Man of Words

Pipal tree similar to my village

I was around eight then with vivid imagination and day dreaming was my favorite hobby. My father being the Headmaster of a renowned school, our house had a constant flow of visitors of all types. Villagers seeking advice, students, academics, VIPs visiting the area, musicians, etc all came to our house seeking my father’s erudite company and my mother’s delicious cuisines kept their gastronomic cravings happy. No matter who came and who they were I was always curious to know them and being a child they all indulged my curiosity. Over the years I met many such people, many of them I don’t recall the names or faces, and each of them were remarkable and unique in their own ways. Of all those that I do remember, today I will tell you of a man who literally was a ‘man of words’.

I don’t remember his name and for this post I will name him Uncle Bose. I saw him first when one day out of the blue he appeared at our door, seeking to borrow a book from my father’s massive library. People wanting to borrow books from my father wasn’t unique since his library was famous, but what made Uncle Bose remarkable was that when he came to our house first he did not utter a single word. He simply brought out a chit of paper from his pocket and wrote down few words to express the purpose of his visit. And that’s how he would always communicate with anyone; few words scribbled hastily on a chit of paper. No one had ever heard him utter a word vocally.

Uncle Bose was lanky, with an erect posture, crew cut hair, clean shaven and he always dressed in a sky blue half shirt and a dhoti. In his shirt top pocket he had a seemingly endless supply of chit papers while in one of his lower pockets was a pencil and a hanky in the other. That’s all he ever carried with him, or at least as far as anyone could see. He had a jovial appearance and an even temperament; I don’t remember ever seeing him getting angry or irritated or upset about anything. He was unmarried and lived in his ancestral house with his parents and siblings. He most knowledgeable and knew almost everything about anything. Whenever asked a question on anything under the sky, out would come his chit paper and he would scribble his answer and then walk away with a mysterious smile upon his placid countenance. 

Everyone in the village was curious about Uncle Bose. No one knew or could explain the reason for his silence. He never spoke about himself and hence people’s curiosity only heightened further. My fertile mind raced helter-skelter imagining Uncle Bose as a mystery man doing superhuman feats around the world. Who was he, where did he go, where did he come from, what did he do and above all why did he refuse to speak; and each day I waited for him to arrive breathless hoping to solve the riddle or at least a part of it one day. As soon as he came I would start hopping around him, throwing innocent questions, hoping that he would speak to a child in privacy even if he won’t with an adult. May be he understood my purpose hence he would only smile and pat my head yet never say a word. He won’t speak and I was determined that one day I must make him do so. He loved to eat and I enjoyed watching him eat, so I would get him food from the kitchen and observe as he would eat with gusto. In between mouthfuls he would throw me mysterious smiles and caress my hair lovingly while I watched his face unblinking, hoping against hope to hear him utter some syllables.

Uncle Bose was witty and had a sharp mind. I remember one evening gathering at our home where Uncle Bose was being harangued by all about the benefits of talking and why he must talk and share his life’s experiences with others. He listened with great patience, smiling mischievously at everyone and at the end, when people fell silent he brought out yet another chit of paper from his pocket and wrote, ‘there’s no end to an argument’.

It was rumored that Uncle Bose wasn’t silent all his life. Long time back, while in his youth, he was like any other normal man. Then one day he left the village for a distant land and wasn’t heard from for nearly 15 years. Here the story takes a curious turn: one group of people said that he had gone to London for further studies and had achieved immense success in some kind of business and the other group said that he had gone off to the Himalaya in search of divinity. Neither is confirmed nor did Uncle Bose ever deny either of the stories. Then after 15 years of his sudden disappearance he returned to the village as if he had never gone with the only difference that now he had stopped talking. It is certain that he had his tongue and vocal chords intact and he remained silent by choice. No one could ever discover the reason for his voluntary muteness and till the last day that my father was in that village I could not make Uncle Bose say a single word.

I stayed in that village for five years growing up to be a young girl of thirteen and then we had to leave since my father got a better offer elsewhere. The memories of those five years are indelible in my mind and among them Uncle Bose remains an enigma even today. I am sure he is no more and I wonder often if he ever spoke a word in his life, did he say something ever to anyone and did he remember the tiny little girl who would always wait for him at the door with another question for him, so that he may utter a word.