Chapter 4

Over a period of time, Marcus quit his daytime job and began working as a caricature artist at the bridge. . With bent backs, beggars would crouch along the grand bridge adorned with white satin scarves on their necks to protect themselves from the icy winds which ran through the city during the winter. On a quite silent day, when for a moment silence would be accentuated and heard with utmost clarity, you could hear the guy with the harp would play the first melody for the day.
Looking down below from the bridge, one could see that the waters had frozen over the lakes and the rivers seem placid. The sunlight reflected sharply and gave a glint of golden hue though this frozen surface to the surroundings for its albeit brief appearance during the day. The changing of the seasons had bought about an almost angelic respect for the sun. He realized it was not just him, but also with the great stage he shared on this bridge. These were the people who celebrated life, in the midst of a never ending bridge that seemed to bustle with a great energy of its own. There were jesters abound, who would come with their melancholic faces at the break of dawn, and at the first advent of the morn, would sit on their rumpled jackets to change into their uniforms. These uniforms, their own symbol of joy were the perfect masks to show the almost symbiotic relationship that exists between melancholy and jest.

It surely must not be the portrait, he thought.

But for all his logical explainations, Marcus still could never get the sense of comfort that exists in a state of denial. He just could not forget the gaze of the artist as he patiently waited day after day in the café, his meager lunch completed with a bottle of whisky.. Of what remained of the artist and his whereabouts he just didn’t know. But somehow, somewhere, through that haunting portrait, he had left behind in him the remnants of an artist’s gaze.
It could not be the liveliness of the colours that existed despite their contrast in the picture which struck him. Nor could it be how peaceful black and white looked to each other, almost seamlessly blended in a single canvas.

How could it be? How could a single picture almost change a state of being?

These sudden spurts of irrational thought, which almost became a source of joy to him could not be just the handiwork of a man who he hardly knew. Never. For all Marcus knew, he was just a penniless artist who visited the café for his meager lunch and a small cup of whisky.

And what of art? Art has never captured a human being. It was a rather foolish thought and an inhuman one at that.