Chapter 214 Return without Success
"Freida, don't be so anxious. Take your time."
"Ron! Ron! You have to save him!"
Anand's wife burst into tears, her hair was disheveled and her face was haggard. She had spent these days in complete fear.
She knew well what it meant for a low-caste person like them to go missing in Mumbai, but she didn't want to believe it.
"He is a good man who has never hurt anyone. Lord Shiva should bless him."
"Yes, he's a good man, he'll be fine." Ron comforted her.
As soon as he got off the plane, he rushed to Suer Electric without delay.
Anand's home is in the legal slum behind, and there are many familiar neighbors gathered at the door, who are also comforting the sad and desperate Frieda.
Several children watched eagerly. The eldest, Jamal, held onto his mother's arm, while the younger ones giggled and crawled around the house.
When Frieda saw Ron coming, she felt like she saw a savior.
She knew that the only person who could save Anand was Ron, so she went to report the case, but the Mumbai police didn't care about the life or death of Dalits.
"When did he disappear and where was he last seen?" Ron asked.
"A week ago, he said he was going to a patient's home to check on him. The patient was not in good condition. But he never came back. Rajiv searched all the patients' homes but couldn't find him."
Rajiv was the boy from the leprosy slum who worked behind Anand, usually running errands for Merck.
"Sulbai, I wanted to be with him that day, but Anand Baba asked me to go back." Rajiv lowered his head in remorse.
He also had a small hut in the slum, and several children from the leprosy slum lived with him.
Anand didn't let him come home late because Rajiv needed to take care of the children.
Ron sighed softly, his intuition telling him that this matter was not that simple.
Anand was not usually alone, but that day was an exception, and then something went wrong.
No matter how you look at it, this seems like a premeditated action. Maybe the person behind this has been watching him for several days.
But who would target Anand? He has no power or influence, and is not rich. At best, he is just a Dalit who lives a good life.
If it's not directed at him, then who is it directed at?
The answer is self-evident.
Ron frowned and thought. Anand was now only responsible for the drug testing business. They had even stopped smuggling drugs for a long time.
There shouldn't be many competitors in this business, so why are they targeting Anand?
"Has anything happened recently? I mean, has Anand said anything? Or behaved in any unusual way?"
"He has a good temper and is happy every day," Frieda replied.
All right, Ron also imagined that chubby smiling face.
He looked around and finally looked at Rajiv, "What did Luca say?"
"I've looked everywhere in South Mumbai, but I can't find it!" At this moment, Luca squeezed in from outside.
He rushed here as soon as he heard the news that Ron had returned to Mumbai.
"Not even in the palace!" he added.
Ron glared at him. It was already this late and he still had time to talk about those things.
"Man, Anand is also my brother. In the past few days, I have been asking around in the black market for information."
"Any results?"
"No, it just disappeared out of thin air." Luca shrugged.
The clean disappearance made Ron even more certain that someone was behind all this.
"Please pay more attention to the places he usually goes. I'll go and get some information."
Ron stood up immediately and prepared to go to the police station to find Aggie.
The people here in the slums and Luca and the others can't provide any valuable information, and this matter is not something they can handle.
He was just wondering who was the mastermind behind this and why they chose Anand?
Ron's business shouldn't have any fierce competitors.
First of all, travel companies can be ruled out. The profits of hundreds of thousands of rupees every month are simply not on the table.
Not to mention the travel agency, with Khad Khan's endorsement, the gangs in Mumbai are avoiding them.
Sur Electric? Not likely.
The only country with which there had been a conflict, Banya, had long since disappeared, and even the other party's factories had been taken over.
Other electrical appliance brands also don’t make sense. The current market in India is one where demand exceeds supply, and it will be an incremental market for a long time to come.
The cake is getting bigger and bigger, but we are still far from the stage of fierce competition.
The only business that Ron has that conflicts with others is mining, but that is far away in Uttar Pradesh.
He thought about it all the time but couldn't figure out who was the mastermind behind it.
The most urgent task is to find Anand first. Among the people Ron knows, the short and fat one can be truly called a friend.
His intuition told him that Anand was just locked up and his life was not in danger.
Otherwise, why would the other party spend so much money to bother a Dalit?
Ajay's office moved back to Bandra, which is far less grand than its previous location in South Mumbai.
When Ron walked in, he saw a police captain and his informant reporting to Aggie about the recent gunfight.
"Are those people from Daud's gang on the field?" asked Aij.
"Not sure yet, sir, but sporadic gunfights in the outfield have been going on for four days now." The superintendent shook his head.
Field, outfield, these are the terms in cricket.
It seemed they were discussing not a gang fight but a cricket match.
In fact, for many hooligans, the thrill of belonging to a gang is no different from the pride of playing for a cricket team.
The gang leader, like the captain of a team, must be the smartest one. He has to arrange the outfielders and carefully plan the batting order. He has to change the players on the field from time to time and take the opportunity to test the abilities of new joiners.
The Mumbai gangs have their own operating system, which is not as violent and chaotic as the outside world imagines.
"Find out who's on the field as soon as possible." Aij waved his hand.
"Don't worry, Boss. We'll be able to figure out the main lineup in less than a week," the superintendent assured.
"Yes, yes, officer." The thin informant also nodded and bowed.
"Girish, you'd better hurry up. Once you get this done, I can drop the case against you," Ajay promised him.
"No problem, officer!" the informant was delighted.
He immediately came to Ajie's desk, bent down, and whispered something to him quickly and lowly. Ajie nodded frequently and wrote and drew on his notes.
Ron's arrival seemed to have not attracted his attention. He issued various orders, roared from time to time, kept asking questions, and threatened the prisoners that he would cripple them or even kill them, otherwise he would harm the people they cared about most.
For a full half hour, Ajie was dealing with various emergencies in this restless city, and this was under the premise that his jurisdiction was greatly reduced.
"When did you come?" It was not until the informant left that Aijie realized there was an extra person in the office.
"It's been a while," Ron shrugged. "I thought the police's informants were all undercover agents. Are you recruiting gangsters too?"
"I have the evidence against them." Aijie chuckled.
In order to escape punishment, these informants will do everything they can to help the police gather information.
Of course, it won’t be easy to win over the informant at the beginning.
It's a psychological battle: you have a little information, but you have to convince the other person that you know more.
The suspect would also weigh the truthfulness of Ajay's words and only reveal a little at a time until he was sure he could escape safely or was forced to surrender.
Every time, Ajie is like a street vendor selling sugarcane lemonade, who has to squeeze the information he wants from the suspect's mouth.
The first thing that comes out is the sugarcane juice, followed by the lemon juice essence.
This is not just a simple threat of force. Beating the suspect until he is covered in bruises does not mean that you have control over everything.
The key is to understand their psychology. At the beginning of the interrogation, Ajie will hint that he already knows everything and is just waiting for the other party to confess.
Sometimes that's enough, and sometimes the suspect wants to test you: How much do you know?
Therefore, interrogation is a game, and both parties must be extremely alert and constantly guess each other's thoughts.
It is not very helpful if the interrogators only have batons or wires.
"Okay, tell me, what brings you here so suddenly?" he asked.
"A friend of mine is missing." Ron told him about Anand.
After listening to the story, Aijie frowned slightly and said, "It's a bit troublesome."
"What do you mean?" Ron asked concernedly.
"It's too long, long enough for them to do anything."
The "they" that Aijai mentioned was of course the one who took away the Anands. Whether it was a transfer or something even more cruel, a week was more than enough.
"My intuition tells me that he is still in Mumbai and there is no reason for those people to bother him."
"You mean they came for you?" asked Ajie.
"I'm just suspicious. My friend never has conflicts with anyone, and he's from a low caste."
"I'll make a few calls for you." Aijie picked up the landline on the table.
He made several calls in succession, but all to no avail.
"There have been no similar reports in South Mumbai recently, and no bodies matching the description have been found."
Ron was speechless, as Frieda and the others had clearly reported the case.
Forget it, India's police system is rotten to the core.
"Please keep an eye on the police station for me. He is a very important friend of mine."
"Let his family come to me."
"What?" Ron, who was about to get up, was stunned.
"Other police stations won't take missing persons cases, so I will." Aijie said calmly.
Ron smiled. See, he had more than one friend, a real friend.
"If you need anything, contact me." He prepared to leave.
"You'd better be careful?" Aijie reminded him.
"Huh?" Ron turned around.
"If they really came for you, then they have achieved their goal."
"You mean"
“You’ve returned to Bombay, haven’t you?”
Ron paused, then nodded and left.
He returned empty-handed, and Ajie didn't find any useful information here.
Anand really seemed to have disappeared out of thin air, leaving no trace.
Ron and Ajay didn't know that the person who actually took Anand away was not a gang kidnapper or an enemy, but the police themselves.
Only the police can make a person disappear completely without leaking any information.
Indian police arrest people at will and don't even have to report it.
Sometimes even they themselves don’t know who is in the cell and what crime they have committed.
Anand was thrown into a dark detention cell, which was like being on an isolated island in the world, with no wind blowing in or out.
Ron didn't give up, he was still thinking of ways.
(End of this chapter)
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