He was crying now, and presented a very mournful appearance to the gaze of the passer-by. These ladies above him were those of the tiny “golden lily feet,” and very wealthy and aristocratic, so they could not leave their rooms and come down to him, as that was not their custom. If it had been the next day they could have done so, for on every day of the week of San Nin they were permitted to leave their homes and go anywhere they pleased.
“Ni kiu mat meng a?” (what is your name?) they asked.
“My name? Sing Ho,” he cried.
“You come up,” they called down to him, pointing meanwhile to a dark and narrow stairway which led up from the street.
“It so dark—Sing Ho ’flaid to go alone—I want mo chun—boo, hoo,” he wailed, in a pitiful little voice.
“But you must come. We find mo chun; we give you heap plenty fiah-clackeh (fire-cracker), plenty nice little cake; come on!”
Baby though he was, he remembered that his mother had always warned him against strangers, and told him never to allow any one to persuade him to go with them. But finally he decided that this was very different, and that anything would be better than being lost on the street.
“All light!” he sobbed, and started in great fear up the narrow stairway. Ugh! how dark it was! and he trembled, as his little sandalled feet crept hesitatingly on. When he at last reached the end of the stairway he found himself in a dark and narrow hall thick with the fumes of opium.
Where were the beautiful ladies?—and the little cakes? Nothing was to be seen but the gaunt figures of Chinamen gliding stealthily to and fro in the narrow hall. There were many doors on either side the hallway, and in each door was a small, square lattice into which the men would speak some queer words in Chinese, when the door would be cautiously opened, and he would enter. When the doors opened little Sing Ho caught glimpses of many Chinamen with cards in their hands, seated around some tables and calling out in a loud voice strange Chinese words which he could not understand. In some of the rooms he could see men reclining on bamboo couches and smoking opium. Oh, if his mother could see him now, as he stood there alone, and trembling in the half-darkness!
Just then his dear and beautiful little mother had put the last stitch in the blouse she was embroidering, and proudly held it out to the admiring gaze of her sister, who lived with her.