The Forbidden Daughter (31 page)

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“You’re not a good liar, Isha.” He laughed out loud. “Your expression just now said it was worse than awful.”

“It wasn’t the tea, honest. I was trying to think of a way to address my problem with Karnik.”

“It’s
our
problem now,” he said, turning serious again,

“whether you like it or not. First of all, let’s take my laptop computer to your house and check out the disk. If we find something useful, we’ll make copies.”

“But you could end up like Nikhil.” The very idea of it gave her the chills. She couldn’t let this gem of a man die because of her.

“Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.” He placed a quick kiss on her cheek and shot to his feet. “Come on, let’s get started.”

“Now?” The peck on the cheek was a sweet, subtle affirmation of his intentions.

“Yes, now. If Nikhil’s killer was either Karnik or his hired as-sassin, don’t you think Karnik is going to panic after what you said to him and act on it right away?”

“That’s true.” The stark reality of her stupidly impulsive behavior came back to her with full force a second time. What had possessed her to poke a sharp stick at a potentially deadly man?

As a result she’d roused the sleeping beast and brought danger right to her doorstep.

Maybe Karnik had already put his evil plans into action. At the very least he could take her to court for defamation of character. There was no choice but to let Harish help her and hope for the best. She took off the borrowed cardigan, folded it, and placed it on the sofa.

Meanwhile, Harish disappeared for a minute into one of the rooms leading off the drawing room and returned with a black leather computer case slung over his shoulder. Pulling his car keys out of his pocket, he nodded. “Let’s go.”

She picked up her purse and allowed him to usher her out the door. Once settled inside the car, she prayed she wasn’t too late.

The killer could be waiting for her right now.

Chapter 26

Isha and Harish let themselves into the flat. The place was quiet, which meant the kids were asleep. Isha found Sundari in the kitchen, obviously waiting up for her.

“Isha-bayi, are you all right?” Sundari rose to her feet, casting an anxious look at Isha. Sheila must have told her about the scene at the hospital.

“I’m okay, Sundari. I’m sorry I had you worried.”

She seemed a bit startled to see Harish at this time of night but quickly joined her hands to greet him. “
Namaste,
Doctor-saheb.”

“Doctor-saheb is helping me with something on his computer,” Isha explained to Sundari.

Sundari said nothing in response and showed no emotion whatsoever. It wasn’t Sundari’s place to question Isha about what she did or the fact that a man was in her home late at night. In their world, servants couldn’t presume to judge their employers’ conduct. Instead she politely offered to make them tea, which Harish and Isha refused.

Isha glanced at her. “Why aren’t you in bed? You’ve been up since dawn.”

“I waited to tell you that Sheila-bayi wants you to ring her as soon as you get home.”

“It’s rather late to disturb her,” said Isha, looking at the clock.

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Sundari shook her head. “She said whatever time you come, you must ring her. It is not urgent, but it is important.”

“All right, then.” Isha turned to Harish. “Why don’t you go ahead and power up your computer while I ring Sheila?”

As Isha picked up the phone, she watched Sundari quietly slip into Priya’s bedroom and close the door behind her. Meanwhile Harish set up his computer on the kitchen table, plugged it into the nearest outlet and started working the keyboard.

Within a single ring Sheila answered the phone. “Isha?”

“I hope I didn’t disturb you.”

“No. I was waiting for your call. I couldn’t sleep until I heard from you.” She was silent for a second. “So . . . what’s going on? Are you feeling better now?”

“A lot better, thanks to Harish. But I’ve realized what an idiot I’ve been, shooting my mouth off like that.”

“It’s all that accumulating stress, Isha,” said Sheila on a quiet note.

But Isha could hear the note of worry in her voice.

“Harish is a good man. I’m glad he was there when it all happened. He took charge right away.”

Yes, he had the commonsense and presence of mind to defuse
a potentially volatile situation and make sure it didn’t turn into
a major crisis,
thought Isha with a bitter sigh. She didn’t want to tell Sheila that Harish was in her home at the moment. That would mean telling Sheila everything about the information she’d been hiding in her
almirah
. It would also mean putting one more person in danger.

So she stuck to a safer topic. “How did the children’s visit with Ayee go? I never got a chance to ask you.”

“Better than I’d anticipated. Ayee can’t talk a lot at the moment, but she touched the girls and thanked Priya for saving her life. Then she asked her about school and other activities. Priya, of course, chatted a lot.” Sheila chuckled. “The chatterbox was a godsend in an awkward moment. She told Ayee all about her stay at the convent, her new flat, her new sister, your dressmaking, Doctor-kaka, and her chess games—just about everything.”

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“What was Ayee’s reaction?”

“Ayee seemed shocked and dismayed. This was the first time she was hearing the details of what your life and the girls’ has been for the past fifteen months. I had given Ayee only the bare facts and no more.”

“I see.”

“I noticed the sadness and regret in Ayee’s expression. I think she’s feeling badly about what her granddaughters and you had to endure.”

“So, what happens now?” Isha hoped Ayee had her fill of her grandchildren and wouldn’t ask for more. She’d made peace with God and her conscience. Now things could go back to the way they were.

But Sheila stunned her by saying, “I think she felt guiltier than ever, subjecting her own flesh and blood to such difficult circumstances. She wants to continue to see them.”

“You’re not serious!”

“Isha, there were tears in Ayee’s eyes when she saw Diya. She kept staring at her all the while and asking to hold her. I think the baby’s strong resemblance to Niku is what affected Ayee so sharply.”

“Really? I thought she’d detest Diya more than Priya because . . . well, you know why.”

“You’re wrong. Diya resembles Niku even more than Priya does, even down to the expression. Ayee recognized that right away. I think her need to see the kids again grew stronger after she met Diya.”

“That means you’ll be stuck chauffeuring the girls back and forth to visit Ayee. I don’t want to burden you with that.”

“Don’t be silly!” said Sheila. “The boys and I go there frequently. I’ll just take the girls at the same time, if it’s okay with you, that is.”

“I’ll think about it. At the moment I have other things to worry about. My confrontation with Karnik may have caused more trouble than I thought. Harish pointed it out to me, so now I have to see what I can do to patch things up.”

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“Exactly what are you going to do? Ring Karnik and apologize?”

Isha bit her lip. “I might have to.”

“Let me know whatever you decide.”

“Okay.” Isha said a hasty good night and put down the phone. From Harish’s expression she could tell he had the computer up and running, and was waiting for her. “I’ll get the disk,” she told him and went into the bedroom. A minute later she returned with the envelope.

Harish inserted the disk into the appropriate drive and clicked the mouse a couple of times. He frowned at the screen when something popped up. “Interesting! Pull up your chair,”

he instructed her. “I want you to take a look at the date the information was saved to the disk.”

She moved her chair closer and studied what he pointed out.

“June 23rd!” She turned to Harish. “It was the night Nikhil died! That means he obtained the information the same day he was killed.”

“Look at the time—12:21 AM. That’s a little after midnight of June 22nd
.
” Harish leaned back in his chair and stared at the screen for several seconds. “I don’t mean to offend you, but do you think Nikhil stole the file from Karnik’s computer?”

“Nikhil wasn’t a thief! He’d never break into someone’s place and steal something.”

“He may have been enraged and desperate enough to do it.

Or he could have hired someone to do it for him.”

“I’m not sure about that.” She didn’t know what to think.

There were so many secrets and so many unanswered questions.

Did she really know Nikhil at all? Could he have been a thief?

Again she wondered, what else had her late husband been doing behind her back? The thought made her cringe. It was tantamount to being betrayed by a dead man.

Harish’s voice brought her back to the present. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.” He had the file opened and displayed on the screen. “Do the spreadsheets contain this?”

Despite knowing more or less what to expect, Isha still drew 230
Shobhan Bantwal

in a sharp breath when she saw the same data that she had on the paper copies. “I think so.” She spread out the papers on the kitchen table for him to see.

He took a couple of minutes to examine and compare the information, then let out a low whistle. “Wow! The old man’s been busy, and becoming very wealthy with his ugly side business.

Besides, all these are probably cash transactions, so the income-tax folks have no clue. The money is all his, free and clear.” He shook his head. “Incredible!”

“Exactly my sentiments when I first saw this. Despite what I already knew, when I saw how extensive the list was, I was stunned.” She pointed to a few names on the list. “These are people I know well. At least I thought I did. I never imagined these women would resort to selective abortion.” She pondered it for a second. “No wonder they’re all giving birth to boys while I’ve had two girls.”

“And some of those precious boys are my patients,” he said.

The sarcasm in his voice wasn’t lost on Isha.

“How eerie is that? Aldous Huxley’s
Brave New World
in motion?”

“If not that, then it’s close,” he said dryly. “Did you know that a conservative estimate puts anywhere between eight and ten million girls as either aborted or killed in infancy in the last two decades?”

“That many!” She’d been under the impression it was a few hundred thousand. “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “I started reading up on the subject after we discussed it the other day. I was shocked. And, remember, it’s only a conservative estimate, meaning a certain percentage of the cases are never recorded.”

“So there could be lots more that never come to light . . . like Karnik’s cases.” She gave herself a moment to absorb the fact.

“It could even be twice that number. My God!” It was sicken-ing.

Harish gave her a searching look. “I don’t mean to pry, but do you think Sheila and Kumar may have gone through this?”

“No way! Sheila was shocked when I told her Ayee and Baba THE

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wanted me to have an abortion. Her distress was genuine. I’ve known Sheila and Kumar for many years and I know they’d never resort to something like this. You’ve seen how much they love both my children.”

“I’m glad,” murmured Harish. “I’ve come to like and respect them.”

“Besides, I think they were hoping for a girl the second time around. They got Arvind instead.”

Harish saved the data from the disk onto his hard drive and pulled out three blank disks from a storage pocket in the computer case. A few minutes later he had the information copied on the new disks. “Tomorrow I’ll print up a set for my office safe and one for the safety deposit box.”

“What’s the third one for?”

“For the police,” he said, looking at her across the table.

“Don’t look so alarmed. I’ll take them directly to the superintendent. I know him.”

“You mean Patil?” When he nodded, she gave a contemptuous sniff. “I know him, too. Fat lot of good he did when Nikhil took the evidence to him! And just look at his investigation of Nikhil’s death. More than a year and a quarter later, what does Patil have to show for it?”

“But that could be because Nikhil never had a chance to get this evidence to Patil. We now know he was killed only hours after he got the disk.”

“Hmm.” He had a point. She hadn’t thought of that.

“Assuming Nikhil never had a chance to turn this over to Patil, it’s up to us. We need to share with him what we have.”

He shut down the computer. “Besides, with no clues whatsoever, what could Patil do? Karnik must have hired a pro to do such a thorough job.” He stopped what he was doing and shifted his gaze to her. “All the more reason why I’m concerned about
your
safety.”

A shiver went through her. “Should we tell Patil that we have copies of everything?”

“He’ll know that anyway. He’s a seasoned police officer.”

Putting the three disks in his shirt pocket, Harish packed up the 232
Shobhan Bantwal

computer. “I’ll take care of storing the copies in the appropriate places. Make sure you keep yours locked, too.”

“All right.” The icy feeling still lingered. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“For what?”

“For turning your nice, uncomplicated life upside down.

You’re probably wondering why in the world your path crossed mine.”

He gave her a slow, heartwarming smile. “I’m wondering why our paths didn’t cross when we were both young and single.”

“They did in college.”

“But they didn’t cross in the real sense. We were kids then—

students.”

“
You
are still young and single, and the world is yours to take, Harish. Go grab it with both hands before it’s too late.”

“I
am
trying to grab the world with both hands. I’m hoping you’ll be part of it.”

She patted his hand. “Give me some time.”