Books: Kim

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Chapter 5

Here come I to my own again
Fed, forgiven, and known again
Claimed by bone of my bone again,
And sib to flesh of my flesh!
The fatted calf is dressed for me,
But the husks have greater zest for me ...
I think my pigs will be best for me,
So I'm off to the styes afresh.

The Prodigal Son.

Once more the lazy, string-tied, shuffling procession got under
way, and she slept till they reached the next halting-stage. It was
a very short march, and time lacked an hour to sundown, so Kim cast
about for means of amusement.

'But why not sit and rest?' said one of the escort. 'Only the
devils and the English walk to and fro without reason.'

'Never make friends with the Devil, a Monkey, or a Boy. No man
knows what they will do next,' said his fellow.

Kim turned a scornful back - he did not want to hear the old story
how the Devil played with the boys and repented of it and walked
idly across country.

The lama strode after him. All that day, whenever they passed a
stream, he had turned aside to look at it, but in no case had he
received any warning that he had found his River. Insensibly, too,
the comfort of speaking to someone in a reasonable tongue,' and of
being properly considered and respected as her spiritual adviser by
a well-born woman, had weaned his thoughts a little from the
Search. And further, he was prepared to spend serene years in his
quest; having nothing of the white manis impatience, but a great
faith.

'Where goest thou?' he called after Kim.

'Nowhither - it was a small march, and all this'- Kim waved his
hands abroad - 'is new to me.'

'She is beyond question a wise and a discerning woman. But it is
hard to meditate when -'

'All women are thus.' Kim spoke as might have Solomon.

'Before the lamassery was a broad platform,' the lama muttered,
looping up the well-worn rosary, 'of stone. On that I have left the
marks of my feet - pacing to and fro with these.'

He clicked the beads, and began the 'Om mane pudme hum's of his
devotion; grateful for the cool, the quiet, and the absence of
dust.

One thing after another drew Kim's idle eye across the plain. There
was no purpose in his wanderings, except that the build of the huts
near by seemed new, and he wished to investigate.

They came out on a broad tract of grazing-ground, brown and purple
in the afternoon light, with a heavy clump of mangoes in the
centre. It struck Kim as curious that no shrine stood in so
eligible a spot: the boy was observing as any priest for these
things. Far across the plain walked side by side four men, made
small by the distance. He looked intently under his curved palms
and caught the sheen of brass.

'Soldiers. White soldiers!' said he. 'Let us see.'

'It is always soldiers when thou and I go out alone together. But I
have never seen the white soldiers.'

'They do no harm except when they are drunk. Keep behind this
tree.'

They stepped behind the thick trunks in the cool dark of the mango-
tope. Two little figures halted; the other two came forward
uncertainly. They were the advance-party of a regiment on the
march, sent out, as usual, to mark the camp. They bore five-foot
sticks with fluttering flags, and called to each other as they
spread over the flat earth.

At last they entered the mango-grove, walking heavily.

'It's here or hereabouts - officers' tents under the trees, I take
it, an' the rest of us can stay outside. Have they marked out for
the baggage-wagons behind?'

They cried again to their comrades in the distance, and the rough
answer came back faint and mellowed.

'Shove the flag in here, then,' said one.

'What do they prepare?' said the lama, wonderstruck. 'This is a
great and terrible world. What is the device on the flag?'

A soldier thrust a stave within a few feet of them, grunted
discontentedly, pulled it up again, conferred with his companion,
who looked up and down the shaded cave of greenery, and returned
it.

Kim stared with all his eyes, his breath coming short and sharp
between his teeth. The soldiers stamped off into the sunshine.

'O Holy One!' he gasped. 'My horoscope! The drawing in the dust by
the priest at Umballa! Remember what he said. First come two -
ferashes - to make all things ready - in a dark place, as it is
always at the beginning of a vision.'

'But this is not vision,' said the lama. 'It is the world's
Illusion, and no more.'

'And after them comes the Bull - the Red Bull on the green field.
Look! It is he!'

He pointed to the flag that was snap snapping in the evening breeze
not ten feet away. It was no more than an ordinary camp marking-
flag; but the regiment, always punctilious in matters of millinery,
had charged it with the regimental device, the Red Bull, which is
the crest of the Mavericks - the great Red Bull on a background of
Irish green.

'I see, and now I remember.' said the lama. 'Certainly it is thy
Bull. Certainly, also, the two men came to make all ready.'

'They are soldiers - white soldiers. What said the priest? "The
sign over against the Bull is the sign of War and armed men." Holy
One, this thing touches my Search.'

'True. It is true.' The lama stared fixedly at the device that
flamed like a ruby in the dusk. 'The priest at Umballa said that
thine was the sign of War.'

'What is to do now?'

'Wait. Let us wait.'

'Even now the darkness clears" said Kim. It was only natural that
the descending sun should at last strike through the tree-trunks,
across the grove, filling it with mealy gold light for a few
minutes; but to Kim it was the crown of the Umballa Brahmin's
prophecy.

'Hark!' said the lama. 'One beats a drum - far off!'

At first the sound, carrying diluted through the still air,
resembled the beating of an artery in the head. Soon a sharpness
was added.

'Ah! The music,' Kim explained. He knew the sound of a regimental
band, but it amazed the lama.

At the far end of the plain a heavy, dusty column crawled in sight.
Then the wind brought the tune:

We crave your condescension
To tell you what we know
Of marching in the Mulligan Guards
To Sligo Port below!

Here broke in the shrill-tongued fifes:

We shouldered arms,
We marched - we marched away.
From Phoenix Park
We marched to Dublin Bay.
The drums and the fifes,
Oh, sweetly they did play,
As we marched - marched - marched - with the
Mulligan Guards!

It was the band of the Mavericks playing the regiment to camp; for
the men were route-marching with their baggage. The rippling column
swung into the level - carts behind it divided left and right, ran
about like an ant-hill, and ...

'But this is sorcery!' said the lama.

The plain dotted itself with tents that seemed to rise, all spread,
from the carts. Another rush of men invaded the grove, pitched a
huge tent in silence, ran up yet eight or nine more by the side of
it, unearthed cooking-pots, pans, and bundles, which were taken
possession of by a crowd of native servants; and behold the mango-
tope turned into an orderly town as they watched!

'Let us go,' said the lama, sinking back afraid, as the fires
twinkled and white officers with jingling swords stalked into the
Mess-tent.

'Stand back in the shadow. No one can see beyond the light of a
fire,' said Kim, his eyes still on the flag. He had never before
watched the routine of a seasoned regiment pitching camp in thirty
minutes.

'Look! look! look!' clucked the lama. 'Yonder comes a priest.' It
was Bennett, the Church of England Chaplain of the regiment,
limping in dusty black. One of his flock had made some rude remarks
about the Chaplain's mettle; and to abash him Bennett had marched
step by step with the men that day. The black dress, gold cross on
the watch-chain, the hairless face, and the soft, black wideawake
hat would have marked him as a holy man anywhere in all India. He
dropped into a camp-chair by the door of the Mess-tent and slid off
his boots. Three or four officers gathered round him, laughing and
joking over his exploit.

'The talk of white men is wholly lacking in dignity,' said the
lama, who judged only by tone. 'But I considered the countenance of
that priest and I think he is learned. Is it likely that he will
understand our talk? I would talk to him of my Search.'

'Never speak to a white man till he is fed,' said Kim, quoting a
well-known proverb. 'They will eat now, and - and I do not think
they are good to beg from. Let us go back to the resting-place.
After we have eaten we will come again. It certainly was a Red Bull
- my Red Bull.'

They were both noticeably absent-minded when the old lady's retinue
set their meal before them; so none broke their reserve, for it is
not lucky to annoy guests.

'Now,' said Kim, picking his teeth, 'we will return to that place;
but thou, O Holy One, must wait a little way off, because thy feet
are heavier than mine and I am anxious to see more of that Red
Bull.'

'But how canst thou understand the talk? Walk slowly. The road is
dark,' the lama replied uneasily.

Kim put the question aside. 'I marked a place near to the trees,'
said he, 'where thou canst sit till I call. Nay,' as the lama made
some sort of protest, 'remember this is my Search - the Search for
my Red Bull. The sign in the Stars was not for thee. I know a
little of the customs of white soldiers, and I always desire to see
some new things.'

'What dost thou not know of this world?' The lama squatted
obediently in a little hollow of the ground not a hundred yards
from the hump of the mango-trees dark against the star-powdered
sky.

'Stay till I call.' Kim flitted into the dusk. He knew that in all
probability there would be sentries round the camp, and smiled to
himself as he heard the thick boots of one. A boy who can dodge
over the roofs of Lahore city on a moonlight night, using every
little patch and corner of darkness to discomfit his pursuer, is
not likely to be checked by a line of well-trained soldiers. He
paid them the compliment of crawling between a couple, and, running
and halting, crouching and dropping flat, worked his way toward the
lighted Mess-tent where, close pressed behind the mango-tree, he
waited till some chance word should give him a returnable lead.

The one thing now in his mind was further information as to the Red
Bull. For aught he knew, and Kim's limitations were as curious and
sudden as his expansions, the men, the nine hundred thorough devils
of his father's prophecy, might pray to the beast after dark, as
Hindus pray to the Holy Cow. That at least would be entirely right
and logical, and the padre with the gold cross would be therefore
the man to consult in the matter. On the other hand, remembering
sober-faced padres whom he had avoided in Lahore city, the priest
might be an inquisitive nuisance who would bid him learn. But had
it not been proven at Umballa that his sign in the high heavens
portended War and armed men? Was he not the Friend of the Stars as
well as of all the World, crammed to the teeth with dreadful
secrets? Lastly - and firstly as the undercurrent of all his quick
thoughts -this adventure, though he did not know the English word,
was a stupendous lark - a delightful continuation of his old
flights across the housetops, as well as the fulfilment of sublime
prophecy. He lay belly-flat and wriggled towards the Mess-tent
door, a hand on the amulet round his neck.

It was as he suspected. The Sahibs prayed to their God; for in the
centre of the Mess-table - its sole ornament when they were on the
line of march - stood a golden bull fashioned from old-time loot of
the Summer Palace at Pekin - a red-gold bull with lowered head,
ramping upon a field of Irish green. To him the Sahibs held out
their glasses and cried aloud confusedly.

Now the Reverend Arthur Bennett always left Mess after that toast,
and being rather tired by his march his movements were more abrupt
than usual. Kim, with slightly raised head, was still staring at
his totem on the table, when the Chaplain stepped on his right
shoulder-blade. Kim flinched under the leather, and, rolling
sideways, brought down the Chaplain, who, ever a man of action,
caught him by the throat and nearly choked the life out of him. Kim
then kicked him desperately in the stomach. Mr Bennett gasped and
doubled up, but without relaxing his grip, rolled over again, and
silently hauled Kim to his own tent. The Mavericks were incurable
practical jokers; and it occurred to the Englishman that silence
was best till he had made complete inquiry.

'Why, it's a boy!' he said, as he drew his prize under the light of
the tent-pole lantern, then shaking him severely cried: 'What were
you doing? You're a thief. Choor? Mallum?' His Hindustani was very
limited, and the ruffled and disgusted Kim intended to keep to the
character laid down for him. As he recovered his breath he was
inventing a beautifully plausible tale of his relations to some
scullion, and at the same time keeping a keen eye on and a little
under the Chaplain's left arm-pit. The chance came; he ducked for
the doorway, but a long arm shot out and clutched at his neck,
snapping the amulet-string and closing on the amulet.

'Give it me. O, give it me. Is it lost? Give me the papers.'

The words were in English - the tinny, saw-cut English of the
native-bred, and the Chaplain jumped.

'A scapular,' said he, opening his hand. 'No, some sort of heathen
charm. Why - why, do you speak English? Little boys who steal are
beaten. You know that?'

'I do not - I did not steal.' Kim danced in agony like a terrier at
a lifted stick. 'Oh, give it me. It is my charm. Do not thieve it
from me.'

The Chaplain took no heed, but, going to the tent door, called
aloud. A fattish, clean-shaven man appeared.

'I want your advice, Father Victor,' said Bennett. 'I found this
boy in the dark outside the Mess-tent. Ordinarily, I should have
chastised him and let him go, because I believe him to be a thief.
But it seems he talks English, and he attaches some sort of value
to a charm round his neck. I thought perhaps you might help me.'

Between himself and the Roman Catholic Chaplain of the Irish
contingent lay, as Bennett believed, an unbridgeable gulf, but it
was noticeable that whenever the Church of England dealt with a
human problem she was very likely to call in the Church of Rome.
Bennett's official abhorrence of the Scarlet Woman and all her ways
was only equalled by his private respect for Father Victor.

'A thief talking English, is it? Let's look at his charm. No, it's
not a scapular, Bennett.' He held out his hand.

'But have we any right to open it? A sound whipping -'

'I did not thieve,' protested Kim. 'You have hit me kicks all over
my body. Now give me my charm and I will go away.'

'Not quite so fast. We'll look first,' said Father Victor,
leisurely rolling out poor Kimball O'Hara's 'ne varietur'
parchment, his clearance-certificate, and Kim's baptismal
certificate. On this last O'Hara - with some confused idea that he
was doing wonders for his son - had scrawled scores of times: 'Look
after the boy. Please look after the boy' - signing his name and
regimental number in full.

'Powers of Darkness below!" said Father Victor, passing all over to
Mr Bennett. 'Do you know what these things are?'

'Yes.' said Kim. 'They are mine, and I want to go away.'

'I do not quite understand,' said Mr Bennett. 'He probably brought
them on purpose. It may be a begging trick of some kind.'

'I never saw a beggar less anxious to stay with his company, then.
There's the makings of a gay mystery here. Ye believe in
Providence, Bennett?'

'I hope so.'

'Well, I believe in miracles, so it comes to the same thing. Powers
of Darkness! Kimball O'Hara! And his son! But then he's a native,
and I saw Kimball married myself to Annie Shott. How long have you
had these things, boy?'

'Ever since I was a little baby.'

Father Victor stepped forward quickly and opened the front of Kim's
upper garment. 'You see, Bennett, he's not very black. What's your
name?'

'Kim.'

'Or Kimball?'

'Perhaps. Will you let me go away?'

'What else?'

'They call me Kim Rishti ke. That is Kim of the Rishti.'

'What is that - "Rishti"?'

'Eye-rishti - that was the Regiment - my father's.'

'Irish - oh, I see.'

'Yess. That was how my father told me. My father, he has lived.'

'Has lived where?'

'Has lived. Of course he is dead - gone-out.'

'Oh! That's your abrupt way of putting it, is it?'

Bennett interrupted. 'It is possible I have done the boy an
injustice. He is certainly white, though evidently neglected. I am
sure I must have bruised him. I do not think spirits -'

'Get him a glass of sherry, then, and let him squat on the cot.
Now, Kim,' continued Father Victor, 'no one is going to hurt you.
Drink that down and tell us about yourself. The truth, if you've no
objection.'

Kim coughed a little as he put down the empty glass, and
considered. This seemed a time for caution and fancy. Small boys
who prowl about camps are generally turned out after a whipping.
But he had received no stripes; the amulet was evidently working in
his favour, and it looked as though the Umballa horoscope and the
few words that he could remember of his father's maunderings fitted
in most miraculously. Else why did the fat padre seem so impressed,
and why the glass of hot yellow drink from the lean one?

'My father, he is dead in Lahore city since I was very little. The
woman, she kept kabarri shop near where the hire-carriages are.'
Kim began with a plunge, not quite sure how far the truth would
serve him.

'Your mother?'

'No!' - with a gesture of disgust. 'She went out when I was born.
My father, he got these papers from the Jadoo-Gher what do you call
that?' (Bennett nodded) 'because he was in good-standing. What do
you call that?' (again Bennett nodded). 'My father told me that. He
said, too, and also the Brahmin who made the drawing in the dust at
Umballa two days ago, he said, that I shall find a Red Bull on a
green field and that the Bull shall help me.'

'A phenomenal little liar,' muttered Bennett.

'Powers of Darkness below, what a country!' murmured Father Victor.
'Go on, Kim.'

'I did not thieve. Besides, I am just now disciple of a very holy
man. He is sitting outside. We saw two men come with flags, making
the place ready. That is always so in a dream, or on account of a -
a -prophecy. So I knew it was come true. I saw the Red Bull on the
green field, and my father he said: "Nine hundred pukka devils and
the Colonel riding on a horse will look after you when you find the
Red Bull!" I did not know what to do when I saw the Bull, but I
went away and I came again when it was dark. I wanted to see the
Bull again, and I saw the Bull again with the - the Sahibs praying
to it. I think the Bull shall help me. The holy man said so too. He
is sitting outside. Will you hurt him, if I call him a shout now?
He is very holy. He can witness to all the things I say, and he
knows I am not a thief.'

'"Sahibs praying to a bull!" What in the world do you make of
that?' said Bennett. "'Disciple of a holy man!" Is the boy mad?'

'It's O'Hara's boy, sure enough. O'Hara's boy leagued with all the
Powers of Darkness. It's very much what his father would have done
if he was drunk. We'd better invite the holy man. He may know
something.'

'He does not know anything,' said Kim. 'I will show you him if you
come. He is my master. Then afterwards we can go.'

'Powers of Darkness!' was all that Father Victor could say, as
Bennett marched off, with a firm hand on Kim's shoulder.

They found the lama where he had dropped.

'The Search is at an end for me,' shouted Kim in the vernacular. 'I
have found the Bull, but God knows what comes next. They will not
hurt you. Come to the fat priest's tent with this thin man and see
the end. It is all new, and they cannot talk Hindi. They are only
uncurried donkeys.'

'Then it is not well to make a jest of their ignorance,' the lama
returned. 'I am glad if thou art rejoiced, chela.'

Dignified and unsuspicious, he strode into the little tent, saluted
the Churches as a Churchman, and sat down by the open charcoal
brazier. The yellow lining of the tent reflected in the lamplight
made his face red-gold.

Bennett looked at him with the triple-ringed uninterest of the
creed that lumps nine-tenths of the world under the title of
'heathen'.

'And what was the end of the Search? What gift has the Red Bull
brought?' The lama addressed himself to Kim.

'He says, "What are you going to do?"' Bennett was staring uneasily
at Father Victor, and Kim, for his own ends, took upon himself the
office of interpreter.

'I do not see what concern this fakir has with the boy, who is
probably his dupe or his confederate,' Bennett began. 'We cannot
allow an English boy - Assuming that he is the son of a Mason, the
sooner he goes to the Masonic Orphanage the better.'

'Ah! That's your opinion as Secretary to the Regimental Lodge,'
said Father Victor; 'but we might as well tell the old man what we
are going to do. He doesn't look like a villain.'

'My experience is that one can never fathom the Oriental mind. Now,
Kimball, I wish you to tell this man what I say word for word.'

Kim gathered the import of the next few sentences and began thus:

'Holy One, the thin fool who looks like a camel says that I am the
son of a Sahib.'

'But how?'

'Oh, it is true. I knew it since my birth, but he could only find
it out by rending the amulet from my neck and reading all the
papers. He thinks that once a Sahib is always a Sahib, and between
the two of them they purpose to keep me in this Regiment or to send
me to a madrissah [a school]. It has happened before. I have always
avoided it. The fat fool is of one mind and the camel-like one of
another. But that is no odds. I may spend one night here and
perhaps the next. It has happened before. Then I will run away and
return to thee.'

'But tell them that thou art my chela. Tell them how thou didst
come to me when I was faint and bewildered. Tell them of our
Search, and they will surely let thee go now.'

'I have already told them. They laugh, and they talk of the
police.'

'What are you saying?' asked Mr Bennett.

'Oah. He only says that if you do not let me go it will stop him in
his business - his ur-gent private af-fairs.' This last was a
reminiscence of some talk with a Eurasian clerk in the Canal
Department, but it only drew a smile, which nettled him. 'And if
you did know what his business was you would not be in such a
beastly hurry to interfere.'

'What is it then?' said Father Victor, not without feeling, as he
watched the lama's face.

'There is a River in this country which he wishes to find so verree
much. It was put out by an Arrow which -'Kim tapped his foot
impatiently as he translated in his own mind from the vernacular to
his clumsy English. 'Oah, it was made by our Lord God Buddha, you
know, and if you wash there you are washed away from all your sins
and made as white as cotton-wool.' (Kim had heard mission-talk in
his time.) 'I am his disciple, and we must find that River. It is
so verree valuable to us.'

'Say that again,' said Bennett. Kim obeyed, with amplifications.

'But this is gross blasphemy!' cried the Church of England.

'Tck! Tck!' said Father Victor sympathetically. 'I'd give a good
deal to be able to talk the vernacular. A river that washes away
sin! And how long have you two been looking for it?'

'Oh, many days. Now we wish to go away and look for it again. It is
not here, you see.'

'I see,' said Father Victor gravely. 'But he can't go on in that
old man's company. It would be different, Kim, if you were not a
soldier's son. Tell him that the Regiment will take care of you and
make you as good a man as your - as good a man as can be. Tell him
that if he believes in miracles he must believe that -'

'There is no need to play on his credulity,' Bennett interrupted.

'I'm doing no such thing. He must believe that the boy's coming
here -to his own Regiment - in search of his Red Bull is in the
nature of a miracle. Consider the chances against it, Bennett. This
one boy in all India, and our Regiment of all others on the line o'
march for him to meet with! It's predestined on the face of it.
Yes, tell him it's Kismet. Kismet, mallum? [Do you understand?]'

He turned towards the lama, to whom he might as well have talked of
Mesopotamia.

'They say,' - the old man's eye lighted at Kim's speech 'they say
that the meaning of my horoscope is now accomplished, and that
being led back - though as thou knowest I went out of curiosity -
to these people and their Red Bull I must needs go to a madrissah
and be turned into a Sahib. Now I make pretence of agreement, for
at the worst it will be but a few meals eaten away from thee. Then
I will slip away and follow down the road to Saharunpore.
Therefore, Holy One, keep with that Kulu woman - on no account
stray far from her cart till I come again. Past question, my sign
is of War and of armed men. See how they have given me wine to
drink and set me upon a bed of honour! My father must have been
some great person. So if they raise me to honour among them, good.
If not, good again. However it goes, I will run back to thee when I
am tired. But stay with the Rajputni, or I shall miss thy feet ...
Oah yess,' said the boy, 'I have told him everything you tell me to
say.'

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