Kim
“That may not be, _chela_. From my bones outward I do desire it, but it
is forbidden. I have seen the Cause of Things.”
“Why? When the Hills give thee back thy strength day by day? Remember
we were weak and fainting down below there in the Doon.”
“I became strong to do evil and to forget. A brawler and a swashbuckler
upon the hillsides was I.” Kim bit back a smile. “Just and perfect is
the Wheel, swerving not a hair. When I was a man—a long time ago—I did
pilgrimage to Guru Ch’wan among the poplars” (he pointed Bhotanwards),
“where they keep the Sacred Horse.”
“Quiet, be quiet!” said Shamlegh, all arow. “He speaks of
Jam-lin-nin-k’or, the Horse That Can Go Round The World In a Day.”
“I speak to my _chela_ only,” said the lama, in gentle reproof, and
they scattered like frost on south eaves of a morning. “I did not seek
truth in those days, but the talk of doctrine. All illusion! I drank
the beer and ate the bread of Guru Ch’wan. Next day one said: ‘We go
out to fight Sangor Gutok down the valley to discover’ (mark again how
Lust is tied to Anger!) ‘which Abbot shall bear rule in the valley and
take the profit of the prayers they print at Sangor Gutok.’ I went, and
we fought a day.”
“But how, Holy One?”
“With our long pencases as I could have shown ... I say, we fought
under the poplars, both Abbots and all the monks, and one laid open my
forehead to the bone. See!” He tilted back his cap and showed a
puckered silvery scar. “Just and perfect is the Wheel! Yesterday the
scar itched, and after fifty years I recalled how it was dealt and the
face of him who dealt it; dwelling a little in illusion. Followed that
which thou didst see—strife and stupidity. Just is the Wheel! The
idolater’s blow fell upon the scar. Then I was shaken in my soul: my
soul was darkened, and the boat of my soul rocked upon the waters of
illusion. Not till I came to Shamlegh could I meditate upon the Cause
of Things, or trace the running grass-roots of Evil. I strove all the
long night.”
“But, Holy One, thou art innocent of all evil. May I be thy sacrifice!”
Kim was genuinely distressed at the old man’s sorrow, and Mahbub Ali’s
phrase slipped out unawares.
“In the dawn,” the lama went on more gravely, ready rosary clicking
between the slow sentences, “came enlightenment. It is here ... I am an
old man ... hill-bred, hill-fed, never to sit down among my Hills.
Three years I travelled through Hind, but—can earth be stronger than
Mother Earth? My stupid body yearned to the Hills and the snows of the
Hills, from below there. I said, and it is true, my Search is sure. So,
at the Kulu woman’s house I turned hillward, over-persuaded by myself.
There is no blame to the _hakim_. He—following Desire—foretold that the
Hills would make me strong. They strengthened me to do evil, to forget
my Search. I delighted in life and the lust of life. I desired strong
slopes to climb. I cast about to find them. I measured the strength of
my body, which is evil, against the high Hills, I made a mock of thee
when thy breath came short under Jamnotri. I jested when thou wouldst
not face the snow of the pass.”
“But what harm? I _was_ afraid. It was just. I am not a hillman; and I
loved thee for thy new strength.”
“More than once I remember”—he rested his cheek dolefully on his
hand—“I sought thy praise and the _hakim’s_ for the mere strength of my
legs. Thus evil followed evil till the cup was full. Just is the Wheel!
All Hind for three years did me all honour. From the Fountain of Wisdom
in the Wonder House to”—he smiled—“a little child playing by a big
gun—the world prepared my road. And why?”
“Because we loved thee. It is only the fever of the blow. I myself am
still sick and shaken.”
“No! It was because I was upon the Way—tuned as are _si-nen_ (cymbals)
to the purpose of the Law. I departed from that ordinance. The tune was
broken: followed the punishment. In my own Hills, on the edge of my own
country, in the very place of my evil desire, comes the buffet—here!”
(He touched his brow.) “As a novice is beaten when he misplaces the
cups, so am I beaten, who was Abbot of Such-zen. No word, look you, but
a blow, _chela_.”
“But the Sahibs did not know thee, Holy One?”
“We were well matched. Ignorance and Lust met Ignorance and Lust upon
the road, and they begat Anger. The blow was a sign to me, who am no
better than a strayed yak, that my place is not here. Who can read the
Cause of an act is halfway to Freedom! ‘Back to the path,’ says the
Blow. ‘The Hills are not for thee. Thou canst not choose Freedom and go
in bondage to the delight of life.’”
“Would we had never met that cursed Russian!”
“Our Lord Himself cannot make the Wheel swing backward. And for my
merit that I had acquired I gain yet another sign.” He put his hand in
his bosom, and drew forth the Wheel of Life. “Look! I considered this
after I had meditated. There remains untorn by the idolater no more
than the breadth of my fingernail.”
“I see.”
“So much, then, is the span of my life in this body. I have served the
Wheel all my days. Now the Wheel serves me. But for the merit I have
acquired in guiding thee upon the Way, there would have been added to
me yet another life ere I had found my River. Is it plain, _chela?_”
Kim stared at the brutally disfigured chart. From left to right
diagonally the rent ran—from the Eleventh House where Desire gives
birth to the Child (as it is drawn by Tibetans)—across the human and
animal worlds, to the Fifth House—the empty House of the Senses. The
logic was unanswerable.
“Before our Lord won Enlightenment”—the lama folded all away with
reverence—“He was tempted. I too have been tempted, but it is finished.
The Arrow fell in the Plains—not in the Hills. Therefore, what make we
here?”
“Shall we at least wait for the _hakim?_”
“I know how long I shall live in this body. What can a _hakim_ do?”
“But thou art all sick and shaken. Thou canst not walk.”
“How can I be sick if I see Freedom?” He rose unsteadily to his feet.
“Then I must get food from the village. Oh, the weary Road!” Kim felt
that he too needed rest.
“That is lawful. Let us eat and go. The Arrow fell in the Plains ...
but I yielded to Desire. Make ready, _chela_.”
Kim turned to the woman with the turquoise headgear who had been idly
pitching pebbles over the cliff. She smiled very kindly.
“I found him like a strayed buffalo in a cornfield—the Babu; snorting
and sneezing with cold. He was so hungry that he forgot his dignity and
gave me sweet words. The Sahibs have nothing.” She flung out an empty
palm. “One is very sick about the stomach. Thy work?”
Kim nodded, with a bright eye.
“I spoke to the Bengali first—and to the people of a near-by village
after. The Sahibs will be given food as they need it—nor will the
people ask money. The plunder is already distributed. The Babu makes
lying speeches to the Sahibs. Why does he not leave them?”
“Out of the greatness of his heart.”
“Was never a Bengali yet had one bigger than a dried walnut. But it is
no matter ... Now as to walnuts. After service comes reward. I have
said the village is thine.”
“It is my loss,” Kim began. “Even now I had planned desirable things in
my heart which”—there is no need to go through the compliments proper
to these occasions. He sighed deeply ... “But my master, led by a
vision—”
“Huh! What can old eyes see except a full begging-bowl?”
“—turns from this village to the Plains again.”
“Bid him stay.”
Kim shook his head. “I know my Holy One, and his rage if he be
crossed,” he replied impressively. “His curses shake the Hills.”
“Pity they did not save him from a broken head! I heard that thou wast
the tiger-hearted one who smote the Sahib. Let him dream a little
longer. Stay!”
“Hillwoman,” said Kim, with austerity that could not harden the
outlines of his young oval face, “these matters are too high for thee.”
“The Gods be good to us! Since when have men and women been other than
men and women?”
“A priest is a priest. He says he will go upon this hour. I am his
_chela_, and I go with him. We need food for the Road. He is an
honoured guest in all the villages, but”—he broke into a pure boy’s
grin—“the food here is good. Give me some.”
“What if I do not give it thee? I am the woman of this village.”
“Then I curse thee—a little—not greatly, but enough to remember.” He
could not help smiling.
“Thou hast cursed me already by the down-dropped eyelash and the
uplifted chin. Curses? What should I care for mere words?” She clenched
her hands upon her bosom ... “But I would not have thee to go in anger,
thinking hardly of me—a gatherer of cow-dung and grass at Shamlegh, but
still a woman of substance.”
“I think nothing,” said Kim, “but that I am grieved to go, for I am
very weary; and that we need food. Here is the bag.”
The woman snatched it angrily. “I was foolish,” said she. “Who is thy
woman in the Plains? Fair or black? I was fair once. Laughest thou?
Once, long ago, if thou canst believe, a Sahib looked on me with
favour. Once, long ago, I wore European clothes at the Mission-house
yonder.” She pointed towards Kotgarh. “Once, long ago. I was
_Ker-lis-ti-an_ and spoke English—as the Sahibs speak it. Yes. My Sahib
said he would return and wed me—yes, wed me. He went away—I had nursed
him when he was sick—but he never returned. Then I saw that the Gods of
the Kerlistians lied, and I went back to my own people ... I have never
set eyes on a Sahib since. (Do not laugh at me. The fit is past, little
priestling.) Thy face and thy walk and thy fashion of speech put me in
mind of my Sahib, though thou art only a wandering mendicant to whom I
give a dole. Curse me? Thou canst neither curse nor bless!” She set her
hands on her hips and laughed bitterly. “Thy Gods are lies; thy works
are lies; thy words are lies. There are no Gods under all the Heavens.
I know it ... But for awhile I thought it was my Sahib come back, and
he was my God. Yes, once I made music on a _pianno_ in the
Mission-house at Kotgarh. Now I give alms to priests who are
_heatthen_.” She wound up with the English word, and tied the mouth of
the brimming bag.
“I wait for thee, _chela_,” said the lama, leaning against the
door-post.
The woman swept the tall figure with her eyes. “He walk! He cannot
cover half a mile. Whither would old bones go?”
At this Kim, already perplexed by the lama’s collapse and foreseeing
the weight of the bag, fairly lost his temper.
“What is it to thee, woman of ill-omen, where he goes?”
“Nothing—but something to thee, priest with a Sahib’s face. Wilt thou
carry him on thy shoulders?”
“I go to the Plains. None must hinder my return. I have wrestled with
my soul till I am strengthless. The stupid body is spent, and we are
far from the Plains.”
“Behold!” she said simply, and drew aside to let Kim see his own utter
helplessness. “Curse me. Maybe it will give him strength. Make a charm!
Call on thy great God. Thou art a priest.” She turned away.
The lama had squatted limply, still holding by the door-post. One
cannot strike down an old man that he recovers again like a boy in the
night. Weakness bowed him to the earth, but his eyes that hung on Kim
were alive and imploring.
“It is all well,” said Kim. “It is the thin air that weakens thee. In a
little while we go! It is the mountain-sickness. I too am a little sick
at stomach,”—and he knelt and comforted with such poor words as came
first to his lips. Then the woman returned, more erect than ever.
“Thy Gods useless, heh? Try mine. I am the Woman of Shamlegh.” She
hailed hoarsely, and there came out of a cow-pen her two husbands and
three others with a _dooli_, the rude native litter of the Hills, that
they use for carrying the sick and for visits of state. “These