In an instant the brave feelings of his nature rose uppermost, for was he not Bahadūr? and addressing his sword, as the custom of Orientals often is, he said, “Oh! sword! thou hast been with me in many an honourable fight, and shall I now tarnish thy fair fame by using thee thus? No. I ask pardon, and return you to your scabbard without a stain.” And so saying he let the blind man pass.
But he determined upon following him, and if possible, to recover his money; whereupon he crept stealthily behind him and close upon his heels, and when the old blind villain arrived at his hut, Bahadūr Singh saw him open the door, and before he had time to close and fasten it from the inside, the brave soldier had managed to slip in too, and quite unheard. Keeping very silent, he watched the old villain take off his “kummul” and his wallet, and then make his way to a corner of the hut. He there took up a tile flush with the floor, and removed from a hole beneath it a “chattie,” or earthenware vessel, in which he was proceeding to put in from his wallet the money he had collected during the day. Bahadūr Singh saw his own hundred gold mohurs going in one by one, and then overheard the old blind villain say, “I have done well to day. I have here four hundred gold mohurs, and with this further one hundred, I shall have five hundred gold mohurs, and who so rich as I?” And then he carefully returned the “chattie” and put back the tile, feeling it over and over again to be sure that it was in its right place. He then returned to his “charpai,” or cot, and sat down, apparently to think a bit.
BAHADŪR SINGH AND THE BLIND BEGGAR.
It was now Bahadūr Singh’s turn to try his luck at recovering his money; so moving very noiselessly, he crept to the money corner, lifted the tile, took out the “chattie,” and was getting back to a spot he had selected behind the “charpai,” when as ill-luck would have it, he struck against a shelf projecting from the wall, and the noise at once aroused the old blind villain, who rushed to the money corner, only to find that his store had vanished. He howled, he shouted at the top of his voice, he brandished about him his staff, smashing the water-pots, and deluging the hut with water, and it was only by great dexterity that Bahadūr Singh could keep behind him, and so avoid coming in contact either with him or his staff.
In a very short time, however, there came a knock at the door, and the old blind villain let in a stranger, who, to Bahadūr Singh’s relief, was, he noticed, also a blind man. The stranger called out, “What is all this noise about?” “Hai, Hai! Booh, Booh!” said the old blind villain; all my money is gone, and I am ruined for ever.” “Your money gone” he replied, “How can that be? Where did you put it?” “Here, here,” he said, pulling the stranger to the money corner. “But what a fool you were to keep it there! Why didn’t you do as I always do? When I get enough together to make up a gold mohur I sew it up into my turban.”
Bahadūr Singh, hearing this, at once by a quick and quiet movement reached forward and took off the turban of the stranger and put it aside, whereupon the stranger rushed at the old blind villain and said, “Why did you take my turban off and where is it?” “I didn’t,” he replied. “But you must have done so, for there is no one else here, and you want to take my money now, do you?” So saying, he went for the old blind villain, knocked him down on to the slushy floor, and pummelled him until he cried hard for mercy.
Bahadūr Singh, with something like a smile at seeing his enemy punished, then quitted the hut, leaving them to fight it out. He took with him the “chattie” and the gold mohurs, and left the turban behind.
He went straight to the village police, told the story, claimed only his own one hundred gold mohurs, and left with them the four hundred belonging to the old blind villain, which were there and then confiscated to the State.
So this old blind villain not only lost his money, but got a terrible thrashing into the bargain, and this tale is often told in the “Hûjrâhs,” or places of meeting of the village story-tellers, as a capital instance of how best to retaliate, and how cleverly the biter was bit.