I t was almost under duress that I got Byomkesh to leave the house.

For the last month he had been concentrating on a complicated forgery case. He would sit with a pile of papers all day and try to conjure up the image of the criminal from it all. As the mystery thickened, so did his conversation trickle gradually to silence. I noticed that this endless ploughing through papers, sitting in the library day after day, wasn’t doing his health any good. But every time I brought this up, he would say, ‘Oh no, I am quite all right.’

That evening I said, ‘I am not going to take no for an answer. We’re going for a walk. You need at least a couple of hours’ respite in the day.’

‘But...’

‘No buts. Let’s go to the lake. Your forger won’t give you the slip in two hours.’

‘Oh, all right. ‘ He pushed the papers away and set off, but it wasn’t difficult to guess that his mind hadn’t let go of the problem at hand.

While walking by the lake I suddenly spotted a long-lost friend of mine. We had studied together until the Intermediate class—then he had entered the medical college. I hadn’t seen him since. I called out to him, ‘Hey, you’re Mohan, aren’t you? How are you doing?’

He turned around and exclaimed delightedly, ‘Ajit! It is you! It’s been so long. So tell me, how is everything?’ After exchanging excited greetings I introduced him to Byomkesh. Mohan said, ‘So you are Byomkesh Bakshi? Delighted to make your acquaintance. I did suspect at times that the Ajit Bandyopadhyay who writes about your exploits is our old friend, Ajit. But I wasn’t quite sure.’

I said, ‘So what are you up to nowadays?’

Mohan replied, ‘I have my practice here in Calcutta.’

We strolled about and spoke of this and that. An hour passed pleasantly. I noticed that during the conversation Mohan opened his mouth a couple of times as if to say something, but then stopped himself. Byomkesh must have noticed it too because at one point he smiled and said, ‘Please go ahead and say what you want to say.’

Mohan said, a little shyly, ‘There is something that I want to ask you, but I am hesitant. Actually it is such a trivial problem that it seems unfair to bother you with it. Yet—’

I said, ‘That’s all right, tell us. If nothing else, it will at least serve the purpose of delivering Byomkesh for a short while from the hands of that forger.’

‘Forger?’

I explained.

Mohan said,’I see! But perhaps Byomkeshbabu will laugh at what I have to say.’

‘If it is amusing I shall certainly laugh, ‘ said Byomkesh, ‘but from your manner it doesn’t seem to be a laughing matter. Instead it appears that a certain problem has kept you pondering—you are desperate to find a solution to it.’

Mohan said excitedly, ‘You are absolutely right. Perhaps it is very simple—but for me it has become an irresoluble conundrum. I am not entirely stupid—I think I have my fair share of common sense; yet, you’ll be surprised to know how an ailing old man, who is paralysed to boot, is duping me every single day. It isn’t just me; he is defeating his entire family’s attempts at strict vigilance.’

In the course of the conversation we had sat down on a bench. Mohan said, ‘Let me tell you about it as briefly as possible. I am the family-physician in a very affluent household. The family goes back a long way to when the city was just coming up. In addition to other incomes and assets they own a market from which they earn a massive monthly amount as rent. So you can gauge their financial standing.

‘The master of this house is Nandadulalbabu. He is actually my only patient in that household. In his heyday he was such a profligate that by the time he reached the age of fifty his health gave up on him. His body plays host to a plethora of diseases. He has long been rendered immobile from arthritis. Now there are signs of paralysis as well. There is a saying among us doctors that there is nothing strange about man’s death; it is the fact the he is alive at all that is a source of wonder. This patient of mine is a prime example of that.

‘Words fail me in trying to describe the character of Nandadulalbabu to you. Foul-mouthed, mistrustful, crafty, malicious—in brief, I have never seen a meaner nature than his. He has a wife and a family, but he isn’t on good terms with anyone. He would like to continue along the same depraved lines as he did in his youth. But his vitality has sapped and his health doesn’t permit such excesses any longer. Hence, he bears great bitterness and envy towards everyone—as if they were responsible for his condition. He is always looking for ways and means to pull a fast one on someone to prove his ability.

‘His body is weak and he has a heart condition too—hence he cannot leave his room. He sits there in his den, heaping unspeakable indignities upon the entire universe with every sentence he speaks and filling page after page with writing. He has a misplaced notion that he is an unparalleled litterateur; so, now in black, now in red ink, he writes and writes. He is terribly upset with the publishers—he believes that they are in on the conspiracy against him and therefore refuse to publish his work.’

Curious, I asked, ‘What does he write?’

‘Fiction. Or it may even be autobiographical. Only once did I glance at a page of the stuff; never again have I been able to look at it. After you’ve read that filth, even a holy oblation won’t cleanse you. I am certain that even today’s young experimental writers would have a fit if