkies.

Just then, the slightly grainy image of a woman came on the screens. She looked pale and nervous. But her voice was strong as she said, ‘I am Delnaz, Karan’s wife. Everything you have just heard is absolutely true.’

The crowd was shocked back into silence.

‘For the past six months, I’ve known that my husband is a mass murderer, and I’m ashamed to admit that I didn’t have the courage to do anything about it. He has managed to get away with it all these years, covering his tracks with meticulous planning and using all his considerable influence to good effect. He is a very clever criminal indeed.’

People seemed to have frozen in their tracks. Delnaz had the undivided attention of every person in the auditorium. I saw utter panic on Karan’s face. But he remained seated. Tried to say something to the President and principal. They ignored him. I guess he was trying to act calm. Pretend that the whole thing was nothing but an elaborate prank.

Delnaz continued. ‘Many of you who have followed the tragic case of Anna Grishin, the Russian teenager murdered in Goa some time back, will be shocked to learn that Anna’s killer is none other than my husband, Karan. He had a brief relationship with her, slashed her to death and then dumped her body in the sea. Another Russian tourist, who witnessed it, was shot dead while his girlfriend was disposed of in a road accident.

‘I have a list of all, or almost all, his victims with me. Knowing that Karan is the perpetrator, it will not be difficult to establish a trail of evidence. I know enough myself to get him sent to the gallows without much trouble.’ She paused, and then held up a large, wicked-looking knife. ‘This is the weapon he uses, though…’

The screen went blank. I guess someone had finally managed to shut it down.

Karan now stood up and screamed, ‘This is complete bullshit! It’s a political conspiracy by my enemies…’ He practically jumped off the stage. And began to stomp down the aisle. No one tried to stop him.

The plan had gone perfectly so far. In fact, even better than we could have hoped for.

Two questions had always plagued our minds. One—would we be able to play enough of the video before someone stopped it? And, would the people in the audience, many of whom were highly respected members of society, believe what they were seeing and hearing?

There was no doubt in my mind that the answer to both questions was now a resounding “Yes”.

I looked around for Roy and spotted him quietly slipping out of the auditorium.

84

Roy

Karan came out, followed by three men in grey safari suits. I hadn’t noticed them before, and figured that they were his official security guys, probably NSG commandos. He stopped and looked around for a couple of seconds, presumably waiting for his own two thugs. There was no way for him to know that they were lying unconscious inside. When no one emerged, he continued walking.

A black BMW X5 came up on the road outside the auditorium. Karan must have called ahead. A uniformed chauffeur rushed out and held the door open for him but he pushed the man away and got into the driver’s seat himself. I expected the security men to get in as well but before they could, Karan drove off, throwing gravel and dust in his wake.

I stood there, watching the BMW disappear around a line of trees. Karan was clearly heading out of the campus.

Fuck.
This was not what I had expected. Our theory was that after being exposed, Karan would rush back to the principal’s house, where he was staying. Perhaps make some phone calls, think about his next course of action or simply pack up to leave.

Giving me enough time to do what I needed to do.

In hindsight, it had been a foolish assumption. After the humiliation in the auditorium, Karan was obviously not going to hang around. He would want to put as much distance between himself and the people who had seen our little presentation. There was also the possibility that he could be detained for an investigation, but he had managed to bluster his way out before anyone could even think of that.

My mind was racing. I had to do something really fast.

There was a solitary motorcycle in the parking lot behind the academic block. I ran towards it. I saw that it was a Royal Enfield Bullet. Good. I would need all the horses in its 500 cc engine. It took me only a few seconds to get it started and then I was off.

My old friend, the durwan, was about to close the gates after the exit of the BMW, when he saw me bearing down towards him. He jumped out of the way with a nimbleness that belied his age, and I sped out. There was only one direction in which Karan could have gone, so I followed the road going downhill and towards the town.

It was a typical mountain road, narrow and rough. I pushed the Bullet to ninety, slowing only on the hairpin bends. I skidded a few times on the loose gravel but somehow managed to stay upright. Within a few minutes, I spotted the BMW in the distance, also going dangerously fast.

That’s when I recognised the opportunity in front of me.

Until that moment, my only thought was to find out where Karan was going. Since he had shed his security cover and was alone, I guessed that he was planning to hide out for a while somewhere. It was imperative we didn’t lose track of him. If I at least knew where he was, I could figure out how to execute the second part of our plan.

I would have to make it look like an impulsive act, an extreme step to escape the disgrace and possible retribution that lay ahead. But time was critical. I had no doubt that Karan would already be planning his moves.