‘A great foolishness!’

’Oh! black shame too.  So he thought after he had seen thee — and a few others, male and female.  So he abandoned it; and now he goes to beat a big fat Babu man.’

‘I do not understand.’

’Allah forbid it!  Some men are strong in knowledge, Red Hat.  Thy strength is stronger still.  Keep it — I think thou wilt.  If the boy be not a good servant, pull his ears off.’

With a hitch of his broad Bokhariot belt the Pathan swaggered off into the gloaming, and the lama came down from his clouds so far as to look at the broad back.

’That person lacks courtesy, and is deceived by the shadow of appearances.  But he spoke well of my chela, who now enters upon his reward.  Let me make the prayer! ...  Wake, O fortunate above all born of women.  Wake!  It is found!’

Kim came up from those deep wells, and the lama attended his yawning pleasure; duly snapping fingers to head off evil spirits.

’I have slept a hundred years.  Where -?  Holy One, hast thou been here long?  I went out to look for thee, but’ — he laughed drowsily — ’I slept by the way.  I am all well now.  Hast thou eaten?  Let us go to the house.  It is many days since I tended thee.  And the Sahiba fed thee well?  Who shampooed thy legs?  What of the weaknesses — the belly and the neck, and the beating in the ears?’

‘Gone — all gone.  Dost thou not know?’

’I know nothing, but that I have not seen thee in a monkey’s age.  Know what?’

’Strange the knowledge did not reach out to thee, when all my thoughts were theeward.’

’I cannot see the face, but the voice is like a gong.  Has the Sahiba made a young man of thee by her cookery?’

He peered at the cross-legged figure, outlined jet-black against the lemon-coloured drift of light.  So does the stone Bodhisat sit who looks down upon the patent self-registering turnstiles of the Lahore Museum.

The lama held his peace.  Except for the click of the rosary and a faint clop-clop of Mahbub’s retreating feet, the soft, smoky silence of evening in India wrapped them close.

‘Hear me!  I bring news.’

‘But let us -’

Out shot the long yellow hand compelling silence.  Kim tucked his feet under his robe-edge obediently.

’Hear me!  I bring news!  The Search is finished.  Comes now the Reward ...  Thus.  When we were among the Hills, I lived on thy strength till the young branch bowed and nigh broke.  When we came out of the Hills, I was troubled for thee and for other matters which I held in my heart.  The boat of my soul lacked direction; I could not see into the Cause of Things.  So I gave thee over to the virtuous woman altogether.  I took no food.  I drank no water.  Still I saw not the Way.  They pressed food upon me and cried at my shut door.  So I removed myself to a hollow under a tree.  I took no food.  I took no water.  I sat in meditation two days and two nights, abstracting my mind; inbreathing and outbreathing in the required manner ...  Upon the second night — so great was my reward — the wise Soul loosed itself from the silly Body and went free.  This I have never before attained, though I have stood on the threshold of it.  Consider, for it is a marvel!’