The Kipling Reader | Page 4

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 could 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 round
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 musk-rats?' 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?'
'There's not the least danger,' said Rikki-tikki; 'but Nag is in the garden,
and I know you don't go there.'
'My cousin Chua, the rat, told me----' said Chuchundra, and then he
stopped.
'Told you what?'
'H'sh! Nag is everywhere, Rikki-tikki. You should have talked to Chua
in the garden.'
'I didn't--so you must tell me. Quick, Chuchundra, or I'll bite you!'

Chuchundra sat down and cried till the tears rolled off his whiskers. 'I
am a very poor man,' he sobbed. 'I never had spirit enough to run out
into the middle of the room. H'sh! I mustn't tell you anything. Can't you
hear, Rikki-tikki?'
Rikki-tikki listened. The house was as still as still, but he thought he
could just catch the faintest scratch-scratch in the world,--a noise as
faint as that of a wasp walking on a window-pane,--the dry scratch of a
snake's scales on brickwork.
'That's Nag or Nagaina,' he said to himself; 'and he's crawling into the
bath-room sluice. You're right, Chuchundra; I should have talked to
Chua.'
He stole off to Teddy's bath-room, but there was nothing there, and
then to Teddy's mother's bath-room. At the bottom of the smooth
plaster wall there was a brick pulled out to make a sluice for the
bath-water, and as Rikki-tikki stole in by the masonry curb where the
bath is put, he heard Nag and Nagaina whispering together outside in
the moonlight.
'When the house is emptied of people,' said Nagaina to her husband, 'he
will have to go away, and then the garden will be our own again. Go in
quietly, and remember that the big man who killed Karait is the first
one to bite. Then come out and tell me, and we will hunt for Rikki-tikki
together.'
'But are you sure that there is anything to be gained by killing the
people?' said Nag.
'Everything. When there were no people in the bungalow, did we have
any mongoose in the garden? So long as the bungalow is empty, we are
king and queen of the garden; and remember that as soon as our eggs in
the melon-bed hatch (as they may to-morrow), our children will need
room and quiet.'
I had not thought of that,' said Nag. 'I will go, but there is no need that
we should hunt for Rikki-tikki afterward. I will kill the big man and his

wife, and the child if I can, and come away quietly. Then the bungalow
will be empty, and Rikki-tikki will go.'
Rikki-tikki tingled all over with rage and hatred at this, and then Nag's
head came through the sluice, and his five feet of cold body followed it.
Angry as he was, Rikki-tikki was very frightened as he saw the size of
the big cobra. Nag coiled himself up, raised his head, and looked into
the bath-room in the dark, and Rikki could see his eyes glitter.
'Now, if I kill him here, Nagaina will know; and if I fight him on the