“Where are you, Ravi? I need you to clean this room,” Ravi’s grandmother yelled from the first floor.
Ravi was on the ground floor of their tea estate bungalow staring at his late Grandpa.
“It’s been six months already since you left us,” Ravi said. He wiped his wistful eyes staring at his grandfather’s photograph on the wall. “What will I do without you?” The college going boy, out of his teens, shed a silent tear in the memory of his late grandfather.
“I miss you Grandpa,” he reminisced. “My father, grandfather, friend, philosopher, guide, my everything. You were even my mother, especially with a stupid woman like Grandma around. I don’t know how I will manage everything without you,” he spoke to the photo again.
“Where are you Ravi? Can’t you come here?” Ravi heard his Grandma howl again.
He smiled and added, “Your wife is shouting for me as usual. Let me go there. Don’t worry, I will take care of Grandma.” And then he winked, “Even if she doesn’t care for me.”
He did not like his grandmother much. He knew there was a stark difference between his Grandpa and Grandma. He suspected, nay was certain, that even she wasn’t too fond of him despite his being her son’s only son.
She was a garrulous, stupid woman with not much understanding of the world around her. Brought up in a small village, his grandmother had devoted her life to running the household. Cooking, washing, cleaning, petty gossip, quarrelling and nagging. These were what her life revolved around.
Ravi was her easy and only target.
“Ravi, clear your study table.”
“Ravi, wash the utensils.”
“Ravi, fold these clothes.”
“Ravi, don’t talk with that girl.”
These were her pet peeves. Ravi spent his childhood and adolescence listening to them. Beyond her stupidity, Ravi knew she had some deeper misgivings about him.
“This boy doesn’t listen to me. He is not my blood,” Ravi had heard her say once. “He was a curse on my son. He took my son away,” she said. “He came in this world, and our son went away in the accident. He didn’t even spare his own mother. He is not a good omen.” She spewed venom on Ravi in her thoughts, speech, and deeds.
“Don’t blabber nonsense. He is God’s gift to us. God left him to us when he took our son and daughter-in-law,” Grandpa reprimanded her. She kept quiet after that, but Ravi suspected she never got rid of her prejudices.
These memories troubled him now that his Grandpa was no more. “Don’t know how I will manage with Grandma. In six months, she hasn’t spoken to my heart,” he said, staring again at his Grandpa in the photograph.
“Ravi come here. Have you gone deaf? Or have you turned dumb? I called you ten times,” she exaggerated like usual. Her tone had turned quarrelsome. “I told you I need your help in clearing up some of your Grandpa’s things. Will you trouble your old Grandma like this? I have one leg in the grave. With all this housework, it’s not far when my second leg will join it. Will you come here and help this old, helpless woman…..or are you waiting for me to join your Gran…….?”
“Yes, I am coming, Wait, don’t blabber,” Ravi shouted back. Then he muttered under his breath, “Her daily dose of drama.”
He walked up the stairs in slow motion. He went to the first floor of their house where his Grandpa’s reading room used to be. His Grandpa used to spend hours together in that room.
“You must spend some time with me in the reading room. It has a wealth of knowledge in it. It will help you someday,” Ravi recollected his grandfather telling him.
He saw his Grandma sitting there on the floor.
Large specks of dust welcomed him. He had rarely been to that room. His grandparents lived in another room in the house. That’s where he spent most of his time when Grandpa was home. This reading room had started becoming packed in the last few years. His grandfather spent most of his life working at the tea estate. A rich family owned it, and he helped them maintain their properties. The scion of the family was his good friend. He was also a book lover, like his Grandpa, though he was much richer. Hence he had a bigger collection. Once they grew older, they retired from the estate and spent most of their time in the scion’s library. His Grandpa got books from there, filling this reading room up.
“Look at the dust around here. I told your Grandpa so many times to get this room cleaned, but he never did anything about it. In this house, who listens to me anyway?” his Grandma complained. “Clean this up today.”
As Ravi looked at the pile out there, it was clear to him that this was going to take a large part of the day. Piled near one wall were a lot of old newspapers. The entire pile of newspapers were around 10 feet tall and 3 feet wide.
A little distance away from that was a big wooden shelf around 18 feet wide and 10 feet tall, with 4 sections for books. It contained books of all types laid across in sets of 15 odd rows of around 20 books each. His Grandpa had a surprisingly good collection of books, Ravi thought. But who is going to read them now? he felt.
Next to those books were a small set of files. These are tea estate papers, Ravi thought. Next he saw a set of loose papers and thick books. They looked like encyclopaedias or dictionaries of some kind. They seemed particularly old and tattered. Some of them were also lying on the writing table. Ravi saw some papers with something scribbled on them. It looked like his Grandpa was working on them till he breathed his last.
“We need to clear this all up. Go and call the waste newspaper boy,” ordered his Grandma. “Do it now,” she insisted.
“Yes, I will call him,” said Ravi. He stepped out to check the newspaper boy’s number from their phone book outside.
“Is that Babu?” he asked, as he dialled the newspaper boy’s number.
“Yes,” he heard from the other side.
“This is Ravi. Please come to our house to collect waste newspapers and old books. There is a lot of it here that we want to dispose of,” he informed Babu.
“Yes, I will be there in an hour,” Babu confirmed.
Ravi walked back to his Grandpa’s reading room. He noticed that his Grandma had already started sweeping the floor.
“This will need some scrubbing. I will go get our maid, and some acid and water to clean this up,” she remarked with expertise, and walked out to get it.
Ravi walked across to the newspaper pile. He saw that there were labels on the pile at various sections. On one pile, the label said, “Emergency period”. Next to it, another label said “August 1947”. Next to it, another label said “Pre-independence”. Ravi went through them in a bit more detail.
There were some newspapers bearing historic dates hidden in those piles. One of the piles had a set of around 25 newspapers all dated “15th August 1947”.
Another pile had a set of around 50 newspapers in many languages dated “31st January 1948”.
Ravi realized that the first date was the day of India’s independence. The second date was the date after Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination.
It struck him that these were not normal newspapers. These were collections of the scion of the tea estate. They definitely had some historical value. He was not sure how much value they had. But it looked like the scion had gifted them to his Grandpa from his own collection. His Grandpa had preserved them with care. He had stored them along with normal newspapers. Was his purpose to hide them from Grandma? He had also labelled them so that Ravi finds them.
A faint smile flashed itself on Ravi’s face. He started getting a bit excited about what he had chanced upon. He wondered what else lay in store.
As he walked a bit further, he now started looking for some other things in the room. Who knows what else his Grandpa had stored here for him?
So he started scampering through the books that were in the shelf there. He reached the section which had the files. As he opened a few files, he found that the files were not about the tea estate. The files had a listing of the various books in the tea estate scion’s collection. Next to every listing were specification details of each item. It looked like a librarian’s listing. Some books also had an approximate price. Most of the books were regular, old books with not much value.
As he went through the file, he noticed two books in the list written in bold letters. They also had a star marked against them. He tried to figure out what the star stood for. The footnote below the list said star mark meant ‘Antique gifts received’.
He read the names of the two antique gifts and could not believe his eyes.
The first antique book on the list had an interesting title. It said, “Handwritten Manuscript of an unpublished book by Shakespeare.” Next to the title were more details. The scion of the tea estate had bought this book from London in an auction for 48,000 pounds in 1969. Current value mentioned was unknown.
The second antique book on the list had an even more interesting title. It said, “First Authentic Indian Version of the Atlas of the World.” It further mentioned: “Made by the ancient mathematician and astronomer Aryabhata.” Next to the titles were further details. The scion of the tea estate had bought it in an auction for 87,500 pounds in 1970, and only two such copies existed. Current value mentioned was unknown.
Ravi’s heart palpitated faster and missed a beat. His eyes wandered all around the files. They searched to check if the files mentioned the location of these books. Where were these titles? Were they here? Or were they in the scion’s library?
He hoped that his Grandpa had created some labels like the ones for the special newspapers. His mind worked at a rapid pace to find where these antique gifts were. He could not find any location mentioned in the files. His eyes wandered around the bookshelf. They didn’t find anything. They then wandered around the room searching for these treasures.
He did not know what exactly he should look for. How did these antique books look like? Not like the others, Ravi felt. But he thought he would recognize them when he saw them. His eyes searched all around, scanning the room for clues.
They stopped near the writing-table on the study. There he saw a thick book which he had earlier thought to be either a dictionary or encyclopaedia. He went closer and saw it.
He experienced a moment of extreme joy that he had never felt before. His feet jumped a few inches off the ground. He saw that there was a label on top of the thick book which said, “Aryabhata’s Atlas”. Under the thick book were a huge set of old, tattered pages put together. They had a label that read “Shakespeare’s Manuscript”.
He had found them. He pumped his fist in the air in delight. He laughed aloud for the first time in the six months since his Grandpa passed away. His Grandpa had left a treasure for his pet grandson. His joy knew no bounds. He felt like jumping around the room. He felt like crying out loud.
He raised both his hands above and felt victorious. He did not know what else to do. His mind started firming up his calculations and started feeling rich. Overwhelmed with emotion, he felt like hugging his late Grandpa.
He thought he should call his Grandma and tell her about his discovery. He wanted to tell her to stop the disposal right now. These treasures were worth almost one hundred and fifty thousand pounds in 1970. How much is one hundred and fifty thousand pounds, by the way? He ran a quick calculation. The realisation raised his eyebrows even more. And that was in 1970. How much would they be worth now? He jumped what seemed like a few feet off the ground. He almost called out for Grandma in excitement. He felt like telling her how rich they had become.
But then he had second thoughts. He was not sure what his Grandma would think about it. He always had mixed feelings about her. He remembered that even she had mixed feelings about him. She never accepted him as her own. She always held him responsible for snatching her son away. She has not forgiven him in her heart.
Should he tell her? And if he does, will she, as Grandpa’s wife, become the rightful owner of these treasures? And if she gets this, would she give him anything? The stupid woman doesn’t understand anything. But her mind isn’t straight. Would she leave him with nothing? Such thoughts enveloped his mind.
But his conscience reminded him. He did have a duty to his Grandma. Grandpa won’t be happy with him if he didn’t take care of her. After all, everything said and done, for good or bad, she did have a role in raising him. What should he do? He thought hard.
And that’s when he decided. I will take care of my Grandma but tell her about this after I get the money. No point in telling her right away and getting into trouble. No point in making a fuss about it. She does not understand the practical matters of the world. She would not understand. She won’t be able to handle it.
Plus what if her true colours come out? She may try to lord over these treasures. She would grab everything for herself. He was sure she never had great feelings for him. He was certain she still blames him for her son’s death.
Let me handle this, he thought. I am not being a cheat here, he rationalized. I am only making sure I get the money that my Grandpa wanted to give me. He now realized what his Grandpa meant when he said there is a wealth of knowledge here.
So that is it, he decided. He felt proud of himself. He felt he was the one who deserved it. Ravi was ecstatic.
His Grandma returned to the room with her tools and material for cleaning up the room.
“What have you been doing? Everything is like it was. I thought you must have started packing them,” she said.
He glared at her. “Why are you staring at me? Let’s finish this cleaning up,” she ordered.
“Yes. I was trying to sort them out and check if we should keep some of these books and papers with us. I will read some of them,” Ravi said.
“No, don’t start a new story. I don’t want to keep anything. You are not interested in reading them. For so many years, you never went to your Grandpa’s reading room. There is no chance you will read anything now. Let’s dispose of everything.”
“No Grandma, I will read,” he said.
“You haven’t stepped into the room for years. What will you read now?” Grandma argued.
“I am going to read some of these. Especially the ones out here. They are interesting,” Ravi said and pointed to the large stacks of the treasures.
“Nothing doing. Only because you saw them here, now you are making useless plans,” Grandma taunted Ravi.
“No Grandma. I have decided that I am going to read those,” Ravi insisted.
“Nothing doing I said. No more arguments. We have to get rid of everything. That is final. Now help me in packing these,” she said and moved forward.
Ravi knew this was going to happen. She never listens. He had seen it for years. So Ravi decided that now was the time for going into stealth mode. He gave Grandma a helping hand to get the room cleaned up and started the packing.
But deep inside, he thought of his next move. It was clear Grandma isn’t going to let me keep any of these. No point in arguing with her, he thought. It is better I find another way out.
But how do I hold on to my treasures?
Should I hide them somewhere? They are too big for that. And Grandma is here keeping a watch.
Should I put them away somewhere? But where? And how? And what if someone saw them and found them out before me?
Plus let me not sound too eager. If I insist too much on keeping something back, she may get suspicious, he thought. And then, I may have to tell her everything, he worried. And then she may take it all for herself, he panicked. This is not good.
Ravi’s thoughts spiralled out of control.
The doorbell rang. Ravi went to open the door. It was Babu, the newspaper boy. He had come with his weighing tools and packing bags. Ravi directed him to the room. On seeing the amount of newspapers and books, Babu said he had only brought his cycle. He will need to bring a 4-wheeler tempo to take all the stuff.
“Yes that’s right” Ravi said.
That’s when Ravi thought Babu is my saviour. This was his opportunity. He must seize it. He must make a deal with him, so that he gets his treasures back. And he must go with Babu to get the tempo and do it then.
“I will go with Babu to get the tempo,” Ravi said.
“Ok, but do the packing first, and then go get the tempo,” his Grandma ordered. “And I want everything out of here.”
So they went about packing all the stuff.
While packing, Ravi was already thinking of the deprived childhood he had. His mind went, with disgust, to the rich scion’s grandchildren going to their high-end schools. He recollected them going around the world for their vacations. He saw the cars they roamed around in, the doors of which his Grandpa used to open for them. He decided that he is soon going to get one of those cars. A Hundred and fifty thousand pounds in 1970 value is a lot of money, he told himself.
And while doing the packing, Ravi smiled at the thought. My life is changing. The future beckons. After all, Grandpa took care of me even while going away. If only he had a wife who was even half as nice as him, he thought.
They packed the newspapers. It took a while to pack them. Ravi ensured that the labels were also packed well, so that he can spot those papers later to get them back. They do seem like collector’s items with value, Ravi felt. They could pay for his post graduate education abroad if not anything else, he thought.
Then they started packing the books. This was a tough ask. Packing the big books together was not easy.
As they completed the packing, Ravi realized that it is best to strike a deal now with Babu. Else he would leave it for too late.
“Grandma now let me go with Babu to get the tempo. Let us save time. We should be back in an hour. We will finish the rest when we are back.”
“Yes Ravi, you are right. Why waste time? Already this has taken the entire afternoon.”
Ravi was happy with his timing. He knew his Grandma and her penchant for getting things done in a hurry. He stepped out with Babu.
“So what’s the rate you are giving for buying this stuff up?” Ravi asked Babu when they were out of the house on their way to get the tempo.
“Same rate as usual. 8 rupees per kg for newspapers and 5 rupees per kg for books,” Babu replied.
“Ok – here is the deal Babu. Instead of you paying us like every time, this time I will pay you,” Ravi started. Babu’s face lit up. On seeing that, Ravi continued. “I will pay you 50 rupees per kg for newspapers and 30 rupees per kg for books,” Ravi put forward his deal.
Babu’s eyebrows went to the back of his forehead. He couldn’t believe his stroke of good fortune. But he could not understand why he was getting paid. Not the one to question it though, he said “Ok. What do I have to do in return?”
Ravi smiled. “Yes, you have to do me a favour. I need some newspapers and two of these books back from you.”
“Some newspapers and two books back? You can keep them with you right away, Sir,” Babu said.
“No but Grandma won’t let me keep them,” Ravi explained.
“Oh ok. Are they special newspapers and books?” Baba enquired.
“Hmm. Yes, you can say so,” Ravi said with a frown. Then he added, lest Babu suspects something, “They are close to my heart. My Grandpa’s memories. Sentimental value. He used to tell me stories from them when I was a kid. But my Grandma won’t listen. She is a quarrelsome woman, you know.”
“Oh Ok Sir. I will give them as soon as I step out,” Babu promised.
“Great,” Ravi said and added, “And one more thing, this deal stays between you and me only. Nothing goes out to my Grandma.”
“Yes sir, no problem” Babu confirmed to Ravi.
Ravi was in seventh heaven now. Nothing could come between him and his treasures. His spirits were high. His future was bright. He hired the most expensive 4-wheeler tempo available.
“And I am paying for this too,” he told a shocked Babu. No one had hired such an expensive vehicle for carrying waste newspapers and books so far.
As they got closer to the house, Ravi called his Grandma. “We are on our way. We will be there in 5 minutes.”
“Wonderful. Everything is ready. I have packed everything now. You only need to pick it up. It’s already late. Come soon.”
“Yes, on our way, almost there,” Ravi replied.
Babu and Ravi reached the house in five minutes as promised. They went straight to the reading room to pick up the material. Ravi signalled to Babu to stay quiet, do the job and get out.
On entering the room, Ravi and Babu saw that the packing was over. They did not have to do anything. Grandma had packed everything. But Ravi could not see the Atlas and the Manuscript.
He looked around to spot them but could not find them.
So he asked his Grandma. “So you finished everything?”
“Yes,” she declared with a wide grin. “Why waste time?”
“Where are that fat encyclopaedia and the other pages that I had kept under it?” Ravi asked.
His Grandma replied with a big grin of pride that comes from a job well done on her face. “Oh, those? They were too big to fit into any of the packages. They were too big for the tempo too.”
“Ok good. So then we will not dispose them off,” Ravi said, relieved.
“No, no,” Grandma continued. “I told you we have to get rid of everything. So I cut them into many pieces and packed them all into different, smaller packages. Anyway, they were old waste books.”
She pointed to the packages kept right at the end. “I don’t know why your Grandpa got such oversized books which he never read!”
Even before she finished, Ravi collapsed to the ground and Babu ran to hold him. But Ravi had already crashed to the floor.
His Grandma said, “Oh dear Ravi. I am sorry to have made you work so hard since morning. Poor child, he did not even have a proper lunch today.”
***