hind them--for, hill-fashion, they were
perched on the edge of all things--the ground fell sheer two thousand
feet to Shamlegh-midden, where never yet man has set foot.

The men made no motion to divide the plunder till they had seen the
lama bedded down in the best room of the place, with Kim shampooing his
feet, Mohammedan-fashion.

'We will send food,' said the Ao-chung man, 'and the red-topped kilta.
By dawn there will be none to give evidence, one way or the other. If
anything is not needed in the kilta--see here!'

He pointed through the window--opening into space that was filled with
moonlight reflected from the snow--and threw out an empty whisky-bottle.

'No need to listen for the fall. This is the world's end,' he said,
and went out. The lama looked forth, a hand on either sill, with eyes
that shone like yellow opals. From the enormous pit before him white
peaks lifted themselves yearning to the moonlight. The rest was as the
darkness of interstellar space.

'These,' he said slowly, 'are indeed my Hills. Thus should a man
abide, perched above the world, separated from delights, considering
vast matters.'

'Yes; if he has a chela to prepare tea for him, and to fold a blanket
for his head, and to chase out calving cows.'

A smoky lamp burned in a niche, but the full moonlight beat it down;
and by the mixed light, stooping above the food-bag and cups, Kim moved
like a tall ghost.

'Ai! But now I have let the blood cool, my head still beats and drums,
and there is a cord round the back of my neck.'

'No wonder. It was a strong blow. May he who dealt it--'

'But for my own passions there would have been no evil.'

'What evil? Thou hast saved the Sahibs from the death they deserved a
hundred times.'

'The lesson is not well learnt, chela.' The lama came to rest on a
folded blanket, as Kim went forward with his evening routine. 'The
blow was but a shadow upon a shadow. Evil in itself--my legs weary
apace these latter days!--it met evil in me: anger, rage, and a lust
to return evil. These wrought in my blood, woke tumult in my stomach,
and dazzled my ears.' Here he drank scalding black-tea ceremonially,
taking the hot cup from Kim's hand. 'Had I been passionless, the evil
blow would have done only bodily evil--a scar, or a bruise--which is
illusion. But my mind was not abstracted, for rushed in straightway a
lust to let the Spiti men kill. In fighting that lust, my soul was
torn and w