CHAPTER III.A FIGHT FOR LIFE.
Itwas a ticklish moment, but the surgeon was coolness itself.
“Stand steady, Darcy!” he cried to me in resolute tones, as he drew his sword from its sheath. “Empty your revolver amongst them, my boy, and be careful to take steady aim.”
I must confess that I felt a little flurried at this moment, though I tried hard to pull myself together, knowing how much depended upon my coolness and resolution. This attack by a detachment of the enemy was so sudden, and was made in such a determined manner, that it is small wonder that my presence of mind deserted me for a few moments.
Charlie tried in vain to rise, and then sank back in an exhausted state.
“Give me a weapon to defend myself with,” hesaid hoarsely; “I won’t be killed without a struggle, weak as I am.”
My friend’s faltering voice and pathetic request helped to recall my wits, and braced up my nerves like a powerful tonic. I darted to the dead blue-jacket’s side, and gained possession of his rifle and cutlass. The latter I handed to Charlie with the remark, “We’ll defend you, old chap, but you may as well have this bit of steel in your fist.” Then I glanced hurriedly at our approaching foes. They were only twenty yards distant. Every moment was precious indeed. There had been no time for me to obtain cartridges from the dead man’s pouch, but I now hastily opened the breech of the rifle and discovered, to my delight, that it was loaded. Without a moment’s hesitation I dropped on one knee, levelled the piece, and took careful aim at one of the leading desperadoes.
A jet of flame issued from the muzzle of the rifle as I pressed the trigger, and then a little puff of sulphurous smoke. At almost the same moment the man at whom I had aimed sprang several feet from the ground in a sort of convulsive bound, and then fell heavily to the earth a lifeless corpse.
Unfortunately the surgeon had no pistols with him.
“Well done, my boy!” he cried, as he saw the effect of my shot; “that’s reduced the odds against us, at any rate.”
“Do give us a hand, Jack,” cried Charlie, making a fresh but equally futile attempt to struggle to his feet. “I’m sure I can do something to help.”
“Just you shut up, Charlie!” I said angrily; “you’re only balking me at the moment when—”
I broke off short, for a bullet from a pistol whizzed so close to my head that it almost grazed my temple.
Two of our antagonists, who possessed pistols, had opened fire upon us at almost point-blank range. It was fortunate for us that they were so poorly supplied with firearms. Had it been otherwise, our chances of success would have been slender indeed.
The surgeon stood unscathed, his bright sword-blade flashing in the sunlight. He was a Scotsman, tall, lithe, muscular, and a very good fencer. I felt sure that he would make very short work of an indifferent swordsman, however powerful an individual the latter might be. For all we knew, however, the unprepossessing men who were bearing down upon us might be adepts at wielding the cutlasses which they were waving defiantly in the air as they bounded along.
“Blaze away with your revolver, my lad!” shouted the doctor. “Don’t let them all come to close quarters.”
I had already taken aim with my Colt, trusting to make another gap in the little detachment before it rushed in upon us. Sharply the report rang out, the surgeon gave an exultant shout, and as two villanous-looking fellows charged in upon us with glaring eyeballs and features distorted with rage, I caught a hasty glance of the man I had covered with my pistol writhing on the ground and uttering horrible imprecations. I afterwards discovered that I had shot him in the right shoulder, and had thus effectually debarred him from taking part in the conflict.
The odds were thus made even, but I felt that even man for man we had our work cut out for us, for both our antagonists, though rather below middle size, were square-built, powerful-looking fellows. Their brawny, sunburnt throats and chests were bare, and the rolled-up sleeves of their loose jackets displayed muscles and sinews of which any athlete might have been proud.
I had again levelled my revolver, hoping to get in another shot; but before I could take proper aim or press the trigger, my invaluable little weapon was struck from my hand by a blow from the cutlass ofthe man who had singled me out for attack. Most fortunately my hand escaped injury, for I was quite sure that my opponent had fully intended to sever it from my arm at the wrist. Stepping back a pace, I hurriedly shifted my sword from my left hand to my right, and brought it to the first guard, keeping my eyes warily fixed upon the dark, cruel orbs of my savage-looking antagonist. It flashed like lightning through my brain that, by great good luck, I was not pitted against an expert swordsman, for I saw him again raise his cutlass in order to deliver a swashing blow instead of making a straight and direct lunge at my heart.
“I’ll have him now!” I muttered, feeling all the self-confidence of a youngster who had not reached his seventeenth year; and with great promptitude I shortened my sword and drove the sharp point straight at his breast, just as he had unwarily left it exposed by raising his brawny arm to cut me down. Ioughtto have got that point home. By all the laws of fence my antagonist’s life was at my disposal, and he should have been stretched upon the sward at my feet; but as ill luck would have it—we always attribute our misfortunes to ill luck, don’t we?—I slipped on a patch of wet grass, and fell prostrate atthe very feet of my foe, my nose coming into violent contact with a hard mound of earth.
Although thiscontretempswas most unexpected, and the shock considerable, I had presence of mind enough to keep a firm grip of my sword. One does not lightly part with a firm and trusty friend.
But oh, how well I remember, even at this distance of time, the awful thought passing swiftly through my brain, “I’m helplessly in the power of my antagonist, and he’ll assuredly kill me.”
A boy, however, does not give in while there’s a chance left, slight and remote as it may be, and even as the thought recorded above flashed through my mind I struggled to rise. As I turned my head I saw, to my horror, that my foe, with a cruel and exultant smile on his lips, was on the point of running me through with a downward stabbing blow. It was impossible to avoid this thrust in my helpless position, and I felt an icy feeling of despair at my heart. Then the sharp crack of a revolver—to my intense astonishment—cleft the air, and the next moment the fellow who had been so intent upon finishing me off fell across me with a terrific thud, and I lost consciousness from the violence of the shock.