tales of Suchita

The embargo had been lifted. Mayur and Sagar could start playing detective again. No one was happier than Radha’s dadi. She still nurtured the hope that the two boys would positively influence her grandson and make a man out of…out of whatever he was currently.

If only she knew the influence that Radha had on his sidekicks…

Watson and Timothy were in Radha’s house on the pretext of a group project. They did have a project to complete but Timothy had assured them that his big sister would complete it for them, no charges. He explained that she needed some points for doing charity and she would add their name in her project. He didn’t care…as long as she didn’t tell their parents and they could pass.

“Start from the beginning Tim,” said Radha seriously, right hand on chin, and left hand cupping the right elbow.

Mayur rolled his eyes and nudged Sagar. Despite everything, he thought Radha was alright – odd most certainly but alright. But he didn’t appreciate the theatrics too much. Worse was when Radha told him he didn’t have it in him to understand the finer nuances of the role of a sidekick. Like he knew what being a sidekick entailed. He didn’t think Radha would survive a day, a day, as a sidekick.

Sagar visibly gulped, looked at Mayur for support and began.

It was a hot afternoon. The time was half past one. All of Sagar’s classmates had been downstairs since it was the forty-five minute free period (a luxury really) before school got over at 2. Sagar had come into the classroom to get his bottle of water.

Ever since that boy from sixth grade had lost his bottle and Radha had become increasingly sure that a thief was among them, he had taken to keeping tabs on his.

Much to his relief, his bottle was still there, just where he had kept it…inside his school bag. He took a welcome drink from it, casually glancing around and…

“Casually? What do you mean casually?” interrupted Radha.

While Mayur sighed tiredly (they had already been over this several times), Sagar explained patiently, “Like I told you I felt I saw something out the corner of my eye and…”

“What? What do you mean corner of your eye? You didn’t tell us that before!”

“But I thought…”

“Sagar I have told you this so many times. Every little detail is important.”

“I saw something move at the corner of my eye…”

“Peripheral vision.”

“What?”

“It’s called peripheral vision.”

“How does that matter?” asked Radha hotly.

“It doesn’t. Corner of the eye is called peripheral vision,” explained Mayur smugly. He couldn’t believe he knew something that Radha didn’t.

“Shut up will you. And stop interrupting Sagar. You will break his flow of thoughts.”

“I will break…”

“I saw,” Sagar bellowed, “something in my peripheral vision and turned to look.” He paused to see if the two would interrupt him. Both of them shrugged so he continued, “I walked over to Radha’s desk. A feather sat…”

“You,” bellowed Radha this time in a rare showcase of anger, frustration, irritation and excitement, “said nothing about a feather.”

Shocked, all Sagar could do was stare at Radha who was red in the face. He giggled nervously then abruptly shut up. “Yes but there was a piece of paper below the feather so I threw…” his voice trailed off as he saw Radha groan and hold his head.

“Is he okay?” he whispered so only Mayur could hear him.

This time, Mayur had no words of solace to offer his partner. Even he knew, though he was a mere sidekick that Sagar had made a tremendous blunder.

“Please continue,” said Radha in a tight voice.

Understanding finally dawning, Sagar left nothing out of the tale this time.

It had been the flicker of the feather that had caught his attention. A beautiful brown and black feather the likes of which he had never seen before; not that he had particularly paid attention to feathers before but this one looked beautiful.

He had picked it up and carefully placed it in his math textbook…Sagar had obviously not thrown it but Radha didn’t need to know that. The feather had been weighed down by a piece of pebble. Under the pebble and the feather had been a note – a handwritten note that said, ‘the game is on.’

Radha studied the note now, so intrigued by the handwriting and the message that he forgot the real clue, the clue that could have helped him identify the thief, was the feather and not the detail of the pebble and the note. But then he was only thirteen and still learning the ropes of this detective business.

“It’s a girl,” declared Mayur triumphantly. “Didn’t I tell you it could be a girl?”

“Why is it a girl?”

“Look at the handwriting man. Do you know any boy in the seventh grade who has that good handwriting?”

“That,” said Sagar, thinking of his sister’s handwriting, “could be the…”

The outside noises faded again as Radha’s focus pinned on the note. He didn’t tell the two bickering boys that the handwriting proved nothing…except that the thief was clever. Obviously he had asked a girl to write the note just to throw Radha off his scent.

But what did the message mean? How did this boy know Radha was onto him and his thefts? And should Radha now respond to this attack?

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This is the sixth post in the series. To know more about Radha, click here.