The Thief

Sagar was climbing down the drainpipe when he heard the whistle being blown by the security guard eighty feet below him. He felt the strain of the weight of his backpack on his shoulders. Oh why did he have to pick up the marble Buddha statue? 

He decided to throw it down so that he could escape the cops who were surely on their way. He swung the backpack off his shoulders and threw it as far away as he could. It landed a few feet away from the security guards who were now gathered together to catch him. 

Seeing that the attention of the security guards was on the backpack and its contents, he jumped across to the next wing of the building where he landed on the service ledge. He climbed into an open window and quietly walked through a bedroom where two children were sleeping. He opened the door and walked towards the main door of the flat. He quietly unlocked it and walked out into the passageway leading to the lift. 

The security guards who had been distracted for only a few moments, realised that the thief had made his getaway as they could no longer see him. They flashed their torches and could not see him anywhere. 

Sagar meanwhile got into the lift and made his escape through the lobby of the B wing which was on the opposite side of where the security guards were looking for him. When he got out on the road, he got into an auto rickshaw and woke the sleeping driver, offering him 200 bucks to take him to the railway station. 

He reached the station and paid the rickshaw driver and went to the ticket counter. There were no queues at 4:30 in the morning and he purchased a ticket for the next train to his village. 

The train would arrive in one hour and he had to wait. He bought a newspaper and spread it out on the platform floor and lay down. He used his folded arm as a pillow and closed his eyes. He was beginning to drift off when he remembered what his mother had said to him before he left for the city, ‘Your luck will run out someday Sagar, stop being a thief. We manage well from the income from our crops. We don’t need more.’ 

He wondered if that was a fact, as the money that he brought home always found a use and even helped others in the village. There were never any savings though. He turned over and rested and then he heard the announcement that the train had arrived. He got up and walked to the unreserved compartment and got himself a seat. 

A sadhu was sitting across him who smiled at him as he sat down. The train started and Sagar was lost in his thoughts. Was it really time to give up this way of making money by breaking into people’s homes? 

He wondered if he would get a sign. Just then the sadhu leaned over to him and whispered to him  ‘Don’t worry, you will get your answers. I too was on the wrong side of the law when I was younger, and when things got bad, I ran to the mountains, not to return for 20 years.’ 

Sagar understood that this sadhu had powers and listened to him intently. This was his sign. 

‘Everybody has a past and the future is yours to claim’ the sadhu continued. Choose wisely, choose well, and do it now. Don’t wait!’ The sun was rising and it was a new day and Sagar would always remember it.

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