Page:Kim - Rudyard Kipling (1912).djvu/211

Rh Lurgan Sahib! Is it an order that thy servant does not speak to me?'

'It is an order.' The voice came from behind him and he started.

'Very good. But remember,' he muttered, as he resought the quilt, 'I will beat thee in the morning. I do not like Hindus.'

That was no cheerful night; the room being overful of voices and music. Kim was waked twice by some one calling his name. The second time he set out in search, and ended by bruising his nose against a box that certainly spoke with a human tongue, but in no sort of human accent. It seemed to end in a tin trumpet and to be joined by wires to a smaller box on the floor—so far, at least, as he could judge by touch. And the voice, very hard and whirring, came out of the trumpet, singing. Taza ba taza nao benao. Kim rubbed his nose and grew furious, thinking, as usual, in Hind.

'This with a beggar from the bazar might be good but—I am a Sahib and the son of a Sahib and, which is twice as much more beside, a student of Lucknao. Yess' (here he turned to English), 'a boy of St. Xavier's. Damn Mr. Lurgan's eyes!—It is some sort of machinery like a sewing-machine. Oh, it is great cheek of him—we are not frightened that way in Lucknow—No.' Then in Hindi: 'But what does he gain? He is only a trader—I am in his shop. But Creighton Sahib is a Colonel—and I think Creighton Sahib gave orders that it should be done. How I will beat that Hindu bastard in the morning. What is this?'

The trumpet-box was pouring out a string of the most elaborate abuse that even Kim had ever heard, in a level uninterested voice, that for a moment lifted the short hairs in his neck. When the vile thing drew breath, Kim was reassured by the soft, sewing-machine-like whirr.