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Piari embankment I saw that the party consisted of two covered bullock-carts and five or six men on foot. They were evidently going towards the railway-station.

I felt that I ought to keep out of their sight, for, however intelligent they might be, if they saw me standing alone there, like a veritable ghost, at that hour of the night, they would at least make a terrible uproar, if nothing more.

I came back and stood in my original place. A few minutes later the little company passed by along the embankment just above me. I thought at first that I had been detected, for one of the foremost men stood looking towards me for several seconds and then spoke to someone in the first bullock-cart, but they proceeded almost immediately and were soon lost to sight behind a bushy tree. Feeling that the night was almost over, I was making up my mind to return when a loud voice came from behind the tree. 'Srikanta Babu!'

'Hallo,' I cried. 'Is that Ratan?'

'Yes, sir. Please come this way, sir.'

Quickly mounting the embankment, I asked, 'Ratan, are you going home?'

'Yes, sir,' he answered, 'we're going home: and Mother is in the first cart.'

As I approached the cart, Piari looked out through the curtains and said, 'I knew that it could not be anybody else as soon as the durwan described what he saw. Come up into the cart; I have something to tell you'.

'What is it?' I asked, going nearer.