A Tale of the Year 1919 Page 2

  He fell silent, as if he had nothing more to say.

  ‘What happened after that?’ I asked quickly.

  His eyes welled up with tears. ‘They were shot . . . shot dead on the spot.’

  I didn’t say anything. The train slowed and pulled into the station. He hailed a coolie to carry his bags. As he was leaving, I asked, ‘The ending of the story you just told . . . it seems as if you made it up yourself?’

  He started and looked at me. ‘How did you know?’ he asked, surprised.

  ‘How? Your tone was filled with incredible agony.’

  Swallowing his bitterness with a glob of saliva, he replied, ‘Yes, those bitches . . .’ He held himself back from cursing and added after a pause, ‘They disgraced their brother’s selfless martyrdom.’

  With that he got off the train and walked away.

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  Copyright © Muhammad Umar Memon, 2015

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  This digital edition published in 2017.

  e-ISBN: 978-9-386-81556-9

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.