The Phantom Rickshaw | Page 3

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Prepared by David Reed [email protected] or [email protected]

THE PHANTOM 'RICKSHAW AND OTHER GHOST STORIES
by Rudyard Kipling
* * * * *
The Phantom 'Rickshaw My Own True Ghost Story The Strange Ride
of Morrowbie Jukes The Man Who Would Be King "The Finest Story
in The World"
* * * * *

THE PHANTOM 'RICKSHAW
May no ill dreams disturb my rest, Nor Powers of Darkness me molest.
--_Evening Hymn._
One of the few advantages that India has over England is a great
Knowability. After five years' service a man is directly or indirectly
acquainted with the two or three hundred Civilians in his Province, all
the Messes of ten or twelve Regiments and Batteries, and some fifteen
hundred other people of the non-official caste. In ten years his
knowledge should be doubled, and at the end of twenty he knows, or
knows something about, every Englishman in the Empire, and may
travel anywhere and everywhere without paying hotel-bills.
Globe-trotters who expect entertainment as a right, have, even within
my memory, blunted this open-heartedness, but none the less to-day, if
you belong to the Inner Circle and are neither a Bear nor a Black Sheep,
all houses are open to you, and our small world is very, very kind and
helpful.
Rickett of Kamartha stayed with Polder of Kumaon some fifteen years
ago. He meant to stay two nights, but was knocked down by rheumatic

fever, and for six weeks disorganized Polder's establishment, stopped
Polder's work, and nearly died in Polder's bedroom. Polder behaves as
though he had been placed under eternal obligation by Rickett, and
yearly sends the little Ricketts a box of presents and toys. It is the same
everywhere. The men who do not take the trouble to conceal from you
their opinion that you are an incompetent ass, and the women who
blacken your character and misunderstand your wife's amusements,
will work themselves to the bone in your behalf if you fall sick or into
serious trouble.
Heatherlegh, the Doctor, kept, in addition to his regular practice, a
hospital on his private account--an arrangement of loose boxes for
Incurables, his friend called it--but it was really a sort of fitting-up shed
for craft that had been damaged by stress of weather. The weather in
India is often sultry, and since the tale of bricks is always a fixed
quantity, and the only liberty allowed is permission to work overtime
and get no thanks, men occasionally break down and become