“Yes, Resident,” was the reply, “three buttertubs full, and fifteen tins have been delivered into my custody. In the tubs the opium was packed just like butter, one little tub of ten kilos, inside a larger one, and surrounded by coarse salt. The tins contain about five kilos each. The whole amounts to about one and a half ‘pikols.’ ”
“So, so,” said van Gulpendam, “that is a pretty good haul.”
“Which are worth,” continued Meidema, “I should say, about nine thousand guilders.”
“How do you make that out?” asked the Resident. “You know Government delivers the raw opium to the farmers at the rate of 30 guilders the kattie. Now, 30 × 150, is, according to my reckoning, no more than four thousand five hundred guilders. I am right, am I not?”
“You are perfectly right, sir,” replied Meidema. “But you must remember that this is not raw material. We have got hold of tjandoe, and you know, I suppose, that one kattie of raw opium gives only fifteen thirty second parts of pure tjandoe.”
“I daresay you are right,” said the other. “But,” he added, fixing a very strange look upon his inspector, “are you quite sure it is opium?”
Without appearing to notice his superior officer’s look, Meidema answered at once: “It is something better than that, sir, it is tjandoe. Look at the sample, I have one here with me. It is the purest Bengal article.”
“Hadn’t we better,” said van Gulpendam, “submit that sample to a chemist for analysis?”
“Just as you please,” said Meidema; “but I see not the slightest need for that. It is tjandoe, and it contains, at least, twenty or thirty per cent of morphia.”
“Indeed,” quoth van Gulpendam. “I was only thinking—Well, it is your business, you know what is best. The contraband has been placed in your custody. You know, I suppose, where it came from?”