Horror Story

It was the middle of the month of Ashadh, but it wasn't raining much this time. I was sitting in our roof room and watching the sky outside. At that moment, I heard footsteps on the stairs and looked back to see Puhul entering the room. He appeared and said, "Come quickly. Aranyadadu has come. He asked me to call you." Aranyadadu was actually Patai's grandfather. He was a forest ranger by profession. He had traveled to many places in his long career. He used to come to Patai's house every four months and then he would tell us wonderful stories. When he came earlier, he had told us a wonderful and spooky experience of a landlord's house in Samudragarh.

As soon as we reached Patai's house, it started raining in big drops. The others had already arrived on the veranda in front of the house. Sajane loves to eat a lot, and as usual, he took out chips from a packet of chips and started eating them. There is a chair where Grandpa will come and sit. As soon as Puhul and I sat down, Aranyadadu came and sat down with a cup of coffee in his hand. After sitting down, he looked at us and said, ‘Then. What’s up with everyone? How are your studies going?’

‘It’s going well Grandpa’

‘Baah! Baah! Well, then, Sajan, are you eating any new food? Or are you just eating the old ones?’

Sajan said while chewing chips, ‘Am I going to eat a cow?’. Patai was trying to make Sajan angry by saying something from behind, but we stopped him.



Aranyadadu took a sip of his coffee and said, ‘Come on, let me tell you a different story today.’

‘At that time, my posting was in the Sundarbans. My office is in Chamta. You know, there is no other place in India as beautiful as the Sundarbans. The time I am talking about was when the tiger menace in the Sundarbans was much worse than it is now. Not only the tigers, but also the poachers were very annoying in my area. A few days ago, we found the body of a well-known old tiger here.

The tiger was shot dead by the poachers. But when the guards arrived, they ran away leaving the body behind. Then, one day, I was working in the office in the afternoon; at that time, a guard came and said, ‘Sir. Your call has come. Barosaheb has called.’ ‘The baroda of Chamta region, Asim Ganguly, is a very rash person. If he sees a little negligence in his work, he gets very angry. I quickly went and picked up the phone. On the phone, Barosaheb told me that the group that had killed that tiger that day had received news through the char that they would all be in the Tetulbanki char today. I should reach there without any delay. And arrest them. I told him that I would be leaving in a little while.' Grandpa said this much and immediately a deafening sound was heard from somewhere nearby. And Patai's CFL light went out. Load shedding. It got dark very early today because of the clouds. Within a while, Patai's sister came and left a big bowl of muri maha and a walla giri. Grandpa also got down from the chair and started again with a handful of muri in his mouth.

'Then as soon as I got the call, I went out with two forest guards. After walking for a few minutes along a canal, our launch reached the Kalindi River. At this time, there is a lot of water in the river, so our launch started swaying quite a bit in the waves of the water. By then, it was evening, the light of the moon fell on the water of the river and the bushes on both sides. In this way, after walking for about twenty minutes, we entered a relatively narrow canal. This is the Kumirmari canal. At the end of Tetulbankir Char. This Tetulbankir Char does not have a very good reputation. The tiger infestation here is quite good. While passing through this area during the day, one often sees the most terrible sign of this Bada region flying around in some or the other island, a torn shirt or a piece of shirt stuck to the end of a stick.’ 

 I asked, ‘Grandpa, why is this sign the most terrible.’ Grandpa said, ‘Actually, do you know that the life of the people there is not very easy. This sign is as difficult as it is a warning. What would you say; if a person is taken or killed by a tiger on an island, his group mates stick a piece of his cloth to the end of a stick and bury it. That means tigers killed people here,’  

 ‘Listen then, you know, there are many dilapidated huts on many islands in the Sundarbans. Most of them were built during the reign of Hamilton Sahib. There is one on this Tetulbanki char too. We headed towards it hoping that the poachers might be found there. There are wild hetal and goran bushes all around, and inside it, the house stands like an ancient animal in the darkness of the evening. There is no damage to the door or the latch. We entered very carefully, making as little noise as possible. But, the house was completely empty. There were no poachers except a few rats and mice. We were quite shaken by this. So did they know we were coming in advance? Well, we have come this far and are waiting.

  The three of us sat in a room, huddled together. The two guards who were with me

One of them was named Vikas Pramanik and the other was named Ismail. Vikas used to be a Baul, he took his only son to the tiger. Then he joined the forest service. Ismail is our launch driver. As the evening deepened, the face of the forest changed. From the trees outside, we could hear the sounds of various insects and crickets. I heard a deer calling somewhere in the distance. I lit the torch and looked at the clock once, it was eight o'clock.

Having said this, Grandpa stopped for a while and drank some water. We were all sitting close together. The damp cold wind made our shadows tremble a little in the light of the wall. Grandpa put a fennel lozenge in his mouth and started talking again,

'We are sitting and Vikas occasionally peeks out the window and looks outside. I was about to say no, when I felt that it had become very quiet outside. All the sounds of insects seemed to have stopped as they moved. At that moment, I heard the sound too. Over the sound of the water in the canal outside, a vague, whispering voice came to our ears, as if crying out, ‘Father! Here I am. Your beggar. Come to me, Father.’

As if the wind from the bushes of the groves and bushes around us was pushing that voice to us, as if he had no choice but to give it, I could already see that Bikash’s expression had changed. He looked outside once, trying to find someone, and then, saying, ‘The beggar is coming,’ he ran out of the house. Immediately, I saw Ismail, saying, ‘All is well, sir, come soon.’ When I came out, I saw that the darkness had increased considerably. It was as if that disembodied voice was calling out to us from all over the island, "Baba! It's me. Come to me, Baba, come."

As I followed Bikash, I asked Ismail, "Who is Gadai? And why did Bikash run away like that?" Ismail said, "Sir, the beggar is Bikash's son, his uncle took him last year. He's a slow ghost, sir. Go quickly, otherwise Bikash won't be able to save me." Hearing this, a wave of fear ran through my whole body. Why is the boy who was killed by a tiger calling out again?

Bikash was running towards the back of the hut. The jungle was quite deep on this side. Just before he entered the jungle, Ismail ran hard and jumped on him. As I was approaching them, Ismail threw Bikash to the ground and sat on him, and Bikash was thrashing around. I will go ask Vikas. At this time, my eyes fell straight. A little distance from the place where we were standing, the beginning of a deep forest.

There were many bushes and complete darkness in the place. As soon as my eyes fell on that place, my whole body froze in fear. Even in that darkness, I clearly saw that darkness was gathering under a beautiful tree. A primitive, unearthly shadow figure made of thick, black darkness was watching us. But the sound around us was still floating in the air. Ismail also seemed to have become a little distracted by the sight of that figure, and Vikas knocked him out with a punch and stood up. I couldn't move at that time. My legs felt incredibly heavy. As if they weren't my own legs. They wouldn't move even if I wanted to. As Bikash approached the statue, which was about an arm's length away, the entire island shook with the roar of the tiger, and in an instant a huge tiger came from the side of the statue and fell on Bikash's neck and disappeared before he could blink. And everything became a blur before my eyes.'

We all sat close to him. As soon as Grandpa stopped, we all shouted, 'Then! Then!'

'Then when I regained consciousness, I saw Ismail bringing water from the canal and pouring it on my face. I sat up holding his hand. My head was shaking. Looking at the place where the statue was, I saw that there was nothing left, and the calls of crickets and insects were heard again. We searched for Bikash's body a lot but could not find anything else. Then we returned.'

Speaking of this, Grandpa fell silent. Even when it rained, his excitement was not as great now. In the dim light of the electricity, I caught a glimpse of Patai's colorful flower tree. Patai asked, "Grandpa, the tiger was there, but you didn't realize it?" Grandpa smiled a little and said, "I told you that a few days ago a tiger's body was found in my area." We said, "Yes, you said yes."

"I saw that tiger's body. The tiger didn't have a tail. Maybe it was cut off in a fight or by a poacher." Then he remained silent for a while and said, "The tiger that took Vikas that day didn't have a tail either."

Before Grandpa could finish speaking, there was another loud flash of lightning and from who knows where a gust of wind came and extinguished the wall.