16 
LAND 5? WATER 
August 29, 1918 
The Theatre: By W. J. Turner 
New Theatre : The Chinese Puzzle 
MY love forChinamen, those celestial beings of 
iny boyhood, made my eyes stop, as they ran 
down the amusements column of my morning 
paper, at "The Chinese Puzzle." In spite of 
the persistence witli which authors of travel 
books on Cliina refer to smells, no one takes any notice ; 
we all go on dreaming of willows and jieach-blossom hanging 
in bizarre and dreamy landscapes, variegated by grave 
Chinese faces with charming pigtails. In a moment one of 
^ those placid, smiling faces may grin with frightful and incom- 
prehensible ferocity ; before you can believe your eyes, that 
face is as smooth and expressionless as water. Thjs experi- 
ence of Chinamen is universal ; we all look for it ; babies 
taken to the theatre for the first time expect it ; and when 
Mr. Leon M. Lion, as the Marquis Chi Lung, silently entered 
the salon of Sir Roger dc la Haye's country house in the 
first act, it made my mouth involuntarily open, and 
rustled the paper in the stalls. Though the Marquis's 
appearance would strike terror to the stoutest hearts, he is 
o\\\\ there to arrange a loan to the Chinese Government 
through Mr. Paul Marketel, a millionaire, working under 
the auspices of the British Inireign Office. Sir Roger, wl;o 
is in the Foreign Office, is the son of Chi Lung's oldest friend ; 
the agreement which is conipleted during the afternoon is 
locked by him in a secret drawer in a room adjoining the 
salon ; but that evening, when the London papers arrive, 
they contain the full agreement, in spite of its having been 
written in Chinese characters, which no European in the 
house, except Sir Roger, could read, and of its never having 
left its hiding place. 
This is not the Chinese puzzle ; it is merely d d annoy- 
ing, as it was on the historic occasion when the Attache 
_ threw the dispatch-bag into the sea to avoid capture, and it 
floaied. The audience know the culprit, who is neither 
Sir Roger nor the Marquis. The Chinese puzzle is Chi Lung, 
who is addicted to producing a peculiar buzzing " sss " at odd 
moments, especially when introduced to ladies. He produces 
this noise most frequently when talking to the young lady 
who is going to be Sir Roger's wife. Naomi Melsham is just 
the girl for a Foreign Ofi&ce official's wife, as she and 
her mother have been living for years on their wits ; but 
now Naomi has fallen in love with Sir Roger, and wishes to 
break completely with her old life, when, on this unusual 
afternoon, her mother undulates gracefully into the salon, 
and by various q_uajnt gestures, mingled with a terrible 
threat, induces Naomi to consent to obtain the contents of 
the agreement for Strumm, the celebrated German who 
supplies Mrs. Melsham with hats. Of course, this is putting 
. it crudely, without the finesse that the authors display ; 
briefly, Strumm will provide the cash to prevent the financial 
collapse of the Melshams. 
How the contents of the agreement are obtained I shall not 
reveal. I shall only say that it is done by Naomi, with the 
help — quite unwittingly — of a young Frenchman, Arm^nd de 
Rochecorbon, a friend of Sir Roger's, who springs about the 
salon in such a chronic state of excitement that we feel that 
something simply must happen. It does ; and Mrs. Melsham 
floats away with her hats, and dies somewhere between the 
first and third acts, leaving her daughter to face the increasing 
"sss" of Chi Lung. Naomi has not foreseen that Sir Roger 
will be suspected of having sold the contents of the agreement, 
failing some other explanation of the affair, and it is a terrible 
shock whfen Sir Aylmer Brent, of the Foreign Office, arrives 
to take Sir Roger's resignation, and she realises that his 
career is ruined. Sir Aylmer, following the invariable tradi- 
tion of high officials of the Foreign Office, comes down the 
terrace with his hat in his hand, with a slow, dehberate 
tread; and without a smile. It is a shocking moment for the 
poor mother, whom I have not yet mentioned, but who 
makes the frightful mistake of forgetting to ask Sir Aylmer 
to have a drink. Even with a drink, however, nothing could 
have been done ; the resignation must be proffered, and 
Sir Aylmer goes away with it, leaving Sir Roger's mother 
imploring 'the Marquis Chi Lung as her husband's friend to 
help them. Chi Lung makes a number of polite remarks 
about women, and thoroughly scares Naomi, whom he alone 
suspects, by producing a buzz louder than ordinary. 
Sir Roger, feeling absolutely broken, now wishes to release 
Naomi ; but she will not have it, and hopes by her love to 
make up for his ruined career. In a touching scene she 
tells him how they will go away together and forget all about 
it. She has had a distressing night, and has forgotten to 
powder her nose. This is Chi Lung's opportunity ; he makes 
an extraordinarily big buzz, and says cruelly, but with a 
most attractive manner: "The peach-blossom has lost its 
bloom this morning." He is not the man for week-end parties! 
In the third act we are in the Chinese room at Sir Roger's 
house. The marriage has been a failure. Naomi has dis- 
covered that love cannot make up to Sir Roger for his lost 
honour. All his friends have cut him, and he thinks of 
nothing, day and night, but his chart, which, is an elaborate 
record he is compiling of the actions of all his guests and 
household every minute f;f that eventful day ten months 
ago. He imagines he is on the verge of finding the guilty 
person. The chart is almost complete, and all the guests 
are to reassemble this vcrv afternoon. For some reason 
inscrutable to him and his mother, Chi Lung has been opposed 
to his continuing his investigations ; however, he is expected 
to appear. By this time the continuous strain has brought 
Naomi almost to the p<jint of collapse, and she looks forward 
with terror to meeting Chi-Lung. Chi Lung arrives ; and 
there is a really exciting scene between them, leading to his 
presenting her with a piece of paper which he bids her open. 
With trembling fingers she reads the name "Strumm," and 
her pent-up fear escapes in a shriek. It was an excellent 
shriek that Ethel Irving gave, quite worth whi'.e rushing 
out of the bar for, if one had fortunately been there. From 
now on is the soundest part of the play. The guests have 
all arrived; and the cross-examination begins. Everybody 
accounts satisfactorily for every minute of his time, except 
Armand de Rochecorbon, who makes a revelation which 
leads straight to Naomi. The scent is getting hot, and Sir 
Roger — poor fellow — wholly unsuspecting where it will take 
him, excitedly cross-examines Naomi. The wretched girl is 
nearly distraught ; discovery is inevitable when, suddenly 
Chi Lung intervenes with the startling confession that he is 
the guilty person. 
We have come now ^to the Chinese puzzle : Why does 
Chi Lung save Naomi, whom he despises ? And we find 
that it is to repay the debt of gratitude to his old friend. 
Sir Roger's father. This is in character; unhke the buzz, it is 
truly Chinese ; perhaps Chi Lung has remembered the old 
Chinese poet who, about the year loo B.C. said : 
The dead are gone and with them we cannot converse. 
The living are here and ought to have our love. 
In the last act Naomi comes to Chi Lung's house and 
tells him she must confess, that she cannot bear it any longer. 
Chi Lung points out to her that now that he has taken the 
responsibility. Sir Roger is cleared, and will be reinstated. 
If she confesses then, in this foolish country of Western 
barbarians, where a man's honour is inextricably mixed up 
with his wife's. Sir Roger will once more be ruined ; if she 
loves Sir Roger most, she will keep silent ; but if she loves 
herself most, she will confess. Naomi sees the force of this 
argument, and at the crucial moment, when Chi Lung has 
to substantiate his confession by proofs, keeps silent. The 
play ends with Chi Lung saluting the photograph of 
his dead friend, having repaid his indebtedness by his 
sacrifice. 
It is a pity the authors did not take more trouble with 
Chi Lung, who in the first half of the play acts and talks 
with a rudeness and violence thoroughly foreign to his race 
— who.se urbanity is such that their irony, for instance, is 
usually so flat and low-pitched as to be imperceptible to us. 
In spite of an excellent make-up, Mr. Leon M. Lion was not 
impressive ; he was not dignified enough, and his gestures 
were exaggerated. As part author, Mr. Lion was also 
responsible for Chi Lung's impoliteness. It is true that a 
Chinese poet has written : 
How sad it is to be a woman ! 
Nothing on earth is held so cheap. 
but that is poetic licence ; no Chinaman would walk about 
at a garden party or at a country house week-end, dropping 
waspish remarks on the weakness of women. Mr. Lion also 
made the mistake of saying these things with an air not of 
infinite regret, but of thorough enio\-ment. Of the others. 
Miss Ellen O'Malley looked subtle and provocative, but 
passed blamelessly across the background. Miss Lilian 
Braithwaite, as Sir Roger's mother, was excellent. Best of 
all were some Chinese curtains which, though extremely 
bizarre, hung with great restraint. 
