The Accident

 

  I was in jitters as the balance-sheet did not tally. Just then the telephone rang and its jangling made me even more jittery. “Raju speaking,”I took up the receiver impatiently.

  “Raju,” I’m Lakshmi speaking...M...Mukund is killed. Bus accident. Come to the mortuary. General Hospital…”Lakshmi spoke in sobs.

  “What! Mukund killed!” I was shocked. The earth under my feet trembled. “My bosom friend Mukund is no more!” the receiver slipped down from my hand. I sank in the chair and my mind was in a maze.

  Ten minutes passed. My mind cleared of the maze, caused by the shocking news of Mukund’s death gradually. “What should I do now,”I thought, “What a fool I am to sit here and think like this? I should go to the hospital and stand by poor Lakshmi. I should console her.” I took my officer’s permission and left for the hospital.

  I took a taxi. As it raced towards the hospital, I pictured in my mind poor, bereaved Lakshmi, sitting on a bench in the verandah of the mortuary and weeping bitterly. It was my responsibility as her family friend, guide and philosopher to offer her consolation and prevent her from going to pieces. Myself and Mukund were best friends since our school days. His death was a loss not only to Lakshmi but to me also. It was a void which could not be filled by anybody else. 

  The taxi pulled up at the General Hospital. I got down and without waiting for the change from the taxi driver, I strode towards the mortuary. 

  I entered the corridor in front of the mortuary and stood transfixed for a while. Lakshmi sat on a bench crying her head buried in her knees. Only the previous day I had seen her in high spirits celebrating her twenty-fifth birthday. But now - what a change fate had wrought upon her. She heard the sound of my footsteps. She looked up and saw me. She got up and staggered towards me. “Raju” she burst,”my Mu...kund...Mukund...is no more. Tell me, can’t I go with him?”

  She clung to me like an abandoned little child and wept.

  I wiped the tears streaming down her face. I was affected more by Mukund’s death. But I must seem composed before poor Lakshmi. “No Lakshmi, don’t say like that” I said, fighting back my tears. “You must live for the sake of Mukund’s dear memory.”

  “Excuse me Madame,”the police inspector who came out of the mortuary room said.”You can identify the body. Sir, you better accompany the lady in.”

  I took Lakshmi by her arm and said “Come,”

  Lakshmi walked into the mortuary as if in a dazed condition. She was not crying now. She was looking at the dead bodies, some on the stretchers mutilated or wounded, some others in the stretch of drawers, some drawers half pulled out. The mortuary room was filled with the cries and wails of the kith and kin who were trying to identify the bodies. The inspector led us to a chest of drawers and pulled out one, “Madame:”the police inspector said slowly, ``Could this be your husband’s body? Please try to identify.”

  At the mention of Mukund, Lakshmi became her pitiable self again. “Oh, no! I can’t bear to see my Mukund mu...mutilated.”she covered her face in her hands and wailed.

  “Aye Lakshmi! Hai Raju! you too. “I am alive. I’m not dead.” Mukund appeared there from nowhere.

  “Mukund...Mukund...Is it you?” Lakshmi laughed through her tears and clung to her husband. Mukund gathered her into his arms as if she were a fragile thing. Both of them became oblivious of the world for some time.

  The police inspector looked at me puzzled. “Mistaken identity, I suppose.” I said to the law officer. 

  I looked at Mukund and Lakshmi, still entwined in each other’s arms, with a sigh of happiness.

  The law officer pulled out a notebook from his trouser pocket. “Yes,” he said.

  Mukund gave his statement: As I was going to my office this morning by bus, my pocket was picked. The culprit jumped down from the bus when I tried to catch him. He came under the rear wheels of the bus and was crushed to death. As my wallet contained only a five rupee note and my photo identity card, I did not report the theft to the police.”

  Mukund paused for a moment and continued with a suppressed smile,”My landlord telephoned to my office that the police informed my wife that I was killed in a road accident. The rest you know, inspector.”

  “I am glad at the happy twist of the story.”the law officer said to me,”as you’ve rightly supposed it was a case of mistaken identity. May God give your friend a hundred years of happy married life.”

  “Well said inspector,”I joined, “elders say that if a man, earlier supposed to have been dead, is alive, he would be blessed with another hundred years of happy life.”

 While we left the mortuary, I could not help shedding a tear of pity for the unknown pick-pocket, the victim of easy money, “just a fiver.”