'What is it to fear? Two old men and a boy? How wilt thou ever make a soldier, Princeling?'
The lama had waked too, but, taking no notice of the child, began to click his rosary.
'What is that?' said the child, stopping a yell midway. 'I have never seen such beads. Give them me.'
'Aha,' said the lama, smiling, and trailing a loop of it on the grass:
'This is a handful of cardamoms,
This is a lump of ghi:
This is millet and chillies and rice,
A supper for thee and me!'
The child shrieked with joy, and snatched at the dark, glancing beads.
'Oho!' said the old soldier. 'Whence had thou that song, despiser of this world?'
'I learned it in Pathân Kot—sitting on a doorstep,' said the lama shyly. 'It is good to be kind to babes.'
'As I remember, before the sleep came on us, thou hadst told me that marriage and bearing were darkeners of the true light, stumbling-blocks upon the way. Do children drop from heaven in thy country? Is it the Way to sing them songs?'
'No man is all perfect,' said the lama gravely, recoiling the rosary. 'Run now to thy mother, little one.'
'Hear him!' said the soldier to Kim. 'He is ashamed for that he has made a child happy. There was a very good householder lost in thee, my brother. Hai, child!' He threw it a pice. 'Sweetmeats are always nice.' And as the little figure capered away into the sunshine: 'They grow up and become men. Holy One, I grieve that I slept in the midst of thy preaching. Forgive me.'
