WILDFIRE IN GOSSIPING

Once upon a time, there was a boy named Girish who was a sweeper for one of the richest people of the town. He was an overworked worker and was tired of his work. One day, his friend Ganesh, the son of the cobbler, walked past him. He noticed his friend who was angrily brushing the garden of the huge house. 

  “What happened, Girish?” he asked looking at dust which was raising and falling down in the same place. “Why are you raising that dust?”

  Girish lifted his head, revealing an angry ‘V’ formed on his face. “You know,” he said. “I’m not getting my monthly pay properly, and they aren’t decreasing the work either. Who on earth would have thought a rich house like this would hold up a poor boy’s salary.” Girish sighed and started his angry sweeping again.

  “Maybe I can help,” Ganesh offered. “You know, I have to deliver shoes even out of this house daily. Maybe somebody needs a new sweeper.”

  Girish looked up with a glimpse of hope, but it was quickly replaced with his angriness. “Okay,” he said. “If you can help, then please do. Madam is coming.”

  Girish got back to work and so did Ganesh, saying hello to their madam who’d just come. Girish didn’t bother to say hello, though. He hid his furious face with a short smile.

  The next day too, Girish had a lot of work to do. His salary, which he was supposed to get three weeks back, didn’t come yet. He was so furious that he thought he should do something that everyone in the house should suffer. He thought and thought the whole day and came up with an unpleasant plan. A plan that would destroy all occupants of the huge mansion!

  There was another house just beside this house which was as beautiful and fabulous as this one was. Both the owners disliked each other. Their faces were as if they wanted to murder each other when they just saw one another’s faces.

  Girish went to the other house and met with the owner named Seth Jaiwal in the garden. Then, he began his fiction storytelling.  Girish told the owner of the other house that the owner of the house he worked for is a thief!

  The next day a theft happened in that house. By the time, the rumors about the owner of the house had spread like wildfire. With such a big theft, that too in one of the biggest houses of the small town, everyone was sure it was done by the owner of the house beside. Seth Jaiwal went to Girish to confirm it.

  Girish saw his opportunity and blamed the owner for it. “I’m sure he’s the one who did it,” he said.

  Seth Jaiwal went back to his home, furious. Later that day, he announced, “We’ve been trying to find out who did the theft. After a thorough investigation, we have a clear suspect in mind. And I’m afraid it’s the owner of the house alongside ours!”    

  The next day was chaos. From Girish’s telling the owner is a thief, the fake information changed to the owner as a criminal. Some people speculated that the owner even had a criminal background and was hiding it from everyone over the years. Others said he was even a terrorist!

  After all this, people started protesting before the house. Some people started claiming that the owner had even stolen things from them and demanded them back. Girish joined the protest too, hoping to get back all his salary. He was gritty to take even more money for making due.

  After hours of protesting, the police arrived. With all these rumors, they came in to arrest the owner. The door was broken and police handcuffed the owner of the house, pulling him to the police station.

  The poor man complained. He demanded evidence to prove he was the thief in that theft. The policemen just gestured their hand across the whole town for this plea.

  The case was taken to court for the owner to be proved guilty, although he wasn’t. In the end, the judge of the court asked, “Tell me, did you steal the things?”

  “I didn’t steal anything,” the owner repeated, possibly for the hundredth time.

  The judge sighed. “Take him into police custody,” he said to the police. “We’ll continue the oral argument tomorrow.” With that, he stood up and walked off.

  The whole day, the poor owner thought about what he should tell. There seemed to be no point in convincing he has done no mistake. There was a whole town against him. He decided to confess that he’d stolen the things!

“Did you steal?” the judge asked again the next day.

  “Yes, I stole,” the owner confessed as he’d thought.

  The people in the court booed. They seemed ready to throw their footwear at him.

  “Okay,” the judge said, shoving the gavel on the wooden bar. “Why did you steal?”

  The owner sighed but kept his brave face. “I just went into the house one evening-”

  “Why?” the judge asked.

  “I wanted him”—he pointed to Seth Jaiwal standing in the hall—“to sign a contract with me.”

  The judge looked suspiciously at Seth but bought his focus back to the owner. “Okay, continue.”

  “When I walked into the hall, I saw an open locker,” the owner continued. “I was going to close it when I saw Seth’s wife. She came to me and said, ‘Take how much money you want and share it with all the citizens of the whole town. My husband got this whole money just by stealing and scamming from others’.” The owner bought out a few thousand rupees from his pocket and showed it to the judge. “I gave away all the money and am only left with this.”

  The judge thought about this for a moment and gave orders to bring Seth Jaiwal to the witness box. Then he asked, “Did you really scam money from the people?”

  The Seth felt demeaned. He was standing in between hundreds of people and getting humiliated. “Sorry, your honor,” he said. “I never lost money. My seek was just to set up this man guilty. I get my mistake and promise to never do this again.”

  Thus, the day ended with Seth Jaiwal getting put behind the bars for thirty days. As far as the owner is concerned, he was proved innocent. Later that day, he went to all his workers and gave them their salaries. When he reached Girish, he said, “My boy, here’s your pay. Sorry I delayed it.”

  Girish felt embarrassed and realized his mistake. His anger made a disaster in the whole town, but he was happy to have revealed the real thief to the township.

Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of my imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or persons is entirely coincidental. || Contents of this story should not be reproduced in any manner without permission.