"If the sahib would only tell me--"
"I tell you to burke it! Why, man, if I only had your conscience all things would be possible; I'd make money even out of this. I'll help you so far. You have somehow or another to restore certain notes, the numbers of which are known. I happen to have traced one of these already, and you happen to have got hold of a wrong one. I will exchange. If you haven't got it about you,--ah! I see you have; that is a great saving of trouble."
A quarter of an hour later John Raby wrote a few lines to Major Marsden's successor enclosing a thousand-rupee note which he had found in an unexpected place in Colonel Stuart's office, adding his belief that the others would doubtless turn up ere long, and suggesting a few days' grace in order that a thorough search might be made.
"Never lie if you can help it," he said to himself sardonically. "That dear old prig Marsden would be shocked at my squaring this business, though at one stage of the proceedings he tried to do so himself. What the devil would be the good of an inquiry to any living soul? And as I've lost a thousand in avoiding one, no one could accuse me of interested motives. Marsden and I row in the same boat, and if I had had as much money as he has!-- Well, she is a dear little girl, and that's a fact."
He called on the dear little girl after leaving the office, and comforted her greatly by general expressions of hope. They made her almost more grateful to him than any certainty would have done, for they showed a more perfect trust in her father's integrity. So even the young man's caution told in his favour, and he went home very well satisfied with himself, to await the final explanation that was to emanate from the Lâlâ's fertile brain. The notes would be found somewhere, no doubt; or else in looking over his accounts he would discover a like sum owing to Government which would cause the disappearance of the apparent deficiency.
But amid all his terror, the Lâlâ had noted John Raby's assertion that, given a certain conscience, he could make money out of the restitution; and these idle words stood between him and many a solution of the difficulty. His soul (if he had one) was full of hate, a sense of defeat, and a desire for revenge. If only he could devise some plan by which he could retain the plunder, especially that thousand-rupee note the white-faced shaitan had given him in exchange!
Dawn found him still in the upper chamber alone with his faithful jackal. There was determination in his face and dogged resistance in Râm Lâl's.
"Fool!" whispered the usurer. "If I fall, where art thou? And I swear I will let the whole thing go. I have money,--thou hast none. It is only a year without opium or tobacco, Râmu, and the wife and children well cared for meanwhile. Are you going to back out of the agreement, unfaithful to salt?"
"A year is ten years without opium, Lâlâ; and there is no need for this. I am the scapegoat, it is true, but only for safety."
"Son of owls!" cursed the usurer, still under his breath. "It is for safety, thy safety as well as mine. For if thou wilt do as I bid thee, it will tie that shaitan's hands; and if they be not tied, they will meddle. Besides, the sahib-logue are never satisfied without a scapegoat, and if some one go not to jail they will inquire; and then, Râmu, wilt thou fare better? 'Twill be longer in the cells, that is all. Opium can be smuggled, Râmu! See, I promise five rupees a month to the warder, and a big caste dinner when thou returnest from the father-in-law's house