Previous - Next

makes a Sikh.' But he did not say this very loud.

The lama sighed and shrank into himself, a dingy, shapeless mass.
In the pauses of their talk they could hear the low droning 'Om
mane pudme hum! Om mane pudme hum!' - and the thick click of the
wooden rosary beads.

'It irks me,' he said at last. 'The speed and the clatter irk me.
Moreover, my chela, I think that maybe we have over-passed that
River.'

'Peace, peace,' said Kim. 'Was not the River near Benares? We are
yet far from the place.'

'But - if our Lord came North, it may be any one of these little
ones that we have run across.'

'I do not know.'

'But thou wast sent to me - wast thou sent to me? - for the merit
I had acquired over yonder at Such-zen. From beside the cannon
didst thou come - bearing two faces - and two garbs.'

'Peace. One must not speak of these things here,' whispered Kim.
'There was but one of me. Think again and thou wilt remember. A
boy - a Hindu boy - by the great green cannon.'

'But was there not also an Englishman with a white beard holy
among images - who himself made more sure my assurance of the
River of the Arrow?'

'He - we - went to the Ajaib-Gher in Lahore to pray before the
Gods there,' Kim explained to the openly listening company. 'And
the Sahib of the Wonder House talked to him - yes, this is truth
as a brother. He is a very holy man, from far beyond the Hills.
Rest, thou. In time we come to Umballa.'

'But my River - the River of my healing?'

'And then, if it please thee, we will go hunting for that River
on foot. So that we miss nothing - not even a little rivulet in a
field-side.'

'But thou hast a Search of thine own?' The lama - very pleased
that he remembered so well - sat bolt upright.

'Ay,' said Kim, humouring him. The boy was entirely happy to be
out chewing pan and seeing new people in the great good-tempered
world.

'It was a bull - a Red Bull that shall come and help thee and
carry thee - whither? I have forgotten. A Red Bull on a green
field, was it not?'

'Nay, it will carry me nowhere,' said Kim. 'It is but a tale I
told thee.'

'What is this?' The cultivator's wife leaned forward, her
bracelets clinking on her arm. 'Do ye both dream dreams? A Red
Bull on a green field, that shall carry thee to the heavens or
what? Was it a vision? Did one make a prophecy? We have a Red
Bull in our village behind Jullundur city, and he grazes by
choice in the very greenest of our fields!'

'Give a woman an old wife's tale and a weaver-bird a leaf and a
thread', they will weave wonderful things,' said the Sikh. 'All
holy men dream dreams, and by following holy men their disciples
attain that power.'

'A Red Bull on a green field, was it?' the lama repeated. 'In a
former life it may be thou hast acquired merit, and the Bull will
come to reward thee.'

'Nay - nay - it was but a tale one told to me - for a jest
belike. But I will seek the Bull about Umballa, and thou canst

Previous - Next