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| September (First) 2010 |
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| DELHI PRESS MAGAZINES : WOMAN'S ERA |
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WOMAN'S ERA /
FICTION (14/21) / THE BURGLARY
| The Burglary |
| Ambika Joshi, the wife of the city’s well-known jeweller, telephoned at the police station, saying that she had been robbed and attacked. Her husband was on a business trip. A police enquiry followed. What was its result? |
| By Kasturi Rangachari |
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The phone rang in the silent police station at 2 am. A sleepy police constable picked it up. "Jamilbagh police station," he yawned. "I've been attacked and robbed!" sobbed a woman's voice. "Please come at once to No. 180, New Colony." "The police will come immediately," promised the constable who had been jolted wide awake. "Are you hurt? Shall we bring an ambulance?"
"Yes…no! I'm hurt but I don't need to go to the hospital. But…how will you get in? I'm tied up and the maid isn't responding to my cries! Perhaps she too was tied up and gagged by the burglar! And the watchman seems to be asleep – and he doesn't have a key, anyway! You'll have to climb up to the first floor terrace and come in – just as the burglar did!"
When the police arrived at the big bungalow, with its spacious garden, about 15 minutes later, they first woke up the watchman who was dozing in his little cubicle near the gate and then did as the woman had told them to. A young and agile constable climbed up the water pipe to the first floor terrace, entered through the open French windows and then came down and let the police in.
"There is a woman who is tied up in the bedroom upstairs, sir," he told the Inspector in charge of the police group that had responded to the woman's phone call.
"Did you untie her or touch anything?"
"No, sir."
"Good!" said the Inspector and ran up the stairs that the constable had come down. He found a woman dressed in a night gown with her ankles tied together and her hands tied behind her back, lying on the carpet next to a table on which a phone stood. The receiver had been pushed off the hook. The woman had a scarf around her neck.
"Thank God, you have come!" exclaimed the woman and she began to sob as the policeman examined her bonds.
"The person who tied you up has used tape. It'll be a bit painful when I pull it off," said the Inspector and the woman gave moans of anguish, as he pulled the tapes off. The Inspector then helped her into an armchair next to the bed.
"How are you feeling?" he asked her, looking at the bruises on her face. "Shall I call a doctor?"
"No," said the woman. "I don't need a doctor. But you must catch the thief, Inspector! He's taken a packet of diamonds, jewellery weighing at least 100 tolas and
Rs 15 lakh in cash!"
The Inspector's eyebrows flew up and he took a deep breath. "Are you alone in the house?" he asked the woman. "What about your husband, your children and the servants?"
"My husband has gone to Mumbai on business and we have no children. There are 2 servants who stay in, but one of them has taken leave to go to his village. That leaves only a maid and her room is down the passage. She doesn't seem to have woken up. Perhaps she is tied up too!"
The Inspector sent 2 of the women constables who had come with him to find out if the maid was all right and he himself went and examined the French windows.
"The lock has been forced," he observed. "Did you hear any noise when that was being done?"
The woman shook her head. One of the women constables returned and told the Inspector that the maid was not tied up but that she was fast asleep. The Inspector told her to wake up the maid and take her down and wait for him. "In the meantime, why don't you tell me what happened," he said to the woman. "But first let me introduce myself. I'm Inspector Adiga."
The woman, who appeared to be in her 40s, nodded and gave her name as Ambika Joshi. She told the Inspector that her husband was Lalit Joshi. As soon as he heard the name, the Inspector drew in his breath sharply. He knew that Lalit Joshi owned Geethanjali Jewellery, a shop that was famous in the city for its exquisite and exclusive jewellery.
"I came up to bed as usual at about 10 pm, Inspector Adiga," Ambika Joshi said. "I changed and watched TV for some time," she gestured towards the big screen TV that stood across the room from the bed in the luxuriously furnished air-conditioned room and then went on, "I switched off the TV and turned off the light about half an hour later and went to sleep. The next thing I knew, a man wearing a mask over his face, was pulling me up!"
"A mask. So you couldn't see his face. But what about his build?"
"He was tall and well-built."
"Please go on, Mrs Joshi."
"The French windows leading to the terrace were open and it was obvious that he had come in that way. He then ordered me to tell him where my husband's secret safe was as well as its combination! When I didn't speak at once, he slapped me hard several times and said that he would kill me if I didn't tell him – and he pulled a gun out of his pocket!"
"Secret safe?" asked Inspector Adiga.
"Yes! He apparently knew that my husband doesn't keep anything really valuable in the safe that is in the study downstairs and that he has a secret safe."
"And where is this secret safe?"
The woman pointed towards an alcove to a side of the room in which a dressing-table stood. The Inspector turned towards it. In the alcove hung a few paintings. One of them had been taken down and a wall safe that would normally have been hidden by the painting could be seen. The door of the safe was open.
"Do many people know about this safe? For instance, do the servants know?"
"No, they do not know. My husband is always very careful to see that none of them is in the room when he opens it. And I dust the paintings myself. But a couple of senior people in the shop may know."
"Does your husband keep a lot of valuables in the secret safe?"
"Not as a rule. But sometimes special customers and exporters ask to see some exclusive pieces – antique pieces mostly – in private or ask my husband to bring some jewellery to wherever they are – in Mumbai usually. Then he brings the jewellery home and keeps it in the secret safe till he meets those people and shows the pieces to them. Also, he sometimes buys jewellery or precious gemstones from people and keeps them in the safe till he takes them to the shop."
"I see. And the valuables that were in the safe tonight?"
"My husband bought the diamonds from a businessman from Surat 2 days ago, but since he left the same day for Mumbai, they remained in the safe. The jewellery consisted of antique pieces that someone from one of our erstwhile royal houses had given him to sell. The sale was to go through privately and so he hadn't taken the pieces to the shop. As for the money, it was part of the money that he had brought home to pay for the diamonds that he planned to buy.
“The man from Surat brought fewer diamonds than my husband had expected and this money was left over. He planned to take both the diamonds and the money to the shop when he came back from Mumbai."
"Is the secret safe ever empty?"
"Actually it's empty quite often."
"I see. So the thief not only knew that there was a secret safe but also that there were going to be valuables in it tonight."
"It appears so."
"That seems to indicate someone from the shop."
Mrs Joshi drew in her breath. "There are not many employees whom my husband would have told about all this and all the senior people have been with him many years," she said slowly.
"That means nothing when it's a matter of greed for money," declared the Inspector. "What happened after the burglar threatened you with the gun?"
"I knew from his manner that he meant what he said and so I told him where the safe was and its combination. He then taped up my hands and my ankles and gagged me with this scarf," the woman indicated the scarf knotted around her neck, "and left me on the bed and went to the safe. He opened it and took out everything in it and put it all into a bag he had brought with him. Then he left me tied up on the bed and went away the way he had come – down the water pipe to the side of the terrace."
"Hm. Rs 15 lakh in cash. Even if all the money was in Rs 100 notes – and Rs 500 notes aren't all that common – that means 150 bundles. And 100 tolas of gold would also be quite bulky. Was the jewellery in boxes?"
"No, it was all in a zip bag."
"So 150 bundles of notes and a zipped up bag of jewellery and a packet of diamonds. How did he carry so much?"
"He had a big bag with him."
"The kind you carry in your hand? The haversack kind you wear on your back is normally not that big."
"He carried it in his hand."
"How did he carry it when he went down the pipe?"
"I don't know. I mean I was tied up, gagged and terrified."
"Didn't you follow his movements with your eyes as he left?"
"I did, but I couldn't see him after he went onto the terrace."
"Which side did he go?"
"He turned to the right."
"Hm. I suppose he threw the bag down and then shinned down the pipe. What happened after that?"
"For some time after he had left, I lay there, scared that he might come back. Then, when it became obvious that he wasn't going to, I tried to free myself. I soon realised that I could never get the tape off my wrists and ankles, but I managed to push the scarf down, off my mouth. Once my mouth was free, I shouted for the watchman and the maid and thumped the bed with my legs and made as much noise as I could, but neither of them heard me.
"I then rolled off the bed and, kneeling by the table on which the phone stood, I pushed the receiver off the hook with my cheek. There was a pencil on the table and I picked it up with my mouth and pushed the police station emergency number buttons with it. I also pushed the speaker-phone button so that I could speak without having to use the receiver. You know what happened after that."
The Inspector then went down with Mrs Joshi and spoke to the maid and watchman who were there waiting for him. Both looked terrified. "So, you sleep on duty, do you?" asked the Inspector in a bullying voice, looking at the watchman. "A fine watchman you are!"
"Sir…sir…I never sleep!" stammered the watchman. "I don't know how I fell asleep tonight!"
"And you, you certainly sleep soundly!" Inspector Adiga turned to the maid. "So much went on in the house and you slept through it all. And you are just 2 doors away from your mistress! All this is very suspicious!"
The maid looked at him with scared eyes. She licked her lips. "I don't know why I slept so soundly," she mumbled.
"You heard nothing at all? No voices in your memsahib’s room? No shouting and banging when she tried to wake you up?"
"No. I think I heard a bell, but I was feeling very heavy-headed and tired …and I thought I would get up and see what it was if it was repeated. But it wasn't repeated and so I didn't get up."
"A bell? You must be imagining things. There was no bell, it was me shouting that you should have heard!" said Mrs Joshi in irritation. Adiga turned back to the watchman.
"Believe me, sir," begged the watchman. "I never sleep on duty! I don't know what happened tonight. Why I drank 2 cups of tea at 10, in place of the one cup I usually drink!"
"And why was that?"
"The maid usually makes me tea before she closes up the kitchen. Tonight too she made me a cup and then Memsahib came in. She said that she had a headache and asked Seema, he gestured towards the maid,” to make a pot of tea. Then she asked Seema and me to have a cup with her. I told her that I had already had tea but she just said that it didn't matter and poured out cups for Seema and me. So I had a second cup."
"Does your mistress often have tea with you?"
"No, this was the first time. She had a headache, you see. But that meant that I had 2 cups of tea."
"And Seema also had a cup?"
"Yes, though she doesn't usually have tea at night."
"I see. That makes it all the more surprising that you both slept so soundly!" The Inspector moved towards the door but he gave the two servants warning looks. "I haven't finished with both of you," he said sternly. "And, in the meantime, tell me if you think of anything that could help us find the thief."
As soon as it was light, Inspector Adiga went and examined the ground under the right side of the first floor terrace, hoping to find some signs of the burglar. There were flowerbeds there and a water pipe ran up the wall beside them, but though the soil was soft and slightly damp, there were no footprints or any other signs of the burglar.
"Sir, there are some marks here!" called out a policeman from the other side.
Inspector Adiga hurried over and, sure enough, there were footprints on the flowerbed and an impression of the kind that would have been made if something heavy had been thrown down from the first floor. A water pipe ran up the wall on that side too.
"Strange!" muttered the Inspector to himself. "Mrs Joshi said that the burglar turned to the right after he left the room, but for these marks to have been made, he must have turned left!"
Even as the Inspector was examining the ground, a gleaming car drove in through the gate and drew up in front of the house. A tall, distinguished-looking man got out of the car and looked in surprise at the police jeep standing there. His eyes then fell on the Inspector and the other policemen.
"What's the matter?" he asked the Inspector. "Why are all of you here? Is something …wrong?"
"Mr Joshi?" asked Inspector Adiga. "I'm afraid I have some bad news for you."
"My…wife! Is she all right?"
"She's fine. But you had a burglary here last night."
"Oh my God!"
Joshi rushed into the house. The Inspector went in slowly and waited. He heard voices upstairs and some time later Joshi came down the stairs. He looked shattered. Mrs Joshi came down behind him, looking nervous and tense.
"Mr Joshi, at how much do you estimate of your loss?" asked Inspector.
"The diamonds alone were worth more than a crore! And the antique jewellery another crore! I'm ruined!"
Mr Joshi sat down on a chair and covered his face with his hands. The Inspector cleared his throat. “I understand how upset you must be, Mr Joshi," he said sympathetically. "But you must pull yourself together and help us with some information. Only then can we find the thief."
Joshi sighed and sat up straight. "You're right, Inspector," he said dully. "Now, what information can I give you?"
"First of all, how many people knew that you had so much in the secret safe last night?"
"Well, besides myself and Ambika, only Samuel at the shop knew."
"What about Ramamurthy and Rai?" asked Mrs Joshi in a startled voice.
"Ramamurthy has been on leave for the last week. His daughter is getting married. So he didn't know about either the diamonds or the antique jewellery. And I sent Rai to Kolkata on work a few days ago. So he wouldn't have known either."
"I see. And do you trust this Samuel?" asked the Inspector.
"He's been with me for many years and has never given me any reason to distrust him. But Ambika would know better. He was an old college friend of hers and I gave him a job on her recommendation."
Adiga looked at Mrs Joshi. She cleared her throat. "He's all right," she said weakly.
"And no one else knew, Mr Joshi?"
"No."
"Could you describe Samuel, Mr Joshi?"
"He's well, rather short and quite plump."
"Hm. And just you 3 people – you, your wife and this Samuel – knew about the valuables in the safe..."
Joshi looked irritated. "I've just told you that, Inspector!" he snapped.
"Then sir, I would like permission to search your house!" said Inspector Adiga crisply.
"Search my house? Are you mad, Inspector?" Joshi looked ready to explode.
"It would be better if you gave me permission. Otherwise, I'll have to get a search warrant and people would come to know."
"Come to know what, damn it?"
"That I suspect that there is fraud involved in this so-called theft."
Joshi glowered at him. "All right, Inspector," he ground out between clenched teeth. "Search, but if you find nothing, then I'm going to the Commissioner of Police with a complaint!"
Inspector Adiga nodded and gestured to the policemen with him to go and search the house, but Mrs Joshi stepped forward. "No, you can't search the house!" she snapped. "Go and bring a search warrant first and then I'll allow you to!"
"Ambika…" began Joshi, but Adiga interrupted him.
"I'll go and get a search warrant, Mrs Joshi, but I'll leave the policemen I have with me here – to keep a watch on what goes on here while I'm away!"
"Stop talking nonsense and get on with your search!" shouted Joshi.
Inspector Adiga smiled. "I don't have to, sir," he said politely. "Your wife will tell us where everything is!"
"Are you mad?" exploded Joshi. "How could my wife know?" He swung around to look at his wife and fell silent when he saw her ashen face. "What is it, Ambika?" he asked after a long pause. "Do your know anything about…the theft?"
Ambika Joshi threw back her head. "All right, Lalit," she said crisply. "This Inspector seems cleverer than he looks and he's got me! Yes, I have it all – the diamonds, the jewellery and the money!"
"What! You mean that there was no theft?" Joshi looked stunned.
"No, there was no real theft. I just made it look as if there had been one."
"But why on earth would you do something like that?"
"You drove me to it, Lalit!"
"What nonsense! I drove you to steal from me?"
"Yes! I decided to look after my own interests, when I came to know that…that…you were having an affair and that you were thinking of leaving me!"
Lalit's eyes narrowed. He glanced at Adiga and then back at Ambika. "Who told you that?" he asked and then gave a wry smile and answered his own question. "It must have been Samuel, of course!"
"You hardly tried to keep it a secret from him! Or perhaps you thought that as man and as your employee, he'd be on your side. But Samuel is my friend first and your employee afterwards! And yes, he told me! For you I was just an aging wife who had not even managed to give you a child, but for him I was a friend who had helped him when the days were dark and difficult, and he didn't forget that!
"Lalit, don't insult either him or me by thinking that we were having an affair. Samuel is happily married and is the father of 2 sweet children! And don't think that you can punish him by firing him either. He's got an excellent job in the Gulf – thanks to all the experience he got working for you – and will be leaving you shortly.
"Anyway, I knew that once you decided that I had to go, you would be totally without pity. You would divorce me and though you wouldn't grudge me enough maintenance to keep body and soul together, you certainly wouldn't give me enough to live at the standard I've become used to. And why shouldn't I have a good life just because you've found someone younger with firmer flesh?
"So I waited till I knew that there would be valuables in the safe and you would be away. Of course there was no thief but I put a mild sedative into the tea that the watchmen and the maid drank so that they wouldn't know that there had been any thief!
"I also needed someone who would come and tie me up and make the footprints and other mark under the terrace. Samuel agreed to do that. He came at about 11.30 and I let him in. I had already opened the safe and packed everything in it into bags and hidden them where neither you nor the servants would ever stumble across them. It was only for a short time, anyway. Then Samuel would help me sell everything. I knew that would not get the full price for them, but I would have got enough to make it possible for me to live in comfort the rest of my days.
"Samuel taped up my wrists and ankles. I had already tied a scarf loosely around my neck. He then left – through the door and not down the water pipe – and I phoned up the police! Samuel was to make marks in the flowerbeds before he left."
There was silence after Ambika Joshi finished speaking. She broke it herself. "But how did you come to suspect that the robbery hadn't really taken place, Inspector?" she asked.
"From several facts. There was the fact that both the watchman and the maid were unusually sleepy last night – after you insisted that they have tea with you and even poured it out for them yourself – something that you had never done before. And your headache was something that you didn't tell me when I asked you to tell me about last night.
“Then there was the fact that the maid said that she had heard a bell. The way you at once changed the subject when she said that made me suspicious. It must have been Samuel ringing the doorbell that she heard.
"And there was also the fact that Samuel made the marks on the wrong side of the flowerbed. You must have told him to make marks on the right side, meaning the right side of the terrace, but he made them on the right side of the flowerbed, as he stood facing the terrace!
"All this made me suspect you, but I realised that you must have had someone to help you by tying you up. Who had this been? Both the maid and the watchman were asleep and we had to wake them up, so it could not have been a servant whom you bribed. At that time I did not know about Samuel and your friendship with him and so as far as I was concerned, it could have been anyone.
But I wondered if you and your husband were perpetrating an insurance fraud. That is why I said that I wanted to search the house. Mr Joshi did not object to that, though he threatened me with action if I found nothing. That made me sure that you had been acting not with him but with someone else.
"Later, when you showed obvious distress when you heard that Ramamurthy and Rai were away, I felt that your accomplice might have been Samuel. Samuel had not paid any attention to that fact, but you realised that he would now become a suspect. He seems to be a good man, this Samuel, but his mind does not work as a criminal's does!"
"He is a good man," said
Mrs Joshi with a twisted smile. She now seemed perfectly composed. "And what happens now, Inspector?" she asked almost conversationally. "Will you arrest me?"
"I could charge you with theft and fraud and arrest you, but I don't know if that is what your husband would want!"
"And why wouldn't I want that, Inspector?" spluttered Lalit Joshi. "I insist that you charge her with theft…!"
Inspector Adiga cut him short. “Do you realise that it would all come out then, Mr Joshi?" he asked. "All about your affair and your decision to divorce your wife, her despair and her decision to rob you. Do you want that? And then, do you have theft insurance?"
When Lalit nodded, he went on, "Any lawyer your wife got to defend her would advise her to counter-charge you with having organised the theft yourself so that you could defraud the insurance company! You would have to disprove that, you know. And even if you could, some mud would stick and you would lose your reputation in the market.
"The way I see it, this is a matter between the two of you and I'm willing to leave it like that – provided of course, you agree, Mr Joshi."
When Lalit Joshi did not say anything, the Inspector went on, "I'll go now and you two talk things over. My unasked-for advice is that both of you behave like mature adults and be fair to the other!"
Inspector Adiga turned and walked to the front door. Once there, he turned and looked back. Lalit Joshi and Ambika Joshi were both sitting quietly, looking at each other. Both seemed lost in thought. He left the house and walked to the police jeep.
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