'And our Somâj dispensary hath trebled its attendance these last days. The people know their friends, know themselves safe! Not that the tales of poison at the hospitals are true; but what will you? These poor folks are ignorant, and we have promised----'
What the promise was, Khôjee did not catch; nor did she care to know. All her thoughts were with Khâdjee's pink satin trousers. Therefore she felt as if the whole round world had slipped from under her feet when Mittun, the pawnbroker, from the midst of the miscellaneous collection of rubbish in which he sat like a tame magpie possessed by the nest-building instinct, told her calmly that he had just sold them! Sold them at an incredibly high price to a lady of the bazaar who was in a hurry for something smart in which to appear at an assignation that evening. And then, with infinite self-complacency, he drew out from a bag two rupees and some pice.
'See this, mother!' he said, handing her the money. ''Tis a chance such as comes but once in a kobari's life, who must needs fill his belly a many times with other folk's leavings ere he find a grain of corn to stay his own hunger withal.' Here he looked round distastefully at the old lamps, keys, pickle-bottles, rags, books--Heaven knows what--that made up his stock-in-trade, and which, in truth, looked but indigestible fare. 'Yet I am honest,' he went on; 'this much I made, over and above what I loaned thee on them. So there 'tis, with but the due interest held back. Let none say Mittun, kobari, is no honest man, who cares not for his customers----'
'Nay! meean-jee,' fluttered Khôjee, helpless. 'None said that of thee. Yet would I rather the trousers, and I could have given thee gold.'
Mittun eyed the bangle covetously. 'Give it me now, mother. I could loan thee ten rupees on that to buy new trousering.'
Khôjee shook her head timidly; for even the pawnbroker, being a man, had authority.
''Tis for to-morrow, brother; there is not time----'
'Thou couldst buy second-hand,' he persisted; 'there be many in the bazaar, though I have them not. In truth, Mussumat Khôjee, I would have sold thine for less than I got, seeing that old clothes are no safe purchase nowadays, what with police inspection, and no rags here, no rags there! As if the plague came in aught but God's will!'
Khôjee, fearful of persuasion, assented hastily to the pawnbroker's piety. Everything was God's will; even her failure to redeem the pink satin trousers!
'I will give thee fifteen for the bangle,' called Mittun after her, and she quickened her limp from the temptation. The bangle was for another purpose. Still fifteen rupees would purchase the 'Essence of Happiness' and leave a margin for sagou dam (sago) and salep misri. Also for real cardamoms. Yes! surely with fifteen rupees in prospect she might afford herself some real cardamoms for to-morrow's assemblage, instead of the cheaper kind she had laid in. It would give style to the occasion, even if the pink satin trousers were unattainable.