Page:Bengal Fairy Tales.djvu/39

Rh failure. The means they had adopted for his destruction had made him rich in the possession of eight milch cows. What more could they do? They racked their brains to find a solution of the question, and ultimately resolved to burn him alive by setting fire to his house the next night. The object of their evil intentions, however, by some means or other, guessed what was brewing, and spent the night chosen by the incendiaries for the crime, away from home. His house, however, was reduced to heaps of charcoal and ashes during his absence. But he was not the man to submit to misfortune without attempting to turn it to the best advantage. Returning home, he collected the charcoal, and, putting it into two large gunny-bags, which he placed on the back of one of his cows, one bag on each side, he started for the market for the ostensible purpose of selling their contents.

He knew well that the sale would fetch very little, so he did not really go to the market at all, but roamed about on the look out for further adventure. The day, however, passed unprofitably, and in the evening he retired to a Chati.

There he found a man with a cow loaded in the same way as his. In course of conversation, he asked his companion what his bags contained, and was told that they were filled with rupees. Being asked what the contents of his bags were, Khoodeh said that they were gold mohurs. Now this was a most successful cast of his dice, for when he was asleep the other man, who could hardly close his eyes during the night on account of the itching in his fingers to make the gold mohurs his own, got up long before the dawn, and drove away Khoodeh's cow with the bags of charcoal on it, leaving his own behind.

Khoodeh was prepared for the success of his ruse, so getting up at dawn, he drove the cow with the money home, reaching it before his brothers were awake. Their wives, however, had left their rooms, and were engaged in their morning duties. Unburdening the cow, and pouring down the money on the floor of his sleeping room as noiselessly as