CHAPTER XV.
“THE OLD FIRST HEROIC LESSONS.”
“WHY, Mrs North!” Disturbed in his task of supervising the proceedings of a nervous native assistant, whose mind was less occupied with his dispensing than with the bullets which flattened themselves occasionally upon the pavement outside the surgery, Dr Tighe had turned suddenly to find Georgia at his elbow. “Can I do anything for you?” he asked kindly, looking with professional disapproval at her pale face and weary eyes.
“I want you to let me help you in the hospital.”
“And I thought you were a sensible woman! Will you tell me if you call this wise, now?”
“I think it would help me to have something to do.”
“But not this. What am I to say to the Major when—if—when I see him again, if you overtask your strength?”
“I see you think I am mad,” she said earnestly, “but I know he is alive. But the suspense is so dreadful, doctor. It’s certain that he is wounded, and I can scarcely doubt he is a prisoner; and what may be happening to him at any moment? It is killing me, and I must live—for both their sakes.” The doctor nodded quickly. “And I thought if I could do something to help those who were suffering as he is, it might—oh, I don’t know—it might make me tired enough to sleep again.”
“A good idea!” said Dr Tighe, in his most matter-of-fact tones. “You shall relieve me of half my dressings, by all means, and I’ll turn over to you the out-patient work among these unfortunate women and children. You can leave that dispensing, Babu”—the assistant, who had been listening for the thud of the bullets, started violently—“and go round the wards with the Memsahib.”
From his own cases on the opposite side of the improvised wards Dr Tighe glanced across at Georgia several times, remarking with approval that her face and figure were losing their look of utter weariness as she went about her work. She was giving her whole mind to it, that was evident, and for the time her own anxiety was pushed into the background. The number of patients to be treated was considerable, for besides the men who had been wounded at the fight in the Akrab Pass, there were a good many casualties due to the enemy’s fire since the siege had begun. The work was therefore heavy, but as soon as the dressings were finished Dr Tighe bustled up to Georgia and pointed out a new opening for her energies.
“The Colonel wants sacks made—millions of ’em—for sand-bags,” he said. “He was at his wits’ end about it this morning, tried to get the native women to sew them, and they wouldn’t.”
“Oh, why didn’t he ask us?” cried Georgia. “We would have worked our fingers to the bone.”
“I’m sure you would, and it’s likely he’d ask it of you, isn’t it? But why all the refugees should have board and lodging given them free, I don’t know. Why, they wouldn’t even make the sacks for payment! A lot of them said they couldn’t sew, and the rest seemed to think they were being persecuted when they were asked to do it. But you know how to get round them, Mrs North. We can’t very well say that if a woman doesn’t sew a sack a day out she goes—sounds a bit brutal—but you’ll manage to set them to work, I’m sure. I’ll tell Colonel Graham you’ve taken the matter in hand, and he’ll be for ever grateful.”
Unpromising though the task seemed, Georgia succeeded in finding six women who consented to sew if the Memsahibs would do so too, and a working-party was organised in the little courtyard, from which Mr Hardy and the men-servants were rigorously banished for the time. Since the need of sand-bags—at any rate in such numbers—had not been foreseen, the proper material was lacking, but all the tents in the fort were promptly requisitioned, and their canvas utilised. The regimental tailors cut out the sacks, delivering them into the charge of Rahah, and inside the courtyard Mrs Hardy and Georgia superintended the unskilled workers, while Flora and Mabel took a pride in proving their willingness to blister their fingers for their country. It was fortunate that fine needlework was not required, for the native women’s ideas of sewing were rudimentary in the extreme, but their two instructresses succeeded at last in convincing them, by precept and example, that to sew one side only of a seam was unnecessary as a decoration and not calculated materially to further the usefulness of a sack. When this lesson had been sufficiently impressed upon the pupils, Georgia sat down in the doorway of her room to divide the pice which Colonel Graham had entrusted to her for distribution among them. The sun was setting over the hill beyond the fort, and the women, as they sat cross-legged on the floor, seized the fact that the light was in their eyes as an excuse for turning round to gaze greedily at the money which Georgia was apportioning on a chair. Suddenly there was a whizz and a noisy clatter. A bullet had grazed Georgia’s hand and struck the chair, sending the coins flying, and it was followed by a burst of firing, which caused the terrified workwomen to drop their sacks and exclaim with one voice that they were dead.
“Down! down!” cried Georgia, setting the example herself, “and crawl round to the other verandah. They are firing from the hill, but they won’t be able to see us there.”
Dragging with her one woman who was paralysed with fright, she induced the others to follow her, and when they were out of the line of fire, proceeded to examine the terrific wounds from which one and all declared themselves to be suffering. Curiously enough, no one was badly hurt. Two had scratches, and one a nasty bruise from a ricochet shot, but of severe injuries there were none. Georgia dressed the wounds and comforted the sufferers with one or two pice extra, and then sent them back to their own quarters, thus allowing admittance to Colonel Graham, Mr Hardy, the Commissioner, and Fitz, who had been informed by the horrified servants that the enemy were firing into the Memsahibs’ courtyard. Their anxiety raised to the highest pitch by the shrieks from within, the four gentlemen were held at bay in the passage by the heroic Rahah, who informed them that they must pass over her body before they should break the pardah of the women assembled under her mistress’s protection. Just as they were at last admitted a cry from behind made them look round, to see an unfortunate water-carrier who had been passing along the rampart falling into the courtyard.
“We must get up a parados on that side,” said Colonel Graham, when the wounded man had been sent to the hospital. “They command the inside of the whole east curtain from that hill. Your sand-bags will be made useful sooner than we expected, Mrs North.”
“But what is to happen to us?” cried Mabel. “Are we to stay here to be shot at?”
“Calm yourself, my dear girl,” said Mr Burgrave, in gently reproving tones. “You are in no danger at the present moment.”
“You see, Miss North,” said the Colonel, “I don’t want to have to put you either in the hospital courtyard or among the native refugees, and there is nowhere else. After all, this court is so small that the enemy can’t possibly command more than the east side, and we’ll put that right by hanging curtains along the verandah.”
“Why, what good would that be against bullets?”
“The curtain wouldn’t stop them, certainly, but our friends up there are very careful of their ammunition, and never waste a shot. Not being able to see whether any one is in the verandah, they won’t aim at it. It was the sight of a whole party assembled here that was irresistible.”
“But is Georgia to live in darkness?” demanded Georgia’s self-constituted champion.
“Nonsense, Mab! There are three other verandahs to sit in. After all, one expects bullets in a siege,” said Georgia.
“That’s the right spirit, Mrs North,” said Colonel Graham heartily. “As soon as it’s dusk we’ll have the matting up from the club-house—messroom, I mean—floor, and nail it along the roof of this verandah and across the corner where the passage is. Then you’ll be safe from anything but chance shots, and those, I’m afraid, we can none of us guard against.”
“But are those fellows up there to pot at the ladies without our ever having a chance to pay them back, sir?” cried Fitz.
“I was coming to that. Of course the plan is to clear us off the east rampart so that a force from the town may rush it under cover of the fire from the hill, and therefore the parados must be our first care. Still, I think we can spare a few sand-bags for the two western towers, and if we arrange a little sangar on the top of each when it is dark, we can show our chivalrous friends the snipers to-morrow what it feels like to be sniped. Tell Winlock to set all the servants to work filling bags and baskets, and anything else they can find, with earth at once.”
“We seem to hold our own fairly well at present,” said Mr Burgrave, as Fitz departed, and the Colonel stood looking narrowly at the threatened verandah and the scattered work-materials with which it was strewn.
“We seem to—yes, but it is simply because we have not been tried as yet. There is far too great a length of wall for us to hold against a well-planned attack—say from two sides at once. Why they haven’t put us to the test before I can’t imagine. It’s not like their usual tactics to let things drag on in this way.”
“I am of opinion that they dislike crossing the cleared space, and intend to remain at a discreet distance and starve us out. If only they stick to that, we ought to be relieved long before matters come to a crisis.”
“No, it’s not that!” cried the Colonel irritably. “There’s something behind that we don’t see. If there was any possibility of their having guns, I should say they were waiting for them. But where are they to get them from unless they have surprised Rahmat-Ullah, which we have no reason to suppose? They have some dodge on hand, though, I’m certain.”
“Is there any weak point at which they could be aiming?”
“Man, this place is nothing but weak points. If those fellows on the hill knew what they were about, they could enfilade our north and south ramparts as well as cover the eastern one. The south curtain is so weak now that an elephant or a battering-ram—let alone a well-planted shell or two—could knock it over, and the canal on that side is getting lower every day. The water-carriers have to go down a dozen steps now, and it’s only the enemy’s fear for their own precious skins that prevents their picking them off from the opposite bank. We could pepper them from the rampart, they know that, and they haven’t the sense to pour in an oblique fire from the hill. I suppose, too, it hasn’t occurred to you that if they took it into their heads to blow us up, one or two plucky fellows could get close up to the walls under cover of a general attack, and lay a train at their leisure. It’s impossible to fire transversely from the loopholes in the towers without exposing pretty nearly one’s whole body, and as to depressing a rifle and firing point-blank down from the parapet, well——”
Mr Burgrave understood the pause to mean that the consequences would probably be very uncomfortable for the holder of the rifle, and said no more. The night passed without further alarm, save that Georgia found it would be dangerous to have a light in her rooms unless door and shutters were both closed. The glimmer from the window, even when only seen through the matting curtain, attracted two or three bullets immediately, and it was evident that the choice must be made between air and light. During the hours of darkness the besieged worked hard at their defences, and succeeded in erecting a more or less effectual shelter along the inside of the east rampart, and also a sand-bag parapet at the summit of the two western towers. The gateway turrets on the north-east, which were now exposed to the fire from the hill in the rear as well as to that from General Keeling’s house in front, were strengthened in the same way. Behind these shelters the best marksmen of the garrison took up their posts, and as soon as the bullets began to fly from the hill, seized the opportunity of pointing out to the enemy that the state of things had altered to some extent in the night. Since it was impossible for a man on either side to fire without exposing himself slightly, a return shot was the instant comment on this imprudence, and hence, before the morning was over, both parties were lying low and glaring at their opponents’ sangars, ready to shoot but not caring to be shot. Helmets on the one side and turbans on the other, raised cautiously on rifle-barrels above the breastwork, drew a few shots, but the nature of the trick was quickly perceived by both parties, and the sniping continued to languish.
“Their rifles seem to carry as far as ours,” remarked Mr Burgrave to Colonel Graham.
“So they ought,” was the grim reply. “Most of them, if not all, are ours. They are stolen and smuggled wholesale into Ethiopia, and Bahram Khan has borrowed them to arm his followers with. That’s how they manage to give us so much trouble. In the matchlock days, when this place was built, we could have laughed at their shooting from the hill.”
“What is that?” said the Commissioner suddenly, putting up his eye-glass; “a pile of cannon-balls? It was not there last night.”
They were standing in one of the gateway turrets, and the heap to which he pointed was visible upon the cleared space, in front of the entrance to a lane between two of the houses occupied by the enemy. Colonel Graham laid down his field-glass with an exclamation of disgust.
“Cannon-balls! It’s heads—human heads—heads of our men. Those fiends have surprised one of our posts—Sultanibagh probably, beyond Shah Nawaz. I telegraphed to the Jemadar in charge to retire upon Rahmat-Ullah, as there was no chance of their getting here safely, but the wires must have been cut before they got the message, or else the men have been ambushed on their way. Well, Bahram Khan has put himself beyond the pale of mercy this time, even with our Government, I should imagine.”
As the light grew stronger the sickening trophy was perceived from other parts of the fort, and the men of the Khemistan Horse began to become impatient. It appeared that a deserter had ventured close under the walls in the night, in order to taunt the garrison with some unexplained reverse, the nature of which was now made manifest. They were asked how long Sinjāj Kīlin’s sowars had been content to hide behind stone walls, instead of coming out to fight on horseback in the open, and a variety of interesting and savoury information was added as to the precise nature of the tortures in store for all, whether officers or men, who fell into Bahram Khan’s hands. To the men who had so long dominated the frontier, this abuse was intolerably galling, and the troopers were gathering in corners with sullen faces, and asking one another why they were kept back from washing out the disgrace in blood. They had now been in the fort the best part of a week, no attack in force had been made, and yet there had not been the slightest attempt to drive off the enemy or inflict any loss upon him. Ressaldar Badullah Khan voiced this feeling to Colonel Graham a little later, when the Colonel had passed with a judicious lack of apparent notice the scowling groups of men who were discussing the state of affairs.
“Our faces are black, sahib,” said the native officer, in response to the question put to him. “Bahram Khan and his badmashes laugh at our beards, and we are pent up here like women. We are better men than they—we have proved it in every fight since first Sinjāj Kīlin Sahib raised the regiment—why then (so say the sowars) is it forbidden to us to issue forth with our horses, and sweep the baseborn rabble outside from the face of the earth?”
“Is the regiment complaining of the course I choose to take, Ressaldar?”
“Nay, sahib; the sowars say that it is the will of the Kumpsioner Sahib which is being done.”
“They are wrong. It is mine. What could the regiment do on horseback in the streets of the town, with the enemy firing from roofs and loopholes? We have not a man too many in the fort now, and yet, Ressaldar, I anticipate a sortie in force before long, though not in review order.”
The Ressaldar’s eyes gleamed. “May the news be told to the regiment, sahib?” he asked.
“Could they refrain from shouting it to the next man who taunts them? No, Ressaldar; tell them to trust me as they have always done hitherto. There will be work to be done before many days, but I cannot set mutinous men to do it.”
Badullah Khan went out, meeting Woodworth on the threshold.
“Would you mind coming up to the north-western tower, sir?” asked the adjutant, when he had closed the door. “The enemy seem to be doing something in that direction which I can’t quite make out.”
“What sort of thing?” asked Colonel Graham, rising.
“I would rather not give an opinion until you have seen what there is to see, sir,” was the reply, so unwontedly cautious that the Colonel prepared for a heavy blow. Woodworth followed him up the narrow winding stairs in silence, and pointed to the stretch of desert on the northern side of the town, across which two long strings of men and animals were slowly passing in a westerly direction. The Colonel started, examined the moving objects through his field-glass, and called to his orderly—
“Ask Beltring Sahib to come here at once.”
Almost before Beltring, breathless, had mounted the staircase, he was greeted by a question. “Beltring, are there any guns at Nalapur?”
“No, sir. At least, there are two old field-pieces in front of the palace, but that’s all.”
“Are they in working order?”
“They use them for firing salutes, sir, not for anything else, I believe.”
“Still, that shows they are safe to work, and here they are. Where will they mount them, should you say, Woodworth?”
“On the hill, sir. The slope on the far side is comparatively easy for getting them up.”
“True, and from the brow there they could knock the place about our ears in a couple of hours. At all costs we must keep them from getting the range to-day. They will have no range-finders, that’s one good thing, and if we can secure a night’s respite, it’ll be a pity if we don’t make good use of it. Tell our marksmen to fire at anything they see moving up there. Those guns must not be placed in position before sunset. And then tell all the other officers and volunteers to meet me on the south rampart immediately.”
The council of war which assembled on the rampart, sheltered by the south-western tower, was sufficiently informal to make the hair of any stickler for military etiquette stand on end, but its proceedings were absolutely practical. The Colonel, beside whom stood Mr Burgrave, stated the situation briefly.
“You have seen the two guns which the enemy intend to mount on the hill there. Once they get them into position and find our range, we may as well retire into the vaults and wait until we are smoked out, for there is no possible shelter above ground. With our small force it is hopeless to detach a party to sally out and capture the guns in the open—more especially since the enemy hold the town between us and them. Still, they have plenty to do in getting the guns across the canal and dragging them up the hill, and we must make it our business to prevent them from opening fire to-day, and to-night those guns must be taken. I propose to leave the Commissioner in charge of the fort, with ten of his own Sikhs and fifty sowars under Ressaldar Ghulam Rasul. Every civilian who can hold a weapon must also do duty. I shall take a hundred and fifty dismounted sowars and thirty Sikhs, with all the enrolled volunteers, and make a dash for the hill under cover of darkness. If we succeed, we shall have averted a great danger; if we fail, the fort will be no worse off than if we had hung about and done nothing. I am confident that the Commissioner will fight to the end, and not allow himself to be tempted by any offer of terms.”
“Know the beggars too well,” said Mr Burgrave laconically.
“That’s the main scheme; now for details. To reach the hill, the canal must be crossed in any case. The most obvious plan would undoubtedly be for the force to rendezvous silently in the shadow of the west curtain, traverse the irrigated land, and restore the bridge at the foot of the hill sufficiently to cross by it. But the enemy could sweep the whole route from their positions both in the town and on the hill, and they will be very much on the alert to-night. My idea is to cross the canal here from the water-gate, and march the first part of the distance along the bank, so as to come upon the enemy from the side he won’t expect us. He knows we have neither boat nor bridge, and the water is still deep enough along the wall to be impassable to any but good swimmers.”
“Then how do you propose to cross?” asked Mr Burgrave.
“There I must invite suggestions. We have no time for building boats or bridges, and the water-gate offers no facilities for it either. A raft, possibly. What do you think, Runcorn?”
“A raft supported on inflated skins, sir?” asked the engineer officer. “That might be practicable, but it would have to be very small, for the passage to the gate is so narrow that all the materials must be taken to the water’s edge separately and put together there. There is no standing-ground of any sort but the wretched shaky steps that the water-carriers use, so that we can’t well lower things from the wall.”
“And the time spent in ferrying the force over would be interminable, not to mention the risk of discovery by the enemy,” said Colonel Graham.
His subordinates looked at one another. Various suggestions had been hazarded and rejected, when a hesitating voice made itself heard. The speaker was Mr Hardy, who had joined the group a few minutes earlier, with a message to the Colonel from one of the wounded officers in the hospital.
“In my Oxford days,” he said, “I remember a pleasant walk through the meadows—” His hearers gasped. Why should these peaceful recollections be obtruded at such a moment? “There was one point at which the path crossed a considerable stream, and a punt that ran on wires was placed there. I’m afraid I am not very intelligible,” he smiled nervously. “I can’t describe the mechanism in technical language, but the punt was fastened to one wire, and the other was free and moved on pulleys, so that you could pull yourself across, or draw the punt towards you if it happened to be at the opposite bank.”
“Padri,” said Colonel Graham, “it’s clear that you are an unsuspected mechanical genius. This is the very thing we want, though we must use rope instead of wire.”
“But we have even got that, sir,” said Runcorn eagerly. “Timson was boasting that he had saved all the stores of his department—miles of telegraph wire amongst them. Now he’ll have to disgorge.”
“Then will you set about the construction of the ferry, Runcorn? You can’t begin work on the spot until night, but you can get your materials ready. Requisition anything you want, of course.”
“May we make a suggestion, sir?” said Fitz Anstruther, coming forward with Winlock as the council broke up. Signals of intelligence had been passing between the two for some time, and they had held a whispered consultation while the ferry was being discussed.
“Why, what plot have you on hand?”
It was Winlock who answered. “We thought that it might make all the difference to your success, sir, if a diversion could be arranged to distract the enemy’s attention. We two know every foot of these hills from chikor-shooting, and if we might pick out a dozen or so of the sowars who have constantly gone with us out hunting as beaters, we could make a sham attack. We know of a splendid place on the side of a hill, inaccessible from below, which commands the camp of the hostile tribes, and we thought if we sent up a signal rocket or two, to be answered from the fort, and then poured in as many volleys as there was time for, it might make a good impression. Of course, as soon as they try to get round us and rush the hill, we must retire, to keep them from finding out how few we are; but the main force ought to have settled the guns by that time, and we might rendezvous on the hill and march back together.”
“It sounds feasible,” said the Colonel slowly; “but how do you propose to cross the canal?”
“We don’t mean to cross it in going, sir. Anstruther says we can clamber along the base of this wall from the water-gate round the south-western tower, so as to get on to dry land under the west curtain.”
“I know it’s possible, sir,” said Fitz eagerly. “I’ve done it more than once when the canal was low, and it’ll be easier now that the bricks are so much washed away. And of course we shall be very careful in crossing the irrigated land—all of us in khaki, you see, and taking advantage of every bit of cover—and unless we run right into one of the enemy’s outposts, I don’t see how they are to spot us. And think of the benefit it will be to have their attention distracted from your movement!”
“You realise that you are taking your lives in your hands? You will probably have to swim the canal higher up to join us, and, after all, we may not be able to wait for you. Your men will be volunteers, of course? They must understand that it’s a desperate business.”
“Yes, sir; but they’ll come like a shot. They’ve been out with us after markhor, and we’ve been in some tight places in the mountains. May we have what rockets we want?”
“By all means. Good luck go with you! I wish I was coming too!”
“That’s really handsome of the C.O.,” said Fitz, dodging a bullet as he clattered down the stairs into the courtyard with Winlock. “Grand firework display to-night! What a pity that the ladies and all the refugees can’t have front seats on the ramparts to watch the tamasha!”