Philip Van Doren Stern (ed) (146 page)

"I
no
dig
glave,"
said
the
man.

"What
the
devil
do
you
mean
by
that?
There
were
two
coolies
digging
a
grave
this
afternoon."

The
two
Chinese
looked
at
one
another.
Then
the
boy
said
they had
been
to
the
cemetery
together.
There
was
no
new
grave
there.

The
taipan
only
just
stopped
himself
from
speaking.

"But
damn
it
all,
I
saw
it
myself,"
were
the
words
on
the
tip
of
his tongue.

But
he
did
not
say
them.
He
grew
very
red
as
he
choked
them down.
The
two
Chinese
looked
at
him
with
their
steady
eyes.
For
a moment
his
breath
failed
him.

"All
right.
Get
out,"
he
gasped.

But
as
soon
as
they
were
gone
he
shouted
for
the
boy
again,
and when
he
came,
maddeningly
impassive,
he
told
him
to
bring
some whisky.
He
rubbed
his
sweating
face
with
a
handkerchief.
His
hand trembled
when
he
lifted
the
glass
to
his
lips.
They
could
say
what they
liked,
but
he
had
seen
the
grave.
Why,
he
could
hear
still
the dull
thud
as
the
coolies
threw
the
spadefuls
of
earth
on
the
ground above
them.
What
did
it
mean?
He
could
feel
his
heart
beating.
He felt
strangely
ill
at
ease.
But
he
pulled
himself
together.
It
was
all nonsense.
If
there
was
no
grave
there
it
must
have
been
an
hallucination.
The
best
thing
he
could
do
was
to
go
to
the
club,
and
if
he
ran across
the
doctor
he
would
ask
him
to
give
him
a
look
over.

Everyone
in
the
club
looked
just
the
same
as
ever.
He
did
not
know why
he
should
have
expected
them
to
look
different.
It
was
a
comfort.
These
men,
living
for
many
years
with
one
another
lives
that were
methodically
regulated,
had
acquired
a
number
of
little
idiosyncrasies—one
of
them
hummed
incessantly
while
he
played
bridge, another
insisted
on
drinking
beer
through
a
straw—and
these
tricks which
had
so
often
irritated
the
taipan
now
gave
him
a
sense
of
security.
He
needed
it,
for
he
could
not
get
out
of
his
head
that
strange sight
he
had
seen;
he
played
bridge
very
badly;
his
partner
was
censorious,
and
the
taipan
lost
his
temper.
He
thought
the
men
were looking
at
him
oddly.
He
wondered
what
they
saw
in
him
that
was unaccustomed.

Suddenly
he
felt
he
could
not
bear
to
stay
in
the
club
any
longer. As
he
went
out
he
saw
the
doctor
reading
The
Times
in
the
reading-room,
but
he
could
not
bring
himself
to
speak
to
him.
He
wanted to
see
for
himself
whether
that
grave
was
really
there
and
stepping into
his
chair
he
told
his
bearers
to
take
him
to
the
cemetery.
You couldn't
have
an
hallucination
twice,
could
you?
And
besides,
he would
take
the
overseer
in
with
him
and
if
the
grave
was
not
there he
wouldn't
see
it,
and
if
it
was
he'd
give
the
overseer
the
soundest thrashing
he'd
ever
had.
But
the
overseer
was
nowhere
to
be
found. He
had
gone
out
and
taken
the
keys
with
him.
When
the
taipan found
he
could
not
get
into
the
cemetery
he
felt
suddenly
exhausted. He
got
back
into
his
chair
and
told
his
bearers
to
take
him
home.
He would
lie
down
for
half
an
hour
before
dinner.
He
was
tired
out.
That
was
it.
He
had
heard
that
people
had
hallucinations
when
they
were tired.
When
his
boy
came
in
to
put
out
his
clothes
for
dinner
it
was only
by
an
effort
of
will
that
he
got
up.
He
had
a
strong
inclination not
to
dress
that
evening,
but
he
resisted
it:
he
made
it
a
rule
to
dress, he
had
dressed
every
evening
for
twenty
years
and
it
would
never
do to
break
his
rule.
But
he
ordered
a
bottle
of
champagne
with
his
dinner
and
that
made
him
feel
more
comfortable.
Afterwards
he
told
the boy
to
bring
him
the
best
brandy.
When
he
had
drunk
a
couple
of glasses
of
this
he
felt
himself
again.
Hallucinations
be
damned!
He went
to
the
billiard
room
and
practised
a
few
difficult
shots.
There could
not
be
much
the
matter
with
him
when
his
eye
was
so
sure. When
he
went
to
bed
he
sank
immediately
into
a
sound
sleep.