Short Story: A Fakir’s Word by Debashish Banerjee

Debashish Banerjee shares a beautiful slice of life moment, intrepid with emotions, feelings, memories and loads of nostalgia for one to take away from it.

‘Behind every moustache there’s a secret’ the drunkard used to say. His name was Keshto. But the village urchins nick-named him Keshto, the-bottle-holder. Though every one of us happened to have held a bottle very often, Keshto was called so for his sheer habit of drinking. Every soul in our society knew that he lived in a hovel at the end of the Steel Market street and was heard chanting the same line more than twenty times a day totally geared up intoxicated. 

No one bothered. But I. His refrain made me restless. I smelt a rat. ‘Why should there be a secret behind every moustache?’ cudgelled my brain. 

The next day when I was on my way to college Keshto was found scratching on the bark of a mango tree. His half-filled wine bottle was at his feet uncapped. He was working on a capital A with a rusted bottle-opener. Enquired he retaliated that he would tell me everything on my returning from college.

Five hours rolled away. Asked about that A, he had been curving across the bark, Keshto furnished that A stood for Ameena. He had a story about Ameena and it was thus: