their looks. My prospects of enlisting his co-operation, therefore, were of the slenderest.
When
I presented myself at Mirzah's tin-roofed one-roomed shack he was still
at his early-morning devotions. After he had perused my introduction,
he scrutinised me carefully and then declared with an air of deep
gratitude, that I had been sent by Heaven itself. It required little
intuition on my part to divine that Mirzah's cupboard was not
overstocked, for hollower cheeks than his I had as yet not encountered
in all my journeyings across the Malay Peninsular.
There
is an Oriental saying which I remembered as I faced my broker-to-be. It
says that the All-Merciful never sends one of his winged messengers to
earth, but chooses quite an ordinary mortal in pursuit of his own
selfish ends, for bringing succour to the needy and comfort to the
distressed.
In
my eagerness to make the most of the few hours I had allotted to the
small township, I asked at once whether Mirzah knew of anyone who stood
in urgent need of diamonds. Mirzah replied that it was an ill thing to
discuss such important business on an empty stomach (he was doubtless
referring to his own). I at once agreed to postpone my business until
he had broken his fast, for after all, it was only seven, a little more
than an hour after sunrise. He offered me the loan of his best rattan
rocking-chair in which to compose my salesman's ardour, and went on. I
suspected that he had gone to get credit for provender on the strength
of his prospects with me, for the news of my arrival in town had
already reached the ears
