We took a
great square stone in the temple for the
Master??™s chair, and little stones for the officers??™
chairs, and painted the black pavement
with white squares, and did what we
could to make things regular.
???At the levee which was held that night
on the hillside with big bonfires, Dravot
gives out that him and me were gods and
sons of Alexander, and Past Grand-Masters
in the Craft, and was come to make Kafiristan
a country where every man should eat
in peace and drink in quiet, and specially
obey us. Then the Chiefs come round to
shake hands, and they was so hairy and
white and fair it was just shaking hands
with old friends. We gave them names according
as they was like men we had known
in India??”Billy Fish, Holly Dilworth, Pikky
Kergan that was Bazar-master when I was
at Mhow, and so on, and so on.
???The most amazing miracle was at Lodge
next night. One of the old priests was
watching us continuous, and I felt uneasy,
for I knew we??™d have to fudge the Ritual,
and I didn??™t know what the men knew. The
old priest was a stranger come in from beyond
the village of Bashkai. The minute
Dravot puts on the Master??™s apron that the
girls had made for him, the priest fetches a
whoop and a howl, and tries to overturn the
stone that Dravot was sitting on. ???It??™s all
up now,??™ I says. ???That comes of meddling
with the Craft without warrant!??™ Dravot
never winked an eye, not when ten priests
took and tilted over the Grand-Master??™s chair
??”which was to say the stone of Imbra.
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