Kim

and the soil of the Jullundur-doab for the best soil in it.'

'I have said many times--in the Temple, I think--that if need be, the

River will open at our feet. We will therefore go North,' said the

lama, rising. 'I remember a pleasant place, set about with

fruit-trees, where one can walk in meditation--and the air is cooler

there. It comes from the Hills and the snow of the Hills.'

'What is the name?' said Kim.

'How should I know? Didst thou not--no, that was after the Army rose

out of the earth and took thee away. I abode there in meditation in a

room against the dovecot--except when she talked eternally.'

'Oho! the woman from Kulu. That is by Saharunpore.' Kim laughed.

'How does the spirit move thy master? Does he go afoot, for the sake

of past sins?' the Jat demanded cautiously. 'It is a far cry to

Delhi.'

'No,' said Kim. 'I will beg a tikkut for the te-rain.' One does not

own to the possession of money in India.

'Then, in the name of the Gods, let us take the fire-carriage. My son

is best in his mother's arms. The Government has brought on us many

taxes, but it gives us one good thing--the te-rain that joins friends

and unites the anxious. A wonderful matter is the te-rain.'

They all piled into it a couple of hours later, and slept through the

heat of the day. The Kamboh plied Kim with ten thousand questions as

to the lama's walk and work in life, and received some curious answers.

Kim was content to be where he was, to look out upon the flat

North-Western landscape, and to talk to the changing mob of

fellow-passengers. Even today, tickets and ticket-clipping are dark

oppression to Indian rustics. They do not understand why, when they

have paid for a magic piece of paper, strangers should punch great

pieces out of the charm. So, long and furious are the debates between

travellers and Eurasian ticket-collectors. Kim assisted at two or

three with grave advice, meant to darken counsel and to show off his

wisdom before the lama and the admiring Kamboh. But at Somna Road the

Fates sent him a matter to think upon. There tumbled into the

compartment, as the train was moving off, a mean, lean little person--a

Mahratta, so far as Kim could judge by the cock of the tight turban.

His face was cut, his muslin upper-garment was badly torn, and one leg

was bandaged. He told them that a country-cart had upset and nearly

slain him: he was going to Delhi, where his son lived. Kim watched

him closely. If, as he asserted, he had been rolled over and over on

the earth, there should have been signs of gravel-rash on the skin.

But all his injuries seemed clean cuts, and a mere fall from a cart

could not cast a man into such extremity of terror. As, with shaking

fingers, he knotted up the torn cloth about his neck he laid bare an

amulet of the kind called a keeper-up of the heart. Now, amulets are

common enough, but they are not generally strung on square-plaited

copper wire, and still fewer amulets bear black enamel on silver.

There were none except the Kamboh and the lama in the compartment,

which, luckily, was of an old type with solid ends. Kim made as to

scratch in his bosom, and thereby lifted his own amulet. The

Mahratta's face changed altogether at the sight, and he disposed the

amulet fairly on his breast.

'Yes,' he went on to the Kamboh, 'I was in haste, and the cart, driven

by a bastard, bound its wheel in a water-cut, and besides the harm done

to me there was lost a full dish of tarkeean. I was not a Son of the

Charm [a lucky man] that day.'

'That was a great loss,' said the Kamboh, withdrawing interest. His

experience of Benares had made him suspicious.

'Who cooked it?' said Kim.

'A woman.' The Mahratta raised his eyes.

'But all women can cook tarkeean,' said the Kamboh. 'It is a good

curry, as I know.'

'Oh yes, it is a good curry,' said the Mahratta.

'And cheap,' said Kim. 'But what about caste?'

'Oh, there is no caste where men go to--look for tarkeean,' the

Mahratta replied, in the prescribed cadence. 'Of whose service art

thou?'

'Of the service of this Holy One.' Kim pointed to the happy, drowsy

lama, who woke with a jerk at the well-loved word.

'Ah, he was sent from Heaven to aid me. He is called the Friend of all

the World. He is also called the Friend of the Stars. He walks as a

physician--his time being ripe. Great is his wisdom.'

'And a Son of the Charm,' said Kim under his breath, as the Kamboh made

haste to prepare a pipe lest the Mahratta should beg.

'And who is that?' the Mahratta asked, glancing sideways nervously.

'One whose child I--we have cured, who lies under great debt to us. Sit

by the window, man from Jullundur. Here is a sick one.'

'Humph! I have no desire to mix with chance-met wastrels. My ears are

not long. I am not a woman wishing to overhear secrets.' The Jat slid

himself heavily into a far corner.

'Art thou anything of a healer? I am ten leagues deep in calamity,'

cried the Mahratta, picking up the cue.

'This man is cut and bruised all over. I go about to cure him,' Kim

retorted. 'None interfered between thy babe and me.'

'I am rebuked,' said the Kamboh meekly. 'I am thy debtor for the life

of my son. Thou art a miracle-worker--I know it.'

'Show me the cuts.' Kim bent over the Mahratta's neck, his heart

nearly choking him; for this was the Great Game with a vengeance. 'Now,

tell thy tale swiftly, brother, while I say a charm.'

'I come from the South, where my work lay. One of us they slew by the

roadside. Hast thou heard?' Kim shook his head. He, of course, knew

nothing of E's predecessor, slain down South in the habit of an Arab

trader. 'Having found a certain letter which I was sent to seek, I

came away. I escaped from the city and ran to Mhow. So sure was I

that none knew, I did not change my face. At Mhow a woman brought

charge against me of theft of jewellery in that city which I had left.

Then I saw the cry was out against me. I ran from Mhow by night,

bribing the police, who had been bribed to hand me over without

question to my enemies in the South. Then I lay in old Chitor city a

week, a penitent in a temple, but I could not get rid of the letter

which was my charge. I buried it under the Queen's Stone, at Chitor,

in the place known to us all.'

Kim did not know, but not for worlds would he have broken the thread.

'At Chitor, look you, I was all in Kings' country; for Kotah to the

east is beyond the Queen's law, and east again lie Jaipur and Gwalior.

Neither love spies, and there is no justice. I was hunted like a wet

jackal; but I broke through at Bandakui, where I heard there was a

charge against me of murder in the city I had left--of the murder of a

boy. They have both the corpse and the witnesses waiting.'

'But cannot the Government protect?'

'We of the Game are beyond protection. If we die, we die. Our names

are blotted from the book. That is all. At Bandakui, where lives one

of Us, I thought to slip the scent by changing my face, and so made me

a Mahratta. Then I came to Agra, and would have turned back to Chitor

to recover the letter. So sure I was I had slipped them. Therefore I

did not send a tar [telegram] to any one saying where the letter lay.

I wished the credit of it all.'

Kim nodded. He understood that feeling well.

'But at Agra, walking in the streets, a man cried a debt against me,

and approaching with many witnesses, would hale me to the courts then

and there. Oh, they are clever in the South! He recognized me as his