For an introduction to The Trivial Trio, read this post before you read any further.
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Sanjaynagar 4th Main was where Jammy and Vinu had lived for almost 25+ yrs now and they therefore pretty much knew all the residents of the 20 odd houses on both sides of the street. Vinu was more up-to-date with the current residents as he was the more jovial, people-friendly person of the trio. While Jammy and Maddy knew all the old timers on the street, Vinu was the man who had this information at his fingertips.
One fine day in June 2013, when Vinu woke up in the morning and came out to wash his car as was his usual norm, he noticed policemen standing near the house of Mrs. Ganga down the road. His curiosity piqued, he went there to find out what was happening.
It turned out that the car parked outside her house, which belonged to Sandy, her son was stolen last night. Sandy who was standing there told Vinu – “See how neatly they have torn open the rubber beading of the back window and gotten into the car. They took away my billing meter, stereo system and my car mobile charger.”
“Damn, replacing all of this is going to cost me at least a good Rs. 10,000 and the worst part is that I can claim insurance only for the back window as the Insurance Company does not cover car stereos or any other accessories as part of their policy.”
By this time, Vinu was joined by Maddy as well who happened to be returning from his morning walk that way. However, given the fact that they could not go around investigating each and every small little theft in the locality, they decided that this was not something that The Trivial Trio could get involved with and decided to let the local cops deal with this.
A fortnight later, when the car next to Jammy’s house was stolen using the same modus operandi, the trio was spurred into action. This time around the thief had cut open the beading of the front glass of the car and stolen the car stereo and the GPS device kept in the glove compartment. Jammy took this very personally given his proximity to the theft itself and called Vinu and Maddy upto his room immediately.
“Macha, this is just not happening boss! First we thought this was a one-off case and we didn’t take it too seriously, but now, this is just too much. All 3 of us have cars and Vinu, the whole world and its cousin knows how much you love your new Wagon R with alloy wheels and neon lights. It probably is just a matter of time before your car stereo, the DVD Player, your sub woofer and all those other fancy gadgets you have in there get stolen too. It is an affront to The Trivial Trio and our abilities if we don’t do something about this soon.”
At the mention of his Wagon R, Vinu jumped up – “Dude, Jammy, don’t you even dare to think that some petty thief will lay his hands on my car. I will beat the stuffing out of anybody who even dreams of doing something like that.”
Maddy smiling at Vinu’s aggression brought back the conversation on track – “Guys, it is quite obvious that both the thefts were done by the same person. The thief carefully removed the beading of the glass, stole only things that can easily be sold second hand and did not bother touching any of the internal components of the car.”
Jammy then got into his usual task allocation mode – “Ok, here’s what we will do. Vinu, you are the people person. So go and talk to Sandy and find out everything you can about the night his car was broken into. Where exactly did he park the car? What time did he park the car? What time did he turn off the lights at home? What time did he go to sleep? Did he hear or see anything funny that night? We need to know everything about that night. Ok?”
“Maddy, you and me will go to all the car accessory dealers within a radius of 5 Km from here and try to find out if anybody has tried to sell them second hand car stereos, GPS devices, or anything like that. Let us all of us regroup here in the evening today.”
In the evening when the trio regrouped, Jammy and Maddy had hit a dead end. While some of the car accessory shops were at least open to the fact that they purchased second hand accessories from people, a couple of shopkeepers had almost physically assaulted them for even suggesting something like this.
Vinu then updated them about his conversations with Sandy and Krishna. “There was really nothing special about the nights on which both these cars were broken into. While Sandy came home at around 9.45 PM and parked his car at the usual spot outside his house, right opposite the street light. He had his dinner, watched some TV, came outside at around 10.30 PM to lock the gate. Even at this time the car was at its usual spot, nothing unusual. He then went back inside, switched off all lights and went to sleep. What happened when he woke up next morning is something that we saw ourselves.”
“The story with Krishna is also quite ordinary, nothing unusual. He came back by around 9 PM that night, parked his car outside his gate, opposite the street light, had dinner by around 10 PM, came out for a smoke after that, his car was right there. Went back in, switched off the lights at around 11 PM and went to sleep.”
“Neither of them or anybody in their homes saw or heard anything unusual that night.”
Jammy stood up, put his hands on his hips – “Hmm, looks like we are hitting only dead ends today. Tell you what guys, sleep over what Vinu just shared and think of anything that strikes you as unusual. Let us see if our wonderful brains or my stimulating smokes come up with any brainwave tonight.”
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TO BE CONTINUED…
