’Slower a little.  What has a bay mare to do ...  Is it Mahbub Ali, the great dealer?’

’Who else?  I have been in his service.  Take more ink.  Again.  As the order was, so I did it.  We then went on foot towards Benares, but on the third day we found a certain regiment.  Is that down?’

‘Ay, pulton,’ murmured the writer, all ears.

’I went into their camp and was caught, and by means of the charm about my neck, which thou knowest, it was established that I was the son of some man in the regiment:  according to the prophecy of the Red Bull, which thou knowest was common talk of our bazar.’  Kim waited for this shaft to sink into the letter-writer’s heart, cleared his throat, and continued:  ’A priest clothed me and gave me a new name ...  One priest, however, was a fool.  The clothes are very heavy, but I am a Sahib and my heart is heavy too.  They send me to a school and beat me.  I do not like the air and water here.  Come then and help me, Mahbub Ali, or send me some money, for I have not sufficient to pay the writer who writes this.’

’ “Who writes this.”  It is my own fault that I was tricked.  Thou art as clever as Husain Bux that forged the Treasury stamps at Nucklao.  But what a tale!  What a tale!  Is it true by any chance?’

’It does not profit to tell lies to Mahbub Ali.  It is better to help his friends by lending them a stamp.  When the money comes I will repay.’

The writer grunted doubtfully, but took a stamp out of his desk, sealed the letter, handed it over to Kim, and departed.  Mahbub Ali’s was a name of power in Umballa.

‘That is the way to win a good account with the Gods,’ Kim shouted after him.

‘Pay me twice over when the money comes,’ the man cried over his shoulder.

‘What was you bukkin’ to that nigger about?’ said the drummer-boy when Kim returned to the veranda.  ‘I was watch-in’ you.’

‘I was only talkin’ to him.’

‘You talk the same as a nigger, don’t you?’

‘No-ah!  No-ah!  I onlee speak a little.  What shall we do now?’

’The bugles’ll go for dinner in arf a minute.  My Gawd!  I wish I’d gone up to the Front with the Regiment.  It’s awful doin’ nothin’ but school down ’ere.  Don’t you ‘ate it?’

‘Oah yess!’

I’d run away if I knew where to go to, but, as the men say, in this bloomin’ Injia you’re only a prisoner at large.  You can’t desert without bein’ took back at once.  I’m fair sick of it.’

‘You have been in Be — England?’

‘W’y, I only come out last troopin’ season with my mother.  I should think I ’ave been in England.  What a ignorant little beggar you are!  You was brought up in the gutter, wasn’t you?’

’Oah yess.  Tell me something about England.  My father he came from there.’