thing we get except cash on your hands, and that this very night."
"I understand," Rajmohan replied, "you will do well not to conceal from me how much you stand in need of my aid. You are aware that a deed in such a big and wealthy house will be followed by too strict an enquiry and too hot a search for the property to render it convenient to you all to be enjoying your shares in quiet for some time, and you absolutely want somebody who can hold them in trust for you—which you well know none can do so well as I, specially as suspicion will not easily fall on me. Yes, I have an excellent hiding-place for such things; but I shall demand too much I fear."
"You see it—be moderate in your terms," rejoined the dacoit, for such, the reader sees, he was.
"We won't haggle," replied Rajmohan, "I want one-fourth of what you may sell the things for."
The dacoit knew Rajmohan too well to think he was endeavouring to bully him into a bad bargain.—He was silent for a moment and then said:
"So far as I am concerned—agreed; but I must take the opinion of the others, though you know my word in such matters is their word also."
"I have no doubt of that," responded Rajmohan, "but one word more. Before you take away these things, we will make a guesswork of what the things will sell for—and you will
