CHAPTER IX
THE CHINAMAN'S SHOP
Bill Bigs met a good many Chinamen, and had dealings with them, always finding them keen business fellows, moderately honest, though some were arrant rogues.
He went out of the coffee house to look round, and saw the fat Chinaman still standing in his doorway like a statue, as though he had not moved since they saw him before entering the house.
The name on the shop was Lin Soo. Probably this was the name of the man at the door; at any rate something prompted Bill to cross the road and look in at the shop window. He saw three tea chests, which he guessed were empty, a couple of Chinese bowls, a vase with strange hideous dragons painted or burnt on, an ivory-handled stick, a hat, a pile of chop-sticks, a bundle of red papers, and a cat slumbering serenely among the miscellaneous collection.
"Is the cat for sale?" he asked the man.
The Chinaman smiled.
"Not for sale. A good cat; he catchee mice, cockroaches."
"I didn't know there were any mice here."