“For which sorrow thou, also, wept in the veranda,” added Leh Shin.

“The Lady Sahib had many bowls of lacquer, some green, some red, some spotted like the back of a poison snake, but she lacked a golden bowl, and, should I be able to procure one for a moderate price, it would add greatly to her pleasure in remembering her servant, for, says not the Wise One, ’a gift is a small thing, but the hand that holds it may not be raised to smite.’”

Shiraz, all the time he was speaking, had regarded the Chinaman from behind his respectable gold-rimmed spectacles, and he noticed that Leh Shin did not seem to care for the subject of lacquer, for his face darkened and he stopped scratching.

“I deal not in lacquer,” he said quickly.  “Neither touch thou the accursed thing, O Shiraz.  Leave it to Mhtoon Pah, who is a sorcerer and whose lies mount as high as the topmost pinnacle of the Pagoda.”  The Chinaman’s lips drew back from his teeth, and he snarled like a dog.  “I will not speak of him to thee, but I would that the face of Mhtoon Pah was under my heel, and his eyeballs under my thumbs.”

“Yet this golden bowl has been in my thought,” the voice of Shiraz flowed on evenly.  “And I said that here, in Mangadone, I might find such an one.  Thou art sure that lacquer is accursed to thine eyes, Leh Shin?  That thou hast not such a bowl by thee, neither that thy assistant, when he seeks the bed for myself and the lesser bed for my friend, could not look craftily into the shop of this merchant, and ask the price as he passeth, if so be that Mhtoon Pah has such a bowl to sell?”

Leh Shin spat ferociously.

“There was a bowl, a bowl such as you describe, O servant of Kings, and I thought to procure it, for word was brought me that Mhtoon Pah had need of it, and I desired to hold it before him and withdraw it again, and to inspire his covetousness and rage and then to sell it from my own hand, but he leagues with devils and his power is great, for, behold, Honourable Haj, the bowl that was mine was lost by the man from the seas who was about to sell it to me.  Lost, in all truth, and after the lapse of many days, Mhtoon Pah had it in his shop, and sold it to the Lady Sahib.”

“The hands of a man of wealth are more than two,” said Shiraz oracularly.

“Nay, not so, for all thy learning, Pilgrim from the Shrine of Mahomet.  The hands of this merchant, at the time I speak, were as my hands, or thine,” he held out his claws and snatched at the air as though it was his enemy’s throat.  “For his boy, his assistant, the Christian Absalom, who served him well, and whom Mhtoon Pah fed upon sweets from the vendor’s stall, was suddenly taken from him, and has vanished, like the smoke of an opium pipe.”

Shiraz expressed wonder, and agreed with Leh Shin that sorcery had been used, shaking his head gravely and at length rising to his feet.

“The shadows lengthen and the hour of prayer draws near.  It is time for the follower of the Prophet to give a poor man’s alms at the gate of the Mosque, and to pray and praise,” he said.  “Thy assistant tarries, Leh Shin; let him go forth with speed and place my purchase in thy keeping, since I met thee in a happy hour, and shall return upon the morrow from the Serai, where it is Allah’s will that I pass the night in peace.”