A Fellow Traveller is short story written by English writer, A.G Gardiner. The main theme of story ” A Fellow Traveller” is freedom, compassion, equality and uncertainty.
A Fellow Traveller By A.G Gardiner
Summary of A Fellow Traveller By A.G Gardiner
When you travel via bus or train so there are many other people with you too. The story writer is travelling by train and in train he has one more traveller with him who is very special. The story begins with writer who says I don’t know who came in that train first, I think he must be there before I came in but maybe I did not notice him.
I’m traveling in a train which is going from London to Midland town. It is a stopping train which stops at every station and moved slowly-slowly. Train is very boring as takes so much time to go from one place to another. Our writer saw train stop at every station and few passenger leaves the train at every station. At the end of journey, writer was the only person left in train or maybe he feels like he is the only person left in train.
The writer says being alone in the train give him a freedom, he can do whatever he wants. No one see me, no one can judge and no one can stop me. The writer gives examples what things you can do if you are alone in train. He says you can talk loudly as no one would listen you, you can crack joke yourself and can laugh at your own jokes. You can roll on floor of train without caring that dust on it can destroy your clothes.
If you want you can stand by head and no one would see you. You can sing song or dance or try a golf shot or you can play marbles on train floor. No one will see you, no one will heard and no one will judge you. You would have enough freedom to open the window of train or you can close it, it is your wish. When we travel with people, many people gives suggestion to close window or open it. Since you are alone in train you can close and open train window as your wish.
But writer say, I didn’t do any of these things on train that day. I didn’t do it because I didn’t remember to do any of these things in train. The writer does ordinary things when he was alone in train, he put his newspaper aside, lie on seat and started looking out from the windows. Thereafter, I started reading news paper again while smoking cigarette. After some time, writer realizes he is not alone in train there is one more fellow traveller with him travelling in train.
That fellow traveller came flying and sits on a nose of writer. Now you can understand, if he is sitting on nose that means he is an insect. Here writer is talking about Mosquito. As writer touches his nose, Mosquito flied and keep flying in train compartment. Mosquito took round of the compartment and this time he sits on writer’s neck. The writer touches his neck and flied Mosquito from his neck. Mosquito again flied, took a round of compartment and this time he sits on a elbow of writer.
The writer gets angry, everything has its limit, I gave two warnings to you but now you are crossing your limits. I’m wearing a black cap which means I’m a judge of this compartment so as a judge I sentence you to death. You have made many mistakes and there is lots of evidence against you, evidence is that you are disturbing public peace as well as you are travelling without a ticket in train. You don’t even have a meat coupon which means you have no right to drink blood of people.
Your punishment is death for your crimes. Thereafter, writer attacks on Mosquito with his right hand but Mosquito immediately flies away. I felt ashamed as I couldn’t kill a Mosquito. I have decided to kill a Mosquito anyhow because it is a matter of self-respect now. The writer stood up, roll my newspaper and tried to kill that Mosquito from one seat to another seat. Wherever Mosquito went I follows him to kill but every time he saves his life and flied away.
This was all wasted as I couldn’t kill a mosquito but I believe Mosquito must be enjoying me as I was not able to kill him. After some time, my anger subsided for Mosquito. The writer say, Mosquito kills superiority in me. I have decided that I won’t kill this Mosquito now. Afterwards, I put my newspaper on table, Mosquito came flying and sits on newspaper. I said to mosquito, you are sitting on wrong place because If I fold this paper then you will die in it.
But I will not kill you now because I like you. I feels like you’re my younger brother. You and me both are fellow traveller and will travel together till our destination. The writer was talking to Mosquito, he heard a sound from window and that is Coolie who wants to pick writer’s bag. At the end of story, writer pick his luggage and started going out from train but before going out he look back to see Mosquito one more time. Mosquito was still flying around a lamp.