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THE day had passed in unendurable peace. To Ming So's enquiries they replied that Tung's wife was busy and could talk with no one. Lien Fa was asleep, and, when he wakened her, swore at him and went to sleep again. Yang Fei proved unbearably dull--he began to realise that in reciting the "Ballad of Everlasting Wrong" she had exhausted her repertoire, or so it seemed. The porter, whom the boy approached in desperation, was reading a novel, and resented interruption.
So the afternoon, and evening passed in utter boredom. Ming So began to wonder how he could possibly live in "The Happy Heart" for very much longer. He missed the unending work and incident of the country, finding the city spiritually a Gobi desert of dullness.