board the Monarch. This summer an American man and his wife came to live on it. Rhamon called them the Sahib and Mem Sahib. When they arrived he heard his father say, "Sahib, the Monarch is a little floating palace. You shall live like a king on that boat."
And indeed Rhamon thought so too, for he had often been inside. He had felt the soft, thick carpets under his little bare feet. He loved the pretty colors of the embroideries that hung from the windows and covered the beds. And he liked to trace with his fingers the patterns of the wood carvings around the windows and doors.
Almost every day the river merchants poled their boats slowly up alongside the Monarch and looked in through the windows. Holding up some special treasure they would begin, "Mem Sahib will look? In all the world Mem Sahib will not find beads like these. Lady Sahib not buy, only look!" Their soft voices kept on and on until Mem Sahib looked.
