"Good. Now, Peer Sahib, what happened to you?" asked the Kótwal of another officer present.
"My lord, it was just before midnight," he replied, "when two men, Gosais, brought a third person, who was slightly wounded, but complained much of his neck. He is a foreigner, for he speaks the Delhi language. They said he had been robbed, and told us to keep him safe till the morning, when they would come for him; and as the man was very helpless, we put him on a bed in the guard-room, and have brought him here. Again at dawn, some of the men were going towards the temple of Toolja Bhowani, when they saw the dead body of a man, with a deep wound in his back and a stab in his breast—a Hindu, for he had on a Brahmun's thread, so he may be a Rajpoot; but no one knew him. Several mohurs were picked up by him and others between this place and the temple:—the Mutsuddee has them—eleven, I think,—and there was blood all the way along. It was a desperate cut; and how the man could have run at all with those wounds, it is hard to say."
"He was murdered, then," thought Fazil; "would I had not struck him! yet there is one traitor and robber the less."
"And the man who was brought in, what of him?" asked the Kótwal.
"He moaned and groaned, my lord, worse than a woman; said he had been robbed at the temple; spoke of Pahar Singh who had wounded him, Maun Singh who had throttled him, then of the Shah's secretary—may his name be honoured!—and some ten thousand rupees. In short, noble sir, we could make nothing of the matter, for he began to weep if we spoke to him, and told us to take him to the King without delay. So we brought him here, and must speak for himself. It appeared to me like the dream of some opium-smoker," continued the speaker to those about him; "we could not understand it at all."
"Shouldst thou know the men who brought him?"
"Well, my lord, I can't say for certain," replied the officer, "but one of our people said they were not what they seemed; and he thought one was Bulwunt Rao, who is a Silladar of the noble Khan yonder, and who goes about bazars at night, sometimes; the other's face was tied up, and he did not speak."
"I was the other, Meerza Sahib," interposed Fazil, quietly.
"I thought as much," said the Kótwal, drily. "Were they armed, Peer Sahib?"
"Yes, to be sure, my lord," he replied; "would any one go about in those quarters at night without being armed? Yes, they had sword and shield."