Achmed Abdullah

“ The Hatchetman A barrel-organ had just creaked up the street, leaving a sudden rent of silence in the hectic clattering of the Pell Street symphony and lending a slow, dramatic thud to the words of Yung Long, the wholesale grocer, that drifted through the gangrened door.
"Yes," he said. "Wong Ti—" and Wong Ti, on his way through the hall, stopped as he heard his name—"is a killer, a hatchetman. In the whole of Pell Street there is none more skilled than he in his profession. He is old and withered. True! But his mind is sharp, his hand is steady, and he knows the intricate lore of drugs. ”

“ Good morals are the only law by which the human mind may hope to attain to the shining planes of spiritual wisdom. Good morals are necessary for women—desirable even for men!"
"Good morals are a delusion, fool!" the hatchetman had rejoined. "Only happiness counts in life. Happiness—and justice. And as to Chia Shun——"
"Yes?" had come the eager question.
"I know that she is a butterfly, while I am a regrettable, dried-up cockroach."
"Do you think it fitting that a butterfly and—ah—a regrettable, dried-up cockroach should mate, O wise and elder brother?" ”

“ At the time of the wedding, Wong Ti had explained his position to Nag Hong Fah, the pouchy, greasy proprietor of the Great Shanghai Chop Suey Palace, not because he thought that he owed an explanation to any one, but to forestall leaky-tongued, babbling gossip.
"I am not a Cantonese pig," he had said, adding with callous brutality, "as you are. I am from the West, from the province of Shensi, the cradle of the black-haired race. Our men are free, and so are our women—freer even than—these!" ”

“ A dwarfed, gnarled lychee tree with glistening, blackish green leaves; a draggle-tail parrot tulip, brown and tawny and gamboge yellow, in a turquoise blue pot; another pot, virulently crimson, dragon painted, planted with anæmic Cantonese frisias; a waxen budding narcissus bulb bending beneath the greasy, stinking soot—and the whole characteristic of Wong Ti, killer, red-handed assassin; yet a philosopher and a gentle, just man. ”

“ He turned and walked up the stairs with that furtive step which, since it was the scientific accomplishing of murder that brought him the glitter of gold, the shine of silver, the jangling of copper, and the pleasant, dry rustle of paper money had become second nature to him: heels well down, toes slowly gripping through soft duffle soles, arms carefully balanced, hands at right angles from the wrists, and fingers spread out gropingly, like the sensitive antennæ of some night insect, to give warning of unfamiliar objects. ”

“ There was the large cheval mirror, intimately connected with the mysterious murder of one Li Tuan-fen, king amongst laundrymen and hereditary enemy of the Yung clan, in which every morning and countless times during the day his wife surveyed the lissom, wicked sweetness of her nineteen years, her smooth, raven hair, her long black lashes that swept over opaque, delightfully slanting eyes like lovely silk fringes, the delicate golden velvet texture of her skin, and her narrow, fluttering hands. ”

“ And Pell Street knew—and did not tell—why he had returned.
"He will sneer at us, but he will cure us," Nag Hop Fat, the soothsayer, had crystallized the prevailing sentiment, "thereby accumulating much face for himself, his father, and all his ancestors. With every drop of medicine, will he give us two, perhaps three, grains of contempt. And we, knowing that he is a great doctor, will not be able to refuse the medicine—nor the contempt. A most proper and wise man is En Hai!" ”

“ And he had understood almost from the first, when Doctor En Hai had returned to Pell Street—"because they need me"—and had nailed his shingle on the floor below.
"A butterfly will always yearn for a butterfly," Wong Ti smiled now, as he held over the lamp the little brown chandoo cube, which was stuck on the opening of the furnace. The opium fizzled, dissolved, and evaporated. ”

“ He could put poison in your belly, and your lips would be none the wiser. Too, he is fearless of the white devils' incomprehensible laws. He has killed more often than there are hairs on his honourable chest. ”