At Hankow Edward and Stone found that they had almost too much money. In order to go to Chungking—one of the few cities in the world without a Thomas Cook—they had to change their eight hundred American dollars into a much larger number of Mexican silver dollars. Their suitcases were rooted to the ground by the weight of their silver. “Let me borrow some from you,” suggested Edward, turning scarlet in a way that proved his honesty to himself. “It’ll be a purely business transaction. I’ll pay you two per cent per month. I want a thin suit of clothes.” “Sure, go ahead,” said Stone. Edward bought a cream-colored ready-made suit and saw in the mirror that he looked like an unsuccessful dentist. He walked hurriedly out of the store to escape this dreadful ghost. “You look like thirty cents,” said Stone, who seemed to have inherited his mother’s frank callousness. They embarked on a wide sunny little steamer for Ichang. Edward sat on the deck day after day and saw failure gathering like a cloud about his hope of Emily. He reminded himself industriously of his hopelessness and of the fact that he looked like thirty cents. Edward never, in the whole course of his life, forgot any derogatory personal remark made about himself in his hearing. He luxuriated too much in the criticism of others to forget it. Edward noticed the bald leathery water buffaloes at work in the flat fields; he only noticed them because he thought their faces were like his, like his own face reduced—or magnified—to the absurd. This idea made him watch for the closer buffaloes with a morbid eagerness. On the tilted swaying back of one near the tail sat a little boy in a broad hat, playing the flute and drumming his heels. The buffalo went dismally past its fellows who were lying dismally in the mud; it had not enough strength of mind to defy the little boy and give itself up to its one dismal pleasure. Black trails worn by the tears of years streaked the buffalo’s face; its horns drooped awry. The river ran so smoothly that it was like a broad road of polished golden glass. It seemed that the eyes were deceived—nothing so unruffled could pass so swiftly. It seemed to Edward that he was flashing above its still surface, the cords of the western sun had snared him and were snatching him from himself. Beneath him time and youth and the river—flowered and golden—stood still and were left behind. A dull but hot sun laid shadeless light on the exact pyramid hills that stand about Ichang and the mouth of the Yangtze Gorges.