“At times I thought of my rifle, but I put that idea aside because of the regiment and the scandal in the newspapers—­still, I was always meditating some way out.  I think now, if I’d opened my mind to one of my pals, it would have been easier, and I’d not have felt it so cruel hard; but somehow I’d never breathed the name of Polly to one of them—­I held her like a holy thing apart.  I could not stand the talk and the coarse chaff of the barrack-room, so I kept my trouble sealed up, till at last it grew too big for me, and I made up my mind to do away with myself, where no one would be a penny the wiser.  I got a couple of days’ leave—­by way of seeing a pal at Tonghoo—­and I went up the river and away into the Jungles, and wandered about looking for some venomous reptile to put an end to me in a natural way!  But, if you’ll believe me, sir, divil a bite could I get—­not after searching for half a day; and, av coorse, had I been looking without intention, I’d have found dozens.

“What with walking miles in the blazing sun and nothing to eat, I believe I fell down with a stroke, and some wood-cutters found me and carried me into their village—­a big place with a great thorn hedge and gates to keep off the Dacoits.  The head man they call a Thugyi took me over, and his women nursed me; he was a rich fellow with four yoke of oxen, and so no expense was spared; and there I lived for many a long day, very strange and out of myself.  I could not remember who I was, nor where I came from; all the clothes I had to me name was a shirt and a pair of drawers.  By degrees, thanks to great charity and kindness, I come round, I remembered everything only too well, and then I buried Mick Ryan in the jungle and became a pongye.  The peace and quiet ate into me very bones, and I took on the yellow robe.  The rest and the holy life tamed me and did y soul good; and many an evening when I’d be roaming in the forests, among the splendid tall trees and beautiful flowers, with the birds and animals around me so tame and at their ease, I’d have a feelin’ that Polly was walkin’ alongside of me, the face on her shining with the light of heaven!  But,” drawing himself erect, “excuse me, sir, for bothering you with all this foolish, crazy sort of talk.”

“Not at all,” said Shafto.  “Thank you so much for telling me your story.  I am truly sorry for you, Ryan; it was hard lines losing your Polly.  Do you mind telling me some more?  After you had recovered your memory and become a pongye, what happened next?”

“Well, after a while, I chanced to see English papers and hear outside news, an’ I got a cast in a cargo boat down the river.  I had a sort o’ longin’ to see the soldiers, the love of the Service is in me blood, so now and then I was drawn to Rangoon to get a sight of the khaki and to hear the barrack yarns.  Ye see, one quarter of me is Cingalese—­I suppose me grandfather on one side was a Buddhist, and that is how pongye life came so pleasant and aisy to me.  The three quarters of me is an Irish soldier, an’ every day the soldier within me grows an’ the pongye dies away.”