"If I should choose to qualify the truth a little, it might be awkward if some liar knew where I actually went. I can do my own lying, thank you. And it costs less." So he found a small storekeeper who owed him money and who felt flattered by being aroused from bed by such an important personage. To him he told a long yarn about having been stripped by thieves-- "And if it were known that such bad thieves lurk in your neighborhood, where there is only your shop and a few stables, you might find yourself in bad with the police, who would come and search you--and you know what that means! So you had better say nothing about it." He bought several yards of cotton cloth and dressed himself native style. He also bought a cotton turban, wrapping the silk one carefully around his body underneath his shirt, and into that he tucked his remaining money. "Now perhaps I can venture homeward without being robbed," he remarked to the storekeeper; and having started homeward because he was sure the storekeeper would watch him out of sight, he made a circuit and went hurrying in the opposite direction. His goal now was the Pul-ke-Nichi--the long, narrow thoroughfare on the far side of the city, that dipped down between two mounds, on which the temples of Siva and Kali stood, connected by an ancient bridge. He had no fear of not finding Brahmins awake. "Two things would wake them anyhow," he told himself, "the chink of money; and the least little whisper of smelly, secret news--they love it." * * * * * He was tired to the bone, but he solved that problem. To the pious horror of the temple Brahmins the Ranee had recently installed a modern hospital in that part of town in charge of a young Sikh doctor, who was nothing if not keen on getting cases. There was a motor cycle ambulance, and a night bell. Bamjee rang the bell, gave a false name and told circumstantial details of an accident. He offered to show the way to where the victim was, and the doctor decided to drive the ambulance himself; his presence on the scene, instead of the ignorant ambulance man, might save the victim's life. So Bamjee lay in comfort in the ambulance while the doctor drove at full tilt through the city, missing the legs of sleeping men by inches, clearing the way with his horn and breaking all the rules of even reckless driving with a confidence in destiny and disregard for risk that would never occur to any one except a Sikh intent on winning laurels for himself. And in the dark trough of the Pul-ke-Nichi, where the bridge cast pitch-black shadows and there were too many sleeping nondescripts for even a Sikh to take that chance of killing some one, Bamjee stepped out of the ambulance to find the supposititious victim-- "Compound fracture of both thigh bones, doctor, and the ribs of both sides--one arm broken also, and perhaps internal injury--a very interesting case."