Now and again he heard the singsong cadence of a Chinese quotation.

It was a strange picture that Kim watched between drooped eyelids.

The lama, very straight and erect, the deep folds of his yellow clothing slashed with black in the light of the parao fires precisely as a knotted tree-trunk is slashed with the shadows of the low sun, addressed a tinsel and lacquered ruth which burned like a many-coloured jewel in the same uncertain light.

The patterns on the gold-worked curtains ran up and down, melting and reforming as the folds shook and quivered to the night wind; and when the talk grew more earnest the jewelled forefinger snapped out little sparks of light between the embroideries.

Behind the cart was a wall of uncertain darkness speckled with little flames and alive with half-caught forms and faces and shadows.