

The white wash was the answer as at no other times, the cartons left in the attic get disturbed. This time round operation whitewash got completed smoothly and I was not at home. The casually placed previous year diary must have attempted a free fall, spilling the currency note which he had left in between the pages. One currency note indicating a likely windfall - he had a fancy for almost fresh currency of 100,500 or 1000 denomination, some smart person had taken the pains of riffling through the pages of all the other diaries. The discoverer quietly pocketed the cash and shared the secrets. That is how the leak must have occurred.

Discrete inquiries, among the family members, with a sheepish grin revealed that friends and relatives did not visit on the days of whitewashing and rearranging activities. Maid servant being a sari-clad terror, he decided to deal with her in a different fashion – by the process of eliminating other suspects. Since, every third or fourth year, the same team conducted the whitewashing ritual it seemed easy to float innocent inquiries to gather information that would ultimately lead to the ‘Who’.
This took a bit of roaming as the team keeps on moving from one job to another and patience to talk to them alone so that somebody in the crew does not get alerted or spill the beans to one of the family members in a chance meeting. The final conclusion he came to was that the carton boxes were already on the floor when the team came for work. One of the key, from the dangling bunch, had to be with one of the family members or the servant maid as far as the discovery of the secret diaries was concerned.

Bystander came to know that his son and daughter had reached hours before start of whitewashing, due to hitches in their travel plans. The three of them air and snarl disagreements, sulk in silence on trivial issues. A few hours later, each one of them want to give in if only the other two blink first. Intervening meal time helps matters a little; pushing a dish forward or filling a glass with water or by un-wrapping the sweet packet. When the ice breaks, the dinner table becomes the Tower of Babel, with discussions on any subject under the sun, without any inhibition. There was a predictable periodicity which eluded their reasoning. In the end, Why all this gets answered with a why not this?


The son and daughter, coming closer, said in a sympathetic gesture, “we know the troubles you had taken and understand your feelings, now”. The inflection on the “now’ conveyed a lot of meanings. They exited the scene saying, “if it gives you pleasure, then continue to write”. The diplomatic words did not say whether it is the diary or the fiction that I can continue to write!
Bystander made up his mind to open the packet, wondering what sort of a prank they have pulled on him. A handmade card that said simply “We are sorry”, two volumes of their caricatures capturing him in different moods and a bundle of currency notes totaling Rs. 19,200 brought tears to his eyes. He sat thinking about the great experience the diaries have given him.
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