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The Chinese “boys” made a rush for the end of the room, and there, up on the sideboard, among the glass, pelting his enemy, the high official, as fast as he could throw, was Lepas.

A finger bowl struck the butler full in the face, and gave the monkey time to make his escape out into the darkness through the wide-open doors.

We saw nothing more of Lepas for a week or more; we had, indeed, about given him up, wondering as to his whereabouts, when one afternoon, as I was taking my usual post-tiffin siesta on the cool side of the great, wide-spreading veranda, I heard a timid whistle, and looked up to see Lepas seated on the railing, as sad and humble as any truant schoolboy.

His hair was matted and faded and his face was dirty. His form had lost some of the plumpness that had come to it with good living, but there was the same wicked twinkle in his eyes, and the same hypocritical deceit in his bearing as of old.

I reached out my hand to take him, but he hopped a few feet away and began to beg with his teeth.

“Lepas,” I said, “you have a bad heart. I wash my hands of you. When Hamat comes back you can go to him and be an ordinary, low caste monkey. Now go! I never want to see you again!”

Lepas puckered up his lips and whistled mournfully for a few moments, but seeing no sign of forgiveness in my face he jumped down and began to turn handsprings and dance with the most demure grace.

I took no notice of him, and after a few vain efforts to attract my attention, he hopped dejectedly off the veranda across the lawn, and disappeared among the timboso trees and rubber-vines.

Two weeks later Hamat returned from Mecca. He paid me a visit in state–white robe and green turban. I shook hands and called him by his new title of nobility, Tuan Hadji, but he did not refer to Lepas.

Before many minutes he commenced to look wistfully about. I pointed to the trees back of the house. He went out under them and called two or three times.

There was a great chattering among the rubber-vines, and in a moment down came Lepas and sprang to his old master’s shoulder as happy as a lover.

I never saw Lepas but once again, and that was one evening on the ocean esplanade. He was in the centre of an admiring circle of half-nude Malay and Hindu boys, going through his quaint antics, while Hamat squatted before him beating on a crocodile-hide drum and singing a plaintive, monotonous song.

When it was finished, Lepas took an empty cocoanut shell and went out into the crowd to collect pennies.

I threw in a dollar. Lepas salaamed low as he snatched it out and bit it to test its genuineness. It was his latest accomplishment. Then he hid himself among the laughing crowd.

That Lepas knew me, I could tell by the droop in his eye and the quick glance he gave to the right and left, to see if there was room to escape in case I made an effort to avenge my wrongs.

I had no desire, however, to renew the acquaintance, and was quite willing to let by-gones be by-gones.