‘I believe Batra came into contact with Maganlal through his job as a PRO,’ said Feluda. We were sitting at a restaurant, on our way back to Kathmandu, having coffee and sandwiches. With us were Dr Divakar, Inspector Sharma of the Nepal Police and Inspector Joardar from Calcutta. We had found Dr Divakar in one of the rooms in the bungalow. His hands and feet were tied, and he had been gagged. But that had not stopped him from stamping his feet, making that thudding noise we had heard. According to what Dr Divakar told the police this morning, Batra had called at his house and picked him up, saying there was an emergency case needing his attention. He had then collected Maganlal and the two men had forced him to go to the bungalow with them. Maganlal and his men were now back in Kathmandu, all under arrest. I was dying to know how he’d react to the LSD, but knew I’d have to wait until tomorrow to find out. Feluda was still speaking. ‘Maganlal knew an educated, intelligent man like Batra would be very useful to him. So he got him to join his gang. When he came to know Anikendra Som was making enquiries, he realized Som had to be got out of the way. He chose Batra for this task. Batra took the same plane from Kathmandu as Som, and managed to get talking with him, although he later denied this. We found one sentence in Mr Som’s notebook that said, “Find out about AB”. I had thought at first that meant antibiotics, but the minute I learnt Batra’s first name was Anantlal, I realized Som was referring to him. It could be that something Batra said made him suspicious.’ Feluda paused to take a sip from his cup, and continued, ‘It now looks as though Mr Som had mentioned to Batra that he was going to meet me. Batra knew who I was. So he could guess that should Som get killed, I would be asked to make an investigation. He didn’t know then that we would run into each other purely by accident. But when we did, the idea of creating a “double” occurred to him immediately. I have to admit it was a very clever idea. He happened to have bought a blue shirt just before he met me, which, in fact, he was still carrying in a plastic bag. Soon after we parted, he must have gone into a shop for readymade garments and changed into the blue shirt in one of their fitting rooms. Then he deliberately walked past us, pretending never to have seen me in his life. The next day, he staged a little drama in the gift shop, and came to my house in the evening to convince me of the existence of this “double”. The day after that, he left his hotel very early in the morning in a taxi, went to Mr Som’s hotel at five