The priest then went on to the temple, while the blind man returned home, very sad and sorrowful.
As soon as he entered the door, his daughter saw by his look that something unfortunate had happened and begged him to tell her what it was.
At first he would not say because he feared to frighten her, but she asked him so many questions that at last he was obliged to tell her the whole story.
Sim Ching was indeed terrified when she heard what her father had promised the priest.
“Alas! Alas!” she cried. “How can we possibly get the rice ready for him? You know it is only by the kindness of the neighbors that we have the handful that I have cooked for our dinner to-day.”
The poor man began to weep. “What you say is true,” he cried. “Better that I should have died in the pit than be thrown into prison as will surely happen to me if I cannot give the priest the hundred and fifty bags that I promised him.”
The blind man now set out to beg, telling every one his sad story and asking them to help him to collect the rice, but the people of the village were themselves poor and had no more than enough food for their own families.
Time slipped by, until at last the day arrived when the priest’s servants were to come to demand the rice, and the blind man had not yet been able to get together even one bagful of rice, let alone a hundred and fifty.
He and his daughter sat together very sorrowful, and now and then the blind man bemoaned himself as he thought of how he was to be beaten and thrown into prison, for he had now learned enough about the priest to know that he could expect no mercy from one as cruel and greedy as he.
Now there lived in another city, not far away, a very rich merchant who owned many ships that traded in foreign lands. This merchant had become so proud of his wealth and his power that he called himself the Prince of the Sea, and so it was that he obliged others to address him. This greatly offended a powerful Water Spirit who lived under the sea over which the ships of the merchant sailed. And now, in order to punish the merchant, the Water Spirit sent storms down upon the ships. Many were destroyed, and others were driven on to reefs, or back to the ports they sailed from. So many misfortunes overtook the vessels that sailors became afraid to sail on them, and the merchant began to fear he would be ruined.