There were five of them on the khatiya (cot), he spoke and the rest of them listened with rapt
attention. It was a cold night in a remote village in India and the blanket was
warm and just spacious enough for the tall man and his little grandchildren.
“So, I was walking and walking and was very tired but still
hopeful, seeing the distant lights in the village. And as I was passing the
culvert over the stream, I saw it, there it was again!”, he sounded curiously
spooky.
“So, it was following you all that while, was it?”, curiosity
followed one of the children.
“Oh indeed, it was!”, he exclaimed. “Well, that’s what they
usually do you know. And if the traveller tries to keep an eye on it, all in
vain, slowly he loses focus on where he was going and gets lost. Forever.” he
added in a very matter of fact way, leaving the children almost shuddering as
they clung closer.
“Did it say anything this time?”, one of them mustered up
the courage to ask.
“Ah well, this time it didn’t. But it simply knew that I
knew that it was the same one!”, the mystery in his voice kept them longing, so
he went on, “So, like any other discerning traveller, I simply focused on the
road ahead of me and after a while, it was gone! It just vanished in thin
air.”
There was a slight commotion in the limited space inside the
blanket as the children couldn’t resist the tingle in the spine after the scary
reveal.
As if almost to double the intensity of the fear they felt,
he said, “Well, you may see it too! If you stand near the culvert when the dusk
falls into the night and walk slow enough to let everyone pass by, when you
are finally alone on the road, you will see it. The talking goat!!”
And dusk really fell into the night, not to bring the lonely
talking goat with melancholy yellow eyes, out on the road though. The night
just fell into the lap of more stories, ‘The Talking ghost..err..goat revisited’,
‘The foxes in the jungle‘, ‘The bear around the Mahua tree’, ‘the firefly
ghosts’ and many more, walking as far as the rambling road twined into the
horizon.
********************************************************************
“Is it true that the fireflies that visit the mango trees in the night are actually spirits?”, she asked with one of her brows raised
expectantly.
“Why do you ask?”
“Well, dadu (grandpa)
told us about it and I just wanted to check if he was fooling us.” she said
with a causal shrug.
“Hmm, I see. That’s probably true but you would want to
check it for yourself though, won’t you? By the way, did he tell you guys about
the white horse?”
“No, what’s that? What white horse?” she exclaimed.
“Will tell you another day, have to go now.”
As she waived at her father, the yarn of the tale
fell out on the road too, spinning as far as the rambling road twined into the
horizon. And as the dusk once again fell into the night, once again the fireflies swarmed around the mango trees, the
foxes cried from the Bamboo jungle, a bear slowly rolled towards the sweet
smelling Mahua tree and a white horse appeared on the moonlit village road. Galloping
past the houses, galloping far into the night, it went as far as the stories could
take you!
********************************************************************
“So, did you find
your white horse?”, the chuckling voice jolted her pace of thought.
“Well, A for one, it’s not MY horse and B, thanks for the
condescending tone”, she replied with a dash of irritation in her voice.
“Ha-ha and C, its the mistress of the horse that bites! C’mon now, tell me about
it.”
“Well, if you want to know, there isn’t one but many white
horse stories. Or they might all be the same, I don’t know, the details are
different though”, she mumbled.
“If her majesty would care to explain?”
“Well, a gazillion of them apparently have galloped the
whole of European soil or as it says in the local tales”, she retorted. “There’s
one that Kalki, the 10th incarnation of Vishnu would ride and
there’s one that the Mahdi, the redeemer of Islam would ride and again it
appears as the ride of the Christ too. The proceeds of the stories are similar
and the context is same for all these three stories.
“Enlighten me please.”
“Most of the mentions are in the local myths in various
parts of Europe and Asia and are narrated as stories of the past. But there are
some mentions of future appearances as well, like in, Kalki, Mahdi and Christ’s
stories. The plotlines are quite like Marvel comic stuff you know, saving the
world and saving the good and getting rid of the bad etcetera. Typical end of
the age stories”, she said nonchalantly.
“Don’t pretend to sound so bored, you love this stuff,
right? Moreover, it’s quite nice, this comparison. What do YOU think of the
stories though?”
“What? As in, what do I think about my dad’s white horse
story, whether it qualifies here or not?” she burst into a laughter.
And as the conversation went back and forth, the steps of
the story spiralled up to the sky where the dusk fell into the night. It left a
trail in your soul, as haunting and as cherished, as remarkable and as ordinary it was. That
story!
Did you find yours? What’s your story??
