So much for the tiresome facts, as familiar to you, I'm sure, as to the constables and state troopers who followed in your wake. The foregoing, aided by several clues I'll withhold to keep you on your toes, will pursue you with a tenacity worthy of Inspector Javert, but before they close in, gird yourselves, I repeat, for a vengeance infinitely more pitiless. Fourteen of the sculptures you took posses properties of a most curious and terrifying nature, as you will observe when your limbs begin to wither and your hair falls out in patches. In time, these minor manifestations will multiply and effloresce, riddling you with frambesia, the king's evil, sheep rot, and clonic spasm, until your very existence becomes a burden and you cry out for release. All this, though, is simply a prelude, a curtain-raiser, for what ensues, and I doubt whether any Occidental could accurately forecast it. If, however, it would help to intensify your anguish, I can delimit the powers of a few of the divinities you've affronted and describe the punishment they meted out in one analogous instance. Hold on tight.

First of all, the six figures of the Buddha you heisted -- four Siamese heads, a black obsidian statuette in the earth touching position, and a large brass figure of the Dying Buddha on a teakwood base. Now, you probably share the widespread Western belief that the Lord Buddha is the most compassionate of the gods, much more so than Jehovah and Allah and the rest. ' Fess up -- don't you? Well, ordinarily he is, except (as the Wheel of the Law specifies) toward impious folk who steal, disturb, or maltreat the Presence. Very peculiar retribution indeed seems to overtake such jokers. Eight or ten years ago, a couple of French hoods stole a priceless Khmer head from the Musee Guimet, in Paris, and a week later crawled into the Salpetriere with unmistakable symptoms of leprosy. Hell's own amount of chaulmoogra oil did nothing to alleviate their torment; they expired amid indescribable fantods, imploring the Blessed One to forgive their desecration. Any reputable French interne can supply you with a dozen similar instances, and I'll presently recount a case out of my own personal experience, but, for the moment, let's resume our catalogue.