"He pletty nice man, Sam Low, yes?"
"Oh, you know him, then? Oh, he's all right, Yen Sin."
It was growing dark outside, and colder, with a rising wind from landward to seaward against the tide. A sense of something odd and wrong came over me; it was a moment before I could make it out. The fire was dead in the stove for the first time in memory and the Vestal irons were cold. Yen Sin asked me to light the lamp. In the waxing yellow glow he turned his eyes to mine, and mine were big.
"You know Mista God?" he questioned.
"Oh, yes," I answered soberly. "Yes, indeed."
"Mista God allee same like Mista Yen Sin, yes?"
I felt myself paling at his blasphemy, and thought of lightning.
"Mista God," he went on in the same speculative tone, "Mista God know allee bad things, allee same like Mista Yen Sin, yes?"
"Where is the minister?" I demanded in desperation.
"Mista Yen Sin likee see Mista Minista." When he added, with a transparent hand fluttering over his heart: "Like see pletty quick now," I seemed to fathom for the first time what was happening to him.