“‘That two-anna basket-hanger governed India, I swear I’d become a naturalized Muscovite to-morrow. I’m a _femme incomprise_. This thing’s broken my heart. It’ll take six months’ shootin’-leave in India to mend it. Do you think I can get it, Pussy?’ “He got it in about three minutes and a half, and seventeen days later he was back in the arms of Rutton Singh--horrid disgraced--with orders to hand over his command, etc., to Cathcart MacMonnie.” “Observe!” said Dick Four. “One colonel of the Political Department in charge of thirty Sikhs, on a hilltop. Observe, my children!” “Naturally, Cathcart not being a fool, even if he _is_ a Political, let Stalky do his shooting within fifteen miles of Fort Everett for the next six months, and I always understood they and Rutton Singh _and_ the prisoner were as thick as thieves. Then Stalky loafed back to his regiment, I believe. I’ve never seen him since.” “I have, though,” said McTurk, swelling with pride. We all turned as one man. “It was at the beginning of this hot weather. I was in camp in the Jullunder doab and stumbled slap on Stalky in a Sikh village; sitting on the one chair of state, with half the population grovellin’ before him, a dozen Sikh babies on his knees, an old harridan clappin’ him on the shoulder, and a garland o’ flowers round his neck. Told me he was recruitin’. We dined together that night, but he never said a word of the business at the Fort. Told me, though, that if I wanted any supplies I’d better say I was Koran Sahib’s _bhai_; and I did, and the Sikhs wouldn’t take my money.” “Ah! That must have been one of Rutton Singh’s villages,” said Dick Four; and we smoked for some time in silence. “I say,” said McTurk, casting back through the years, “did Stalky ever tell you _how_ Rabbits-Eggs came to rock King that night?” “No,” said Dick Four. Then McTurk told. “I see,” said Dick Four, nodding. “Practically he duplicated that trick over again. There’s nobody like Stalky.” “That’s just where you make the mistake,” I said. “India’s full of Stalkies--Cheltenham and Haileybury and Marlborough chaps--that we don’t know anything about, and the surprises will begin when there is really a big row on.” “Who will be surprised?” said Dick Four. “The other side. The gentlemen who go to the front in first-class carriages. Just imagine Stalky let loose on the south side of Europe with a sufficiency of Sikhs and a reasonable prospect of loot. Consider it quietly.” “There’s something in that, but you’re too much of an optimist, Beetle,” said the Infant. “Well, I’ve a right to be. Ain’t I responsible for the whole thing? You needn’t laugh. Who wrote ‘Aladdin now has got his wife’--eh?” “What’s that got to do with it?” said Tertius. “Everything,” said I. “Prove it,” said the Infant. And I have. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Stalky & Co., by Rudyard Kipling