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Story Time: The mysterious act
“They will never find me here. I’d better go home now,” twelve-year-old Hamid muttered to himself as the golden bowl of the sun disappeared over the western horizon.
He and his friends, Athar and Shamshad, had been playing hide and seek. Hamid had climbed a tree and had been perched up there for a long time. His friends had not found him as he had expected.
Now, as he began to climb down the tree, he noticed some one sneaking towards the tree, carrying a large bag in his hand. Hamid decided to sit back in the branches and watch. As the stranger drew nearer, he turned out to be Mr Nisar, Hamid’s next door neighbour. “Why is he acting so mysteriously?” the boy asked himself.
Stopping under Hamid’s tree, the man looked carefully all around. Then he stooped down and began to dig a hole in the ground. Hamid, too, bent down over the branches to have a better look, to find out what the man was up to. Mr Nisar buried the bag and levelled the ground with his heavy shoes. Before leaving the place the man once again looked about him. After Mr Nisar had disappeared amongst the bushes, Hamid slipped down the tree. He wanted to see what the bag contained. Grabbing a pointed, thick branch he sat down to dig, but felt as if someone was behind the trees. He threw the stick away, stood up and crept to a nearby bush.
He heard the faint sound of approaching footsteps. It was getting dark and the boy could not see the person’s face clearly. From his physique the boy gathered that it was none other than Mr Nisar himself. “Why has he come back?” Hamid wondered. Taking out a flashlight from his pocket the man noticed Hamid’s footprints. “Someone has been here,” he muttered to himself.
Mr Nisar dug up the bag and buried it again about a metre away from a cluster of bushes. He placed a large rock over it and disappeared into the woods.
“Should I remove the stone and dig up the bag?” Hamid asked himself. But the next moment he decided against it. “Mr Nisar must be keeping a watch in hiding.”
Hamid decided to hurry home and tell his parents about the whole incident. As he cautiously walked through the forest, he sensed he was being followed. He stepped aside from the path and looked over his shoulder, but was unable to see anyone in the growing darkness. A moment later he continued to move through the woods. The trees around him were alive with the sound of nocturnal animals. When Hamid neared his home he saw a police car parked in front of Mr Nisar’s house. “What is going on there?” he wondered.
As he pressed his doorbell, Hamid noticed Mr Nisar striding home. He was not coming through the forest but from a long way along the road. He and the police officer had just began talking to each other when Hamid entered his house.
“Why are the police here?” Hamid asked his parents. “Has something happened in Mr Nisar’s house?”
“They have come to search Mr Nisar’s house,” Mother whispered. “Someone reported to the police that he is involved in the illegal business of heroin smuggling and that there are packets of narcotics in his house.”
“But he is a respected man and would not involve himself in such a business,” Father added. “I think someone is envious of Mr Nisar’s fame, and by this he hopes to destroy our neighbour’s reputation.”
Hamid listened to his parents patiently but his thoughts wandered back to the woods, where Mr Nisar had buried the bag. He related the whole matter to his parents. They looked at him with surprise. “It must be heroin that he buried hack there,” Mother whispered.
“We should tell the police,” suggested Father.
But by now the police car had gone away. Father hurriedly dialled the police station’s number and told them what Hamid had seen in the woods.
Half an hour later, the Police came back to arrest Mr Nisar. They had found the bag full of heroin with Mr Nisar’s fingerprints on it. The next day Hamid was given a reward for helping the police.
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