The Bald-Headed Doll !!!

The Bald-Headed Doll!

I found the bald-headed doll lying near the Caretaker's Toilet at the back of the hostel when I was making a round in the early morning hours! I couldn't help picking it up. On closer inspection, I found it to be wearing one of those wavy, dark greenish party dresses with fringes, topped with a light blue, sleeveless skirt that reached down to her bare feet in wavy patterns.

She had an oval-shaped face with roundish eyes the colour of which was sea-green. The lashes around the lids were as pretty as they could get and a complete mismatch with the brows which looked more hand-painted than real. 

She was completely bald!

As the Matron I made it a point not to touch anything belonging to the PG inmates. But the doll even with the bald head looked so pretty that  I was unsure of what to do with it.

"Madam, where did you find it?" I was so lost in the doll that I hadn't even seen when Anjali, the Caretaker's wife had turned up near me."Please, hide it somewhere. If Shruti sees it, she'll raise a hue and cry. You know how stubborn she can be at times."

She was talking about her three-year-old daughter.

I realised that Anjali was right, so I tied the doll with a string to the top of the Christmas Tree. Shruti did get to see the doll after a while and cried her heart out for the doll but it was simply beyond her reach.

Mona, one of the hostel captains, was the next to notice it during breakfast time.

"Ma'am, why did you hang it there? Don't you know that these dolls are I'll omen and bring bad bad luck?"

I was stunned. How could Mona, a third-year Nursing student, talk like that? How could she be so superstitious?

But soon the whole hostel was echoing her concern. Rupsa, the girl staying in the room facing the stairs on the first floor stopped me when I took the doll up to find out if one of the wards had lost the doll or not.

"Madam, please don't bring it in. I'm sorry if I seem rude but there's something, I know what it is…there's something about it that I find….scary."

"I just wanted to know if the doll belongs to you. I know how fond you are Rupsa of dolls. Even on her last visit to the hostel, your Mom was telling me about your fondness for dolls since childhood. Why, the other day, your roommate, Tirna was openly wondering about the number of dolls you have brought to the hostel…"

"She's right, Madam but most of the dolls are Barbie dolls. Barbie dolls are never associated with anything bad. While that one..that one in your hand….Madam, please dump it somewhere. Get rid of it at the earliest before anything untoward happens to YOU!"

I couldn't believe my ears! When almost every single one of them started talking to me in a similar manner, I did not know how to react. I might not have been as bright as some of the inmates of the hostel were but I was never a superstitious girl. How could these girls, there were sixty-one of them, to be precise, be believed to be the representatives of what we call, modern girls, how could they be so superstitious?

I came down an hour later and put the doll back on the tree top.

But my resolve to have the doll still tied to the top of the Christmas tree was slackened when Biswajit, the caretaker, knocked on my door in the afternoon.

"Madam, sorry about disturbing you. May I tell you something?" His tone told me that there was something wrong. He looked ill at ease.

"What is it, Biswajit? Has any of our girls been taken ill all of a sudden?"

"No, no, Madam. They're all as fit as a fiddle, as far as I know." He paused for a moment before continuing, " It's about that horrid doll. Do you know Madam that it was only last year when the hiding place of the jangis (terrorists), that abandoned building behind our hostel, was raided by the police? Nine of them altogether were shot dead. And we didn't know anything about them staying over there! It was such a big jolt! I couldn't sleep for one whole week, thinking about their hideout."

Biswajit now lowered his head and spoke in a hushed tone. "What if the doll has a bomb or something?"

I was so stunned by the fear in his voice that I decided to dump it forthwith.

"You may be right, Biswajit. Why don't you dump it somewhere?"

In spite of his apparent reluctance, Biswajit finally agreed to do my bidding. After he had taken the doll down as he was about to take it to the the garden, not very far away from the hostel, I stopped him.

"Hang on a sec, Biswajit. Let me take a snap of it. If anyone comes looking for the doll afterwards, the photo may be quite handy."

I got back to my room, picked up the mobile from the bed and dashed out. I took not one but three photos of the most beautiful doll I had ever seen in my life!

Soon after that, Biswajit hurried to the wall on the eastern side and flung it as far as he could in the garden used for dumping purposes.

Half an hour had passed when Sneha, Isha, and Rima came to my door.

"Madam, we have a request. As you took that damn…., I mean, that despicable doll all over the hostel, we all feel quite scared, you know. No really, we are, Madam." She must have added the last sentence, having seen the strange look on my face.

"We've discussed the matter and felt that if you could sprinkle some water of the Holy Ganges, the ill effects of the horrible doll may be overcome. Will you do it please, for our sake?"

I was left stranded at the door by their request before I had the good sense to nod my head.

"Don't you worry, girls? I'll do that."

After they had retreated to their rooms, I realised that finding Ganga Jaal in a recently come-up hostel in the middle of nowhere was not going to be easy. Right then I noticed the plastic bottle atop the Godrej almirah in my room. The old sweeper had handed it to me at the end of the Saraswati Puja day in the hostel.

"Thank God. The girls will be relieved."

I climbed up to the third floor sprinkling a little bit of the holy water before every room on each floor.

"Madam, please don't forget to sprinkle a little bit of the water into your room as well as the room of the Caretaker. It is for your safety as well as the safety of his family, you know. Especially the safety of Shruti." Taniya, the girl staying all by herself in the corner on the left of the second floor, came out of her room and asked me on my way back to the ground floor.

With the holy water of the Ganges sprinkled all over the hostel, normalcy was restored. I retired to my room after dinner and was lying down in my bed.

How superstitious and suspicious this generation of girls is! We weren't like them in our days! I heaved a sigh and started fiddling with my mobile. Sleep doesn't come easy as you grow old.

The half photo of the doll appeared on the screen. What a pretty doll it was! I thought to myself. Just then Mona's words came back to me.

"Madam, don't you know that these dolls are I'll omen and bring bad bad luck?"

And the very next moment, I had this eerie feeling. I felt that the eyes of the girl were blinking!

God! Staying with these girls, I seem to have lost my head. No sooner had the thought come to my head when the next slide, the slide of the girl in her party dress surfaced on the screen on its own!

I sat up, stupified. If I thought that I had had enough for one day, I was yet to know about the reality!

By then, the girl had started sweeping around on her feet, dancing!

I couldn't have imagined the whole thing and I knew I had to call Biswajit from his room a few yards away from mine. As I fumbled for the switch, a shot of pain cut through my heart, leaving me numbed.

I made one last attempt to switch the light on. My final blunder for I fell with my face down in the process. I tried to raise my head but the pain this time was more severe. I tried to call out Biswajit but found my voice choked and only some incoherent, inaudible sounds came out of my mouth.

I nearly gave up. Lying in the semi-darkness of the room, the flash of light was like a ray of hope.

I made one last attempt to open my eyes. Where did the mobile come from? How come I hadn't noticed it fall?

I had hardly turned my eyes to the screen when I could see the doll staring at me in a crooked way. That was the last I had seen of the doll……

If I am still alive today, all thanks, Mona. She was feeling a little uneasy even at around 12.30 AM, thinking of the doll and couldn't go to sleep. Lying in bed in her room on the floor above, she told me much, much later - she had heard some strange noise coming from my room. 

Frightened for my safety, she came running down, having already pressed the alarm bell. That must have awakened Biswajit from his sleep. When he came sprinting to my room, accompanied by Mona and a few more girls, he had to break the door open as it was latched from inside.

They found me lying on the floor, face down. But for a small cut on my forehead, there were no other serious injuries.

The mobile was lying towards the left of my head. It was still on with the screen blurring before it became all flashy and blank!

The end