Cloots had taken the measure of him months before and once for all, he would have said, in his smoky little village. And to appearance the fellow had not changed a hair from the simple, untaught, somewhat hard-bitten but altogether undistinguished headman of Apyodaw. He was just what he had always been. Yet Cloots saw now with transfixing clarity that he did not know him in the least—could never have known him. For this native, who was a very ordinary native, had withdrawn himself, after the immemorial manner of the native on his own occasions, beyond every index of temper or purpose: fear, respect, rage, hate, injured pride, or lacerated honor; impatience, vindictiveness, greed—or doubt.
Cloots could not fathom Moung Poh Sin. He could not follow the thought process of Moung Poh Sin. Worst of all, he could not divine those elements from which Moung Poh Sin had borrowed such absolute and amazing assurance. It made him cautious.
"Softly," he said. "Softly a while. There is some folly here. Name the business."
"There is no business, Shway. Only a debt."
"All debts of money were long ago settled between us."
"It is not money, Shway. Only my house is empty; my hearth is cold. My heart is both cold and empty. There is no one under my roof to husk the paddy, or to cook, or to sing, or to drive away evil spirits with laughter. There will never be any fat babies rolling about the mats or swinging in the basket at my home while the mother tells the Sehn-nee, the cradle song. Once I had a treasure in my house, Shway. Where is that treasure now?"
"Meaning thy daughter, Moung Poh Sin?" asked Cloots directly to show himself quite cool and firm. "Meaning Mah Soung, thy daughter?"
"Mah Soung is dead," said the headman.
"Mah Soung is dead," repeated Cloots, and an echo ran back and forth between the walls with his word. He glanced swiftly toward the kneeling maiden by the altar in the dim taper light, and for all his control he could not repress the strangest flicker of fancy. She looked very like Mah Soung. Very like. Some tilt of the head, some odd, soft line of the shining tress over the ear started a poignant dart of memory, caught his breath sharp. It was in just such a place as this, he recalled, in pursuit of just such an idle, colorful adventure, that he first had found Mah Soung....