I had thought the news of an escaped tiger would be the highlight of our stay. But who knew something else would happen, and Feluda would get inextricably linked with it? I will not be able to forget Mahesh Chowdhury’s birthday on 23 November for a long time to come. And the memory of the scenes in Rajrappa, particularly the temple of Chhinnamasta, standing against its strangely beautiful dry and rocky background, will always stay alive in my memory. But I must go back to the previous evening. The roar of the tiger made Lalmohan Babu go rather pale. However, just as I was about to suggest he should sleep in our room, he announced that he was fine, but could he please have the big torch with five cells? The reason for this was that he had heard somewhere a tiger would retreat if a bright light shone in its eyes for more then a few seconds. ‘Mind you,’ he said before going to his own room, ‘if the tiger roared outside my window, I’m not sure if I’d have the nerve to open it and shine the torch in its face. But Bulakiprasad tells me he has a weapon, and he’s not afraid of wild animals.’ Luckily, even if the tiger did pay us a visit in the middle of the night, it decided not to roar; so all was well. We reached Kailash the following morning on the dot of eight-thirty. Lalmohan Babu took one look at the house and said, ‘The Shiva who lives in this Kailash must be an English one!’ Feluda and I had to agree with him. It might have been built only ten years ago, but its appearance was that of a house built fifty years ago during British times. A chowkidar opened the gate for us. We passed through and parked in one corner of the compound. There were three cars. Pritin Babu’s black Ambassador, a white Fiat and an old yellow Pontiac. ‘Look, Felu Babu, I have found a clue!’ Lalmohan Babu exclaimed. He had found a piece of paper near the edge of the lawn. Like Mr Sahai’s house, Kailash had a garden on one side. ‘How can you find a clue when there’s no mystery?’ Feluda laughed. ‘I know, but just look at what’s written on it. Doesn’t it seem sort of mysterious?’ It was a leaf torn from a child’s exercise book. A few letters from the alphabet were written on it. There was no mystery in it at all. Whoever had written it seemed to be rather fond of the letter ‘X’. It said: XLNC XL XPDNC NME OICURMT Feluda put it in his pocket with a smile.

A very old Muslim bearer was standing near the portico. He said ‘Salaam, huzoor’, and took us inside. A familiar voice had already reached our ears. We saw Pritindra Chowdhury as soon as we stepped into the drawing room. He came forward to greet us warmly: ‘Oh, do come in. So kind of you to come!’ We returned his greeting, then stood still, staring at the walls. Instead of framed paintings, they were covered by framed butterflies. Each frame had eight of them, carefully pinned and beautifully displayed. There were eight such frames, which made a total of sixty-four butterflies, each with its wings spread, looking as though they were ready to take flight. The whole room seemed to glow with their bright colours. The collector himself was seated on a sofa. He rose with a smile when he saw us enter the room. In his youth, he must have been both good looking and physically strong. He was still tall, and held himself straight. His complexion was very fair, he was clean-shaven and dressed in a fine dhoti, a silk kurta and a heavily embroidered Kashmiri shawl. On his nose were perched rimless glasses. Pritin Babu only knew Feluda’s name, so Lalmohan Babu and I had to be introduced by Feluda. Before Mahesh Chowdhury could say anything, Lalmohan Babu piped up, ‘Happy birthday to you, sir!’ Mr Chowdhury laughed. ‘Thank you, thank you! I don’t see why an old man like me should celebrate his birthday, but this whole thing was arranged by my daughter-in-law. Look, she even made me dress up. But I am very glad you were able to come. Hope you didn’t find it difficult to find our K dash eyelash?’ Lalmohan Babu and I stared dumbly at him. But Feluda raised his eyebrows only for a fleeting second before saying, ‘No, sir, we found it quite easily.’ ‘Good. I knew you’d get my meaning. You must be used to dealing with codes and ciphers. However, your friends are still looking puzzled.’ Feluda had to take out his small notebook and pen and write the code down to explain. ‘K— eyelash,’ he wrote. ‘Now say the words quickly,’ he said with a smile. Lalmohan Babu promptly started saying ‘K eyelash, K eyelash’ rapidly, breaking off suddenly to say, ‘Oh, oh, I see. It does sound like Kailash, doesn’t it?’ I had to laugh. Then I saw a little girl of about five, who was sitting on the floor in the middle of the room with a doll in her lap. In her hand was a pair of tweezers. She kept pinching the doll’s forehead with it, possibly to pretend that she was tweezing its eyebrows. ‘That’s my granddaughter,’ Mr Chowdhury said. ‘She’s a double-bee.’ ‘I see. You mean she is called Bibi?’ Feluda asked. This time, even I could figure out double-bee could only mean BB. Feluda and I often played word games at home, so this wasn’t difficult. ‘Yes. I like playing with words,’ Mahesh Chowdhury explained. ‘Let me get my brother,’ said Pritin Babu and left the room. We sat down. Mr Chowdhury was smiling a little, looking straight at Feluda. Feluda returned his look without the slightest trace of embarrassment, and smiled in return. ‘Well, well, well!’ Mr Chowdhury said finally.