Padmavati, the village hostess's body is found in the sacred chamber of the Kali temple. Men wanted her, women hated her and some wanted to keep their liaisons hidden. But who had the motive, means and opportunity to kill her? Padmavati charged by the hour - her laughs, her understanding, her empathy, her advice - everything was available only in return for the payment, which made her, in the sarpanch Seetaraamaiah's eye, little more than a trader. 'Look', the priest Krishna Shastri said, pointing to the letters around him. 'Satyam, Shekhar Seetaraamaiah - how many men did she have in her grasp? How many?' The onus of solving the case puts head constable Venkat Reddy in a quandary. He has never even solved petty crimes and here he is faced with murder. If this were a novel, the constable Venkat Reddy thought vacantly, would the reader think of him as a worthy detective? Would anyone bother reading about a bundling, confused constable pretending to be a detective? The equation before him is simple, seven suspects, seven motives, one murder.