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[Assistant] That's fire. So, you, uh, when did you become interested in rap music?


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[Assistant] That happened. And also shout out to Madzilla. She's like an Instagram model. She opened a bottle of champagne and it blasted everywhere and there was a printer and it got all over the printer. Those are my two favorite.


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[Assistant] The pros and cons of that is kinda- We can destroy some stuff. I'm always trying to think of like fucked up things we could do to go viral. Like when I had Fatboy dump the drink on my head. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.


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[Assistant] I was thinking about doing something where somebody steals my chain during the interview. That'd be dope. That'd be, that'd be pretty funny. But I don't want, I don't wear a chain, so that might be a dead giveaway that is not real.


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[Assistant] Well because it's like, say you have five million dollars tomorrow, it's kind of like, what are you going to do with it? You're going to buy a car, you're probably going to buy a house. I mean, invest in bitcoin. Smart thing to do is put it in the bank, but most people aren't really thinking that. They're thinking, I might as well buy a bunch of expensive shoes.


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[Assistant] What would I have done without YBN Cordae? I don't know what I was doing before now. I have no clue.


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[Assistant] Okay, so from your perspective, you see Namir start popping off, and his shit happened fast.


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[Assistant] Yeah, yeah, uh, I never worked in food service besides the grocery store. I never worked at like a restaurant, so I never really learned what that come up was like.


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[Assistant] That's amazing. I mean, I would probably want to start doing a shitload of cocaine if I worked at Fridays too, to be honest.


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[Assistant] That would not be good. Plus you're gonna, your one shift at Fridays, you're gonna like spend your whole check doing drugs probably.


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[Assistant] Do you always feel like you had something special about you that was gonna allow you to be successful or even to be a rapper specifically?


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[Assistant] Yeah. Hell yeah. Yeah, it was my memories of it too, just having shitty jobs, just like, God, how the fuck do I get out of here? How do I beat this?


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[Assistant] She's out here being the heartthrob. No, but it just, it seems like a setup just in the sense that you then come out and you're so different from them but so dope in your own way that to me it's like, there has to be like a mastermind who's sort of like putting together these moves. But no.


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[Assistant] Yeah, cause it's like, you know, that's a special kind of role to play is like your homie's blowing up and you know you're nice, but you don't want to necessarily like go super out of your way to start outshining them when they just started shining.


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[Assistant] Yeah, see, I think that's the kind of valuable or interesting position that you're in, in the sense that you are affiliated with Namir and Jay. So you're already part of this popping ass wave, but then you come out with a completely different style. And I just feel like people are ready for it in a lot of ways. Like the response I've seen to your 1985 response has just been like, yes.


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[Assistant] Yeah, yeah. No, yeah, so, okay, what was your perception of J. Cole leading up to doing this 1985 response? Were you always a fan of him, I'm assuming?


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[Assistant] Jay Cole's biggest concern on this most recent album just definitely seems to be the drugs, which I think is very reasonable on his part.


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[Assistant] Are the one thing that young people fucking love. Yeah. As you get older you realize that they're bad, that they're very bad. Yeah.


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[Assistant] But there's like a tendency to older people in hip hop to not call out the younger people for abusing drugs because of the fact that they know that drugs are like the cool thing. And they always, in some way probably always will be. J. Cole, like the principle thing that he's kind of attacking on the album is just like,


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[Assistant] It's kind of like a noble thing that he took that on in particular, but what's your take on that? Cause you're united to drugs I'm guessing?


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[Assistant] And I mean especially I think that at a period like where you're at in your life where you really need to be conceptualizing exactly what you want your career to be and who you want to be as a person.


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[Assistant] Yeah, weed is a great way to like sit back and sort of like, you know, tune out and like relax and shit. But when I look at where you're at in your career and a lot of young rappers and stuff, that's not the direction I would tell them to go in. I would say, yo, you need to be on it. Like you need to be recording, touring, meeting fans, doing all the productive shit, not just sinking


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[Assistant] That's gonna be tight, but uhm, yeaah, I don't know, like, I feel like...


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[Assistant] Yeah, there's something about, like, where you're at in your career where I just feel like there's just huge things on the horizon because I think you're gonna be able to seize upon a lot of different fan groups. You know, different types of people are gonna fuck with you.


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[Assistant] And even when you look at your shit, like you got 200k on Instagram and you're getting like crazy engagement.


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[Assistant] Yeah, I think I met him when he was 5,000 and he was, you know, honestly not that different than he is now. He's just a lot smarter now.


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[Assistant] I remember him telling me like, oh Adam, I'm about to get the chain, the bracelet, the fucking watch, blah blah blah, and like telling me his plans, and I'm like,


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[Assistant] No, you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna go backwards. I'm gonna go house, car, jewelry.


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[Assistant] Is there anybody else in the crew who raps? Nah. You're the man.


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[Assistant] Hell yeaah. What, so from your perspective though, do you have like a mixtape in mind? Do you have plans like in terms of where you want to take your career? How you want this all to work?


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[Assistant] I'm gonna hit him, I'm gonna tell him to watch this podcast so he can, so I can help spark out that conversation.


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[Assistant] Well, the thing that's weird to me about the fact that you even sorta came out by, you know, making a song that sort of referenced J. Cole and stuff is that you remind me of him a lot.


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[Assistant] No, but like J. Cole, he's just like, he just struck me, I was like, woah, like, you could be that famous and also be that humble. Like, that's how I felt talking to him, like, I, like, in a lot of ways, like, I've just never met anybody that acted like that much of a regular dude who was that, like, he's like the most selling rapper, like, you know, at least top three selling rapper.


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[Assistant] It didn't have anything to do with us because I didn't give his number out. Pump didn't even have his number. He was talking to him on my phone and stuff, but J. Cole was kind of like weirded out. Like he thought that we might have like been trying to prank call him or something, which is, I would not do that.


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[Assistant] You got 200k now, so you're lit in the club. You walk up to a girl and she's like, bing, 200k, sup.


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[Assistant] Having 200k versus having 2k is a whole different world in terms of how that first conversation with a girl goes.


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[Assistant] Hell yeaah. Alright, well hey, everybody go listen to YBN Cordae. He got Fridays in the rearview mirror. He got a mill on the horizon. Yes, yes, a million dollars. He's lit. Thank you very much to everybody who watched this. No Jumper, coolest podcast in the world. Check us out on YouTube, Soundcloud, iTunes.


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[Assistant] DeQuille, man, how's life, man? I like you with your Santa hat on and whatnot. Got you a couple shots going on. You know, I'm a lemonade, I'm a lemonade guy myself, but I respect what you got going on.


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[Assistant] I was in disgust about the fact that they went out there and let so many explosive plays happen.


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[Assistant] Yeah, I give them eight or nine at the most. You guys want me to write them down for eight touchdowns?


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[Assistant] When McNuggets first tested this on me.


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[Assistant] Defense out shot, D-Wise returned, defense forced two takeaways to cruise past the Texans. Man, I just think that, you know, since this offense for the Texans is not that great.


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[Assistant] Uhm, and with Dee White returning, everybody's kind of forgetting that about the defense. So I think they want to show, hey, it's a new day and age. They started with Tom Brady. They want to show you that it's going to continue to go even with Dee White here. They're going to be even more motivated. We're going to finally see an interception. Don't know. I want to say.


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[Assistant] You willing to give up Austin Hedges for Murphy?


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[Assistant] That's what I wanted him to say cause that's, that's all he been talking about. We have nobody at the end of the line and we need that big bat and we need, he was trying to trade for, uh,


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[Assistant] What's the catcher, uh, I can't think of his name, Cabrera? Cabrera?


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[Assistant] Okay, to answer the first question, yeaah, I think he does for sure. I'd like to see him get more, get his hand on the ball, meaning bringing down interceptions. But the way that he's playing these top receivers and shutting them down, absolutely. He has all pro bowl and all pro. He has to keep going.


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[Assistant] The same thing I'm saying about him is the exact same thing I said about Gnu last year. Now Gnu has switched his position to nickel, so I get it, but when he's been on the outside, it's been a little tricky. So as long as Martin Emerson continues to trend upwards, absolutely, they definitely would have hit a home run. As far as Denzel Ward goes,


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[Assistant] Not willing, obviously I'm biased because this is my former teammate and I've known the kid for a while. So uhm,


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[Assistant] He is one of the best corners in this league and that's just not something that you willy, you give away. Cause this is a passing league and you need guys to stop guys. So I wouldn't just give him away.


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[Assistant] I'ma go Tupac, all eyes on me. I thought you was gonna say hit him up. That's the greatest, even better. Tupac, hit him up. I don't know if that... It's a great one. I'm going Michael Jackson Smith.


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[Assistant] I'll make it short and sweet then. You don't have to be, you got time. No, I ain't got a lot on my mind. It's only one thing that's on my mind when I woke up this morning. Utah. You know the assignment. You know what you need to do today.


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[Assistant] Now it's funny how life works, you know. Now I'm begging them to go out there and


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[Assistant] Handle business tonight. It helps send the Buckeyes back here. Brad is not a fan of it, but Brad understands.


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[Assistant] Shout out to them Buckeyes and Norda Daym going to join the Big Ten. Man, it's not planned.


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[Assistant] I wanna know why do you have a G on your hand?


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[Assistant] Let me ask you this, is Brissette's name included on that? Yes.


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[Assistant] Salutare! Today we are going to show you how to make simple bubbles.


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[Assistant] I present to Congress Captain Toh Yuen Kai, Intelligence Department of Chinese 6th Army. Captain Toh would like to see you.


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[Assistant] Gentleman. An American who sells oil. Some of our women are riding in his truck.


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[Assistant] You know those two guys back there? Very well indeed. They are my first and second brother. Men of very complicated imaginations. Cut out that double talk. Sometimes when thoughts come to me, I speak them out loud. It's a most discourteous habit, Mr. Jones. You must please excuse me. As you figure it out by now, I don't like you very much. Oh, that's perfectly okay, Mr. Jones. I don't like you either. So you see, our feelings are entirely mutual. Now that we got that ironed out, who are you? Third brother, Lin Wei.


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[Assistant] A medical student at the university, where with Miss Grant, I also studied English. For an American, Miss Grant has many unusual qualities.


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[Assistant] Did alright too. That was most usual. Twice before I have seen him do the same thing.


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[Assistant] Luang Por's wider reputation rests, above all, on his ability to communicate the Dhamma.


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[Assistant] His Dhamma talks circle the world in print, on screens and as audible files on a variety of modern devices. Throughout his life of teaching


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[Assistant] He modeled two qualities of the Kalyana Mitra, specifically concerned with communication skills.


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[Assistant] Firstly, the ability to speak effectively, to get through to people, to counsel and admonish.


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[Assistant] And secondly, the ability to explain profound matters with clarity and accuracy.


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[Assistant] From his earliest days as a teacher, even before the establishment of Wat Pa Pong, Luang Por's gift for articulating the teachings had been clearly apparent.


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[Assistant] He became highly skilled in adapting his discourses to the needs of his audience. Adept at using everyday objects to illustrate profound topics in simple terms.


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[Assistant] The Buddha maintained that the Dhamma should be taught in a way that clarified, convinced, roused and gladdened the mind of the listener.


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[Assistant] Those who listened to Luang Por teaching over a long period would assert that those four words summed it up very well.


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[Assistant] The Isan culture into which Lumpur was born has always delighted in the skillful use of language.


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[Assistant] He grew up in an environment in which the ability to speak eloquently, dexterously and with humor was prized on every level of society.


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[Assistant] Isan folk music is full of wit and invention.


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[Assistant] When Luang Por was young, contests that involved the composition of extemporary rhymes were a feature of harvest time.


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[Assistant] Given these conditions, it might be said that Luang Por's speaking skills were not especially unusual. It was the use to which he put them that set him apart.


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[Assistant] The unrehearsed and vernacular dhamma talks he gave retained the energy and spark of folk oratory in a religious context formerly dominated by stiff and mannered text-based sermons.


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[Assistant] Luangpor was not the first monk in Thailand to teach in this way. The down-to-earth style of discourse was one of the characteristic features of the teachings given by the great Luangpor Man and his disciples as they wandered through the Isan countryside.


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[Assistant] Luang Por felt himself an inheritor of this tradition and became perhaps its finest exponent.


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[Assistant] Transcriptions of Luang Por's Dhamma talks have been read and treasured by huge numbers of Thai Buddhists.


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[Assistant] Translations of the transcriptions have made them available in many other languages. Nevertheless,


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[Assistant] As written records of oral teachings are necessarily restricted to content, they can only provide a one-dimensional record of the magic and emotional power of the originals.


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[Assistant] In them, Longpo's voice is utterly compelling.


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[Assistant] The natural, unassailable authority of his voice augmented by a palpable benevolence.


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[Assistant] The vast majority of the transcribed talks are from the last four years of his teaching career.


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[Assistant] There is a pronounced paternal tone to these talks, and an ever-present undercurrent of humor and warmth.


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[Assistant] The key feature of long-pause dama talks was their spontaneity.


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[Assistant] Luang Por maintained the Dhamma talks could not and should not be prepared beforehand.


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[Assistant] Although he would have a general theme in his mind when he began to talk, it might soon be discarded as his mind settled into a more fertile groove. He once mentioned to a disciple that sometimes he ascended to the high Dhamma seat and still would have no idea of what he was going to talk about.


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[Assistant] But, after I finished the namo invocation and composed my mind, then it comes by itself and starts to flow.


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[Assistant] Referring to this sense of an unforced flow of Dhamma emerging from within him, he compared it to the speech of a scholar learned from a book.


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[Assistant] The dharma that comes from the heart flows like water from a spring that never runs dry.


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[Assistant] But the knowledge that comes from memory is like rainwater in a jar.


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[Assistant] Once the rainy season is over, it soon comes to an end.


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[Assistant] In his middle age, Luang Por was still a remarkably vigorous man, and his dhama talks reflected that.


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[Assistant] He would generate an incredible energy as the talk progressed.


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[Assistant] Ajaan Roongrit recalled that some of the more fiery discourses would confront the defilements of the listeners in such an uncompromising fashion that it would really hurt. You'd be black and blue from the first night. If you couldn't take it you'd leave within three days. If you stayed you wouldn't ever want to leave.


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[Assistant] Occasionally, Luang Por would launch straight into a theme that was on his mind.


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[Assistant] More usually, he would begin a talk with a few general phrases, a familiar riff, even a meander or two, as he eased himself into the talk, biding time, allowing a theme to emerge by itself, which, within a few seconds, a few minutes, it inevitably did.


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[Assistant] Then, almost visibly, as if something had clicked into place, the talk would assume a clear trajectory. Gradually, as the power and focus of his words began to crank up inexorably, listeners would feel themselves being swept along by a powerful surge of Dhamma.


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[Assistant] For newly arrived Western monks, as yet unfamiliar with the language and cultural norms, some of the high-octane Dhamma discourses given in Isan dialect could sound uncomfortably akin to rants. But over time, it would become clear to them that something more profound was taking place.


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[Assistant] The audience at such talks showed no signs of agitation. Many sat with eyes closed in meditation.


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[Assistant] Those with eyes open were alert and intent.


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[Assistant] Although Luang Por's Dhamma talks were largely concerned with universal and timeless truths of the human condition, they were also very much grounded in the time and place in which they were given.


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[Assistant] Especially in the case of a speaker of Lumpur's gifts, the impromptu stream-of-consciousness style of speaking can allow for a profound symbiosis between speaker and audience.


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[Assistant] It is this unique element to the talks which is impossible to preserve in transcriptions.


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[Assistant] On a more mundane level, the power of L'empore's dhama talks may be explained in terms of the classic principles of rhetoric, whereby the audience's positive regard for the speaker must precede and underpin the logic of the talk and its emotional impact.


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[Assistant] L'Empereur's ethos was potent. Not only did he radiate a considerable personal charisma, but he also spoke with an authority derived from his age, his role as abbot, and his position as their teacher.


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[Assistant] Most importantly of all, he was believed by his audience to be a fully enlightened master.


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[Assistant] He gave such a firm impression that he was speaking from direct experience rather than from a memory of the texts, that his words would go straight to the hearts of his listeners.


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[Assistant] For many years, Lungpo gave dhamma talks almost exclusively in the Isan dialect that was his mother tongue, a language that lends itself easily to oratory and storytelling.


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[Assistant] But as increasing numbers of people from Bangkok started to make their way to Wat Bapong, Luang Por began speaking in Central Thai more and more.


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[Assistant] It was not a huge leap. Isan and Thai share much of the same vocabulary. However, this similarity is not always immediately obvious, masked by a difference in certain consonants and by the different tones in which the words are pronounced.


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[Assistant] For example, the high-tone Thai word ร้อน, which means hot, is a low-tone ห้อน in Nissan.


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[Assistant] Initially, occasional lapses into Isan or passages of unusual syntax showed that Luang Por was not completely comfortable speaking in Central Thai.


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[Assistant] These slight glitches disappeared after a few years, but Long Po's Thai style always retained a distinctive character.


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[Assistant] Until the end of his life, he always said michannan, which means otherwise, when he meant prachannan, or consequently.


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[Assistant] The slightly modified Isan idioms that appeared in his talks clothed in Thai, conveyed in a special freshness and charm.


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[Assistant] Coinciding with this shift into the Thai language came a move to a less rousing, more reflective style of delivery in Luang Por's discourses.


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[Assistant] It's debatable to what extent the change was due to the shift of language itself and how much to his physical decline. It was not exactly the case that he'd never spoken in this way before, but now it became the dominant mode.


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[Assistant] Ajahn Rangrit was one of the monks who enjoyed the new style. You'd listen and feel an exhilaration in the Dhamma, and you'd feel good after the talk was over. If you had any wisdom, you'd learnt a lot because he spoke gently, it was easy on the ear. And so, he changed. The basic content of the talks remained the same, but the flavour was better.


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[Assistant] But whatever changes of tone might have occurred, the primary distinguishing characteristics of Luang Por's Dhamma talks remained constant from his early talks until his last great discourses in the Rains Retreat of 1982.


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[Assistant] They were delivered using simple language with a minimum of theory, as a contemporary of Lungpo-man once put it, as simple as could be, but no simpler.


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[Assistant] And they employed plentiful similes using objects and experiences with which the listeners were familiar to explain the subtle realities of the mind.


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[Assistant] Occasionally, he would intersperse anecdotes from his own experiences and from those of his teachers, contemporaries, and disciples.


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[Assistant] This gave his listeners an enjoyable and absorbing experience, rather like reading a book that they couldn't put down.


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[Assistant] He said that listening to dumber talks requires a special attitude.


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[Assistant] Keep listening. Don't just believe what you hear, and don't disbelieve. Make yourself neutral. Keep listening.


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[Assistant] It will bring good results, and there's no danger in it.


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[Assistant] The peril lies in believing too much in what you hear, or in disbelieving.


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[Assistant] Listen and contemplate. This is what practice is about.


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[Assistant] As you don't know yet whether the things you like and dislike are true or not.


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[Assistant] The Buddha said that for the time being, you should keep listening.


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[Assistant] If you don't, you'll just follow your own opinions about things, and if you do that, then you'll develop wrong view, and your practice won't advance. The wise person is one who keeps looking, contemplating, continually reflecting.


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[Assistant] The true Dhamma is not something that can be communicated with words. You can't appropriate someone else's knowledge. If you take someone else's knowledge, then you have to meditate on it.


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[Assistant] Listening to someone else and understanding what they say doesn't mean that your defilements will come to an end.


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[Assistant] You have to take that understanding and then chew on it and digest it until it's a sure thing and really your own.


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[Assistant] In the mid-1970s, during the construction of a road up to the peak of Tamsangpet,


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[Assistant] Lumpur had amazed his disciples with his physical stamina. Within a short time, his health declined to the degree that he had to reduce the number of formal Dhamma talks he delivered to perhaps two or three discourses a month. He told his disciples to look on the bright side.


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[Assistant] If he gave too many talks, they might simply memorize his words and delude themselves into believing that they truly understood what they did not.


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[Assistant] Intoxicated by the Dhamma, they might neglect their own practice and get caught in lecturing others about inner peace, with their own minds still hot and confused.


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[Assistant] For his disciples, who looked forward to his talk so eagerly, it was not one of his most convincing arguments.


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[Assistant] On another occasion, Luang Por said that the task of the teacher lay more in providing supportive conditions for practice than in giving frequent discourses.


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[Assistant] He said that if you provide a bull with a meadow to graze in, then graze is what it will do. Its nature is to eat grass, and it doesn't need to be persuaded to do it.


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[Assistant] Any animal standing in the middle of a meadow and not grazing, he said, is no bull. Maybe it's a pig.


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[Assistant] In other words, a monk demonstrates his sincerity, his monk-ness, by the degree to which he takes advantage of the monastic environment. For those devoted to the training,


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[Assistant] One of the most prominent features of Luang Por's Dhamma talks was the use of vivid simile. The untrained mind is like the water buffalo. Or another one.


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[Assistant] The different stages of meditation develop like the maturing of a mango.


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[Assistant] So many of Longpaw's talks are peppered with vivid similes, and it was this ability to draw analogies between abstract principles and everyday objects familiar to his audience that most clearly expressed his gift for communicating the Dhamma.


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[Assistant] It was his mastery of similes more than any other rhetorical skill that helped to make his talk so entertaining and lucid.


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[Assistant] Similes demystified the teachings for his audience, brought them down to earth, and made them less intimidating, more immediate and practical.


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[Assistant] Luang Por was particularly skilled in choosing similes appropriate to his audience.


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[Assistant] Teaching the local villagers, or indeed the monks, most of whom came from farming families, the images were predominantly agricultural. They featured rice plants and buffalos, fruit orchards and fishnets.


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[Assistant] Teaching members of the armed forces, the similes would often be martial or draw from the world of Thai boxing.


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[Assistant] For urban audiences, he would tend to use the objects around him that they could see and hear.


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[Assistant] While he used some similes over and over again during his teaching career, others occurred to him spontaneously in the midst of a discourse or while answering questions, as his mind sought a way to translate the truths he had experienced into terms his audience could understand.


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[Assistant] It was exhilarating for his listeners to see him effortlessly employ elements of the world around him to embody timeless truths. Animals of all kinds appear in these similes. Snakes, dogs, millipedes, water buffaloes, frogs and many more. Chickens were a particular favorite.


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[Assistant] Seeking to express how mistaken and ridiculous it would be for someone to rest satisfied with gaining an intellectual knowledge of Buddhist teachings and not to use it as an aid to abandon defilements.


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[Assistant] He compared it to someone raising chickens and eating the chicken shit rather than the eggs.


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[Assistant] The difference in behavior between heedless and heedful monks, he described in terms of the differing behaviors of domestic chickens and the wild chickens that lived in Wat Bap Hong.


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[Assistant] Some of the most profound and beautiful of Lumpur similes shed light upon experience in meditation.


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[Assistant] In one memorable image, he compared the mind existing in a state both at peace and yet primed to respond intelligently to conditions, to that of a bell at rest.


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[Assistant] When a bell is rung and its natural silence disturbed by a forceful stimulus, the bell responds with a beautiful sound that, after a suitable duration, returns to silence.


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[Assistant] In the same way, he said, the mind should dwell with few wishes in the present moment.


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[Assistant] When a challenge arises, it should overcome that challenge with wisdom, and then, like a bell, return to a natural state of rest.


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[Assistant] Longpo explained how the stabilized mind, turning its attention to the three characteristics of existence, is unwavering in the face of sense contact.


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[Assistant] He said that impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and not-self are like a seashore, and the sense objects surging into the mind are like the waves. It's like waves breaking on the shore.


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[Assistant] After a wave hits the shore, it breaks up and a new one appears in its place.


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[Assistant] Waves can reach no further than the shore.


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[Assistant] In the same way, sense objects can now go no further than our sense of knowing.


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[Assistant] Meeting the perception of impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and not-self, they split apart and disappear.


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[Assistant] In the mid-1970s, Luang Por acquired, as it were, another arrow to his rhetorical bow.


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[Assistant] He was much taken with Ajaan Buddhadasa's newly published translations of the works of the Chinese Zen masters Hui Neng and Wang Bo.


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[Assistant] Hui Neng, who was born in the 6th century, was the 6th Zen Patriarch and author of the Platform Sutra.


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[Assistant] Huang Bo, who lived later in the 9th century, was the subject of the book Record of the Transmission of the Lamp.


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[Assistant] Luang Por found these texts, gave him a new and fresh vocabulary to express the Dhamma.


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[Assistant] Western monks who had practiced in the Zen tradition added to his knowledge.


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[Assistant] The influence that these translated texts had upon the way he taught may be observed in a number of his later Dhamma discourses. There are, for example, a number of references to the mind citta in terms comparable to how the phrase original mind is used in Zen texts.


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[Assistant] On one occasion, he compared the mind to a leaf that is naturally still but flutters about because of the wind of mental states.


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[Assistant] If it understood the nature of thoughts, the mind would stay still.


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[Assistant] This is called the natural state of the mind. And why we have come to practice now is to see the mind in this pristine state.


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[Assistant] Lumpur affirmed that liberation was known not through an escape from the world of convention, but from seeing it in its true light. It was the attachment to contingent realities as ultimately real that was the problem.


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[Assistant] This would seem to be his response to the Mahayana teaching of the identity of Saṃsāra and Nibbāna. Now, if we know conventional reality, then we'll know liberation. If we clearly know liberation, then we'll know convention. This is to know the Dhamma. Here, there is completion.


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[Assistant] In conversation, he would sometimes enjoy using the paradoxical phrasing of profound truths that is characteristic of Zen.


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[Assistant] On one occasion, he asked one of the Western monks to send a letter to Ajahn Sumedho in England. He said, Ask Sumedho.


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[Assistant] If you can't go forward, and you can't go back, and you can't stand still, what can you do?


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[Assistant] There's no evidence that Zen teachings modified Luang Por's understanding of Dhamma.


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[Assistant] It was more as if an artist at the height of his powers had found a new medium in which to express himself. A painter in oils, exploring the use of watercolours.


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[Assistant] A characteristic flexibility of his mind allowed him to open up to this new way of presenting the Dhamma.


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[Assistant] He interpreted the texts he read in light of his own understanding, and then integrated them into the teachings which he gave to his disciples.


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[Assistant] As Luang Por got older, more and more of his teaching was conducted informally.


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[Assistant] He no longer led the morning and evening sessions in the Dhamma hall.


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[Assistant] He would spend many hours a day seated on a wide wicker seat in the flawed and open-sided space beneath his kuti.


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[Assistant] There, accompanied by a small number of attendants, he would receive a steady stream of lay visitors eager to make merit, to receive blessings, advice and inspiration.


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[Assistant] At night time, after the evening chanting and meditation session in the Dhamma hall was over, more resident monks would make their way through the forest to Hiskuti.


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[Assistant] Most would stay until Luang Por retired for the night, some conversing with Luang Por, others sitting quietly in the shadows, enjoying the atmosphere and warmth and directness of his teachings. Some monks would massage his feet or his hands as he chattered and chewed betel nut.


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[Assistant] The monks considered the opportunity to attend upon Luang Por while he answered Dhamma questions to be a special treat.


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[Assistant] They particularly enjoyed the rare occasion when somebody came to argue with him.


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[Assistant] After one such occasion, a monk remarked to his friend that it was like watching a great master of martial arts effortlessly dealing with a clumsy opponent who foolishly believed that he was better than he was.


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[Assistant] A janchon cherished the memory of being part of such occasions.


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[Assistant] I'd feel this marvelous sense that I was participating in a long tradition of students sitting in the middle of the forest at the feet of their teacher, receiving words of wisdom straight from his mouth.


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[Assistant] It was the joy of being in the presence of someone I was convinced knew all that needed to be known.


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[Assistant] I could not imagine anyone being able to ask him any important question whatsoever about life that he would not be able to answer immediately and with absolute authority. It gave me an intense feeling of well-being.


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[Assistant] was a mode of teaching that Lung Po seemed to particularly enjoy. On one occasion,


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[Assistant] It delighted him when new answers arose spontaneously in his mind in response to unusual questions or to old questions from a new perspective.


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[Assistant] Lungpo was particularly skilled in distinguishing between different kinds of questions and varying his replies accordingly. He did not feel bound to always answer questions in the terms in which they were asked.


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[Assistant] When questions were poorly framed or sprang from a lack of information or from mistaken assumptions, he would answer by separating the various strands of the question, making necessary distinctions, and often dealing with the wrong thinking lying behind the question along the way.


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[Assistant] Some questions he threw back at the questioner with a counter question, a method at which he was particularly adept.


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[Assistant] He would, for example, ask questioners wanting him to free them from some doubt or other, whether they would believe him if he told them the answer. When they hastily assured him that they would.


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[Assistant] He would tell them that in that case they'd be fools, because another person's words could never set one free.


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[Assistant] In these cases, the problem was often not so much with the question itself but with the intention of the questioner.


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[Assistant] If the questioner was caught up in a serious delusion, he was likely to interpret any answer given to him in the light of his beliefs and become even more entrenched in wrong view. It was better to add no more fuel to the fire.


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[Assistant] If the questioner was asking questions from an impure motive, perhaps to try to gauge Luang Por's attainment, Luang Por would refuse to play along.


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[Assistant] If questioners asked about topics way beyond their level of practice, Luang Por would consider the questions to be idle ones, and he would refuse to add to the conceptual log pile already clogging the questioner's brain. Luang Por had more than one type of silence.


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[Assistant] Sometimes he would look blankly, as if he hadn't heard the question.


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[Assistant] The questioner would usually realize with a jolt that they'd asked something inappropriate and move on to another topic.


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[Assistant] If the questioner missed the hint and repeated the question, he would receive a fierce look, one that would surge up into his mind more than once in the following hours and days.


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[Assistant] In a particularly dire case, Luang Por might snub the person by turning to talk to someone else.


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[Assistant] In some cases, he would say more gently that the questioner was straying a long way from home. Why not ask something relevant to his present experience?


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[Assistant] Every now and then, Luang Por would answer long involved questions with a single word or phrase. The brevity and the power with which he would express himself on these occasions could be shocking, and it could also be just what was needed to illuminate the confused mind of the questioner or the excessive elaboration of his questions.


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[Assistant] As a Jantian would report, it was an effective tool to use when conversing with people puffed up with their own intelligence and views.


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[Assistant] He wouldn't interpret or clarify issues like other people. He'd just cut the problems off and throw them away.


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[Assistant] He'd cut them into little bits, and that would be the end of them.


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[Assistant] Sometimes all he'd need was a single word or counter question.


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[Assistant] Some people like to go and listen when others were asking questions, but they'd be disappointed if they thought they were going to hear conventional answers.


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[Assistant] It wasn't so much that he gave practical advice on how to solve problems. It was more that he showed people how to correct their thinking and attitudes.


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[Assistant] When people came to him with doubts, they'd heard a monk say this and was it right and so on.


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[Assistant] He'd say that being aware of your lack of understanding of a matter,


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[Assistant] And your desire to get an answer to it was more valuable than just adopting the opinions of another person. That's the way that he would answer questions.


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[Assistant] His answers were immediate and spontaneous, but they would always be spot on.


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[Assistant] Someone once asked him about Paticca Samuppada, the teaching of dependent origination.


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[Assistant] He asked the questioner whether he'd ever fallen out of a tree. You lose your hand hold, he said, and the next moment you're lying on the ground in pain.


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[Assistant] You don't know what went on in your mind as you fell. You didn't have any mindfulness. It was all too quick.


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[Assistant] All you know is that you're suffering now because you just fell out of a tree.


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[Assistant] But there tend to be moments when suddenly my head bobs up and down.


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[Assistant] It's like I'm nodding, but I'm aware. There's mindfulness there. What's that called? It's called hitting an air pocket. It's what happens when you go up in a plane.


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[Assistant] Although Luang Por would, on occasion, include some technical detail in his explanations, he was more likely to reply to questions by encouraging the person to look into his own mind for the answers.


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[Assistant] He saw little value in spoon-feeding information that would not be absorbed. Questioners seeking more specific advice about different meditation techniques would often be cautioned that their problem did not lie in a lack of information, but in the attitude with which they were applying the information they already had.


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[Assistant] The sharpness of his wit was well demonstrated with the visit of a certain Christian missionary who held the Buddhist teaching of not self to be untenable.


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[Assistant] He was of the view that the knowledge of not-self presupposes a knower, and that that knower must be the self. The question he asked Lungpo was, who knows not-self? Lungpo's immediate counter question was, who knows self?


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[Assistant] Without getting caught in philosophical wrangling, Luang Por was asserting that if knowledge of not-self requires something that is not not-self, i.e. self, as its knower, then the opposite must also hold true.


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[Assistant] Knowledge of self presupposes something that is not self as its knower.


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[Assistant] If the proponent of the self-view objects that the self knows itself, then the Buddhist may add that by the same token, knowing may be considered a naturally arising property of the not-self mind.


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[Assistant] Longpaw's three-word counter question avoided the need for such a convoluted explanation.


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[Assistant] The most important point for Luang Por was that without a mind honed through meditation practice, there can be no resolution of the issue of self and not self, only beliefs and speculation.


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[Assistant] This chapter has sought to bring Lung Po into a clearer focus. It has dealt with how he has appeared to the people around him, and the personality traits and qualities that impress themselves most upon them. In particular,


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[Assistant] Emphasis has been laid on those virtues that enabled him to fulfill the role of the Galyana-mitta to his disciples.


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[Assistant] He has been seen to inspire affection, love, devotion and respect, as well as fear and awe. He has been presented as a role model, encouraging his disciples to emulate his practice.


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[Assistant] He has been shown as Dhammakamo, one with a great passion for Dhamma, who, after being willing to put his life on the line in his own practice, exercised great patience and endurance in sharing what he had realized with others.


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[Assistant] There has been an extended account of his ability to communicate the Dhamma effectively in both formal and informal modes.


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[Assistant] All of these qualities and others will reappear throughout the rest of this book. But now, the focus will shift towards a more systematic presentation of Lumpur's teaching and training of his disciples monastic and lay in the development of the Eightfold Path.


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[Assistant] All Japanese staff officers speak English. Never mind the social amenities.


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[Assistant] Thousand thanks. We have two minutes and a half left.


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[Assistant] You must believe me when I say that contrary to popular belief that the Japanese people have always held your country in great esteem. That's fine.


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[Assistant] Yes, they like it so well that they have finally decided to take it away from you. They don't say. In fact, we have already moved toward that aim.


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[Assistant] Your defenses in the city of Honolulu are smoking shambles and you're dead by the thousands litter the streets and beaches.


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[Assistant] And the fate of Pearl Harbor will be the fate of all so-called free democracies who dare oppose the Imperial Japanese government. Because we and our allies, for the ultimate good of all nations concerned, have determined to establish a new world order.


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[Assistant] That cough doesn't seem any better, Helen. We'll have to take care of it.


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[Assistant] I brought this oil for Helen. I want her chest rubbed with it.


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[Assistant] Yes, you do, Jane. In your heart, you know perfectly well. Your duty is to prepare yourself to do God's work in the world. Isn't that true?


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[Assistant] And who can do God's work? An ignorant woman or an educated one? Yes, you know the answer to that. And where can you get an education, Jane? Where?


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[Assistant] Precisely. So you know you have to go back to school, even though you may hate the very thought of it. Isn't that true?


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[Assistant] Jane, it's not every young woman that can face the world single-handed. But you know what right is, and you'll stick to it with thick and thin.


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[Assistant] I wish to see Mr. Rochester. What name shall I say, sir? Oh, tell him Mr. Mason. Mr. Mason of Spanish Town, Jamaica.


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[Assistant] Well, what is it? Let her be taken care of. Let her be treated as tenderly as may be.


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[Assistant] Forgive me, it's no business of mine. All the same, I do feel obliged to ask you about this letter. It comes from a lawyer in Milket.


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[Assistant] He writes to me as the person whose name you gave as reference when you went to Thornfield. That's near Milket, isn't it? A client of his wants to know your whereabouts. You know who he's inquiring for you?


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[Assistant] If you don't produce my umbrella, I'll call the police!


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana. My dear Monsieur Poirot. It was a soft, purring voice. A voice used deliberately as an instrument. Nothing impulsive or premeditated about it. Hercule Poirot swung round. He bowed. He shook hands ceremoniously. There was something in his eye that was unusual.


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[Assistant] It was the exhibition of snuff boxes at Wessex House at Mission One Guinea in aid of the London hospitals. My dear man, said Mr. Shaytana, how nice to see you.


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[Assistant] Not, uh, hanging or guillotining much just at present? Slack season in the criminal world.


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[Assistant] Or is there to be a robbery here this afternoon? That would be too delicious.


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[Assistant] Alas monsieur, said Poirot, I came here in a purely private capacity.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaitano was diverted for a moment by a lovely young thing with tight poodle curls up one side of her head and three cornucopias in black straw on the other. He said, my dear, why didn't you come to my party? It really was a marvelous party. Quite a lot of people actually spoke to me.


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[Assistant] One woman even said, how do you do? And, uh, goodbye and thank you so much. But of course she came from a garden city, poor thing.


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[Assistant] The only moustache in London, perhaps, that could compete with that of Monsieur Hercule Poirot. But, uh, it is not so luxuriant, he murmured to himself. No. Decidedly, it is inferior in every respect. Good man, it catches the eye. The whole of Mr. Shaytana's person caught the eye. It was designed to do so.


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[Assistant] He deliberately attempted a Mephistophelian effect. He was tall and thin. His face was long and melancholy. His eyebrows were heavily accented and jet black.


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[Assistant] He wore a mustache with stiff waxed ends and a tiny black imperial. His clothes were works of art, of exquisite cut, but with a suggestion of bizarre.


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[Assistant] Every healthy Englishman who saw him longed earnestly and fervently to kick him. They said, with a singular lack of originality, There's that damn Daigo Shaitana.


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[Assistant] Their wives, daughters, sisters, aunts, mothers, and even grandmothers said, varying the idiom according to their generation, words to this effect,


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[Assistant] I know, my dear. Of course, he is too terrible, but so rich, and such marvelous parties, and he's always got something amusing and spiteful to tell you about people.


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[Assistant] Whether Mr. Shaitano was an Argentine, or a Portuguese, or a Greek, or some other nationality rightly despised by the insular Britain, nobody knew. But three facts were quite certain.


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[Assistant] He existed richly and beautifully in a super flat in Park Lane. He gave wonderful parties.


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[Assistant] Large parties, small parties, macabre parties, respectable parties, and definitely queer parties. He was a man of whom nearly everybody was a little afraid.


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[Assistant] Why this last was so can hardly be stated in definite words.


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[Assistant] There was a feeling perhaps that he knew a little too much about everybody.


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[Assistant] And there was a feeling, too, that his sense of humor was a curious one.


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[Assistant] People nearly always felt that it would be better not to risk offending Mr. Shaitana.


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[Assistant] It was his humor this afternoon to bait that ridiculous looking little man, Hercule Poirot. So, even the policeman needs recreation, he said.


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[Assistant] I see, he said, that you yourself have lent three snuff boxes to the exhibition.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana waved a deprecating hand. Oh, one picks up trifles here and there. You must come to my flat one day. I have some interesting pieces.


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[Assistant] I do not confine myself to any particular period or class of object.


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[Assistant] Your tastes are Catholic, said Poirot, smiling, as you say. Suddenly, Mr. Shaytan's eyes danced. The corners of his lips curled up. His eyebrows assumed a fantastic tilt.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaitana snapped disdainful fingers. The cup used by the Brighton murderer. The gemmy of a celebrated burglar. Absurd childishness.


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[Assistant] I should never burden myself with rubbish like that. I collect only the best objects of their kind.


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[Assistant] And, uh, what do you consider the best object? Artistically speaking, in crime, inquired Poirot.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana leaned forward and laid two fingers on Poirot's shoulder. He hissed his words dramatically.


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[Assistant] Said Mr. Shaitana, my dear, dear man.


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[Assistant] You and I look on these things as from pulls apart. For you, crime is a matter of routine. A murder?


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[Assistant] And the court murderer is necessarily one of the failures. He is second rate. No.


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[Assistant] I look on the matter from the artistic point of view. I collect only the best. The best being? asked Poirot. My dear fellow. The ones who have got away with it.


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[Assistant] Any day of the week after next would suit me, said Poirot with a bow. Good. Then let us say Friday. Friday the 18th that will be. I will write it down at once in my little book. Really. The idea pleases me enormously.


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[Assistant] I am not quite sure if it pleases me," said Poirot slowly.


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[Assistant] I do not mean that I am insensible to the kindness of your invitation. No, not that.


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[Assistant] Shaitan interrupted him, but it shocks your bourgeois sensibilities.


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[Assistant] My dear fellow, you must free yourself from the limitations of the policeman mentality. Poirot said slowly,


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[Assistant] It is true that I have a thoroughly bourgeois attitude to murder, but my dear, why?


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[Assistant] A stupid bungled butchering business, yes I agree with you, but murder can be an art. A murderer can be an artist. Oh, I admit it. Well then, Mr. Shaytana asked, but he is still a murderer.


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[Assistant] Surely, my dear Monsieur Poirot, to do a thing supremely well is a justification.


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[Assistant] You want, very unimaginatively, to take every murderer, handcuff him, shut him up, and eventually break his neck for him, in the early hours of the morning.


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[Assistant] I am not as insensitive to art in crime as you think. I can admire the perfect murder.


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[Assistant] I can also admire a tiger, that splendid tawny striped beast, but I will admire him from outside his cage. I will not go inside.


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[Assistant] That is to say, not unless it is my duty to do so.


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[Assistant] For you see, Mr. Shaitana, the tiger might spring. Mr. Shaitana laughed, I see, and the murderer might


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[Assistant] Then you will not come to meet my collection of, uh, tigers? On the contrary, I shall be enchanted. How brave. You do not quite understand me, Mr. Sheetana. My words were in the nature of a warning.


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[Assistant] You asked me just now to admit that your idea of a collection of murderers was amusing. I said I could think of another word other than amusing. That word was dangerous.


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[Assistant] I fancy, Mr. Shaytana, that your hobby might be a dangerous one. Mr. Shaytana laughed. A very Mephistophelian laugh. He said, May I expect you then, on the 18th? Poirot gave a little bow. You may expect me on the 18th. Mille remerciements. I shall arrange a little party, mused Shaytana. Do not forget. Eight o'clock. He moved away.


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[Assistant] Haru stood a minute or two looking after him. He shook his head slowly and thoughtfully.


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[Assistant] Dinner at Mr. Shatana's. The door of Mr. Shatana's flat opened noiselessly. A grey haired butler drew it back to let Poirot enter.


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[Assistant] Sherry glass in hand, Shaytana came forward to meet him. He was as usual, immaculately dressed.


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[Assistant] The showman in him enjoyed the little start of surprise that Poirot gave.


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[Assistant] Mrs Ariadne Oliver was extremely well known as one of the foremost writers of detective and other sensational stories.


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[Assistant] She wrote chatty, if not particularly grammatical, articles on the tendency of the criminal, famous cream passionel. Murder for love versus murder for gain.


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[Assistant] She was also a hotheaded feminist, and when any murder of importance was occupying space in the press, there was sure to be an interview with Mrs. Oliver.


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[Assistant] And it was mentioned that Mrs. Oliver had said, now if a woman were the head of Scotland Yard, she was an earnest believer in women's intuition.


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[Assistant] For the rest, she was an agreeable woman of middle age, handsome in a rather untidy fashion, with fine eyes, substantial shoulders, and a large quantity of rebellious grey hair, with which she was continually experimenting. One day, her appearance would be highly intellectual.


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[Assistant] A brow with a hair scraped back from it and coiled in a large bun in the neck.


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[Assistant] On another, Mrs. Oliver would suddenly appear with Madonna loops or large masses of slightly untidy curls. On this particular evening, Mrs. Oliver was trying out a fringe.


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[Assistant] She greeted Poirot whom she had met before at a literary dinner in an agreeable base voice.


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[Assistant] And the superintendant battle you doubtless know, said Mr. Shaitana. A big, square, wooden-faced man moved forward.


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[Assistant] Not only did an onlooker feel that Superintendent Battle was carved out of wood, he also managed to convey the impression that the wood in question was the timber out of a battleship.


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[Assistant] Said Superintendent Battle, and his wooden face creased into a smile, and then returned to its former unexpressiveness. Conel race, went on Mr. Shaytana.


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[Assistant] Quirrow had not previously met Colonel Rayes, but he knew something about him.


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[Assistant] A dark, handsome, deeply bronzed man of fifty, he was usually to be found in some outpost of empire. Especially if there were trouble brewing. Secret service is a melodramatic term.


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[Assistant] But it described pretty accurately to the lay mind the nature and scope of Colonel Race's activities.


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[Assistant] Poirot had by now taken in and appreciated the particular essence of his host's humorous intentions.


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[Assistant] Our other guests are late, said Mr. Shaytana.


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[Assistant] My fault, perhaps. I believe I told them 8.50. But at that moment the door opened, and the butler announced, Dr. Roberts.


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[Assistant] The man who came in did so with a kind of parody of a brisk bedside manner.


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[Assistant] He was a cheerful-looking, highly-colored individual of middle age, small, twinkling eyes, a touch of baldness, a tendency to en bon point, and a general air of well-scrubbed and disinfected medical practitioner. His manner was cheerful and confident. You felt that his diagnosis would be correct, and his treatments agreeable and practical. A little champagne in convalescence, perhaps? A man of the world. Not late, I hope, said Dr. Roberts, genially.


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[Assistant] He shook hands with his host and was introduced to the others. He seemed particularly gratified at meeting Battle.


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[Assistant] Too bad to make you talk shop, but I warn you, I shall have a try at it.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Lorimer was a well-dressed woman of sixty. She had finely cut features, beautifully arranged grey hair, and a clear, incisive voice. I hope I'm not late, she said, advancing to her host. She turned from him to greet Dr. Roberts, with whom she was acquainted. The butler announced, Major Despard. Major Despard was a tall, lean, handsome man, his face slightly marred by a scar on the temple.


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[Assistant] Introductions completed, he gravitated naturally to the side of Colonel Race, and the two men were soon talking sport and comparing their experiences on safari. For the last time, the door opened and the butler announced, Miss Meredith.


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[Assistant] A girl in her early twenties entered. She was of medium height and pretty. Brown curls clustered in her neck.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana descended on her with sherry and an ornate and complimentary reply. His introductions were formal and almost ceremonious.


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[Assistant] Ms. Meredith was left sipping her sherry by Poirot's side.


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[Assistant] Our friend is very punctilious," said Poirot with a smile. The girl agreed.


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[Assistant] People rather dispense with introductions nowadays. They just say, I expect you know everybody and leave it at that. Whether you do or you don't, whether you do or you don't, sometimes it makes it awkward. But I think this is more awe-inspiring. She hesitated and then said, is that Mrs. Oliver, the novelist?


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[Assistant] This is Oliver's base voice rose powerfully at that minute, speaking to Dr. Roberts.


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[Assistant] You can't get away from a woman's instinct, doctor. Women know these things.


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[Assistant] Forgetting that she no longer had a brow, she endeavored to sweep her hair back from it, but was foiled by the fringe. That is Mrs. Oliver, said Poirot. The one who wrote the body in the library? That identical one? Miss Meredith frowned a little. And that, uh, wooden-looking man? A superintendent, did Mr. Sheytaner say? From Scotland Yard? And you? And me? I know all about you, Mr. Poirot.


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[Assistant] It was you who really solved the ABC crimes. Mamzel, you cover me with confusion. Miss Meredith drew her brows together. Mr. Shaitana, she began, and then stopped. Mr. Shaitana, Quirrow said quietly, one might say he was crime minded. It seems so. Doubtless he wishes to hear us dispute ourselves.


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[Assistant] He is already egging on Mrs. Oliver and Dr. Roberts. They are now discussing untraceable poison. Ms. Meredith gave a little gasp as she said, what a queer man he is. Dr. Roberts? No, Mr. Shaitana. She shivered a little and said, there's always something a little frightening about him, I think. You never know what would strike him as amusing. It might, it might be something cruel, such as


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[Assistant] Fox hunting, huh? As Meredith threw him a reproachful glance, I meant, oh, something, uh, oriental. He has perhaps the torturous mind, admitted Poirot. Torturers? No, no, no. Tortuous, I said.


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[Assistant] I don't think I like him frightfully, confided Miss Meredith, her voice dropping. You will like his dinner though, Quirrow assured her. He has a marvellous cook. She looked at him doubtfully and then laughed. Why, she exclaimed, I believe you are quite human. But certainly I am human. You see, said Miss Meredith, all these celebrities are rather intimidating. Mamzeh, you should not be intimidated.


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[Assistant] You should have already your autograph book and your fountain pen. Well, you see, I'm not really terribly interested in crime. I don't think women are. It's always men who read detective stories. Hercule Poirot's side effectively, alas, he murmured.


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[Assistant] What would I not give at this minute to be even the most minor of film stars? The butler threw the door open. Dinner is served, he murmured. Poirot's prognostication was amply justified. The dinner was delicious at its serving perfection. Subdued light, polished wood, the blue gleam of Irish glass,


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[Assistant] In the dimness at the head of the table, Mr. Shaitana looked more than ever diabolical.


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[Assistant] Ms. Meredith was between Superintendent Battle and Major Despair. Cuarro was between Mrs. Lorimer and Dr. Roberts.


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[Assistant] The latter murmured facetiously to him, You're not going to be allowed to monopolize the only pretty girl all the evening, you French fellows. You don't waste your time, do you? I happen to be Belgian, murmured Poirot. Same thing where the ladies are concerned I expect, my boy, said the doctor cheerfully.


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[Assistant] Then, dropping the facetiousness and adopting a professional tone, he began to talk to Colonel Race on his other side about the latest developments in the treatment of sleeping sickness.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Lorimer turned to Poirot and began to talk of the latest plays. Her judgments were silent and her criticisms apt. They drifted on to books and then to world politics. He found her a well-informed and thoroughly intelligent woman.


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[Assistant] On the opposite side of the table, Mrs. Oliver was asking Major Despard if he knew of any unheard of out of the way poisons. Well, there's curare.


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[Assistant] My dear man. That's been done hundreds of times. I mean something new. Major Despard said dryly. Primitive tribes are rather old fashioned.


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[Assistant] They stick to the good old stuff their grandfathers and great grandfathers used before them. Very tiresome of them, said Mrs. Oliver.


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[Assistant] I should have thought they were always experimenting with pounding up herbs and things. Such a chance for explorers. I always think they could come home and kill off all their rich old uncles with some new drug that no one's ever heard of. You should go to civilization, not to the wilds for that, said Despair.


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[Assistant] In the modern laboratory, for instance, cultures of innocent-looking germs that will produce bona fide diseases.


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[Assistant] Oh, that wouldn't do for my public, said Mrs. Oliver. Besides, one is so apt to get their names wrong.


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[Assistant] Staphylococcus and streptococcus and all those things so difficult for my secretary. And anyway, rather dull, don't you think so? What do you think, Superintendent Battle?


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[Assistant] In real life, people don't bother about being too subtle, Mrs. Oliver, said the superintendent. They usually stick to arsenic, because it's nice and handy to get hold of.


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[Assistant] Nonsense, said Mrs. Oliver. That's simply because there are lots of crimes you people at Scotland Yard never find out. Now, have you had a woman there? As a matter of fact, we have.


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[Assistant] Yes, those dreadful policewomen in funny hats who bother people in parks. I mean a woman at the head of things. Women know about crime.


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[Assistant] They're usually very successful criminals, said Superintendent Battle. Keep their heads well. It's amazing how they'll brazen things out. Mr. Shaytana laughed gently. Poison is a woman's weapon, he said.


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[Assistant] There must be many secret women poisoners. Never found out.


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[Assistant] Of course there are, said Mrs. Oliver happily, helping herself lavishly to a mousse of foie gras.


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[Assistant] A doctor too has opportunities, went on Mr. Shaytana thoughtfully. I protest, cried Dr. Roberts. When we poison our patients, it's entirely by accident. He laughed heartily. But if I were to commit a crime, went on Mr. Shaytana. He stopped, and something in that pause compelled attention. All faces were turned to him. I should make it very simple, I think. There's always an accident.


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[Assistant] A shooting accident for instance, or the domestic kind of accident. Then he shrugged his shoulders and picked up his wine glass. But...


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[Assistant] Who am I to pronounce with so many experts present? He drank.


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[Assistant] The candlelight threw a red shade from the wine onto his face with its waxed mustache, its little imperial, its fantastic eyebrows. There was a momentary silence. Mrs. Oliver said, Is it twenty-two or twenty past? An angel passing. My feet aren't crossed. It must be a black angel.


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[Assistant] When the company returned to the drawing room, a bridge table had been set out. Coffee was handed round. Who plays bridge? asked Mr. Shaitana. Mrs. Lorimer, I know. And Dr. Roberts? Do you play Miss Meredith? Yes. I'm not frightfully good though. Excellent. And Major Despard? Good. Supposing you four play here.


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[Assistant] Thank goodness there's to be bridge, said Mrs. Lorimer in an aside to Poirot. I'm one of the worst bridge fiends that ever lived.


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[Assistant] It's growing on me. I simply will not go out to dinner now if there's no bridge afterwards. Just fall asleep. I'm ashamed of myself, but there it is. They cut for partners.


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[Assistant] Mrs Lorimer was partnered with Anne Meredith against Major Despard and Dr Roberts.


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[Assistant] Mind you win, said Mrs. Oliver, her feminist feelings rising. Show the men they can't have it all their own way.


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[Assistant] They haven't got a hope, the poor dears," said Dr. Roberts cheerfully as he started shuffling the other pack. Your deal, I think, Mrs. Lottimer? Major Despard sat down rather slowly.


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[Assistant] There is another bridge table in the other room, said Mr. Shaitana.


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[Assistant] The others protested that they would much rather not play, but he overruled them firmly, and in the end they sat down.


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[Assistant] Why not win Mrs. Oliver against battle and race?


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana watched them for a little while, smiled in a Mephistophelian manner as he observed on what hand Mrs. Oliver declared to no trumps, and then went noiselessly through into the other room. They were well down to it, their faces serious, the bids coming quickly. A one heart, pass, three clubs, three spades, four diamonds, double, four hearts. Mr. Shaytana stood watching a moment, smiling to himself.


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[Assistant] Then he crossed the room and sat down in a big chair by the fireplace.


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[Assistant] The tray of drinks had been brought in and placed on an adjacent table. The firelight gleamed on the crystal stoppers. Always an artist in lighting.


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[Assistant] Mr. Shaytana had simulated the appearance of a merely fire-lit room.


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[Assistant] A small shaded lamp at his elbow gave him light to read by if he so desired. Discreet floodlighting gave the room a subdued look.


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[Assistant] A slight pause always before Despard's voice came, not so much a slow thinker as a man who liked to be sure before he spoke. Four hearts. Double. His face lit up by the flickering firelight, Mr. Shaitano smiled. He smiled, and he went on smiling. His eyelids flickered a little. His party was amusing him.


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[Assistant] Five diamonds, game and rubber, said Colonel Race. Good for you, partner, he said to Poirot. I didn't think you'd do it. Lucky they didn't lead a spade.


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[Assistant] Wouldn't have made much difference, I expect, said Superintendent Battle, a man of gentle magnanimity.


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[Assistant] Oh, you'll excuse me, said Superintendent Battle, but I'm by way of being an early-to-bed man. I too, said Hercule Poirot. Oh, we'd better add up, said Race.


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[Assistant] The result of the evening's five rubbers was an overwhelming victory for the male sex.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Oliver had lost three pounds and seven shillings to the other three. The biggest winner was Colonel Race.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Oliver, though a bad bridge player, was a sporting loser. She paid up cheerfully.


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[Assistant] Everything went wrong for me tonight, she said. It is like that sometimes. I held the most beautiful cards yesterday, 150 honors, three times running.


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[Assistant] Double five clubs, Mrs. Lorimer was saying in her cool incisive voice. Five, no trumps. Double five, no trumps. Mrs. Oliver came up to the bridge table. This was likely to be an exciting hand. Superintendent Battle came with her. Colonel Race went towards Mr. Shaytana, Quarrow behind him. Gotta be going, Shaytana, said Race. Mr. Shaytana did not answer.


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[Assistant] His head had fallen forward and he seemed to be asleep. Race gave a momentary whimsical glance at Poirot and went a little nearer. Suddenly he uttered a muffled exclamation and bent forward.


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[Assistant] Morrow was beside him in a minute, he too looking where Colonel Race was pointing.


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[Assistant] Something that might have been a particularly ornate shirt stud, but was not.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Oliver continued to watch the play of five no trumps doubled.


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[Assistant] Superintendent Battle, despite his appearance of stolidity, was a very quick man.


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[Assistant] His eyebrows went up, and he said in a low voice as he joined them,


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[Assistant] With a nod, Colonel Race indicated the silent figure in the chair.


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[Assistant] As battle bent over it, Poirot looked thoughtfully at what he could see of Mr. Shatana's face.


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[Assistant] He had examined without touching the thing which looked like an extra stud in Mr. Shaytana's shirt. And it was not an extra stud. He had raised the limp hand and let it fall. Now he stood up.


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[Assistant] So different that all heads at the bridge table turned to him, and Anne Meredith's hand remained poised over an ace of spades in dummy.


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[Assistant] I'm sorry to tell you all, he said, that our host, Mr. Shaytana, is dead.


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[Assistant] Came briskly across the floor with a bounding medical in at the death step.


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[Assistant] Without seeming to, the bulk of Superintendent Battle impeded his progress. Just a minute, Dr. Roberts.


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[Assistant] It isn't a fainting fit, and I'm sorry, but nobody's going to touch him until the divisional surgeon comes. Mr. Shaytana's been murdered, ladies and gentlemen. Murdered? A horrified, incredulous sigh from Anne. A stare, a very blank stare from Despard. A sharp incisive, murdered? from Mrs. Lorimer. A good God! from Dr. Roberts. Superintendent Battle nodded his head slowly.


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[Assistant] He looked rather like a Chinese porcelain Mandarin. His expression was quite blank. Stabbed, he said. That's the way of it, stabbed. Then he shot out a question. Any of you leave the bridge table during the evening?


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[Assistant] He had risen now and was standing like a soldier on parade. His narrow, intelligent face turned to battle.


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[Assistant] I think every one of us, at one time or another, moved from the bridge table. Either to get drinks, or to put wood on the fire. I did both. When I went to the fire, Shaytana was asleep in the chair. Asleep? I thought so. Yes. He may have been, said Battle. Or he may have been dead then. We'll go into that presently. I'll ask you now to go into the room next door. He turned to the quiet figure at his elbow.


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[Assistant] Race gave a quick nod of comprehension. Alright, Superintendent. The four bridge players went slowly through the doorway.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Oliver sat down in a chair at the far end of the room and began to sob quietly. Battle took up the telephone receiver and spoke. Then he said, The local police will be around immediately.


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[Assistant] Orders from headquarters are that I'm to take on the case. Divisional surgeon will be here almost at once. How long should you say he's been dead, Monsieur Poirot? I'd say well over an hour, myself. I agree.


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[Assistant] Alas, that one cannot be more exact. That one cannot say, uh, this man has been dead one hour, twenty-five minutes and forty seconds. Battle nodded absently.


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[Assistant] He was sitting right in front of the fire, that makes a slight difference.


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[Assistant] Over an hour, not more than two and a half. That's what our doctor will say, I'll be bound. And nobody heard anything, and nobody saw anything. Amazing. What a desperate chance to take. He might have cried out. But he did not. The murderer's luck held. As you say, mon ami. It was a very desperate business. Any idea, Monsieur Poirot, Mr. Motive? Anything of that kind? Poirot said slowly.


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[Assistant] Oh, the stupid little man, murmured Hercule Poirot, to dress up as the devil and try to frighten people. Quelle enfantillage. The door opened. The divisional surgeon came in, bag in hand. He was followed by the divisional inspector talking to battle. A cameraman came next. There was a constable in the hall. The routine of the detection of crime had begun.


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[Assistant] Perkyl Poirot, Mrs. Oliver, Colonel Race, and Superintendent Battle sat round the dining room table. It was an hour later. The body had been examined, photographed, and removed. A fingerprint expert had been and gone. Superintendent Battle looked at Poirot.


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[Assistant] Before I have those four in, I want to hear what you've got to tell me. According to you, there was something behind this party tonight? Very deliberately and carefully.


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[Assistant] Poirot retold the conversation he had held with Shaytana at Wessex House. Superintendent Battle pursed his lips. He very nearly whistled. Exhibits, eh? Murderers all alive, oh. And you think he meant it? You don't think he was pulling your leg? Poirot shook his head. Oh no, he meant it.


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[Assistant] Sheetana was a man who prided himself on his Mephistophelian attitude to life. He was a man of great vanity. He was also a stupid man. That is why he is dead. I get you said Superintendent Battle, following things out in his mind.


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[Assistant] A party of eight and himself, four sleuths, so to speak, and four murderers.


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[Assistant] It's impossible, cried Mrs. Oliver. Absolutely impossible. None of those people can be criminals.


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[Assistant] Superintendent Battle shook his head thoughtfully. I wouldn't be so sure of that Mrs. Oliver. Murderers look and behave very much like everybody else.


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[Assistant] Nice, quiet, well behaved, reasonable folk very often. In that case, it's Doctor Roberts, said Mrs. Oliver firmly. I felt instinctively that there was something wrong with that man as soon as I saw him. My instincts never lie. That'll turn to Colonel Race. Race shrugged his shoulders.


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[Assistant] It shows that Shaitano was right in one case, at least. After all, he can only have suspected that these people were murderers. He can't have been sure. He may have been right in all four cases.


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[Assistant] The victim thought that Shaytana was giving himself an evening's amusement.


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[Assistant] Leading up to a moment when he'd hand the victim over to the police. You.


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[Assistant] Or she must have thought that Chaitana had definite evidence. Had he? Poirot shrugged his shoulders. That we shall never know.


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[Assistant] Dr. Roberts, repeated Mrs. Oliver firmly. Such a hearty man. Murderers are often hearty.


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[Assistant] I dare say we would if there was a woman at the head of Scotland Yard, said Superintendent Battle, a momentary twinkle showing in his unemotional eye. But you see, mere men being in charge, we've got to be careful. We've got to get there slowly.


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[Assistant] Men, men! sighed Mrs. Oliver, and began to compose newspaper articles in her head. Better have them in now.


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[Assistant] Said Superintendent Battle. It won't do to keep them hanging about too long. Colonel Race half rose. If you'd like us to go.


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[Assistant] Superintendent Battle hesitated a minute as he caught Mrs. Oliver's eloquent eye. He was well aware of Colonel Race's official position, and Poirot had worked with the police on many occasions.


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[Assistant] Mrs. Oliver to remain was decidedly stretching a point. But Battle was a kindly man.


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[Assistant] He remembered that Mrs. Oliver had lost three pounds and seven shillings at bridge, and that she had been a cheerful loser.


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[Assistant] You can all stay, he said, as far as I'm concerned.


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[Assistant] But no interruptions, please. He looked at Mrs. Oliver, and there mustn't be a hint of what Mr. Poirot had just told us.


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[Assistant] That was Shaytana's little secret, and to all intents and purposes, it died with him. Understand? Perfectly, said Mrs. Oliver.


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[Assistant] Battle strode to the door and called the constable who was on duty in the hall.


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[Assistant] Now go to the little smoking room. You'll find Anderson there with four guests. Ask Dr. Roberts if he'll be so good as to step this way.


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[Assistant] Real life is a little different, said Battle. I know, said Mrs Oliver, badly constructed.


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[Assistant] Dr. Roberts entered with the springiness of his step slightly subdued. I say battle, he said. This is the devil of a business. Excuse me, Mrs. Oliver, but it is. Professionally speaking, I could hardly have believed it. To stab a man with three other people a few yards away. He shook his head. I wouldn't like to have done it. A slight smile twitched up the corners of his mouth. What can I say or do to convince you that I didn't do it? Well, there's motive, Dr. Roberts.


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[Assistant] Naturally, you'll investigate my relations with him closely. I expect that. I'm not a fool. But you won't find anything. I had no reason for killing Shaytana, and I didn't kill him. Superintendent Battle nodded, woodenly. Ah, that's all right, Dr. Roberts. I've got to investigate, as you know. You're a sensible man. Now, can you tell me anything about the other three people?


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[Assistant] I'm afraid I don't know very much. Despair and Miss Meredith, I met for the first time tonight. I knew of Despair before, read his travel book, and a jolly good yarn it is.


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[Assistant] Did you know that he and Mr. Shaytana were acquainted? No. Shaytana never mentioned him to me.


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[Assistant] As I say, I've heard of him, but never met him. Miss Meredith, I've never seen before. Mrs. Lorimer, I know slightly. And what do you know about her? Robert shrugged his shoulders.


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[Assistant] She's a widow, moderately well-off, uh, intelligent, well-bred woman, first-class bridge player. That's where I've met her, as a matter of fact, playing bridge. And Mr. Shaitano never mentioned her either. No? Hmm. Well, that doesn't help us much.


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[Assistant] Now, Dr. Roberts, perhaps you'll be so kind as to tax your memory carefully, and tell me how often you yourself left your seat at the bridge table, and all you can remember about the movements of the others. Dr. Roberts took a few minutes to think. It's difficult, he said frankly. I can remember my own movements, more or less.


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[Assistant] I got up three times, that is on three occasions when I was dummy. I left my seat and made myself useful.


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[Assistant] Once I went over and put wood on the fire. Once I brought drinks to the two ladies. Once I poured out a whiskey and soda for myself. Can you remember the times? I can only say very roughly.


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[Assistant] We began to play about nine-thirty, I imagine. I should say it was about an hour later that I stoked the fire. Quite a short time after that that I fetched the drinks. Next hand but one, I think. And perhaps half past eleven when I got myself a whiskey and soda.


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[Assistant] Those times are quite approximate. I couldn't answer for them being correct.


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[Assistant] The table with the drinks was beyond Mr. Shaytana's chair. Yes. That's to say I passed quite near him three times.


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[Assistant] Well that's what I thought the first time. The second time I didn't even look at him.


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[Assistant] Third time, I rather fancy the thought just passed through my mind, how the beggar does sleep. But I didn't really look closely at him. Very good.


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[Assistant] Now, when did your fellow players leave their seats? Dr. Roberts frowned.


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[Assistant] Difficult. Very difficult. Despair went and fetched an extra ashtray, I think.


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[Assistant] And he went for a drink, uh, that was before me, for I remember he asked me if I'd have one, and I said I wasn't quite ready.


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[Assistant] And the ladies? Mrs. Lorimer went over to the fire once, poked it, I think.


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[Assistant] I rather fancy she spoke to Shaytana, but I didn't know. I was playing a rather tricky no-Trump at the time.


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[Assistant] And Miss Meredith? Ah, she certainly left the table once. Came round and looked at my hand.


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[Assistant] No one's chair was directly facing the fireplace? No, sort of sideways on, and there was a big cabinet between Chinese piece, very handsome.


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[Assistant] In this case, undoubtedly, Dummy was the murderer, said Superintendent Battle. All the same, said Dr. Roberts. It wanted nerve, you know. After all, who's to say that somebody won't look up, just at the critical moment? Yes, said Battle. It was a big risk. The motive must have been a strong one.


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[Assistant] You'll find out, I expect, said Roberts. You'll go through his papers, all that sort of thing. There'll probably be a clue.


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[Assistant] We all hope so, said Superintendent Battle gloomily. He shot a keen glance at the other.


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[Assistant] I wonder if you'd oblige me, Dr. Roberts, by giving me a personal opinion. As man to man. Certainly.


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[Assistant] Which do you fancy yourself of the three? Dr. Roberts shrugged his shoulders. That's easy. Of hand I'd say Despair. The man's got plenty of nerve. He's used to a dangerous life where you've got to act quickly.


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[Assistant] You wouldn't mind taking a risk. It doesn't seem to me likely the women are in on this. Take a bit of strength, I should imagine. Not so much as you might think. Take a look at this.


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[Assistant] Rather like a conjurer, battle suddenly produced a long thin instrument of gleaming metal with a small, round, jeweled head.


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[Assistant] Dr. Roberts leaned forward, took it and examined it with rich professional appreciation. He tried the point and whistled.


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[Assistant] Tool, what a tool. Absolutely made for murder, this little boy. Going like butter, absolutely like butter. Brought it with him, I suppose. No, it was Mr. Shaitaners.


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[Assistant] It lay on the table near the door with a good many other knickknacks. So, the murderer helped himself. Bit of luck finding a tool like that.


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[Assistant] Well, uh, that's one way of looking at it, said Battle slowly. Well, of course, it wasn't luck for Shay Turner, poor fellow.


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[Assistant] I didn't mean that, Dr. Roberts. I meant that there was another angle of looking at the business.


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[Assistant] It's just an idea, said Superintendent Battle stolidly. Well, it might be so, of course, said Dr. Robert slowly. Superintendent Battle cleared his throat,


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[Assistant] Well, I won't keep you any longer, doctor. Thank you for your help. Perhaps you'll leave your address. Certainly. 200 Gloucester Terrace, W2. Telephone number, Bayswater, 23896. Thank you. I may have to call upon you shortly. Delighted to see you at any time.


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[Assistant] Hope there won't be too much in the papers. I don't want my nervous patients upset. Superintendent Battle looked round at Poirot.


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[Assistant] Excuse me, uh, Monsieur Poirot, if you'd like to ask any questions, I'm sure the doctor wouldn't mind. Course not, course not.


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[Assistant] Great admirer of yours, Mr. Poirot. Little gray cells, order and method. I know all about it. I feel sure you'll think of something most intriguing to ask me.


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[Assistant] I just like to get all the details clear in my mind. For instance, how many robbers did you play? Three, said Roberts promptly. We'd got a one game all in the fourth rubber when you came in.


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[Assistant] And who lost? Uh, Mrs. Lorimer won every rubber. Miss Meredith won the first and lost the next two.


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[Assistant] I was a bit up, and Miss Meredith and her spa must have been down. Warrow said smiling.