“Hai! Hai!” said the soldier, leaping to his feet. “What is it? What orders? ... It is ... a child! I dreamed it was an alarm. Little one—little one—do not cry. Have I slept? That was discourteous indeed!”
“I fear! I am afraid!” roared the child.
“What is it to fear? Two old men and a boy? How wilt thou ever make a soldier, Princeling?”
The lama had waked too, but, taking no direct notice of the child, clicked his rosary.
“What is that?” said the child, stopping a yell midway. “I have never seen such things. Give them me.”
“Aha.” said the lama, smiling, and trailing a loop of it on the grass:
This is a handful of cardamoms,
This is a lump of ghi:
This is millet and chillies and rice,
A supper for thee and me!
The child shrieked with joy, and snatched at the dark, glancing beads.
“Oho!” said the old soldier. “Whence hadst thou that song, despiser of this world?”
“I learned it in Pathânkot—sitting on a doorstep,” said the lama shyly. “It is good to be kind to babes.”