RADHARANI
friend's offer, and the lawyer with the utmost care and tenderness conveyed the sick woman and her daughter to his home.
All that medical skill could do was attempted in vain, and the widow died very shortly after the restoration of her fortunes. Radharani's lawyer took the necessary steps to have the heiress put in possession of her property. But seeing that she was but a child still, he retained her as his guest and did not send her to her ancestral home. The Collector of the district, who in India takes the place of the Court of Chancery, was desirous of putting the estate under the Court of Wards, but Kamakhya Babu was of opinion that he would be a better guardian of the girl's interests than any government official. His legal astuteness defeated the Collector's well-meant plans and he found himself free to defend his ward's interests without official interference. His most serious responsibility was the need of finding a suitable husband for the heiress. Fortunately the good lawyer was a man of modern ideas and
67
