The Pointing Man: A Burmese Mystery
NEW YORK E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 1920
Dust lay thick along the road that led through the very heart of the native quarter of Mangadone; dust raised into a misty haze which hung in the air and actually introduced a light undernote of red into the effect. Dust, which covered the bare feet of the coolies, the velvet slippers of the Burmese, which encroached everywhere and no one regarded, for presently, just at sundown, shouting watermen, carrying large bamboo vessels with great spouts, would come running along the road, casting the splashing water on all sides, and reduce the dry powder to temporary mud.
The main street of the huge bazaar in Mangadone was as busy a thoroughfare as any crowded lane of the city of London, and it blazed with colour and life as the evening air grew cool. There were shops where baskets were sold, shops apparently devoted only to the sale of mirrors, shops where tailors sat on the ground and worked at sewing machines; sweet stalls, food stalls, cafés, flanked by dusty tubs of plants and crowded with customers, who reclined on sofas and chairs set right into the street itself. Nearer the river end of the street, the shops were more important, and business offices announced themselves on large placards inscribed in English, and in curling Burmese characters like small worms hooping and arching themselves, and again in thick black letters which resembled tea leaves formed into the picturesque design of Chinese writing, for Mangadone was one of the most cosmopolitan ports of the East, and stood high in the commercial world as a place for trade.
Along the street a motley of colour took itself like a sea of shades and tints. Green, crimson, lemon yellow, lapis-lazuli, royal purple, intermingled with the naked brown bodies of coolies clad only in loin-cloths, for every race and class emerged just before sunset. Rich Burmen clad in yards of stiff, rustling silk jostled the lean, spare Chinamen and the Madrassis who came to Mangadone to make money out of the indolence of the natives of a place who cared to do little but smoke and laugh. Poor Burmen in red and yellow cottons, as content with life as their wealthy brethren, loitered and smoked with the little white-coated women with flower-decked heads, and they all flowed on with the tide and filled the air with a perpetual babel of sound.
Marjorie Douie
THE POINTING MAN
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IN WHICH THE DESTINY THAT PLAYS WITH MEN MOVES THE PIECES ON THE BOARD
TELLS THE STORY OF A LOSS, AND HOW IT AFFECTED THE REV. FRANCIS HEATH
INDICATES A STANDPOINT COMMONLY SUPPOSED TO REPRESENT THE PRINCIPLES OF THE JESUIT FATHERS
INTRODUCES THE READER TO MRS. WILDER IN A SECRETIVE MOOD
CRAVEN JOICEY, THE BANKER, FINDS THAT HIS MEMORY IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED
TELLS HOW ATKINS EXPLAINS FACTS BY PEOPLE AND NOT PEOPLE BY FACTS, AND HOW HARTLEY, HEAD OF THE POLICE, SMELLS THE SCENT OF APPLE ORCHARDS GROWING IN A FOOL'S PARADISE
FINDS THE REV. FRANCIS HEATH READING GEORGE HERBERT'S POEMS, AND LEAVES HIM PLEDGED TO A POSSIBLY COMPROMISING SILENCE
SHOWS HOW THE CLOAK OF DARKNESS OF ONE NIGHT HIDES MANY EMOTIONS, AND MRS. WILDER IS FRANKLY INQUISITIVE
MRS. WILDER IS PRESENTED IN A MELTING MOOD, AND DRAYCOTT WILDER IS FORCED TO RECALL THE LINES COMMENCING "A FOOL THERE WAS"
IN WHICH CRAVEN JOICEY IS OVERCOME BY A SUDDEN INDISPOSITION, AND HARTLEY, WITHOUT LOOKING FOR HIM, FINDS THE MAN HE WANTED
SHOWS HOW THE "WHISPER FROM THE DAWN OF LIFE" ENABLES CORYNDON TO TAKE THE DRIFTING THREADS BETWEEN HIS FINGERS
SHOWS HOW A MAN MAY CLIMB A HUNDRED STEPS INTO A PASSIONLESS PEACE, AND RETURN AGAIN TO A WORLD OF SMALL TORMENTS
PUTS FORWARD THE FACT THAT A SUDDEN FRIENDSHIP NEED NOT BE BASED UPON A SUDDEN LIKING; AND PASSES THE NIGHT UNTIL DAWN REVEALS A SHAMEFUL SECRET
TELLS HOW SHIRAZ, THE PUNJABI, ADMITTED THE FRAILTIES OF ORDINARY HUMANITY, AND HOW CORYNDON ATTENDED AFTERNOON SERVICE AND CONSIDERED THE VEXED QUESTION OF TEMPERAMENT.
IN WHICH THE FURTHERING OF A STRANGE COMRADESHIP IS CONTINUED, AND A BEGGAR FROM AMRITZAR CRIES IN THE STREETS OF MANGADONE
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.
TELLS HOW CORYNDON LEARNS FROM THE REV. FRANCIS HEATH WHAT THE REV. FRANCIS HEATH NEVER TOLD HIM.
THE REV. FRANCIS HEATH UNLOCKS HIS DOOR AND SHOWS WHAT LIES BEHIND
IN WHICH LEH SHIN WHISPERS A STORY INTO THE EAR OF SHIRAZ, THE PUNJABI; THE BURDEN OF WHICH IS: "HAVE I FOUND THEE, O MINE ENEMY?"
CRAVEN JOICEY, THE BANKER, IS FACED BY A MAN WITH A WHIP IN HIS HAND, AND CORYNDON FINDS A CLUE
DEMONSTRATES THE PERSUASIVE POWER OF A KNIFE EDGE, AND TELLS A STORY OF A GOLD LACQUER BOWL
IN WHICH CORYNDON HOLDS THE LAST THREAD AND DRAWS IT TIGHT
DEMONSTRATES THE TRUTH OF THE AXIOM THAT "THE UNEXPECTED ALWAYS HAPPENS"
IN WHICH A WOODEN IMAGE POINTS FOR THE LAST TIME