on the edge of a cow's manger, telling stories to a
village smith's children.

'She will only ask for another son for her daughter. I have not
forgotten her,' he said. 'Let her acquire merit. Send word that we
will come.'

They covered eleven miles through the fields in two days, and were
overwhelmed with attentions at the end; for the old lady held a fine
tradition of hospitality, to which she forced her son-in-law, who was
under the thumb of his women-folk and bought peace by borrowing of the
money-lender. Age had not weakened her tongue or her memory, and from
a discreetly barred upper window, in the hearing of not less than a
dozen servants, she paid Kim compliments that would have flung European
audiences into unclean dismay.

'But thou art still the shameless beggar-brat of the parao,' she
shrilled. 'I have not forgotten thee. Wash ye and eat. The father of
my daughter's son is gone away awhile. So we poor women are dumb and
useless.'

For proof, she harangued the entire household unsparingly till food and
drink were brought; and in the evening--the smoke-scented evening,
copper-dun and turquoise across the fields--it pleased her to order her
palanquin to be set down in the untidy forecourt by smoky torchlight;
and there, behind not too closely drawn curtains, she gossiped.

'Had the Holy One come alone, I should have received him otherwise; but
with this rogue, who can be too careful?'

'Maharanee,' said Kim, choosing as always the amplest title, 'is it my
fault that none other than a Sahib--a polis-Sahib--called the Maharanee
whose face he--' 'Chutt! That was on the pilgrimage. When we
travel--thou knowest the proverb.'

'Called the Maharanee a Breaker of Hearts and a Dispenser of Delights?'

'To remember that! It was true. So he did. That was in the time of
the bloom of my beauty.' She chuckled like a contented parrot above
the sugar lump. 'Now tell me of thy goings and comings--as much as may
be without shame. How many maids, and whose wives, hang upon thine
eyelashes? Ye hail from Benares? I would have gone there again this
year, but my daughter--we have only two sons. Phaii! Such is the
effect of these low plains. Now in Kulu men are elephants. But I
would ask thy Holy One--stand aside, rogue--a charm against most
lamentable windy colics that in mango-time overtake my daughter's
eldest. Two years back he gave me a powerful spell.'

'Oh, Holy One!' said Kim, bubbling with mir