Security under Scrutiny_Chapter 3: The Wealthy watchman

It so happened that once it was Raju's destiny to have lived in a house in a community living  owned by his father Ramamurthy. He had been living under the same room ever since the initial days of his recollection would date back to. Every morning Kamala would wake Raju up, he would refresh himself with a boost or bournvita post which he would be insisted to take a quick bath with the warm water his father has steamed it for him at the temperature suitable to a kid's body. Every after this epic burden of events of his daily chores , Raju would come out of the washroom  with the towel wrapped around his waist  ready to take up the position under the running fan drying his wet body. This was the favourite moment of his life which would make him forget  certain situations like the worst  encounter with his teachers, getting punished for not doing the homework and getting  duck out in cricket   which he considered as the biggest problems and tragedy of his life. Raju would stand under the fan like a laughing buddha until the last drop of water in his body would evaporate. He never liked to be interrupted during his water evaporation time. During one such day, Raju was traumatized by the bashing sound of footsteps outside.

They were recruiting night watchmen for their apartment.A man in his late 50 s with heavy mustache and heavier stomach was chosen.  He was called Arulanandam ,but people called him Arul. Arul was a soft spoken man. He would take a long stick at midnight and would roam around the apparent premises like a zombie with is black scarf around his neck and a torchlight  in his other hand . Once Arulanandam happened to scare a young bachelor IT employee residing in the apartment who returned from his night shift. The young man had his eerie up his spine just looking at Arulanandam's ghosty outline from behind. When the guy screamed out of terror, the shrill tone made Arul worry and turn back slowly flashing the light right on his face and then turned the torch upwards this time flashing his own face which had half closed drowsy dreadful eyes long nose a big white mustache , the wrinkles and dark circles and the bulge near his eyes adding the perfect phantom effect which had only frightened the poor guy more. The guy on the sight of Arul dropped his vehicle for a moment and then regained his senses only after a few seconds . Arul's zombi walk with a black shawl which he draped around his head and flowed till his ankle , an the wooden rod in his right hand  with which he made a knocking sound on the ground and torch in his left hand which flashed the perfect lightning which would terrorise any human on earth believing him to be a ghost was a perfect match for the night watchman. The scary sound effect ( by the stick) with perfect lightning ( the torch) and the perfect costume design,  with a perfect casting made even the real ghosts, wandering cats , burglars and night shift workers away. Due to his age, he was eventually shifted as a day watchman. It  happened that one day Arul did not turn up to work and eventually  gave his resignation.

 After a brief 3 months after his resignation,to everyone's surprise he was once again spotted on our road. There was a lot of speculation  about him taking up the work again. The road leading to Raju's home was a long straight road having lots of trees,shady and consisted of many plots some were occupied many were abandoned by humans but occupied by the creatures belonging to the family of animalia. One such plot had an individual house which appeared to have been abandoned since ages. The creepers explored one wall of the small ,random plants that started to breed on the cement cracks of the window shed; all these added to the creepy look and made humans unwilling to approach it. One fine day when Raju was out for a walk, he couldn't help but notice the house was cleaned up. After a couple of days the house was taken by a big family. It was none other than Arul's family. The gossip started to surface on their community premises that the Arul had managed to earn a fortune abroad and managed to buy this house. There was one more version of interpretation that the house was his ancestral inheritance and that's why he had taken a watchman's job in the same street to have an eye on this house.Many theories and speculation triggered everyone's imagination. Raju never cared about any of these until Babloo and Ravi told him. Arul's son rented an auto and was paid for the daily ride to take and drop Babloo and Ravi to school and back home. Soon Babloo and Ravi  became trustworthy information providers. Meanwhile Arul's daughter's wedding took place grandly. It was told that it took place in a posh Kalyana mandap and the groom worked abroad. The creepy house was whitewashed and was decorated  with colourful bulbs and lights. The car decorated with flowers stood on the road in which the bride and groom were escorted.This made the "foreign fortune " version of the story more reliable. The whole apartment peeped out of the window to know what was happening. Some even turned into a part-time defective and scrutinized Arul's every movement.After a month or two Babloo and Ravi were seen travelling by school bus. It was said that the son too managed to take a job abroad leaving Babloo and Ravi to travel by school bus.  After a year, Arul started a water can business with his second son. Ravi's family too purchased water cans from Arul but never made any enquiry about his wealth or his personal life. The wealthy watchman ended up being a wealthy merchant.



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