“A Ghost?” asked the patient.

“A Ghost!” exclaimed the people around.

“A Ghost” said the doctor sagely.

“What shall I have to do?” inquired the patient, anxiously—­

“You will have to go every morning to that well (indicating the one mentioned above), and throw a basketful of flowers in” said the doctor.

“I shall do that every day” said the patient.

“Then we shall begin from to-morrow” said the doctor.

The next morning everybody had been ready to start long before the doctor was out of bed.  He came at last and all got up to start.  Then a big landau and pair drew up to take the doctor and the patient to the abode of the ghost in the well.  Just as the patient was thinking of getting in the doctor said “We don’t require a carriage Lalla Saheb—­we shall all have to walk—­and bare-footed too, and between you and me we shall have to carry the basket of flowers also.”

The patient was really troubled.  Never indeed in his life had he walked a mile—­not to say of three—­and that, bare-footed and carrying a basket of flowers in his hands.  However he had to do it.  It was a goodly procession.  The big millionaire—­the big doctor with a large number of followers walking bare-footed—­caused amazement and amusement to all who saw them.

It took them a full hour and a half to reach the well—­and there the doctor pronounced the mantra in Sanskrit and the flowers were thrown in.  The mantra (charm) was in Sanskrit, the doctor who knew a little of the language had taken great pains to compose it the night before and even then it was not grammatically quite correct.

At last the party returned, but not on foot.  The journey back was performed in the carriages that had followed the patient and his doctor.  From that day the practice was followed regularly.  The patient’s health began to improve and he began to regain his power of digestion fast.  In a month he was all right; but he never discontinued the practice of going to the well and throwing in a basketful of flowers with his own hands.  He had also learnt the mantra (the mystic charm) by heart; but the doctor had sworn him to secrecy and he told it to nobody.  Shoes with felt sole were soon procured from England (it being 40 years before any Indian Rope Sole Shoe Factory came into existence) and thus the inconvenience of walking this distance bare-footed was easily obviated.

After a month’s further stay the doctor came away from Agra having earned a fabulous fee, and he always received occasional letters and presents from his patient who never discontinued the practice of visiting the well till his death about 17 years later.

“The three-mile walk is all that he requires” said the doctor to his friends (among whom evidently my grand-father was one) on his return from Agra, “and since he has got used to it now he won’t discontinue even if he comes to know of the deception I have practised on him—­and I have cured his indigestion after all.”