The loaf of bread

 

While running on the streets of the old imperial city, Khaled looked back often, he was exhausted and wanted to stop, but his legs were still taking leaps and bounds as if of their own volition. while running, he stumbled upon a few people on the streets, who probably came out to sun themselves, the city hardly got sunny like it was today and they probably wanted to bask themselves. As Khaled stumbled, he fell, and his dirty looking rag tucked tightly in his armpit, holding the treasure he secured that sunny morning slipped from its place and a loaf of bread that fell out and was partially tampered upon by the people it stumbled upon. Khaled got up quickly, covered whatever bread remained in the rag, tucked it under the armpit, and started running again as only a child can run while holding a cache of prized goodies under its armpit. A couple of imperial guards who were loitering around, also probably basking in the sun, looked at the scene amused first at the when somebody yelled " A thief, A thief " started running after him.

It was the baker, who yelled, out of breath as he was he stopped for a while when he saw he saw the imperial guards took the next part of the relay, he stopped altogether catching his breath and while doing so calculated his loss, a two-mile run, for a loaf of bread leaving his entire shop open to the street and probably to many other street urchins like the one he was following, he turned about and started running back. The first group of people who were following Khaled now also turned one by one somehow, the entry of imperial guards damped their interest in the chase and they soon remembered as having more important things to do than run after an urchin.  Frankly, no one wanted to be on the bad side of the imperial guard so one by one they all fell behind. With imperial guards and a few people who managed to gain some distance on the thief,  attracted a new set of people, this group with new vigor and fresh energy started yelling  running after the imperial guards, they soon were joined by few other people who just wanted to make most of this morning, so,  they too started to run after the thief. The imperial guards were amazed at the crowd following them. Never had they witnessed such a chase and the excited throng that followed it.

People in the bazaar looked at the scene, for them, the scene was as new as a fresh canvas with the thief nowhere in sight, the people took in the scene as was happening, a mob was running after the imperial guards, they thought, these are the sultan’s henchmen and surely they must have done something bad for no ordinary people had the courage to stand up to a single guard, leave the quartet with a sergeant and his troop. A new group of people who more or less came to the same conclusion started to run after the guards. A whole lot of new crowd now started to follow the henchman, one of the imperial guards, the sergeant who while looking back at the crowd met upfront and stumbled upon an incense seller on the street. making the incense spread everywhere, it gave the chase, an ecclesiastical look, and aroma. While his troop stopped to help him up Khaled had very cleverly taken a sharp turn and taken refuge in the stack of hay.

Now seeing the excited and yelling crowd charging at them, the guards heavily outnumbered, with no time to douse the excitement of the crowd, started to run to the first alley they could find and the eerie screaming crowd, seeing the guards flee, which they actually did,  followed them more excited and with a whole lot of screaming.

After a while Khaled came out of his safe refuge, and as he was dusting his ragged clothes that had been patched at so many places that the original cloth was just the border that was clinging on to the patches. It looked like a multicolored tapestry that one would present to the princess at the sultan's palace. He took out the bread and looked at it. All the while he was running, he only had a glimpsed of the trampled bread, now as he looked at the bread, he thought for a while and broke the bread in half. The trampled one, he fed to the horse, gloomily looking at him, neighing with questions as to what this little urchin is doing in his heap of food?  

Khaled walked back to the bazaar as if nothing happened he looked at the many souks lined up,  selling many wares both exotic and local, the sellers who ran after him calling him thief were now so preoccupied with their wares and customers, that they hardly noticed a 13-year old urchin, in ragged clothes, like so many others in the imperial district of the great Ottoman empire.  They neither had interest nor time to go after a lump of bread. And soon it was forgotten. The memory of the public is only limited to their current inhibitions, most events pass through this collective limited memory in such a manner that even the most important events are forgotten in the process.

Khaled walked past the bazaar, the fresh smell of falafel filled his nostrils, and his stomach answered the call by churning. He was hungry but he won’t be charmed with the smell, he took determined steps to the fisher shacks that were more close to the docks of the salty Mediterranean and smelled perpetually of dead fish as if this eternal smell will make long after the human creed has left its footmark of egomania as a simple mark on the limestone rock pressured to the minuscule the maniacal achievements to the zagged lines. coming to one of the shacks, which was no more than three walls and cloth, while most rags patched on the cloth which served both as a door in the day and quilt at the night. He went in.

to be continued...!!