XXII

IN WHICH CORYNDON HOLDS THE LAST THREAD AND DRAWS IT TIGHT

When Leh Shin opened the shop door and pushed in his grey, gaunt face, he looked around as though wondering in a half-dreamy, half-detached abstraction where some object he had expected to see had gone.  At length his eyes wandered to the Burman, who sat on the ground eyeing him with a curiously intent and concentrated regard.

“Thine assistant hath gone to the river house,” he said, answering the unspoken question.  “He left me in charge of thy shop and thy goods.”

Leh Shin nodded silently and closed the door.  When he turned, the Burman beckoned to him with a studied suggestion of mystery.

“What is thy message?” asked Leh Shin.  He believed the Burman to be afflicted with a madness, and his odd and persistent movement of his arm hardly conveyed anything to the drowsy, drugged brain of the Chinaman.

The Burman made no reply, but beckoned again, pointing to the floor beside him in dumb show, and Leh Shin advanced slowly and took up his place on a grass mat a little distance off.  Silently, and very softly, the Burman crept near to him, and putting his mouth close to his ear, talked in a rapid, hissing whisper.  His words were low, but their effect upon Leh Shin was startling, for he recoiled as though touched by a hot needle.  His hands clutched his clothes, and his whole frame stiffened.  Even when he drew away, he listened with avidity as the Burman continued to pour forth his story.

He had a friend in the household of Hartley Sahib, so he told Leh Shin, a friend who had sensitive ears and had heard much; had heard in fact the whole story of the stained rag, and of Mhtoon Pah’s wild appeal for justice against the Chinaman.

“Well for thee, Leh Shin, that I have a friend in the house of that Thakin who rules the Police.  But for him I should not have been informed of the plot against thy life, for, ‘on this evidence,’ saith he, ’assuredly they will hang the Chinaman, and Mhtoon Pah is witness against him.’”

“Mhtoon Pah, Mhtoon Pah!” said Leh Shin, and he needed to add no curses to the name, spoken as he said it.

When Coryndon had fully explained that his friend, who was in the service of Hartley, had not only given him a circumstantial account of how the rag was to be used as final and conclusive evidence of Leh Shin’s guilt, but that he had also stolen the rag out of Hartley Sahib’s locked box, to be safely returned to him later, Leh Shin almost tore it from between Coryndon’s fingers.

“Nay, I cannot deliver it unto thee.  My word is pledged.  Look closely at it, if thou wilt, but it may not leave my hand or I break my oath.”

He held it under the circle of lamplight, and the Chinaman leaned over his shoulder to look at it.  For a long time he examined it carefully, feeling its texture and touching it with light fingers.