Page:Wren--The young stagers.djvu/104

86 good priest, who was a better one. So did the kulkarni. So did the schoolmaster, a learned man on nine rupees a month, and no bad hand himself at little games. So did the civil patel. So did all the adult male villagers and all the children. For it was an interesting and piquant situation—a Virtuous Tiger who must not be molested and a Travelling M.P. who must molest one or depart unmulct, with buttoned pockets. One thing was certain. Lucy must not bleed. Another thing was equally certain, the Traveller must be bled. ..."

"When's the tiger hunt going to begin, pleathe, Buthter?" interrupted the Vice.

"Well, my son, to make a short story long—the next time the Simple Villagers of Soni went up to Lucy's cave with sackbut, harp and psaltery, praise and oblations and the carcase of a goat that had otherwise outlived its days of usefulness, as was their wont at the new moon—they didn't. The shikari just took the goat up without any tamasha whatever, and presently after took the good M.P. for a quiet evening stroll to the very spot where Lucy, full of con-