Indra and the Line of Ants

Indra was king of the sky, and he had a palace made of gold. It had a hall you could shout in and never hear the end of. It had a balcony above the clouds. When the sun came up, the whole thing turned the colour of honey. Indra stood on the balcony every morning and looked at it, and every morning he thought the same thing. It could be grander.

So he called for the builder. "One more tower," said Indra. "On that corner. Taller than the others." The builder built it. "Now a hall beside it," said Indra. "With a fountain." The builder built that too. Then a garden. Then a bigger gate. Then a tower taller than the tower before it. The builder was an old man. Every time he rolled up his plans and said, "It is finished," Indra looked at the palace and said, "Nearly."

One morning a boy came to the door. He was small, and barefoot, and wearing plain cream cloth, and nobody could say afterwards how he had got all the way up past the clouds. He looked at the golden hall for a while. Then he said, "Who is it all for?" "For me," said Indra. "I am the king of the sky." "Ah," said the boy, and he smiled as though Indra had said something interesting, and he sat down on the floor.

"Look," said the boy. Indra looked. Across the shining marble floor, close to the wall, there was a thin dark line moving very slowly. Ants. A long line of them, walking one behind the other, going somewhere of their own. Indra knelt down to see. They went past his knee without stopping. There were more of them than he could count, and not one of them looked up at the gold. "Every one of them is busy," said the boy. "Every one of them is sure that what they are carrying is the important thing." Then he said, "How many towers would be enough?" Indra opened his mouth. And found that he did not have a number.

When he looked up, the boy was gone. Indra stayed where he was for a while, on the floor of his own golden hall, watching the ants go by. Then he stood up and went to find the builder, who was outside with his plans rolled under his arm, waiting to be told about the next tower. "It is finished," said Indra. The old man looked at him. "It was finished a long time ago," said Indra. "Come and have something to eat." And they sat on the balcony together while the sun went down and turned the whole palace the colour of honey, which it had been doing all along.