He was caught like a rat in a trap! There was the opening in the wall, the muddy krooplie in his grasp; he stood plainly convicted. The criminal hung his head--of what avail to speak, and aver his innocence?--he was not innocent! Others had got the booty, he would suffer for them. As he had been toiling and labouring they had been within, and had carried off what he too had come to seek. Perhaps he was served rightly; but he never got a chance--no, not even to rob. Meanwhile old Turroo literally rent his clothes, and tore his scanty white beard, and howled, cursed, and gesticulated like a madman. Zālim Sing stood foremost amongst sympathizers (for the venerable relative still possessed a house, cattle, and lands), and said “that truly it did not surprise him to find that the thief was his blood-brother.” Nevertheless, it did astonish most of the assembly, for Chūnnee, if miserably poor, had ever been known to be scrupulously honest. They were amazed, moreover, that he should _begin_ on such a large scale! Chūnnee offered no resistance; he was led away, and shut up in a cowhouse, whilst Zālim Sing’s brother-in-law, full of zeal, ran all the way to Bugwa to fetch the police. The police arrived at daybreak--two men and an inspector, in their blue tunics and red turbans--all looking excessively wise; but their searching and cross-examining, discovered nothing beyond the empty box. How had Chūnnee spirited away the treasures? Who was his accomplice? “Let him be beaten till he speaks,” implored the venerable creature who had been ravished of his treasure. “Let the soles of his feet be roasted until he opens his mouth. Where hath he hidden them?”--and he shouted to the whole assembled village--“the two bags of rupees, the golden bangles, the anklets, the strings of pearls--forty pair without blemish? If he will only give me the pearls!”--and the old man lifted up his voice and wept. A dirty, half-naked old man, how strange it seemed, to behold him weeping for his pearls! Now, had it been a young and lovely woman, the grief would have seemed natural. And who would have believed that old Turroo had such treasures? Ay, he was a sly fox. “Give me my pearls, yea, and my gold mohurs. Thou mayst keep the rest, and go free,” he declared magnanimously. But Chūnnee could not give what he had not got, and therefore held his peace. His children screamed when they saw their father’s arms pinioned with ropes, the iron things on his hands, and heard he was going away to the Jail Khana--screamed from fear and hunger. Meanwhile old Turroo howled and raved like one possessed, and, pointing to his grand-nephew, besought the police to put him to torture by fire, then and there. In former days strange things were done under the mantle of the law; but in these enlightened times no policeman dare venture, even for a large bribe, to practise the question by torture.