ARYA AND THE THIEVES

It was the talk of the teashop that morning: someone had broken into the Maha Mudalali’s house last night, ransacked his Almayrah and stolen most of the gold jewelery that he had kept inside.

“Seems like the thief knew exactly where to find the Gold,” said one of the men, to the boy serving them tea.

“Sounds like an inside job to me,” said another sipping his drink.

Arya overheard this conversation as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes, and stood waiting for the sugar his mother had asked him to buy that morning.

“An inside job?” he asked, sleep leaving him instantly. He always loved a good mystery. The more complicated it was the better, and an inside job sounded very complicated.

Carrying the sugar back home, Arya’s head was full of possibilities. “The Maha Mudalali had at least five people working for him and all of them had been with him since he was a young boy,” Arya thought. “So all of them are trusted, then how could it be an inside job?”

With more thoughts of the kind running in his mind, he went in search of his next door neighbour and friend Tikiri. Much like him, Tikiri had voiced several times how she would like to investigate a real mystery.

“Let’s go right now!” she insisted after Arya explained what he had heard and so the two children, with breakfast put aside ran to the Maha Mudalali’s big house in hopes they would discover something else.

But they were not the only ones there, a small crowd had gathered by the gate and a police jeep could be seen parked close to the house.

“The OIC himself is here,” one of the villagers said as the children tried to creep through the group to get to the front gate. As they tried craning their necks to see what was going on inside the house they heard a loud beep behind them.

The crowd parted to let in Raju, Mudalali’s right-handman and his blue truck. Taking the opportunity, Arya and Tikiri both slipped in through the open gate and ran along the pathway that led to the house, hiding behind the trees and bushes that dotted the large grounds until they got to the back yard. When the children arrived, the whole of the household help seemed to be gathered there.

“What are you children doing here?” asked the crosslooking caretaker, Heenbanda as he spotted them. Before the two could answer there came a loud commotion from inside, and Raju’s voice could be clearly heard: “I didn’t do it! What do you mean?”

The group rushed to the front garden, and Arya and Tikiri saw two burly policemen holding onto a startled looking Raju and a small-made old lady, leading them up to the Jeep.

“It’s obvious that you are the one who has orchestrated this whole thing!” the OIC who followed behind said. “You are the one who got a job for this old lady so she could do all the stealing for you eh?”

The old lady was silently crying, and it was obvious to the two children that she was the only new member of the Maha Mudalali’s staff there.

“Latha, couldn’t have done it!” shouted Raju. “She’s a very honest person, and I got her because the Mudalali asked me if I could find someone to do the cooking till the old cook came back from her holiday. How could that make me a criminal?”

“Let’s see about that at the police station!” said one of the burly policemen as they pushed him into the Jeep.

Arya looked stunned at what was happening before them, as did everyone else. Raju had been working for the Mudalali for more years than anyone could count, and was the most honest human being Arya knew.

“This isn’t right!” he said to Tikiri. “We have to find out who the real thief is!”

TO BE CONTINUED.