Page:In Black and White - Kipling (1890).djvu/38

 here a penny and there a penny. God is my witness that I am a poor man! The money is all with Ram Dass—may his sons turn Christian, and his daughter be a burning fire and a shame in the house from generation to generation! May she die unwed, the mother of a multitude of bastards! Let the light go out in the house of Ram Dass, my brother. This I pray daily twice—with offerings and charms.

Thus the trouble began. We divided the town of Isser Jang between us—I and my brother. There was a jaghirdar, a landholder, beyond the gates, living but one short mile out, on the road that leads to Montgomery, and his name was Muhammed Shah, son of a Nawab. He was a great devil and drank wine. So long as there were women in his house, and wine and money for the marriage feasts, he was merry and wiped his mouth. Ram Dass lent him the money, a lakh or half a lakh—how do I know?—and so long as the money was lent, the jaghirdar cared not what he signed.

The people of Isser Jang were my portion, and the jaghirdar and the out-town was the portion of Ram Dass; for so we had arranged. I was the poor man, for the people of Isser Jang were without wealth. I did what I could, but Ram Dass had only to wait without the door of the jaghirdar's garden-court and to lend him the money; taking the bonds from the hand of the Steward.

In the autumn of the year after the lending, Ram Dass said to the jaghirdar:—"Pay me my money," but the jaghirdar gave him abuse. But Ram Dass went into the Courts with the papers and the bonds—all correct—and took out decrees against the jaghirdar; and the name of the Government was across the stamps of the decrees. Ram Dass took field by field, and mango-tree by mango-tree, and well by well; putting in his own men—debtors of the out town of Isser Jang—to cultivate the crops. So he crept up across the land, for he had the papers, and the name of the Government was across the stamps, till his men held the crops for him on all sides of the big white house of the jaghirdar. It