“Max, if anything happens to me, will you be good to Girzilla?” asked Ibrahim, one night.
“Anything happen? What do you mean?”
“I feel that we are about to have a battle, and I may fall.”
“Of course, so may I.”
“Yes; but I feel it here,” and Ibrahim placed his hand on his forehead.
“Premonition, eh? Take a good stiff dose of quinine, and you will be all right.”
“No, I am not sick.”
“Perhaps not, but talking of being sick. Wasn’t that a lark I had with the Mahdi?”
“What lark?”
“I forgot you were not there. It was good fun. I could have split my sides with laughter, but I had to be sober as a judge.”
“What did you do, Madcap?”
“Swear you won’t give me away.”
“Give you away?” repeated Ibrahim, surprisedly.
“Don’t tell anyone. Don’t tell even Girzilla.”
“No.”
“Swear it.”
“By the beard of the prophet, I swear!”
“Well, you know the Mahdi has a great deal more ceremony shown him now than at first. His hands and feet are washed before he stretches himself on your uncle’s sacred carpet.”
“Yes, I know that.”
“You also know that he must pour the water into the basin himself.”
“Yes.”
“Well, the Mahdi stood ready for the water. A big Arab held the basin, another came with a leather bottle, filled with the sacred water. The Mahdi took the bottle and poured some into the basin; but he nearly fell with fright.”
“Why?”
“The water foamed and sizzed until it overflowed the basin. The Arab was so frightened that he dropped the bowl and fell on his knees. ‘Bring the other vessel,’ commanded the Mahdi. The other was brought, and the same thing occurred. ‘A miracle! A miracle!’ shouted your uncle, and Mohammed declared that it signified a great uprising of the Mahdi’s enemies; but just as the boiling and frothing of the water subsided, so would his enemies. Hadn’t I hard work to preserve a sober face, because——”
“What did you do?”
“I got your uncle’s medicine chest and put three seidlitz powders in each bowl. The white powder was not noticed because the Mahdi insists on the sacred sand from Mecca being at the bottom of the basin.”
“It was a shame, Max. How could you do it?”
“You ought to thank me, for everyone believes it to have been a miracle.”
“Max, Max, I am afraid that you are indeed an infidel.”
“Not at all, Ibrahim, old fellow, only——What was that?”
“A bugle call ‘to arms.’”
The conversation was over; Madcap Max became the soldier once again.
He buckled on his scimiter and joined his men.
“The cohorts of the infidels are coming,” shouted the Mahdi. “But not one will go back. The grave shall receive each one who fights beneath the crescent without the star.”
Through a mountain pass five thousand men, headed by the Governor of Fashoda and the Chief of Shiluk, were seen approaching.
On a jet-black Arab horse Hubert Ponsonby rode, looking kinglike and majestic.
The whiteness of his skin contrasted strangely with the tawny color of the soldiers.
He was clad in white, and he looked almost ghostly as he bestrode the back of the raven-colored horse.
He did everything for effect.
“Allah il Allah!” shouted the Mahdists, and the same cry was repeated by the Fashodans.
“For Mahomet and the Mahdi!” cried the Mahdists, and the Fashodans replied with stentorian voices:
“For Mahomet and the khedive.”
The Fashodans commenced the battle.
They were weary and wanted it over.
They believed the victory would be an easy one. They had no water, and the wells were guarded by the Mahdists.
Hence it was that they precipitated the struggle.
The Mahdi was practically unarmed.
He carried a spear, but from it streamed pennons on which were written passages from the Koran.
There was something grand about this religious fanatic.
Strong and brave as a lion, yet he was as simple and guileless as a child.
He hated war, and yet believed it to be a sacred mission.
He knew it was only by the sword that he could win, and yet he would not use the weapon himself.
When the fight was hottest he was calm.
The bullets flew about him like hail, but he sat unharmed and as cool as if he knew the leaden hail could not hurt him.
On came the legions from Fashoda.
But it was evident that they were disheartened.
“Who is that white man?” asked Max.
“Hubert Ponsonby,” answered one of the Mahdists.
“An Englishman?”
“Yes.”
“It is the same. He cheated my father’s firm. I wondered what had become of him. Wonder if he knows me? It is three years since we met, and I was only sixteen then.”
Max thought all this quicker than the pen can write the words.
He called his men to follow him, and swinging his scimiter above his head dashed into the very midst of the attacking force.
He pushed his way through until he found himself by the side of Hubert’s coal-black horse.
“Hubert Ponsonby!” exclaimed Max.
“Who calls me by that name?”
“I do.”
“You; and who are you?”
“Max Gordon, of the firm you robbed.”
“You lie!”
“Do I, Hubert Ponsonby? My scimiter shall whet itself in your flesh and prove my words.”
Hubert swung his scimiter round with terrific force, but it cut the empty air.
Max wheeled round quickly and parried a second blow.
“So ho! You are a renegade, are you?” sneered Ponsonby.
“You wear the Turk’s colors, I the Mahdi’s; that is the difference,” answered Max.
Steel clashed on steel, the sparks flew from the blades, but neither combatant was wounded.
“Surrender!” cried Max.
“Never!” answered Hubert.
Again the two men came together.
The blood was now flowing from Hubert’s left shoulder, but Max was unhurt.
The Englishman was getting weak from loss of blood.
With his left hand, weak though it was from the wound, he drew his revolver.
“No, that will never do,” Max exclaimed, as he made an upward cut and sent the revolver careening through the air.
The Soudanese very seldom fight fairly, and when they saw that Hubert was getting the worst of it, a dozen of them surrounded Max, cutting him off entirely from his followers.
It was a critical moment.
Max swung his scimiter round vigorously, dealing out terrible blows with it; but what could one man do against twelve?
He felt he would have to succumb.
Ibrahim’s premonition came to his mind.
He was to be the one to die, not the Persian.
He was ready for his fate, but even as he admitted it he resolved that Ponsonby should not live to gloat over his defeat.
He threw himself forward on Ponsonby, bearing him from his horse.
Like a lightning flash Max dismounted and grasped Hubert by the throat.
A Soudanese raised his scimiter and was about to bring it down on the young American’s head, when the blow was turned aside by the Mahdi’s spear, and instead of cutting off the head of the young lieutenant of the Mahdi, it did no other damage than the destruction of a verse of the Koran.
Amid the flashing of steel and the cracking of musketry the Mahdi rode; he had saved the madcap’s life at the risk of his own.
Ibrahim had fought with terrible fury, and scores of the Fashodans had felt the keenness of his sword and the strength of his arm.
His latest achievement was the capture of the Governor of Fashoda.
When the day ended and the result of the fight was known, it was found that of the five thousand brave followers of Hubert Ponsonby and the Fashodan governor, not two hundred escaped.
The carnage was fearful.
The Mahdi lost about two hundred men, the enemy over four thousand.
Ibrahim and Max were the heroes of the hour, and the Mahdi, in a loud voice, proclaimed the “infidel” Max as an adopted son of the prophet.
Amid heartfelt cries of: “Great is Allah! The Mahdi hath come!” the sun went down, and Mohammed Ahmed was the greatest warrior the Soudan had ever known.