CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH
Eighty to One
Ahmed entered the city with the first column. When, however, Nicholsondecided to work along the ramparts and leave Colonel Jones and thesecond column to push forward into the streets, he ordered Ahmed to actas guide to the colonel. Ahmed led the way through the streets by whichhe had come on the night when he dropped over the wall. The victorioustroops swept them clear of mutineers, but their progress was slow,because the men could not be restrained from plundering as they went.
In due time they reached the great mosque, whence, after waiting vainlyfor the arrival of the fourth column, Colonel Jones decided to retire tothe Begam Bagh. It happened as the troops withdrew, that a determinedrush of mutineers down the street in which Dr. Craddock's house wassituated, cut off Ahmed and a small group of men from the main body. Toforce their way through the enemy was impossible without great loss, andAhmed, perceiving that the little party was in danger of annihilation,led them at the double into the lane that ran behind the doctor's house,to take refuge there until the way was clear. They were only just intime. They scaled the wall of the garden by mounting upon one another'sshoulders; and the last four or five were only saved from the mutineers,who came dashing along in pursuit, by the fire of their comrades who hadalready gained the top of the wall. In the temporary check the last menwere hauled up, and dropped safely into the garden.
The group numbered fifteen besides Ahmed, thirteen being sepoys of the4th Sikh Infantry, and two corporals of the 2nd Fusiliers. It was clearthat they would by and by be no better than rats in a trap unless theyfound shelter in the house, and Ahmed, rapidly explaining to a nativesergeant that he knew the place, made a dash with half the party pastthe fountain to the back door, leaving the rest to deal with any of theenemy who should attempt to drop into the garden as they themselves haddone.
Just as he reached the door, happening to glance up at a small windowoverlooking the garden, he saw the face of Minghal Khan. Next moment hehad disappeared. The door was open. Ahmed rushed in, and up the stairs,followed by the men. He reached the landing only to see the darwanleaping down the front staircase. Running along after him, Ahmed lookedover. A shot grazed his ear: the darwan had turned at the bottom andfired. Ahmed sprang down five steps at a time, there was a hurry-scurrybelow, and by the time he arrived at the compound three or four figureswere hastening through the front gate, which they shut behind them witha bang.
Ahmed had no idea of pursuing them. He barred the gate, ran back to themen he had left, who had followed him from the house, and went upstairsagain, with the intention of passing through the almirah and assuringhimself that the doctor was safe. In the surgery he was amazed to seeboth the doctor and the khansaman, laid on the floor and securely bound.In a moment he cut their bonds.
"Allah is good!" cried the khansaman. "I have even now suffered grievouspangs, and but for thee the sahib would have suffered also."
"How comes this?" asked Ahmed.
"I had taken food to the sahib when Minghal Khan and the darwan came tous with a sepoy: without doubt the darwan had spied me entering thewall. They were armed: the sahib had his pistol, but it is uselessstriving against fate. We should have been slain, and I bethought myselfthat the sahibs are in the city, and perchance if we were spared theycould save us. While there is life there is hope. And we were bound, andMinghal Khan had us carried here, and demanded to know the place wherethe sahib's treasure is concealed. Hai! what treasure have we! He hadtortured me to loose my tongue, and would have done the same to thesahib but that thou camest. Truly Allah is great!"
"Have we taken the city?" asked the doctor.
"We have entered, sahib, and Nikalsain is here; but there is still muchto do, and I heard it said that Reid Sahib has been checked, and theLahore gate is still to be won."
"Well, then, we must hold this house until the rebels are driven away,"said the doctor; "it will be a hard task for us three."
"There are men with me, sahib," said Ahmed. "We make about a score inall."
"Then we can do it. What men are they?"
"Some Sikhs, sahib, and two Englishmen."
"It could not be better. Go and see what can be done to put the house ina state of defence, and come to me here. I am still too weak to do verymuch, I fear; but I can advise, and the men will obey me."
Ahmed hastened away with the khansaman. In the dining-room they foundseveral large bales of goods ready packed: Minghal had evidentlyprepared for the inevitable. It was clear, in spite of his professedpoverty, that he had managed to amass a good deal of plunder, and he hadapparently only delayed with the prospect of adding to his store thetreasure which he believed the doctor had concealed in the house. Therewere two pistols on a shelf: he had not had time to snatch them up as hefled. And in the passage Ahmed discovered a musket and ammunition leftbehind by one of Minghal's men in the hurry of departure. With theselatter Ahmed armed the khansaman, who like most Mohammedans had someknowledge of the gun. The pistols would form an excellent reserve incase of fighting at close quarters.
Ahmed did not suppose that Minghal had gone for good. With three-partsof the city still in the hands of the mutineers there would be no lackof men to help him recover the house that held not only his enemy, butall his property and, as he believed, a hoard of treasure also. Ahmedwas considering how best to prepare for a fierce assault when he heardloud shouts from below. Running to the window from which Minghal hadlooked down on the garden, he saw that several of the enemy had mountedthe wall, on the roof of the colonnade, and that some had dropped to theground on the inner side. But he saw in the same moment that there wasno reason for anxiety as to the safety of the back of the house. Therewas a crowd of about thirty or forty men in the lane outside, but onlyabout half-a-dozen had had the courage to make the escalade of the wall.If the assault had been at all general, the little party inside thegarden would have stood no chance; but dropping one by one, and atirregular intervals, within easy reach of the men underneath thecolonnade, the besiegers had but a short shrift. Before he could recoverhimself each man was beset by the man nearest to him, who dashed frombeneath the cover of the colonnade and attacked him with his sword. Thedefenders wisely reserved their ammunition. A man dropping from a heightrequired a fraction of a second to recover himself. In each case, beforerecovery was possible, one or other of the men had cut his victim down.
Seeing the fate of their companions, the men on the top of the colonnadehesitated to make the jump. They felt themselves, however, secure fromattack, and called to their comrades in the lane to join them. A fewbegan to scramble up, but, although the position of the men beneath thecolonnade was not visible to the attackers on top, the men themselvescould see their enemy through the cracks in the roof where the wood hadwarped. One of the Englishmen, firing upwards through the roof, disposedof a mutineer, who rolled down the slope of the colonnade into thegarden. His comrades, fearing a like fate, hastily vacated the roof anddropped down into the lane, dashing the new-found courage of the men whowere about to join them.
Ahmed ran back to the doctor to inform him of what he had seen.
"Post two men at the window, and let them fire whenever a sepoy showshimself," said the doctor.
The khansaman and one of the Sikhs took up their position at the window.Sped by a few well-directed shots, the enemy either evacuated the laneor took shelter immediately beneath the wall, where they were secure.
Meanwhile, as was soon apparent, they had sent off for reinforcements toroot out this little island of the Feringhis in the middle of an as yetunconquered locality. The sound of firing could still be heard in thedistance, but Ahmed and his companions realized that they were cut offby several hundred yards of streets and houses from Colonel Jones'column, which indeed had by this time probably reached the Begam Bagh,and that the intervening district was without doubt swarming withmutineers. All they could hope to do was to cling to their positionuntil the tide of attack rolled on once more, driving back the rebels,and clearing
the way for a sortie. Ahmed would have been even moreanxious than he was had he known that Colonel Jones was even thendeciding to fall back from the Begam Bagh to a position nearer thewalls, where he intended to remain for the night.
The house was square built, slightly higher than the houses surroundingit. On each side there was a more modern residence, detached, andapproaching within about twenty feet of it. There was no access to thegarden from the front compound except through the house itself.
During the lull which succeeded the first check, the doctor summoned thetwo English corporals, and told them to consider themselves under hisorders.
"All right, your honour," said one of the men. "We're jolly glad to seethat one Englishman has been left alive by the Pandies."
"You don't look very strong, sir," said the other, "and don't you putyourself out. We'll give them ruffians what for."
The doctor posted six men in the front compound. There were six in thegarden. Three he stationed within the house, so that they couldreinforce either the front or the rear, whichever might be the moreseriously pressed. Ahmed he kept with him, and when the others had takenup their positions he sent him to the roof to take stock of thesurroundings.
In two or three minutes Ahmed had got all the information he required.That the enemy was on the alert he soon found by the shots that whistledabout his ears as soon as he was discovered; but by standing a littleway back from the parapet he was protected against any musketry firefrom below. After a careful scrutiny of his surroundings he hurriedbelow and made his report to the doctor.
"Hazur," he said in conclusion, "we cannot hold the house if the rebelscome in sufficient numbers to overcome our men outside. We could notfire on them from the roof, because we should be seen above the parapet,and hit from below; and if we are seen at the windows we shall be marksfor the enemy."
"Then we must set about making the house defensible. Can the parapet beloopholed?"
"Yes, sahib; the brickwork is crumbling, and with tools we could easilymake loopholes."
"Get a hammer and a chisel, khansaman, and go to the roof with AhmedKhan. Jaldi karo! Stay, give the three men below tools for makingloopholes in the shutters; we may want them by and by."
The khansaman provided one of the men with an auger, and the others withpokers and other kitchen utensils, with which, made red-hot, they couldbore holes through the heavy wood of the shutters. Then he followedAhmed to the roof, where they set to work vigorously to make loopholesin the parapet.
There were still sounds of firing in the distance. At present there wasno sign of an attack on the house. Knowing Minghal Khan, Ahmed suspectedthat he was making quite sure there was no danger of being taken in therear before attempting an onslaught.
When his work at the parapet was finished, he went down again to thedoctor, who sent him to see how the men were getting on with their taskat the shutters. Three front windows on the ground floor had alreadybeen bored with two loopholes each, and without consulting the doctor heset the men to treat the shutters of the four windows at the back in thesame way. The men looked at each other in surprise when he had giventhis order and gone.
"Who is this Pathan that gives us commands?" said one of them.
"Yea, he speaks even as the sahibs. Shall we do what one of thesepuffed-up Guides commands us?"
"Not I, for one," said the third man. "The sahib said the front windows;that was his order, given us by the khansaman, who is the sahib'sservant. We shall be shamed if we do the bidding of a vile Pathan."
And they laid down their tools and squatted on the floor.
Ahmed meanwhile had hastened to the front door. He found it was made ofextremely hard wood and thickly covered with iron studs, forming asufficiently stout defence against anything short of a battering-ram ora cannon-shot. Coming back through the house to examine the back doorand the door leading to the servants' quarters, he noticed the threeSikhs squatting in idleness.
"Dogs," he cried, "did not I say go to the back windows, and do as youdid with the front? Why this idleness?"
"We obey the sahibs," said one of the men sulkily.
"Thou son of a dog, take up thy tools at once, or verily thou wilt besorry."
Ahmed stood over the men, and his voice rang with a tone of command asauthoritative as that of their own officers. The Sikh hesitated for amoment, then, to his own surprise, no less than that of his comrades, hetook up his tools, rose, and went off slowly to the back of the house.
"You two follow him," said Ahmed.
And the others got up, and went without a word.
Ahmed found that the back doors were slightly made and frail. They wouldill sustain a vigorous assault. So he got the doctor to give orders thata quantity of heavy furniture should be collected in the passage leadingto them--material for blockading it if the doors were battered down.While perambulating the lower part of the house, he noticed some bales,containing Minghal Khan's possessions, which had been laid against thewall of the compound, in readiness for instant removal. These hecarried, with the khansaman's assistance, to the upper part of thehouse. Then he removed all provisions--a very scanty store--from theservants' quarters, and conveyed the water-pots, filled by the bhistithat morning, to the dining-room. This done, he felt that the garrisonwas prepared to meet the storm.
But when he returned to the surgery, the doctor gave a further order.
"Find a long plank," he said, "as wide as the stairs--nail two together,if you cannot find one wide enough--and drive nails through it so thattheir points stand up."
The necessary material was soon found. When it was thickly studded withnails, the doctor bade them make a hole in it, pass a rope through thehole, and tie it to the newel of the staircase. Ahmed guessed thepurpose it was designed for; for the present he laid it on its side, sothat there was free passage up and down the stairs.
It was a full hour before the attack was resumed. Looking from a window,Ahmed saw the street beyond the compound thronged with rebels, somesepoys, but the majority Irregulars. Ladders were placed against thewall, and the enemy began to swarm up. There was a volley from thedefenders collected at the door of the house. Several of the men who hadmounted the wall fell back; others, finding themselves unsupported, gaveway before the rush of their opponents, who dashed across the compoundand thrust their bayonets fiercely upwards. For a moment the top of thewall was clear, but the defenders had fired their pieces, and Ahmed knewthat a determined rush by the enemy must swamp the little band. Thequestion was, Would this rush come before the men could reload? Theywere hard at work charging their muskets. He shouted to the Sikhs in thehouse to come to the support of their comrades, and then ran to the backto see how things were faring there.
Ahmed was surprised to find things very quiet in that direction. Heheard the sound of a pistol-shot from above. The doctor had stationedhimself at the back window, which had been partially shuttered, andfired one pistol while the khansaman loaded the other. He was a finepistol-shot. The wall at the back prevented the mob in the narrow lanefrom firing at the window. But, as soon as a head showed itself abovethe wall, the doctor never failed to hit. For a few minutes themutineers were baffled, but they soon rose to the situation, swarmedinto a house on the other side of the lane, beyond pistol-shot, andbegan to fire at the shuttered window with their muskets. In a minute ortwo the doctor was forced from his position. A splinter from thewoodwork had slightly wounded him; to stay where he was would have beenmerely to court death.
Once more the enemy in the lane were emboldened to climb the wall andgain the roof of the colonnade. They also swarmed into the gardens ofthe next houses, and began to mount the wall from three sides. One ofthe corporals had ordered the men to reserve their fire until the enemybegan to leap down into the garden, knowing that half-a-dozen men withinwere equal to many times their number dropping one by one from the roofof the colonnade. But the situation was now changed. It was not aquestion of two or three to one, but thirty or forty to one, and a verydetermined rush by the enemy mig
ht cut the men off from the housealtogether. Ahmed saw the danger. Rushing across the garden, he calledto the Sikhs to make a dash for the doorway. The men instantly obeyed;in the excitement of the moment they did not stop to question who it wasthat was giving them orders; it was instinctive with them to obeycommands delivered in that sharp, decisive way. But the corporal did notunderstand the words: he only saw the Sikhs rushing back to the house;and he turned on Ahmed and began to ask, in the lurid vernacular of theBritish soldier, what he meant by interfering. There was no time toanswer. The enemy seized this moment to charge. Ahmed with his sword cutdown one of the men before he had recovered from his leap: thecorporal's bayonet disposed of another. Then the Englishman became aliveto the danger, and with Ahmed sprinted across the garden to the house.One of the Sikhs was waiting to slam the door as soon as they gotthrough. Another, just behind, stood with levelled musket, and took asnap-shot at the man immediately behind Ahmed. The mutineer fell,tripping up the man following him, and giving Ahmed the fraction of asecond that was necessary to slip in behind the corporal and bar thedoor. Two other Sikhs at once occupied the loopholes, and in anothersecond or two their fire brought down two of the leading mutineers.
The doctor, meanwhile, had cried to the other men to post themselves atthe back windows, the shutters of which also were loopholed, and theytoo fired among the throng now crowding into the garden from threesides. There were not wanting men of courage among the assailants, andseveral of them rushed up to the windows with the idea of firing throughthe loopholes, which were plainly to be seen, if only by the smokefiltering through them; but the inside of the house being higher thanthe outside, they were unable to reach high enough to get an aim. Allthey could do was to fire at the shutters, and a scattered volley ofbullets thudded upon them. For the most part they embedded themselves inthe woodwork. One or two actually penetrated the loopholes, but beingfired from below, they failed to hit the men behind, who had retiredslightly from the windows to reload.
The doctor shouted to the men to fire alternately, one reloading whilethe other fired. The mutineers crowding into the garden found themselvesexposed to a deadly dropping of bullets of which they themselves couldsee the fatal results, while they were ignorant of what damage their ownfire was doing. There was no cover in the garden except the fountain.Every part of it was commanded from the door or one or other of thewindows; the fountain would at best shelter only one or two. They foundthat every bullet fired by the garrison meant the loss of one of theirnumber. There were several rushes and attempts to batter in the doorwith the stocks of muskets, or to push the muzzles up through theloopholes, but these always met with the same fate as the first,although one Sikh was badly hit by a splinter.
While the men still kept up their fire, Ahmed rushed through to thefront, whence he again heard the din of conflict. There had been anotherrush up the ladders, met by a fusillade and a charge by the garrisonunder the British corporal. Again the enemy had been hurled back. Ahmedarrived on the scene just in time to see the last man disappearing fromthe wall, transfixed by the corporal's bayonet.
Again there was silence both at the back and in front of the house. Atthe back the crowd of mutineers in the garden had been suddenly seizedwith panic, their comrades dropping one by one beneath the fire of thegarrison without being able to do anything effectual in reply. They hadswarmed back over the colonnade, and regained the lane behind or thegardens of the adjacent houses.
Ahmed seized the interval of quiet to hurry up to the doctor, whom hefound somewhat shaken by his injury, but perfectly calm. He was, indeed,on the point of descending, to take more direct and effectual commandthan was possible from the room above.
"I have had a knock," he said, with a smile, "but I think I can manageto crawl down."
"Not so, sahib," said Ahmed. "They are good fighters, the men below, andthe English naik is a very good man. But if the sahib would go to theroof perhaps he might call down word of what the Purbiyas are doing. Thekhansaman and I can help the sahib to go up."
"Chup! I am not so bad as that. Lend me your arm."
He went up, supported by Ahmed. Together they crawled across the roof tothe parapet and peeped over. There was a confused hubbub below. In thestreet at the front of the house they saw Minghal Khan with a group ofsepoys, but the greater part of the mob consisted of Irregulars, andtheir numbers were much increased since the beginning of the attack.
For a time there was a lull; but ere long it became apparent that theenemy were intending a new move. Men appeared on the roof of a house onthe far side of the road opposite the doctor's gateway. Others at thesame time crowded at the upper windows. A preliminary shot from one ofthe windows showed that the new position occupied by the enemy dominatedthe compound in front of the doctor's house, for one of the Sikhs waswounded by it. Indeed, the doctor wondered whether the men could bewithdrawn safely from their position underneath the front wall. Inrunning the gauntlet over the exposed portion of the compound, many ofthem would probably fall beneath the muskets of the enemy in the houseopposite. Seeing for a moment that there was no threatening of dangerfrom the direction of the lane at the rear, he bade Ahmed crawl over theroof and send the khansaman, who was acting as orderly, to summon fourmen from the back of the house. These he ordered to keep up a brisk fireon the men on the roof and at the windows of the house opposite. Thedoctor's house being higher than the latter, the enemy here were at agreat disadvantage. They maintained the musketry duel for a few minutes,then vacated the position; but although the roof of the doctor's housewas higher than that of the neighbouring buildings, with the exceptionof one at some little distance, it was not so much higher as to afford,with its low parapet, complete protection. A fusillade from severalbuildings at once would make the roof almost untenable, if only byreason of the splinters of brickwork.
That the enemy had realized the weakness of the position on the roof wasevident some ten minutes later. Shots began to patter upon the parapetfrom several directions. The commanding building at a little distancewas now occupied. Here the besiegers were on more level terms with thebesieged, and bullets began to sing across the roof. First one man andthen another was hit, either by bullets or by fragments of the parapet.
"This will never do," said the doctor. "We must go."
They crawled back to the trap-door and descended into the house. But ina moment the doctor saw that the evacuation of the roof would haveserious consequences for the gallant band in the front compound. Unlessthe fire from the opposite house, now packed with marksmen, could bedominated, the next attack on the compound must inevitably succeed. Assoon as its defenders showed themselves in attempting to charge theassailants from the wall, they would become the targets for muskets atno more than fifty or sixty yards' range.
"Run down and bring the men into the house," said the doctor.
Ahmed hastened below and gave the order in the sahib's name, adding acaution to beware of flying bullets. The men scampered back along thefoot of the wall, crouching low. They were not visible from the oppositehouse until they had covered half the distance to the door; then theenemy espied their movement and fired a volley. But the men were goingrapidly in single file; only one was struck, by a bullet rebounding fromthe wall, and in another ten seconds the whole band was safe within thehouse.
The withdrawal was not a moment too soon. There was suddenly a sound ofmany hammers falling upon steel. The enemy were making an attack uponthe walls both at the front and back, driving iron spikes into them withthe object of making loopholes. The walls were stoutly built, and it wasa full quarter of an hour before the iron bars began to show on theirinner side. In half-an-hour at least twenty loopholes had been piercedboth in the front and back, and a continuous fusillade was kept up uponthe shutters and doors of the house. As soon as one man fired outside,apparently his place was taken by another with a newly-loaded musket,and the new-comer only waited until the smoke had partially cleared todischarge his piece. The woodwork of the house was both thick and hard;only a small
proportion of the bullets penetrated the interior; but therange was no more than thirty or forty yards, and there were many goodmarksmen among the sepoys. Two of the garrison standing behind theloopholes were struck, and one musket was rendered useless. Thekhansaman ran to inform the doctor, who had the injured men carriedupstairs, where he extracted the bullets and bound up their wounds. Fora few minutes more the work of loopholing the wall continued, and thedefences were battered with an uninterrupted hail of bullets. Graduallythe shots found weak spots in the woodwork. Another man was hit, thistime through a fissure torn in the shutter by a previous bullet. Everynow and again a yell from the outside told that a bullet from thedefences had made its way through the loopholes of the wall. Theseapertures were a good deal larger than those in the doors and shuttersof the house, and offered a far better mark. The assailants could affordto lose twenty men to one of the besieged. And when the mutineersnoticed that the firing from the house was less in volume owing to thecasualties, they became more and more eager. The British columns hadretired to their positions near the ramparts; the report had flownthrough the city that the fourth column had been annihilated; the rumourwas spreading that the great Nikalsain himself was dead. The fanaticalcrowds in the streets still indulged a hope that the British would berepelled; and meanwhile, to Minghal Khan and his mob, it seemed that thelittle party in the house would ere long fall an easy prey.
The sultry afternoon was drawing on towards night. All sounds of combatelsewhere in the city had ceased. The attack upon the house had as yetfailed: but the outworks had been rendered untenable, and the defencemust now be confined to the house itself. It seemed that Minghal Khanwas satisfied with what he had gained so far; for the firing suddenlyceased, and as darkness sank down upon the scene it appeared probablethat the final assault was deferred until the morning. The doctorscarcely expected a night attack. The enemy had already sufferedseverely, and, numerous as they were, they were not likely to court theheavy losses that an assault in the dark upon strong defences mustentail. That he was right was proved as time passed. A close watch waskept upon the house; fires were lighted both front and back; and mencould be heard talking; but there was no sign of a renewal of theassault.
The little garrison was glad enough of the respite. They were tired outafter the strain of work and fighting during the hot hours of the day.The doctor ordered all the men in turn to act as sentries, one at theback and one at the front, keeping watch while the others slept. It wasonly at the entreaty of the khansaman that he went to his own bed, andhe insisted on being awaked at the first sign of movement among theenemy.
Day had hardly dawned when there came a great yelling from the street,and the rumble of distant wheels. The rumbling sound came nearer momentby moment until it suddenly stopped.
"Go to the roof," said the doctor to Ahmed. His face wore an expressionof great anxiety. Ahmed hurried up through the trap-door and crawled tothe parapet. He was at once seen from the roof of the loftiest house,and bullets pattered round him; but he looked over and saw--what he hadexpected to see. A gun had been brought down the street, and stood inthe gateway of the house immediately opposite the gate of the compound.There were no horses: evidently the gun had been dragged to its positionby men. The gunners were in the act of loading. Ahmed rushed back acrossthe roof, with less caution than before, and was just descending throughthe trap-door when a bullet whizzed past his left ear, carrying away alock of his thick hair. He leapt down the steps, and ran to acquaint thedoctor with the new peril in which the house lay.
Dr. Craddock was perturbed. Neither the gate of the compound nor thedoor of the house, nor even the walls themselves, could stand abattering from round shot, and if a breach was once made the house wouldswarm with the fanatical mutineers, against whom resistance would bevain.
"We must spike the gun, sahib," said Ahmed.
"Impossible! You would rush to your death," replied the doctor.
"Nay, sahib, it must be done; and there is no time to be lost. Give theorder, and we thy servants will obey."
The doctor turned, still hesitating, to one of the corporals andexplained what Ahmed had suggested: he felt that he could hardly orderso desperate an undertaking unless the men would volunteer.
"Spike the gun! Right you are, sir," said the corporal cheerfully. "ThemPandies never can stand a charge. We'll do it, by Jehosopher we will.Blowed if an Englishman is going to be licked by a blooming Pathan."
Ahmed had already seized a hammer and a heavy nail.
"Give them to me, you Pathan," cried the corporal.
"Let him alone," said the doctor. "Get all the men together: nine of youfollow the Guide: the rest man the loopholes. Make your rush when theyhave fired the gun; quick! you haven't a moment to lose."
The whole garrison ran to the front door. Ahmed drew the bolts. The twocorporals and seven of the Sikhs stood ready; the rest went to theloopholes. They had hardly taken their places when there was atremendous roar; the gate of the compound was shattered to splinters;and through the gap and the smoke a crowd of yelling sepoys began topour into the enclosure. But the men at the loopholes had their musketsready: at a word from Ahmed they fired a volley, concentrating their aimon the gateway. The foremost of the besiegers fell, and those behind,taken aback by the sudden volley, paused. At that instant Ahmed flungwide the door, and dashed straight for the gate at the head of ninecheering men with fixed bayonets.
Pandy never waited for the touch of cold steel. There was a wildstampede from the gateway. The sepoys tumbled over one another in theirpanic. While the men behind were pushing on, those in front were pushingback. The crowd fell apart as the cheering band drove through them, andmade a path through which Ahmed and the two corporals headed the resttowards the gun. The gunners stood as if paralyzed; before they couldflee the bayonets had done their fell work.
Ahmed was on the point of spiking the gun when a sudden inspirationseized him. The gun had been partly prepared for the next charge. Roundshot and grape lay ready. The mutineers up the street, charged by theSikhs, were huddled together like a flock of sheep chased by a dog, andthe space around the gun was clear. Ahmed dropped his hammer, and beganto ram in a charge of grape.
"Right you are!" said one of the corporals, divining his intention."We'll slew her round. Come on, Bill."
The two corporals with Ahmed's assistance rammed in the charge, andslewed the gun round so that it pointed down the street, where the crowdwas already beginning to surge back. Then Ahmed snatched up the burningportfire that lay on the ground and applied it to the touch-hole.
There was a babel of yells from the throng as the shot sped among them.In so dense a crowd the havoc was terrific. The instant the gun wasfired, before the smoke had cleared away, Ahmed drove his spike into thetouch-hole, and raising his voice to its highest pitch shouted to theSikhs to return. In a few moments the whole party was dashing backthrough the gateway into the compound. Bullets sang about their ears,fired from the neighbouring houses; but the smoke still lay thick overthe street, giving them partial protection. One man was struck; himAhmed and another caught up and carried between them. They were the lastto reach the door, and had not entered when the crowd, frantic with rageat their losses and the spoiling of their weapon, came surging in at thegate. The door was shut just as the first of them, not stopping to fire,was making a fierce cut at Ahmed.
Breathless but exultant at the success of their desperate enterprise,Ahmed and the little party went to the loopholes and fired a volley atthe assailants which again daunted them. But now a strident voice washeard among the shouts outside. Fierce yells answered it, growing involume every moment.
"A fakir!" cried a Sikh.
"I've heard the like of that screeching in Seven Dials of a Saturdaynight," said one of the corporals.
"And, by gum, it means mischief," said the other. "He'll work thosePandies up into a perfect fury, Jack, and they'll be that mad they'dcharge into hell."
"Well, screeches won't break down the door."
"
No, but a battering-ram will, and dash me if the beggars haven't gotone."
A score of mutineers were hauling a heavy log through the gateway. Atthe same moment there was a great uproar from the rear of the house. Theattack in that quarter had not been resumed since the previous night,the rebels having apparently determined to concentrate on the front,trusting to win an easy victory with the aid of their gun. Owing to thecasualties among the defenders, only ten men were now available, and thedivision of forces necessary to cope with simultaneous attacks in bothfront and rear laid a heavy handicap upon them. Half ran to the back torepel the assault. The furniture had already been massed against thedoor, and Ahmed saw with relief that by firing through the loopholes inthe shutters the attackers could for the present be held off. It wasotherwise in front. Several of the men carrying the log were shot down,but others took their places before the defenders could reload, and theram was launched against the timber. The whole building trembled underthe impact, and though the door for the moment held fast, it was plainthat it could not long withstand such a battery.
The doctor was alive to the situation. He called to the men to preparefor a rush up the staircase, bidding one of them get ready thenail-studded plank for laying lengthwise on the stairs. While the menwere still holding their position at the loopholes, they heard the soundof wrenching woodwork above, and in a few minutes there was a large gapin the ceiling of the hall. Immediately afterwards there came from abovethe sharp sound of hammers on metal. Ahmed could not guess what thedoctor and the khansaman were doing, but felt sure that whatever it wasthe defence would gain by it.
Meanwhile the battering on the front door had at last loosened thehinges; it was time to retire. Ahmed and the five men with him went afew steps up the staircase. Then he laid the plank on the treads, sothat none of the enemy could mount without crossing five feet of sharpiron points. The massive timber withstood several more assaults beforethere was a final crash, and it hung half open, disclosing a part of theyelling crowd outside. Ahmed and his comrades were only dimly visible tothe besiegers, while the latter in the open courtyard were in full viewof the besieged. A second after the door burst open the six men on thestairs fired together. There was no chance of missing the densely packedthrong--every shot claimed its victim. For a second or two the crowdrecoiled. The little firing party ran up to the landing. Then thedoctor, limping to the top of the stairs, gave directions to thekhansaman to pour down the plank the contents of a huge blue bottle.Shots were whistling round them from the muskets of the rebels who hadswarmed into the hall, but neither showed the slightest concern. Kalujahad just finished his work when, led by the shrieking fakir, the mobmade a rush for the stairway. Several men, heedless of the nails,scrambled up for a foot or two. Then with shrill cries of rage and painthey jumped backwards, overturning their comrades who were pressing onbehind them. The plank was smoking with the strong acid which thekhansaman had poured upon it. Most of the mob were barefooted, and eventheir tough soles could not withstand the effects of the burning liquid,the fumes from which set those above choking.
The hall was now packed tight with yelling rebels, so closely pressedtogether that to use their muskets was impossible. They had no escapefrom the shots fired by the men above as fast as they could reload. Thena new terror was added to the scene. Ahmed now saw the meaning of theknocking he had heard. Over the gap in the floor the khansaman had laidthe doctor's sitz-bath, in the bottom of which he had pierced a numberof holes. He was now engaged in emptying the contents of his master'sbottles into the bath, the doctor adding water from time to time. Itwould have puzzled the most expert chemist to define the chemicalcomposition which fell in a steady shower on the heads of thepanic-stricken mutineers. The liquid fizzed and smoked, and changedcolour like a chameleon--now green, now yellow, now brown, now anindescribable mixture of tints. There was only one desire among thediscomfited enemy: to escape from this cockpit in which they sufferedpangs due to the hakim's mysterious art as well as to the more familiarweapons of war. Pushing, shouting, scrambling over each other, theyforced their way out into the compound, and there was such a wringing ofhands and such a chorus of groans as surely Delhi had never heard orseen before.
The attack at the front had been effectually beaten off. The doctorhoped that the enemy would now retire altogether. But Ahmed ran up tothe roof to see whether they were indeed withdrawing. The street wasstill full of rebels, and an excited altercation was going on amongthem. The central figures were Minghal Khan, who had hitherto beencontent to hound the men on without showing much eagerness to lead them,and the fakir, who bore many marks of the chemical baptism he hadreceived. The uproar was too great to allow Ahmed to hear what was beingsaid; he could only guess at it by the gesticulations of the men and bywhat happened afterwards. The fakir had, in fact, called on the fanaticswho surrounded him, to bring combustibles for the burning of the house.Against this Minghal vehemently protested: the king's orders were thatno houses should be fired: this would be only to assist the Feringhis.But the fakir scoffed at orders: it was the duty of all the faithful todestroy the infidels by any means in their power. Then Minghal usedanother argument: there was valuable property in the house--hisproperty, his all. The fakir's answer to this was a horrible laugh, andthe taunt that Minghal had shown no disposition to go into the house andfetch his valuable property. Minghal was overborne. Devoted adherents ofthe fakir brought up shavings, pieces of wood, jars of oil. Then, wavinghis arms, his long beard dripping in many-coloured drops, the fakir ledthe shouting mob round to the lane at the back. Not even he cared toface the front again.
Ahmed was descending to inform the doctor of this new move, when hestopped suddenly. A fresh sound had caught his ear: the sound of firing,both artillery and musketry, far away. Were the British columns renewingtheir assault? Was Colonel Jones forcing his way through the city againtowards the mosque? His heart leapt with a great hope. The mutineerswere coming to fire the house: nothing could prevent them; but ratherthan die like rats in a trap, he and his comrades must make a dashthrough the compound, and try to cut their way towards their friends.Suddenly he remembered the doctor. He could not take part in such asortie. He must not be abandoned. The idea must be given up: there wasnothing for it but to hold out to the last moment.
The roofs and windows of the surrounding houses were deserted. No doubttheir former occupants had learnt that the house was to be fired and hadjoined the mob below, hoping for a share in the expected butchery andplunder. Here was a chance of dealing the enemy a last blow. Through thetrap-door Ahmed called to the men to bring up his musket and join him.The mob was already pouring down the lane behind the fakir--hundreds ofmen in the frenzied zeal of fanaticism. They came to the garden wall andbegan to swarm over it; some burst in the gate; they flocked through innumbers too great to be checked by the fire of the ten men above. Avolley flashed; Ahmed took aim at the fakir: he and the men nearest himfell. Those behind leapt over their prostrate bodies, and with fiercecries threw themselves against the door. Once more the ten fired amongthem; then Ahmed saw that men were again appearing on the roof of thenearest house, and before the little party all descended through thetrap-door a Sikh and one of the corporals were hit.
When the others reached the doctor, they found him quietly preparing abomb. He had filled a canister with powder, attached a roughly-madefuse, and was about to light it and fling the bomb among the enemy. Atthe sight of it an alternative scheme flashed into Ahmed's mind. Hequickly explained it to the doctor, then hurried away through thealmirah into the secret chamber below. Placing the table on the doctor'scharpoy, he mounted on it, and laid the canister in a little ventilatingrecess just below the fountain. Then he lit the fuse and rushed away,slamming the door behind him.
He was only half-way up the stairs when he heard the back door burst inwith a crash. Immediately afterwards there was a terrific report, thatshook the house. He ran back, waited a minute or two to allow the fumesof the explosion to clear away, and re-entered the room. It was a wreck.The
fountain had fallen into it, and it was choked with rubbish.Creeping over obstacles he saw a gap above his head, through which, byand by, it might be possible to reach the garden. He hurried back to thesurgery. Whatever might have happened to the crowd in the garden, thosewho had entered the house had kindled a fire; the room was already fullof smoke. In another minute all the little company had descended thespiral stairs to the secret room, leaving the wall of the surgery closedbehind them. Below they would be safe for a time, the underground roombeing connected with the house only by the stone staircase.
Meanwhile the mutineers, daunted by the sudden explosion, had withdrawnto the further side of the garden. Some in terror had recrossed thewall; but the fire was alight; there had been no sign of any attempt atescape on the part of the garrison; and the fanatical throng exulted inthe belief that ere long their victims would be consumed with the house.
Half-an-hour passed. The waiting men noticed that the uproar above,which had diminished, now broke out again with redoubled clamour. And itwas not yells of execration and of triumph, but the cries of men infight, mingled with the sound of musketry. Ahmed ventured to mount onthe heap of rubbish towards the small gap where the fountain had been.He came to the surface, and as he put his head cautiously out, the firstsight that met his eyes was a red-coated British officer, with flashingsword, chasing the darwan across the garden. The chase was brief; theman fell; and the officer, turning to rejoin his men, caught sight ofAhmed, who had crawled out of the hole and was running towards him. Hecame with outstretched sword to deal with another mutineer, as hesupposed, and observing the khaki uniform, hastened his step with amuttered imprecation: it was a new thing for the wearers of the khaki toturn traitors. But Ahmed drew himself up and stood at the salute.
"Hazur," he said, "there is a sahib below, and I am of Lumsden Sahib'sGuides."
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