What are the seasonings of a well-told murder story? If true crime buffs — with an instinct for recounting — compiled a list of salts to riveting misdeeds, they’d still fall short of herbs known to Vaseem Khan. These are secret herbs; some are found in the Himalayan foothills, some in Khan’s sagacious application of history and others in an almost-there relationship between inspectors and criminalists. Our preferred kind includes Akbar, a tomcat that lazily skirts the mystery. The Lost Man of Bombay (Hodder & Stoughton, Ltd), Khan’s third edition in the Malabar House series, seeks the identity of a disfigured European man. The tale kicks off with two expeditionists finding his body near Tsangchokla Pass, Ladakh. The year is 1950. A pocketbook with a stamp of Bombay Press, 1943 directs the dead man’s itinerary back to Mumbai (then Bombay). But more than anything, the gnomic line in the diary: “Caesar’s Triumph holds the key,” puzzles the protagonist, Inspector Persis Wadia the most. 

Mahalaxmi Race Course