Chapter 16: Meghna / Doosra Din (Second Day)

# Chapter 16: Meghna / Doosra Din (Second Day)

Monday.

The hotel woke to a grey sky, unusual for Udaipur in November, where the sun was a reliable employee that showed up on time and stayed late. But today the clouds had arrived from the west, low and thick, pressing down on the lake and the hills and the old city, giving the landscape the muted quality of a photograph taken through gauze. lake was pewter instead of silver. The Aravalli hills were shadows instead of shapes. The chaatri on the rooftop was damp from a mist that was not quite rain but more than humidity, the atmospheric indecision of a climate that couldn't commit to weather.

Meghna had slept poorly. Room nine, her room, second floor, the jharokha overlooking the lake, had been comfortable enough, the bed adequate, the sheets clean, the mosquito net unnecessary. But her brain had refused to comply with the body's request for rest. Catalogue kept running. Entries kept shuffling. The floor plan and the relationship map and the timeline kept rotating behind her closed eyes like the screens of a surveillance system that she couldn't turn off.

At six AM, she gave up on sleep. Dressed. Cotton salwar kameez, blue, her second-day outfit — she'd packed for a wedding weekend, not a murder investigation, and her wardrobe options were thinning. She went downstairs. The lobby was empty — the reception desk unmanned, the constable on night duty dozing in a chair near the front door, the building holding the pre-dawn silence of a space that was between occupations, between the night's stillness and the morning's activity.

She went to the kitchen.

Banwari was already there. Of course Banwari was already there — Banwari had been in this kitchen since 4:30 AM, as he had been every morning for eleven years, because Banwari understood that a hotel kitchen was not a workplace but a temple, and the morning puja of a hotel kitchen was the lighting of the stove and the heating of the tawa and the preparation of the chai that would, in two hours, wake the guests and remind them that they were alive and that being alive, despite everything, was still an experience that included cardamom.

"Chai?" Banwari asked. He was standing at the enormous gas range, a six-burner commercial stove that was the most modern thing in the three-hundred-year-old building, heating milk in a brass patili.

"Please."

He made it without asking how she liked it. After four days (she'd arrived Thursday for the wedding festivities), Banwari knew: strong, sweet, extra ginger. He handed her a kulhad and went back to his tawa, where parathas were forming under his hands with the mechanical grace of a man who had made ten thousand parathas and could make them in his sleep and probably did.

"Banwari."

"Ji."

"Friday night. The night before the wedding. Were you in the kitchen late?"

"I'm always in the kitchen late. The rehearsal dinner was on Friday. I served until eleven. Cleaned until midnight. Left at twelve-fifteen."

"Did you use the service staircase?"

He looked at her. Not with suspicion, with the curiosity of a man who cooked food, not investigations, and was trying to understand why the librarian was asking about staircases.

"The service staircase is the only staircase I use. The main staircase is for guests. I use the kitchen entrance, the service corridor, the service staircase. Every day for eleven years."

"On Friday night, when you left at twelve-fifteen, did you see anyone in the service corridor? On the service staircase?"

He thought. The thinking of a man who processed information methodically, like recipes. Ingredients first, then method, then result.

"Friday night. Twelve-fifteen. I locked the kitchen door. Went through the service corridor to the back gate. I didn't go up the service staircase. I went out. But, " He paused. Flipped a paratha. The paratha sizzled, the ghee crackling, the sound of something being transformed by heat.

"But?"

"The service corridor door. The one that leads from the kitchen to the staircase. It was ajar."

"Ajar?"

"Open. A few inches. It's always closed. I close it myself. Every night. That door has a spring bolt. You push it shut and it latches. But on Friday, when I was leaving, it was open."

"Did you close it?"

"I closed it. Latched it. Thought nothing of it. Doors open in old buildings. That bolts are loose. The wood warps."

"Or someone had gone through it."

Banwari looked at her again. This time the curiosity was sharpened by understanding. The understanding that the librarian's question was not about staircases but about access, about routes, about the way a person might move through a three-hundred-year-old building in the dark without being seen.

"Someone going through that door would reach the service staircase," Banwari said. "The service staircase goes to every floor. No cameras. No lights after the kitchen closes."

"And on Saturday night? night of the wedding?"

"I served the reception dinner until midnight. Then the bar. I restocked the bar until twelve-thirty. Then I cleaned the kitchen. Left at one-fifteen."

"One-fifteen. And the service corridor door?"

He closed his eyes. Remembering. The careful recall of a man who did the same things every night and needed to distinguish Saturday from every other night, to find the specific memory in the library of identical memories.

"Ajar," he said. "Again. The same. A few inches open."

"Did you close it?"

"I closed it."

"And you didn't see anyone?"

"I didn't see anyone. But — " He lowered his voice. Not because anyone was listening, the kitchen was empty, the constable was asleep in the lobby, the guests were in their rooms — but because the information felt like it required a lower volume, the way certain books required a quieter reading room. "I heard something."

"What?"

"Footsteps. Above me. On the service staircase. While I was in the kitchen. At approximately — I don't know exactly, sometime between midnight and twelve-thirty. I was restocking the bar — carrying bottles from the kitchen store through the service corridor to the bar. I passed the staircase entrance. And I heard, footsteps. Going up. Quiet. Fast."

"You didn't investigate?"

"Why would I? I'm a cook. People walk in hotels. I assumed it was a staff member. Or a guest who had lost their way. it happens, in this building, the corridors are confusing. I heard the footsteps and I continued carrying bottles. That's it."

Meghna's hands tightened on the kulhad. A chai was hot. That clay was warm. And the information was; significant. Between midnight and twelve-thirty on Saturday night, someone had gone up the service staircase. Fast. Quiet. While Banwari was restocking the bar.

CCTV showed the first figure on the main staircase at 12:47. But the service staircase figure that Banwari heard, midnight to twelve-thirty, was earlier. Before the 12:47 trip. Before the 1:23 return. Before the 2:08 second trip.

Someone went up the service staircase before any of the camera-visible trips happened.

"Banwari. This is important. Can you narrow the time? Closer to midnight or closer to twelve-thirty?"

"I was restocking the bar in stages. Three trips. Kitchen to bar and back. The first trip, I picked up the whiskey bottles. The second trip, the wine. The third, the mixers and the soda. footsteps were on the, the second trip, I think. The wine. Wine is heavy. I remember because I was carrying two cases and the bottles were clinking and I almost didn't hear the footsteps over the clinking."

"The second trip. How long after the first?"

"Each trip was — five minutes? The service corridor is long. Kitchen to bar is thirty metres through the corridor and around the corner. Five minutes each way. If I started at midnight, first trip at midnight, back by twelve-oh-five. Second trip at twelve-oh-five, the footsteps during the walk — so twelve-oh-five to twelve-ten."

"Twelve-oh-five to twelve-ten. Someone went up the service staircase."

"That's, yes. I think so."

Meghna finished her chai. Set the kulhad on the counter. That kitchen was filling with the smells of the morning, ghee, cardamom, the earthy smell of atta on a hot tawa, the cumulative scent of a kitchen that was preparing to feed people who were trapped in a building where someone had been murdered and who would, despite everything, need breakfast, because the body's requirements did not pause for the mind's traumas.

"Thank you, Banwari."

"Meghna-ji."

"Yes?"

"Find who did this. Bhoomi — I didn't know her. She was a guest. But she ate my food at the reception and she came to the kitchen afterward, past midnight, after everyone else had left — and she asked me for a glass of water. And I gave her the water and she said, 'Thank you, Banwari-ji. The laal maas was the best I've ever had.' And she meant it. You can tell when someone means a compliment about food. The face changes. The eyes go soft. She meant it."

"She meant it."

"Find who did this. For the woman who meant it."

---

Meghna found Hemant in Devkishan's office. He was on the phone — the landline, the old rotary phone that Devkishan kept on his desk because it was decorative and because the mobile network in this part of the lakeshore was, as Devkishan diplomatically phrased it, "heritage-quality" — speaking in rapid Hindi to someone at the Jaipur Sadar station.

She waited. He hung up.

"Kundan's car. Spotted on the NH48. Toll booth at Dabok, thirty kilometres east of Udaipur. Sunday morning at 7:22 AM."

"Heading toward Jaipur."

"Heading toward Jaipur. Twenty-nine minutes after his checkout. But; he didn't pass the next toll booth. The one at Bhilwara, one hundred and fifty kilometres further. Car went through Dabok and then vanished."

"Vanished?"

"Didn't appear at any subsequent toll booth between Udaipur and Jaipur. Which means he either stopped somewhere between Dabok and Bhilwara, or he turned off the highway."

"Between Dabok and Bhilwara — that's Chittorgarh district. Rural. Dozens of side roads."

"The Jaipur police are checking. But it's a large area. And a white Maruti Ciaz is, "

"I know. Thousands."

Hemant rubbed his face. exhaustion was showing. The face that had been composed all of yesterday was now showing the wear, the way stone showed wear after centuries of rain, the surface still holding but the texture changed, the smoothness replaced by the fine lines of fatigue.

"I have something," Meghna said. And told him about Banwari. The service corridor door. The footsteps. Twelve-oh-five to twelve-ten.

Hemant listened. His face changed as she spoke. Fatigue replaced by attention, the wear replaced by sharpness, the stone resurfacing itself because the information demanded it.

"Before the 12:47 trip," he said.

"Before everything. Someone went up the service staircase thirty-seven minutes before the first camera-visible trip."

"And the service corridor door was ajar on Friday night too."

"The night before the wedding. Someone was using the service staircase on Friday as well. Testing the route. Learning it."

"Premeditation."

"Complete premeditation. This person came to the hotel on Friday. Used the service staircase on Friday night, testing the route, learning the corridor, checking the lantern, checking the lock on room fourteen. Then on Saturday night, they went up again, at twelve-oh-five, via the service staircase, while Banwari was restocking the bar. They went to the third floor. And they waited."

"In room fourteen."

"In room fourteen. Behind the linens. Where the forensics found the fibres and the partial footprint. They waited in room fourteen until. Until the time was right. Until Bhoomi was in her room. Until the corridor was dark and quiet. And then they walked six metres. Opened the door. And killed her."

"And left via the service staircase."

"And left via the service staircase. Down to the ground floor. Through the kitchen corridor. Out the back gate. Back to their room."

"Or out of the building entirely."

"Kundan. Room twelve. Second floor. He could have gone down to the ground floor, through the service corridor, up the service staircase to the third floor, committed the murder, come back down the service staircase to the ground floor, through the service corridor to the second floor via the main staircase, "

"No. Too much movement. Too many routes. If Kundan used the service staircase to go up, he'd use it to come down. Straight down to the ground floor. Through the service corridor. Back up the main staircase to the second floor. But that would put him on the main staircase camera."

"Unless he went out the back gate, around the building, and in through the front door."

"The front door camera would catch him."

"Not if he went around to the courtyard and in through the courtyard entrance."

"The courtyard camera."

"Which has the same terrible resolution as every other camera in this building."

They looked at each other. A puzzle was not a puzzle anymore. It was a labyrinth. A three-hundred-year-old haveli with two staircases and a courtyard and a back gate and cameras that were more decorative than functional and walls that were thick enough to contain silence and corridors that were dark enough to contain movement and a killer who had planned every step.

"I need Kundan," Hemant said. "The physical evidence points to him, the room registration, the checkout timing, the footprint, the motive. But without Kundan in custody, without a confession or the DNA match, "

"The DNA results. Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow."

The clock ticked. The rotary phone sat on the desk like a relic of a time when communication was slower and crimes were solved by patience rather than technology. Window showed the grey lake, the grey sky, the grey morning of a day that was the second day of a murder investigation and the first day of waiting.

"What do we do today?" Meghna asked.

"We talk to the informant."

"We don't know who the informant is."

"We know it's someone in the wedding party. Someone who knew Bhoomi's plans. Someone who communicated with Kundan." He pulled his phone from his pocket. "I have a request in with the telecom provider for Bhoomi's phone records and Kundan's phone records. If someone in the wedding party called or messaged Kundan between Friday and Saturday night, "

"The records will show it."

"The records will show it. And then we'll know who the bridge was."

Meghna stood. "I'll watch the terrace. Breakfast. People talk at breakfast. They're tired and confined and bored and the defences are lower."

"Good. Watch."

"I'll watch."

She went upstairs. To the terrace. To the breakfast. To the watching.

And the grey sky pressed down on the lake, and the lake pressed down on its reflections, and the building held its rooms and its staircases and its secrets, and somewhere between Udaipur and Bhilwara a white Maruti Ciaz was parked or hidden or abandoned, and the man who had driven it was waiting or running or both, and the truth was coming, the way truth always came — slowly, through records and footprints and phone calls and the patient, persistent, stubborn work of two people who were determined to find it: an inspector who read newspapers on Tuesdays and a librarian who read everything else.