“True. It is true, Mahbub Ali. And if he comes to no harm, I do not desire anything better. But it is great insolence on his part.”
“He does not tell me, even, whither he goes,” said Mahbub. “He is no fool. When his time is accomplished he will come to me. It is time the healer of pearls took him in hand. He ripens too quickly—as Sahibs reckon.”
This prophecy was fulfilled to the letter a month later. Mahbub had gone down to Umballa to bring up a fresh consignment of horses, and Kim met him on the Kalka road at dusk riding alone, begged an alms of him, was sworn at, and replied in English. There was nobody within earshot to hear Mahbub’s gasp of amazement.
“Oho! And where hast thou been?”
“Up and down—down and up.”
“Come under a tree, out of the wet, and tell.”
“I stayed for a while with an old man near Umballa; anon with a household of my acquaintance in Umballa. With one of these I went as far as Delhi to the southward. That is a wondrous city. Then I drove a bullock for a teli coming north; but I heard of a great feast forward in Patiala, and thither went I in the company of a firework-maker. It was a great feast” (Kim rubbed his stomach). “I saw Rajahs, and elephants with gold and silver trappings; and they lit all the fireworks at once, whereby eleven men were killed, my firework-maker among them, and I was blown across a tent but took no harm. Then I came back to the rêl with a Sikh horseman, to whom I was groom for my bread; and so here.”
“ Shabash! ” said Mahbub Ali.