"Comale," said his mother, "what are you doing?" And Comale did not
dare to hunt any more.

He was dreadfully miserable as he lay that night in the darkness. He
could not sleep. He listened for any outcry. To think that he might
have let an enemy into his own home! Comale rose upon his elbow to
listen. The walls of Cingalese houses are not carried up to the
roof, and, because of this, an outcry or conversation in one room
can be heard all over the house. Comale listened. Sometimes he
fancied he heard the sound of something slipping over the matting on
the floor. So worried was he that when he slept it was only by short
naps from which he woke with a start, and resumed his listening.

Toward morning, when light began to come, Comale crept from his
place. He looked toward where his little brothers slept. Hanging
above one of the little boys was a slender dark line. It was alive!
It swayed to and fro in the shadows, and seemed to slip a little
lower toward the sleeping child. Comale started. He sprang forward
with a cry, and caught the swaying thing. But it was no living
creature that Comale brought with him to the floor. It was only a
long, thin strip of bamboo with which Comale's father had intended
to bind cinnamon bark! The strip had been hung up out of the way,
and had swung a little in the current of air between the top of the
wall and the roof. As the bamboo strip swayed, it had gradually
slipped lower and lower toward the sleeping little boy below.

Comale's outcry had aroused the household; and without reserve the
penitent lad told to the family the story of his misdeed. His dark-
faced father smiled slightly and showed his teeth through his beard.