get
up, rub his hands on his knees and lift his chair inside the door, which
he closed with a noise of dragging chains and creaking bolts.

Slowly the last gleam withdrew, and the dust lost its effect of amber,
and the trees grew dark, and little whispering winds clapped the palm
leaves one on another with a dry, barking sound. Children still screamed
and played, and dogs yelped and offered to show fight, and still people
on foot came and went, and the dusk drew down a veil and the greater
noise subsided into a lower key.

The beggar was no longer there, his place was empty and he had gone.

XVI

IN WHICH LEH SHIN IS BREATHED UPON BY A JOSS, AND EXPERIENCES THE TERROR
OF A MAN WHO TOUCHES THE VEIL BEHIND WHICH THE IMMORTALS DWELL.

Of all the savage desires that riot in the hearts of men, the lust of
revenge is probably the strongest. Civilization has done its best to
control and curb wild impulse; but as long as a cruel wrong rankles, or
a fierce longing to square an old account remains, there will be hands
thrust out to take the naked sword of the Lord into their own finite
grasp, and there will be men who will be content to pay the price so
that they may see the desire of their eyes.

The Oriental has above the white races an illimitable patience in
awaiting his hour for retribution, for the heart of the East does not
forget and can hold a purpose silently through the dust-blown, sunlit
years, waiting for the dawn of the appointed day.

When Leh Shin set out towards the Joss House, he was repeating a
procedure that had become constant with him of late. He knew that a Joss
was revengeful and terrible in matters of hate, therefore his prayer
would be understood in the strange region of power where the Great Ones
dwelt. His religion was a mixture of the teachings of Buddha, Confucius,
and Shinto, for long absence from his own country and constant
association with the Burmese and Japanese had blended and confused the
original belief that he had learnt in far-away Canton. To this basis was
added the grossest form of superstition, and the wildest fancies of a
brain muddled with the fumes of opium, but the one thing clear to him
was, that a Joss, though an immortal being, was able to comprehend
hatred.

The gods punished terribly, slaying with plague and pestilence,
destroying life by flood and years of famine, and so Leh Shin knew that
they were very like men, taking full advantage of their fearful power