The Stolen Necklace

“The Stolen Necklace” is one of the outstanding stories of the first biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Amishi Khanna, G.D Goenka World School, India.

The Stolen Necklace

Once, two friends lived in Germany, they were Tom Scmitz and Joe Kuhn. Both were in their thirties. Tom was straightforward, solemn and on the other hand, Joe was bubbly, light-hearted and hilarious. They were best friends. Everybody adored their friendship but only Joe’s wife, Sophie, was jealous of them; she sought out a conspiracy to break their friendship forever. She secretly found out the jewelry Tom’s mother had given to him as she knew that Tom only told Joe about it; she stole all the jewelry.

Soon, finding out the theft, Tom became enraged. He blamed Joe of the theft as he had only told him about the place he kept the jewels. He even felt badly hurt as he couldn’t believe that his dearest friend could do such a thing to him. Of course, Joe knew nothing about the theft and was indignant as well as bewildered at being blamed for doing something he had not done, especially by his beloved friend. Feeling poignant he cried out to Tom, “How could you blame me for the theft, after all, I’m your dearest friend?” “Dearest friend my foot!” bellowed Tom, you could see in his awfully distorted face the agony and anger he felt. Joe could also feel this and knew that they were no longer friends but furious enemies from then.

A few years later, there was a prodigious carnival in Berlin and unfortunately both decided to visit with their families. By chance, they accidently met at an ice cream shop and at first they didn’t recognize each other. Tom was the first to realize the situation and tried to pass without being noticed by Joe, but by the corner of his eye he caught sight of one of the stolen necklaces in Sophie’s neck. Anger boiled inside him, and not being able to control himself, he started beating Joe. Bleeding horribly Joe couldn’t defend himself; he waited for the final blow. Somehow, they reached a steep roof, not noticing this Tom kept fighting. Suddenly, Joe’s feet slipped and he was about to fall when, filled with a sudden tenderness, Tom helped him up.

“After that horrendous fight, wh-why did you help me?” stammered Joe feebly, “Because I still love you, but what you did was unforgivable. After all, most of the jewelry was for your daughter’s wedding gift” Tom answered affectionately. “I know all that, but I’ve not stolen anything and my wife told me that the necklace she is wearing is a gift from her brother,” Joe retorted, looking at Sophie. Sophie turned red. Seeing this, the truth came suddenly flooding in his brain: his wife was the culprit, who had stolen the jewelry and created all the misunderstanding.

Tears came pouring down both their cheeks, they embraced; the sweet, merry and warm embrace of friendship among two hateful enemies, who were fighting just two minutes before.