Narrative Text

THE LOST NECKLACE

Abridge from: Compton’s Precyclopedia Vol.5

By Soemarto

Centuries ago, a young girl sat as still as she could while a man carved her picture into a large stone in a palace wall. It had taken many days. She was very glad when he almost finished it. Her fingers tugged at the golden hawk that hung on a string of red beads around her neck. But the necklace broke and the beads scattered on the ground. The carver picked them all up and he promised to fix them in a short time. The girl said that the necklace was a birthday present from her father.

When the girl grew up she gave the necklace to her daughter who in turn gave it to her daughter, too. One day when a terrible war broke out, the people of the city ran away leaving many things behind.

One of the things left was the pretty necklace.

The enemy soldiers took everything of value they could find. But the beautiful necklace lay unnoticed among some broken toys. Years went by; the drifting sands covered the city and the walls. Each year the city was buried deeper and deeper. Camel caravans passed on it. But nobody knew there was a city buried under the desert.

Then one day, some men and women came looking for buried cities. A fresh water spring and the way the sand had been heaped by the wind told them something might be buried there. And they started digging. They dug for days, deeper and deeper, wider and wider but still they found nothing.

One day… A worker shouted, “I’ve found something. A wall.” Then they dug even more carefully. When the palace wall was uncovered, they brushed the earth from the young girl’s picture.

A few days later as they dug out one of the royal bedrooms, a tiny re bump appeared in the sand. Carefully, they brushed the earth away until a string of dark red beads with a tiny golden hawk was uncovered.

“They are the beads the girl on the wall is wearing”, said one of the men. “She must have been a princess.” Now the treasure from the past is in a museum. People come to look at it and try to imagine the young princess.

Then other men and women are digging, looking for cities that have been buried for so long that they had been forgotten. Each time one is discovered, a little more is learned about people who lived long, long ago.