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with thee? At least I may, acquiring merit, wipe out past ill.'

'Make me a Sahib - so they think. The day after tomorrow I return.
Do not grieve.'

'Of what sort? Such an one as this or that man?' He pointed to
Father Victor. 'Such an one as those I saw this evening, men wearing
swords and stamping heavily?'

'Maybe.'

'That is not well. These men follow desire and come to emptiness.
Thou must not be of their sort.'

'The Umballa priest said that my Star was War,' Kim interjected. 'I
will ask these fools - but there is truly no need. I will run away
this night, for all I wanted to see the new things.'

Kim put two or three questions in English to Father Victor,
translating the replies to the lama.

Then: 'He says, "You take him from me and you cannot say what you
will make him." He says, "Tell me before I go, for it is not a
small thing to make a child."'

'You will be sent to a school. Later on, we shall see. Kimball, I
suppose you'd like to be a soldier?'

'Gorah-log [white-folk]. No-ah! No-ah!' Kim shook his head
violently. There was nothing in his composition to which drill and
routine appealed. 'I will not be a soldier.'

'You will be what you're told to be,' said Bennett; 'and you should
be grateful that we're going to help you.'

Kim smiled compassionately. If these men lay under the delusion
that he would do anything that he did not fancy, so much the
better.

Another long silence followed. Bennett fidgeted with impatience,
and suggested calling a sentry to evict the fakir.

'Do they give or sell learning among the Sahibs? Ask them,' said
the lama, and Kim interpreted.

'They say that money is paid to the teacher - but that money the
Regiment will give ... What need? It is only for a night.'

'And - the more money is paid the better learning is given?' The
lama disregarded Kim's plans for an early flight. 'It is no wrong
to pay for learning. To help the ignorant to wisdom is always a
merit.' The rosary clicked furiously as an abacus. Then he faced
his oppressors.

'Ask them for how much money do they give a wise and suitable
teaching? And in what city is that teaching given?'

'Well,' said Father Victor in English, when Kim had translated,
'that depends. The Regiment would pay for you all the time you are
at the Military Orphanage; or you might go on the Punjab Masonic
Orphanage's list (not that he or you 'ud understand what that
means); but the best schooling a boy can get in India is, of
course, at St Xavier's in Partibus at Lucknow.' This took some time
to interpret, for Bennett wished to cut it short.

'He wants to know how much?' said Kim placidly.

'Two or three hundred rupees a year.' Father Victor was long past
any sense of amazement. Bennett, impatient, did not understand.

'He says: "Write that name and the money upon a paper and give it
him." And he says you must write your name below, because he is
going to write a letter in some days to you.

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