Mod Lady and the Prabhus
Ratan Lal Basu
Copyright 2011 Ratan Lal Basu
Contents
Part-I
Part-II
Part-III
Part-IV
Author
Part-I
‘Oh that’s the tree,’ gaunt Prabhu cried out in ecstasy. Fat Prabhu nodded to indicate that he too had seen it and they climbed down the slope of the embankment and made for the tree. The path was strewn with thorny thickets, titillating bushes and furthermore snakes could be lurking in the thick bushes. They battered down the bushes and thickets with the long bamboo clubs they had brought along and advanced slowly toward the tree and reaching at the bottom of the tall old saal tree they started to examine the trunk of the tree closely and were elated to find the red vermillion mark at a height of five feet. It was an asterisk drawn neatly by vermillion dissolved in oil so as to save the marking from being washed off by rain water. They removed the creepers from beneath the red marking and were reassured to find the markings edged out deeply in the trunk. Both of them smiled jubilantly.
‘Now we are to move straight to the twentieth tree and then take a right urn,’ gaunt Prabhu said.
‘Wait a bit and let us examine the map and guidelines once again,’ Fat Prabhu said calmly. Fat Prabhu reached into his shirt pocket and took out the role of paper, worn yellow by time and carefully unfurled it so that the crisp sheet does not tear. They examined the paper carefully and thereafter moved forward, beating down the bushes and counting the trees they had passed.
Part-II
Notwithstanding the identity of the first name, the two Probhus were radically opposite in many respects. One was fat, short in stature, swarthy, and the other gaunt, tall and fair. The fat Prabhu was sober in temperament, had candid looks and his hair was snapped very small giving his head the look of the edges of a tooth brush. The gaunt one, on the other hand, was emotional, looked smart and clever and got a hair cut imitating the film heroes. They had, however, similarities too. Both were around thirty, both had left home at Bihar in quest of job at their very childhood and the poor parents of both never tried to get them back to home. They, with many other siblings to feed, were relieved to be free from the burden of at least one child. The two Prabhus resided at a slum house near Ambari Falakata, only a few kilometers from the city of Siliguri and both were close friends. Fat Prabhu worked as a conductor at a private bus and gaunt Prabhu in a shop. Earnings of both were meager and they could barely make out the subsistence. But in spite of their financial stringency they were always jovial and optimistic.
Both were good at heart, cordial, helpful to others and they did not have any addiction except biri smoking. But one inclination of gaunt Prabhu occasionally put him to trouble. He could not keep his head if he happened to come across any sexy girl and very often they lured him to undertake risky adventures leading to trouble but in most of the cases he could extricate himself by sheer presence of mind.
Once, gaunt Prabhu had gone alone to visit the Shivaratri mela, which is held for about a month in February every year at Jalpesh in the duars region of the Jalpaiguri district around a famous Shiva temple. Thousands of pilgrims and visitors congregate at the place during the festival and most of them spend night in the open field and for lighting, most of the families visiting the fair carry lanterns for the night as there’s provision of electricity only for the temple. They turn the lanterns low while sleeping.
Prabhu had his dinner from a cheap makeshift hotel and thereafter laying a blanket at the corner of the field lighted a biri and started looking around and found that everybody except him was in deep slumber after daylong toil. All of a sudden, his gaze fell on a sleeping young couple not far from him and he was agitated. He had earlier seen both the husband and the wife taking tabs of bhang and, therefore, Prabhu presumed that their sleep would not break easily. The wife, around twenty six, was healthy and sexy and the view of her heavy breast-line shown through the disheveled garments made Prabhu hot and crazy. He looked around and examined carefully and was reassured that everyone was in deep sleep and there was no other person within twenty yards of the sleeping couple. Prabhu crawled cautiously toward the couple and reaching near the wife turned their lantern off. He then carefully got on top of her and started his thrilling adventure. Her sleep was deep but the onslaught made her half awake and she thought it was her husband and started mumbling in sleepy tone,
‘Why are you doing the staff here in this mela, are not you aware of the people around? You did this twice last night and still cannot avoid doing it in this public place, so sex hungry you are!’
Her mumbling made the husband awake and he thought she was talking in sleep. He said, ‘What happened? Why are you hollering idiotically? What have I done to you here?’
‘If not you, who else has done it then?’ The wife said angrily.
Finishing his job, Prabhu had already rolled back under his blanket. He cried out in a loud voice, ‘Who has done it? Apprehend the culprit.’
The noise had broken the sleep of many persons and they thought it was a theft case and started hollering, ‘Catch the thief. Catch the thief.’
The account of gaunt Prabhu’s intrepid adventure made Fat double up in laughter and he said jokingly, ‘So you’re going to be a father soon.’ Then he turned serious, ‘You ought not to take such risks any more. If caught, it would be grave for you.’
‘You may rest assured, nothing like that would happen. I’d come out safe for sure,’ Gaunt laughed.
But next time his presence of mind failed to rescue him and the warning of Fat came true. While attempting to kiss a school girl in the paddy field, the shriek of the girl made the peasants rush over and Gaunt was beaten severely and sent to hospital. Thereafter he eschewed his adventure in spite of his strong desires.
Fat was shy and sober in nature but whenever he came across any beautiful girl in the bus he got elated and forgot to ask for the fare and taking advantage of the weakness of him clever school girls used to travel free.
Gaunt had got a good job with a road contractor and the payment was good and regular; but the work at that place was completed in a few months and the contractor took another assignment at a place about two hundred kilometers away. He, however, had asked gaunt to accompany him to the new place but Gaunt did not like to leave his dwelling and above all, the friend. So he once again resumed his lowly paid job at the shop.
In the bus, favor of the trade union leaders was necessary to get assignments regularly and Fat was too shy to contact the leaders and therefore his duty was curtailed to four days a weak slashing down his income drastically.
Part-III
The two Prabhus started talking after dinner about their miserable lives and could not find out how to extricate themselves from this beggar like life.
‘This life of slavery and indigence is insufferable,’ Fat said glumly.
‘You’re right,’ Gaunt said. ‘We must get out of it, but how I don’t know. Business requires capital and we don’t have it and nobody would lend us.’
‘Then are we to rot away like this?’
‘I’m still hopeful some opportunity should come our way.’
And the opportunity came all of a sudden, as though dropped from heaven. There was none to look after Tarapada Saha, an unmarried and miser money lender, at his death bed. Because of their philanthropic disposition, the two Prabhus served him as though he’s their father and in the morning before death Saha told,
‘I cannot repay the indebtedness I owe you. I’m going to die soon I feel now. But I can repay you at least to some extent. All my money is hidden in an old steel trunk hidden in a hole in a water course inside the forest. I’ve no successor to
claim it.’
‘But how can we find out the cave?’ Gaunt asked.
‘Here’s the map and paper giving guideline to the cave.’
He gave them the key of the drawer attached to his cot and opening it they found the role of paper. In the evening Saha died.
A week after cremation of Saha, the two friends took their lunch early. Fat had a off day and Gaunt took leave from the shop under the ruse of going to Siliguri to meet a relative. They hired two bicycles from a cycle shop known to them and proceeded for the treasure trove. They cycled first to Gazaldoba Tista barrage and depositing their cycles in the house of a known person near the barrage, they proceeded on foot along the bank of the Tista-Mahananda canal towards their target spot indicated in the map.
Part-IV
They counted the trees as they crossed them and stopped at the twentieth