The Jinxed Rat !

A great scholar had once opined, "Don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing." Once, an Indian tourist walked into a curio / antique shop in Birmingham with an intention of buying something which is really rare or is hardly heard of.
 
He saw many articles and antiques etc. in that shop, but did not feel like buying anything, as they did not impress him and make him spend money on it.  He was just about to leave that shop, that while turning suddenly; he noticed something which caught his fancy. Curiously looking around at the exotica, he noticed a very life-like, life-sized bronze statue of a rat with his tail somewhat twisted. The piece did not have any price tag, but it was so striking that he immediately decided to buy it. He grabbed it, and walked upto the owner of the shop and asked : "How much for this bronze rat ?"
 
"Twenty five dollars for the rat, one hundred dollars for the story about it," said the shop-owner. The tourist gave the shop-keeper twenty five dollars and said, "I will just take the rat and you can keep the story."
 
After putting the antique in his bag and he started walking down the street carrying his bronze rat. But suddenly,  after walking for a few meters, he noticed that a few real rats have started crawling out of the alleys and sewerage and began to follow him down the street. "This is really disconcerting"  he uttered and began to walk faster and faster. But within a couple blocks, the herd of rats behind him grew into hundreds, and they began squealing and making weird noises. Then he began to trot towards the bay, looking around to see that the rats now had started multiplying and numbered in the thousands, and were still squealing and coming toward him faster and faster, as if trying to chase him to get hold of something from him.
 
He became somewhat scared and concerned as well, and he started running towards the edge of the bay. He also felt as if the rats were in fact, trying to get back their bronze statued rat, which he had purchased from a shop just a little while ago. As he could not tolerate huge number of rats following him, on reaching there, he threw the bronze rat as far out into the bay as he could. Amazingly, the thousands of rats who were following and chasing him very weirdly a short while ago, also started jumping into the bay. He was really flabbergasted to see and judge the whole incidence / scenario, as to what and why was it really happening to him and why suddenly all the rats had appeared and why they have now jumped into the sea.......... And within a few minutes, to his astonishment, he saw that all the rats who have been chasing him, have all drowned in the bay.
 
He was not really able to judge or understand as to what and how did the whole incidence happen. Suddenly, an idea struck his mind and he started walking back to the shop owner with his curious mind - all full of questions and a lot of amazement. But on seeing him back in his shop, the Shop-owner started laughing loudly and weirdly. 
 
"Ah ha.....  ah ha...... " said the owner, "You have come back to me know the story, I knew that you will certainly return to me ......... ?" "No !" said the tourist, with a lot of conviction writ large on his face,  "I have only come back to see if you have any other statue of an Indian politician in bronze !!

 
R.D. Bhardwaj "Noorpuri"