g in the vernacular, 'for except my boy here--it was foolish of
him to buy so much white arsenic when, if he had asked, I could have
given it--except my boy here I have not in a long time met with one
better worth teaching. And there are ten days more ere thou canst
return to Lucknao where they teach nothing--at the long price. We
shall, I think, be friends.'

They were a most mad ten days, but Kim enjoyed himself too much to
reflect on their craziness. In the morning they played the Jewel
Game--sometimes with veritable stones, sometimes with piles of swords
and daggers, sometimes with photo-graphs of natives. Through the
afternoons he and the Hindu boy would mount guard in the shop, sitting
dumb behind a carpet-bale or a screen and watching Mr Lurgan's many and
very curious visitors. There were small Rajahs, escorts coughing in
the veranda, who came to buy curiosities--such as phonographs and
mechanical toys. There were ladies in search of necklaces, and men, it
seemed to Kim--but his mind may have been vitiated by early
training--in search of the ladies; natives from independent and
feudatory Courts whose ostensible business was the repair of broken
necklaces--rivers of light poured out upon the table--but whose true
end seemed to be to raise money for angry Maharanees or young Rajahs.
There were Babus to whom Lurgan Sahib talked with austerity and
authority, but at the end of each interview he gave them money in
coined silver and currency notes. There were occasional gatherings of
long-coated theatrical natives who discussed metaphysics in English and
Bengali, to Mr Lurgan's great edification. He was always interested in
religions. At the end of the day, Kim and the Hindu boy--whose name
varied at Lurgan's pleasure--were expected to give a detailed account
of all that they had seen and heard--their view of each man's
character, as shown in his face, talk, and manner, and their notions of
his real errand. After dinner, Lurgan Sahib's fancy turned more to
what might be called dressing-up, in which game he took a most
informing interest. He could paint faces to a marvel; with a brush-dab
here and a line there changing them past recognition. The shop was
full of all manner of dresses and turbans, and Kim was apparelled
variously as a young Mohammedan of good family, an oilman, and
once--which was a joyous evening--as the son of an Oudh landholder in
the fullest of full dress. Lurgan Sahib had a hawk's eye to