“I think I understand,” I said.  “You brought the treasure home, put it in what you considered a safe place, and one day awoke to find your estimable guest missing and the treasure gone with him.  Have I guessed correctly?”

“You have hit the mark exactly,” Kitwater replied.  “We woke one day not only to find the treasure gone, but also ourselves and our mission seriously compromised.  The relations of the dead man not only accused us of having alienated him from the faith of his forefathers, but also of having robbed him of his ancestral treasure.  We could not but admit that we had been presented with the wealth in question, and when it was demanded of us, we could only explain that we had lost it in our turn.  You can imagine the position for yourself.  At the best of times the foreigner is not popular in China, and our situation was particularly unpleasant.  Situated as we were in one of the wildest portions of the empire, and accused of the basest sacrilege, that is to say of violating the home of a dead man, we could hope for but small mercy.  The man who had robbed us had entirely disappeared and no trace of him could be discovered.  To attempt to offer any explanation, or to incriminate him, was out of the question.  We could only suffer in silence.”

He paused and heaved a heavy sigh.

“And what form did your punishment take?” I inquired, for I was beginning to be interested in their story.

“Can you not see for yourself?” the man answered.  “Can you not see that I am blind, while my companion is dumb?  That was what they condemned us to.  By that man’s villainy I am destined never to look upon God’s earth again, while my companion will never be able to converse with his fellow-men, except by signs.  We are in the world, yet out of it.”

I looked at them both in amazement.  Their tale seemed too terrible to be true.  And yet I had the best of evidence to show that it was correct.

“And why have you come to me?  What do you want me to do?  I cannot give you back your sight, nor your friend his power of speech.”

“But you can help us to find the man who brought this misery upon us,” Kitwater replied.  “That is what we have come to ask of you.  He must not be permitted to enjoy the wealth he stole from us.  It is sacred to a special duty, and that duty it must perform.  We are not overburdened with riches, in fact we are dependent upon the bounty of another, but if you can help us to recover the sum that was stolen from us, we will gladly pay whatever you may ask!  We cannot say more than that.”

“But this is a most unheard-of request,” I said.  “How do you know where the man may be at this moment?”