Windrush: Cry Havelock (Jack Windrush Book 4)

by Malcolm Archibald

  'I'm glad to hear it, Thorpe. I don't want it to explode until we're well clear, and I want it to take the mine down. Can you do that?'

  'Of course sir.' Thorpe sounded pained at Jack doubting his professional skill. He looked at the pile of kegs and the tunnel. 'It's a pity you ruined so many of them; I could have blown up half Lucknow if you'd let me.'

  Jack grunted. 'That's precisely why I did not let you, Thorpe, and hurry man; the Mutineers will recover and be back anytime.'

  'Give me a minute sir,' Thorpe said. 'I have to do this properly.' He tugged at the barrels, checking which ones were soaked and which still contained dry powder.

  'Get a move on, Thorpe!' Jack ran to the bend in the tunnel and looked around, jerking back as somebody fired a pistol at him. 'Hurry, man!'

  At Jack's shout, the press of rebels increased their speed. He fired twice at the leading man, saw him stagger and temporarily block the passage and then Thorpe was at his side, grinning.

  'Right, sir; I've lit two fuses.'

  'Jesus, Thorpe! We have to get out first.'

  'You said to hurry, sir!' Thorpe sounded indignant. 'So I hurried.'

  'Come on, man!' Firing a final shot, Jack followed Thorpe to the head of the mine, where the powder casks provided their only access to the hole in the roof.

  Thorpe had laid a spiral trail of gunpowder around the top few yards of the tunnel, with the sputtering flame ending at an open keg at the bottom of the pyramid.

  'How long will it take?' Jack asked as he clambered toward the hole. He gasped as the wound in his side opened, and fresh blood seeped out.

  'Three minutes sir, and then,' Thorpe waited for Jack beside the hole. 'Bang!' He grinned. 'I wish I could see it close.'

  'If you do, you'd be blown to bits.' Jack pushed him outside. 'Get up there, Thorpe!' He had one last glance down, where sparks and smoke hissed from the gunpowder fuse, saw the Mutineers rush forward and hauled himself outside. Sunlight hit him like a hammer, bright, hard and unfriendly. He stood up, suddenly feeling very exposed. He was about two hundred yards from the Residency, with gunfire booming from both sides and Thorpe hesitating, trying to stare down the hole to watch the coming explosion.

  'Thorpey! Sir!' Coleman was standing in the lee of a ruined building about thirty yards away, toward the city. 'Over here!' He gestured violently. 'Hurry!'

  Jack heard the crackle of musketry and then saw the Mutineers; there were perhaps fifteen of them standing behind a small wall near Coleman. A havildar snapped an order, and their rifles came to the present, and another order had the muzzles pointing directly at him.

  'Get down, sir!' Thorpe grabbed Jack's arm and pulled him to the ground an instant before the volley crashed out.

  Jack heard the bullets passing overhead and then he was on his feet and running, with Thorpe at his side and their feet kicking up little spurts of dust.

  'This way, sir!' Coleman shouted. 'We're over here!'

  Jack's men sheltered in the shattered fragments of a house, with Logan and Coleman taking it in turns to load and fire over the wall toward the Mutineers. Sergeant O'Neill half lay, half slumped against a broken doorway, with his face drawn and white from loss of blood.

  'Sir,' Thorpe said. 'There's nothing happened. My explosion hasn't happened.'

  Jack nodded, ducking as something smashed into the wall from behind him. He looked around; there was gunfire from the British defenders in front and much heavier fire from the tangled streets and palaces of Lucknow behind. They were in the middle, a no-man's land where stray shots or falling cannonballs could fall at any second. 'I hope the rebels have not managed to put the fuse out.'

  'I lit two, sir,' Thorpe said. 'That's why I was so long. I lit the one in the middle of the ground so the pandies would think there were only one, and another hidden beside the barrels.'

  'Well done, Thorpe.' Jack was surprised Thorpe had thought of a decoy.

  A head thrust from the hole they had made and a rebel miner climbed out and looked around, followed by another.

  'Do you want me to shoot them, sir? Or will I shoot they sepoy lads?' Logan swivelled his rifle from side to side in momentary indecision.

  'Shoot the sepoys,' Jack decided for him. 'The fuse must have gone out, Thorpe.'

  'No, sir.' Thorpe spoke with conviction. 'My fuses won't go out. I know what I'm doing.'

  Although they were expecting it, the explosion took both Jack and Thorpe by surprise. Jack had felt the shock wave before he heard anything, and then the ground around the mine rose up. It split asunder, sending dirt and rocks and pieces of human bodies in a dirty surge upwards before they fell back in a wide irregular circle. The ground between the explosion and the British positions slid downward to create an immediate and obvious depression. The two rebel miners who had emerged had vanished.

  'Jesus,' Thorpe was staring, open-mouthed. 'That was something worth seeing, sir!'

  'Logan, Coleman, Williams' Jack said sharply. 'Why have you stopped firing?' He pointed at the sepoys. 'They're standing like targets that even a Johnny Raw could hit!'

  Shocked by the sudden eruption in the ground, the sepoys were staring at the still descending debris. Some stood open-mouthed, others had dropped their rifles. Jack heard Logan's evil laugh as he lined up the Havildar and fired, with the bullet taking the man in the chest and knocking him off his feet. Coleman and Williams were a fraction slower and less accurate, with one other sepoy falling.

  'Sir,' Thorpe rubbed his ears and shouted. 'Can you hear something?'

  'It's only temporary,' Jack yelled. 'Your hearing will come back.'

  'No, sir, I mean can you hear music or something?' Thorpe looked around as a British cannon crashed out, and a ball arced overhead. A Mutineer battery returned fire with some interest.

  'It's the pipes,' Logan shouted above their temporary deafness after the blast. 'It'll be the 78th inside our lines.'

  'It's coming from over there.' Coleman jerked a finger over his shoulder.

  Jack ducked as a bullet smacked into the wall beside his head. He eyed the hundreds of yards between their present position and the besieged garrison and knew it would be a killing ground. The besiegers had an unknown number of cannon covering the open area, plus thousands of men with muskets and rifles. As he watched, the Mutineers opened fire with a torrent of solid ball and grapeshot that tore up the ground and hammered at the defenders' walls.

  Coleman loaded his rifle, aimed and fired. 'There's your leg broken for you, you bastard.'

  'We're not going back to the Residency,' Jack decided. 'We're heading for Sir Colin.' For a moment he had a vision of the dour Scotsman who led the Highland Brigade at the Alma and commanded the Thin Red Line at Balaklava. There was nobody with whom he had more confidence, except perhaps Havelock.

  Looking over the back wall of the building, Jack worked out their route out of this open wasteland to the shelter of the relieving British column. Without knowing exactly where the rebel positions were, he would have to treat every building as a possible enemy strongpoint and move from cover to cover. He eyed the ground, seeing a surreal landscape of walled palaces and mosques with minarets, ruined buildings and patches of woodland. The whole area was graced by parkland and spoiled by dead bodies, fighting soldiers and the snouts of cannons.

  'Follow me, men,' Jack said. 'Keep under cover as much as you can.' He darted to a ruined cottage, whose roof slowly smouldered under the sun.

  'This is like walking through a fairytale,' Coleman pointed to a distant palace with tall towers and a beautiful dome. 'You can just see Cinderella living there, can't you?'

  'Who's Cinderella?' Fairytales had not been part of Thorpe's childhood.

  'She's a sort of princess,' Coleman said. 'Far too good for the likes of you.'

  'Stuck-up bitch, her,' Thorpe gave his opinion at once. 'Living out here and thinking she's better than we are. Bloody black bastard, she is.'

  'She wasn't black,' Coleman said.

  'Then why is she li
ving in India? Stupid bint.' Thorpe grabbed hold of Coleman's arm. 'Over to the right, Coley!'

  'Sir!' Coleman hissed. 'Thorpey's seen something.'

  'Where?' Jack halted the men. They lay down, searching for dead ground or a bush, rock, anything behind which they could shelter. Armstrong and Williams supported O'Neill between them.

  'Over there, sir. In the corner of that broken cottage.' Thorpe did not point; such sudden movement attracted unwanted attention.

  Jack stared through the heat-haze and drifting smoke. 'Whitelam; can you see anything?'

  'Yes, sir. Two men, three. They're wearing black shakos and red coats.'

  'Mutineers,' Jack decided. There was a clear space in front before the next small copse of tangled trees. 'We'll never make it without being seen.'

  'We can take them, sir,' Coleman said.

  'We'll have to.' Jack agreed. He lay flat, spying out the land. 'There is a depression from here to that tree,' he nodded toward a lone peepul tree on which a score of birds was sitting. 'When we reach it, we keep down and go round the back of their position.'

  'Sir,' Whitelam said softly. 'The birds will make a noise when we reach them. They'll give us away.'

  Jack measured the distance from the peepul tree to the occupied cottage. 'There are fifty yards of open ground to cover,' he said. 'We might do it in a rush.'

  There were at least three Mutineers in the cottage. If each got off one shot, they might kill three of his men. Was there an alternative? Perhaps there was, for men with firm nerves.

  'We follow the dead ground to the tree,' he decided. 'Then we stand slowly, so as not to alarm the birds and we walk to the Mutineers' positions. God knows we could pass for pandies; we're in rags and are as tanned as they are. We might get close before they realise what we are, and then in with the bayonet.'

  It was a simple plan, made in seconds, but it was the best Jack could do.

  'How are you doing, Sergeant?'

  'Fine, sir, but I'll slow you down.' O'Neill managed a wan smile. 'Best if you just leave me here and get to the British lines.'

  Jack frowned. 'You're not thinking about deserting are you, O'Neill?'

  'No, sir!' O'Neill said.

  'Then stay with us, Sergeant.'

  With his heart hammering, Jack led his men through the depression, feeling the sun burning his head and hoping the Mutineers were not watching, waiting for him to get closer. The tree loomed ahead with the birds chattering on the upper branches: he did not know what kind of birds they were and did not care.

  Jack reached the tree and stood up slowly, breathing heavily. His men followed one by one. He could feel the tension as he stepped toward the Mutineers with every yard gained decreasing the distance to cover yet also making him an easier target.

  'We could charge them, sir,' Logan said.

  'Keep quiet Logan and walk slowly.'

  The birds did not react until the last man arrived at the peepul tree and then they exploded skyward with fluttering wings and loud cries that must have alerted the Mutineers. Jack squared his shoulders and put on a swagger as if he had every right to be in the no-man's-land between the British and the rebel lines.

  'They've seen us,' Whitelam said softly. 'Their turning our way.'

  'Wave,' Jack said and lifted his right hand. 'Confuse them!'

  He kept walking, feeling the prickle of tension as the Mutineers appeared in gaps of the wall. There were only three, and two pointed their rifles directly at Jack. One of the Mutineers shouted something, either a greeting or a challenge and he replied with one word.

  'Shabash!' and then he remembered his Urdu. 'Jai ram!' His men followed, shouting 'jai ram' as if their lives depended on it, as perhaps they did, Jack realised.

  Judging the distance, he tensed, still waving. 'Right boys,' he muttered. 'Take them!' Jack began the rush, but despite his bleeding leg, Logan was there first, dodging sideways as one of the Mutineers fired and lunged in with the bayonet before the man recovered. With the other men of the 113th following, the rebels were overwhelmed, their dead bodies ugly in death, just three more victims of war.

  'Keep within the cottage walls,' Jack was breathing heavily. 'In case somebody investigates the shooting.'

  Armstrong arrived with O'Neill slung across his back. 'The sergeant's passed out, sir.'

  'Look after him, Armstrong.'

  'Aye, sir.'

  They crouched down, with flies already exploring the dead Mutineers. The birds circled for a while and returned to the peepul tree; for them, the incident was over. Jack looked around. Lucknow shimmered under the sun; somewhere artillery fired, and then the shrill notes of a bugle. 'I think we're all right,' he rose cautiously and stepped forward, feeling the pounding of his heart. Coleman was right behind them, with Logan and Thorpe next. 'That copse there,' Jack pointed ahead. 'Walk quickly rather than run.'

  He did not see from where the shots came; he only saw the spurts of dust they raised and heard the curious double-crash of the original report and the quick echo. 'Move!'

  The 113th needed no urging. Dodging and jinking, they scattered and ran to the trees, with bullets thudding into the ground around them. Jack helped Armstrong with O'Neill and joined the others in the copse. 'Anybody hurt?'

  'No, sir,' Coleman seemed to have taken up the role of a non-commissioned officer. 'We're all here safe and sound.'

  'Did anybody see who was firing?' Jack asked. 'And what's that buzzing sound?'

  'I did, sir,' Whitelam said. 'The shots came from over there.' He pointed forward, the direction in which they were heading. 'I think it was our side.'

  'Thank you, Whitelam.' Jack moved deeper into the trees and immediately wished he had not. Flies rose in uncounted thousands from a layer of corpses. 'Oh, dear God!'

  'We can't stay here, sir,' Thorpe swatted vainly at the swarm that now surrounded them. 'They'll eat us alive.'

  Jack nodded and spat out a fly in disgust. 'Skirt the bodies and move on. We can't have far to go now.'

  'Over there, sir,' Whitelam pointed. 'There's a picket coming out from these buildings.'

  'That's the Sikandrabagh,' Jack said. It was another walled palace, with a secure gateway, corner bastions and loopholes. 'This place could have been created as a soldier's nightmare.'

  Carrying Enfield rifles with fixed bayonets, the men wore dun-khaki coloured tunics, dark trousers and white forage hats. A handkerchief shaded the back of their necks. The man who led them wore a red jacket, dark-tartan kilt and strode forward with no attempt at concealment. 'They're ours, right enough,' Jack said. 'Madras Fusiliers led by a Highland major. Ninety-third I think. Stay put just now.'

  Jack emerged when the picket was within a few yards of the copse. 'Well met, Ninety-third!'

  Dark lines of weariness marked the face of the major. 'Who the deuce are you and where did you come from?'

  'Captain Jack Windrush of the 113th, sir.'

  '113th?' The major frowned. 'I thought you were inside the Residency.'

  'Most of us are sir.'

  'Oh, I see.' The major gave a small nod of his head. 'Well, your men may have to stay there for some time, Windrush. The Mutineers have held us up here at the Sikandrabagh; the palace over there, in case you didn't know.'

  'What happened?'

  'We were pushing toward Lucknow when the rebels in the Sikandrabagh opened up on us.'

  The Sikandrabagh wall was around 150 yards long, with tell-tale spurts of smoke where the Mutineers were firing at the relieving, and to Jack still invisible, British column. 'The palace is inside the walls of course.' The major stood erect as a cannonball ripped overhead. 'We were jammed in a cul-de-sac. These fellows deserve to get hanged for letting any of us out alive. I'm MacRae by the way, of the Ninety-third. Come on, Windrush, and we'll get you back with the column.'

  There was the ear-battering crack of artillery as a six-gun battery of the Bengal Horse Artillery opened up.

  'That'll be Captain Blunt.' MacRae had not flinched at the sou
nd. 'He galloped through the Mutineers' fire to get his guns in place.'

  Despite the torrent of iron from the Sikandrabagh walls, sappers were throwing down bankings and making space for a two-gun battery of eighteen-pounders. Within an astonishingly short time, the guns thrust their evil snouts toward the garden walls. Crisp commands heralded the commencement of the bombardment.

  'Where could I find Sir Colin?'

  'Over there,' MacRae pointed to the massed ranks of the 93rd, which waited, hands grasping their rifles and eyes narrowed. In front, Sir Colin sat astride his horse talking to their colonel.

  'Lie down, Ninety-third, lie down' Sir Colin spoke in his customary Glasgow burr, so different from the gutter accent of Donnie Logan. 'Every man of you is worth his weight in gold today.'

  'Sir!' Jack reported what had happened.

  'So you caused that explosion.' Sir Colin was as dour as ever as he scrutinised Jack. 'I remember you from the Crimea. You're a captain now, I see.'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'Your regiment had a bad time at Gondabad.'

  'Yes, sir. We lost the best part of a company and most of the senior officers.'

  Sir Colin frowned. 'That was rather careless of you. How did you escape?'

  'I had my company away on a route march, sir.'

  'You were lucky. Get your wounded man away safe and stay close to me, Windrush.' Sir Colin turned aside as an ensign ran to him with a gasped message. 'Very good.' He raised his voice. 'Ewart!' The colonel of the 93rd came to him, pulling at a fine set of whiskers.

  'The eighteen-pounders have made a breach, Ewart. It's time to bring on the tartan,' Campbell said. 'Let my own lads at them.'

  'Sir,' Jack stepped forward. 'I have a few men with me. Could I have your permission to join the 93rd?'

  Campbell nearly smiled. 'If I recall, you were with the 93rd at the Alma. Don't let your men get in the way, Windrush.'

  'We'll be careful, sir.'

  The artillery had blown the hole in the south-east angle of the wall, where once a doorway had stood, and the Highlanders were already there. At three foot square, the breach was smaller than Jack had anticipated, yet the Highlanders did not object. One at a time they pushed through the gap, firing as they entered and fended off the Mutineers with their bayonets until the next man arrived and their numbers grew.