Page:Tales of Bengal (S. B. Banerjea).djvu/105

Rh Amarendra called to inquire how the new contract fared and was thunderstruck to find Jogesh's house locked up. Hastening to Campbell & Co.'s Strand offices, he saw a notice "to let" exhibited there. This spectacle confirmed his worst fears—he had been twice swindled outrageously. His only hope lay in the scoundrel's arrest; so he laid an information at the police station, and a clever detective was told off to investigate the charge. Strange was the story which came to light. No such firm as "Campbell & Co." existed; Ganesh Babu and Salim Sardár were both accomplices of Jogesh, who had rented an office on the Strand for one month at Rs. 300 which was never paid. He had also engaged twenty or thirty loafers at 4 annas (4d.) a head to personate coolies for a couple of hours. This part of the inquiry was satisfactory enough—for the police; not so the efforts they made to trace Jogesh and his accomplices. From that day to this nothing has been heard of them.

Amarendra Babu never recovered from this crushing blow. The loss of nearly Rs. 14,000 is a very serious matter for any one of moderate means; to him it was doubly grievous, for he worshipped money and valued nothing but success. By constantly brooding on his misfortunes and folly he developed symptoms of madness and was at times so violent