Kim

him. He became thickly treasonous, and spoke in terms of sweeping

indecency of a Government which had forced upon him a white man's

education and neglected to supply him with a white man's salary. He

babbled tales of oppression and wrong till the tears ran down his

cheeks for the miseries of his land. Then he staggered off, singing

love-songs of Lower Bengal, and collapsed upon a wet tree-trunk. Never

was so unfortunate a product of English rule in India more unhappily

thrust upon aliens.

'They are all just of that pattern,' said one sportsman to the other in

French. 'When we get into India proper thou wilt see. I should like

to visit his Rajah. One might speak the good word there. It is

possible that he has heard of us and wishes to signify his good-will.'

'We have not time. We must get into Simla as soon as may be,' his

companion replied. 'For my own part, I wish our reports had been sent

back from Hilas, or even Leh.'

'The English post is better and safer. Remember we are given all

facilities--and Name of God!--they give them to us too! Is it

unbelievable stupidity?'

'It is pride--pride that deserves and will receive punishment.'

'Yes! To fight a fellow-Continental in our game is something. There

is a risk attached, but these people--bah! It is too easy.'

'Pride--all pride, my friend.'

'Now what the deuce is good of Chandernagore being so close to Calcutta

and all,' said Hurree, snoring open-mouthed on the sodden moss, 'if I

cannot understand their French? They talk so particularly fast! It

would have been much better to cut their beastly throats.'

When he presented himself again he was racked with a

headache--penitent, and volubly afraid that in his drunkenness he might

have been indiscreet. He loved the British Government--it was the

source of all prosperity and honour, and his master at Rampur held the

very same opinion. Upon this the men began to deride him and to quote

past words, till step by step, with deprecating smirks, oily grins, and

leers of infinite cunning, the poor Babu was beaten out of his defences

and forced to speak--truth. When Lurgan was told the tale later, he

mourned aloud that he could not have been in the place of the stubborn,

inattentive coolies, who with grass mats over their heads and the

raindrops puddling in their footprints, waited on the weather. All the

Sahibs of their acquaintance--rough-clad men joyously returning year

after year to their chosen gullies--had servants and cooks and

orderlies, very often hillmen. These Sahibs travelled without any

retinue. Therefore they were poor Sahibs, and ignorant; for no Sahib

in his senses would follow a Bengali's advice. But the Bengali,

appearing from somewhere, had given them money, and could make shift

with their dialect. Used to comprehensive ill-treatment from their own

colour, they suspected a trap somewhere, and stood by to run if

occasion offered.

Then through the new-washed air, steaming with delicious earth-smells,

the Babu led the way down the slopes--walking ahead of the coolies in

pride; walking behind the foreigners in humility. His thoughts were

many and various. The least of them would have interested his

companions beyond words. But he was an agreeable guide, ever keen to

point out the beauties of his royal master's domain. He peopled the

hills with anything thev had a mind to slay--thar, ibex, or markhor,

and bear by Elisha's allowance. He discoursed of botany and ethnology

with unimpeachable inaccuracy, and his store of local legends--he had

been a trusted agent of the State for fifteen years, remember--was

inexhaustible.

'Decidedly this fellow is an original,' said the taller of the two

foreigners. 'He is like the nightmare of a Viennese courier.'

'He represents in little India in transition--the monstrous hybridism

of East and West,' the Russian replied. 'It is we who can deal with

Orientals.'

'He has lost his own country and has not acquired any other. But he

has a most complete hatred of his conquerors. Listen. He confided to

me last night,' said the other.

Under the striped umbrella Hurree Babu was straining ear and brain to

follow the quick-poured French, and keeping both eyes on a kilta full

of maps and documents--an extra-large one with a double red oil-skin

cover. He did not wish to steal anything. He only desired to know

what to steal, and, incidentally, how to get away when he had stolen

it. He thanked all the Gods of Hindustan, and Herbert Spencer, that

there remained some valuables to steal.

On the second day the road rose steeply to a grass spur above the

forest; and it was here, about sunset, that they came across an aged

lama--but they called him a bonze--sitting cross-legged above a

mysterious chart held down by stones, which he was explaining to a

young man, evidently a neophyte, of singular, though unwashen, beauty.

The striped umbrella had been sighted half a march away, and Kim had

suggested a halt till it came up to them.

'Ha!' said Hurree Babu, resourceful as Puss-in-Boots. 'That is

eminent local holy man. Probably subject of my royal master.'

'What is he doing? It is very curious.'

'He is expounding holy picture--all hand-worked.'

The two men stood bareheaded in the wash of the afternoon sunlight low

across the gold-coloured grass. The sullen coolies, glad of the check,

halted and slid down their loads.

'Look!' said the Frenchman. 'It is like a picture for the birth of a

religion--the first teacher and the first disciple. Is he a Buddhist?'

'Of some debased kind,' the other answered. 'There are no true

Buddhists among the Hills. But look at the folds of the drapery. Look

at his eyes--how insolent! Why does this make one feel that we are so

young a people?' The speaker struck passionately at a tall weed. 'We

have nowhere left our mark yet. Nowhere! That, do you understand, is

what disquiets me.' He scowled at the placid face, and the monumental

calm of the pose.

'Have patience. We shall make your mark together--we and you young

people. Meantime, draw his picture.'

The Babu advanced loftily; his back out of all keeping with his

deferential speech, or his wink towards Kim.

'Holy One, these be Sahibs. My medicines cured one of a flux, and I go

into Simla to oversee his recovery. They wish to see thy picture--'

'To heal the sick is always good. This is the Wheel of Life,' said the

lama, 'the same I showed thee in the hut at Ziglaur when the rain fell.'

'And to hear thee expound it.'

The lama's eyes lighted at the prospect of new listeners. 'To expound

the Most Excellent Way is good. Have they any knowledge of Hindi, such

as had the Keeper of Images?'

'A little, maybe.'

Hereat, simply as a child engrossed with a new game, the lama threw

back his head and began the full-throated invocation of the Doctor of

Divinity ere he opens the full doctrine. The strangers leaned on their

alpenstocks and listened. Kim, squatting humbly, watched the red

sunlight on their faces, and the blend and parting of their long

shadows. They wore un-English leggings and curious girt-in belts that

reminded him hazily of the pictures in a book in St Xavier's library

"The Adventures of a Young Naturalist in Mexico" was its name. Yes,

they looked very like the wonderful M. Sumichrast of that tale, and

very unlike the 'highly unscrupulous folk' of Hurree Babu's imagining.

The coolies, earth-coloured and mute, crouched reverently some twenty