The Babu looked about him and perceived a cart standing in the lane.

He advanced to it and looked in.
"This is obvious place for satisfactory concealment," he said, as with some difficulty he clambered in.

Over the edge of the cart he kept watch.
In a while he heard the sound of a man walking.

The man was certainly at some distance from the turning, but the Babu's head went down at once.
The man whose footsteps he heard was wearing boots, but there would be one walking in front of that man who was wearing slippers--Ahmed Ismail.
Ahmed Ismail, indeed, turned an instant afterwards into the lane, passed the cart and walked up to the door of the big house.

There he halted, and Shere Ali joined him.
"The gift was understood, your Highness," he said.