Valley of the Mountain Goddess - Table of Contents  

 Rose lay on the rock near the pond, restless and frightened, thinking. 
 There was no explanation for the sounds she had heard from the thicket near the cave.  Were they really ghosts?  Ghosts out to take revenge!
 Gopan’s face came to her mind. It was with him that she had stayed for the longest in the cave. Everything about him was fresh in her mind as though it all had happened only on the previous day.
 * * * * * * * * * * *
 What a smart boy he was! He was  nine, but as playful as a child of three. The only child of a rich planter, Gopan was certainly a bit spoiled.
 At first, Rose pretended to be dumb and deaf as usual. But with Gopan the trick did not work. He did make her talk and laugh on the very first day.
 All day long, he would play in the yard making sand dunes. When he was tired, he would call granny to play with him. If she refused, he would begin to cry like a baby until she obliged. On some days, he would spend his time drawing sketches from morning to dusk.  Gopan loved to draw animals - horses, elephants, bullocks and camels. In a few days he had filled all the walls with the life like picture of men and animals, all in charcoal. It was really a fun to watch the child drawing.
 Gopan would not eat unless his granny rolled up the rice into small balls and placed them in his mouth. At first Rose would not yield to such whims of her ward. But soon, she began to obey him in all his whims and fancies.
 The boy would accompany her to the stream whenever she went out to fetch water.  He loved to play in water. Sometimes he would drench his granny by splashing water on her. There was no use scolding or threatening him.
 Once, finding him crying silently, Rose went to him. There were two pictures on the floor.
 “This is dad, this is mom,” said he pointing to the pictures.
 Rose liked the boy. She was anxious that the boy was released even without any ransom. She was ready to forgo her share of the amount.
 When Soman came in with a dark face, she could easily guess the reason. The date had been extended many times. The ransom had been halved. But Gopan’s father had not yielded to his pressure
  The wicked bastard!  Money was more precious to him than his only son - the smartest boy one could ever hope for!
 Taking his gun, Soman went out of the cave.
“Gopan, follow me!” he snarled.
 “Where are we going?” asked the boy with innocent curiosity.
 “We’ll shoot a rabbit,” he said looking away.
 The boy accompanied him with enthusiasm.
 After a while, a shot was heard, and Soman came back alone soon after.
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It all had happened a few years before, and Rose tried to convince herself that Gopan’s ghost would not do her any harm. Though dead, she was still his dear granny.
Though she tried to believe that Gopan, dead or alive, would not do her any harm, she was all the same very much frightened indeed. She became more and more convinced that the voices she had heard were those of the murdered children.
 She imagined she heard the whispering voices all around her. Wasn’t it the hushed talk of children?
 In the cave it would be safer. Past the granite walls, Satan himself would not come. If she lay down on the stone floor, facing the door, with eyes wide open, she would be safer than anywhere else in the world.
Still, she feared that the boys she had imagined to have watched her from the thicket, might take out the girl through the pond. When Soman came, he would find that the girl had vanished. What would he do? He would shoot her without further questions…
 Finding herself between the devil and the deep sea, she decided to face the devil rather than be shot by her merciless accomplice. 
 Did she hear another of the whistling sounds? Wasn’t it the whistle from Gopan’s lips? It was the same whistle she had heard from the thicket at noon. She was sure it came from a tree above her. Such a long piercing whistle it was that it made her hairs stand on end.
 She stole a glance to where she thought the sound was coming from and saw a moving light on the tree. Inside the glow, she saw a boy’s face for a split second. A cry died in her throat. She took the chopper and held it tightly.
 With a weird whistle and a beacon of light illuminating it, the boy’s face was floating in the air.
 It happened suddenly - the light and the boy’s face rushed at her from the nothingness of the night air. She stared hard, the chopper clutched in her hand. Was it Gopan?
The face vanished, and in its place, a skull swam swiftly to her. When she saw the skull, all her resistance melted away and a terrible cry rose out of her. She fled through the path under the thicket with all the speed she could muster.
Stumbling very often and moaning like a lost soul, she ran and ran until she reached the stream. Stumbling from a boulder midstream, she fell down into the cold water. Hoisting herself up, she looked back like a wild beast at the hunter in pursuit. Close on her heels was the skull with the light, laughing madly. 
Mustering all her strength, she sprang up and crossed the stream. Once out of water, she darted along the second part of the path and hopped into the cave.
“Spare me, Gopan. I didn’t kill you… Spare me … Spare me…” her mind wailed.
She entered the cave and locked the door and fearfully looked out. The skull was advancing brandishing the light. She fell on the stone floor in a dead faint.