12.

Oak tree(n) - a large tree which bears acorns and typically

has lobed deciduous leaves.
13. Pecked(v) - strike or bite something with its beak.
14. Fitted(v) - made or shaped to fill a space or to cover something
closely or exactly.
15. Scarlet minivets(v)- a boldly patterned Asian cuckoo-shrike
(songbird)

TEXT

“THIS One day, when Rakesh was six, he walked from the
Mussoorie bazaar eating cherries. They were a little sweet, a little
sour; small, bright red cherries, which had come all the way from
the Kashmir valley.

Here in the Himalayan foothills where Rakesh lived, there

were not many fruit trees. The soil was stony, and the dry cold
winds stunted the growth of most plants. But on the more
sheltered slopes there were forests of oak and deodar.

Rakesh lived with his grandfather on the outskirts of

Mussoorie, just where the forest began.

Grandfather was a retired forest ranger. He had a little cottage

outside the town.

Rakesh was on his way home from school when he bought

the cherries. He paid fifty paisa for the bunch. It took him about
half an hour to walk home, and by the time he reached the cottage
there were only three cherries left.

‘Have a cherry, grandfather,’ he said, as soon as he saw

grandfather in the garden.

Grand father took one cherry and Rakesh promptly ate the
other two. He kept the last seed in his mouth for some time,
rolling it round and round on his tongue until all the tang had
gone. Then he placed the seed on the palm of his hand and studied
it.

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 ‘Are cherry seeds lucky?’ asked Rakesh.

‘Of course.’

‘Nothing is lucky if you put it away. If you want luck, you

must put it to some use.’

‘What can I do with a seed?’

‘Plant it.’

So Rakesh found a small spade and began to dig up a flower-

bed.

‘Hey, not there,’ said grandfather. ‘I’ve sown mustard in that

bed. Plant it in that shady corner, where it won’t be disturbed.’

Rakesh went to a corner of the garden where the earth was

soft and yielding. He did not have to dig. He pressed the seed
into the soil with his thumb and it went right in.

Then he had his lunch, and ran off to play cricket with his
friends, and forgot all about the cherry seed.

When it was winter in the hills, a cold wind blew down from
the snows and went whoo-whoo-whoo in the deodar trees, and
the garden was dry and bare. In the evenings grandfather and
Rakesh sat over a charcoal fire, and grandfather told rakesh
stories – stories about people who turned into animals, and ghosts
who lived in trees, and beans that jumped and stones that wept
– and in turn Rakesh would read to him from the news paper,
Grandfather’s eyesight being rather weak. Rakesh found the news
paper very dull – especially after the stories – but grand father
wanted all the news…

They knew it was spring when the wild duck flew north again,
to Siberia. Early in the morning, when he got up to chop wood
and light a fire, Rakesh saw the V shaped formation streaming
northwards and heard the calls of birds clearly through the thin
mountain air.

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 One morning in the garden he bent to pick up what he thought
was a small twig and found to his surprise that it was well rooted.
He stared at it for a moment, then ran to fetch grandfather, calling,
‘Dada, come and look, the cherry tree has come up!’

‘What cherry tree?’ Asked grandfather, who had forgotten

about it.

‘The seed we planted last year – look, it’s come up!’

Rakesh went down on his haunches, while Grandfather bent

almost double and peered down at the tiny tree. It was about
four inches high.

‘Yes, it’s a cherry tree,’ said grandfather. ‘You should water it

now and then.’

Rakesh ran indoors and came back with a bucket of water.

‘Don’t drown it!’ said grandfather.

Rakesh gave it a sprinkling and circled it with pebbles. ’what

are the pebbles for?’ asked grandfather.

‘For privacy,’ said Rakesh.

He looked at the tree every morning but it did not seem to be

growing very fast. So he stopped looking at it – except quickly,
out of the corner of his eye. And, after a week or two, when he
allowed himself to look at it properly, he found that it had grown
– at least an inch!

That year the monsoon rains came early and Rakesh plodded
to and from school in rain coat and gum boots. Ferns sprang
from the trunks of trees, strange looking lilies came up in the
long grass, and even when it wasn’t raining the trees dripped
and mist came curling up the valley. The cherry tree grew quickly
in this season.

It was about two feet high when a goat entered the garden

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and ate all the leaves. Only the main stem and two thin branches
remained.

‘Never mind,’ said grandfather, seeing that Rakesh was upset.

‘It will grow again: cherry trees are tough.’

Towards the end of the rainy season new leaves appeared on

the tree. Then a woman cutting the grass cut the cherry in two.

When grandfather saw what had happened, he went after

the woman and scolded her; but the damage could not be repaired.

‘May be it will die now,’ said Rakesh.

‘May be,’ said grandfather.

But the cherry tree had no intention of dying.

By the time summer came round again, it had sent several

new shoots with tender green leaves. Rakesh had grown taller
too. He was eight now, a sturdy boy with curly black hair and
deep black eyes. ‘Blackberry,’ grandfather called them.

That monsoon Rakesh went home to his village, to help his

father and mother with the planting and ploughing and sowing.
He was thinner but stronger when he came back to his
grandfather’s house at the end of rains, to find that cherry tree
had grown another foot. It was now up to his chest.

Even when there was rain, Rakesh would sometimes water

the tree. He wanted it to know that he was there.

One day he found a bright green praying mantis perched on

a branch, peering at him with bulging eyes. Rakesh let it remain
there. It was the cherry tree’s first visitor.

The next visitor was a hairy caterpillar, who started making

a meal of the leaves. Rakesh removed it quickly and dropped it
on a heap of dry leaves.

‘Come back when you are a butterfly,’ he said.

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 Winter came early. The cherry tree bent low with the weight
of snow. Field mice sought shelter in the roof of the cottage. The
road from the valley was blocked, and for several days there was
no newspaper, and this made grandfather quite grumpy. His
stories began to have unhappy endings.

In February it was Rakesh’s birthday. He was nine – and the

tree was four, but almost as tall as Rakesh.

One morning, when the sun came out, Grandfather came

into the garden. ‘Let some warmth get into my bones,’ he said.
He stopped in front of the cherry tree, stared at it for a few
moments, and then called out, ‘Rakesh! Come and look! Come
quickly before it falls!’

Rakesh and grandfather gazed at the tree as though it had

performed a miracle. There was a pale pink blossom at the end of
a branch.

The following year there were more blossoms. And suddenly

the tree was taller than Rakesh, even though it was less than
half his age. And then it was taller than grandfather, who was
older than some of the oak trees.

But Rakesh had grown too. He could run and jump and climb
trees as well as most boys, and he read a lot of books, although
he still liked listening grandfather’s tales.

In the cherry tree, bees came to feed on the nectar in the

blossoms, and tiny birds pecked at the blossoms and broke them
off. But the tree kept blossoming right through the spring, and
there were always more blossoms than birds.

That summer there were small cherries on the tree. Rakesh

tasted one and spat it out.

‘It’s too sour,’ he said.

‘They‘ll be better next year,’ said grandfather.

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 But the birds liked them – especially the bigger birds, such
as the bulbuls and scarlet minivets – and they flitted in and out
of the foliage, feasting on the cherries.

On a warm sunny afternoon, when even the bees looked

sleepy, Rakesh was looking for grandfather without finding him
in any of his favorite places around the house. Then he looked
out of the bed room window and saw grandfather reclining on a
cane chair under the cherry tree.

‘There is just the right amount of shade here,’ said

grandfather. ‘And I like looking at the leaves.’

‘They’re pretty leaves,’ said Rakesh. ‘And they are always ready
to dance, if there’s breeze.’

After grandfather had come indoors, Rakesh went into the

garden and lay down on the grass beneath the tree. He gazed up
through the leaves at the great blue sky; and turning on his side,
he could see the mountain striding away into the clouds. He was
still lying beneath the tree when the evening shadows crept across
the garden. Grandfather came back and sat down beside the
Rakesh, and they waited in silence until it was dark.

‘There are so many trees in the forest,’ said Rakesh. ‘What’s

so special about this tree? Why do we like it so much?’

‘We planted it ourselves,’ said grandfather. ‘That’s why it’s

special.’

‘Just one small seed,’ said Rakesh, and he touched the smooth
bark of the tree that had grown. He ran his hand along the trunk
of the tree and put his finger to the tip of a leaf. ‘I wonder,’ he
whispered. ‘Is this what it feels to be God?’

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ruskin Bond is a prolific Indian author of British descent,

known for his contribution to children’s literature in India. He
was awarded the Padma Shri in 1999 and Padma Bhushan in

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