'Perhaps I should have asked questions about the ruby ring. What was its story? Where

did it come from? But, at that young age, and in the societal milieu of the time (where

fathers were somewhat aloof and not to be questioned), I did not...It was only much

later that I unearthed the significance of the ring, and some of the mysteries it held-a

lifetime later.'

One evening in the early 1950s, when Ajit Singh Dutta was a young boy, his

father gave him a ring. The ornament with its glowing cabochon ruby might

have made 10-year-old Ajit curious, but at that age, he did not give it a second

thought, and the ring ended up forgotten, locked in the safe of his mother's

almirah.

It was only years later, after his father's death, that the beautiful ring gradually

unfurled its mysteries-a stack of letters in cream-coloured envelopes,

familiar piano tunes, a mysterious woman named Louise, and a whirlwind

romance caught between competing family loyalties that tried to defy the

hurdles of distance and cultural differences.

The search-spanning decades-that followed, for a woman whose love

was reflected in the beauty of the ring and in the intimate letters she wrote,

opened up not only an entirely new world for Ajit but also helped him

rediscover his own father. He learnt of the passionate 'Raj' who had remained

hidden within Rajinder Singh Datta, the strict father and philosopher that he

had grown up with.

Written in evocative prose, this deeply moving, nostalgic story of a lost

romance is also a son's unusual and extraordinary tribute to his father.