Deep (W)aters

Deep (W)aters

Gayatri and Varun walked back to the inn. They went to Gayatri’s room. Varun asked, ‘So what do we do now?’

Gayatri said, ‘I think it is time we looked at the second stanza of the verses we heard during the seance with Loveleen. We need to unravel that now.’

‘Okay let us get down to it.’

Gayatri fetched her handbag and pulled out the piece of paper on which she had written the verses. She said, ‘Here it is.’

The two of them looked at the second stanza.

Move upward,
Go up and up,
Till you find what you want,
Then free it from its prison.

‘It says ‘Move upward, Go up and up’. That probably means going up the family tree and finding someone’s antecedents. Either yours or ours. You say your great-grandfather’s name was Rama Vedan. Could it be a coincidence? If it is not, it would explain why Anandi was attacked by the monkey. As per what Udayashree Patti said her clan is protected by the Vanara God. And there is also the curse that none of the zamindar’s descendants would be able to procreate if they as much as stepped into the village.’

‘In which case why attack Anandi? Why not me?’

‘Remember what Udayashree Patti said? It is the women folk of the descendants who would be tortured and killed. Anandi is your wife. The idea is to destroy her. She is the one who would give birth to your children. And another thing is Akhila was a girl and she was pregnant when she disappeared. You say Anandi was looking confused when you people filmed that scene here. Something might have happened which Anandi probably forgot. Something that confused her. The next two lines don’t make any sense. It says ‘Till you find what you want. Then free it from its prison.’ I don’t have any idea about that.’

Varun said, ‘Shall we visit that place where we filmed the scene? That might give us some idea.’

Varun and Gayatri hired an auto-rickshaw and Varun directed the man to go to the spot where they had filmed the scene. It was a bit difficult to find the place but finally, Varun told the auto-rickshaw driver to stop at a point where there was a steep gradient. He said, ‘I think this is the place.’

They told the driver to wait. They got out of the auto-rickshaw and walked down the gradient. It was a steep incline and the two of them had difficulty balancing themselves. They reached the point where there was a steep drop into the river. Gayatri said, ‘The water here must be deep Varun. It is very still. You say Anandi jumped into this and you jumped in after her?’

Varun nodded. Gayatri said, ‘I think the director must have been mad.’

Varun said, ‘If you look at the sides, you will notice that there is a way to reach the water without having to jump in straight off the top. It was just that for the scene that was being filmed it was necessary to jump straight into it. I have an idea. What if Akhila drowned in this river? Was pushed in or something like that? I think I will dive in here and look around a bit tomorrow.’

Gayatri looked alarmed and said, ‘We had better meet the policeman Xavier D’cruz first and see what he has to say.’

They climbed back the incline and got into the auto-rickshaw. Varun asked the driver, ‘Do you know where an Englishman by the name of Xavier D’Cruz lives? They say he lives in a big bungalow with a garden. Can you take us there?’

The driver nodded and started his auto-rickshaw…

                                                                                             To Be Continued...

This post is a part of #BlogchatterA2Z 2023

#AtoZChallenge 2023 letter W

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