By Rudyard Kipling
As I came through the Desert thus it was—As I camethrough the Desert. The City of Dreadful Night.
Somewhere in the Other World， where there are books andpictures and plays and shop windows to look at， and thousandsof men who spend their lives in building up all four， lives agentleman who writes real stories about the real insides ofpeople； and his name is Mr. Walter Besant. But he will insistupon treating his ghosts—he has published half a workshopfulof them—with levity. He makes his ghost-seers talk familiarly，and， in some cases， flirt outrageously， with the phantoms. Youmay treat anything， from a Viceroy to a Vernacular Paper， withlevity； but you must behave reverently toward a ghost， andparticularly an Indian one.
There are， in this land， ghosts who take the form of fat，cold， pobby corpses， and hide in trees near the roadside tilla traveler passes. Then they drop upon his neck and remain.
There are also terrible ghosts of women who have died inchild-bed. These wander along the pathways at dusk，or hidein the crops near a village， and call seductively. But to answertheir call is death in this world and the next. Their feet areturned backward that all sober men may recognize them. Thereare ghosts of little children who have been thrown into wells.
These haunt well curbs and the fringes of jungles， and wailunder the stars， or catch women by the wrist and beg to betaken up and carried. These and the corpse ghosts， however，are only vernacular articles and do not attack Sahibs. No nativeghost has yet been authentically reported to have frightened anEnglishman； but many English ghosts have scared the life outof both white and black.
Nearly every other Station owns a ghost. There are saidto be two at Simla， not counting the woman who blows thebellows at Syree dak-bungalow on the Old Road； Mussooriehas a house haunted of a very lively Thing； a White Lady issupposed to do night-watchman round a house in Lahore；Dalhousie says that one of her houses “repeats” on autumnevenings all the incidents of a horrible horse-and-precipiceaccident； Murree has a merry ghost， and， now that she has beenswept by cholera， will have room for a sorrowful one； thereare Officers’ Quarters in Mian Mir whose doors open withoutreason， and whose furniture is guaranteed to creak， not withthe heat of June but with the weight of Invisibles who cometo lounge in the chairs； Peshawur possesses houses that nonewill willingly rent； and there is something—not fever—wrongwith a big bungalow in Allahabad. The older Provinces simplybristle with haunted houses， and march phantom armies alongtheir main thoroughfares.
Some of the dak-bungalows on the Grand Trunk Road havehandy little cemeteries in their compound—witnesses to the“changes and chances of this mortal life” in the days whenmen drove from Calcutta to the Northwest. These bungalowsare objectionable places to put up in. They are generally veryold， always dirty， while the khansamah is as ancient as thebungalow. He either chatters senilely， or falls into the longtrances of age. In both moods he is useless. If you get angrywith him， he refers to some Sahib dead and buried these thirtyyears， and says that when he was in that Sahib’s service not akhansamah in the Province could touch him. Then he jabbersand mows and trembles and fidgets among the dishes， and yourepent of your irritation.
In these dak-bungalows， ghosts are most likely to be found，and when found， they should be made a note of. Not longago it was my business to live in dak-bungalows. I neverinhabited the same house for three nights running， and grewto be learned in the breed. I lived in Government-built oneswith red brick walls and rail ceilings， an inventory of thefurniture posted in every room， and an excited snake at thethreshold to give welcome. I lived in “converted” ones—oldhouses officiating as dak-bungalows—where nothing was inits proper place and there wasn’t even a fowl for dinner. I livedin second-hand palaces where the wind blew through openworkmarble tracery just as uncomfortably as through a brokenpane. I lived in dak-bungalows where the last entry in thevisitors’ book was fifteen months old， and where they slashedoff the curry-kid’s head with a sword. It was my good luck tomeet all sorts of men， from sober traveling missionaries anddeserters flying from British Regiments， to drunken loaferswho threw whisky bottles at all who passed； and my stillgreater good fortune just to escape a maternity case. Seeingthat a fair proportion of the tragedy of our lives out here acteditself in dak-bungalows， I wondered that I had met no ghosts.
A ghost that would voluntarily hang about a dak-bungalowwould be mad of course； but so many men have died mad indak-bungalows that there must be a fair percentage of lunaticghosts.
In due time I found my ghost， or ghosts rather， for therewere two of them. Up till that hour I had sympathized with Mr.
Besant’s method of handling them， as shown in “The StrangeCase of Mr. Lucraft and Other Stories.” I am now in theOpposition.
We will call the bungalow Katmal dak-bungalow. But thatwas the smallest part of the horror. A man with a sensitivehide has no right to sleep in dak-bungalows. He should marry.
Katmal dak-bungalow was old and rotten and unrepaired. Thefloor was of worn brick， the walls were filthy， and the windowswere nearly black with grime. It stood on a bypath largely usedby native Sub-Deputy Assistants of all kinds， from Finance toForests； but real Sahibs were rare. The khansamah， who wasnearly bent double with old age， said so.
When I arrived， there was a fitful， undecided rain on the faceof the land， accompanied by a restless wind， and every gustmade a noise like the rattling of dry bones in the stiff toddypalms outside. The khansamah completely lost his head on myarrival. He had served a Sahib once. Did I know that Sahib？