Delhi Noir Read Online Free PDF Page B

looked for the file everywhere—in every single directory, folder, and subfolder, even the hidden ones. I searched for it by keyword, by date, by name, by subject. But it was nowhere to be found. I stared at the computer and suddenly felt certain that my ex-wife, the custodian of our only child, had somehow gotten to it and erased it. So certain was I that I sent e-mails to my lawyers and hers, to her parents and to mine, to her bosses and to mine, to the police, the supreme and high courts, the prime minister, and a few friends of the family who happened to be ministers at the time. Then I sat back and waited for news of her arrest to arrive.
    My mobile phone rang after fifteen minutes.
    It was one of the she-bosses, Sheena, the one for whom I was doing the feasibility study.
    “I don’t believe this,” she said. “Do you know what time it is?”
    “I’m telling you, it’s true,” I insisted, raising my voice. “I was going to print it out and mail it to you tomorrow, but the bitch got to it first. She must be spying on me.”
    “And how is she doing that?” Sheena asked sweetly.
    “I don’t know.” I looked suspiciously at the walls. “Maybe she bribed the maid again.”
    Silence on the line. I could see Sheena shaking her head, her shoulder-length iron-gray hair brushing her cheeks.
    “Do you know what time it is?” she asked for the second time.
    I looked at my watch. 1:29. “Time? What has time got to do with anything? This is an emergency, we need to find her and put her in prison,” I said impatiently.
    “It’s 1:30 a.m.” she continued in the same deadpan voice. “I have to work tomorrow morning, you know. I can’t sleep till 11 like you do.”
    I sensed a lecture coming and groaned. “But you’ve got plenty of time to sleep. Stop talking and go to sleep now. I’ll find her and the file and get them to you tomorrow. Promise.” The moment the word was out of my mouth, I knew I’d made a mistake.
    “You won’t,” she sighed. “You won’t because you haven’t done it. You’ve just been boozing and womanizing instead. How can you be so irresponsible? Think of Akshay, for God’s sake.” She went on for another five minutes, telling me how I had mucked up my life, finishing with, “Do you have a death wish? If so, just tell us and we’ll leave you alone. But remember, you have a son to think about.”
    “I know, I know,” I said when she’d finished. “Just go to sleep. I’ll find the report and get it to you tomorrow. Promise.”
    The phone went dead. I got up and threw it off the balcony. Then it struck me that if the police called I wouldn’t know, and if they couldn’t find me they would let her go. So I decided to go to the police station myself. I left the house and began walking. I had no choice. My car was gone, not stolen or sold as normally happens in this city, but simply misplaced. It would turn up eventually. It always did—for the car was so filthy no one wanted it in front of their house.
    I walked along National Highway 3 toward Delhi, past the NOIDA golf course, the shopping malls, and the beehive colonies with their peeling façades. People in cars honked as they drove by. Truckers flashed their lights and motorcyclists cursed. But I hardly noticed. I was a man on a mission, filled with a superhuman strength. I walked over the sewage drain that was the Yamuna by way of the Japanese Bridge. As I entered the city, Humayun’s onion-shaped dome glowing palely in the moonlight, my objectives changed and I headed up Mathura Road to the roundabout with the little Lodhi tomb and then turned left toward the Oberoi flyover. I was going to score some sister.

    There was a party going on under the flyover. Four men had just scored some sister and were huddled over a small scrap of paper. One man, his hands trembling like a fish out of water, was trying to light a match, cursing fluently in a mixture of English, Bengali, and Assamese.
    “Hey, even your language smells