He threw himself back in his seat again, licking his gold tooth almost as though he were delicately showing the tip of his tongue to the ghost of the Reverend Oswald Fawcett.
“Oh nonsense!” he thought. “Why all this talk? After all, I am Chinese. Commission is the very lifeblood of China, yet Chinese are the most honest and trusted business men in the world; the honesty of Chinese business men is proverbial—even in Bloomsbury I have heard talk of it—yet every Chinese business man takes his commission as a matter of course.”
He scanned the ghost again, and still his expatriated heart was not satisfied. “Why, can’t you see how pure my intentions are toward the poor idiots? I like them—I am genuinely fond of that lumpy young Saggay Saggayitch. I really do mean well, and will do well by them. … Why, look, I am traveling second class at this moment—not first. … Well, no, of course I shan’t exactly give back the difference—not in so many coins—yet traveling second in this way will allow me to spend more in Seoul on my employer’s behalf. This in itself shows how disinterested I am. I know that I am sent by God to help them. I have proof of it, as follows: I have received direct promptings from Heaven. For instance, that fish—even while Saggay Saggayitch was in the water catching that fish, I suddenly felt quite clearly that I had already dreamed that very scene; I knew at once that the heart, liver, and gall of the fish were to be preserved as gifts from Heaven. God sent that fish—having caused it to be miraculously caught round the waist (a most exceptional method) by Saggay Saggayitch, and I was warned in advance of the miracle by means of a dream. What does this prove? Does it not prove that I am God’s messenger to them? And not only that; I am genuinely fond of them; I wouldn’t do them out of a sen. No, I wouldn’t. …”
The first light of dawn gave a curious false emphasis to various insignificant details in the compartment—to inequalities in the stuffing of the cushions—to spittoons—to smears on the window-glass—to dust and dreary ornamentation. The ghost of the Reverend Oswald Fawcett faded from Wilfred’s moral sight as the light grew stronger and picked out more and more prosaically the details of his surroundings. He leaned back, feeling justified and sophisticated, and looked out of the window. Brown batwing villages, shadeless and lightless in the diffused drowned light of dawn, clung to the miles of dry green and yellow land. The first cooking-fires were being kindled in the clay stoves outside the cottage doors; smoke breathed in a cool blue haze through roofs. Scarlet peppers, spread out to dry on the roofs, looked almost grape-blue with the dew on them—though when the sun should touch them they would wake to a Christmasy vermilion. Mountains—their earth wine-red as though clothed in heather—cut the intensifying line of the horizon into a jagged zigzag. Out-of-doors always seems more essentially out-of-doors at dawn—not, as in the busy afternoon, a mere extension of man’s indoors. There was that aloofness—unstained by humanity—about the cold paling twilight of the land, that one sees in a wild animal’s eyes.
Wilfred had replaced his well-earned money in his breast pocket, but he still held upon his knee four papers that armed him for his errand. Now, by that same first ray of the sun that lighted the eastern aspects of the western mountains as though they were candles, he reread these papers, in order to clarify his anticipation of the next few busy hours.
The first paper was a Power of Attorney signed by Old Sergei in favor of Seryozha. It had been drawn up by Wilfred himself from memory. Wilfred, of course, had only a haughty barrister’s recollection of such a pettifogging paper as a Power of Attorney, yet, as he ran his eye over it, he congratulated himself on having composed an impressive echo of the real thing.
Know All Men by these presents that I Sergei Dmitrivitch Malinin of Chi-tao-kou retail merchant Do Hereby Constitute and Appoint my son Sergei Sergeievitch Malinin of Chi-tao-kou timberworker my true and lawful Attorney for the purposes hereinafter expressed that is to say In my name to receive the moneys deposited by me with Gavril Ilitch Isaev of Seoul hotelkeeper in for investment in his business namely two hundred yen and interest accruing thereto and to give an effectual receipt therefor. And I hereby declare that this Power of Attorney shall be irrevocable for Twelve Calendar Months from the date hereof.
In Witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this . Signed Sealed and Delivered by the abovenamed
