hey
had never been anything but the greatest of friends all their lives.

Chikki was now at the zenith of his power. Eight thousand riflemen, all
armed with weapons of precision and all good shots, obeyed his call,
and he was able to build a strong fort at Chinarak, in the Zaimukht
Mountains, which he garrisoned with his bodyguard of outlaws, while
acres of rich land all round brought him supplies of grain and other
produce, which enabled him to offer to all who came that open-handed,
unstinting hospitality which is the surest path to popularity in
Afghanistan. Yet withal he maintained his simple mode of life and
plain hillman's costume; and once when he came down into Sadda, a
town in British territory, to meet the great Political Officer there,
he formed a marked contrast to the gay clothes and coloured shawls
and gold-banded turbans of the Sahib's satellites. He wore simply
shirt and trousers of plain homespun, and a black turban, ornamented
only by a fringe with a few beads on, and had on his feet a pair of
palm-leaf sandals, such as could be bought in any bazaar for the sum
of one anna. But his rifle was the best there, and the well-filled
cartridge-belt and the six-chambered revolver buckled on excited the
envy of many a man round him, while the firm tread and the thick-set
frame and the determined features displayed the commanding and reckless
character of the man. Yet in society that he cared for he would unbend
and display a boisterous good-humour, though of a kind which would make
a jest of acts of cruelty involving human suffering and even death.

As may be supposed, Chikki had many enemies who were seeking his life,
and he would not allow anyone not known to him to approach him at
night or even in the day, and rarely had his fingers off his revolver
or the trigger of his rifle. Once he was being shaved by his barber
when the foolish man said to him: "Muhammad Anim" (one of Chikki's
sworn enemies) "offered me five hundred rupees the other day if,
while I was shaving you, I should slip the razor and cut your throat;
but Ma'uzbillah! I seek refuge in God; I am your sacrifice, and refused
the son of a pig." Chikki said nothing then, but when the shaving was
over he whipped out his revolver, and said to the luckless barber:
"You refused this time, but next time the temptation may be too great
for you, so I had better be first in." The tongue of that barber wagged
no more, and Chikki got a new and probably more d