'Four days ago I was in Kamburupitiya--I was called to the kachcheri there. They asked me two fanams[14] in the bazaar for a cocoanut.'
'Aiyo! I have not seen a cocoanut for two years.'
'Two fanams! And last year at this time they were but one fanam each. In the bazaar I met the Korala Mahatmaya. The Korala Mahatmaya is a hard man: he said to me, "Arachchi, there are guns in your village for which no permit has been given by the Agent Hamadoru." I said to him, "Ralahami, if there be, the fault is not mine." Then he said, "The order has come from the Agent Hamadoru to the Disa Mahatmaya[15] that if one gun be found without permit in a headman's village there will be trouble both for the Arachchi and the Korala." Now the Disa Mahatmaya is a good man, but the Korala is hard; and they say in Kamburupitiya that the Agent Hamadoru is very hard and strict, and goes round the villages searching for guns for which no permits have been given. They say, too, that he will come this way next month.'
There was a short silence, and then Babehami continued:
'It is five months, Silindu, since I told you to take a permit for your gun, and you have not done so yet. The time to pay three shillings has gone by, and you will now have to pay four. The Korala is a hard man, and the Agent Hamadoru will come next month.'
'Ralahami, I am a poor man. How can I pay four shillings or even three? There is not a fanam in the house. There was a permit taken two years ago. You are my father and my mother. I will hide the gun in a place that only I know of, and if it be taken or question be made, is it not easy to say that the stock was broken, and it was not considered necessary to take a permit for a broken gun?'
But the argument, which before had been successful with Babehami, now seemed to have lost its strength.
'A permit is required. It is the order of Government. I have told you the Korala is a hard man, and he is angry with me because I brought him but two cocoanuts as a present, whereas other Arachchis bring him an amunam of paddy. For I, too, am a poor man.'
Silindu sat in helpless silence. The hopelessness of raising two rupees to pay for a gun licence for the moment drove out of his mind the object of his coming to Babehami's house. All that he felt was the misery of a new misfortune, and, as was his nature, he sat dumb under it. At last, however, the pressing need of the moment again recurred to him, and he started in the tortuous way, habitual to villagers, to approach the subject.