‘What do you think, Mr Mitter?’ asked Mr Samaddar on our way back from Bamungachhi. ‘Is there any hope of unravelling this mystery?’ ‘I need to think, Mr Samaddar. And I need to read these papers I took from your uncle’s room. Maybe that’ll help me understand the man better. Besides, I need to do a bit of reading and research on music and musical instruments. Please give me two days to sort myself out.’ This conversation was taking place in the car when we finally set off on our return journey. Feluda had spent a lot of time in searching the whole house a second time, but even that had yielded nothing. ‘Yes, of course,’ Mr Samaddar replied politely. ‘You will have to help me with some dates.’ ‘Yes?’ ‘When did Radharaman’s son Muralidhar die?’ ‘In 1945, twenty-eight years ago.’ ‘How old was his son at that time?’ ‘Dharani? He must have been seven or eight.’ ‘Did they always live in Calcutta?’ ‘No, Muralidhar used to work in Bihar. His wife came to live with us in Calcutta after Muralidhar died. When she passed away, Dharani was a college student. He was quite bright, but he began to change after his mother died. Very soon, he left college and joined a theatre group. A year later, my uncle moved to Bamungachhi. His house was built in—’ ‘—Nineteen fifty-nine. Yes, I saw that written on the main gate.’ Radharaman Samaddar’s papers proved to be a collection of old letters, a few cash memos, two old prescriptions, a catalogue of musical instruments produced by a German company called Spiegler, musical notation written on pages torn out of a notebook, and press reviews of five plays, in which mention of a Sanjay Lahiri had been underlined with a blue pencil. ‘Hm,’ said Feluda, looking at the notation. ‘The handwriting on these is the same as that in Surajit Dasgupta’s letter.’ Then he went through the catalogue and said, ‘There’s no mention of a melochord.’ After reading the reviews, he remarked, ‘Dharanidhar and this Sanjay Lahiri appear to be the same man. As far as I can see, although Radharaman refused to have anything to do with his grandson, he did collect information on him, especially if it was praise of his acting.’ Feluda put all the papers away carefully in a plastic bag, and rang a theatre journal called Manchalok, to find out which theatre group Sanjay Lahiri worked for. It turned out that the group was called the Modern Opera. Apparently, Sanjay Lahiri did all the lead roles. Feluda then rang their

office, and was told that the group was currently away in Jalpaiguri. They would be back only after a week. We went out after lunch. I had never had to go to so many different places, all on the same day! Feluda took me first to the National Museum. He didn’t tell me why we were going there, and I didn’t ask because he had sunk into silence and was cracking his knuckles. This clearly meant he was thinking hard, and was not to be disturbed. We went straight to the section for musical instruments. To be honest, I didn’t even know the museum had such a section. It was packed with all kinds of instruments, going back to the time of the Mahabharata. Modern instruments were also displayed, although there was nothing that might have come from the West. Then we went to two music shops, one in Free School Street, and the other in Lal Bazaar. Neither had heard of anything called melochord. ‘Mr Samaddar was an old and valued customer,’ said Mr Mondol of Mondol & Co. which had its shop in Lal Bazaar (Feluda had found one of their cash memos among Radharaman’s papers yesterday). ‘But no, we never sold him the instrument you are talking about. What does it look like? Is it a wind instrument like a clarinet?’ ‘No. It’s more like a harmonium, but much smaller in size. The sound it gives out is a cross between a piano and a sitar.’ ‘How many octaves does it have?’ I knew the eight notes—sa re ga ma pa dha ni sa—made one octave. The large harmoniums in Mondol’s shop had provision for as many as three octaves. When Feluda told him a melochord had only one octave, Mr Mondol shook his head and said, ‘No, sir, I don’t think we can help you. This instrument might well be only a toy. You may wish to check in the big toy shops in New Market.’ We thanked Mr Mondol and made our way to College Street. Feluda bought three books on music, and then we went off to find the office of Manchalok. We found it relatively easily, but it took us a long time to find a photograph of Sanjay Lahiri. Finally, Feluda dug out a crumpled photo from somewhere, and offered to pay for it. ‘Oh, I can’t ask you to pay for that picture, sir!’ laughed the editor of the magazine. ‘You are Felu Mitter, aren’t you? It’s a privilege to be able to help you.’ By the time we returned home after stopping at a café for a glass of lassi, it was 7.30 p.m. The whole area was plunged in darkness because of load shedding. Undaunted, Feluda lit a couple of candles and began leafing through his books. When the power came back at nine, he said to me, ‘Topshe, could you please pop across to your friend Poltu’s house, and ask him if I might borrow his harmonium just for this evening?’ It took me only a few minutes to bring the harmonium. When I went to bed quite late at night, Feluda was still playing it. I had a strange dream that night. I saw myself standing before a huge iron door, in the middle of which was a very large hole. It was big enough for me to slip through; but instead of doing that, Feluda,