An extraordinary girl

Attempt on My Life

I have spoken about the very beautiful relative of mine who had been forced to marry a most ugly man for the sake of money and was never happy.

Before her marriage she was living with me and my mother. My mother had a servant whom I did not like at all. On any excuse he would pop into my room, and at any time, in spite of my severely scolding him about it and forbidding him to enter. My mother would be very much displeased at my behaviour. My relative also used to say that I should not use such strong language. I would plead with my mother to dismiss him, but she would sing the same refrain each time: the man works well; it is very difficult to get servants nowadays, etc. etc. Eventually, she gave in and dismissed him. But it was not the last we heard from him.

After a few days something happened. My relative and I slept in the same room. At the foot of my bed was an almirah where our letters, ornaments etc. were stored and the key used to remain in the keyhole. The almirah always opened with a harsh sound. One night I woke up to a noise and whispered to my relative to wake up and told her that somebody was there in the room. Then again a harsh sound. "It is the sound of the opening of my almirah," I said. When finally we found the courage to get up, we discovered that the almirah was open and one drawer was missing. We looked for it up and down and at last located it downstairs, the papers scattered on the floor, the jewellery gone, and an initial scrawled there. We understood at once it was the dismissed servant's mischief, for his name began with that initial.

A few days later another kind of mischief started. We began missing foodstuffs from the kitchen. I had a faithful servant of my own. He decided to keep watch at night with a thick stick in his hand. As soon as he saw the man stretching his hand through the window, he struck it a heavy blow. The thief ran away through the garden. We found traces of blood on the ground as we followed his tracks that seemed to vanish into the darkness. Next day our driver did not turn up for work. Naturally we suspected him and wondered if he could be the thief. After some days he turned up with a bandaged hand. There was no doubt now. We informed the police. They thrashed him mercilessly and he admitted that a man had put him up to the job and had promised him an attractive reward for a more difficult assignment later on. He did not, however, disclose the man's name or the nature of the assignment to come. But we had no doubts who he was and suspected that he might be planning to kill me. We conveyed our fears to the police. A guard was posted to keep watch. After quite some days, again I heard a sound during my sleep and woke up. I saw a shadowy figure reflected in the mirror with a dagger in his hand. I shouted at once and jumped to the other side of the bed. The policeman on guard rushed in, people came running, but the man had escaped. We observed that he had come up climbing the drain pipe.

We were in a panic and decided that we must leave the place and move elsewhere.

There have been other attempts too; but each time, I am certain, a divine intervention saved me.