Byomkesh crossed the road rapidly and approached the gate. He looked around, but in the dimly lit environs of the lake, no one was visible.

Byomkesh hovered for a while at the gate before walking through it and proceeding towards the lake’s shore. He had barely taken a few steps when a man detached himself from the shadows under a tree and beckoned to Byomkesh. When the latter approached him, the man suggested, ‘Come, let’s go and sit on that bench there.’

The bench was located under a tree by the water’s edge. Byomkesh sat on the right end of the bench. In the dull glimmer of faraway lights their faces were indistinct at best. Byomkesh said, ‘Now tell me what you know.’

‘I will,’ the man assured him. ‘Actually, the person I wish to talk about is very dear to my heart. That’s why I’m feeling a bit awkward. Have you a cigarette on you?’

Byomkesh took out his pack of cigarettes and offered it to the man. The latter took one and returned the pack to Byomkesh. Then, as he reached into his pocket, as though rummaging for matches, he suddenly said, ‘Look who’s approaching.’ His gaze had moved past Byomkesh and travelled beyond, as if trained on someone approaching from behind the spot where Byomkesh was seated.

Byomkesh turned back to look and waited. He was prepared for the pressure he felt on his back, below the left shoulder. Then he whipped around. His companion had been trying to thrust a porcupine quill into his back. For a second, the man sat there, bewildered. Then he tried to get up and run. But Byomkesh’s iron fist had landed on his jaw like a heavy-duty weapon and laid him out, face down.

In the meantime, two other men had appeared, as if out of thin air, like Aladdin’s genie. They seized the prostrate man by his arms and hauled him to his feet. Rakhalbabu wrenched the porcupine quill out of his hand and announced, ‘Probal Gupta, you murdered three men in cold blood and attempted to murder two others. We’re taking you to the police station.’

A fortnight later, on an overcast morning, an informal tea session was taking place at Byomkesh’s house. Ajit was present and so was Satyaboti. It had been raining almost incessantly since the previous night. The rain would barely stop before starting again. The wrath of summer seemed to be abating, transformed by the rain into rivulets of love.

‘So,’ Ajit observed, ‘you sent such a wonderful singer to jail! The man is, indeed, a truly gifted singer. Did he really kill all those people?’

Satyaboti said, ‘The man was surely deranged.’

‘Probal Gupta isn’t deranged,’ Byomkesh told them. ‘But neither is he entirely normal. He came from an affluent family and the vagaries of fate had, without warning, reduced him to a state of penury. His plight had soured him. Of the seven deadly sins, two were intrinsic to his nature: Greed