[Illustration: 'First I will take my pay,' the letter-writer said.] 'It does not profit to tell lies to Mahbub Ali. It is better to help his friends by lending them a stamp. When the money comes I will repay.' The writer grunted doubtfully, but took a stamp out of his desk, sealed the letter, handed it over to Kim, and departed. Mahbub Ali's was a name of power in Umballa. 'That is the way to win a good account with the Gods,' Kim shouted after him. 'Pay me twice over when the money comes,' the man cried over his shoulder. 'What was you bukkin' to that nigger about?' said the drummer-boy when Kim returned to the veranda. 'I was watchin' you.' 'I was only talkin' to him.' 'You talk the same as a nigger, don't you?' 'No-ah! No-ah! I onlee speak a little. What shall we do now?' 'The bugles 'ill go for dinner in arf a minute. My Gawd! I wish I'd gone up to the front with the regiment. It's awful doin' nothin' but school down 'ere. Don't you 'ate it?' 'Oah yess!' 'I'd run away if I knew where to go to, but, as the men say, in this bloomin' Injia you're only a prisoner at large. You can't desert without bein' took back at once. I'm fair sick of it.' 'You have been in Be--England?' 'W'y, I only come out last troopin' season with my mother. I should think I 'ave been in England. What a ignorant little beggar you are. You was brought up in the gutter, wasn't you?' 'Oah yess. Tell me something about England. My father he came from there.' Though he would not say so, Kim of course disbelieved every word the drummer-boy spoke about the Liverpool suburb which was his England. It passed the heavy time till dinner--a most unappetising meal served to the boys and a few invalids in a corner of a barrack-room. But that he had written to Mahbub Ali, Kim would have been almost depressed. The indifference of native crowds he was used to; but this strong loneliness among white men preyed on him. He was grateful when, in the course of the afternoon, a big soldier took him over to Father Victor, who lived in another wing across another dusty parade-ground. The priest was reading an English letter written in purple ink. He looked at Kim more curiously than ever. 'An' how do you like it, my son, as far as you've gone? Not much, eh? It must be hard--very hard on a wild animal. Listen now. I've an amazin' epistle from your friend.' 'Where is he? Is he well? Oah! If he knows to write me letters, it is all right.' 'You're fond of him then?' 'Of course I am fond of him. He was fond of me.' 'It seems so by the look of this. He can't write English, can he?' 'Oah no. Not that I know, but of course he found a letter-writer who can write English verree well, and so he wrote. I do hope you understand.' 'That accounts for it. D'you know anything about his money affairs?' Kim's face showed that he did not. 'How can I tell?'