Nataraj is the owner of a small press in Malgudi. He leads a normal life...until a bull-headed taxidermist named Vasu enters his shop. Vasu is at first a normal customer. He employs Nataraj to print some business cards. However, as the weeks pass, Vasu becomes more and more familiar with Nataraj's press, and those who frequent the press, a poet and a journalist, learn to avoid the bullying taxidermist.

Vasu talks Nataraj into lending him the apartment above the press, which Vasu immediately turns into a taxidermy operation, complete with dead animals, skins and solvents. The taxidermist goes on a hunting spree, poaching animals in the forests of Mempi, a village outside of Malgudi. After complaints about the taxidermist, Nataraj asks Vasu to leave the premises, an order that is irreverently ignored by the egotistical taxidermist, who appears to be above the law.

The poet completes a long poem, and the journalist and Nataraj plan a celebration. The planning goes smoothly until Nataraj learns that Vasu intends to kill the temple elephant during the celebration procession. Nataraj attempts to stop Vasu, sneaking into his apartment the night of the procession. He finds the taxidermist at the window...dead. An investigation follows, but no murderer is found. Nataraj's assistant discovers that Vasu was killed by his own hand, when he slapped a mosquito on his forehead.