WRITTEN BY: RUSKIN BOND
A young boy makes friends with Anil. Anil trusts him completely and employs him. Does the boy betray his trust?
Read to find out!!!!!
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THE THIEF ' S STORY
But i can't pay you.....
You look a bit of a wrestler yourself..... I want to work for you.
AT ANIL ' S ROOM.............
If you can cook, then i can feed you....
Can you feed me?
One day Anil came with a bundle of notes and told Hari that he had sold a book to the Publisher. At night he kept the money safely under the mattress of his bed.
I had been working for Anil for a month and, apart from cheating in shopping, i have not done anything in my line of work.
The story is about a 15 year old thief who changes his name every month to stay ahead of the police. This time he kept his name as Hari Singh. The thief meets Anil, a 25 year old struggling author, while watching wrestling match, asks him if he can work for him as he feels that he had not robbed for the past few days and thought it would be easy to rob a simple person like Anil.
The trust prevented him from robbing Anil as Hari thought that robbing a careless person like Anil didn't make much differences because he might not even notice that he had been robbed and that took out all fun from work.
Anil took Hari to his room over the Jumna Sweet Shop and gave a space in the balcony to sleep. That night Hari cooked a meal which was really bad because Anil gave it to a stray dog and told him to go off. Hari smiled in his most attractive way and Anil agreed to teach him how to cook, write full sentences and add numbers.
I know that Anil will show only a touch of sadness. Not for the loss of money, but for the loss of trust.
Hari realized that he had been working for more than a month and he had not stolen anything apart from the 1 rupee that he kept everyday from the grocery money. He was surprised with the amount of trust Anil had on him as he had never seen such a trusting person in his life.
He steals the money and decides to leave the city by Lucknow Express that departed at 10:30. When he reached the station, the train had slowly started moving from the platform. But he hesitated to go that he himself didn't know what was the reason.
In my short career as a thief, i had made a study of men's faces when they has lost their goods. The greedy man showed fear, the rich man showed anger, the poor showed acceptance.
After the train had left, Hari was all alone in the train station. He was left with no place to sleep at night. The only person he knew was Anil and he had looted him as well. He sat on a bench in a park as it started to rain. Then he realized that the notes had got wet. He realized that learning how to read and write would help him to get a much more respectable and honest job which would pay him much more than these few hundred rupees.
He headed back to the room and placed the money back. Next morning he woke up a bit late and Anil had already made his tea. Anil gave a RS. 50 note and promised him that he would be paid regularly. Hari took the notes in his hands and realized that the notes were wet. Hari realized that Anil had come to know about his misdeeds but there was no sadness, anger or guilt in his mind.