Then I will tell thee more, Friend of all the World, though in the telling I lend thee my head.' 'It was forfeit to me,' said Kim, with deep relish, 'in Umballa, when thou didst pick me up on the horse after the drummer-boy beat me.' 'Speak a little plainer.

All the world may tell lies save thou and I.
For equally is thy life forfeit to me if I chose to raise my finger here.' 'And this is known to me also,' said Kim, readjusting the live charcoal-ball on the weed.

'It is a very sure tie between us.

Indeed, thy hold is surer even than mine; for who would miss a boy beaten to death, or, it may be, thrown into a well by the roadside?
Most people here and in Simla and across the passes behind the Hills would, on the other hand, say: "What has come to Mahbub Ali ?" if he were found dead among his horses.

Surely, too, the Colonel Sahib would make inquiries.
But again,'-- Kim's face puckered with cunning,--'he would not make overlong inquiry, lest people should ask: "What has this Colonel Sahib to do with that horse-dealer ?" But I--if I lived--' 'As thou wouldst surely die--' 'Maybe; but I say, if I lived, I, and I alone, would know that one had come by night, as a common thief perhaps, to Mahbub Ali's bulkhead in the serai, and there had slain him, either before or after that thief had made a full search into his saddlebags and between the soles of his slippers.