"Leave the thing here, and I will see what the doctors have to say
about it."

"_Thakin_, _Thakin_," said Mhtoon Pah. "The time grows late. My night's
rest is taken from me, and the Chinaman, Leh Shin, walks the roads. I
saw him from my place at sunset. I saw him go by like a cat that prowls
when night falls and it grows dark. He passed by my wooden image of a
dancing man, and he touched him as he passed--" he gave a despairing
gesture with his heavy hands. "Oh, Absalom, Absalom, my grief is heavy!"

"He will be either found or accounted for," said Hartley, with a
decision and firmness he was far from feeling, and Mhtoon Pah, with bent
head, went away out of the room.

The rain that had held off all day began to come down in pitiless
torrents, blown in by the wind, and fighting against bolts and bars. It
ruffled the muddy waters of the river, ran along the kennels of the
Chinese quarter, drove the inhabitants of Paradise Street indoors and
soused down over the Cantonment gardens, and battered on the travelling
carriage of Craven Joicey, that came along the road, a waterproof over
the pony's back and another covering the _syce_, and Joicey sat inside
the small green box, holding the window-strings under his heavy arms.

Joicey was not a cheerful companion, and in his present mood Fitzgibbon,
the Barrister, would have suited Hartley better; but he had asked
Joicey, and Joicey was on his way, thinking about Bank business in all
probability, thinking of money lent out at interest, thinking of careful
ledgers and neat rows of figures, and certainly not in the least likely
to be thinking of the Chinese quarter, or of a person of so small
account, financially, as Absalom, the Christian native. The river or the