I am sure most people have lost an umbrella at least once in their lives. But my cousin, Roopa, once lost something far more valuable—a pair of diamond studs.Roopa’s mother had gifted a small pair of diamond studs to Roopa’s daughter. Each stud contained six diamonds set in a circle around a seventh central diamond. As the girl grew from a child to a teenager, the grandmother thought the studs looked small on her and offered to exchange them for a bigger pair. So one day, Roopa went to the bank to collect the small pair of studs from the safe deposit locker.
When she got home and opened her handbag, she discovered to her horror that they were not there! Her first thought was that the pouch had fallen from her bag as she took out her purse to pay the auto. She rushed down to the gate to check, but there was no satin pouch on the road. So she went back to the bank and the grocery store, the places she had just visited, but drew a blank. Finally, she believed that she had left it in the auto.
The next day, her mother called and suggested they meet to exchange the studs. Roopa could not bring herself to tell the truth. So she said she hadn’t yet had time to collect the studs from the bank locker.
She agonised over the loss all week. The studs had cost her mother a small fortune, but it was not just a monetary loss. They were the loving gift of a grandmother to her beloved granddaughter. Roopa felt terrible.
One day, as she was changing the bedsheets in her room, she decided that she would confess everything to her mother. Her eyes welled up as she imagined her mother’s anguished face when she told her the news.
As she shook out the bed sheet, a clinking sound, as something fell to the floor, made her heart skip a beat! It was the pouch with the studs! In a flash, she remembered how they came to be under her mattress.
The other day, when she had taken them out of her handbag to keep in the cupboard, the doorbell had rung. Not wishing to keep the caller waiting, she simply shoved them under the mattress for temporary safekeeping. It was an unconscious action and when she came back to the room, she forgot it completely! Her cheeks still wet with tears, she laughed with sheer joy and relief!