A New Faith: Part 1: Chapter 4

It took Alia and Carlos another five minutes to reach the tram stop closest to the concert hall. They hopped off and rapidly walked to the side entrance where someone seemed to be waiting for them. 

“Hi! You must be the police.

My name is Vidya. I am one of the assistant managers here.”

Vidya was a well-rounded woman with almond-shaped black eyes. She had accentuated them with some kohl. She was wearing what felt like a stylish boiler-suit and seemed surprisingly fresh given the early hour.  

“Good morning, Vidya," Alia greeted her.

"I am Alia, the lead investigator. And this is my colleague, Carlos. 

Thanks for meeting us at such short notice.”

“No worries. I was already here when you called,” Vidya said while shaking Carlos' hand.

“We have a complicated concert scheduled for today and I wanted to get an early start.”

Alia nodded at Carlos. Earlier, she had told him to lead the interview. Carlos had the potential to be a good detective because of his unusually meticulous approach. But he also got tongue-tied when it came to interviewing people. Sonia and Alia had decided to nudge him out of his comfort zone. 

“So… umm… Vidya… umm… we-shall-try-to-wrap-this-interview-up-quickly.”

“Excuse me!?” Vidya looked at Alia to see if she had understood what Carlos was trying to say.

Carlos's face was crimson with embarrassment.

Alia debated whether to take it from there but decided to give Carlos another chance. “Patience, Padawan,” she could almost hear the voice of Sonia in her head. 

In a quieter and steadier voice, Carlos started again, “sorry about that.”

Vidya simply nodded.

“Do you know Nadeem?” Carlos asked right off the bat. Alia couldn’t help herself and frowned at him. Did he really want to just dive in without any preamble? As she turned back to observe Vidya’s reaction, she caught a fleeting half-smile being replaced immediately by a neutral expression. "Interesting," Alia thought.

“Why? Is he in some kind of trouble?”

“Do you know him?”

“Yes. Quite well, actually.”

All the color had drained from Carlos’ face as he realized that he had asked about Nadeem in the present tense. Based on Vidya’s reaction, it was clear that she didn't know Nadeem was dead.

He froze and then in a flat low voice said, “umm... we are very sorry to inform you that Nadeem was found dead earlier today.”

The reaction on Vidya’s face was instant and devastating. Gone was any semblance of poise. Her face turned ashen. She crumpled right in front of them as if someone had let out the air from a balloon. If not for Carlos’ quick action to catch her, she would have hit the ground hard.

Alia knelt down to cradle her head. She pulled out her water bottle and sprinkled some of the water on Vidya’s face. A few moments went by. Carlos anxiously looked at Alia wondering if he should call for an ambulance.

Slowly, Vidya stirred. She opened her eyes and started crying softly.

Alia let her cry for a bit. She gently stroked her back as Vidya sat up on the floor. After a few moments, she softly asked, “were you two close?”

Vidya nodded and even more tears streamed down her cheeks. Those beautiful black eyes looked like muddy ponds and some of the kohl started spreading under her eyes. 

“Why don’t we go to your office and sit down for a bit?” 

“Yes… yes… of course.”

Vidya stood up with their support and led them inside. Her shoulders sagged under the weight of the immense grief. Alia continued to lightly hold on to her arm as they walked. The building was quiet as a tomb except for Vidya’s deep breaths. 

In contrast to Nadeem, Qasim had been a loner and Alia’s team had never really gotten to know much about him from anyone around him - not his neighbors, not his colleagues, not even the cafe that he frequented for his meals. He was doing research and only seemed to interact with his research cohort if at all. Even those conversations were limited to academic discussions. No one seemed to know Qasim, the person. 

They patiently waited for Vidya to calm down. The office was functional. There were no items of personal interest. It was probably used by many people as and when needed instead of being permanently assigned to any one person in particular. It had all the hallmarks of being a space that was re-configured frequently. The table was askew and the chairs were pushed into the corners. There were different kinds of paraphernalia lying on the desk and scattered around the shelves resting against the wall behind the desk. Alia figured that the forensic team was unlikely to find anything of value in there.

Finally, Vidya started talking. 

“I said that Nadeem and I were close. That is not really true.

I liked him… I mean… a lot."

A bit of color rose in her cheeks. 

"But I am not sure how he felt about me," she murmured.

"We had been working together for a while. He was the quietest one in our team. He basically did what he was told. He would speak up only if he strongly disagreed. Which happened rarely.

The only other time he opened his mouth was when he played his flute. That usually happened during his breaks when he would sit in one corner of the stage and play his haunting tunes.”

Carlos asked, “did you two ever go out? I mean, for lunch or something?”

“Well... I did invite him out a few times. He always declined.

I tried to chat with him one-on-one during our breaks. But now that I think about it, he rarely said much in those conversations. He seemed to prefer listening to me chatter away.

I used to tell myself that he listened because he must like me, too. Else why would he hang out with me?” Vidya looked at them defiantly.

“Was there anyone that had any problems with him? Any arguments? Any fights?”

“In two years, he must have lost his temper, maybe, once or twice. I think, the first time was right after he had come aboard and we had all gone out for drinks. Everyone was a bit too tipsy than usual. And someone - now I can’t remember who - was asking Nadeem where he came from. Nadeem suddenly got livid. He even smashed his wine glass.”

Carlos pointedly looked at Alia.

“And the second time?”

“I am afraid this was with me. I had told him to change some settings in our audio equipment. It had been a long day… heck a long week!

We had been preparing for this really complicated show. There were numerous disagreements with the performers and everybody was on the edge. At one point, I simply gave up trying to convince the performers on what the correct settings were. I told Nadeem what to do. And he reiterated why that was the wrong thing to do.

Maybe, I was a bit short with him. I told him to just do it and move on to the next task. He didn’t say anything but the expression on his face really scared me. His anger just wafted off him like a winter gale. I made an excuse and ran out of the room. For the next few days, he avoided even making eye contact with me.”

“When did this happen?”

“Maybe a few weeks ago. Dunno… I think it was before the previous show.” 

“Anything outside of these two incidents? Say, from his past?”

“In all the time that he has worked here, he has never mentioned anything from his past. And, especially, after that outburst at the bar, no one asked him about it again.

Anyway, the past is the past. What’s the point of talking about it? Even I get annoyed if someone goes on and on about their past.”

“Before working with you, what did he do?” 

“He was an electrician. And he had also been certified as an A/V technician.

Actually, I was on his interview panel. Not only was he good at the technical aspects, because he was a decent musician, he had an excellent ear for sound.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“Yesterday, during the last rehearsal of the show. After wrap up, I didn’t see him leave. I was quite preoccupied with the show’s creator.

Between you and me, that one is a lot to handle. She keeps changing her mind so many times.

But I gotta say, the show is gonna be phenomenal. I can’t wait to see it as an audience member.”

Alia smiled but didn’t say anything. The creator Vidya was referring to was her partner, Maria, of course.

Carlos had done a good job of interviewing. He got more and more comfortable as the interview went along. Vidya had also stopped crying and was quite composed by that time. Alia felt that this was the most they could get out of her for the time being. She looked at Carlos and nodded. 

He thanked Vidya and mentioned that they would like to interview the rest of her colleagues as soon as possible. She promised to arrange that. She also offered to get a list of performers that Nadeem had come in contact with in the last few days.

As they were walking out of the office, Carlos glanced back and noticed that tears had again started streaming down Vidya’s cheeks. She had somehow found the strength to pull herself together for the duration of the interview. The moment it was over, she succumbed to her grief all over again. He wished that he could go back and comfort her. But he was a cop and she could be a suspect.

By that time, a few staffers of the concert hall had trickled in because they had gotten conflicting messages about whether the concert was happening or not. Some had heard about Nadeem’s death but, again, were not sure if that was true. They were nervously talking in a huddle when Alia and Carlos stepped out of the office. Alia decided to interview them right away. It took almost three hours to finish all the interviews. Other staffers kept trickling in as the morning wore on. Once they were done with the interviews, they decided to stop by the crime scene before taking the tram back to the HQ.

While Carlos walked around the crime scene, Alia checked in with the two uniforms who were keeping guard. A couple of crime scene technicians were still collecting evidence. There had been nothing out of the ordinary, according to the uniforms. A few people had tried to chat up the uniforms. But that was about it. 

Just as Alia turned away from the uniforms to summon Carlos, she noticed a tall black woman staring at the crime scene from across the street. There was nothing suspicious about her. Another gawker, no doubt, thought Alia. But even at that distance, there was something about the expression on the face of the woman that stuck Alia as odd. Before she could process that feeling, Carlos came over and told her that the rest of the team was ready for the debriefing at the HQ. She nodded and turned around for another look at the woman. But the woman had vanished.

On the tram ride back to the HQ, Carlos couldn’t help himself and promptly asked Alia, “boss, how did I do?”

“You did well!” Alia smiled encouragingly at him. Then seeing that he was looking for some more feedback, she added, “it is best to ease into the conversation instead of getting to your main questions immediately. You have to show some compassion to the person you are talking with. It helps them trust you a bit. That way, you are likely to get good quality information from them. 

Of course, sometimes using a provocative technique is necessary to throw them off their balance.

Which style to go with is something you have to learn to figure out.”

Carlos was nodding his head as he jotted down these tips in his notebook. Alia was not a big fan of noting everything down. She preferred to assimilate new information while she was getting it. That way it stuck in her head. “To each his own,” she thought with a mental shrug. 

The tram was crowded. The official press release about the second murder had been circulated and there were a lot of subdued conversations happening all around them. Understandably, everyone was in shock. The effect of the first murder had been fading as most people were beginning to write it off as an anomaly even though the killer had not been found.

Alia gazed around her and tried to infer the mood of the crowd from the expressions and the brief excerpts she could overhear. Was there fear? Anger? Apprehension? 

It was close to lunch time and the tram’s lunch counter was open for business. The delicious aroma from the oven lassoed them. Without exchanging even a look, they made their way through the crowd to the counter. She bought kebabs drizzled with lemon sauce while Carlos picked up some shrimp tamales. 

This was not exactly the food they had grown up with because none of the food in Sequoia had meat in it. She knew that there was no animal being bred for food. There were no farms in the traditional sense. Everything was grown in these gigantic vertical farms enclosed in glass-houses. She had vaguely heard about the "meat" being manufactured in factories, whatever that meant. And she was quite sure that nothing much was imported from outside Sequoia because it was ridiculously costly.

It didn't really matter as she bit into the perfectly charred skin of the kebab and more or less inhaled instead of eating the tender "flesh" within. She was instantly transported to her happy place. No wonder she felt that these kebabs tasted exactly like the ones she used to eat in Iran. Or maybe not. She was not really sure about that any more. Initially, everyone wanted to replicate the exact taste from their pre-Sequoia homes. But as they all settled down, people became adventurous. And the chefs responded with panache. They not only fused the various cuisines in novel ways but also developed entirely new cuisines.

Alia found her and Carlos' choice of food entirely predictable. In moments of stress, people invariably revert to their comfort zones. Both of them had sub-consciously chosen their respective comfort food items. In fact, for the last few weeks, she had been craving Iranian food ever so often that Maria had gotten restless.  

Maybe she should look up what Nadeem’s last meal was. Or what he ate, generally. She turned to Carlos and asked him to jot down this line of questioning. He gave her a puzzled look but didn’t say anything. He was generally open-minded and didn’t mind going down rabbit-holes. In Alia’s opinion, that was another important quality of a good detective.  

Until that first murder, the detectives worked mostly on burglary cases. Most of them were simple cases. The perpetrator was, often enough, one of the employees at the place where the theft had occurred. Usually, the perpetrator confessed to the crime within the first couple of interviews. Typically, the burglary was the culmination of a series of petty misdemeanors that had gone either unnoticed or unpunished.

The perpetrators were, more often than not, genuinely ashamed of their deed. It also became apparent that they had relied on thieving since their childhood, driven mostly by hunger. There was no malice behind most of the thefts. On the contrary, both the investigation team and the victims of the crimes were, in many cases, disarmed by the naiveté and innocence of the perpetrators. Most of the perpetrators were sentenced to community service of varying lengths depending on the value of the stolen things.

In a few cases, the thefts were quite creative. Some perpetrators seemed to not even want the thing that they had stolen. For them, the act of planning and executing the theft seemed to be the whole point of the act. They considered themselves to be artists. 

The murders, though, were something else. There was no possibility of absence of malice. And there was nothing creative about them.