Seeing Mamma break down like this made my heart tremble. I was about to come out from behind the curtain when suddenly a soldier arrived there. He bowed with great respect and said, "My Lady, the Little Lord is not found anywhere in the house. Now we suspect that he might have gone outside. Do we have permission to search for him outside the kingdom?"
Mamma gave the order with trembling hands. That soldier immediately left for outside the kingdom with his squad. I was standing behind the curtain listening to all this and I was stunned. "Oh my god! Now these people are going to search for me outside? I never thought things would go this far!"
Now I was in even more of a dilemma. Mamma also went towards the outside, crying along with those soldiers. Now the way to get out from there was clear, but my mind was racing—"What do I do now? Today or tomorrow, I will have to come in front of them anyway, then what will I answer? Should I run away?"
But as soon as the thought of running away came, I immediately remembered those 'monster pigs'. "No, no, running away would be madness! When the ordinary animals here are so dangerous, how will the rest of the monsters in the forest be? Right now I don't know anything, I will be killed alone outside." I immediately brushed off the thought of running away.
Now the biggest question was—what excuse will I make? Mamma is so worried, what will I explain to her? But there was no time to think right now. I said to myself, "I'll think of an excuse later, first let me reach my room somehow."
I took a deep breath and, taking advantage of the darkness, moved towards my room on tiptoe.
I moved towards my room on tiptoe, but as soon as I reached near the door, my eyes widened. Inside my room, four maids were searching every corner like crazy. Someone was opening the drawers of the cupboard and looking, someone was peeking inside a small jug kept on the table! They were looking behind the racks and in every small and big place as if I were not a human, but an ant.
I was surprised to see all this. I said to myself, "Arey bhai! Can I even fit in that small jug? What are these people searching for?" Looking at their crazy antics, I was feeling like laughing and also felt scared. It was clear that it is impossible to go inside the room right now.
I immediately backed away from there and went further into the corridor. Then I saw another room where there was a huge pile of clothes. Perhaps these were washed clothes that were to be folded. I looked at those scattered clothes and thought, "Why are these clothes kept like this here?"
Then the light bulb in my mischievous mind flickered and a solid idea came. A big 'dirty' (funny) smile came on my face. I slowly rubbed both my hands together—like a villain preparing his master plan.
"Now the real fun begins!"
Seeing My Lady's condition, it was clearly visible that she was broken. Two maids were supporting her and they were slowly passing by the same room where a huge pile of clothes was kept.
Suddenly My Lady's steps stopped. Her eyes fell on a tiny shoe peeking out from under that pile of clothes. Her eyes widened. She moved quickly towards that side and said to a maid, "Remove all these clothes! Right this instant!"
The maids immediately got to work in a panic. They started throwing the clothes aside one by one quickly. As soon as the last cloth was removed, Ansole was lying underneath. He was completely silent. As soon as the light fell on his face, he slowly opened his eyes, as if he had just woken up from a deep sleep. With innocence, he rubbed his eyes with his small fingers and looking towards his Mamma, asked with great innocence, "Mamma... is Hide & Seek over?
Hearing this, a flood of tears flowed from My Lady's eyes. She sat on the floor amidst the pile of clothes and hugged Ansole tightly to her chest. Her sobs were not showing any sign of stopping now. She just closed her eyes while hugging Ansole.
Then Ansole thought in his mind, Mission Complete! But then he saw that Mamma was crying a lot because of him, so he apologized in his mind, 'Please forgive me', and there he wiped her tears with his small palms and asked innocently, "Mamma, why are you crying?"
My Lady said nothing, just kept holding him even more tightly. Then she looked towards the maids from there, her face was red with anger. She picked up Ansole in her lap and said, "He was right here! And you people pretended to search the whole house but couldn't see him here? Do you even have an idea of what all I had to go through because of the great negligence of all of you?"
A maid wanted to say something fearfully, but My Lady immediately interrupted her and then scolded them for a little while longer. Then later she composed herself and left from there with Ansole. Ansole was looking towards the maids from over her shoulder. He thought in his mind— 'Sorry maids, forgive me... but this was necessary.'
As soon as they went far away, a maid standing behind nudged her companion and whispered in a low voice, "Listen, didn't you find something strange? We threw every single cloth here one by one to find the Little Lord. When we were making this pile, the Little Lord was not there at all! Then how did he suddenly reach the very bottom of these clothes? As if he was already there."
The other maid just shook her head in surprise and whispered, "Exactly! Both of us had looked at the whole place, no one was there. Now how the Little Lord came there, only he knows."
They all stood there stunned, and Ansole had safely gone towards his room with his Mamma.