Kim (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) - Rudyard Kipling [121]
‘How didst thou follow us?’
‘Oah. Thatt was nothing. I know from our mutual friend you go to Saharunpore. So I come on. Red Lamas are not inconspicuous persons. I buy myself my drug-box, and I am very good doctor really. I go to Akrola of the Ford, and hear all about you and I talk here and talk there. All the common people know what you do. I knew when the hospitable old lady sent the dooli.309 They have great recollections of the old lama’s visits here. I know old ladies cannot keep their hands from medicines. So I am a doctor, and—you hear my talk? I think it is verree good. My word, Mister O’Hara, they know about you and the lama for fifty miles—the common people. So I come. Do you mind?’
‘Babuji,’ said Kim, looking up at the broad, grinning face, ‘I am a Sahib.’
‘My dear Mister O’Hara—’
‘And I hope to play the Great Game.’
‘You are subordinate to me departmentally at present.’
‘Then why talk like an ape in a tree? Men do not come after one from Simla and change their dress, for the sake of a few sweet words. I am not a child. Talk Hindi and let us get to the yolk of the egg. Thou art here—speaking not one word of truth in ten. Why art thou here? Give a straight answer.’
‘That is so verree disconcerting of the Europeans, Mister O’Hara. You should know a heap better at your time of life.’
‘But I want to know,’ said Kim, laughing. ‘If it is the Game, I may help. How can I do anything if you bukh [babble] all round the shop?’
Hurree Babu reached for the pipe, and sucked it till it guggled again.
‘Now I will speak vernacular. You sit tight, Mister O’Hara.... It concerns the pedigree of a white stallion.’
‘Still? That was finished long ago.’
‘When every one is dead the Great Game is finished. Not before. Listen to me till the end. There were Five Kings who prepared a sudden war three years ago, when thou wast given the stallion’s pedigree by Mahbub Ali. Upon them, because of that news, and ere they were ready, fell our Army.’
‘Ay—eight thousand men with guns. I remember that night.’
‘But the war was not pushed. That is the Government custom. The troops were recalled because the Government believed the Five Kings were cowed; and it is not cheap to feed men among the high Passes. Hilás and Bunár—Rajahs with guns—undertook for a price to guard the Passes against all coming from the North. They protested both fear and friendship.’ He broke off with a giggle into English: ‘Of course, I tell you this unoffeecially to elucidate political situation, Mister O’Hara. Offeecially, I am debarred from criticising any action of superiors. Now I go on.—This pleased the Government, anxious to avoid expense, and a bond was made for so many rupees a month that Hilás and Bunár should guard the Passes as soon as the State’s troops were withdrawn. At that time—it was after we two met—I, who had been selling tea in Leh, became a clerk of accounts in the Army. When the troops were withdrawn, I was left behind to pay the coolies who made new roads in the Hills. This road-making was part of the bond between Bunár, Hilás, and the Government’.
‘So? And then?’
‘I tell you, it was jolly-beastly cold up there too, after summer,’ said Hurree Babu confidentially. ‘I was afraid these Bunár men would cut my throat every night for thee pay-chest. My native sepoy-guard, they laughed at me! By Jove! I was such a fearful man. Nevar mind thatt. I go on colloquially.... I send word many times that these two Kings were sold to the North; and Mahbub Ali, who was yet farther North, amply confirmed it. Nothing was done. Only my feet were frozen, and a toe dropped off. I sent word that the roads for which I was paying money to the diggers were being made for the feet of strangers and enemies.’
‘For?’
‘For the Russians. The thing was an open jest among the coolies. Then I was called down to tell what I knew by speech of tongue. Mahbub came South too. See the end! Over the Passes this year after snow-melting’—he shivered afresh—‘come two strangers under cover of shooting wild goats. They bear guns, but they