"A MURDERER to see you, Doctor sahib", announced my witch attendant, baring her single tooth. 
I was eating lunch at the time, and according to Indian custom first finished my meal, if somewhat apprehensively. After all it might be my last. 
I was shuttered up in my bungalow to shelter from a dust storm that turned day into night. It was early April, and it heralded the beginning of the hot weather that would last till July. The heat was already intense and prostrating and the cataract crowds had melted away. The earth was seared brown, and cattle starved. In the early mornings Santal women could be seen gathering into baskets the white edible blossoms of the mohwa tree as they fell to the ground like manna. In the distance they looked like Millais's picture of 'The Gleaners'. 
The incident of the murderer came as the climax to a chain of unconnected events. I had been watching a thick moving column of black ants, stretching from the garden to under my closed door, intent on killing an injured moth. Presently they organised themselves into groups and removed the body like some great Trojan horse. Outside in the garden it was probable frogs would eat the ants, and frogs were a ready meal for snakes. I reflected how little nature cared for an individual life, and only for the preservation of the species. In my almost daily battle for life in hospital I sometimes wondered if the odds were not against me. 
The evening before the murderer called there was an unusual happening. My postal runner from Simaltala brought an unexpected parcel, which was unusual at any time, and I opened it with the excited anticipation of a child receiving a mysterious present. It contained two round cigarette tins, but though the label indicated my favourite brand I found they were full of small chopped-up pieces of bones. Pondering the mystery, I wondered if some Indian firm was pushing a new 'line' in dehydrated soup for my stock-pot. The true explanation I found in a covering letter in the packing: 
 

I had heard of this method of disposal of a body in India, by chopping it up into small pieces. Saved in the nick of time from cannibalism, I removed the tins from the sideboard, put them in my study and decided to think the matter over. 
On the day of the storm, it abated as suddenly as it had begun, and lunch finished, I prepared to meet the murderer. I found him seated on a chair on my verandah, a heavy Mohamedan of about sixty years, his beard dyed with henna either in honour of the Prophet and a visit to Mecca, or because he shortly intended to take a young, new wife. Although obviously breath-less and in distress, he called continuously "Allah! Allah!" in a loud voice, beating his breast in anguish with clenched fist, the other arm hanging down limply over the chair-arm. Meanwhile a friend fanned him furiously with a straw fan, while a servant knelt in front massaging an outstretched limb vigorously, presumably to relieve cramp. 
His friend told me that my patient had had a severe heart attack three years before, from which he had made a good recovery. Two days ago, however, he had killed a talukdar (local tax official), when the excitement of the encounter, with its fatal outcome, had precipitated another attack. 
He wished to give himself up to the police but felt too ill to submit to the discomforts of the District Jail. Could I recommend on medical grounds that he be allowed bail? 
Here was a nice medico-legal problem, even an unlikely tale, of which I was doubly suspicious in a land of legal intrigue and graft. Even if he had committed murder, could he not have caused the breathlessness and rapid pulse with some indigenous herb unknown to western medicine taken to avoid prison? A careful examination in fact revealed heart-failure so for a modest fee, the required certificate was given, and he was admitted to hospital under observation. Before this was done, I shouted for my personal servant, Sardar, who came rushing at great speed as was his manner, coming to a sudden halt, as if just passing the tape after a hundred yards' sprint, and apparently thinking my life in danger. But it was only that he was expert in tossing up the coins with thumb and forefinger to see if they were sound, a ritual which owing to the high proportion of counterfeit in circulation one carried out with money received from even one's best friend. He drew my attention to a rupee coin showing the bulging profile of King William the Fourth (with 'East India Company' on the obverse), which was no longer valid currency, but I decided to keep it as a memento. 

As further examples of what we doctors call our 'better class practice', dacoits (armed robbers) and other fugitives from the law deserve dishonourable mention. 
When warrants had been issued for their arrest, they would consult me in disguise, successfully gaining admission to hospital for some chronic - always medical - complaint. While yet new to this game of hide-and-seek I would be surprised at their docility and willingness to stay as long as I desired. Their use of hospital as sanctuary only came to light some weeks later, when an Indian Inspector of Police called to ask if such a man were under my care. 

Following closely on the murderer episode, I had another curious medico-legal case, involving proof of signature in a will. The will was being contested on the grounds that the deceased on the relevant date had been blind from cataract, and could not have signed it. One day a vakil (lawyer) representing the would-be beneficiary came to see me, claiming that the deceased had had a successful operation for cataract in my hospital four months prior to singing the will, and could therefore see. He asked permission to take certified copies of entries in my hospital admission and operation registers, but on examination of these, in spite of being otherwise intact, the two vital pages were missing. Cross-examination of hospital orderlies failed to expose the culprit, and all we could learn was that some city-bred strangers had been seen in the hospital a few days before. 

It would be a pity not to round off these legal jottings with a note on the fate of my two tins of bones, left on a chair in my study. I guessed correctly that they had come to me in error, and were intended for a nearby Government laboratory for microscopic examination, but when I went to fetch them, they could not be found. A hue and cry was raised, which was at first without result. My Santal servant's blubber-like face became more serious than ever, and he hinted that it was a judgement on me for the questionable company I had been keeping. 
"The Mussulman who came to the verandah was 'no good'." 
Eventually the bones were retrieved from the garden, whence they had been taken by the sweeper, and given to the mali (gardener) for fertiliser. It was my old witch-receptionist who found them at last. 
I decided I must give her a broomstick as a present at Christmas.