I
couldn't go myself, so I told a couple of our Makalali police and
Imam Din to make talk with the gentleman one time. It was rather
risky, and it might have been expensive, but it turned up trumps.
They were back in a few days with the slaver (he didn't show
fight) and a whole crowd of witnesses, and we tried him in my
bedroom, and fined him properly. Just to show you how demoralized
the brute must have been (Arabs often go dotty after a defeat),
he'd snapped up four or five utterly useless Sheshaheli, and was
offering 'em to all and sundry along the road. Why, he offered
'em to you, didn't he, Imam Din?"
"I was witness that he offered man-eaters' for sale," said Imam
Din.
"Luckily for my cotton-scheme, that landed, him both ways. You
see, he had slaved and exposed slaves for sale in British
territory. That meant the double fine if I could get it out of
him."
"What was his defence?" said Strickland, late of the Punjab
Police.
"As far as I remember--but I had a temperature of 104 degrees at
the time--he'd mistaken the meridians of longitude.
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