Kim
“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 Hindustanee 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 _faquir_ 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