kirs do not steal horses, so I gave them no more
thought. I would find Lutuf Ullah, my partner.'

'The deuce you did? And you didn't bother your head about it? 'Pon my
word, it's just almost as well that I met you. What were they like,
eh?'

'They were only fakirs. They will no more than take a little grain,
perhaps, from one of the trucks. There are many up the line. The
State will never miss the dole. I came here seeking for my partner,
Lutuf Ullah.'

'Never mind your partner. Where are your horse-trucks?'

'A little to this side of the farthest place where they make lamps for
the trains.'--

'The signal-box! Yes.'

'And upon the rail nearest to the road upon the right-hand
side--looking up the line thus. But as regards Lutuf Ullah--a tall man
with a broken nose, and a Persian greyhound Aie!'

The boy had hurried off to wake up a young and enthusiastic policeman;
for, as he said, the Railway had suffered much from depredations in the
goods-yard. Mahbub Ali chuckled in his dyed beard.

'They will walk in their boots, making a noise, and then they will
wonder why there are no fakirs. They are very clever boys--Barton
Sahib and Young Sahib.'

He waited idly for a few minutes, expecting to see them hurry up the
line girt for action. A light engine slid through the station, and he
caught a glimpse of young Barton in the cab.

'I did that child an injustice. He is not altogether a fool,' said
Mahbub Ali. 'To take a fire-carriage for a thief is a new game!'

When Mahbub Ali came to his camp in the dawn, no one thought it worth
while to tell him any news of the night. No one, at least, but one
small horseboy, newly advanced to the great man's service, whom Mahbub
called to his tiny tent to assist in some packing.

'It is all known to me,' whispered Kim, bending above saddlebags. 'Two
Sahibs came up on a te-train. I was running to and fro in the dark on
this side of the trucks as the te-train moved up and down slowly. They
fell upon two men sitting under this truck--Hajji, what shall I do with
this lump of tobacco? Wrap it in paper and put it under the salt-bag?
Yes--and struck them down. But one man struck at a Sahib with a
fakir's buck's horn' (Kim meant the conjoined black-buck horns, which
are a fakir's sole temporal weapon)--'the blood came. So the other
Sahib, first smiting his own man senseless, smote the stabber with a
short gun which had rolled from the first man's hand. They all