How do the messengers continue to deceive the villagers?

The messengers deceitfully told the villagers the fines to be paid were two-hundred and fifty cowries, rather than the actual fine of two-hundred. They would keep the extra fifty without anyone knowing the difference.

On the morning after the village crier’s appeal the men of Umuofia met in the marketplace and decided to collect without delay two hundred and fifty bags of cowries to appease the white man. They did not know that fifty bags would go to the court messengers, who had increased the fine for that purpose.