‘An interesting man,’ Feluda remarked. We were out in the street, but not walking in the direction of home. Why Feluda chose to go in the opposite direction, I could not tell; nor did he make any attempt at hailing either of the two empty taxis that sailed by.

One little thing was bothering me. I had to mention it to Feluda.

‘Didn’t Dinanath Babu say he thought Pakrashi was about sixty? But Mr Pakrashi himself said he was fifty-three and, quite frankly, he didn’t seem older than that. Isn’t that funny?’

‘All it proves is that Dinanath Babu’s power of observation is not what it should be,’ said Feluda.

A couple of minutes later, we reached Lower Circular Road. Feluda turned left. ‘Are you going to look at that case of robbery?’ I asked. Only three days ago, the papers had reported a case of a daylight robbery. Apparently, three masked men had walked into a jeweller’s shop on Lower Circular Road and got away with a lot of valuable jewellery and precious stones, firing recklessly in the air as they made their escape in a black Ambassador car. ‘It might be fun tracing those daredevils,’ Feluda had said. But sadly, no one had come forward to ask him to investigate. So I thought perhaps he was going to ask a few questions on his own. But Feluda paid no attention to me. It seemed as though his sole purpose in life, certainly at that moment, was to get some exercise and so he would do nothing but continue to walk.

A little later, he turned left again rather abruptly, and walked briskly into the Hindustan International Hotel. I followed him quickly.

‘Did anyone from Simla check in at your hotel on 6 March?’ Feluda asked the receptionist, ‘His first name starts with a “G” … I’m afraid I can’t recall his full name.’

Neither Brijmohan nor Naresh Pakrashi had names that started with a ‘G’. So this had to the applewalla.

The receptionist looked at his book.

‘There are two foreigners listed here on 6 March,’ he said, ‘Gerald Pratley and G. R. Holmes. Both came from abroad.’

‘Thank you,’ said Feluda and left.

We took a taxi as we came out. ‘Park Hotel,’ Feluda said to the driver and lit a Charminar.

‘If you had looked carefully at those red marks on the map,’ he said to me, ‘you’d have seen they were markers for hotels. It’s natural that the man would want to stay at a good hotel. At present, there are five well-known hotels in Calcutta—Grand, Hindustan International, Park, Great Eastern and Ritz Continental. And those red marks had been placed on these. The Park Hotel would be our next port of call.’