Story of a Stolen Pen

 

 

I have weakness for two things: books and pens; and this weakness has been with me since my school days. My school was located around sixty kilometers from the nearest town. I would come to the town when I had some money with me, just to buy a few books. In the college and university days, I had, sometimes, skipped my afternoon tiffin for books.

My favourite place to spend my time has been always a book stall. While travelling, I love to visit the book shops in the bus stand or railway station or in the airport. I have purchased many books from these shops and I while away my time with a book while travelling. I buy books almost every month. I may buy three books at a time, might have read two and I would buy another three books. The unread books get piled up. When I retired from government service, I politely declined an offer for extension of my job by the government for two more years, inter alia, to read the unread books.

In my impressionable age, I had dreams of a house with a library. Of course, I have a library in the house; I spend most of the times here.

The other weakness has been pens. I buy different pens, of course, within my affordable limit. I cannot buy costly pens like the PM is rumoured to be using. When I was in class X (1974), I came across a made in China wing-sung pen in the nearest market to my village. The pen then cost Rs. 12/. Twelve rupees was not a small amount then. I would like to give an example to measure the value of Rs.12 in 1974-75: in the hostel of Bhadrak college where I was studying intermediate science in 1975-77, the mess charge was Rs. 60 per month, i.e. for minimum sixty meals. That means, the cost of the pen was equivalent to twelve meals. I was in proud possession of a wing-sung pen. Now while surfing Amazon I chanced upon wing-sung pens; the cost is Rs. 900 for three pens.

                                                        (Wing-sung pens)

One of my friends had presented me a pilot pen of Japan make. It was a lovely pen; black body with golden cap. She got it from her uncle who was working in a ship and travelling foreign countries. Of course, it was understood, she got the pen to present me without the knowledge of her uncle. I lovingly kept the pen, did not use. The pen was in my suitcase under lock and key.

I was staying in West Hostel of Bhadrak College and sharing the room with four students. Of the four, three were my seniors and was my batch mate. He was in the first-year, commerce. Let’s call him Bipra. His classes were in the morning, but ours were in the day. We went to class after ten in the morning. His classes ended by eleven. He was alone in our room the whole day. He had contrived to get the duplicate keys of all of our suitcases.  He was stealing articles and money when we were in the college.

One day he was caught. He admitted stealing. He wrote an undertaking not to steal in future, and promised to return whatever he had stolen from us. He returned the articles and money he had stolen, to others. But he did not return me the pilot pen. He told he would return me later. He told the pen was in his village; he would bring the pen next time he went to his village.

One day he said, “They are our seniors, but you are my friend. Will you be angry, if I tell you something?”

“Ok, tell,” I said.

“I can’t return you the pen.”

“Why?” I asked.

“You are getting angry. You see, your pen was stolen, you never expected to get it back. It’s a different matter you caught me staling and I admitted…”

“So what?”

“In fact, I have presented that pen to my girlfriend. Please try to understand. Can I tell her I have presented the pen that I had stolen from a friend, and ask her to give me back?”

He had a point. I heaved a sigh and had to forget the pen.

Bipra was a kleptomaniac. He started stealing again and was caught stealing. He was expelled from the hostel. I lost the pen and also my kleptomaniac lover friend.

I was surfing Amazon and I came across a similar pilot pen. The cost of the pen now is rupees four thousand plus.

*****