Page:Ernest Bramah - Kai Lungs Golden Hours.djvu/34

Rh Is the nature of this imagined scene"—thus she indicated the embellishment of the bowl—"familiar to your eyes?"

"It is that known as 'The Willow, replied Kai Lung. "There is a story"

"There is a story!" exclaimed the maiden, loosening from her brow the overhanging look of care. "Thus and thus. Frequently have I importuned him before whom you will appear to explain to me the meaning of the scene. When you are called upon to plead your cause, see to it well that your knowledge of such a tale is clearly shown. He before whom you kneel, craftily plied meanwhile by my unceasing petulance, will then desire to hear it from your lips At the striking of the fourth gong the day is done. What lies between rests with your discriminating wit."

"You are deep in the subtler kind of wisdom, such as the weak possess," confessed Kai Lung. "Yet how will this avail to any length?"

"That which is put off from to-day is put off from to-morrow," was the confident reply. "For the rest—at a corresponding gong-stroke of each day it is this person's custom to gather fruit. Farewell, minstrel."

When Li-loe returned a little later Kai Lung threw his two remaining strings of cash about that rapacious person's neck and embraced him as he exclaimed:

"Chieftain among door-keepers, when I go to the Capital to receive the all-coveted title 'Leaf-crowned' and to chant ceremonial odes before the court, thou shalt accompany me as forerunner, and an agile tribe of selected goats shall sport about thy path."

"Alas, manlet," replied the other, weeping readily, "greatly do I fear that the next journey thou wilt take