Whodunit - Chapter 25 - Still Clueless

“Wait a minute,” Dhruv looked nervous now. “There must be hundreds of people around who interact with animals!”
“Yes, that’s true.” I said, Dhruv relaxed a little, “But none of them were to profit from Rajat’s death. Neither did they all know where Rajat parked his car or where Smruti stayed. What I am confused about is, how did you know he was going to abandoned church?”
“I don’t know what you are talking about. The day my father died, I was at a party with my friends. You can check.” Dhruv said confidently.
“Fine, I will.” I took the number of the club that Dhruv was talking about. I passed the number to Shammi and asked him to check it out.




I walked into Shvetank’s holding cell.
“Are you ready to tell the truth?” I asked him coldly.
“Please. You have to believe me, I didn’t stab him!” Shvetank pleaded.
“What did you do after you used the chloroform on Rajat?” I wanted to hear Shvetank’s side of the story. He winced.
“I’m a biology student. I know how much choloform is harmful to humans, I was very careful! I didn’t use too much for him. He was alive when I left him.”
“Just one hour back, you admitted that it was an accident, now you are saying it wasn’t an accident and someone deliberately killed him?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know! But if I killed him, it was an accident!”
“I believe you.” That seemed to calm him down a little.
“I just threw the bottle and got the hell out of there.” my ears pricked. Dropped the bottle?
“Shvetank, think carefully, you left the bottle there? Near the body? And the handkerchief?” I asked.
“Yes, I just threw the bottle. The handkerchief I think I stuffed inside my bag and got out of there. I dropped Aarti home and prayed that Rajat Sinha gets home safe and sound.”


I looked down at my phone. Shammi had been calling me frantically for the past ten minutes.
“Yeah, tell me.” I answered.
“Okay.. I have some news.”
“Shoot.”
“I bumped into our pal Jagdish and turns out, he supplied the weed to Shvetank. And Shvetank paid him back, full in cash. The day after Rajat Sinha died.”
“Oh. Really? Anything else?” I asked.
“Yeah, Prerna called, she’s going back to Smruti’s apartment, she thinks we’re missing something obvious.”
“Ok. That’s good. I hope she finds something. I’m going around in circles here.”
“Well..” I could sense the hesitation in Shammi’s voice.
“What is it?”
“I checked out that club. Dhruv was there till wee hours of the morning. He was so smashed, he couldn’t walk. They had to call him a cab.”
“So, he’s not our guy?” I asked disappointed. I had bet my money on Dhruv.
“Umm, here’s the weird part. I also spoke to a couple of my buddies in the highway patrol. They recall a speeding bike on Thursday night, heading towards the mountains. They noted down the number but didn’t send a speeding ticket. Guess who the bike belongs to?”
I didn’t want to guess.
“Dhruv?” I asked.
“Yep.”

Whodunit - Chapter 24 - New Suspects

Aarti was sitting nervously, holding her mother’s hand. Dhruv stood outside the interrogation room, glaring at us.

“Inspector, you have the murderer. Why put my sister through this?” He said to me.

“I’m sorry Dhruv, but if your sister was with Shvetank when your father was murdered, she’s likely to be slapped with some charges too. It’s a crime to keep information hidden from the police.” I told him gravely.

“Serious charges?” Dhruv asked, concerned.

I smiled. “That depends on how good your lawyer is. Hey..” A thought occurred to me, “Do you mind sticking around? I would like to ask you some questions.”

Dhruv nodded, “Sure, anything I can do to help.”

I started walking inside the room when Shammi pulled me aside, “I’m going back to the college. I feel like something’s missing.”

I nodded. “While you are at it, check him out too.” I indicated towards Dhruv.

Aarti stiffened as I walked inside the room.

I looked down at some papers in my hand, “What is it that you wanted to tell us?”

Aarti looked at her mum, who nodded encouragingly, “Tell him the truth honey.”

Aarti took a deep breath, “I called him, Rajat. The day he died.”

“What for?” I already knew, but it was always better to cross verify.

“I needed money. Shvetank forced me to ask him for money.” Aarti dabbed her eyes.

“And then?”

“He followed me.. To the church..” Aarti was trembling now.

“Go on..” I said encouragingly.

“And then Shvetank.. he..” She clutched her mother’s hand a little tighter. “He put some chloroform on something and put it around my father’s mouth. I remember telling him that my father will press charges of assault against him. He had just laughed and said ‘I’ll take care of it’ And then he dropped me back home. I didn’t know what he was planning to do...”

I stayed silent, absorbing all that Aarti had told me.

“And then he asked me for Smruti’s and Tara’s address.”

I pulled out the pictures of the knife we had recovered from the crime site.

“Recognize this?” I asked her.

“Yes, it’s Shvetank’s. He always carries it around in his bag pack.”

“I think that’s all for now..” I showed her the way out and beckoned Dhruv in.

“Anything you can tell me?” I didn’t really have any questions for him.

“Not really, I hardly met the man.” Dhruv said coolly.

“But he was very fond of you?”

“I was the only one in the family who was capable enough to take over his precious factory. Aarti, she.. Well, she isn’t the types who would want to run a factory.”

“So you don’t know anything?”

“Well. Aarti wanted me to talk to my dad the day he died. She thought he would give me money if I asked him. But of course I didn’t. I told her I would give her the money, if she only told me what it was for.”

“So now that Rajat’s dead, are you going to accept what his will states? Or is it against your principles to accept his money?”

“That’s a lot of money we are talking about, I’d be a fool to walk away from it.” Dhruv smiled coolly. “Now that he’s dead, I have no qualms taking it.”

Dhruv brushed his hand over his shoulder as he spoke. Animal hair.

“Any pets?” I asked him.

“No.. But I work at a animal shelter.” He smiled. “Dogs! They shed so much hair..”

“Dhruv, where were you ten days ago?” I asked suddenly.

“Why? Am I suspect now?” he laughed.

I was not amused. “Do you know what we found on your father’s belongings apart from blood?” I asked him.

He shook his head, surprised at the sudden change in my tone.

“Animal hair.”

Whodunit - Chapter 23 - Case Solved?

“What’s going on here?” I stepped between Shammi and Shvetank.

“We need to take him in for further questioning.” Shammi nodded towards Shvetank.

“No.. you can’t..” A distraught Aarti was holding on to Shvetank’s arm. “I’ll tell you everything!!” She pleaded.

“Aarti, what are you saying?!” Krupa tried to dislodge Aarti from Shvetank’s arm.

“No.. mum, I know what I’m doing.” She shrugged off Krupa’s hand.

“Everybody calm down!” I ordered.. “Shvetank, you are coming with us. Mrs. Krupa, you have to drive your daughter to the station.”

“She hasn’t done anything! She’s just saying some things to protect him.” She glared at Shvetank.

“Regardless, Aarti wants to say something, and I need a parent’s approval for that.” Krupa Mitwe turned towards Dhruv with a pleading look on her face.  Dhruv shook his head. Krupa sighed, “Fine, I’ll get her.”

We left Shvetank in a holding cell while Shammi filled me in.

“So, I went to the college like you said. And I checked up on Shvetank. Guess what his primary subject is?” He asked.

“I give up, what?”

“Biology. So not only does our boy have access to the labs and Chloroform, I made the lab assistant check, there is some concentrated chloroform missing from the storage area.” I whistled.

“Wait.. That’s not it. The rumor around college is that he was known to experiment with different kinds of substance abuse.”

“And he had the knife.” I said.

“What knife?” I quickly filled in Shammi about the knife. Forensics was going through the contents of Shvetank’s bag but I had already given then a head’s up on the knife.

“But why did he do it?”  Shammi and I were brainstorming now. Before we interrogated the suspect, we needed to have as much information out as possible.

“Didn’t you say he was seeing Aarti?” Shammi asked me.

“Yeah. You don’t think that’s why he killed Rajat right? I mean it’s a little far fetched.”

“Hear me out.” Shammi put up a hand to silence me.

“The last call Rajat received was from Krupa’s house. What if it was Aarti?” I opened my mouth to protest but then stopped. Maybe he was right.

“Lets ask him some questions before Aarti gets here.” I suggested. Shammi nodded. We walked into the holding cell, where Shvetank was looking increasingly nervous.

“What’s going on! Why am I here? I didn’t do anything!” He exclaimed.

“We know about the chloroform.” I said quietly.

All wind zapped out of Shvetank. His shoulders slumped.

“It was an accident. I didn’t mean to..” he put his head in his hands and began to cry. I had to remind myself, that even though he was legally an adult, he was just 19.

“Shvetank.. why did you do it?” I still couldn’t guess a motive.

“He caught me..” He paused. “Doing weed. And he asked me where Aarti was.”

“Where was she?”

“Hiding. She didn’t want her father to find her. She had taken the money from him.” He was sobbing now.

“Money for what?”

“To buy the weed.  And when he turned around, I just dabbed a little chloroform on my handkerchief, and put it around his mouth. I never meant to kill him.”

“You’re lying.” Shammi said roughly.

“No.. no.. you have to believe me. Please! I just wanted to make him unconscious, so that Aarti and I could escape.” He was pleading with us.

“So that’s why you went back to stab him?”

“But I didn’t! He got stabbed?” Shvetank looked perplexed.

“Shvetank. We found a knife, identical to the one you have on the crime scene.” Shammi explained patiently.

“But I lost my old one. I don’t know where. That’s why I bought a replacement.”

We spent an hour with Shvetank, but he did not budge from his statement , that he didn’t stab Rajat Sinha. We were still charging him with murder. He was the murderer, I could feel it.

And Aarti’s testimony, would only confirm it. I was waiting eagerly to interrogate Aarti and be done with this case.

Whodunit - Chapter 22 - A confession?

I rubbed my eyes tiredly. Everyone seemed to have one or the other motive. But first things first. I texted Shammi and asked him to go to Shvetank’s college and do a background check on Shvetank.

I kept an eye on him. I saw Aarti walk up to him swiftly and glanced at me again. She knew something. Either that, or she knew someone who knew something.

I took a step towards Aarti, now would be a good time to question her,I thought,  when I suddenly realized, Aarti was still a minor. Just 17 which meant I would have to question her either with her mother’s consent or with a lawyer. I was thinking about a work around when some one called out for me.

“Inspector Chetan?” An elderly man dressed in a sharp suit called me. Lawyer I presumed.

“That’s me.” I walked towards him.

He glanced at some papers in his hands, “You wanted to ask us some questions? We have some time, if that’s ok with you.”

That was a first for me. Lawyers generally avoided cops like plague. I said so once we were inside his office. He grimaced.

‘Rajat was a friend of mine. And I want to offer all the help that I possibly can.’ He seemed sincere. I had nothing to lose.

“So, when did he change his will?”

He shook his head. “No, its not what you think. He has changed his will twice this year already.”

“Can you give me some specifics?” I had no idea whether this information was to be confidential or not.

“Not really, but I’m going to tell you anyway. Initially, Rajat had a well balanced will, with everything divided between his ex-wife, kids and Tara. Then six months ago, he changed it and added Smruti to it. And two months ago, he changed it again. Completely cut off Tara.”

“But Tara didn’t know about it?” I interjected.

“I can’t be too sure about it, but she did call me a couple of weeks ago to ask me whether Rajat had changed the will recently.”

I raised my eyebrow. “And you didn’t find it suspicious?”

“No.. Couples do it all the time.” He explained. “They discuss something amongst each other and one of them comes down and makes the change. But we don’t give out the details to the spouse. I told her the same thing, that I was not at a liberty to discuss it.”

I nodded.. “So who would be benefitted the most from Rajat’s death? Financially, I mean.”

His answer surprised me.

“Krupa, Aarti and Dhruv.” He smiled at my surprise.

“But Smruti Sharma told me that she was the one who walked away with the most.” I protested.

“You see, Rajat wasn’t sure whether Smruti was genuinely fond of him or she was with him for his money. So he never really gave her a true picture about his wealth. So according to what Rajat told her, she is walking away with the maximum. But the truth is, Rajat’s main possession was his shares. All of which he’s left for Dhruv. He wasn’t sure Dhruv would accept it though. He made arrangements, so that if Dhruv declines to take it, it be liquidated and the money put in a safe deposit till Dhruv decides to take it. Strange right?”

I nodded. “All this for a adopted son? He must be really fond of him.”

“Yes. He is.” He corrected himself. “Was. He was very attached to Dhruv. He also left his house, where Tara is staying right now, to Krupa. Of course, Tara can contest this will, and I’m pretty sure she’ll be able to get some of the money and maybe even the house.”

“Do you have any idea, how was Krupa Mitwe’s and Rajat Sinha’s relationship?” I was just shooting in the dark. I didn’t really expect the lawyer to know.

“No.. not really. Sometimes I think that Rajat used to tolerate her just because she was Dhruv’s mother and Dhruv dotes on her. You can understand, their divorce was bitter.”

We heard some commotion outside. I raced outside.

Shammi was blocking Shvetank’s way. Aarti stood between Shvetank and Shammi. She was crying hard.

“Okay..” She sobbed, “Okay, I’ll tell you everything.. Just let him go.”