Free Banquet on the Dead by Sharath Komarraju

brother for a long minute. ‘How dare you?’ he asked, finally, his voice starting low but rising. ‘ How dare you !’
    Lakshman looked genuinely confused. ‘I thought you—I heard—’
    Praveen slammed his palms on the table and got up. ‘What about you, brother! Shall I ask you now if you killed Ammamma? God knows you had more reason than I did to kill her!’
    Lakshman only frowned, as though he was debating within himself on the merit of what Praveen had said. Then he answered, ‘Maybe. But I did not kill her. I was inside the house when she fell into the well.’
    ‘And I was here, in my office. Can anybody confirm your statement, that you were in the house?’
    ‘Mother can,’ said Lakshman slowly.
    ‘Ha! Yes, a mother’s support to a son’s alibi. How convincing!’
    ‘Hey, listen, I came here to support you if—’
    ‘Oh, shut up, Brother! What makes you think I need your support? You thought I killed her and you came to offer me support? What kind of a brother are you?’
    Lakshman’s face, still beaded with sweat, now contorted with anger of its own. He rose as if to strike his younger brother, but restrained himself. ‘You—you—everyone in the house is saying that you killed her, you understand! And I come to you here—in this godforsaken place—look at how I am sweating, you ungrateful pig! And you, you hurl abuses at me?’
    Praveen clutched the edges of the table to steady himself. His voice was subdued, confused. ‘They think I killed her?’
    ‘Of course they do! Can you blame them after the scene you created last week?’
    ‘Oh—oh—that—that—I did not mean what I said.’
    ‘Oh, come on, you meant it. Everybody who was there thought you meant it.’
    ‘I did not,’ said Praveen. ‘I did not.’ Then he let go of the table and his hands went to his hair. He threw his head back to look at the ceiling, and yelled, ‘I did not!’
    ‘Look, if you’ve not done it, all’s well. I just wanted to make sure—’
    ‘I have not done it.’
    ‘Sit down, Brother,’ Lakshman said.
    Praveen collapsed on the chair.
    ‘Now, tell me again, did you or did you not do it?’
    ‘I did not,’ Praveen said weakly.
    ‘Can you swear to me that you didn’t?’
    Praveen’s eyes moved to pin down his brother. Both of them now were drenched in sweat. Above them the fan rotated furiously, creaking and scraping as it did so.
    The door opened and the boy walked in, his hands full. ‘Two goli-sodas,’ he said.

7

    P RAMEELAMMA WAS A white-haired woman of five-foot-one—about the same height as Kauvery’s. She walked with no visible discomfort, yet from within the folds of her sari Nagarajan spotted a brown belt fastened around the waist. She had flawless, fair skin; the same shade as her daughter’s, Nagarajan noticed, but it did not glow as much as the younger woman’s. She nodded her thanks to the constable in the doorway as she passed, and took the chair across the table.
    ‘First of all, madam,’ Nagarajan started smoothly, ‘I am very sorry for your loss’. The lady’s eyes did not look like they’d been shedding a lot of tears. Come to think of it, Nagarajan reflected, none of the three members of the family they’d met so far had shown any outward signs of grief. The servant had been the only one stricken. Of course, that was neither here nor there—every person had their own way of grieving, and some showed it more than others—but Nagarajan had expected to see some darkening around the eyes of the murdered woman’s daughter, if not anyone else’s.
    She did not look at them directly. Her hands twisted around each other, and her eyes—clear and focussed— were set on the edge of the table-top. She murmured something in response.
    ‘We will try to make this as free of pain as possible for you, madam,’ Nagarajan said. ‘We’re back here again because your son asked us to come.’
    She raised her eyebrows and gave them a half-nod.
    ‘Now, we’re not sure yet,