Key Bunch

It was a normal morning.  I was getting ready to go to my Institute.  Suddenly, I realised that the key bunch with my office keys was missing.  I searched everywhere – table, cupboard, dining table, TV stand, newspaper rack.  But I could not find it.  I became nervous.  Prof. Malathi Bolar, a tough administrator, was our Director at that time and I could not imagine reporting to her that I had lost the keys.  More importantly, I was supposed to conduct an examination that day and the question papers were kept in an almirah in my cabin.  I thought I would have left the keys somewhere in the department the previous day and rushed to the department.  While I was leaving, my wife asked me, ‘Are you not wearing the shoes?’. I said, ‘No, I don’t have time, I will go in my chappals itself’.

I asked everyone in the department, but no one had seen my key bunch.  I searched all the places where I had gone the previous day – library, computer lab, conference room, classroom – but of no use.  A duplicate key of my cabin was available in the department’s office.  But the problem was, the almirah in which I had kept the question papers didn’t have a duplicate key.  The only key of the almirah was part of the bunch that was missing.  I asked the attender to bring the duplicate key of my cabin.  When he went to pick the key, I was hoping against hope that the almirah was not locked.  As soon as he opened my cabin with the duplicate key, I rushed to the almirah.  Yes, it was safely locked!

Suddenly I remembered that after locking my cabin I had been to the canteen the pervious evening.  I had gone for coffee with a colleague of mine, and we were involved in a serious discussion.  I was almost sure that I had left the keys there.  I went to the canteen and asked the manager, ‘Yesterday, I left my key bunch here, did you get it?’.  He said, ‘No Sir’.  I went to the table where we sat the previous evening.  The table was empty.  The manager told me, ‘If you had left it here, someone would have noticed it and handed over to me.  At least the boy who cleans the table would have seen’. He called the boy, but he too said he didn’t find any key bunch there.  I started walking back.  With just about 30 minutes left for the examination to start, the only option available was to get someone to break open the lock of the almirah and take the question papers. 

My phone rang.  It was my wife.  She asked, ‘Did you get the key bunch?’. I said, ‘No’. She said, ‘It is here, come’.  Oh, what a great relief! I went straight to my house.   I was hoping my wife to be standing there with the key bunch in her hand.  But as I entered my house, my wife asked me:

‘Did I not ask you, are you not wearing shoes?’ 

‘So what, the key bunch is inside the shoes?’

‘No, you first wear the shoes’

‘Why should I wear the shoes, where are the keys?’

‘You first wear the shoes’

Unwillingly I sat down to wear my shoes.  I picked up the socks that I had kept on a teapoy near the shoe-stand.  Lo! The key bunch was below my socks!  When I was leaving, I heard my wife say, ‘This is why I say, you must listen to your wife, sometimes’.