The gold cigeratte case

Mr Coleridge was close to retirement when I first met him. I was seven or eight .He was the biggest man I had ever seen, very tall and  heavily built, too large even for a European. He was the manager of the Tea Estate where my father worked as an officer.

In the 40's all estate managers were Europeans and he was the senior most among them, respected by all in Munnar.

He had a 10HP Ariel motor bike, the biggest I had ever seen. I often saw him riding it and was convinced it was custom made for him. But it was his car that attracted me more. My brother once got a lift in it when he went to Munnar along with my father. I was less lucky. I ran about imagining myself driving the car.

The Angel of Munnar - Part two

Munnar of my mother's days

Munnar of my childhood might have been colourless but for the anecdotes I gathered from my mother. It contributed to my knowledge of our surroundings and people of that time and of the bygone. May be my outlook was much influenced by them. This story is about my feelings towards the once beautiful town modulated with my mother's love towards it

After the hectic day and  sumptuous dinner the four poster bed in the master bed room was most alluring.

Out side, the whistling became softer and softer and then slowly died out, but some how I felt it had not, it was just a pause before the sinister. The trees too were still, expecting the ominous.
The stillness carried  remenants of a soft tune that though not  familiar brought to mind Stephan's  'Alayamaniyin osai nan ketten....'( I heard the church bell ringing)

It can not be Stephan's tape recorder again. his quarter is well removed from the bunglow.Is it an alarm?.... Cannot be...I listened closely...... It sounded more like bells tolling.
Far away a nightingale  sang to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. 
The cold night air through the gap of the bath room door chilled the room.