RECOLLECTIONS OF FULL YEARS
on the verandah for coffee, in came Mr. Number One Boy with a ponderous, steaming bread-pudding, all covered with coloured ornaments, which he smilingly displayed for the benefit of the astonished party. It had to be served, of course, and I felt that my explanations regarding Ah Sing's eccentricities didn't make much of an impression.
Over none of the servants did I exercise the control I thought to be necessary, but this was due to the fact that for three months they had been obeying the master; the master had paid them their wages, and to the master they looked for all orders. It took me sometime to discover this, but when I did I began to handle household accounts without assistance.
It was about the end of the typhoon season and the predictions were that there would be no more heavy storms. But it began to rain and blow one day with rather more force than I had ever seen before, and I was told that we were in the midst of a typhoon. "Oh, well," I thought, "if this is all I don't see why there is so much talk about it.” It was just a very hard and very persistent storm. When I began to think it was about time for it to have blown itself out I was awakened one night by what seemed to me to be the bombardment of heavy artillery. My bed was shaking under me, the house was swaying, and the noise was terrifying. I jumped up with an instant idea of insurrectos, and a feeling that I must meet the situation on my feet; then I realised, at once, that it was the typhoon. It was as if all the winds that had blown for two days had gathered themselves together and were hurling themselves in one blast upon us. I reached for the electric switch, but there were no lights; I turned the button time and again; nothing happened. I fumbled for matches all over my room and could find none. My nerves were just at the crying out point when my door was thrown open and in rushed Maria, holding aloft a glimmering candle.
106
