"Oh, I see. German, wasn't he?--Pity
they didn't pop Rudie Hackh in!"
Her swift upward glance might have been admiration, if she had not
said:--
"Your mind works very slowly."
"Oh?" Again he paused, as though somewhat hurt; then answered
cheerfully: "Dare say. Always did. Thought at first you meant the
rattan-juice kind, from Sumatra."
The gate of the town yawned black. From the streets glimmered a few
lanterns, like candles in a long cave. But shunning these unfriendly
corridors, he led her roundabout, now along the walls, now through the
dim ways of an outlying hamlet. A prolonged shriek of growing fright and
anguish came slowly toward them--the cry of a wheelbarrow carrying the
great carcass of a pig, waxy white and waxy red, like an image from a
chamber of horrors. In the blue twilight, fast deepening, the most
familiar things became grotesque. A woman's voice telling stories behind
shadow pictures, and the capricious play of the black puppets on her
lighted screen, had the effect of incantation. Before the booth of a
dentist, the long strings of black teeth swayed in the lantern-glow,
rattling, like horrid necklaces of cannibals.
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