HUMOUR JIST

H U M O U R
Rasipuram Krishnaswami Laxman was born in Mysore in 1924.He began cartooning for the ‘free press journal’ in 1947.He joined ‘The Times of India’ as staff cartoonist and continued to draw for the news paper even today. .He has written and published numerous short stories and essays and travel articles. He has won numerous awards for his cartoons including Asia’s top journalism award ,Ramon Magsaysay award in 1984.In 2005 the government of India honored him with the Padma Visbhushan.
The present humorous story ‘The Gold Frame’ is also written by him. Datta, the owner of ‘the modern frame works’ ,is a silent and hard working man. His shop is actually an extra large wooden packing cage mounted on wobbly legs tucked in a gap between a drug store and a radio repair shop.Datta wears a silver rimmed glasses .He has a complexion of seasoned timber. He gives only laconic answers to the questions of his costumers and friends.
One day a customer came to his shop and showed a photograph which he wanted it to be framed. Datta with his habitual indifference ignored him. He continued with his routine work. The customer wanted a good job to be done no matter how much it costs. The customer volunteered the information and unwrapped a news paper. He exposed a sepia brown photograph of an old man. Datta felt that it was a standard portrait of a grand father, a philanthropist or a social worker of those days.
Datta asked the customer about the kind of frame he wanted for the picture. The customer wanted to have the best of its kind. Then Datta showed him different types of frames. The customer was baffled by the variety. Datta also showed him various mounts. He suggested that a cut mount with an oval shape would look more elegant. Finally the customer placed an order for a gold frame of a cut mount. Its cost was seventeen rupees. Datta asked him to come after two weeks.
Ten days later the tall, rustic- looking customer enquired Datta if the photograph had been framed. He thought that he could collect it if was ready. Datta cast a side glance at him and continued with his work. The customer realized that he had come four days earlier. He asked datta whether it would be ready by Tuesday. Datta generally do not execute the orders of his customers until they visit him at least twice as they never come punctually. Datta, realised that there would be trouble if he did not deliver the order on the promised date.
Next morning he made his first job keeping aside all others. He took the photograph and carefully placed it on a wooden plank on the floor. Then he looked for the pencil stub for marking the measurements. As usual it was missing he shook the folds of his dhoti so violently, that he upset a tin containing white enamel paint it fell right on the sacred photograph of the old great man, emptying its thick slimy contents on it.Datta stood stared at the disaster at his feet as if he had suddenly lost all faculty of movement. In his attempt to save the photograph he made a worse mess of it. He rubbed the picture so hard with a cloth that he peeled off thin strips of filmy coating from its surface. Datta sat helplessly with both hands clutching his head.
Datta had no idea of how to answer for the mutilated photograph. His imagination ran wild suggesting nightmarish consequences as the customer had a fanatic devotion to the photograph he accepted the situation with a hopeless resignation meanwhile an idea flashed in his mind. He searched all the unclaimed photographs to find a substitute for the photograph of the old man. He found a photograph which was a little bit yellowed. But the dazzling gold frame rendered it safe.
The customer turned up promptly after a couple of days. He was struck by its grandeur. Datta held his breath that in another moment he could betray the big hoax he had played. Angrily the customer questioned datta what he had done before he could open his mouth, the customer shouted, that he asked for a cut mount with an oval shape. But the mount was square in shape. Datta was relieved from his tension, as the customer concentrated more on the shape of the mount than on the photograph of the old man for whom he claimed to have a great devotion.