Morning came like a reprieve — sudden, golden, ridiculous in its normalcy. Roosters crowed. Smoke rose from chulhas. Children ran to the village tube well for water. The sun hit the Pandey house and turned it into what it was in daylight — an old, crumbling building, aesthetically creepy but structurally mundane. No figures in windows. No singing. No breathing.
Nidhi had not slept. She'd spent the hours between 3:17 and dawn with every light on, her back against the wall farthest from the door, the camera recording on a tripod pointed at the entrance. The recording showed nothing — no movement, no sound anomaly on the waveform. Whatever had knocked and spoken had left no digital trace.
But on the door itself — the inside surface, the side facing her — there was a new mark. Visible in the morning light. Not a handprint this time. Letters. Scratched into the wood with something sharp — a fingernail, maybe, or a piece of glass. Small, uneven, written in Devanagari:
"आज रात। दरवाज़ा।"
Tonight. The door.
Nidhi photographed it. Then she packed her bag, walked to the pradhan's house, and found Satish eating parathas with the determined aggression of a man who was using breakfast as a coping mechanism.
"We need to go inside the Pandey house," she said.
"No."
"Today. During daylight. With people."
"The answer is still no, but with more conviction."
"Satish, last night she came to my room. She knocked. She said my name. And she left a message on my door." She showed him the photograph. He stopped chewing.
"Something in that house is escalating. Four nights ago, I saw a face through a camera. Three nights ago, singing and a handprint. Two nights ago, the singing was in my room. Last night, it was at my door. It's getting closer. Every night, it's getting closer."
"Then we leave. We go back to Delhi. Today."
"And then what? She follows? Kamla Devi said Chandrakanta chose me. The bangle found me. If this is real — and I'm not saying it is, but if it is — leaving might not be an option."
Satish put down his paratha. "Kya karna chahti hain?"
"I want to see the photograph. The wedding photo. And I want to see the locked room — from outside. The door. Just the door. In daylight, with people around."
Satish looked at her for a long moment. Then he stood up. "Main pradhan ji se baat karta hoon. Agar woh haan bolein, to chalte hain."
Ram Swaroop said no. Then he said no again. Then his wife — a formidable woman named Geeta Devi who ran the household and, by extension, most of the village's actual decision-making — said, "Rehne do, inhe le jaao. Kab tak band rakhoge? Saath saal ho gaye." Let it go. Take her. How long will you keep it closed? It's been sixty years.
Ram Swaroop argued. Geeta Devi gave him the look. The argument ended.
At 11 AM, in full daylight, Nidhi entered the compound of the Pandey house for the first time.
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