by Talbot Mundy
“How did you do all that in time?” demanded Will. “It looks like one of those contractor’s jobs in the States — put through while you wait and to hell with everything!”
“It follows the old road,” Monty answered. “There was too much cobble-paving for the trees to take hold, and most of what they had to cut was small stuff. That accounts, too, for the freedom from stumps. But, do you get the idea? The trees between the end of the cutting and the clay ramp are cut almost through — ready to fall, in fact. I’m afraid of a wind. If it blows, our screen may fall too soon! But if the Turks try to storm the ramp, we’ll draw them on. Then, hey — presto! Down go the remaining trees, and into the middle of ’em rides our cavalry!”
“What’s the use of cavalry four abreast?” demanded Fred, in no mood to be satisfied with anything.
“Rustum Khan is concentrating all his energy on teaching that one maneuver,” Monty answered. “We come—”
“Thought it ‘ud be ‘we!’ Your place is at the rear, giving orders!”
“We come down the track at top speed, and the impetus will carry us clear across the ramp. Some of the horses’ll go down, because the slope is slippery. But the remainder will front form squadron, and charge down hill in line. Then watch!”
“All right,” Fred grumbled. “But how about you rear while all that’s going on? The Turk must have worked his way around Beirut Dagh on former occasions — or how else could he ever have built and held that dismantled fort? What’s to stop him from doing it again?”
“It’s a fifteen-mile fight ahead of him,” Monty answered, “with riflemen posted at every vantage-point all the way—”
“Who is in charge of the riflemen?”
Kagig leaned back until he looked in danger of falling, and tapped his breast significantly three times.
“I — I have picked the men who will command those riflemen and women!”
“Well,” Fred grumbled, “what are your plans for us?”
“For the last time, Fred, I want you, old man, to help me to persuade these others to escape into the hills while there’s still a chance, and I want you to go with them.”
“I also!” exclaimed Kagig. “I also desire that!”
“Now you’ve got that off your chest, Didums, suppose you talk sense,” suggested Fred. “What are your plans?”
Monty recognized the unalterable, and set his face.
“You first, Miss Vanderman. There’s one way in which we can always use a gentlewoman’s services.”
“Mayn’t I fight?” she begged, and we all laughed.
“‘Fraid not. No. The women have cleared out several houses for a hospital. Please go and superintend.”
“Damn!” exclaimed Gloria, Boston fashion, not in the least under her breath.
“I am sending word,” said Kagig, “that they shall obey you or learn from me!”
“The rest of us,” Monty went on, “will know better what to do when we know what the Turk intends, but I expect to send all of you from time to time to wherever the fighting is thickest. Kagig, of course, will please himself, and my orders are subject to his approval.”
“I’ll go, then,” said Gloria. “Good-by!” And she kissed Will on the mouth in full view of all of us, he blushing furiously, and Kagig cracking all his finger-joints.
“Go with her, Will!” urged Monty, as she disappeared down the steps.
“Go and save yourself. You’re young. I’ve notions of my own that
I’ve inherited, and the world calls me a back number. You go with
Miss Vanderman!”
I seconded that motion.
“Go with her, Will! I’ve warned you she’s unsafe alone! Go and protect her!”
Will grinned, wholly without malice.
“Thanks!” he said. “She’s a back number, too. So’m I! If I left Monty in this pinch she’d never look at me, and I’d not ask her to! Inherited notions about merit and all that kind of thing, don’t you know, by gosh! No, sir! She and I both sat into this game. She and I both stay! Wish Esau would open the ball, though. I’m tired of talking.”
Chapter Nineteen “Such drilling as they have had — such little drilling!”
ICH DIEN
Is honor out of fashion and the men she named
Fit only to be buried and defamed
Who dared hold service was true nobleness
And graced their service in a fitting dress?
Are manners out of date because the scullions scoff
At whosoever shuns the common trough
Liking dry bread better than the garbled stew
Nor praising greed because the style is new?
Let go the ancient orders if so be their ways
Are trespassing on decency these days.
So I go, rather than accept the trampled spoil
Or gamble for what great men earned by toil.
For rather than trade honor for a mob’s foul praise
I’ll keep full fealty to the ancient ways
And, hoistinq my forebear’s banner in the face of hell,
Will die beneath it, knowing I die well!
Fifteen minutes after Gloria Vanderman left us I saw a banner go jerkily mounting up the newly placed flag-pole on the keep. A man blew a bugle hoarsely by way of a salute. I raised my hat. Monty raised his. In a moment we were all standing bare-headed, and the great square piece of cloth caught the wind that whistled between two crags of Beirut Dagh.
Fred, our arch-iconoclast, stood uncovered longest.
“Who the devil made it for you?” he inquired.
Stitched on the banner in colored cloth were the two wheat-sheaves and two ships of the Montdidiers, and a scroll stretched its length across the bottom, with the motto doubtless, although in the wind one could not read it.
“The women. Good of ’em, what? Miss Vanderman drew it on paper.
They cut it out, and sat up last night sewing it.”
“I suppose you know that’s filibustering, to fly your private banner on foreign soil?”
“They may call it what they please,” said Monty. “I can’t well fly the flag of England, and Armenia has none yet. Let’s go below, Fred, and see if there’s any news.”
“Yes, there is news,” said Kagig, leading the way down. “I did not say it before the lady. It is not good news.”
“That’s the only kind that won’t keep. Spit it out!” said Will.
Kagig faced us on the stable roof, and his finger-joints cracked again.
“It is the worst! They have sent Mahmoud Bey, against us. I would rather any six other Turks. Mahmoud Bey is not a fool. He is a young successful man, who looks to this campaign to bolster his ambition. He is a ruthless brute!”
“Which Turk isn’t?” asked Will.
“This one is most ruthless. This Mahmoud is the one who in the massacres of five years ago caused Armenian prisoners to have horse-shoes nailed to their naked feet, in order, he said, that they might march without hurt. He will waste no time about preliminaries!”
Kagig was entirely right. Mahmoud Bey began the overture that very instant with artillery fire directed at the hidden defenses flanking the clay ramp. Next we caught the stuttering chorus of his machine guns, and the intermittent answer of Kagig’s riflemen.
“Now, effendim, one of you down to the defenses, please! There is risk my men may use too many cartridges. Talk to them — restrain them. They might listen to me, but—” His long fingers suggested unhappy fragments of past history.
“You, Fred!” said Monty, and Fred hitched his concertina to a more comfortable angle.
Fred was the obvious choice. His gift of tongues would enable him better than any of us to persuade, and if need were, compel. We had left our rifles leaning by the wall at the castle entrance, and in his cartridge bag was my oil-can and rag-bag. I asked him for them, and he threw them to me rather clumsily. Trying to catch them I twisted for the second time the ankle I had hurt that morning. Fred mounted and rode out thro
ugh the echoing entrance without a backward glance, and I sat down and pulled my boot off, for the agony was almost unendurable.
“That settles your task for to-day,” laughed Monty. “Help him back to the top of the tower, Will. Keep me informed of everything you see. Will — you go with Kagig after you’ve helped him up there.”
“All right,” said Will. “Where’s Kagig bound for?”
“Round behind Beirut Dagh,” Kagig announced grimly. “That’s our danger-point. If the Turks force their way round the mountain—” He shrugged his expressive shoulders. Only he of all of us seemed to view the situation seriously. I think we others felt a thrill rather of sport than of danger.
I might have been inclined to resent the inactivity assigned to me, only that it gave me a better chance than I had hoped for of watching for signs of Maga Jhaere’s promised treachery. Will helped me up and made the perch comfortable; then he and Kagig rode away together. Presently Monty, too, mounted a mule, and rode out under the arch, and fifteen minutes later fifty men marched in by twos, laughing and joking, and went to saddling the horses in the semicircular stable below me. After that all the world seemed to grow still for a while, except for the eagles, the distant rag-slitting rattle of rifle-fire, and the occasional bursting of a shell. Most of the shells were falling on the clay ramp, and seemed to be doing no harm whatever.
Away in the distance down the pass, out of range of the fire of our men, but also incapable of harm themselves until they should advance into the open jaws below the clay ramp, I could see the Turks massing in that sort of dense formation that the Germans teach. Even through the glasses it was not possible to guess their numbers, because the angle of vision was narrow and cut off their flanks to right and left; but I sent word down to Monty that a frontal attack in force seemed to be already beginning.
For an hour after that, while the artillery fire increased but our rifle-fire seemed to dwindle under Fred’s persuasive tongue, I watched Monty mustering reenforcements in the gorge below the town. He overcame some of the women’s prejudice, for it was a force made up of men and women that he presently led away. I was rather surprised to see Rustum Khan, after a talk with Monty, return to his squadron and remain inactive under cover of the hill; that fire-eater was the last man one would expect to remain willingly out of action. However, twenty minutes later, Rustum Khan appeared beside me, breathing rather hard. He begged the glasses of me, and spent five minutes studying the firing-line minutely before returning them.
“The lord sahib has more faith in these undrilled folk than I have!” he grumbled at last. “Observe: he goes with that bullet-food of men and women mixed, to hide them in reserve behind the narrow gut at the head of the ramp. The Turks are fools, as Kagig said, and their general is also a fool, in spite of Kagig. They propose to force that ramp. You see that by Frredd sahib’s orders the firing on our side has grown greatly less. That is to draw the Turks on. See! It has drawn them! They are coming! The lord sahib will send for Frredd sahib to take command of that reserve, to man the top of the ramp in case the Turks succeed in climbing too far up it. Then he himself will gallop back to take charge of my squadron below there; and I take charge of his squadron up here. He and I are interchangeable, I having drilled all the men in any case — such drilling as they have had — such little, little drilling!”
The Turks began their advance into the jaws of that defile with a confidence that made my heart turn cold. What did they know? What were they depending on in addition to their weight of numbers? Mahmoud Bey had evidently hurried up almost his whole division, and was driving them forward into our trap as if he knew he could swallow trap and all. Not even foolish generals act that way. It needs a madman. Kagig had said nothing about Mahmoud being mad.
“Listen, Rustum Khan!” I said. “Go with a message to Lord Montdidier. Tell him the whole Turkish force is in motion and coming on as if their general knows something for certain that we don’t know at all. Tell him that I suspect treachery at our rear, and have good reason for it!”
Rustum Khan eyed me for a minute as if he would read the very middle of my heart.
“Can you ride?” he asked.
“Of course,” I answered. “It’s only walking that I can’t do.”
“Then leave those glasses with me, and go yourself!”
“Why won’t you go?” I asked.
“Because here are fifty men who would lack a leader in that case.”
The answer was honest enough, yet I had my qualms about leaving the post Monty had assigned to me. The thought that finally decided me was that I would have opportunity to gallop past the hospital, two hundred yards over the bridge on the Zeitoon side, and make sure that Gloria was safe.
“Have you seen Maga Jhaere anywhere?” I asked.
“No,” said the Rajput, swearing under his breath at the mere mention of her name.
“Then help me down from here. I’ll go.”
He muttered to himself, and I think he thought I was off to make love to the woman; but I was past caring about any one’s opinion on that score. Five minutes later I was trotting a good horse slowly down the upper, steeper portion of the track toward Zeitoon, swearing to myself, and dreading the smoother going where I should feel compelled to gallop whether my ankle hurt or not. As a matter of fact I began to suspect a broken bone or ligament, for the agonizing pain increased and made me sit awkwardly on the horse, thus causing him to change his pace at odd intervals and give me more pain yet. However, gallop I had to, and I reached the bridge going at top speed, only to be forced to rein in, chattering with agony, by a man on foot who raced to reach the bridge ahead of me, and made unmistakable signals of having an important message to deliver.
He proved to be from Kagig, with orders to say that every man at his disposal was engaged by a very strong body of Turks who had spent the night creeping up close to their first objective, and had rushed it with the bayonet shortly after dawn.
“Order the women to stand ready by the bridge!” were the last words (the man had the whole by heart), and then there was a scribbled note from Will by way of make-weight.
“This end of the action looks pretty serious to me. We’re badly outnumbered. The men are fighting gamely, but — tell Gloria for God’s sake to look out after herself!”
I could hear no firing from that direction, for the great bulk of
Beirut Dagh shut it off.
“How far away is the fighting?” I demanded.
“Oh, a long way yet.”
I motioned to him to return to Kagig, and sent my horse across the bridge, catching sight of Gloria outside the hospital directly after I had crossed it. She waved her hand to me; so, seeing she was safe for the present, I let the message to her wait and started down the valley toward Monty as fast as the horse could go. I had my work cut out to drive him into the din of firing, for it was evidently his first experience of bursting shells, and even at half-a-mile distance he reared and plunged, driving me nearly crazy with pain. I found Monty shepherding the reserves he had brought down, watching through glasses from over the top of the spur that formed the left-hand wall of the gut of the pass.
“I left Rustum Khan in my place,” I began, expecting to be damned at once for absenting without leave.
“Glad you came,” he said, without turning his head.
I gave him my message, he listening while he watched the pass and the oncoming enemy.
“I tried to warn you of treachery this morning!” I said hotly. Pain and memory did nothing toward keeping down choler. “Where’s Peter Measel? Seen him anywhere? Where’s Maga Jhaere? Seen her, either? Those Turks are coming on into what they must know is a trap, with the confidence that proves their leaders have special information! Look at them! They can see this pass is lined, with our riflemen, yet on they come! They must suspect we’ve a surprise in store — yet look at them!”
They were coming on line after line, although Fred had turned the ammunition loose, and the rifle-fire of our we
ll-hidden men was playing havoc. Monty seemed to me to look more puzzled than afraid. I went on telling him of the message Kagig had sent, and offered him Will’s note, but he did not even look at it.
“Ah!” he said suddenly. “Now I understand! Yes, it’s treachery.
I beg your pardon for my thoughts this morning.”
“Granted,” said I, “but what next?”
“Look!” he said simply.
There were two sudden developments. What was left of the first advancing company of Turks halted below the ramp, and with sublime effrontery, born no doubt of knowledge that we had no artillery, proceeded to dig themselves a shallow trench. The Zeitoonli were making splendid shooting, but it was only a question of minutes until the shelter would be high enough for crouching men.
The second disturbing factor was that in a long line extending up the flank of the mountain, roughly parallel to the lower end of the track that Monty had caused to be cut from the castle, the trees were coming down as if struck by a cyclone! There must have been more than a regiment armed with axes, cutting a swath through the forest to take our secret road in flank!
That meant two things clearly. Some one had told Mahmoud of our plan to charge down from the height and surprise him, thus robbing us of all the benefit of unexpectedness; and, when the charge should take place, our men would have to ride down four abreast through ambush. And, if Mahmoud had merely intended placing a few men to trap our horsemen, he would never have troubled to cut down the forest. Plainly, he meant to destroy our mounted men at point-blank range, and then march a large force up the horse-track, so turning the tables on us. Considering the overwhelming numbers he had at his disposal, the game to me looked almost over.
Not so, however, to Monty. He glanced over his shoulder once at the men and women waiting for his orders, and I saw the women begin inspiriting their men. Then he turned on me.