Asking Questions is a crime novel by H. R. F. Keating. It is the twentieth novel in the Inspector Ghote series and the twenty-second book, due to the publication of two short story collections.
Plot introduction
Inspector Ghote is ordered to investigate a case of drug smuggling at the Mira Behn Institute for Medical Research. Ghote's chief suspect is Chandra Chagoo, the snake handler, but unfortunately Chagoo himself is dead, the victim of a deadly Russell's viper. Inspector Ghote knows this was no accident, but the only way he will get answers is through asking a lot of awkward questions.
Plot summary
The novel is prefaced by a section entitled "Questions", which consists of four passages numbered in Roman numerals.
I
Chandra Chagoo is threatened by Abdul Khan, who believes Chagoo has been asking questions in order to gather evidence for the police.
II
Dr Gauri Subbiah contemplates confronting Chagoo and demanding exactly what he knows about her past. She fears he knows everything.
III
Dr Ram Mahipal lectures a class of medical students about the importance of asking questions. Privately he contemplates imminent professional ruin for asking the wrong question.
IV
Professor Phaterpaker also contemplates professional ruin as a result of Ram Mahipal's question, the answer to which Chagoo already knows.
The preface ends.
The main body of the novel begins with the heading:
Answer
The Commissioner tells Ghote that a criminal named Abdul Khan has supplied Bombay film stars with drugs from the Mira Behn Institute. Ghote is ordered to find who stole drugs from the institute and arrest them under a false charge to prevent a scandal. Ghote tells the Commissioner that he recently caught an airline stewardess, Nicky D'Costa, smuggling drugs for Abdul Khan. The Commissioner says he will assign another officer to manage Nicky D'Costa as an informant and that it will take a better officer than Ghote to bring Abdul Khan to justice.
Ghote questions Asha Rani, a movie star. Her "friend" Mr Ganguly took a sample of a medicine called A.C.E. and nearly died. Khan, who also supplied Mr Ganguly with cocaine, supplied the A.C.E.
At the institute, Ghote interviews Professor Phaterpaker. The Professor says he will go to any lengths to protect the institute. The institution's work is largely concerned with making new medicines from the venom of poisonous snakes.
Dr Subbiah immediately suspects Chandra Chagoo of having stolen the A.C.E. and leads Ghote to the reptile room. When the door is unlocked they find Chagoo dead with a Russell's viper loose in the room.
The next day the Commissioner assigns Ghote to investigate Chagoo's death to prevent the scandal being exposed by another officer. Ghote realises that Chagoo did not have a key to lock the reptile room door and must have been murdered.
Ghote interviews Dr Ram Mahipal, who left a reptile-room key in his old office at the institute when he suddenly quit his job. Ghote learns from the building manager that Mahipal returned in order to access his computer files on the night Chagoo died. Dr Subbiah, Professor Phaterpaker, Dr Mahipal and the building manager were all in the building at the time.
Ghote suspects that the murderer may be an employee at the nearby hospital. He enlists the inspector originally assigned to Chagoo's death to test this theory.
On their next meeting Mahipal says he returned to teaching in hopes of instilling integrity in young medical students. Mahipal left the institute because he believed that Phaterpaker faked results, possibly on a regular basis.
Phaterpaker takes the news that Chagoo was murdered calmly, remarking that Mahipal was slipshod and implying that he was dismissed for this. Ghote tries to determine exactly why Mahipal left, but Phaterpaker is vague. When Phaterpaker realises he himself is a suspect, he is affronted but admits "cutting corners" and acts like a man with something to hide. Ghote concludes that Phaterpaker is trying to use Mahipal as a scapegoat to protect the institute.
Dr Subbiah reacts badly when asked about her relations with Chagoo, however Ghote concludes she is not the killer.