"It was the esh-starffit[[25]] quails, Huzoor, that I had prepared for the Protector of the Poor; two for his Honour, seeing that he loves the dish, and one for Barker sahib,[[26]] should God send a guest, so that the dignity of the table be upheld even in the wilderness. And, lo! as I sat decorating the dish, my mind occupied in desires to please, I saw him--the infamous Bowriah boy--make off with one. Aged as I am I fled after him, then remembering boys' ways, ran back round the tent in time to see him, from fear, replacing it. Finally, with hue and cry, we caught both escaping into the darkness of the desert."
"Both of them!" I echoed; "but you said there was only one."
"The Huzoor mistakes," retorted the khânsâman quite huffily. "Perchance there was one who stole, and one who gave back. This slave had no time for trivial observation, these being undoubtedly the thieves." He emphasised his words by dragging Mungal and Bungal forward by the ears, and knocking their heads together; his following meanwhile testifying its assent by undertoned remarks, that being Bowriahs the boys were necessarily thieves, and that in addition it was superfluous, if not impious, to draw invidious distinctions where it had pleased Providence to make none.
But my curiosity had been aroused. "Mungal and Bungal," I said solemnly, addressing the culprits who, with hands folded in front of them like infant Samuels, stood cheerfully stolid, just as the adult members of their tribe invariably did when brought before me as habitual criminals, "do you by chance know what telling the truth means?"
As they assured me fervently that they did, I went on to explain that my only desire in this case was to have the truth; that no one should suffer by it; that contrariwise the tellers should receive bucksheesh. Here their beady eyes wandered in confident familiarity to the rotund person of the Deputy Inspector, who had rushed to the scene in mufti on hearing of the crime, and I knew instinctively that they were discounting my words by inherited experience of similar promises. So it was with a prescience of what would follow that I put the least formidable question--
"Which of you replaced the quail?"
The answer came double-barrelled, unhesitating, "I did, Huzoor."
"Let me give the boys five stripes each with the bamboo, Huzoor!" suggested the Deputy Inspector with a stifled yawn, when I had wasted much time and more unction, "it is good for boys at all times, and these are but boys--as yet."
It would have been the wisest plan, but I could not make up my mind to it, so I went to bed that night certain of but one thing--either Mungal or Bungal was a thief. The question was--which?
It kept me awake until I made up my mind that somehow, by hook or by crook, I would find out. Twenty-four hours was after all too short a time for a character study; but I was to be on tour for six weeks at least, and if I took the boys with me I should have ample opportunity of settling the question. Besides, they would be invaluable as trackers.