denied it--he
afterward did deny it.

"A drink?" he murmured. "A drink? Oh, aye, I could name a drink if that
would fill your need. Look over yonder on the slope beyond the
Government House, that purple blaze. It's a big bachang tree in bloom,
and if you should take the path that climbs beside it you might find
such entertainment as perhaps you're seeking. Local I believe it is and
quite tropic. Keep always to the left till you reach a pair o' green
gates--three turns, or it may be four--and mind your footing as you go,
sir--"

So this was the way Mr. Tunstal won his wish in the early morning when
he came to the garden of Lol Raman, up from terrace to terrace above
that far, that very far Eastern town.

He met his first thrill where Ezekiel met his in the vision, within the
threshold of the gate. The high wall he had been following gave suddenly
under an arch. There were the double green doors, standing open, and he
entered a sort of open-air conservatory. At least he had no better word
for the place so crammed with color and scent, and no word at all for
the strange flowers and improbable trees that clustered along the walks.
Down by the farther end of the inclosure stood a low house almost lost
in shrubbery. An arbor with some chairs and tables seemed to invite the
passer-by. And just before him, in Buddhistic meditation under a palm,
squatted the reception committee of one--a monstrous orang-utan, the
true red-haired jungle man, with a face like a hideous black caricature
of Death.

Things happened. At sight of a visitor the huge beast reared himself,
and sprang abruptly into vehement life, bouncing on bent knuckles. He
started out to the limit of his chain until the bright steel links
snicked ominously behind him and the leather harness drew taut about his
shoulders, pumping and roaring in the great cavern of his chest to top a
gale of his own forests. He scurried around the trunk and snatched at
something--a packet of leaves. He ran around the other way and retrieved
a little lacquer box. Crouching over these treasures with every
appearance of the most frantic rage, he began, swiftly and
incredibly--to roll cigarettes!

And meanwhile, impassive as a wax manikin, a white-jacketed,
white-saronged servitor glided from space somewhere to prepare a table
and to offer a chair in the arbor, to set out a square-faced bottle, to
pour a glass of golden yellow liquor, and to collect the tiny, fresh
cylinders of tobacco