Byomkesh Bakshi by Saradindu Bandopadhyay & Monimala Dhar

Author:Saradindu Bandopadhyay & Monimala Dhar [Bandopadhyay, Saradindu & Dhar, Monimala]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mobilism
Publisher: Rupa Publications Private Limited
Published: 2002-12-31T00:00:00+00:00

I could not finish my letter yesterday, I have started writing again today in candle light, after 10 p.m. Homji was telling me the story. We finished having our food before he finished relating the story. We came back to the sitting room. The servant served us coffee. Homji began speaking :—

When Haimabati regained her senses it was past ten — the lights had gone off. She called her maid but there was no one to help for that night. The police came the next morning. Police investigation showed that Haimabati was correct. There were signs of struggle at the back garden at the edge of the gorge. More information came to the police gradually. Manek Mehta was absconding. He was smuggling three lakhs of gold from Pakistan, when the Customs department confiscated the goods. He gave the police the slip but had become penniless. So he had murdered his partner and had vanished with all the money from the safe.

It was necessary to retrieve the body of Bijoy Biswas from the gorge. But this gorge was so inaccessible that it was a very difficult task to go down in search of the body. Moreover, a tiger couple had come to live in the valley below the gorge. One could hear them roar in the night. Anyway, the police went down the gorge with a few tribals — into the valley, in search of the body. But they found very little of the remains of the body. They came up with a few bones, some blood-stained clothes and a muffler — all belonging to Bijoy Biswas. The police issued an arrest warrant against Mehta.

It was soon the 1st of December. One could easily imagine the condition of the poor, destitute, widow. Homji was a kind man, he gave some money to Haimabati. She left Mahabaleshwar for good, wiping her tears of grief and loss.

A month passed. Manek Mehta was still absconding. But the tiger and the tigress were still living in the gorge. They had tasted human blood and so were unable to leave the place.

I was a bit sad when I heard Homji's story. I felt sorry for a fellow Bengali who had made some money but had lost all of it and also his life. But the condition of his widow was of course, worse. I wondered if the police would ever be able to catch Manek Mehta. It was a difficult job in a country like ours, where the population was vast.

I was thinking about all this, when the lights went off. Homji said, "Here lights go off at ten at night and come back early in the morning. Come, let me see you to your room."

He had a huge, long torch with which he showed me the way to my bedroom. There was a row of rooms, all of them were locked except the last room in the corner. There was a long verandah in front of the rooms. The servant had kept a candle on the table.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.