The Courier

The doorbell has rung seven times as I cross the expanse of fifty feet from my room to the front door. Does the idiot with the buzzer-happy finger think I have wings? Or a flunkey exclusively to answer the doorbell in a matter of seconds? “I’m coming,” I snap as the chimes sound for the eighth time. ”What relation are you to XYZ?” calls out an impatient young voice from the gate, even as I open the front door. “What?” “I’m asking what relation you are to XYZ,” repeats the young man on the bicycle, his tone that of one addressing a mental retard. “Wife,” I reply, affronted. He scribbles something on a piece of paper, and as I reach the gate, hands me a couriered package addressed to hubby. “Hold on!” I check him as he turns his bicycle to leave. “Aren’t you supposed to get the acknowledgement document signed when you deliver a package?” “I’ve done it,” he waves the paper at me and starts to cycle away. And all of it suddenly falls into place—the fifty thousand rupee cheque found under the construction debris when the drawing room flooring was being replaced, which my client claimed (in response to indignant questioning), had been sent by courier; the sodden fixed deposit receipt (we’d been away and it had rained), for which hubby had hauled the bank officials over the coals; a neighbour’s legal documents carelessly thrown into our backyard—it all made complete sense now. And here was a member of the fraternity of devious delivery boys, getting away right under my nose. “Stop right there!” I yell with at least ten years worth of frustration over misdelivered documents in my voice. The miscreant freezes in his tracks, and turns around, eyeing me as he would a sabre-toothed tiger, albeit with a touch of ‘what now?’ “How dare you sign my name on the acknowledgement document?” “Well, you were taking a long time coming …” he starts. “Don’t be ridiculous! People can’t fly on wings to answer the doorbell. You’re supposed to wait for a reasonable amount of time after ringing the doorbell.” “Well, ma’am, people can take a long time to answer the doorbell,” he explains. “They might be doing something they can’t stop at once: they might be cooking, or in the loo, or taking a bath, or putting a baby to sleep. Or they might be old and need a long, long time to answer the bell. You can’t expect us to wait around all day at each house.” “And that makes it all right for you to sign their names and throw their couriered packages into their yards and go away?” He simply stares at me. He can’t understand what I’m trying to say. “You either need to wait for the doorbell to be answered and get the acknowledgement document signed by the receiver, or go away without delivering the package,” I explain to him. “Signing someone else’s name is a punishable offense; you could even go to jail for it,” I add for good measure. He looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. “But then they’ll send us again to deliver the package another day!” he protests. “Besides, most courier guys do it. In fact, people tell us to do it because it is such a bother answering doorbells all the time, and most courier packages contain advertisements and other such nonsense anyway. This way, everyone is happy. You get your stuff without botheration and we don’t have to wait. And who cares about the signatures anyway?” I’m reminded of Chekov’s ‘The Malefactor’ that we read as part of our course curriculum in Standard Nine. The boy, just like the protagonist of the story, is unable to make the switch from his reality to mine. I try again, in terms that he might be able to understand: “Why do you think people send stuff by courier and not by normal post?” “Oh! That’s because they want to show how rich they are. Sending stuff by post is cheap”.