Kim by Rudyard Kipling (best reads of all time .txt) 📖

him shelter against evil spirits of the wood. He dreams of Bengali Gods, University text-books of education, and the Royal Society, London, England. Next dawn the bobbing blue-and-white umbrella goes forward.

On the edge of the Doon, Mussoorie well behind them and the Plains spread out in golden dust before, rests a worn litter in which—all the Hills know it—lies a sick lama who seeks a River for his healing. Villages have almost come to blows over the honour of bearing it, for not only has the lama given them blessings, but his disciple good money—full one-third Sahibs’ prices. Twelve miles a day has the dooli travelled, as the greasy, rubbed pole-ends show, and by roads that few Sahibs use. Over the Nilang Pass in storm when the driven snow-dust filled every fold of the impassive lama’s drapery; between the black horns of Raieng where they heard the whistle of the wild goats through the clouds; pitching and strained on the shale below; hard-held between shoulder and clenched jaw when they rounded the hideous curves of the Cut Road under Bhagirati; swinging and creaking to the steady jog-trot of the descent into the Valley of the Waters; pressed along the steamy levels of that locked valley; up, up and out again, to meet the roaring gusts off Kedarnath; set down of mid-days in the dun gloom of kindly oak-forests; passed from village to village in dawn-chill, when even devotees may be forgiven for swearing at impatient holy men; or by torchlight, when the least fearful think of ghosts—the dooli has reached her last stage. The little hill-folk sweat in the modified heat of the lower Siwaliks, and gather round the priests for their blessing and their wage.

“Ye have acquired merit,” says the lama. “Merit greater than your knowing. And ye will return to the Hills,” he sighs.

“Surely. The high Hills as soon as may be.” The bearer rubs his shoulder, drinks water, spits it out again, and readjusts his grass sandal. Kim—his face is drawn and tired—pays very small silver from his belt, heaves out the food-bag, crams an oilskin packet—they are holy writings—into his bosom, and helps the lama to his feet. The peace has come again into the old man’s eyes, and he does not look for the hills to fall down and crush him as he did that terrible night when they were delayed by the flooded river.

The men pick up the dooli and swing out of sight between the scrub clumps.

The lama raises a hand toward the rampart of the Himalayas. “Not with you, O blessed among all hills, fell the Arrow of Our Lord! And never shall I breathe your airs again!”

“But thou art ten times the stronger man in this good air,” says Kim, for to his wearied soul appeal the well-cropped, kindly Plains. “Here, or hereabouts, fell the Arrow, yes. We will go very softly, perhaps, a kos a day, for the Search is sure. But the bag weighs heavy.”

“Ay, our Search is sure. I have come out of great temptation.”

It was never more than a couple of miles a day now, and Kim’s shoulders bore all the weight of it—the burden of an old man, the burden of the heavy food-bag with the locked books, the load of the writings on his heart, and the details of the daily routine. He begged in the dawn, set blankets for the lama’s meditation, held the weary head on his lap through the noonday heats, fanning away the flies till his wrists ached, begged again in the evenings, and rubbed the lama’s feet, who rewarded him with promise of Freedom—today, tomorrow, or, at furthest, the next day.

“Never was such a chela. I doubt at times whether Ananda more faithfully nursed Our Lord. And thou art a Sahib? When I was a man—a long time ago—I forgot that. Now I look upon thee often, and every time I remember that thou art a Sahib. It is strange.”

“Thou hast said there is neither black nor white. Why plague me with this talk, Holy One? Let me rub the other foot. It vexes me. I am not a Sahib. I am thy chela, and my head is heavy on my shoulders.”

“Patience a little! We reach Freedom together. Then thou and I, upon the far bank of the River, will look back upon our lives as in the Hills we saw our days’ marches laid out behind us. Perhaps I was once a Sahib.”

“Was never a Sahib like thee, I swear it.”

“I am certain the Keeper of the Images in the Wonder House was in past life a very wise Abbot. But even his spectacles do not make my eyes see. There fall shadows when I would look steadily. No matter—we know the tricks of the poor stupid carcass—shadow changing to another shadow. I am bound by the illusion of Time and Space. How far came we today in the flesh?”

“Perhaps half a koss.” (Three quarters of a mile, and it was a weary march.)

“Half a koss. Ha! I went ten thousand thousand in the spirit. How, we are all lapped and swathed and swaddled in these senseless things.” He looked at his thin blue-veined hand that found the beads so heavy. “Chela, hast thou never a wish to leave me?”

Kim thought of the oilskin packet and the books in the food-bag. If someone duly authorized would only take delivery of them the Great Game might play itself for aught he then cared. He was tired and hot in his head, and a cough that came from the stomach worried him.

“No.” he said almost sternly. “I am not a dog or a snake to bite when I have learned to love.”

“Thou art too tender towards me.”

“Not that either. I have moved in one matter without consulting thee. I have sent a message to the Kulu woman by that woman who gave us the goat’s milk this morn, saying that thou wast a little feeble and wouldst need a litter. I beat myself in my mind that I did not do it when we entered the Doon. We stay in this place till the litter returns.”

“I am content. She is a woman with a heart of gold, as thou sayest, but a talker—something of a talker.”

“She will not weary thee. I have looked to that also. Holy One, my heart is very heavy for my many carelessnesses towards thee.” An hysterical catch rose in his throat. “I have walked thee too far: I have not picked good food always for thee; I have not considered the heat; I have talked to people on the road and left thee alone ... I have—I have ... Hai mai! But I love thee ... and it is all too late ... I was a child ... Oh, why was I not a man? ...” Overborne by strain, fatigue, and the weight beyond his years, Kim broke down and sobbed at the lama’s feet.

“What a to-do is here!” said the old man gently. “Thou hast never stepped a hair’s breadth from the Way of Obedience. Neglect me? Child, I have lived on thy strength as an old tree lives on the lime of a new wall. Day by day, since Shamlegh down, I have stolen strength from thee. Therefore, not through any sin of thine, art thou weakened. It is the Body—the silly, stupid Body—that speaks now. Not the assured Soul. Be comforted! Know at least the devils that thou fightest. They are earth-born—children of illusion. We will go to the woman from Kulu. She shall acquire merit in housing us, and specially in tending me. Thou shalt run free till strength returns. I had forgotten the stupid Body. If there be any blame, I bear it. But we are too close to the Gates of Deliverance to weigh blame. I could praise thee, but what need? In a little—in a very little—we shall sit beyond all needs.”

And so he petted and comforted Kim with wise saws and grave texts on that little-understood beast, our Body, who, being but a delusion, insists on posing as the Soul, to the darkening of the Way, and the immense multiplication of unnecessary devils.

“Hai! hai! Let us talk of the woman from Kulu. Think you she will ask another charm for her grandsons? When I was a young man, a very long time ago, I was plagued with these vapours—and some others—and I went to an Abbot—a very holy man and a seeker after truth, though then I knew it not. Sit up and listen, child of my soul! My tale was told. Said he to me, ‘Chela, know this. There are many lies in the world, and not a few liars, but there are no liars like our bodies, except it be the sensations of our bodies.’ Considering this I was comforted, and of his great favour he suffered me to drink tea In his presence. Suffer me now to drink tea, for I am thirsty.”

With a laugh across his tears, Kim kissed the lama’s feet, and set about the tea-making.

“Thou leanest on me in the body, Holy One, but I lean on thee for some other things. Dost know it?”

“I have guessed maybe,” and the lama’s eyes twinkled. “We must change that.”

So, when with scufflings and scrapings and a hot air of importance, paddled up nothing less than the Sahiba’s pet palanquin sent twenty miles, with that same grizzled old Oorya servant in charge, and when they reached the disorderly order of the long white rambling house behind Saharunpore, the lama took his own measures.

Said the Sahiba cheerily from an upper window, after compliments: “What is the good of an old woman’s advice to an old man? I told thee—I told thee, Holy One, to keep an eye upon the chela. How didst thou do it? Never answer me! I know. He has been running among the women. Look at his eyes—hollow and sunk—and the Betraying Line from the nose down! He has been sifted out! Fie! Fie! And a priest, too!”

Kim looked up, over-weary to smile, shaking his head in denial.

“Do not jest,” said the lama. “That time is done. We are here upon great matters. A sickness of soul took me in the Hills, and him a sickness of the body. Since then I have lived upon his strength—eating him.”

“Children together—young and old,” she sniffed, but forbore to make any new jokes. “May this present hospitality restore ye! Hold awhile and I will come to gossip of the high good Hills.”

At evening time—her son-in-law was returned, so she did not need to go on inspection round the farm—she won to the meat of the matter, explained low-voicedly by the lama. The two old heads nodded wisely together. Kim had reeled to a room with a cot in it, and was dozing soddenly. The lama had forbidden him to set blankets or get food.

“I know—I know. Who but I?” she cackled. “We who go down to the burning-ghats clutch at the hands of those coming up from the River of Life with full water-jars—yes, brimming water-jars. I did the boy wrong. He lent thee his strength? It is true that the old eat the young daily. Stands now we must restore him.”

“Thou hast many times acquired merit—”

“My merit. What is it? Old bag of bones making curries for men who do not ask ‘Who cooked this?’ Now if it were stored up for my grandson—”

“He that had the belly-pain?”

“To think the Holy One remembers that! I must tell his mother. It is most singular honour! ‘He that had the belly-pain’—straightway the Holy One remembered. She will be proud.”

“My chela is to me as is a son to the unenlightened.”

“Say grandson, rather. Mothers have not the wisdom of our years. If a child cries they say the heavens are falling. Now a grandmother is far enough separated from the pain of bearing and the pleasure of giving the breast to consider whether a cry is wickedness pure or the wind. And since thou speakest once again of wind, when last the Holy One was here, maybe I offended in pressing for charms.”

“Sister,” said the lama, using that form of address a Buddhist monk may sometimes employ towards a nun, “if charms comfort thee—”

“They are better than ten thousand doctors.”

“I say, if they comfort thee, I who was Abbot of Such-zen, will make as many as thou mayest desire. I have never seen thy face—”

“That even the monkeys who steal our loquats count for again. Hee! hee!”

“But as he who sleeps there said,”—he nodded at the shut door of the guest-chamber across the forecourt—“thou hast a heart of gold... And he is in the spirit my very ‘grandson’ to me.”

“Good! I am the Holy One’s cow.” This was pure Hinduism, but the lama never heeded. “I