‘All right. But do let me know how you get on. I’ll be thinking of you!’
We came out of the building and found a taxi waiting just outside the front gate. Taxis in Hong Kong looked different. Instead of black and yellow, they were red and silver.
‘Pearl Hotel,’ said Feluda. The driver nodded and started the car. Lalmohan Babu seemed unusually subdued. When I asked him why, he said it was because his mental horizon had spread enormously in a short span of time. ‘If it spreads any further, I don’t think I could cope!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I had only seen Chinese workmen and Chinese shoemakers in Calcutta. I would never have believed they could build a city like this if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes!’
Mr Pal had told us that the hotel was less than ten minutes from his flat. But our chauffeur kept driving for much longer than that. It was most puzzling. Feluda frowned, then raised his voice and said, ‘We said Pearl Hotel!’
‘Yes,’ said the driver without turning his head. He was wearing dark glasses, so I couldn’t see his eyes. Surely he had heard us right the first time? And surely there couldn’t be more than one hotel by the same name?
The taxi passed through a number of small lanes and finally, after about twenty minutes, stopped at a street corner. There was no doubt that this was an area where only the Chinese lived, far removed from the cosmopolitan atmosphere of the high streets. The buildings were tall and narrow, and terribly congested. Heaven knew if the sun ever went in through those small windows. There were only a few small shops that bore no resemblance to the tempting departmental stores we had seen earlier. All of them had signboards written in Chinese, so there was no way of telling what the shops sold.
‘Where is Pearl Hotel?’ Feluda asked. The driver raised a hand to indicate that we’d have to go into the lane on our right. I looked at the meter. What it showed in Hong Kong dollars amounted to a hundred rupees. But there was nothing we could do except pay up.
Having done this, we picked up our luggage and turned to go. Even without looking at Lalmohan Babu, I could tell that he had turned visibly pale. Everything he had heard about the crime rate in Hong Kong must have been flashing through his mind.
We turned right. The lane was narrow and dark. But before anything else registered, shadows leapt out of the darkness and surrounded us. In the next instant, I felt a blow on my head and passed out.
When I came round, I found myself lying on the floor of a dingy room. Feluda was sitting on a wooden packing crate, smoking a Charminar. There was a funny smell in the room that made me want to close my eyes again and go to sleep. I learnt later that it was the smell of opium. Apparently, the British used to produce opium in India and sell it to the Chinese. This made the British rich, and the Chinese got hooked.
Lalmohan Babu was still unconscious, but was beginning to stir. Our luggage had disappeared. There were four or five packing crates in the room, a cane chair that lay tilted to one side, and a Chinese calendar. Through a tiny window fairly high on the wall came a faint shaft of light, which meant that there was still some daylight left outside.
There were two doors, one on my right and the other in front of me. Both were closed. The only sound to be heard was the chirping of a bird. The Chinese, I had noticed elsewhere, were fond of keeping birds in cages.
‘Wake up, Lalmohan Babu!’ Feluda said. ‘How long will you sleep?’
Lalmohan Babu opened his eyes and winced in pain. ‘My God! What a horrific experience!’ he exclaimed, sitting up with some difficulty. ‘Where on earth are we?’
‘In the massacre chamber,’ Feluda replied calmly. ‘It’s just like one of your stories, isn’t it?’
‘My stories? Ho!’
Perhaps the act of saying ‘Ho!’ brought on a fresh twinge of pain, for he made a face. Then he lowered his voice slightly and said, ‘What just happened to us beats anything I’ve ever written. I’ll give up writing altogether, I swear. Enough is enough.’
‘What! You mean you’ll never write again?’
‘No, never.’
‘All right. Your statement has just been recorded, remember. You can’t go back on your word.’
Feluda’s mini cassette recorder was placed beside him. He pressed the replay button to show Lalmohan Babu his words had truly been taped.
‘Somani is behind this, isn’t he?’ Lalmohan Babu asked. ‘Undoubtedly. Let’s just hope we get our bags back. They took the revolver. But I managed to save this recorder.’
‘Are both those doors locked?’
‘The front door is. The side one opens into a bathroom.’
‘No chance of escaping through there, I suppose?’
‘None. There is a window, but it’s far too small.’
‘Was that taxi driver planted by Somani?’
‘Yes, probably.’
‘But how could he be sure we’d take that same taxi? We could have taken another, or just walked!’
‘If we did, I’m sure Somani would have made some other arrangement for us. It’s no use talking about what might have happened, Lalmohan Babu.’
Lalmohan Babu sighed and lay down again. A minute later, I heard him humming under his breath. How could he sing at a moment like this? I strained my ears and caught the words: ‘O Lord, my time has come/Take me ashore to the other world.’ Did he really think he was about to die?
‘What are you thinking of, Lalmohan Babu?’ Feluda asked, raising an eyebrow.
‘Strange . . . it’s all so strange. I had no idea one could have a dream even after being knocked unconscious. Do you know what I saw? A number of monkeys were being sold, and a man was beating a drum and saying, “Perfumed monkeys from the Renaissance—two dollars each—all from the Renaissance—”’
There were footsteps outside. Someone was coming up a flight of stairs. The footsteps got louder and eventually stopped outside the front door. A key turned in the lock, and the door swung open.
A man in a dark suit came in, followed by two others. All were Indians. The first man turned out to be Hiralal Somani. His mouth was spread in a sly, insolent smile.
‘Hello, Mr Mitter! How are you?’
‘Just as you’d except me to be.’
‘Don’t worry, sir. I haven’t imprisoned you for life. I’ll let you go the minute my job is done.’
‘I fail to see why you removed our luggage.’
‘That was a mistake. Kanhaiya! Kanhaiya!’
One of the two men had disappeared somewhere. Now he came back. The other was standing behind Somani with a gun in his hand.
‘Bring the luggage back,’ Somani instructed the man called Kanhaiya. Then he turned to Feluda and added, ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to miss your dinner tonight. You can start eating again from tomorrow.’
Kanhaiya brought our bags and threw them into the room. ‘Don’t try and be difficult, Mr Mitter,’ Somani warned. ‘Radheshyam here has your revolver. He knows how to shoot, and will not hesitate to pull the trigger if need be. Besides, remember that this is Hong Kong, not Calcutta. No one knows you here. I shall leave you now, and come back tomorrow morning. I’ll set you free then. Good night!’
The faint light coming in through the window had virtually gone. There was a broken lampshade in the room, but no bulb in it.
Hiralal left. Kanhaiya went to the door to close it.
‘Kanhaiya! Kanhaiya!’ Hiralal called from somewhere.
‘Ji, huzoor,’ said Kanhaiya and went out.
Radheshyam now turned to the door to finish what Kanhaiya had started to do and, in that instant, events suddenly took a different turn.
Feluda’s shoulder bag was lying on the floor near his feet. He picked it up and threw it at the door with all his strength. It hit the back of Radheshyam’s head. Before he could do anything, Feluda sprang to his feet and threw himself on Radheshyam. The revolver fell from his hand.
I lost no time in jumping up and joining Feluda. It took me only a second to pick up the revolver and ai
m it at Radheshyam. I had used airguns as a child. There was no question of missing at point blank range.
Radheshyam, however, was still struggling to get out of Feluda’s grasp. It wasn’t easy to hold him down for he was a tall and hefty fellow. Out of the corner of my eye I saw that Lalmohan Babu had picked up one of the packing crates and was dancing around the room, looking for a suitable opportunity to hit Radheshyam with it.
Such an opportunity came only a few seconds later. A corner of the crate struck Radheshyam’s head, causing him to fall flat on his face with a groan. He then lay there, motionless. I noticed blood oozing out of his head. Feluda took the gun from me and quickly turned around to face the figure of Kanhaiya, who had returned to the room. Kanhaiya raised his hands without a word, clearly realizing the tables had turned.
‘Take the bags outside,’ Feluda said. Lalmohan Babu and I carried our luggage out of the room.
Radheshyam was still lying where he had fallen. One blow from Feluda now made Kanhaiya join his mate on the floor. By the time the men came round, we’d be totally out of danger.
There were stairs outside leading to the main exit of the building. Luckily, no one seemed to be about. We made our escape as swiftly as we could, and stepped out into the street.
There were neon signs everywhere. It seemed as though each one of the ten thousand letters in the Chinese alphabet was staring at us. But this wasn’t the main road. There were no trams or buses running on it. All it had were taxis, private cars and loads of people.
We got into the third empty taxi that sailed by. I asked Feluda as soon as we got in, ‘When Somani’s voice shouted for Kanhaiya, it was really your tape recorder doing a replay, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes, that’s right. I had switched it on the moment Somani opened the door. Then I switched it off after I heard him call out to Kanhaiya. Something told me it might prove handy; and it did!’
‘You’re really brilliant!’ said Lalmohan Babu with a great deal of feeling.
‘Thank you, Lalmohan Babu, and your assistance is much appreciated.’
It took us ten minutes and seven dollars to get to the real Pearl Hotel. Feluda rang Mr Pal as soon as we had checked in.
‘I was beginning to get worried,’ said Mr Pal. ‘I rang you at the hotel several times, but they said you hadn’t arrived at all. What happened?’
‘I’ll tell you later. Can you come to the hotel right away?’
‘Of course. I’ve got news for you, too.’
Mr Pal arrived in a few minutes. Feluda quickly explained what had happened. ‘Oh, I’m proud of you!’ Mr Pal said. ‘Now let me tell you what I’ve learnt. I found Krikorian’s home address in the telephone book. I have also discovered where Hiralal’s staying.’
‘How?’
‘There are five other Somanis here. I began calling them one by one. It turned out that Hiralal is Keshav Somani’s cousin. Keshav has a fabrics shop in Kowloon. That’s where he lives, and Hiralal is staying with him. Krikorian is coming back this evening, isn’t he? Hiralal will obviously attempt to transfer the painting to him today. I’ve posted Wong Soo outside Hiralal’s house. Wong Soo works with me. A most capable and reliable young man. He was told to ring me if he saw a car leave Somani’s house.’
‘Where does Krikorian live?’
‘Victoria Hill. A rather posh area, closer from here than it is from Kowloon. So if we left soon after Hiralal, we would get there before him. In fact, you could stop him on the way.’
Feluda shook Mr Pal’s hand. ‘That’s absolutely wonderful. But did Wong Soo call you?’
‘Yes. Just as I was leaving. He saw a man come out of the house carrying a thin, flat parcel. This man then got into a car and left.’
We shot out in Mr Pal’s car in three minutes, and began going up a hill. The road was full of curves and bends and the higher we rose, the better it was to see the city of Hong Kong spread below us. Lalmohan Babu gaped at its million lights, the cars, the highrise buildings, the sea, and kept muttering under his breath, ‘Dreamland, dreamland!’
Ten minutes later, Mr Pal said, ‘This is the right area, but we’ll have to look for the right house.’ There were beautiful old houses everywhere, surrounded by well-kept lawns and gardens. The British had clearly made these houses for themselves to live in comfort. In time, some of them had changed hands.
It did not take us long to find Krikorian’s house. There was a black car parked in its portico, which we recognized instantly. It was the same car that had followed us from the airport. It belonged to Hiralal Somani. He had obviously beaten us to it.
Mr Pal parked his car a little way ahead under a tree, and said, ‘Now we must find a spot from where we can keep an eye on that house.’
We got out of the car and walked back to stand opposite Krikorian’s house. There were shrubs and bushes dotted about. It wasn’t difficult to find a suitable spot. But we did not have to wait for long. Only a minute or so later, the front door of Krikorian’s house opened. A shaft of light streamed out and, in it, we saw Somani come out. He glanced back once, said ‘Good night’ to someone, and got into his car. We saw it move away and disappear round the corner, its engine purring smoothly.
‘What will you do now?’ Mr Pal whispered.
‘Go in and talk to Mr Krikorian,’ Feluda replied.
We stepped out of the dark and walked in through the gate of Krikorian’s house. But before we would reach the portico, a most peculiar thing happened.
The front door opened again, and an old man—possibly in his seventies—rushed out and began running as fast as he could towards the gate. In his hands was Tintoretto’s Jesus, with a new, shining golden frame around it. The presence of four strange people on his driveway did not seem to bother him at all. He looked around wildly, then slapped his forehead and started to yell. ‘Scoundrel! Swindler! Son of a bitch!’
Then he turned to us, a crazed look in his eyes, and said, ‘He just sold me a fake, and I paid fifty thousand dollars for it!’ He did not find it necessary to question who we were and what we were doing at his house.
‘Are you talking about this painting by Tintoretto?’ Feluda asked gently. The old man exploded. ‘Tintoretto?’ he said, panting. ‘Tintoretto my foot! Come with me, I’ll show you.’
He walked with amazing swiftness back to the portico. We followed him quietly. ‘Look!’ he said, holding the painting up in the bright light that came through the open front door. ‘Can you see them? Three green flies. All sticking to the paint. These stupid creatures had made life miserable for me in my room in the hotel in Calcutta. And now I find not one, not two, but three of them in this painting! And that idiot had the nerve to tell me it was genuine. He fooled me because it’s a damn good copy. But I didn’t pay all that money for a fake!’
‘You’re quite right,’ said Feluda soothingly. ‘These flies did not exist in Italy four hundred years ago. They obviously got in there pretty recently.’
Mr Krikorian’s white face had turned red. ‘That dirty double-crossing swine! I don’t even know where he’s staying!’
‘I do,’ Mr Pal said quietly.
‘You do?’ The Armenian turned to him eagerly, now hope in his eyes.
‘Yes. He’s staying in Kowloon. I have the address.’
‘Good. I’ll get hold of him, and skin him alive!’ Then a sudden thought seemed to occur to him. He turned back to Feluda and asked, ‘Who are you?’
‘We knew Somani’s-painting wasn’t genuine. So we came to warn you. But he got here first,’ Feluda replied calmly, lying through his teeth.
‘But . . .’ Mr Pal said suddenly, ‘it’s not too late. We could catch him now, before he gets home. We could follow him in my car. He couldn’t have got very far.’
Mr Krikorian’s eyes took on a new glint. ‘Let’s go,’ he said briefly. We had been unable to drive very fast on our way here because we had to climb up a hill. Now, on our way down, Mr Pal told us to hold on tight and drove as though the devil was after him. But
this did not last for very long.
We saw Somani’s car only five minutes later. He had finished his business, a cheque for fifty thousand dollars was warming his pocket, so naturally he was in no hurry to get anywhere. Mr Pal caught up with his car and began blowing his horn. Somani moved to one side to let him pass. Mr Pal overtook him, went ahead and then parked diagonally across the road, blocking the way completely. Thankfully, there was no other car coming from either direction.
I saw Somani get out of his car with a puzzled air. In the same instant, Mr Krikorian leapt out of ours, still clutching the painting. Feluda followed quickly.
‘Excuse me,’ he said, taking the painting from Mr Krikorian. The old man let go, looking somewhat bemused.
Feluda walked straight up to Somani, carrying the painting. Then, without the slightest warning, he raised his hands and brought the painting down on Somani’s head with a resounding crash. Somani’s head pierced through the canvas and the frame hung round his throat like a necklace. He simply stared, wide-eyed and speechless.
‘Mr Krikorian, you will now get your cheque back,’ Feluda said coldly, his revolver in his hand.
Hiralal Somani continued to look dazed, but seemed to have caught the general drift. With a trembling hand, he took out a cheque from the front pocket of his jacket. Mr Krikorian swooped upon him and snatched it from his hand.
‘Please, Hiralalji,’ said Feluda before returning to the car, ‘do not hold me responsible for this unexpected stroke of misfortune. This was brought about by three green flies.’
Somani’s jaw fell open. We drove off.
Twelve
What I found most amazing was that the second painting sold to Krikorian also turned out to be a fake. But Feluda did not comment on it at all.
Lalmohan Babu raised a different point. ‘Felu Babu,’ he said, ‘how can you be so sure that green flies did not exist in Italy in the sixteenth century? Why, I have heard water hyacinth did not originate in our own country. It was brought by a lady from Europe!’