"This is very unsatisfactory," said I; "we have as yet no clue to his disappearance. If he has gone away, he must have ridden; where is his horse?"
"Ay, where is it?" cried Cheetoo. "Who can tell us?"
"May I be your sacrifice!" said Shekh Qadir; "the horse is not here, nor his Saees. The Khan had two horses, but the saddle of the one missing is that in which all the gold was sewed up."
"Ha!" said Cheetoo, "is it so? Where is the other Saees?"
"Peer-o-Moorshid?" cried an attendant; "he is waiting without."
"Let him too be called." The man entered.
"What knowest thou?" asked Cheetoo.
"I only know," said the fellow, "that the gray horse was kept saddled all the afternoon: this was contrary to custom, for its saddle was always placed in the tent, near the Khan's head when he slept. I asked my fellow Saees the reason of its being so; but he was angry with me, and said it was no business of mine, that the Khan had ordered it, and it was his pleasure. I saw him take the horse from his picket after dark, but I asked no questions."
"There remains but one conclusion to be drawn, Nuwab Sahib," said I. "Ghuffoor Khan has fled, and made off with the booty he had got. By all accounts he had been very fortunate; and every one said his saddle was stuffed with gold."
"So I have also heard," said Cheetoo; "but yet it is hard to think of that man's ingratitude. Here have I been associated with him from boyhood: I have raised him from obscurity to be a leader of three thousand horse; and this has been a scurvy ending to my kindness. Go," said he to the servants, "I find no fault with any of you; take the horse to my pagah, and let him be tied up among my own."