Private Delhi
Part One
Killer
Chapter 1
The killer emptied the final bag of ice into the bath and shut off the cold tap.
With the tub full he stood back to admire his handiwork, watching his breath bloom. Winter in Delhi, it was cold, but the temperature in the small bathroom was even lower than outside and falling fast, just the way he wanted it.
From outside came the sound of footsteps on the stairs and the killer moved quickly. His victim was early but that was fine, he was prepared, and in a heartbeat he left the bathroom and crossed the front room of the apartment, scooping his hypodermic syringe from a table as he passed. A scratching sound announced the key in the lock and the victim opened the door.
The killer attacked from behind, grabbing the victim, pulling him into the room, and smothering a cry of surprise with one gloved hand. He used the syringe and for a second the victim struggled, then went limp. The killer let him drop to the carpet, checked the corridor outside, and then kicked the door shut. He bent to the victim and began to undress him.
Ten minutes later the victim awoke, naked and gasping in the bath. The bathroom light was off and his eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the gloom but he heard the clicking of the ice cubes and knew instantly where he was. His arms had been hoisted overhead, handcuffed to the taps; submerged in the ice, his feet and knees were bound. As he began to struggle he heard someone enter the room and then a gloved hand pushed his head beneath the cubes. He inhaled icy water, feeling his airways fill and his heart constrict with the shock of the sudden cold. When the hand allowed him back to the surface, his coughs and splutters were punctuated by the violent chattering of his teeth.
The figure loomed over him, a shadow in the darkened bathroom. “You’ll feel it in your toes and fingertips first,” he said. “Tingling. Then numbness. That’s your body redirecting resources to protect the vital organs. Clever thing, the body, it can adapt quickly. If you were an Inuit, an Aborigine, even a Tibetan Buddhist monk, then withstanding this kind of cold would be simple for you, but you’re not those things, you’re...”
The killer moved into view. In his hand was the victim’s name badge, taken from his shirt. “Rahul,” he read, and then tossed it into the bath. “Oh, I do apologize. I’m sure you know all about the effects of cold on the human body. You know all about the slow shutting down of the various functions, how the brain dies before the heart.”
“Who are you?” managed Rahul. He squinted. “Do I know you?” The attacker’s voice was familiar somehow.
“I don’t know,” said the attacker. “Do you?” He perched on the edge of the bath and Rahul could see he wore all black, including a black balaclava. Opaque surgical gloves seemed to shine dully in the gloom, giving him the appearance of an evil mime.
“You’re wondering why I’m here,” said the man, as though reading his thoughts. He smiled and removed from his pocket a tiny little tool that he showed to Rahul. “Are you familiar with a procedure called enucleation?”
Chapter 2
Jack Morgan enjoyed risk. Why else would he be standing outside this door at 4 a.m., barely daring to breathe as he used a tiny lubricating spray on the lock and then went to work with his pick, nudging interior tumblers into place?
But not blind risk.
Again, that was the reason the owner of the world-renowned Private investigation agency had arrived in Delhi two days earlier than his official schedule predicted, and more discreetly than usual. It was because he liked his risk with a little forethought.
He liked calculated risk.
He slid into the darkened apartment like a shadow. From his pocket he took a rubber doorstop, closed the front door as far as he could without making a sound, and then wedged it.
Next he listened. For close to five minutes Jack stood in silence by the door, letting his eyes adjust and taking in the scant furniture — a sofa, a television, an upturned packing crate for a coffee table — but more than anything, listening — listening to the noise that emanated from the bedroom.
What he heard was the sound of a man enduring a fitful sleep, a man who mewled with the pain of nightmares.
Jack trod noiselessly through the apartment. In the kitchen he opened the fridge door and peered inside. Nothing. Back in the front room he went to the upturned crate.
On it stood a bottle of whisky. Johnnie Walker.
Oh, Santosh, thought Jack to himself. Tell me you haven’t.
From the bedroom the sound of Santosh Wagh’s nightmares increased, so Jack Morgan finished his work and let himself out of the apartment and into the chill Delhi morning.
Chapter 3
In the upmarket area of Greater Kailash in South Delhi, in a row of homes, a young couple stood at the gate of an abandoned house.
“This is it,” said the boy, his breath fogging in Delhi’s winter air.
“Are you sure?” asked the girl at his side.
“Sure I’m sure,” he replied. “C’mon, let’s go inside.”
They climbed over the gate easily and made their way through overgrown grass to the front door. Padlocked. But the boy used a pick to crack the lock in less than two minutes. Not bad for an amateur, he thought to himself.
He went to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge.
“What’s wrong?” asked the girl. She was shivering and cold and desperately wishing they’d decided to go to the cinema instead of opting to make out here.
The boy was puzzled. “I thought it was unlocked...”
“What do we do now, then?” said the girl.
Like all young men governed by their libido, the boy wasn’t about to give up easily. Yes, it was cold, but he’d come armed with a blanket and the garden was sufficiently overgrown to screen them from the street.
“We don’t need to go inside. Let’s just stay out here,” the boy suggested.
“But it’s so cold,” she gasped.
“We’ll soon warm each other up,” he assured her, leading her to an area close to the front of the house. The grass was damp but he covered it with the blanket from his backpack, and the foliage not only screened them but also protected them from the chill breeze. She tried to imagine that they had found themselves a secret garden, and when he produced a spliff, it sealed the deal.
They sat and spent some minutes in relaxed, agreeable silence as they smoked the spliff, listening to the muted sounds of the city drifting to them through the trees. Then they lay down and began kissing. In a few moments they were making love, cocooned in weed-induced sexual bliss.
“What’s that?” she said.
“What’s what?” he asked, irritated.
“That noise.” Then her senses sharpened. “It’s the ground. The ground is—”
She didn’t get to finish her sentence. Suddenly it was as though the grass were trying to swallow them. Subsidence. A sinkhole. Something. Either way, the earth gave way beneath them, and the two lovebirds crashed through the lawn and into a nightmare beneath.
Chapter 4
Dazed, the girl pulled herself to her hands and knees, coughing and gagging at a sudden stench, a mix of caustic chemicals and something else. Something truly stomach-turning.
The floor was rough concrete. She was in a low-ceilinged basement. A gray patch of light in the ceiling indicated where they’d fallen through. Plasterboard, turf, and rotted wooden beams hung down as though in the aftermath of a storm.