Deafening sound of a gun-shot fired closeby !! I was on the roof in the morning sun, reading a magazine for small kids like me. Our bungalow was close to the market.
My mother asked me to get inside atonce. A second gunshot boomed as I raced down the stairs.
In a while katwaru, our cook, came rushing from the market with wide eyes and a bag loaded with vegetables.
" The pagal rajah has shot dead the young constable. Police has now surrounded the hotel" he said.
Pagal (mad) Rajah !! Oh my God !! I had had my close encounter with this Pagal Rajah only the previous evening when I was in the market with my little sister for black-and-white peppermint drops.
As we were paying money to our friendly old shopkeeper, this guy strode in. He was a tall, hefty character with a weatherbeaten face and a cocky gait. He looked like Hollywood's gun totting John Wayne.
He immetiately got interested in us.
"well young man," he addressed me in a barritone voice, " can you tell me who wrote these lines : 'for men may come and men may go but I shall go on for ever".
Good heavens ! Only the other day our teacher was reading this poem of Tennyson to us ! I told him the name of the poet and also the title of the poem - 'The Brook'.
He looked stunned "Absolutely correct. I can't believe this !" he exclaimed "well well , young man, you certainly deserve a prize for this".
And he ordered the shop keeper to weigh a pound of peppermint drops for me.
It was while I was showing reluctance to accept a gift from a total stranger that I saw stark fear in the eyes of the shopkeeper. "Don't refuse this.Take it and leave the shop atonce " he whìspered handing over the packet.
Rushing back home I saw my father in the verandah, relaxing in an armchair, sourrounded by the aromatic smoke of a hand-rolled cigarette. I narrated the incident.
"My God ! He is that 'pagal'(mad) rajah" said my father, "give this packet to some poor boy. And avoid going to that shop for a few days".
And now that Rajah had shot down and killed a cop !
A barrage of shots now suddenly erupted while katwaru was emptying his vegetable bag. It continued for a while and then it was suddenly all quiet. And soon traffic resumed on the road beyond our spacious front lawns. Katwaru now went out again and came back shortly with the story.
It came to pass that the rajah came back from his estate near the Nepal
border the previous evening and had taken lodge in his usual hotel
overlooking the road crossing. He was accustomed to the traffic
constable saluting him in the morning when he sat in the balcony. This morning he saw a new cop right under him at the crossing. The cop looked young confident and tough. And the cop did not know the erratic and eccentric Rajah.
This cop did not salute the Rajah. The Rajah felt insulted and after a while ordered the cop to salute him. The cop looked up and then ignored him. This was unacceptable to the rajah.The rajah then went inside and came back with a double barrel gun. He raised it and fired a shot close to the cop's boots. And as the cop looked up, surprised, the Rajah commanded " Now salute !".
The cop shouted back that he would get the madcap handcuffed. The next moment a gun shot boomed and the cop was dead. The Rajah had shot the cop in the head.
When the police force arrived to arrest him, the Rajah started firing
indiscrimately at them and seriously injured a cop. He was then shot dead. . . !!
I revisited the city of my
childhood recently after donkeys years . Our sprawling bunglow has now been replaced by a huge shopping complex. The area around the main crossing has also been cleared, including the old hotel, to make room for wide roads. But to my delight our childhood old peppermint shop was still there !
When I entered the shop, the old shopkeeper's son (now himself an old man) was handing over a few
cadbury's chocolates to two tiny tots, a little boy and his sister !! It was just like my ciildhood days!
I smiled back as the boy and the girl looked at me with a fleeting smile.
I did not ask them any
question on Tennyson !!
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