EPISODE: 18

for he climbed up in the big man's lap to see how writing was

done. At nightfall he ran into Teddy's nursery to watch how

kerosene lamps were lighted, and when Teddy went to bed

Rikki-tikki climbed up too. But he was a restless companion,

because he had to get up and attend to every noise all through

the night, and find out what made it. Teddy's mother and father

came in, the last thing, to look at their boy, and Rikki-tikki was

awake on the pillow. "I don't like that," said Teddy's mother. "He

may bite the child." "He'll do no such thing," said the father.

"Teddy's safer with that little beast than if he had a bloodhound

to watch him. If a snake came into the nursery now—"

But Teddy's mother wouldn't think of anything so awful.

Early in the morning Rikki-tikki came to early breakfast in the

veranda riding on Teddy's shoulder, and they gave him banana

and some boiled egg. He sat on all their laps one after the other,

because every well-brought-up mongoose always hopes to be a

house mongoose some day and have rooms to run about in; and

Rikki-tikki's mother (she used to live in the general's house at

Segowlee) had carefully told Rikki what to do if ever he came

across white men.

Then Rikki-tikki went out into the garden to see what was to

be seen. It was a large garden, only half cultivated, with bushes,

as big as summer-houses, of Marshal Niel roses, lime and orange

trees, clumps of bamboos, and thickets of high grass. Rikki-tikki

licked his lips. "This is a splendid hunting-ground," he said, and

his tail grew bottle-brushy at the thought of it, and he scuttled

up and down the garden, snuffing here and there till he heard

very sorrowful voices in a thorn-bush.

It was Darzee, the Tailorbird, and his wife. They had made a

beautiful nest by pulling two big leaves together and stitching

them up the edges with fibers, and had filled the hollow with

cotton and downy fluff. The nest swayed to and fro, as they sat

on the rim and cried.

"What is the matter?" asked Rikki-tikki.

"We are very miserable," said Darzee. "One of our babies fell

out of the nest yesterday and Nag ate him."

"H'm!" said Rikki-tikki, "that is very sad—but I am a stranger

here. Who is Nag?"

Darzee and his wife only cowered down in the nest without

answering, for from the thick grass at the foot of the bush there

came a low hiss—a horrid cold sound that made Rikki-tikki jump

back two clear feet. Then inch by inch out of the grass rose up

the head and spread hood of Nag, the big black cobra, and he

was five feet long from tongue to tail. When he had lifted one-

third of himself clear of the ground, he stayed balancing to and

fro exactly as a dandelion tuft balances in the wind, and he

looked at Rikki-tikki with the wicked snake's eyes that never

change their expression, whatever the snake may be thinking of.

"Who is Nag?" said he. "I am Nag. The great God Brahm put

his mark upon all our people, when the first cobra spread his

hood to keep the sun off Brahm as he slept. Look, and be

afraid!"

He spread out his hood more than ever, and Rikki-tikki saw

the spectacle-mark on the back of it that looks exactly like the

eye part of a hook-and-eye fastening. He was afraid for the

minute, but it is impossible for a mongoose to stay frightened for

any length of time, and though Rikki-tikki had never met a live

cobra before, his mother had fed him on dead ones, and he

knew that all a grown mongoose's business in life was to fight

and eat snakes. Nag knew that too and, at the bottom of his cold

heart, he was afraid.

"Well," said Rikki-tikki, and his tail began to fluff up again,

"marks or no marks, do you think it is right for you to eat

fledglings out of a nest?"

Nag was thinking to himself, and watching the least little

movement in the grass behind Rikki-tikki. He knew that

mongooses in the garden meant death sooner or later for him and his family, but he wanted to get Rikki-tikki off his guard. So

he dropped his head a little, and put it on one side.

"Let us talk," he said. "You eat eggs. Why should not I eat

birds?"

"Behind you! Look behind you!" sang Darzee.

Rikki-tikki knew better than to waste time in staring. He

jumped up in the air as high as he could go, and just under him

whizzed by the head of Nagaina, Nag's wicked wife. She had

crept up behind him as he was talking, to make an end of him.

He heard her savage hiss as the stroke missed. He came down

almost across her back, and if he had been an old mongoose he

would have known that then was the time to break her back

with one bite; but he was afraid of the terrible lashing return

stroke of the cobra. He bit, indeed, but did not bite long enough,

and he jumped clear of the whisking tail, leaving Nagaina torn

and angry.

"Wicked, wicked Darzee!" said Nag, lashing up as high as he

could reach toward the nest in the thorn-bush. But Darzee had

built it out of reach of snakes, and it only swayed to and fro.

Rikki-tikki felt his eyes growing red and hot (when a

mongoose's eyes grow red, he is angry), and he sat back on his

tail and hind legs like a little kangaroo, and looked all round

him, and chattered with rage. But Nag and Nagaina had

disappeared into the grass. When a snake misses its stroke, it

never says anything or gives any sign of what it means to do

next. Rikki-tikki did not care to follow them, for he did not feel

sure that he could manage two snakes at once. So he trotted off

to the gravel path near the house, and sat down to think. It was

a serious matter for him.

If you read the old books of natural history, you will find they

say that when the mongoose fights the snake and happens to get

bitten, he runs off and eats some herb that cures him. That is

not true. The victory is only a matter of quickness of eye and

quickness of foot—snake's blow against mongoose's jump—and as no eye can follow the motion of a snake's head when it

strikes, this makes things much more wonderful than any magic

herb. Rikki-tikki knew he was a young mongoose, and it made

him all the more pleased to think that he had managed to escape

a blow from behind. It gave him confidence in himself, and

when Teddy came running down the path, Rikki-tikki was ready

to be petted.

But just as Teddy was stooping, something wriggled a little in

the dust, and a tiny voice said: "Be careful. I am Death!" It was

Karait, the dusty brown snakeling that lies for choice on the

dusty earth; and his bite is as dangerous as the cobra's. But he is

so small that nobody thinks of him, and so he does the more

harm to people.

Rikki-tikki's eyes grew red again, and he danced up to Karait

with the peculiar rocking, swaying motion that he had inherited

from his family. It looks very funny, but it is so perfectly

balanced a gait that you can fly off from it at any angle you

please, and in dealing with snakes this is an advantage. If Rikki-

tikki had only known, he was doing a much more dangerous

thing than fighting Nag, for Karait is so small, and can turn so

quickly, that unless Rikki bit him close to the back of the head,

he would get the return stroke in his eye or his lip. But Rikki did

not know. His eyes were all red, and he rocked back and forth,

looking for a good place to hold. Karait struck out. Rikki jumped

sideways and tried to run in, but the wicked little dusty gray

head lashed within a fraction of his shoulder, and he had to

jump over the body, and the head followed his heels close.

Teddy shouted to the house: "Oh, look here! Our mongoose is

killing a snake." And Rikki-tikki heard a scream from Teddy's

mother. His father ran out with a stick, but by the time he came

up, Karait had lunged out once too far, and Rikki-tikki had

sprung, jumped on the snake's back, dropped his head far

between his forelegs, bitten as high up the back as he could get

hold, and rolled away. That bite paralyzed Karait, and Rikki-

tikki was just going to eat him up from the tail, after the custom

of his family at dinner, when he remembered that a full meal makes a slow mongoose, and if he wanted all his strength and

quickness ready, he must keep himself thin.

He went away for a dust bath under the castor-oil bushes,

while Teddy's father beat the dead Karait. "What is the use of

that?" thought Rikki-tikki. "I have settled it all;" and then

Teddy's mother picked him up from the dust and hugged him,

crying that he had saved Teddy from death, and Teddy's father

said that he was a providence, and Teddy looked on with big

scared eyes. Rikki-tikki was rather amused at all the fuss, which,

of course, he did not understand. Teddy's mother might just as

well have petted Teddy for playing in the dust. Rikki was

thoroughly enjoying himself.

That night at dinner, walking to and fro among the wine-

glasses on the table, he might have stuffed himself three times

over with nice things. But he remembered Nag and Nagaina, and

though it was very pleasant to be patted and petted by Teddy's

mother, and to sit on Teddy's shoulder, his eyes would get red

from time to time, and he would go off into his long war cry of

"Rikk-tikk-tikki-tikki-tchk!"

Teddy carried him off to bed, and insisted on Rikki-tikki

sleeping under his chin. Rikki-tikki was too well bred to bite or

scratch, but as soon as Teddy was asleep he went off for his

nightly walk round the house, and in the dark he ran up against

Chuchundra, the musk-rat, creeping around by the wall.

Chuchundra is a broken-hearted little beast. He whimpers and

cheeps all the night, trying to make up his mind to run into the

middle of the room. But he never gets there.

"Don't kill me," said Chuchundra, almost weeping. "Rikki-tikki,

don't kill me!"

"Do you think a snake-killer kills muskrats?" said Rikki-tikki

scornfully.

"Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes," said Chuchundra,

more sorrowfully than ever. "And how am I to be sure that Nag

won't mistake me for you some dark night?" .....