The Story of Him - VII

He was on his third drink and having trouble relating the events in a sequence. He remembered his father leaving on the scooter making his way to the office. The land was quiet, no voice came from the surrounding villages, and the huge machines in the mine were deathly quiet... And then came the sounds, a silent, growing hum.... almost like the bees who buzz around his head day after day...The sound grew slowly, almost apologetically, as if the villagers did not really put their heart into what might happen next.... Besides, most were indebted to his father and the giant of a grand-father before him....They would be more worried to harm him than to shout for their demands. But mobs do not behave in the usual manner of a docile human. Mobs derive their strength from a random shriek, a cry or just the presence of huge numbers... And the mob was slowly making its presence felt... The shouts increased until it too merged with the vivid landscape of the mines... The shouts turned into one long monotonous drone... he knew that this was the moment when the mob will start doing something foolish.... And RS was right. At this very moment, his father - a veteran of a hundred mines, blackened with soot that clinged to his face inspite of heavy scrubbing, his father gave up on the hope of an amicable solution.... The crowds were thronging the grounds below the ancient British Administrative block and one of the unknowns had just thrown a stone into the third floor....

The stone crashed through the glass and came unstuck in the protective steel railing. But this was the catalyst. The father rounded up the thirty or so timid office staff, ran across to the corner office in the third floor - the office which held the strong room and locked them in..... He ran next to the other officers and called the police one last time.... The station was nearby and they had been urgently informed atleast ten times, but seemingly the jeeps did not have diesel in them.... The father shouted that they have a few minutes left and then the police can leisurely come to pick up after the bodies... Exasperated, he turned to his superior who was as stubborn as they get. An old school disciplinanrian, the boss refused to budge even as the crowds already entered the complex... It would not end anytime soon.