The story so far:
"...lies, in the depth of darkness! Chapter 1 : Moment of grief" -> (5 skipped) -> "Part 7: The discovery" -> "Part 7: The discovery -- continued"
Part 7: The discovery : continued
by sutirtho
The guys opened the creaky weathered door and cleared the cobwebs; the girls followed. They went to the first floor where it was relatively cleaner. They settled down on newspapers after dusting the ground a bit. There was a small elevated wooden surface and it was used as filler for a table; the Planchet board was placed over it. The guys and the girls sat alternatively forming a circle around the board. Anuj lit the candle and placed it near an end of the table. He also decided to be the medium. Amrita chose herself to be the one who would note down the letters.
“If there’s anything that starts off, please ask questions guys!” Anuj said.
“Don’t worry Anuj, we will do that.” Nisha assured.
The pencil was given to Anuj and all of them placed their index finger on the cork placed at the centre of the Planchet board. The people started concentrating on the board and Anuj started enchanting ‘Sutirtho … Sutirtho …’ mentally. An hour or so passed on, and they could hardly notice a thing. Few minutes later, there was a slight movement of the cork; it started vibrating abruptly. The girls were scared, but they didn’t say a thing. People understood that something was about to happen.
“Sutirtho, are you there?” Nigel asked.
Anuj immediately pointed to ‘Yes’ with the pencil.
“What was that ‘reverse’ and ‘not alone’? Nigel continued with the questions.
Amrita noted few letters at which Anuj pointed. It read “Haroon.”
“What about him?” Rita asked.
Anuj: “Children”.
“Children? You mean there’s a connection?” Nisha got curious.
Anuj: “Sex”.
That perplexed everyone. Haroon flinched. Karan didn’t have an expression on his face at that; he was nonchalant.
“Why did you commit a suicide?” Nigel asked again.
There was no answer. Nigel repeated the question. Anuj’s hand started trembling once again. Amrita scribbled again and it read “I still love Haroon.”
Haroon let out a sigh of grief.
“We know that, but why did you die?” Nigel reframed the question.
There was no movement. Then suddenly Anuj pointed at “No”.
Nigel looked puzzled “Does that mean you didn’t die yourself?”
Anuj: ‘Yes’.
“Who killed you?” Nigel asked.
Amrita noted the letters and couldn’t believe her eyes.
It read “K .... A ... R .... A.... N”.
Karan jumped up suddenly and kicked Anuj hard on his back.
“You think you are smart? Huh?! This is all ****, you guys want to get me all messed up, I’m not going to tolerate anything more. I had enouuuuuuuuuuuugh!” Karan turned livid.
Haroon ran to Karan, immediately, and punched him hard on his face; he placed a few more punches to debilitate him. Karan and Haroon got involved in a fight.
“Tell them you screwing moron, you killed my best friend, accept the fact, else, no one can stop me from killing you right here.” Haroon grunted furiously.
“What are you talking about? Have you gone crazy? Is this some kind of pathetic joke?” Karan screamed.
Haroon held Karan by his collar; Nigel and Anuj tried to free Karan from him. Haroon continued almost breathlessly, “Don’t you dare imitate innocence now, Karan! We decided to talk with him, you agreed on that, and still you killed him?”
Karan hit Haroon ruthlessly on his stomach and cried out in anger “Whatever you guys are thinking, I swear on God, I’d never do that!”
“Dare you swear on God? You liar!” Haroon grumbled and continued holding Karan with all force and slapped him hard. “Speak the truth Karan, else I swear on God you shall not live!” Haroon shouted.
The girls agglomerated in awe seeing the guys fighting; they had no clue of anything happening in front of them.
“You are the root cause you arsehole! You should have been careful.” Karan screamed on top of his voice.
Haroon started sobbing bitterly, “I wish I had stayed with Sutirtho that night; I don’t know why I trusted you! You killed my buddy! You are such a beast!”
The other guys and girls couldn’t decipher whatever those guys where talking about. Nigel tried to make sense, “Haroon, Karan… tell us right away what happened?”
Nigel held Karan tightly; he had already started hating him. Haroon took a deep breath and started explaining. He narrated everything to the point I went unconscious. “Sameer had called up Karan and told him about Sutirtho. Karan was also an accomplice in this crime. We decided to use chloroform to make him unconscious for a while; but we dropped the plan when Sameer pointed out that it could intrigue the police. Sameer and Karan had decided that Sutirtho shouldn’t live anymore. I pacified them and made them agree on discussing things with him the following morning. I also took the responsibility of making him understand things and persuading him to forget what he had seen by promising that we would not be involved again. Karan and I carried him to the hostel, and placed him on his bed and left his room.
Karan was still reeling under the blows from Haroon. Still he wouldn’t let go. Haroon hit him again; Karan couldn’t hit back, he was held firmly by Anuj and Nigel.
“Tell us!” Nigel shouted. “You better tell us now what you did to Sutirtho!”
He started narrating his part of the story, “Haroon and I brought him to his room; we decided to talk with him in the morning when he’d came back to his senses. However, we were scared about him raising an alarm whenever he would wake up. But we guessed that he wouldn’t be around sooner. I thought Sutirtho could screw up my career if I was ever caught by the police. I was absolutely panicked and I couldn’t control taking a decision. I came back later in his room. He was still unconscious. Professor Sameer had inflicted a strong blow. I wore gloves so that there were no fingerprints anywhere; I brought a rope and put it around his neck, and then I tied it down from the ceiling fan. I made him stand on a chair and adjusted the length of the rope appropriately, and then I removed the chair; closed the gate from inside and used the balcony to go out, again closing the balcony gate from outside by placing my hand inside through the grill above the balcony door.”
“Good that you accepted whatever you had done; I already had my instincts saying this! I was just trying to make you accept things in front of others and the police! The Planchet was a decoy!” Anuj said.
Everybody was dumbfounded with that latest piece of information from Anuj. “Yes, there is one more person in this room, and that person is Rita’s uncle Mr. Amit. He is an inspector at Koramangala police station. Here you go Amit uncle; you can take these two and our respected professor!”
“Anuj! How did you guess?” Nigel was too curious to know.
“Obvious question! Let me explain! I had attended the class in which Sameer spoke about ‘reverse speech’. Nigel, you were too lazy to come to the class. I found the concept very interesting. Then the next day, I found Sutirtho very quite and calm. We had a talk, where we discussed stuff about speech. He had mentioned that some sentences, that Haroon spoke, had to do something with children. I didn’t suspect these guys and I tried comforting Sutirtho as he looked somewhat disturbed. Then after dinner when I was coming back, I found him going out, from a distance. So, when we found out the unfortunate incident, I felt terribly bad for Sutirtho. I decided to find out if he had really done the suicide or it was a murder. That is actually an obvious question that strikes everybody."
Anuj paused to re-construct his thoughts. After a momentary gap he continued “The police had kept Sutirtho’s mobile with them, so I didn’t have a chance to find out anything from there. However, I noticed something that belonged to Karan when we were pulling down Sutirtho. You know, whatever way you try not to leave some details, you will definitely keep some hint unknowingly. And that’s what mattered. Karan is the only one among our friend’s circle who wears shirts; others prefer t-shirts. I found one of his popular Colour Plus shirt buttons on Sutirtho’s bed. The one you always wear whenever we plan to go to a disco, you are kind of branded with that shirt. I quickly hid that before anyone could notice.”
“What intrigued me after that was why Karan’s shirt button would be found there, unless there was a struggle or something. A button can’t just fall off on its own. I asked the guard if he had seen Sutirtho entering the hostel sometime. He replied that two guys were carrying him at night around 3:30 am. The hostel dinning room was deserted and most of the guys were sleeping, so no one noticed other than the guard. Then I showed him Karan, Nigel, Haroon and few other guys’ pictures. He recognized Haroon and Karan.”
“After I had done all those research, I was kind of confused as to why would even Karan or Haroon think of killing Sutirtho. We had a good friend’s circle that others were jealous off. I planned this Planchet thing. I told Nigel that I’d seen the same dream as the one he saw yesterday night. It happened, quite luckily, to fit into the scheme of things. I mean, I didn’t expect Nigel would dream anything of that sort. I also asked Niraj to get into Nigel’s room the same way Karan had left Sutirtho’s room the other night, i.e. through the balcony. I told him to paint those words on the wall. I could trust that Nigel was not involved in anything, because, he was studying with me, almost the entire night and he had also slept in my room. With that much done, the situation was created to talk and convince you guys about the decoy i.e. the Planchet; the rest of the things were very easy. I discussed all these things with Rita and requested Amit uncle to help me with this. So, she knew everything. I knew I couldn’t trust the police station that was handling this case, as they’d think as if I was involved in the murder.”
Anuj stopped and gasped for breathe.
“But, how did you guess it was me?” Karan quizzed.
“I had to take a pick between Haroon and you; my gut feeling or intuition, whatever you call it, said that Haroon couldn’t do this, as we all knew he had an affair with Sutirtho. So, I took a wild guess, a pretty wild I should say!”
“And why did Sameer falter while pronouncing ‘reverse’?” Nigel asked.
“I have no idea about that, may be Sutirtho was helping us, you never know! Sometimes certain things just fall into place at the right time! ” Anuj tried explaining.
Anuj continued “And you know what? The post mortem report also showed the fracture of the hyoid bone, which also sometimes suggests manual strangulation. The police had doubted that I guess.”
“Yes, and to add to it, there was a mark found on the neck, that couldn’t have been caused because of the rope; it was a mark of hitting with something tough, as per the reports, which obviously was a concern for the police to think that it was not a suicide.” Mr. Amit added.
“Anyway, I already had enough of all these, what I know right now is that I can continue hating Karan, Haroon & Sameer for the rest of my life!” Nigel looked at Haroon and Karan. His eyes showed deep hatred.
Amrita fulminated, “It’s beyond my dignity to talk with such incorrigible and detestable creatures! And I considered them friends! Poor me! Still, I need to know what made you do all these. You had a girlfriend Karan, and you Haroon, you had such a sweet boy as your partner! Why?”
“I hate myself for being with that beast!” Nisha repented and ran to Karan and slapped him hard and started crying. Nigel tried to help her.
“We want an explanation, we deserve an explanation to such crime; we deserve to know what was lacking in us, that you people had to resort to innocent children?” Rita asked.
“Tell us murderer! Tell us the truth, anyone of you?” Nigel shouted at Karan and Haroon.
Karan started explaining once again, “I don’t deserve to live; I don’t know where my ethics, moral compunctions were! I was, as if, in some other world where I couldn’t make a difference between good or bad. I used to take tuitions from Sameer. It was the end of fifth semester and I felt I needed some help in one of the subjects. You obviously know that, and also the fact that Sameer is unmarried. But, what I’m going to tell you now, was never known by anybody. I’d discovered one day that Sameer was involved with small kids; it was accidental the same way as Sutirtho discovered it. Sameer had given me various threats of failing me in the subjects forever; he also said that he’d tell the principal and my parents, things that are utterly untrue. But, to his surprise, he discovered that I found the concept of sexually interacting with kids interesting. You call it my perverted nature, or my lack of conscience, I was interested in that. So, I became involved in it, and I loved it. But I hate myself now; I hate myself for killing one of my best friends to hide my guilt!”
“I’m really ashamed to think that these two people used to be my friends,” Amrita said. "The kids have the most uncluttered mind, they don't understand, they can't tell people out of fear, and they endure the pain, those little cherubs! You are absolutely insane and inhuman, Karan! Do you understand the grimness of the hideous crime?"“If there’s anything that starts off, please ask questions guys!” Anuj said.
“Don’t worry Anuj, we will do that.” Nisha assured.
The pencil was given to Anuj and all of them placed their index finger on the cork placed at the centre of the Planchet board. The people started concentrating on the board and Anuj started enchanting ‘Sutirtho … Sutirtho …’ mentally. An hour or so passed on, and they could hardly notice a thing. Few minutes later, there was a slight movement of the cork; it started vibrating abruptly. The girls were scared, but they didn’t say a thing. People understood that something was about to happen.
“Sutirtho, are you there?” Nigel asked.
Anuj immediately pointed to ‘Yes’ with the pencil.
“What was that ‘reverse’ and ‘not alone’? Nigel continued with the questions.
Amrita noted few letters at which Anuj pointed. It read “Haroon.”
“What about him?” Rita asked.
Anuj: “Children”.
“Children? You mean there’s a connection?” Nisha got curious.
Anuj: “Sex”.
That perplexed everyone. Haroon flinched. Karan didn’t have an expression on his face at that; he was nonchalant.
“Why did you commit a suicide?” Nigel asked again.
There was no answer. Nigel repeated the question. Anuj’s hand started trembling once again. Amrita scribbled again and it read “I still love Haroon.”
Haroon let out a sigh of grief.
“We know that, but why did you die?” Nigel reframed the question.
There was no movement. Then suddenly Anuj pointed at “No”.
Nigel looked puzzled “Does that mean you didn’t die yourself?”
Anuj: ‘Yes’.
“Who killed you?” Nigel asked.
Amrita noted the letters and couldn’t believe her eyes.
It read “K .... A ... R .... A.... N”.
Karan jumped up suddenly and kicked Anuj hard on his back.
“You think you are smart? Huh?! This is all ****, you guys want to get me all messed up, I’m not going to tolerate anything more. I had enouuuuuuuuuuuugh!” Karan turned livid.
Haroon ran to Karan, immediately, and punched him hard on his face; he placed a few more punches to debilitate him. Karan and Haroon got involved in a fight.
“Tell them you screwing moron, you killed my best friend, accept the fact, else, no one can stop me from killing you right here.” Haroon grunted furiously.
“What are you talking about? Have you gone crazy? Is this some kind of pathetic joke?” Karan screamed.
Haroon held Karan by his collar; Nigel and Anuj tried to free Karan from him. Haroon continued almost breathlessly, “Don’t you dare imitate innocence now, Karan! We decided to talk with him, you agreed on that, and still you killed him?”
Karan hit Haroon ruthlessly on his stomach and cried out in anger “Whatever you guys are thinking, I swear on God, I’d never do that!”
“Dare you swear on God? You liar!” Haroon grumbled and continued holding Karan with all force and slapped him hard. “Speak the truth Karan, else I swear on God you shall not live!” Haroon shouted.
The girls agglomerated in awe seeing the guys fighting; they had no clue of anything happening in front of them.
“You are the root cause you arsehole! You should have been careful.” Karan screamed on top of his voice.
Haroon started sobbing bitterly, “I wish I had stayed with Sutirtho that night; I don’t know why I trusted you! You killed my buddy! You are such a beast!”
The other guys and girls couldn’t decipher whatever those guys where talking about. Nigel tried to make sense, “Haroon, Karan… tell us right away what happened?”
Nigel held Karan tightly; he had already started hating him. Haroon took a deep breath and started explaining. He narrated everything to the point I went unconscious. “Sameer had called up Karan and told him about Sutirtho. Karan was also an accomplice in this crime. We decided to use chloroform to make him unconscious for a while; but we dropped the plan when Sameer pointed out that it could intrigue the police. Sameer and Karan had decided that Sutirtho shouldn’t live anymore. I pacified them and made them agree on discussing things with him the following morning. I also took the responsibility of making him understand things and persuading him to forget what he had seen by promising that we would not be involved again. Karan and I carried him to the hostel, and placed him on his bed and left his room.
Karan was still reeling under the blows from Haroon. Still he wouldn’t let go. Haroon hit him again; Karan couldn’t hit back, he was held firmly by Anuj and Nigel.
“Tell us!” Nigel shouted. “You better tell us now what you did to Sutirtho!”
He started narrating his part of the story, “Haroon and I brought him to his room; we decided to talk with him in the morning when he’d came back to his senses. However, we were scared about him raising an alarm whenever he would wake up. But we guessed that he wouldn’t be around sooner. I thought Sutirtho could screw up my career if I was ever caught by the police. I was absolutely panicked and I couldn’t control taking a decision. I came back later in his room. He was still unconscious. Professor Sameer had inflicted a strong blow. I wore gloves so that there were no fingerprints anywhere; I brought a rope and put it around his neck, and then I tied it down from the ceiling fan. I made him stand on a chair and adjusted the length of the rope appropriately, and then I removed the chair; closed the gate from inside and used the balcony to go out, again closing the balcony gate from outside by placing my hand inside through the grill above the balcony door.”
“Good that you accepted whatever you had done; I already had my instincts saying this! I was just trying to make you accept things in front of others and the police! The Planchet was a decoy!” Anuj said.
Everybody was dumbfounded with that latest piece of information from Anuj. “Yes, there is one more person in this room, and that person is Rita’s uncle Mr. Amit. He is an inspector at Koramangala police station. Here you go Amit uncle; you can take these two and our respected professor!”
“Anuj! How did you guess?” Nigel was too curious to know.
“Obvious question! Let me explain! I had attended the class in which Sameer spoke about ‘reverse speech’. Nigel, you were too lazy to come to the class. I found the concept very interesting. Then the next day, I found Sutirtho very quite and calm. We had a talk, where we discussed stuff about speech. He had mentioned that some sentences, that Haroon spoke, had to do something with children. I didn’t suspect these guys and I tried comforting Sutirtho as he looked somewhat disturbed. Then after dinner when I was coming back, I found him going out, from a distance. So, when we found out the unfortunate incident, I felt terribly bad for Sutirtho. I decided to find out if he had really done the suicide or it was a murder. That is actually an obvious question that strikes everybody."
Anuj paused to re-construct his thoughts. After a momentary gap he continued “The police had kept Sutirtho’s mobile with them, so I didn’t have a chance to find out anything from there. However, I noticed something that belonged to Karan when we were pulling down Sutirtho. You know, whatever way you try not to leave some details, you will definitely keep some hint unknowingly. And that’s what mattered. Karan is the only one among our friend’s circle who wears shirts; others prefer t-shirts. I found one of his popular Colour Plus shirt buttons on Sutirtho’s bed. The one you always wear whenever we plan to go to a disco, you are kind of branded with that shirt. I quickly hid that before anyone could notice.”
“What intrigued me after that was why Karan’s shirt button would be found there, unless there was a struggle or something. A button can’t just fall off on its own. I asked the guard if he had seen Sutirtho entering the hostel sometime. He replied that two guys were carrying him at night around 3:30 am. The hostel dinning room was deserted and most of the guys were sleeping, so no one noticed other than the guard. Then I showed him Karan, Nigel, Haroon and few other guys’ pictures. He recognized Haroon and Karan.”
“After I had done all those research, I was kind of confused as to why would even Karan or Haroon think of killing Sutirtho. We had a good friend’s circle that others were jealous off. I planned this Planchet thing. I told Nigel that I’d seen the same dream as the one he saw yesterday night. It happened, quite luckily, to fit into the scheme of things. I mean, I didn’t expect Nigel would dream anything of that sort. I also asked Niraj to get into Nigel’s room the same way Karan had left Sutirtho’s room the other night, i.e. through the balcony. I told him to paint those words on the wall. I could trust that Nigel was not involved in anything, because, he was studying with me, almost the entire night and he had also slept in my room. With that much done, the situation was created to talk and convince you guys about the decoy i.e. the Planchet; the rest of the things were very easy. I discussed all these things with Rita and requested Amit uncle to help me with this. So, she knew everything. I knew I couldn’t trust the police station that was handling this case, as they’d think as if I was involved in the murder.”
Anuj stopped and gasped for breathe.
“But, how did you guess it was me?” Karan quizzed.
“I had to take a pick between Haroon and you; my gut feeling or intuition, whatever you call it, said that Haroon couldn’t do this, as we all knew he had an affair with Sutirtho. So, I took a wild guess, a pretty wild I should say!”
“And why did Sameer falter while pronouncing ‘reverse’?” Nigel asked.
“I have no idea about that, may be Sutirtho was helping us, you never know! Sometimes certain things just fall into place at the right time! ” Anuj tried explaining.
Anuj continued “And you know what? The post mortem report also showed the fracture of the hyoid bone, which also sometimes suggests manual strangulation. The police had doubted that I guess.”
“Yes, and to add to it, there was a mark found on the neck, that couldn’t have been caused because of the rope; it was a mark of hitting with something tough, as per the reports, which obviously was a concern for the police to think that it was not a suicide.” Mr. Amit added.
“Anyway, I already had enough of all these, what I know right now is that I can continue hating Karan, Haroon & Sameer for the rest of my life!” Nigel looked at Haroon and Karan. His eyes showed deep hatred.
Amrita fulminated, “It’s beyond my dignity to talk with such incorrigible and detestable creatures! And I considered them friends! Poor me! Still, I need to know what made you do all these. You had a girlfriend Karan, and you Haroon, you had such a sweet boy as your partner! Why?”
“I hate myself for being with that beast!” Nisha repented and ran to Karan and slapped him hard and started crying. Nigel tried to help her.
“We want an explanation, we deserve an explanation to such crime; we deserve to know what was lacking in us, that you people had to resort to innocent children?” Rita asked.
“Tell us murderer! Tell us the truth, anyone of you?” Nigel shouted at Karan and Haroon.
Karan started explaining once again, “I don’t deserve to live; I don’t know where my ethics, moral compunctions were! I was, as if, in some other world where I couldn’t make a difference between good or bad. I used to take tuitions from Sameer. It was the end of fifth semester and I felt I needed some help in one of the subjects. You obviously know that, and also the fact that Sameer is unmarried. But, what I’m going to tell you now, was never known by anybody. I’d discovered one day that Sameer was involved with small kids; it was accidental the same way as Sutirtho discovered it. Sameer had given me various threats of failing me in the subjects forever; he also said that he’d tell the principal and my parents, things that are utterly untrue. But, to his surprise, he discovered that I found the concept of sexually interacting with kids interesting. You call it my perverted nature, or my lack of conscience, I was interested in that. So, I became involved in it, and I loved it. But I hate myself now; I hate myself for killing one of my best friends to hide my guilt!”
“And you, parasite, how did you land up with these criminals?” Nisha asked Haroon.
Haroon started saying, “One day, Sutirtho and I were sitting in the garden near the main entrance of the college. It was dusk and we were getting mushy, emotional and physically intimate. We were sitting at such a place where nobody could notice. Sameer had, however, unfortunately seen me, and I didn’t know that, neither did Sutirtho. Few days later I had to go to Sameer’s house and I found out again that Karan and Sameer were involved with the kids. Though they were inside the bed room, some soft cry sounds intrigued me. I went at the back of the house and through the glass in the bathroom; I saw what was happening inside. The door of the bathroom to the bedroom was open halfway. I knocked at his door immediately and went inside and directly charged them for such an abominable act. Sameer and Karan knew that they couldn’t give any explanation that could satisfy me and make me forget things. So, they resorted to blackmailing me. Karan reported to Sameer that I am a gay, and Sameer had already seen me getting intimate with Sutirtho. And, then there were tensions of passing the exams, and also that of reputation going bad and stuff if they announced everywhere about me. I was scared. So, I agreed to keep quiet. But, I had a moral obligation. I thought over it and decided to tell them that I also liked it, and in that way I could at least save the kids from the sinister harassment. I visited Sameer’s house every day and although I feigned that I was having fun, in some way I used to save them from Sameer. I hate myself that I didn’t go to police; I didn’t discuss things with you people or Sutirtho. I didn’t trust my good friends. I was plain scared about my career and my life in the college. I was, kind of, selfish if you guys call me that now. I was carried away.”
“That saves you a bit, but not entirely, as you were someway involved in the crime.” Mr. Amit said.
“But, Haroon, you must have known that Karan had killed Sutirtho! Didn’t you? Why didn’t you tell anybody?” Anuj asked.
“I was scared about everything; Karan and Sameer also scared me a lot… I .. I just got carried away, I just …. such a miserable wretch I am! I couldn’t save my friend, I wish I had stayed with him that night … I can’t forgive myself. Never!” Haroon broke down completely.
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