Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/85

 yelled and struggled, loudly proclaiming his innocence; and my followers gathered up all the money in his bank—nearly seven thousand dollars, so that it took six men to carry it. Thus I departed to my house, with the Chinaman and the money, none daring to bar my passage.

"When we had entered the house, I bade the Chinaman be seated, and I told him that I would kill him, even then, if he did not show me the trick whereby he had cheated me. This he presently did; and for a long time I sat watching him and practising, for I had a mind to learn the manner of his art, thinking that later I might profit by it. Then, just as the dawn was breaking. I led the Chinaman down to the river by the hand, for I was loath to make a mess within my house; and when I had cut his throat, and had sent his body floating downstream, I washed myself, performed my religious ablutions, prayed the morning prayer, and so betook myself to my sleeping-mat, for my eyes were heavy from long waking."

"Kasîh-an China! I am sorry for the Chinaman," I said.

"Why are you sorry for him?" asked Raja Haji. "He had cheated me, wherefore it was not fitting that he should live. Moreover, he was a Chinaman and an infidel, and the lives of such folk were not reckoned by us as being of any worth. In Kinta, before Tûan Birch came to Pêrak, they had a game called main china—the Chinaman game—each man betting upon the number of coins which a