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got 'em all in here for?
JOHN BEAL
Yes, that's just it. I hate interfering with them, but, well, I simply had to.
You see there's two sorts of idols here; they offer fruit and rats to some
of them; they lay them on their hands or their laps.
ARCHIE BEAL
Why do they offer them rats?
JOHN BEAL
O, I don't know. They don't know either. It's the right thing to do out

here, it's been the right thing for hundreds of years; nobody exactly
knows why. It's like the bows we have on evening shoes, or anything
else. But it's all right.
ARCHIE BEAL
Well, what are you putting them in heaps for?
JOHN BEAL
Because there's the other kind, the ones with wide mouths and rust
round them.
ARCHIE BEAL
Rust? Yes, so there is. What do they do?
JOHN BEAL
They offer blood to them, ARCHIE. They pour it down their throats.
Sometimes they kill people, sometimes they only bleed them. It
depends how much blood the idol wants.
ARCHIE BEAL
How much blood it wants? Good Lord! How do they know?
JOHN BEAL
The priests tell them. Sometimes they fill them up to their
necks--they're all hollow, you know. In spring it's awful.
ARCHIE BEAL
Why are they worse in spring?
JOHN BEAL
I don't know. The priests ask for more blood then. Much more. They
say it always was so.
ARCHIE BEAL
And you're stopping it?
JOHN BEAL
Yes, I'm stopping these. One must. I'm letting them worship those. Of
course, it's idolatry and all that kind of thing, but I don't like interfering
short of actual murder.
ARCHIE BEAL
And they're obeying you?
JOHN BEAL
'M, y-yes. I think so.
ARCHIE BEAL
You must have got a great hold over them.
JOHN BEAL

Well, I don't know about that. It's the pass that counts.
ARCHIE BEAL
The pass?
JOHN BEAL
Yes, that place you came over. It's the only way anyone can get here.
ARCHIE BEAL
Yes, I suppose it is. But how does the pass affect these idols?
JOHN BEAL
It affects everything here. If that pass were closed no living man would
ever enter or leave, or even hear of, this country. It's absolutely cut off
except for that one pass. Why, ARCHIE, it isn't even on the map.
ARCHIE BEAL
Yes, I know.
JOHN BEAL
Well, whoever owns that pass is everybody. No one else counts.
ARCHIE BEAL
And who does own it?
JOHN BEAL
Well, it's actually owned by a fellow called Hussein, but Miss
Clement's uncle, a man called Hinnard, a kind of lonely explorer, seems
to have come this way; and I think he understood what this pass is
worth. Anyhow, he lent Hussein a big sum of money and got an
acknowledgment from Hussein. Old Hinnard must have been a
wonderfully shrewd man. For that acknowledgment is no more legal
than an I.O.U., and Hussein is simply a brigand.
ARCHIE BEAL
Not very good security.
JOHN BEAL
Well, you're wrong there. Hussein himself respects that piece of
parchment he signed. There's the name of some god or other written on
it Hussein is frightened of. Now you see how things are. That pass is as
holy as all the gods that there are in Al Shaldomir. Hussein possesses it.
But he owes an enormous sum to Miss Miralda Clement, and I am here
as her agent; and you've come to help me like a great sportsman.
ARCHIE BEAL
O, never mind that. Well, it all seems pretty simple.
JOHN BEAL

Well, I don't know, ARCHIE. Hussein admits the debt, but . . .
ARCHIE BEAL
But what?
JOHN BEAL
I don't know what he'll do.
ARCHIE BEAL
Wants watching, does he?
JOHN BEAL
Yes. And meanwhile I feel sort of responsible for all these silly people.
Somebody's got to look after them. Daoud!
DAOUD [off]
Great master.
JOHN BEAL
Bring in some more gods.
DAOUD
Yes, great master.
JOHN BEAL
I can't get them to stop calling me absurd titles. They're so infernally
Oriental.
[Enter DAOUD.]
ARCHIE BEAL
He's got two big ones this time.
JOHN BEAL [to ARCHIE]
You see, there is rust about their mouths. [To DAOUD]: They are both
unholy.
[He points to R. heap, and DAOUD puts them there. To DAOUD.]
Bring in some more.
DAOUD
Great master, there are no more gods in Al Shaldomir.
JOHN BEAL
It is well.
DAOUD
What orders, great master.
JOHN BEAL
Listen. At night you shall come and take these gods away. These shall
be worshipped again in their own place, these you shall cast into the
great river and tell no man where you cast them.

DAOUD
Yes, great master.
JOHN BEAL
You will do this, Daoud?
DAOUD
Even so, great master.
JOHN BEAL
I am sorry to