Old Man hollow, pace to follow, people’s tree. Half ten, half again century. Rising sun, whence it’s done, can’t you see? Between hands, below them stands, yours, it be. Feluda said to me, ‘When you write about our adventure in the forest, you must start with this puzzle.’ ‘Why? We didn’t get to know of the puzzle until we actually got there!’ ‘I know. But this is just a technique, to tickle the fancy of the reader.’ I wasn’t happy with this answer. Feluda realized it, so a couple of minutes later, he added, ‘Anyone who reads that puzzle at the outset will get the chance to use his own intelligence, you see.’ So I agreed to start my story with it. I should, however, point out at once that it’s no use trying to work out what it means. It’s not easy at all. In fact, it took even Feluda quite a long time to discover its meaning, although when he eventually explained it to me, it seemed simple enough. In talking about our past experiences, I have so far used real names and real places. This time, I have been specifically asked not to do so. I had to turn to Feluda for advice on fictitious names I might use. ‘You can mention the place was near the border of Bhutan, there’s no harm in that,’ Feluda said, ‘but you can change its name to Laxmanbari. The chief character might be called Mr Sinha-Roy. Many old zamindar families used to have that name. In fact, some of them originally came from Rajputana. They came to Bengal and joined the army of Todar Mal to fight the Pathans. Then they simply stayed on, and their descendants became Bengalis.’ I am doing what Feluda told me to do. The names of places and people are fictitious, but not the events. I shall try to relate everything exactly as I saw or heard it. The story began in Calcutta. It was Sunday, 27 May. The time was 9.30 a.m. My summer holidays had started. Of late, the maximum temperature had hit 100°F, so I was keeping myself indoors, pasting stamps from Bhutan into my stamp album. Feluda had recently finished solving a murder case (catching the culprit by using a common pin as a clue), which had made him quite famous. He had also been paid a fat fee. At this moment he was resting at home, stretched out on a divan, reading Thor Heyerdahl’s Aku-Aku. A minute later, Jatayu turned up.

Lalmohan Ganguli—alias Jatayu—the writer of immensely popular crime thrillers, had started visiting us at least twice a month. The popularity of his novels meant that he was pretty well off. As a matter of fact, he was once rather proud of his writing prowess. But when Feluda pointed out dozens of factual errors in his books, Lalmohan Babu began to look upon him with a mixture of respect and admiration. Now, he got his manuscripts corrected by Feluda before passing them on to his publisher. Today, however, he was not carrying a sheaf of papers under his arm, which clearly meant that there was a different reason for his visit. He sat down on a sofa, took out a green face towel from his pocket, wiped his face with it, and said without looking at Feluda, ‘Would you like to see a forest, Felu Babu?’ Feluda raised himself a little, leaning on his elbow. ‘What is your definition of a forest?’ ‘The same as yours, Felu Babu. Cluster of trees. Dense foliage. That sort of thing.’ ‘In West Bengal?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Where? I can’t think of any place other than the Sunderbans, or Terai. Everything else has been wiped clean.’ ‘Have you heard of Mahitosh Sinha-Roy?’ The question was accompanied by a rather smug smile. I had heard of him, too. He was a well- known shikari and a writer. Feluda had one of his books. I hadn’t read it, but Feluda had told me it was most interesting. ‘Doesn’t he live in Orissa, or is it Assam?’ Feluda asked. ‘No, sir,’ Lalmohan Babu replied, taking out an envelope from his pocket with a flourish, ‘he lives in the Dooars Forest, near the border of Bhutan. I dedicated my latest book to him. We have exchanged letters.’ ‘Oh? You mean you dedicate your books even to the living?’ Perhaps I should explain here the business of Lalmohan Babu’s dedications. Nearly all of them are made to famous people who are now dead. The Antarctic Anthropophagi was dedicated to the memory of Robert Scott; The Gorilla’s Grasp said, ‘In the memory of David Livingstone’, and The Atomic Demon (which Feluda said was the most nonsensical stuff he had ever read) had been dedicated to Einstein. Then, when he wrote The Himalayan Hemlock, he dedicated it to the memory of Sir Edmund Hillary. Feluda was furious at this. ‘Why, Lalmohan Babu, why did you have to kill a man who is very much alive?’ ‘What! Hillary is alive?’ Lalmohan Babu asked, looking both apologetic and embarrassed, ‘I didn’t know. I mean . . . he hasn’t been in the news for a long time, and he does go about climbing mountains, doesn’t he? So I thought perhaps he had slipped and . . . well, you know . . .’ His voice trailed away. The mistake was rectified when the second edition of the book came out. Mahitosh Sinha-Roy might be a well-known shikari, but was he really as famous as all these other people? Why was the last book dedicated to him? ‘Well, you see,’ Lalmohan Babu explained, ‘I had to consult his book The Tiger and the Gun quite a few times when I was writing my own. In fact,’ he added with a smile, ‘I used a whole episode. So I felt I had to please him in some way.’ ‘Did you succeed?’

Lalmohan Babu took out the letter from its envelope. ‘Yes. He wouldn’t send an invitation