We rode our tiffins back and met Miss Eastinhoe with her friends.
"Let us go on a tiger-hunt," we all remarked, casually.
As we drove home a voice suddenly broke on the darkness.[3]
[Footnote 3: Another curious Oriental phenomenon, not sufficiently
explained by the author.]
"Peace, Abdallah Hafiz," it said.
"By the holy poker, the Jibena-inosay!" answered Jacobs, who had
recognized the broken voice.
"I have business with thee," continued the voice; "I will be with
thee, anon."
"It is Lamb Ral," my companion explained, as the voice faded away.
"Facetious as ever; now you have him, and then again you don't have
him. We call him the Little Joker, for short."
"Isn't he difficult to explain?" I ventured.
"Very," he said. "But who has ever explained how a man could keep his
family up for years with no visible means of support; or how a person
can promenade on his ear; or crawl into a hole and pull the hole in
after him. And yet you have seen those things, I have seen them,
everybody has seen them, and most of us have done them ourselves."
Later in the evening we were visited by Lamb Ral.
"Do not go tiger-hunting," he said. "It will take you out of the lines
of the jewellery trade."
"Still I shall go," persisted Jacobs.
"What a singular piece of workmanship is that ytaghan!" observed Lamb
Ral, waving one delicate hand towards the wall behind us.
When we turned back from seeing that there was no ytaghan there, the
magician had disappeared, leaving a strong smell of lucifer matches
behind him, but taking a number of triple-plated watches.
"Singular man," said Jacobs, musingly. "I wish I knew how he does it.
It must be profitable."