He was nothing but skin and bones.

He was nothing but skin and bones. He looked at me for a long time, moving his lips and finally said: ‘Thanks God, I finally found my friend!’ He was my old friend! I became very upset and my heart stood still. I asked him surprisingly: ‘What is this condition?’ With a gesture, he suggested I should raise him to a sitting position. I did so. He started to talk with a weak voice, telling his story: ‘I was living with my mother for ten years.

A wealthy man living in a splendid palace was our next-door neighbor. I was enchanted by his beautiful girl. I made friend with her with the promise of marrying her, but before marriage, she became pregnant. I was double–hearted as to whether I should marry or leave her. Finally, I made up my mind to leave her. I moved to a new house without any information. One day, I received a letter from the girl to whom I had lied about marriage.

The letter greatly shook me.’ My friend stretched his hand and took out a letter from under the pillow. He gave the letter to me to read it. The letter started with these words: ‘If I am writing to you, it is not because I love you, for your deceitful behavior is not important. When you left me, you did not think about the fate of me and the child I had with me. I cannot call you a human being with your merciless and inhumane behavior. You said you loved me, but you were lying.

You seduce me and broke your promise! The result was that I escaped from home and took residence in a poor district of the city. My parents died frustrated in their hopes. I am in my deathbed in the last days of my life. You are a liar, deceitful, a criminal! I do not think that God will let you free and let you go unpunished! I am not writing this letter to express my love, for you are too mean to be loved. You have a trust with me and that is your innocent daughter.

If you have a bit of fatherly love, come and take this miserable child!’ I had hardly finished the letter when I realized that he was bitterly weeping. He said: ‘When I read this letter, I was about to die. I speedily went to her place which is this very house. I found her lying motionless on this bed with her daughter sitting next to her. Seeing the girl weeping, I became unconscious.

When I came to consciousness, I had the feeling that my inhumane crimes had turned into ferocious beasts which were about to attack me. Therefore, I decided to live and die like her in the same room which I called the ‘chamber of sorrows’.