When you know you are drowning in opulence so very titanic that an eternity would not be a success at swilling it all, you could well afford to bestow your pensive mind with the leisure of maundering through a plethora of mellow reminiscences under a caramel sun. My reader, I believe I just did the same. Reminiscences though evanescent are charming affairs – they blissfully sing a song of a life time and all the whims, smiles and tears it gives refuge to. But you see, mine are adorned with a special charm, the charm that douses the air with giddy amusement as it sings a fairy tale voyage of a rag picker to his fortunes.
It wasn't my first tryst with the ivory moon against the grotesque darkness of the sky and the grey silence of the pavements, upon which she smiled. It couldn't simply be for any rag picker of Victorian London and as you can now assume, I was no exception. These neat patches of concrete beside the insignificant Lance road were always my silken beds. But that certain night, they seemed silkier still, by grace of the encounter with fortune, I had earlier in the day. A change is the spice of life, and the mundanity of the life I was leading, sure kept killing the sang-froid in me. I was in search of a slightly better job and higher wages – a very natural instinct for a meager lad. Lady luck had smiled upon my unfortunate self while I had been rummaging the rubbish heaps that stood at the further corner of the road for an old worn out wallet. Wallets in the rubbish heaps may seem useless but they often make you richer by a couple of pennies. However, it wasn't the wallet but a maimed cardboard sheet that caught the attention of my sight. It read – "Full time servants need. Please contact Mr. Dominick Calvert for further information. 876-E3, Boris Lane, South Kensington,"in an ostentatious red. Well, that was all I needed... a modest wage and a respectable vocation to offer it.
Within a few unconscious hours, the orbed maiden of the night died and for its ashes, like a phoenix arose another caramel sphere. I didn't whine over the loss of a beautiful night; instead, without depriving myself of time, raced down to the end of the street, crossed a few lanes and roads and finally stood before my dream destination, ogling at the Calvert mansion, like a blissfully ignorant toddler would ogle at a candy parlor. It had the mediocre beauty any palace would behold. As I entered the mansion hall, the incoherent whisperings of the two guards made me wonder. Mind you, though a rag picker, I always kept myself presentable and my aplomb high, so probably they were musing over it.
"Oh Robert! Back aren't you? Freshen yourself, you look a mess my boy!", sprang a pleasant voice from nowhere.
Mr. Calvert himself, wasn't it? I pondered over the intentions behind him addressing me so very affectionately. Unsurprisingly no one did explain it to me and keeping my mouth shut for good I enjoyed the bouquets of luxurious cares and unexpected affections that were bestowed on me for the rest of the day, the day that followed and the next and so on. My new quasar had left my mind swim in a farrago of perplexity, joys and more perplexities, until one fine eve when a servant of the Calvert mansion approached me and mumbled, "Listen Mister, your luck's swell I tell you. You sure hit the looks of the man's nephew. Old Man's a pleasant thing, he's no one except the nephew, I said just now, but the boy was a menace. A real spoilt brat I tell you. Hush! Listen here, the oldie's left all his fortune to him. Unfortunate lad, he died last week, but old man doesn't seem to get it down his throat. He thinks he's alive, thinks you're his Robert! Anyways, great going fellow. Thumbs up. You’ve got a neat fortune awaiting you!"
Weeks passed and so did the years. And as inevitable, Old Calvert embraced an eternal sleep, leaving me in an arrant euphoria that basked in an endless magnificence. Occasionally, a zephyr of guilt sweeps across my whole being, cursing me for keeping the pleasant old man in oblivion. But the candor in the fact that he got deceived instead of me exactly deceiving him, gives me an arcane solace. At times, chimeras in few vales, assume a reality and makes some lives beautiful. Life is not always a sordid ocean of strangling tangibility and redundant encumbrances; sometimes, its also an enchanting fairy-tale where a rag picker picks up a fortune from a rubbish heap, a pauper becomes a prince and misfortunes become the pleasantest of fortunes.
Old Mr. Calvert – did he ever know? I couldn't know whether he was aware of the truth or not, all I could know was that he was a victim of Alzheimer's disease. Anyways, I presume the latter discovery answers it all.
It wasn't my first tryst with the ivory moon against the grotesque darkness of the sky and the grey silence of the pavements, upon which she smiled. It couldn't simply be for any rag picker of Victorian London and as you can now assume, I was no exception. These neat patches of concrete beside the insignificant Lance road were always my silken beds. But that certain night, they seemed silkier still, by grace of the encounter with fortune, I had earlier in the day. A change is the spice of life, and the mundanity of the life I was leading, sure kept killing the sang-froid in me. I was in search of a slightly better job and higher wages – a very natural instinct for a meager lad. Lady luck had smiled upon my unfortunate self while I had been rummaging the rubbish heaps that stood at the further corner of the road for an old worn out wallet. Wallets in the rubbish heaps may seem useless but they often make you richer by a couple of pennies. However, it wasn't the wallet but a maimed cardboard sheet that caught the attention of my sight. It read – "Full time servants need. Please contact Mr. Dominick Calvert for further information. 876-E3, Boris Lane, South Kensington,"in an ostentatious red. Well, that was all I needed... a modest wage and a respectable vocation to offer it.
Within a few unconscious hours, the orbed maiden of the night died and for its ashes, like a phoenix arose another caramel sphere. I didn't whine over the loss of a beautiful night; instead, without depriving myself of time, raced down to the end of the street, crossed a few lanes and roads and finally stood before my dream destination, ogling at the Calvert mansion, like a blissfully ignorant toddler would ogle at a candy parlor. It had the mediocre beauty any palace would behold. As I entered the mansion hall, the incoherent whisperings of the two guards made me wonder. Mind you, though a rag picker, I always kept myself presentable and my aplomb high, so probably they were musing over it.
"Oh Robert! Back aren't you? Freshen yourself, you look a mess my boy!", sprang a pleasant voice from nowhere.
Mr. Calvert himself, wasn't it? I pondered over the intentions behind him addressing me so very affectionately. Unsurprisingly no one did explain it to me and keeping my mouth shut for good I enjoyed the bouquets of luxurious cares and unexpected affections that were bestowed on me for the rest of the day, the day that followed and the next and so on. My new quasar had left my mind swim in a farrago of perplexity, joys and more perplexities, until one fine eve when a servant of the Calvert mansion approached me and mumbled, "Listen Mister, your luck's swell I tell you. You sure hit the looks of the man's nephew. Old Man's a pleasant thing, he's no one except the nephew, I said just now, but the boy was a menace. A real spoilt brat I tell you. Hush! Listen here, the oldie's left all his fortune to him. Unfortunate lad, he died last week, but old man doesn't seem to get it down his throat. He thinks he's alive, thinks you're his Robert! Anyways, great going fellow. Thumbs up. You’ve got a neat fortune awaiting you!"
Weeks passed and so did the years. And as inevitable, Old Calvert embraced an eternal sleep, leaving me in an arrant euphoria that basked in an endless magnificence. Occasionally, a zephyr of guilt sweeps across my whole being, cursing me for keeping the pleasant old man in oblivion. But the candor in the fact that he got deceived instead of me exactly deceiving him, gives me an arcane solace. At times, chimeras in few vales, assume a reality and makes some lives beautiful. Life is not always a sordid ocean of strangling tangibility and redundant encumbrances; sometimes, its also an enchanting fairy-tale where a rag picker picks up a fortune from a rubbish heap, a pauper becomes a prince and misfortunes become the pleasantest of fortunes.
Old Mr. Calvert – did he ever know? I couldn't know whether he was aware of the truth or not, all I could know was that he was a victim of Alzheimer's disease. Anyways, I presume the latter discovery answers it all.
This was a page from the beloved diary of a certain rich man, in Victorian London who encountered his fortunes in a magnificently surprising manner.
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