A murder on the highway

[Preface: Since the past couple of weeks, I have been wondering if I could come up with a murder mystery with as few characters as possible and still create a doubt in the reader’s mind. So I took a shot at it. Do note that since I do not have the luxury to create an elaborate buildup of the storyline (this being a blog post), I have had to rely on conversations to build up the scenario. I don’t know if it has been worth the effort but here goes....]

Inspector Sharan Patel was at his desk just as the clock struck nine. He was a stickler for punctuality, though he seldom left when his work hours ended. He began reading the case file that was in front of him, for the umpteenth time. And today he hoped to bring about a closure to this case.

His reading was interrupted by a soft knock on the door and two men entered the room. Both of them were in their forties and dressed in formal business attire.

“Please come in gentlemen. Thank you both for agreeing to meet me today inspite of your business pressures. Do take your seats” Inspector Patel gestured towards the chairs.

“Well, we want to put this issue behind us as soon as possible Mr. Patel. It has been an agonizing week for us as you can understand” said the bespectacled man in the grey suit.

“Oh I understand completely Mr. Kalyan. It is tough losing your business associate of 18 years and then having to go through all this police investigation” said the inspector.

“Raghuram was not just a business partner, inspector. The three of us have been friends since college”. It was the other man who spoke.

“I know Mr. Mahadev and I shall try and keep this meeting as short as possible. But there are some loose ends in this case which I hope you both could help in tying up”

“So let me recount what we have on this case so far. Raghuram left his office at eleven in the night last Friday and drove alone to Shringeri. At around 7am in the morning as he approached the town, he stopped the car and got down. This was when he was fatally knocked down by an oncoming vehicle”

“He was a frequent visitor to the temple. He would go to Shringeri whenever he was disturbed” said Kalyan

“And what was the reason why he seemed disturbed ?” asked the inspector

“Oh, he had been having marital problems for quite some time now. Over the last one year or so, he has been pretty much cut off from work. But lately, since the past few months, he was terribly upset about something but he would not talk about it to any of us. His behavior became very erratic and we even lost out on a few big contracts because of his indifference to work. But what does that have to do with his accident, inspector ?” asked Kalyan

“You see, Mr. Kalyan, there are a few points that strike me as odd. For one, the place where Raghuram stopped his car is pretty much a straight stretch of road with a clear visibility of a few kilometers and it was early morning with enough sunlight. Secondly, the car itself has sustained minimal damage as the impact appears to have been directed towards Raghuram. Lastly, there were absolutely no screech marks to indicate the driver of the other vehicle even tried to avoid the accident. All this leads me to believe that this was not just another accident but a homicide”

“Oh, that’s unbelievable, Inspector. Raghu had no enemies. He was soft natured and never reprimanded anyone even when they did something wrong” Mahadev exclaimed.

“Exactly, that leaves me with only few options. Tell me, Mr. Kalyan, what are the terms of your partnership and what are the provisions in the eventuality of one of the partners dying ?” inspector Patel had a more serious tone as he spoke.

“This is preposterous inspector, are you suggesting that we had anything to do with his death ?” Kalyan rose from his seat

“That is what I intend to find out. Maybe one of you was involved, maybe both. Though I do hope neither of you had anything to do with this. I request you to calm down and take your seat. Now, if you could answer my question on the partnership, please ?”

Mahadev placed his hand on Kalyan trying to calm him down, as he answered “We are a small cap company, inspector. I and Kalyan, hold 20 percent each while Raghu held 25 percent of the shares. The rest is held by institutions and the public. In the event of any of the partners wanting out, then he would first have to offer his shares to the other partners and only when they declined, could he sell them in the open market. In the case of the demise of any one of us, the shares would automatically split between the remaining two and the family of the partner who died would be compensated according to the worth of the shares. This was to ensure that the controlling stake would remain within us”

“Has there been any contention about the ownership of the firm ?”

“None inspector” Mahadev replied.

“Well, maybe you are not aware of it Mr.Mahadev. I think Mr.Kalyan may have a different story. I spoke to your staff during my investigations and the janitor who works the night shift told me that you and Raghuram had a bitter altercation two months ago about Raghuram’s shares. The janitor says that he overheard you yelling at Raghuram that he better sell his stake to you, isn’t that so Mr.Kalyan ?” inspector Patel turned to Kalyan.

“Well, yes. Like I said, he had caused us to lose a few big contracts and I did not want that to continue. We were friends, yes. But I could not overlook his shortcomings which were costing us big money and so I offered to buy out his stake but he did not want to sell it. That was when I lost my cool and yelled at him. It is not like I yelled at him for the first time. As with any business partners, the three of us have had differences before. That does not mean that I had anything to do with his death” replied Kalyan.

“How come you never bothered to mention that to me ?. And why would you want to buy his stake without even letting me know” Mahadev seemed agitated.

“I was going to if he was willing to sell his stake but since he declined. I did not bring this to your notice as it did not matter” Kalyan continued looking towards inspector Patel as he responded.

Patel then turned to Mahadev
“Well, Mr. Kalyan mentioned about Raghuram having problems in married life, would you be able to throw some light on it Mr. Mahadev ?”

“Why do you suppose I would know anything about it? Raghu seldom talked about his personal problems with us”

“Oh come on Mr. Mahadev, you don’t think that you can hide it for long, do you ?. Ever since this case began, both of you have been under surveillance. I have gone through your phone records from the past six months and interestingly the most calls you made during this period is to the number that belongs to Mrs. Raghuram. Though, I am surprised that there were virtually no calls the last two months.”

“What is he talking about, Dev ?” a surprised Kalyan looked at Mahadev

“Absolute nonsense inspector, I did speak to Shyla often, she heads the HR department of our company and since the HR wing is in a different part of the town, I can only reach her by phone. Also, I knew her from our college days. That does not mean there was anything going on between us as you imply” Mahadev was trying hard to keep his anger in check.

“Now, now Mr.Mahadev, I would not be throwing accusations of this kind if I was not sure of it. Few months ago, you had taken a week off because of what you claimed as ill health. I find it interesting that Mrs. Raghuram had also decided to go for a training in Ahmadabad at around the same time. Infact, when I checked the company leave records over the past one year, I see that Mrs. Raghuram seemed to have trainings or health issues mostly during times you took a few days off. So don’t insult my intelligence any more. Or do you want me to get Shyla here as well ?”

Mahadev was visibly uncomfortable and began shifting in his seat.
“Ok, I admit we were seeing each other. It started as a harmless flirtation but over time we realized that we liked each other a lot. She decided to leave Raghu for me and over the past one year she tried her best to do so. She would frequently look for an excuse to pick a fight and throw tantrums. Raghu, like I mentioned, was soft natured and would bear all the humiliation that was hurled his way. But he began suspecting that Shyla was seeing someone else though he did not know it was me. So Shyla decided that we needed to take a break from each other. We stopped calling or seeing each other since. Finally, Shyla began demanding a divorce since the past two months but Raghu would not hear of it.”

“God !!, and so you thought the only way out was to get rid of Raghu for good…” exclaimed Kalyan

“Shut up, Kalyan. From what I can gather, you had an equally persuasive motive, did you not ?” Mahadev shot back.

“You think, I would have done such a thing for his shares ?. You idiot, he would have sold it to me sooner or later. If his wife went to court for a divorce, he would need all the money he had for the alimony. So I would have had to just wait”

“No one knew about Shyla demanding a divorce apart from me and Raghu. So how the hell would you be willing to wait out till it happened ?. You seem to know a little more than what you claim”

“Interesting, now we have both of you with strong enough motives to get rid of Raghuram. Can you both tell me what you were doing the weekend of the accident? Why don’t you go first Mr.Mahadev” inspector Patel interrupted

“I had to fly to Bombay over the weekend to meet a potential customer. Since I had a lot of work to complete before I left, I decided to take off to Bombay right after work and so had brought along my luggage as well. I took off by the 8pm flight, I was there for two days and returned on Monday morning at around 7 am”

“Is there anyone who could vouch for that ?” inquired Patel.

“Absolutely, you can check with our secretary who booked my tickets and reserved the hotel room as well. In fact, I had discussions with the customer in the lobby of the same hotel” replied Mahadev.

“What about you Mr.Kalyan, do you have an alibi as well ?” Patel turned to Kalyan.

“I worked through Friday night and the whole of Saturday as well. I had to complete some tenders which had to be submitted on Monday. By the time I went home on Saturday, it was close to midnight”

“Was there anyone else in the office that day who can verify your statements Mr.Kalyan ?”

“No, we have a five day week and no one turned up for work that Saturday. I did see housekeeping personal and the gardener working for a brief period in the morning. I doubt if they saw me”

“So you have thirty six hours of unaccounted time and thirty six hours is more than enough for someone to drive up to Shringeri and back.” Patel spoke softly with his eyes half closed. “And, you did want his stake in the company for yourself”

“By the way, Mr.Kalyan did any of your partners know that you were accumulating shares through the accounts of your wife and other family members, from the open market over the past few months and your stake is now twenty three percent ?” asked the inspector, his eyes still closed as slowly rocked back and forth on his chair.

“What !!” cried Mahadev who had a look of shock on his face.

“Oh yes, Mr.Dev, so with Raghuram’s stake of twenty five percent, Mr.Kalyan would have had the controlling stake in the company, well almost” the inspector said.

“And you had the nerve to accuse me of wanting to get rid of Raghu” Mahadev said, his voice rising with every word.

“That’s ridiculous inspector, the stake would have been mine only if he had sold it to me. Otherwise, it gets divided between me and Dev” countered Kalyan. He continued
“But it’s true that I wanted to acquire the controlling stake in the company. Raghu was ruining my company with his hare brained ideas with Dev supporting him without a second thought. I could not let it happen to the company I worked so hard for”. The bitterness in Kalyan’s voice was apparent. “But I swear by God, that I would not stoop to the level of killing him”

“Leave that to me Mr.Kalyan, I am paid for exactly that – to find out how low people can stoop” remarked Patel. He continued “So Mr.Dev, you said you left for Bombay right after work. So who had access to your car over the weekend ?”

“No one inspector, I took the keys with me. I wanted to hand it over to Kalyan but I forgot and the keys remained in my coat pocket”

“What about your car, Mr.Kalyan. Assuming you were at work the whole of Saturday, could someone have used your car in the meantime, did you lend it to anyone ?”

“No, I had the keys with me the whole time”

The inspector closed his eyes. He began nodding his head and a smile appeared on his face.

“Well, gentlemen, thank you both for your time. You have helped me tie up the loose ends in this case”

“So you are convinced that it was indeed an accident and we had nothing to do with it”. It was Kalyan who spoke.

“Oh no, quite the contrary, I knew it was a premeditated murder. But now I know who did it” replied the inspector, his eyes were still closed.

Both Kalyan and Mahadev looked at each other. And before either of them could speak, the inspector rose from his seat.

“So both of you had equally strong motives, one wanted Raghu’s wife and the other wanted his shares. Love and money, the two most common reasons for all murders and here we have both. But only one of you had the drive to go all the way”

He went around the table and stood behind the two men. He continued to speak

“Well, in this case, I think money came in second. Isn’t that so, Mr.Mahadev ?” Patel placed his right hand on Mahadev’s shoulder.

“I have had suspicions on both of you from the start. Kalyan here had both the motive and the opportunity. We have only his word for where he was on Saturday. You had the motive but you had an equally good alibi. I checked with the hotel at Bombay and they confirmed that a room was occupied by Mahadev for two days. The airlines too confirmed that Mahadev had indeed flown to and from Bombay on those dates. You seemed to have a solid alibi until you mentioned that you took the car keys with you. That was a big mistake Mr.Dev, you should not have revealed that”

Mahadev betrayed no emotions. He appeared calm and composed. Patel went on “You see one of the checks that I did was to obtain your credit card transactions of the entire month. And you know what struck me as odd Mr.Dev ?”. Mahadev remained silent. “I saw that you had filled up fuel for your car on Friday evening before you took off to Bombay. But, most interestingly, you filled up a full tank again on Monday morning when you returned from Bombay”

Inspector Patel paused to let the words sink in. He then resumed “You just claimed that the key was with you the whole time and so that rules out the possibility that somebody else had access to your car. And next time you send somebody to impersonate you, make sure they share your dietary preferences. I got hold of the bills from the hotel in Bombay and for a vegetarian, you sure did eat a lot of fish”

“There is no way you can prove that it was my car that was involved in the accident” countered Mahadev

“Well, we will leave that to the forensic department. I hope when you washed your car to get rid off all the blood, you used bleach and not just soap. Because, you see, a luminol test will reveal any bit of blood left over”

For the first time, Mahadev looked agitated. “If only he had agreed to divorce Shyla, this would have never happened. It’s all his fault” he snapped. Patel remained silent. He knew there was more to come. Mahadev continued “Ever since Shyla and I stopped meeting each other, it was simply unbearable for me. I had to do something to get rid of him, inspector. I hit upon this plan and was waiting for him to drive out alone somewhere. I had asked Shyla to inform me anytime he drove out of town.”

Patel interrupted “So Shyla was in this as well ?”

“Oh no, inspector, she thought I was asking her this so that we could meet up when he was out of town. She refused to do so since things were turning out bad between them and she said that we should keep away until she managed to get a divorce” Mahadev responded embarrassed, with his gaze firmly on the ground. He continued “But she missed me as much as I did. About six weeks ago, she emailed me that he was driving to Mysore. I had set up everything as planned. However, he fell sick the day before and so I had to abort my plans. Three weeks ago, Shyla mailed me that he was driving down to Mysore again but I could not get the tickets to Bombay on those dates. Then last week, on Wednesday, Shyla sent me another email informing me of Raghu driving to Shringeri on Friday night. This time there was no hitch and you know the rest”

As he finished, he covered his face with both his hands. It seemed as if the impact of what he had done was slowly sinking in on him.

“I would need to put together some paper work and will let you two work things out about your business affairs since Mahadev will probably need to go on leave for a long time” Inspector Patel walked out of the room leaving the two behind.

“Dev, as terrible as it may sound, I am not entirely surprised by what you did. I did know about you and Shyla for sometime now since I had access to email accounts of both of you and I also knew how desperate you both were, over the past few weeks” said Kalyan

Mahadev remained silent. His face still buried in his palms. He did not bother to look up.

“I am sorry for what happened. Let me know if you need any help from me.” Kalyan stood up and continued “I had asked him to go to Mysore a couple of times to meet a vendor there. Last week, since he was so disturbed, I suggested that he visit the temple. By the way, the inspector seems to have missed out another clause in our partnership agreement. Remember the one that says if anyone of us were to be indisposed for a period of more than a year, then he would be forced to sell his stake to the partners ?.”. He began walking towards the door.

As he neared the door, he turned around and spoke “Another thing Dev, it wasn’t Shyla who sent those mails. It was me. I knew you would take the bait sooner or later. The inspector was wrong, it was money that came first after all”

Mahadev raised his head and looked at Kalyan who seemed to have an enigmatic grin on his face as he turned around and walked out of the door. For a long time, Mahadev kept looking listlessly at the door.