Kim Rudyard Kipling (web ebook reader .TXT) 📖

mouth with gold.” He laid the garments formally at Kim’s feet. There was a gold-embroidered Peshawur turban-cap, rising to a cone, and a big turban-cloth ending in a broad fringe of gold. There was a Delhi embroidered waistcoat to slip over a milky white shirt, fastening to the right, ample and flowing; green pyjamas with twisted silk waist-string; and that nothing might be lacking, russia-leather slippers, smelling divinely, with arrogantly curled tips.

“Upon a Wednesday, and in the morning, to put on new clothes is auspicious,” said Mahbub solemnly. “But we must not forget the wicked folk in the world. So!”

He capped all the splendour, that was taking Kim’s delighted breath away, with a mother-of-pearl, nickel-plated, self-extracting .450 revolver.

“I had thought of a smaller bore, but reflected that this takes Government bullets. A man can always come by those⁠—especially across the Border. Stand up and let me look.” He clapped Kim on the shoulder. “May you never be tired, Pathan! Oh, the hearts to be broken! Oh, the eyes under the eyelashes, looking sideways!”

Kim turned about, pointed his toes, stretched, and felt mechanically for the moustache that was just beginning. Then he stooped towards Mahbub’s feet to make proper acknowledgment with fluttering, quick-patting hands; his heart too full for words. Mahbub forestalled and embraced him.

“My son,” said he, “what need of words between us? But is not the little gun a delight? All six cartridges come out at one twist. It is borne in the bosom next the skin, which, as it were, keeps it oiled. Never put it elsewhere, and please God, thou shalt some day kill a man with it.”

“Hai mai!” said Kim ruefully. “If a Sahib kills a man he is hanged in the jail.”

“True: but one pace beyond the Border, men are wiser. Put it away; but fill it first. Of what use is a gun unfed?”

“When I go back to the madrissah I must return it. They do not allow little guns. Thou wilt keep it for me?”

“Son, I am wearied of that madrissah, where they take the best years of a man to teach him what he can only learn upon the Road. The folly of the Sahibs has neither top nor bottom. No matter. Maybe thy written report shall save thee further bondage; and God He knows we need men more and more in the Game.”

They marched, jaw-bound against blowing sand, across the salt desert to Jodhpur, where Mahbub and his handsome nephew Habib Ullah did much trading; and then sorrowfully, in European clothes, which he was fast outgrowing, Kim went second-class to St. Xavier’s. Three weeks later, Colonel Creighton, pricing Tibetan ghost-daggers at Lurgan’s shop, faced Mahbub Ali openly mutinous. Lurgan Sahib operated as support in reserve.

“The pony is made⁠—finished⁠—mouthed and paced, Sahib! From now on, day by day, he will lose his manners if he is kept at tricks. Drop the rein on his back and let go,” said the horse-dealer. “We need him.”

“But he is so young, Mahbub⁠—not more than sixteen⁠—is he?”

“When I was fifteen, I had shot my man and begot my man, Sahib.”

“You impenitent old heathen!” Creighton turned to Lurgan. The black beard nodded assent to the wisdom of the Afghan’s dyed scarlet.

“I should have used him long ago,” said Lurgan. “The younger the better. That is why I always have my really valuable jewels watched by a child. You sent him to me to try. I tried him in every way: he is the only boy I could not make to see things.”

“In the crystal⁠—in the ink-pool?” demanded Mahbub.

“No. Under my hand, as I told you. That has never happened before. It means that he is strong enough⁠—but you think it skittles, Colonel Creighton⁠—to make anyone do anything he wants. And that is three years ago. I have taught him a good deal since, Colonel Creighton. I think you waste him now.”

“Hmm! Maybe you’re right. But, as you know, there is no Survey work for him at present.”

“Let him out⁠—let him go,” Mahbub interrupted. “Who expects any colt to carry heavy weight at first? Let him run with the caravans⁠—like our white camel-colts⁠—for luck. I would take him myself, but⁠—”

“There is a little business where he would be most useful⁠—in the South,” said Lurgan, with peculiar suavity, dropping his heavy blued eyelids.

“E.23 has that in hand,” said Creighton quickly. “He must not go down there. Besides, he knows no Turki.”

“Only tell him the shape and the smell of the letters we want and he will bring them back,” Lurgan insisted.

“No. That is a man’s job,” said Creighton.

It was a wry-necked matter of unauthorized and incendiary correspondence between a person who claimed to be the ultimate authority in all matters of the Mohammedan religion throughout the world, and a younger member of a royal house who had been brought to book for kidnapping women within British territory. The Muslim Archbishop had been emphatic and over-arrogant; the young prince was merely sulky at the curtailment of his privileges, but there was no need he should continue a correspondence which might some day compromise him. One letter indeed had been procured, but the finder was later found dead by the roadside in the habit of an Arab trader, as E.23, taking up the work, duly reported.

These facts, and a few others not to be published, made both Mahbub and Creighton shake their heads.

“Let him go out with his Red Lama,” said the horse-dealer with visible effort. “He is fond of the old man. He can learn his paces by the rosary at least.”

“I have had some dealings with the old man⁠—by letter,” said Colonel Creighton, smiling to himself. “Whither goes he?”

“Up and down the land, as he has these three years. He seeks a River of Healing. God’s curse upon all⁠—” Mahbub checked himself. “He beds down at the Temple of the Tirthankars or at Buddh Gaya when he is in from the Road. Then he goes to see the boy at the madrissah,