The Complete Adventures of Feluda: Volume II (32 page)

‘W
hat are you thinking, Felu Babu?’ Lalmohan Babu asked.

It was a Sunday morning. The three of us were sitting in our living room, chatting as usual, Lalmohan Babu having driven all the way from his house in Gorpar to join us. There had been a shower earlier, but now the sun was scorching. Our ceiling fan was moving with great gusto, since on Sundays power cuts were rare.

‘I was thinking of your latest novel,’ Feluda replied.

On the first of Baisakh, Jatayu’s new novel,
The Astounding Atlantic
, had been released. By the fifth, four thousand and five hundred copies had been sold. ‘What about my latest novel? How can that possibly give you food for thought?’

‘What I was thinking, simply, was this: no matter how exaggerated or unreal your plots are, you manage to get away with it simply by being able to tell a good story. Despite all their weaknesses, your books are immensely enjoyable.’

Lalmohan Babu began to look deeply gratified, and was about to say something suitable, but Feluda continued, ‘That made me wonder if any of your ancestors had also been writers.’

The truth was that we knew very little about Lalmohan Ganguli’s family. All he had told us was that his parents were no more, and he was a bachelor.

‘My ancestors? I have no idea who they were, or what they did, more than four generations ago. Nobody in the last three generations was a writer, I can tell you that.’

‘Didn’t your father have brothers?’

‘Yes, he had two brothers, one older and the other younger than him. The older one was called Mohinimohan Ganguli. He practised homoeopathy. When I was a child, being ill automatically meant going to my uncle and being given arnica, or rhus tox, or belladonna. My great-grandfather was Lalit Mohan Ganguli. He was a paper merchant. He had a shop called L.M. Ganguli & Sons. Both my grandfather and father looked after our family business, but after my father’s death, things became rather difficult. The shop changed hands, although the name L.M. Ganguli & Sons was retained for some time.’

‘What about your father’s younger brother? Your uncle? Wasn’t he interested in running the business?’

‘No, sir. I saw my uncle, Durgamohan Ganguli, only once in my
life. I was born in 1936. Seven years before that, in 1929, he had become a freedom fighter, and joined the terrorists. The Assistant Commissioner in Khulna—which is now in Bangladesh—used to be a Mr Turnbull. Durgamohan tried to shoot him. He didn’t succeed in killing him, but the bullet hit Turnbull’s chin, causing a great deal of damage.’

‘And then?’

‘Then nothing. Durgamohan disappeared. The police never found him. Perhaps the passion for adventure is something I got from my uncle.’

‘When did you see him?’

‘He returned home once, after Independence, in 1949. That was my first and last meeting with him. The man I saw was utterly different from the daredevil I had heard so much about. Terrorism and pistols were a thing of the past. Durgamohan had become quiet and withdrawn—in fact, much more of a spiritual character than anything else. He stayed at home for a month, then vanished again.’

‘Do you know where he went?’

‘As far as I can remember, he left to work in a forest—something to do with supplying timber.’

‘He didn’t get married?’

‘No, he didn’t.’

‘But surely you have other siblings, and cousins?’

‘I have an older sister. Her husband works in the railway, and they’re posted in Dhanbad. My uncle has three daughters, no sons. All three are married and scattered in various corners of the country. We exchange postcards after Durga Puja, but other than that I have no contact with them. Frankly, I don’t think family ties are so important. I mean, I value friendship much more. I am so close to you and Tapesh, you can see that for yourself. Now, has that anything to do with a blood relation? I don’t really . . .’

He had to stop, for there was a knock at the door. This wasn’t unexpected, for a man called Umashankar Puri had made an appointment to see Feluda at half past nine. It was now 9.33.

I opened the door to let Mr Puri in. He turned out to be a man of medium height, clean-shaven, with salt-and-pepper hair parted on the right. For some strange reason, the parting in his hair made me feel uneasy. Perhaps it was simply that so few men parted their hair on the right—probably one in a hundred—that it seemed positively odd.

‘You appear to have left in a hurry,’ Feluda remarked as soon as greetings had been exchanged and Mr Puri had been offered a seat.

‘Yes, but how did you guess?’ he asked in amazement.

‘All your nails on your left hand are neatly clipped. I can see one nail is still stuck to your jacket. But except for two nails, your right hand . . .’

‘Oh yes, yes. I was clipping those just before coming here. I got a trunk call before I could finish, and then it was time to leave, so . . .’ he laughed.

‘Anyway, tell me now how I may be able to help you.’

Mr Puri stopped laughing. He was quiet for a few seconds, trying to collect his thoughts. Then he said, ‘Your name was recommended to me by the Maharaja of Bhagwangarh. He spoke very highly of you. That is why I am here to seek your assistance.’

‘I am honoured.’

‘The problem is—’ he stopped, then took a deep breath and started again. ‘What I am afraid of is that there may be an unfortunate incident. Can you help me to try and avoid it?’

‘I couldn’t make promises, Mr Puri, without a few more details. What exactly do you think might happen?’

Mr Puri couldn’t make an immediate reply, for Srinath came in at this moment with tea and biscuits. Mr Puri picked up a biscuit and said, ‘Have you heard of Rupnarayangarh? It used to be a princely state.’

‘It does seem to ring a bell. Is it somewhere in Uttar Pradesh?’

‘Yes, that’s right. It’s 90 km to the west of Aligarh. Thirty years ago, its chief was Raja Chandradeo Singh. I was the manager of the estate. Although the country had become independent, small states like ours could still be run privately without too much interference from the government. Chandradeo Singh was then fifty-four, but was strong and very active. He went on shikar, played tennis and polo, and exercised regularly to keep fit. The only thing that bothered him sometimes was an occasional attack of asthma. Who knew one day it would suddenly grow so much worse that the Raja would become totally incapacitated? But that’s what happened. I cannot even begin to describe how horrible his attacks were. In six months, the man who couldn’t sit still became completely confined to bed. No doctor could help him, no medicine worked. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t eat, he couldn’t sleep, or talk, or move.

‘When we were about to give up hope altogether, we heard about
a Bhavani Upadhyaya. He lived in Haridwar, and apparently knew of some ayurvedic medicine that could cure asthma. Dozens of people had already gone to him and were fully recovered.

‘Having heard this, I went to Haridwar myself and tracked him down. He was quite well-known in that area. He turned out to be a very simple man, who lived quietly in a small cottage. When I explained why I had gone to find him, he agreed readily to go to Rupnarayangarh with me, and treat the Raja. His medicine would take ten days to take effect, he said. He would spend those ten days in the estate. If there was no improvement in that time, he would return to Haridwar without taking a single paisa.

‘You may find it difficult to believe, but the Raja’s health was restored in not ten, but three days. By the fourth day, it seemed as though he had never been ill. It was really a miracle. Upadhyaya said he would go back to Haridwar, and could he please be paid fifty rupees for the medicine? The Raja laughed at the idea. “How can you save my life, bring me back from death’s door, and say all I need to pay you is fifty rupees?” he asked Upadhyaya. But Upadhyaya was a man devoid of greed. He refused to take anything more.

‘Raja Chandradeo Singh, however, paid no attention. He was rather different from most men. All his emotions—joy, grief, generosity—were stronger than others. Despite Upadhyaya’s objections, he decided to give him a most valuable pendant. It was made of solid gold, studded with pearls, rubies, emeralds and diamonds. Thirty years ago, its value would have been in the region of seven hundred thousand.’

‘What did Upadhyaya do? Did he take this pendant willingly?’

‘Oh no, no. He seemed greatly distressed by the offer. He said, “I am a simple man. What would I do with a locket like that? Besides, who is ever going to believe I was given it? Won’t everyone assume I had stolen it from somewhere?”

‘The Raja said to him, “No, why should they? We are not going to tell everyone, are we? This is simply between you and me. But if it will make you happier, I will give you a written document, stamped with my royal seal, saying that I have given you this piece of jewellery out of my own free will, as your reward for treating me.”

‘It was only after this that Upadhyaya agreed to accept the Raja’s offer, with happiness and gratitude.’

‘How many people knew about this? I mean, apart from the Raja, Upadhyaya and yourself?’

‘The Maharani knew about it, as well as her two sons—Suraj and Pavan. Suraj was then in his early twenties, a very good and kind young man, which is something of a rarity in royal families. Pavan was only fifteen. In my own family, my wife and my son, Devishankar, learnt about the Raja’s generosity. Devi was five or six years old at the time. The Raja may have mentioned it to someone else in his later years, I don’t know. I certainly did not tell anyone. In the last thirty years, the press did not pick up this story even once. You know very well what reporters and journalists are like. If word had leaked out, do you think they’d have let it remain a secret?’

‘That is true. People who knew certainly seemed to have kept their lips sealed.’

Mr Puri continued, ‘Chandradeo Singh lived for another twelve years. He was succeeded by Surajdeo, although, of course, by then, no one would call him a Raja. However, he was the principal owner of the estate and all other property of his father.’

‘Did you continue to be the manager?’ Feluda asked.

‘Yes. I tried very hard to keep the estate going by developing new projects, going into business, and making sure its future was secure; but unfortunately, Suraj was not really interested in these things. His only passion in life was books. He used to spend nearly sixteen hours in his library every day, refusing to discuss business matters with me. How much could I achieve all on my own? Soon, the financial status of the estate started to deteriorate.’

‘Your own son must have grown up by now.’

‘Oh yes. I sent him to a school in Aligarh. From there he went to college in Delhi, and then started his own business there. He did not return to Rupnarayangarh.’

‘Is he your only son?’

‘Yes. Anyway, I was struggling to keep the affairs of the estate in order. Sometimes I thought of giving it all up and going away to Moradabad, which is where I come from. But I had grown very attached to Rupnarayangarh, I couldn’t leave it just like that.’

Mr Puri stopped briefly to light a cigar. Then he said, ‘I am now coming to the most important part of my story, which will explain why I am here. Please bear with me. What happened was this: about a week ago, Chandradeo’s younger son, Pavan, came to me rather unexpectedly. The first thing he said was, “Give me the name and address of the man who cured my father.” Naturally, I asked him why he wanted it, was anyone ill? To that he said no, no one was ill.
He needed to contact Upadhyaya simply in connection with a television film he was making.

‘I knew Pavan was interested in photography, but had no idea he was now into making films. I said to him, “You mean you’re going to show this man in your film?” He said, “Of course. I am also going to tell everyone about the pendant he was given. I doubt if anyone has ever been given such a big reward for curing an ailment.” At this, I was obliged to tell him that Upadhyaya himself had certainly not wanted any publicity. But he gave me a lecture on how it was the duty of those working for our television to inform the public about all important events, no matter when they had occurred. Besides, Upadhyaya might well change his mind about not wanting any publicity once Pavan had spoken to him. So would I just give him his address?

‘After this, there was nothing I could do, but tell Pavan where Upadhyaya lived. He thanked me and left.’

‘How old would Upadhaya be now?’

‘He’d be in his seventies. When he came to Rupnarayangarh, he was not a young man.’

Feluda said nothing for a few moments, but looked steadily at Mr Puri. Then he asked, ‘Did you come here simply to ensure that nobody found out about Upadhyaya’s secret?’

Mr Puri shook his head. ‘No, Mr Mitter. It is not just that. I am deeply concerned about Chandradeo’s pendant. If Pavan is making a film, he needs a great deal of money. Perhaps he has made arrangements, I don’t know. What I do know is that a locket like that would be enough to remove all his financial worries.’

‘But that would mean adopting unfair means, wouldn’t it?’

‘Yes, certainly.’

‘What kind of a man is Pavandeo?’

‘He has inherited both the strengths and weaknesses of his father. He’s a good sportsman, and a very good photographer. But he gambles a lot. He’s lost quite a lot of money in poker. He can be totally reckless at times, but I have known him to be surprisingly thoughtful and generous. Like his father, he has a complex character, and it is not easy to get to know him well.’

‘So what would you like me to do?’

‘I would simply like you to make sure no one gets the chance to adopt unfair means.’

‘Is Pavandeo going to Haridwar?’

‘Yes, but not immediately. He’ll take at least a week to set out, for he’s busy taking shots of the palace right now.’

‘If I agreed to take this case, I couldn’t leave immediately either. It would take me a while to reserve seats on a train. But assuming that I did agree, how would I recognize Pavandeo?’

‘I thought about that. Here’s his photo. This was published in a magazine last month, after he won a billiard championship. You may keep it. And . . . er . . . would you like me to pay you an advance?’