‘I speak to my chela only,’ said the lama, in gentle reproof, and they scattered like frost on south eaves of a morning. ‘I did not seek truth in those days, but the talk of doctrine. All illusion! I drank the beer and ate the bread of Guru Ch’wan. Next day one said: “We go out to fight Sangor Gutok down the valley to discover (mark again how Lust is tied to Anger!) which abbot shall bear rule in the valley, and take the profit of the prayers they print at Sangor Gutok.” I went, and we fought a day.’
‘But how, Holy One?’
‘With our long pencases as I could have shown…. I say, we fought under the poplars, both abbots and all the monks, and one laid open my forehead to the bone. See!’ He tilted back his cap and showed a puckered silvery scar. ‘Just and perfect is the Wheel! Yesterday the scar itched, and after fifty years I recalled how it was dealt and the face of him who dealt it; dwelling a little in illusion. Followed that which thou didst see—strife and stupidity. Just is the Wheel! The idolater’s blow fell upon the scar. Then I was shaken in my soul: my soul was darkened, and the boat of my soul rocked upon the waters of illusion. Not till I came to Sham-legh could I meditate upon the Cause of Things, or trace the running grass-roots of Evil. I strove all the long night.’
‘But, Holy One, thou art innocent of all evil. May I be thy sacrifice!’
Kim was genuinely distressed at the old man’s sorrow, and Mahbub Ali’s phrase slipped out unawares.
‘In the dawn,’ he went on more gravely, ready rosary clicking between the slow sentences, ‘came enlightenment. It is here…. I am an old man … hill-bred, hill-fed, never to sit down among my hills. Three years I travelled through Hind, but—can earth be stronger than Mother Earth? My stupid body yearned to the Hills and the snow of the Hills, from below there. I said, and it is true, my Search is sure. So, at the Kulu woman’s house I turned hillward, over-persuaded by myself. There is no blame to the hakim. He—following Desire—foretold that the Hills would make me strong. They strengthened me to do evil, to forget my Search. I delighted in life and the lust of life. I desired strong slopes to climb. I cast about to find them. I measured the strength of my body, which is evil, against the high hills. I made a mock of thee when thy breath came short under Jamnotri. I jested when thou wouldst not face the snow of the pass.’
‘But what harm? I was afraid. It was just. I am not a hillman; and I loved thee for thy new strength.’
‘More than once I remember,’ he rested his cheek dolefully on his hand, ‘I sought thy praise and the hakim’s for the mere strength of my legs. Thus evil followed evil till the cup was full. Just is the Wheel! All Hind for three years did me all honour. From the Fountain of Wisdom in the Wonder House to’—he smiled—‘a little child playing by a big gun—the world prepared my road. And why?’
‘Because we loved thee. It is only the fever of the blow. I myself am still sick and shaken.’
‘No! It was because I was upon the Way—tuned as are si-nen (cymbals) to the purpose of the Law. I departed from that ordinance. The tune was broken: followed the punishment. In my own hills, on the edge of my own country, in the very place of my evil desire, comes the buffet—here!’ (He touched his brow.) ‘As a novice is beaten when he misplaces the cups, so am I beaten, who was Abbot of Such-zen. No word, look you, but a blow, chela.’
‘But the Sahibs did not know thee, Holy One?’
‘We were well matched. Ignorance and Lust met Ignorance and Lust upon the road, and they begat Anger. The blow was a sign to me, who am no better than a strayed yak, that my place is not here. Who can read the Cause of an act is half-way to Freedom! “Back to the path,” says the Blow. “The Hills are not for thee. Thou canst not choose Freedom and go in bondage to the delight of life.”’
‘If we had never met that thrice-cursed Russian!’
‘Our Lord Himself cannot make the Wheel swing backward. And for my merit that I had acquired I gain yet another sign.’ He put his hand in his bosom, and drew forth the Wheel of Life. ‘Look! I considered this after I had meditated. There remains untorn by the idolater no more than the breadth of my finger-nail.’
‘I see.’
‘So much, then, is the span of my life in this body. I have served the Wheel all my days. Now the Wheel serves me. But for the merit I have acquired in guiding thee upon the Way, there would have been added to me yet another life ere I had found my River. Is it plain, chela?’
Kim stared at the brutally disfigured chart. From left to right diagonally the rent ran—from the Eleventh House where Desire gives birth to the Child (as it is drawn by Tibetans)—across the human and animal worlds, to the Fifth House—the empty House of the Senses. The logic was unanswerable.
‘Before our Lord won enlightenment,’ the lama folded all away with reverence, ‘He was tempted. I too have been tempted, but it is finished. The Arrow fell in the Plains—not in the Hills. Therefore, what make we here?’
‘Shall we at least wait for the hakim?’
‘I know how long I live in this body. What can a hakim do?’
‘But thou art all sick and shaken. Thou canst not walk.’
‘How can I be sick if I see Freedom?’ He rose unsteadily to his feet.
‘Then I must get food from the village. Oh, the weary Road!’ Kim felt that he too needed rest.
‘That is lawful. Let us eat and go. The Arrow fell in Plains … but I yielded to Desire. Make ready, chela.’
Kim turned to the woman with the turquoise head-gear who had been idly pitching pebbles over the cliff. She smiled very kindly.
‘I found him like a strayed buffalo in a corn-field—the Babu; snorting and sneezing with cold. He was so hungry that he forgot his dignity and gave me sweet words. The Sahibs have nothing.’ She flung out an empty palm. ‘One is very sick about the stomach. Thy work?’
Kim nodded, with a bright eye.
‘I spoke to the Bengali first—and to the people of a nearby village after. The Sahibs will be given food as they need it—nor will the people ask money. The plunder is already distributed. That Babu makes lying speeches to the Sahibs. Why does he not leave them?’
‘Out of the greatness of his heart.’
‘’Was never a Bengali yet had one bigger than a dried walnut. But it is no matter…. Now as to walnuts. After service comes reward. I have said the village is thine.’
‘It is my loss,’ Kim began. ‘Even now I had planned desirable things in my heart which’—there is no need to go through the compliments proper to these occasions. He sighed deeply … ‘But my master, led by a vision——’
‘Huh! What can old eyes see except a full begging-bowl?’
‘——turns from this village to the Plains again.’
‘Bid him stay.’
Kim shook his head. ‘I know my Holy One, and his rage if he be crossed,’ he replied impressively. ‘His curses shake the Hills.’
‘Pity they did not save him from a broken head! I heard that thou wast the tiger-hearted one who smote the Sahib. Let him dream a little longer. Stay!’
‘Hillwoman,’ said Kim, with austerity that could not harden the outlines of his young oval face, ‘these matters are too high for thee.’
‘The Gods be good to us! Since when have men and women been other than men and women?’
‘A priest is a priest. He says he will go upon this hour. I am his chela, and I go with him. We need food for the Road. He is an honoured guest in all the villages, but’—he broke into a pure boy’s grin—‘the food here is good. Give me some.’