‘And what did you do? you surely did not alter them?’
‘Why, what else could I do, Jemadar? I at last pretended to see the mistake and make fresh accounts.’
‘In other words, O cowardly fool! you ate dirt; you allowed him to obtain a mastery over you which you will never regain. You call yourself a Moonshee!—a man of letters! Shame on you, I say, to allow yourself to be dictated to by a boy! Had I a beard like yours, I would cut it off for very shame.’
‘But, Jemadar—’ he interposed.
‘I tell thee I can hear nothing; I know this will not end here—the fellow’s prying should have been stopped at once; and his suspicions will never rest, believe me, till he has found out the whole; and at any rate we shall lose money.’
‘We shall, certainly.’
‘How much?’
‘Two hundred rupees, I dare say.’
‘Alla! Alla! so much! and the worst is that our trade is stopped.’
‘I fear so; how can it be otherwise, as he observes the rates?’