Hushed Echoes

They both woke up very early the following day, while the gateman was busy washing the man’s car, Richard on his own part was piling up all the clothes he was to wash that morning.

When the man was ready to leave for work, he called him and gave him one hundred cedis for detergent he was to use in washing the clothes.

He took it and hurried to the next street and within two minutes he came back with the detergent, ready to start washing.

“My God! This is magnificent, how can only one man be living in this kind of a big house all alone.” he wondered aloud as he admired the architectural beauty of the building. He did not know that the gateman was standing behind him and overheard him.

“Are you surprise?” the gateman said, giggling. ” He is the only one living here, his wife and all his children are living aboard, just sometimes they would visit him here, or sometimes him would go over there to visit them.”

“I see” marco said as he bent down to pick the packet of detergent which had fallen from his hands.

“But doesn’t he have a relation that can stay with him?”

“Since i started working for him, I have never seen any of his relations one day, but sometimes his friends visit him”

There was a knock at the gate, the gateman left in order to check who was knocking, marco started work immediately.

He took his time washing and scrubbing the clothes, he had never thought that washing could be very hectic, but soon he was through with the washing and had to wait for them to dry so that he could resume ironing.

Marco worked for three weeks without complaint from his master and was beginning to look towards receiving his first salary, he was also very pleased with himself, although he had borrowed close to five hundred cedis from the gateman for his feeding, he was sure offsetting his debt completely and then he would use the balance to feed for next month until another salary would be paid and he would begin to save.

Little did he know that his objectives were going to be abortive, five days to end of the month, something happened.

He had washed the clothes the normal way he had always done and hanged them on the rope outside. Unfortunately for him, the rope cut and the clothes fell on the ground.

But the worst of it was that three of the man’s white Guinea brocade fell on the part of the ground that was flooded with diesel, and they were stained beyond repair.

Marco was utterly frightened and dismayed, he tried hard to get the stain out of the clothes, but the stains stuck, he kept in trying until it became certain that the situation was irredeemable.

He kept the stained clothes aside, because the more he looked at them, the more his blood pressure increase, Since he could not keep the matter to himself alone, he decided to confide in the gateman.

“My brother, I’m in trouble! I don’t know what else to do. Boss clothes have been badly stained and it seems there is no way out, i have tried all I could to remove the stain.” Marco explained nervously.

“What! What are you going to do now?” Why did you make that kind mistake? ”

“It was not my fault. I didn’t know that the rope was going to cut.”

The gateman removed the chewing stick from his mouth and held it with his right hand.

“Come let me see it”

He gestured to him and they walked together the backyard where the clothes were kept.

When the gateman saw the stained clothes, he watched with mouth agape, he knew instantly that marco had landed himself in a very serious problem and that if care was not taken, he was bound to incure the wrath of the man.

“Ah!, this is serious problem, boss will be extremely angry, he will deal with you brutally, How will you do it now? He had hardly finished his statement when the horn of the man’s Mercedes Benz started blaring.

“Boss is back” the gateman said apprehensively and took off instantly to open the gate.

The man drove in slowly and parked the car, when he came out of the car, he was wiggling a can beer into his mouth while he used his left hand to signal to the gateman.

“Where is Marco?” the man asked.

” He is at the backyard sir”, the gateman replied.

“Go and ask him to check if clothes are dry, if they are, tell him to iron the one with a brownish embroidery I want to wear it in the next hour”

The gateman was lost in thought momentarily so much so that he forgot to give a reply to the man’s order.

“Did you hear me?” the man snapped.

“Oh! Yes sir” the gateman responded nervously and then went to the backyard to inform Marco.

“There is problem, boss said he wants to wear that dress that is severely stained, he even said you should iron it now”

” What am i going to do for goodness sake? I think the best thing is to let him know about it” Marco remarked soberly.

He picked the clothes, packed them and put them in an empty bucket and slouched towards the house.Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.