"Aye!" he growled. "They paid well, did they? Well, why should they not? Robbers! Sons of swine! Listen, Kachin—in yonder boat is my enemy. From Mandalay I have followed him, and ere the moon sinks I shall avenge the wrongs he committed against my house!"
"A-a-ah!" sympathized the Kachin, forgetting the rude awakening—they are as eager for scandal, these wild men of the hills, as the most polished Englishman who sits beneath a punkah in Rangoon Cantonment.
Whereupon the juggler recited a tale of imaginary woes and wrongs that did justice to his alleged art of story-telling. Myitkyina's lights had long dropped away behind when the juggler saw the leading boat turn, cross the path of moonlight and glide shoreward.
"Ah!" he muttered. "See, Kachin, he thinks to elude me, the swine!"
A glance behind showed him another craft—a mere speck on the expanse of the river. For a moment he was undecided what to do, then, with an exclamation of satisfaction, he stripped himself but for a perineal band.
"Listen well, Kachin," he admonished, creeping forward. "It is not wise for my enemy to see me coming ashore; therefore I shall swim, like a crocodile. Turn back to Myitkyina. There hurry to the bungalow of Colonel Warburton Sahib—you know where it is? Tell him he is wanted at the landing immediately. He will go."
"But my money," objected the Kachin. "How do I know you will come back?"
"Dost thou not see, O fool, that I have left my clothes and my pack? Will not I return for them?"
The boatman was not positive of that.
"Well, then, I will give you half now," compromised the juggler, taking a wallet from the inside pocket of his discarded jacket. The Kachin watched with crafty eyes to see if the wallet would be returned to the pocket, but the juggler thrust it carefully under his turban.