Without betraying any kind of a reaction to her perception of
my state of mind, I told her that I wasn’t lonely. However, I said I was glad
for her compassion. Just then her brother was heard crying out her name loudly.
“Emma, Emma, we are leaving if you don’t come soon.” I turned to look in his
direction and found everyone else looking at us.
She had to get up. She gave me a broad, effusive smile
without any sign of embarrassment or apology and said, “Good, Charles
introduced me to you. I am Emma and he is Charles, my younger brother.
At that very moment, Charles left his place at the other end
of the room and leaving the elderly lady in a state of abandonment, came and
joined his sister at our end. I braced myself up for an unexpected calamity as
I saw him ready to pull the table-cloth over his head. “Do sit up straight in
your chair, Charles.” She commanded as she sat down again. “Say hello to uncle…”
and she looked at me with a question in her eyes. “ Pratap,” I said. “Pratap
Sharma”. Charles of course was not expected to be impressed. He stuck out his
tongue and looked up at the ceiling. Emma was a bit apologetic now and said, “Sorry,
that’s his way of expressing boredom. Don’t take it seriously”.
However, the little guy had started taking an interest in
me. He was in no hurry to make a move now. He put on an angelic face and gave
me a nice little hand-shake. It was a welcome sign of warmth but there was no
time for us to get to know each other better. Emma signaled in the direction of
her aunt to indicate that she was coming and pulled Charles towards her in a
hurry.
Charles wanted to make the best use of this fleeting moment
of intimacy between him and me and before going away; he turned and asked me, “What
did one wall say to another?” I looked at him in a surprise when he said to aid
me in answering his question…”It’s a riddle.” I rolled up my eyes and said with
a stumped expression, “I give up!” He pulled his sister in the direction of the
table where his aunt was waiting for them and started running. Turning back
towards me, he yelled out the answer, “Meet you at the corner!’
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