Rintu’s house has become my ‘shanti niketan’ at retirement. Ipsita – her daughter and my granddaughter – is everytime the lure. The pert chic (= little kid); her quick retorts, perky (= proud) gaits; her prodigious (= extraordinary) faculty of giving me back the poem that I recite to her in no time – all these line my hours of repose with golden touch.
But this time my arrival proved out of season, like chancing (coming/arriving suddenly) upon a rollicking (extravagantly merry) house on a sad day. In brief, my dainty little playmate was in the midst of her examination! Oh, what a devil! Its shadow expels all joys from the child. Even my daughter, a bright loving Mom, puts on a fearful mien! I dare not interfere, lest my love spoils the result. The spoil-sport (= a thing that mars or destroys pleasures), believe it or not, even cows down the child’s steaming and bubbling passion for books of all sorts. Her text-books become a bugbear, (= an illusion of a fearful object) as they are tarred (= blackened) with smear-devil (= a devil that smears or washes with a black paint) of this examination.
However, I feel I can do nothing but bide the hours (= wait my turn) for the four days. At last the cloud of the devil vanishes round the corner and Didimoni (the granddaughter is fondly hailed as) appears out of the blue (= clear sky) like a cherubim (= angel- child) to illumine my days.
One morning, as I sat musing (= in a brooding mood), Rintu marked it. She asked me the cause of this pensive (= thoughtful) mood. I smiled and said, “I am brooding upon the funny turn of things. Your daughter’s exam choked my joys, no doubt. But I have her now and thank my stars that the damned rival has left the scene.
She broke in (= interrupted), “What’s the fun, Papa?” “Not in this, my love, but in what happened with me last night! The devil that left by the rear-door caught me through the front-door!”
My metaphor nonplussed (= amazed) her, “What’s up, Dad – front-door back-door. In fact, I don’t get you!” She questioned.
I said, “Last night I saw the strangest dream. And do you know this phantom whom I thought I had laid finally (lay the phantom = be free from meaningless fear of the unseen), plagued me the whole night. It heckled me in dream like a cat the rat it catches !”
Rintu began giggling to hear this and, at her request, I told her the dream:
I began to write, it was English. I wrote at full speed. Prolific (= too much) matter. It struck me, I had forgotten to enter the rolls and I turned to the front page. I couldn’t remember my roll number. I searched my pockets and the admit card was missing. I sweated, the clock ticked. I could neither advance with questions nor run home for the admit card… In a state of extreme nervous pickle (= awkward situation) I woke up to mop up the beads of perspiration. I woke up, thought it is due to overeating at night and took a glass of water. I don’t know when I slept again. But this time what I saw is the funniest dream of my life. I am the only old man in the hall filled with kids! The way in which they looked at me it seemed they took me for Santa Claus – my long flowing beard, slack garments and oversize pockets. I distributed chocolates to them and felt an oddly pleasant sensation… the scene changed. The invigilators appeared – stern looking, holding answer-books close to their bosom. And questions? Questions rolled in hand as if they were secret formulas!…. Questions in hands the kids had no time for me, they were so busy with them. I felt alone; an old misfit bore in a jubilant company; a rugged date-palm in an orchard of coloured season flowers. So isolated and alone! ….The scene melted into another more vicious! My youth when I was a teacher. The chap, an examinee, would not part with the chit from which he copied. I insisted and he refused. The ‘flying squad’ of the university dispossessed the boy, a scoundrel, of his chit. The latter eyed me like a villain. My young wife panicked as she saw a knot of hoodlums hang round my house. The lurking (= hidden) fear of some nameless harm haunted me day in and day out. We left our house at nightfall, but the same group dogged (= followed) our steps We ran, they chased. We failed for breath, my wife stumbled; I, too… but, thank God the dream exploded and I lay in bed in a pool of bodily sweat!
The dream-narrative engaged Rintu spellbound. She laughed, wondered and shuddered.
“What are you thinking, my child?” I asked.
“Papa, what an assorted (= mixed) stuff. A kind of ‘Multi- Media’ in Computer dialect.
