I could not touch a book, it was impossible
to write, so in the I-know-not-what mood I wandered about from room to
room. It had become quite dark, the thunder was continually pealing, the
lightning gleaming flash after flash, and every now and then sudden gusts
of wind would get hold of the big _lichi_ tree by the neck and give
its shaggy top a thorough shaking. The hollow in front of the house soon
filled with water, and as I paced about, it suddenly struck me that I
ought to offer the shelter of the house to the magistrate.
I sent off an invitation; then after investigation I found the only spare
room encumbered with a platform of planks hanging from the beams, piled
with dirty old quilts and bolsters. Servants' belongings, an excessively
grimy mat, hubble-bubble pipes, tobacco, tinder, and two wooden chests
littered the floor, besides sundry packing-cases full of useless odds and
ends, such as a rusty kettle lid, a bottomless iron stove, a discoloured
old nickel teapot, a soup-plate full of treacle blackened with dust. In a
corner was a tub for washing dishes, and from nails in the wall hung moist
dish-clouts and the cook's livery and skull-cap. The only piece of
furniture was a rickety dressing-table with water stains, oil stains, milk
stains, black, brown, and white stains, and all kinds of mixed stains. The
mirror, detached from it, rested against another wall, and the drawers
were receptacles for a miscellaneous assortment of articles from soiled
napkins down to bottle wires and dust.
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