The Counterfeit Note

       While walking down the street, one morning, I found a hundred rupee note on the footpath. I picked it up, noted the number and took it home.

      In the afternoon the plumber called on me to collect his bill. As I had no other money at home, I settled his account with the hundred rupee note I had found. Later I came to know that the plumber paid the note to his milkman to settle his monthly account, who paid it to his tailor for the garments he had made.

        The tailor in turn used the money to buy an old sewing machine, from a woman who lives in my neigh bourhood. This woman incidentally, had borrowed hundred rupees from me sometime back to buy a pressure cooker, remembering that she owed me hundred rupees, came and paid the debt.

          I recognized the notes as the one I had found on the footpath, and on careful examination I discovered that the bill was counterfeit.

         How much was lost in the whole transaction and by whom?

Answer:  All the transactions carried out through the counterfeit note are invalid, and, therefore, everybody stands in relation to his debtor just where he was before I picked up the note.