We left Inspector Poddar and went to see Indranarayan’s bedroom. It was at the end of a long veranda. His study was only a few feet away. The back door was just across the veranda, so if anyone did come through that door, it must have taken him only a few seconds to get to the study. The bedroom was sparsely furnished. We could see nothing except a bed, a cupboard and a couple of suitcases. Then we went to his study. There were two large shelves on one side, stacked with endless papers and files and folders. Perhaps every line Indranarayan had ever written over the last seventeen years was stored on those shelves. A door led to the veranda outside. On its right was a desk and a chair. Obviously, that was where the murder had taken place. A fountain pen, two ballpoints, pencils, ink, a paperweight and a table lamp were strewn about the desk. Besides these was a violin case. ‘Let’s have a look at the Strings of Amity,’ Feluda said, opening the case. The violin inside looked almost new. Clearly, Indranarayan had taken very good care of this instrument. It must be a hundred years old, I thought. Feluda shut the case again. Apart from the desk, there was a sofa in the room, a chair and a small marble side-table. On the wall hung two framed certificates of merit given to Indranarayan, an English landscape and a photograph of Ramakrishna Paramahansa. We sat down on the sofa. Mr Mallik took the chair. A servant brought four glasses of lassi and placed them on the side-table. Feluda took a sip from a glass, and began his questions. ‘Where is your own room, Mr Mallik?’ ‘Diagonally opposite this one. That room in the far end of the veranda is the library. Mine is next to it.’ ‘When do you usually go to sleep?’ ‘Quite late at night, occasionally later than one o’clock. I do my main work—that is, collecting information on Kandarpanarayan—only at night. I began by interviewing Keertinarayan. He was twenty-two when his grandfather died, so he had had the chance to get to know him a little. When I finished talking to him, I started studying old letters and diaries and other documents.’ ‘Does that mean you were awake that night when Indranarayan was killed?’ ‘Yes, I must have been. But you see, that music hall stands between my room and this one. It is impossible to see or hear anything from that distance.’ ‘How did it get to be known that Ashwini Bhaur from Binapani Opera had come to visit that night?’ ‘Santosh knew about it. The police found the piece of paper he had sent in through Santosh with his name on it. It was Santosh who noted what time Mr Bhaur left.’ ‘Couldn’t you hear Indranarayan play his violin?’

‘I might have. But he played almost every night, so there was no reason for me to pay any special attention. I