The freed wolf limped home to his lair,And lay to lick his sore.With wrinkled lip and fangs agnash—With back-laid ear and eyes aflash—“Twas something rather more than rashTo turn me loose!” he swore.
NOW Jaimihr fondly thought he held a few cards up his sleeve when he made his bargain with Rosemary McClean and let himself be lowered from the Alwa-sahib's rock. He knew, better probably than any one except his brother and the priests, how desperate the British situation had become throughout all India at an instant's notice, and he made his terms accordingly.
He did not believe, in the first place, that there would be any British left to succor by the time matters had been settled sufficiently in Howrah to enable him to dare leave the city at his rear. Afterward, should it seem wise, he would have no objection in the world to riding to the aid of a Company that no longer existed.
In the second place, he entertained no least compunction about breaking his word completely in every particular. He knew that the members of the little band on Alwa's rock would keep their individual and collective word, and therefore that Rosemary McClean would come to him. He suspected, though, that there would prove to be a rider of some sort to her agreement as regarded marrying him, for he had young Cunningham in mind; and he knew enough of Englishmen from hearsay and deduction to guess that Cunningham would interject any obstacle his ingenuity could devise.
Natives of India do not like Englishmen to marry their women. How much less, then, would a stiff-necked member of a race of conquerors care to stand by while a woman of his own race became the wife of a native prince? He did not trust Cunningham, and he recalled that he had had no promise from that gentleman.
Therefore, he proposed to forestall Cunningham if possible, and, if that were inconvenient or rash, he meant to take other means of making Rosemary McClean his, beyond dispute, in any case.
Next to Rosemary McClean he coveted most the throne of Howrah. With regard to that he was shrewd enough not to conceal from himself for a second the necessity for scotching the priests of Siva before he dare broach the Howrah treasure, and so make the throne worth his royal while. Nor did he omit from his calculations the public clamor that would probably be raised should he deal too roughly with the priests. And he intended to deal roughly with them.
So the proposed allegiance of the Rangars suited him in more ways than one. His army and his brother's were so evenly matched in numbers and equipment that he had been able to leave Howrah without fear for the safety of his palace while his back was turned. The eight hundred whom he had led on the unlucky forray to Alwa's were scarcely missed, and, even had the Maharajah known that he was absent with them, there were still too many men behind for him to dare to start reprisals. The Maharajah was too complete a coward to do anything much until he was forced into it.
The Rangars, he resolved, must be made to take the blame for the broaching of the treasure. He proposed to go about the broaching even before hostilities between himself and his brother had commenced, and he expected to be able to trick the Rangars into seeming to be looting. To appear to defend the treasure would probably not be difficult; and it would be even less difficult to blame the Rangars afterward for the death of any priest who might succumb during the ensuing struggle. He counted on the populace, more than on his own organized forces, to make the Rangars powerless when the time should come for them to try to take the upper hand. The mob would suffer in the process, but its fanaticism—its religious prejudice and numbers—would surely win the day.
As for Rosemary McClean, the more he considered her the more his brown eyes glowed. He had promised to make her Maharanee. But he knew too thoroughly what that would mean not to entertain more than a passing doubt as to the wisdom of the course. He was as ready to break his word on that point as on any other.
A woman of his own race, however wooed and won, would have been content to accept the usual status of whisperer from behind the close-meshed screens. Not so an Englishwoman, with no friends to keep her company and with nothing in the world to do but think. She, he realized, would expect to make something definite of her position, and that would suit neither his creed (which was altogether superficial), nor custom (which was iron-bound and to be feared), nor prejudice (which was prodigious), nor yet convenience (which counted most).
He came to the conclusion that the fate in store for her was not such as she would have selected had she had her choice. Nor were his conclusions in regard to her such as would commend him in the eyes of honest men.
But, after all, the throne was the fulcrum of his plotting; and the lever had to be the treasure, if his plans were to succeed beyond upsetting. He changed his plans a dozen times over before he arrived at last at the audacious decision he was seeking.
Like many another Hindoo in that hour of England's need, he did not lose sight altogether of the distant if actual possibility that the Company's servants might—by dint of luck and grit, and what the insurance papers term the Act of God—pull through the crisis. Therefore, he decided that under no circumstances should Rosemary McClean be treated cavalierly until the Rangars were out of the way and he could pose as her protector if need be.
He would be able to prove that Rosemary and her father had come to him of their own free will. He would say that they had asked him for protection from the Rangars. He had evidence that his brother Howrah had been in communication with the Rangars. So, should the Company survive and retain power enough to force an answer to unpleasant questions, he thought it would not be difficult to prove that he had been the Company's friend all along.
Under all the circumstances he considered it best to be false to everybody and strike for no hand but his own, and with that reconsidered end in view he decided on a master-stroke. He sent word to his brother, the Maharajah, saying that the Rangars had accepted service with the Company and purposed a raid on Howrah; therefore, he proposed that they unite against the common enemy and set a trap for the Rangars.
Howrah sent back to ask what proof he had of the Rangars' taking service with the British. Jaimihr answered that Cunningham and Mahommed Gunga were both on Alwa's crag. He also swore that as Alwa's prisoner he had been able to over-hear the Rangars' plans.
The Maharajah was bewildered, as Jaimihr had expected that he would be. And with just as Eastern, just as muddle-headed, just as dishonest reasoning, he made up his mind to play a double game with everybody, too. He agreed to join Jaimihr in opposition to the Rangars. He agreed to send all his forces to meet Jaimihr's and together kill every Rangar who should show himself inside the city. And he privately made plans to arrive on the scene too late, and smash Jaimihr's army after it had been reduced in size and efficiency by its battle with Alwa's men.
Jaimihr, unknowingly, fitted his plan into his brother's by determining to get on the scene early enough to have first crack at the treasure. He meant to get away with that, leave his brother to deal with Alwa's men, circle round, and then attack his brother from the rear.
Finally, he made up his mind once and for all that Rosemary McClean must remain inviolate until he was quite certain that the English had been driven out of India. He expected that good news within a week.
He was delighted when Joanna, dressed as a man, turned up at his palace-gates and cajoled her way in past the guards. To be asked for an escort to bring the McCleans into Howrah fitted in with his role of protector as a key might fit a lock. Now they could never pretend—nobody could ever pretend—that he had seized them. He sent a carriage out for them, and when they arrived placed a whole wing of his palace at their disposal, treating them like royalty. He made no attempt to molest or interfere with either of them, except that he prevented them from going in and out; and he told off plenty of witnesses who would be able to swear subsequently that they had seen how well his guests were treated. He was taking no unnecessary chances at that stage of the game he played.
There were others, though, who plotted besides Jaimihr. There were, for instance, Siva's priests. It is not to be forgotten that in that part of India the priests had been foremost in fomenting the rebellion. They urged Howrah constantly to take the field against the British, and it was only the sure knowledge of his brother's intention to strike for the throne that prevented the Maharajah from doing what the priests urged.
He knew that Alwa and the Rangars would not help him unless Jaimihr first attacked him, for Alwa would be sure to stand on the strict letter of his oath. And he was afraid of the Rangars. He feared that they might protect him and depose him afterward. He reasoned that that, too, might be construed into a strict interpretation of the terms of Alwa's promise!
He consented to collect his army. He kept it under arms. He even paid it something on account of arrears of wages and served out rations. But, to the disgust of the priests who asked nothing better than dissension between the brothers, he jumped at the idea of uniting with Jaimihr to defeat Alwa's men. He knew—just as the priests feared—that once he could trick and defeat Jaimihr he could treat the troublesome priests as cavalierly as he chose.
So the priests made a third knot in the tangle and tried desperately at the last moment to recreate dissension between the rival royal camps.
“Jaimihr is getting ready to attack you!” they assured Howrah. “Attack him first!”
“I will wait until he does attack,” the Maharajah answered. “For the moment we are friends and have a cause in common.”
“Howrah's men will desert to you the moment you make a move to win the throne,” they assured Jaimihr.
“Wait!” answered Jaimihr. “Wait but a day or two. I will move fast as I see fit when I am ready. For the present my cause and my brother's cause are one.”
Spies brought in news to Maharajah, Prince, and priest of the hurried raising of a Rangar army. The Maharajah and the Prince laughed up their sleeves and the priests swore horribly; the interjection of another element—another creed—into the complication did not suit the priestly “book.” They were the only men who were really worried about Alwa.
And another spy—Joanna—disappeared. No longer garbed as a man, she had hung about the palace, and—known to nearly all the sweepers—she had overheard things. Garbed as a man again, she suddenly evaporated in thin air, and Rosemary McClean was left without a servant or any means of communication with the outside world.
The ringed wolf glared the circle roundThrough baleful, blue-lit eye,Not unforgetful of his debt.“Now, heed ye how ye draw the net.”Quoth he: “I'll do some damage yetOr ere my turn to die!”
THE mare that had been a present from Mahommed Gunga was brought out and saddled, together with a fresh horse for the Risaldar. The veteran had needed no summoning, for with a soldier's instinct he had wakened at the moment his self-allotted four hours had expired. He mounted a little stiffly, and tried his horse's paces up and down the courtyard once or twice before nodding to Cunningham.
“All ready, sahib.”
“Ready, Mahommed Gunga.”
But there was one other matter, after all, that needed attention first.
“That horse of mine that brought me hither”—the Risaldar picked out the man who waited with the gong cord in his hand—“is left in thy particular charge. Dost thou hear me? I will tell the Alwa-sahib what I now tell thee—that horse will be required of thee fit, good-tempered, light-mouthed, not spur-marked, and thoroughly well groomed. There will be a reward in the one case, but in the other—I would not stand in thy shoes! It is a trust!”
“Come along, Risaldar!” called Cunningham. “We're wasting an awful lot of time!”
“Nay, sahib, but a good horse is like a woman, to be loved and treated faithfully! Neither horse nor woman should be sacrificed for less than duty! Lead on, bahadur—I will join thee at the gate.”
He had several directions to give for the horse's better care, and Cunningham was forced to wait at least five minutes for him at the foot of the steep descent. Then for another minute the two sat their horses side by side, while the great gate rose slowly, grudgingly, cranked upward by four men.
“If we two ever ride under here again, bahadur, we shall ride with honor thick on us,” remarked Mahommed Gunga. “God knows what thy plan may be; but I know that from now on there will be no peace for either of us until we have helped rip it with our blades from the very belly of rebellion. Ride!”
The gate clanged down behind them as—untouched by heel or spur—the two spring-limbed chargers raced for their bits across the sand. They went like shadows, casting other shadows—moon-made—wind-driven—knee-to-knee.
“Now, sahib!”
The Risaldar broke silence after fifteen minutes. Neither he nor Cunningham were of the type that chatters when the time has come to loosen sabres and sit tight.
“In the matter of what lies ahead—as I said, neither I nor any man knows what this plan of thine may be, but I and the others have accepted thy bare word. These men who await thee—and they are many, and all soldiers, good, seasoned horsemen—have been told that the son of Cunnigan will lead them. Alwa has given his word, and I mine, that in the matter of a leader there is nothing left to be desired. And my five men have told them of certain happenings that they have seen. Therefore, thou art awaited with no little keenness. They will be all eyes and ears. It might be well, then, to set the pace a little slower, for a man looks better on a fresh horse than on a weary one!”
“I'm thinking, Mahommed Gunga, of the two McCleans and of General Byng, who is expecting us. There is little time to lose.”
“I, too, consider them, sahib. It is we Rangars who must do the sabre work. ALL, sahib—ALL—depends now on the impression created on the men awaiting thee! Rein in a little. Thy father's name, thine own, and mine and Alwa's weigh for much on thy side; but have a sound horse between thy legs and a trumpet in thy throat when we get there! I have seen more than one officer have to fight up-hill for the hearts of his troopers because his tired horse stumbled or looked shabby on the first parade. Draw rein a little, sahib.”
So Cunningham, still saying nothing, drew back into an easy canter. He was conscious of something, not at all like a trumpet, in his throat that was nearly choking him. He did not care to let Mahommed Gunga know that what was being mistaken for masterly silence was really emotion! He did not speak because he did not trust his voice.
“There are three squadrons, sahib—each of about five hundred men. Alwa has the right wing, I the left. Take thou the centre and command the whole. The horses are as good as any in this part of India, for each man has brought his best to do thee honor. Each man carries four days' rations in his saddle-bag and two days' rations for his horse. More horse feed is collecting, and they are bringing wagons, to follow when we give the word. But we thought there would be little sense in ordering wagons to follow us to Howrah City, knowing that thy plan would surely entail action. If we are to ride to the aid of Byng-bahadur it seemed better to pick up the wagons on the journey back again. That is all, sahib. There will be no time, of course, to waste on talk or drill. Take charge the moment that we get there—issue thy orders—and trust to the men understanding each command. Lead off without delay.”
“All right,” said Cunningham—two English words that went much further to allay the Risaldar's anxiety than any amount of rhetoric would have done. “But—d'you mean to tell me that the men don't understand words of command?”
“All of them do, sahib—but to many of them the English words are new. They all understand formations, and those who know the English words are teaching the others while they wait for us. There is not one man among them but has couched a lance or swung a sabre in some force or other?”
“Good. Have they all got lances?”
“All the front-rank men are armed with lance and sabre—the rear ranks have sabres only.”
“Good.”
After two hours of steady cantering the going changed and became a quick succession of ever-deepening gorges cleft in sandstone. Far away in the distance to the left there rose a glow that showed where Howrah City kept uneasy vigil, doubtless with watch-fires at every street corner. It looked almost as though the distant city were in flames.
Ahead of them lay the gloom of hell mouth and the silence of the space beyond the stars.
It was with that strange, unclassified, unnamed sixth sense that soldiers, savages, and certain hunters have that Cunningham became aware of life ahead of him—massed, strong-breathing, ready—waiting life, spring-bent in the quivering blackness. A little farther, and he caught the ring of a curb-chain. Then a horse whinnied and a hoarse voice swore low at a restive charger. His own mare neighed, throwing her head high, and some one challenged through the dead-black night.
“How-ut! Hukkums—thar!”
A horseman appeared suddenly from nowhere, and examined them at close quarters instead of waiting for their answer. He peered curiously at Cunningham—glanced at Mahommed Gunga—then wheeled, spinning his horse as the dust eddies twist in the sudden hot-wind gusts.
“Sahib-bahadur hai!” he shouted, racing back.
The night was instantly alive with jingling movement, as line after line of quite invisible light-horse-men—self-disciplined and eager to obey—took up their dressing. The overhanging cliff of sandstone hid the moon, but here and there there was a gleam of eyeballs in the dark—now man's, now horse's—and a sheen that was the hint of steel held vertical. No human being could have guessed the length of the gorge nor the number of the men who waited in it, for the restless chargers stamped in inch-deep sand that deadened sound without seeming to lessen its quantity.
“Salaam, bahadur!”
It was Alwa, saluting with drawn sabre, reining back a pedigreed mare to get all the spectacular emotion out of the encounter that he could.
“Here are fifteen hundred eight and fifty, sahib—all Rangars—true believers—all true men—all pledged to see thee unsinged through the flames of hell! Do them the honor of a quick inspection, sahib!”
“Certainly!” smiled Cunningham.
“I have told them, sahib, that their homes, their women, their possessions, and their honor are all guaranteed them. Also pay. They make no other terms.”
“I guarantee them all of that,” said Cunningham, loud enough for at least the nearest ranks to hear.
“On thine own honor, sahib?”
“On my word of honor!”
“The promise is enough! Will you inspect them, sahib?”
“I'll take their salute first,” said Cunningham.
“Pardon, bahadur!”
Alwa filled his lungs and faced the unseen lines.
“Rangars!” he roared. “Your leader! To Chota-Cunnigan-bahadur—son of Pukka-Cunnigan whom we all knew—general—salute—present—sabres!”
There was sudden movement—the ring of whipped-out metal—a bird's wing-beat—as fifteen hundred hilts rose all together to as many lips—and a sharp intake of breath all down the line.
It wasn't bad. Not bad at all, thought Cunningham. It was not done as regulars would have worked it. There was the little matter of the lances, that he could make out dimly here and there, and he could detect even in that gloom that half of the men had been caught wondering how to salute with lance and sabre both. But that was not their fault; the effort—the respect behind the effort—the desire to act altogether—were all there and striving. He drew his own mare back a little, and returned their salute with full military dignity.
“Reeeecee—turn—sabres!” ordered Alwa, and that movement was accomplished better.
He rode once, slowly, down the long front rank, letting each man look him over—then back again along the rear rank, risking a kick or two, for there was little room between them and the cliff. He was not choking now. The soldier instinct, that is born in a man like statesmanship or poetry, but that never can be taught, had full command over all his other senses, and when he spurred out to the front again his voice rang loud and clear, like a trumpet through the night.
With fifty ground scouts scattered out ahead of them, they drummed out of the gorge and thundered by squadrons on the plain beyond—straight, as the jackal runs, for Howrah City. Alwa, leaving his own squadron, to canter at Cunningham's side, gave him all the new intelligence that mattered.
“Last evening I sent word on ahead to them of our coming, sahib! I sent one messenger to the Maharajah and one to Jaimihr, warning each that we ride to keep our plighted word. At the worst, we shall find both parties ready for us! We shall know before we reach the city who is our friend! News reached me, too, sahib, that the Maharajah and his brother have united against us—that Howrah will eat his promises and play me false. God send he does! I would like to have my hands in that Hindoo's treasure-chests! We none of us know yet, bahadur, what is this plan of thine—”
“You've been guessing awfully close to it, I think” laughed Cunningham.
“Aha! The treasure-chests, then! But—is there—have you information, sahib? Who knows, then—who has told where they are? Neither I nor my men know!”
“Send for Mahommed Gunga.”
Mahommed Gunga left his squadron, too, to canter beside Alwa.
“I am all ears, sahib!” he asserted, reining his horse until his stride was equal to the others.
“The key to the situation is that treasure,” asserted Cunningham. “Howrah wants it. Jaimihr wants it. The priests want it. I know that much for certain, from the McCleans. All right. We're a new factor in the problem, and they all mistrust us nearly as much, if not more, than they mistrust one another. Good. They'll be all of them watching that treasure. It'll be near where they are, and I'm going to snaffle it or break my neck—and all your necks—in the deuced desperate attempt. Is that clear? Where the carcass is, there wheel the kites and there the jackals fight, as your proverb says. The easiest part will be finding the treasure. Then—”
They legged in closer to him, hanging on his words and too busy listening to speak.
“If Howrah thinks we're after the treasure and decides to fight without previous argument, that absolves you from your promise, doesn't it, Alwa-sahib?”
“Surely, sahib, provided our intention is not to evade the promise.”
“Our intention is to prevent Howrah and his brother from fighting, to insure peace and protection on this whole countryside, and, if possible, to ride away with Jaimihr's army to the Company's aid.”
“Good, sahib.”
It seemed to occur to none of the three that fifteen hundred mounted men were somewhat few with which to accomplish such a marvel.
“If they are fighting already, we must interfere.”
“We are ready, bahadur. Fighting is our trade!”
“But, before all things, we must keep our eyes well skinned for a hint of treachery on Jaimihr's part. I would rather quarrel with that gentleman than be his friend, but he happens to hold our promise. We've got to keep our promise, provided he keeps his. I think our first objective is the treasure.”
“That, sahib, is an acrobat of a plan,” said Alwa; “much jumping from one proposition to another!”
“It is no plan at all,” said Cunningham. “It is a mere rehearsal of the circumstances. A plan is something quickly seized at the right second and then acted on—like your capture of Jaimihr. Wait awhile, Alwa-sahib!”
“Ay, wait awhile!” growled Mahommed Gunga. “Did I bring thee a leader to ask plans of thee, or a man of men for thee to follow? Which?”
“All the same,” said Alwa, “I would rather halt and make a good plan. It would be wiser. I do not understand this one.”
“I follow Cunnigan-bahadur!” said Mahommed Gunga; and he spurred off to his squadron. Alwa could see nothing better than to follow suit, for Cunningham closed his lips tight in a manner unmistakable. And whatever Alwa's misgivings might have been, he had the sense and the soldierly determination not to hint at them to his men.
As dawn rose pale-yellow in the eastern sky they thundered into view of Howrah City and drew rein to breathe their horses. The sun was high before they had trotted near enough to make out details. But, long before details could be seen, it was evident that an army was formed up to meet them on the tree-lined maidan that lay between them and the two-mile-long palace-wall. Beyond all doubt it was Jaimihr's army, for his elephants were not so gaudily harnessed as Howrah's, and his men were not so brilliantly dressed.
As they dipped into the last depression between them and the wall and halted for a minute's consultation, a khaki-clad, shrivelled figure of a man leaped up from behind a sand-ridge, and raced toward Cunningham, shouting to him in a dialect he had no knowledge of and gesticulating wildly. A trooper spurred down on him, brought him up all standing with an intercepted lance, examined him through puckered eyes, and then, roaring with laughter, picked him up and carried him to Cunningham.
“A woman, sahib! By the beard of Abraham, a woman!”
“Joanna!”
“Ha, sahib! Ha, sahib!”
She babbled to him, word overtaking word and choking all together in a dust-dry throat. Cunningham gave her water and then set her on the ground.
“Translate, somebody!” he ordered. “I can't understand a word she says.”
Babbled and hurried and a little vague it might be, but Joanna had the news of the minute pat.
“Jaimihr is looting the treasure now, sahib. He has tricked his brother. They were to join, and both fight against you, but Jaimihr tried to get the treasure out before either you or his brother came. He is trying now, sahib!”
“Miss McClean! Ask her where Miss McClean is! Ask for Miss Maklin, sahib!”
“Jaimihr has told her that thou and Alwa and Mahommed Gunga are all dead, and the British overwhelmed throughout all India! He has her with him in a carriage, under guard, for all his men are with him and he could spare no great guard for his palace. See! Look, sahib! Jaimihr's palace is in flames!”
Alwa all but fell from his charger, laughing volcanically. The Rajput, who never can agree, can always see the humor in other Rajputs' disagreement.
“Ho, but they are playing a great game with each other!” he shouted. But Cunningham decided he had wasted time enough. He shouted his orders, and in less than thirty seconds his three squadrons were thundering in the direction of Jaimihr's army and the palace-wall. They drew rein again within a quarter of a mile of it, to discover with amazed military eyes that Jaimihr had no artillery.
It was then, at the moment when they halted, that Jaimihr reached a quick decision and the wrong one. He knew by now that his brother had won the first trick in the game of treachery, for he could see the smoke and flames of his burning palace from where he sat his horse. He decided at once that Alwa and his Rangars must have taken sides with the Maharajah, for how, otherwise, he reasoned, could the Maharajah dare let the Rangars approach unwatched and unmolested. It was evident to him that the Rangars were acting as part of a concerted movement.
He made up his mind to attack and beat off the new arrivals without further ceremony. He out-numbered them by four or five to one, and was on his own ground. Whatever their intentions, at least he would be able to pretend afterward that he had acted in defence of the sacred treasure; and then, with the treasure in his possession, he would soon be able to recompense himself for a mere burned and looted palace!
So he opened fire without notice, argument, or parley, and an ill-aimed volley shrieked over the heads of Cunningham's three squadrons.
Cunningham, unruffled and undecided still, made out through puckered eyes the six-horse carriage in which Miss McClean evidently was; it was drawn up close beside the wall, and two regiments were between it and his squadron. He was recalling the terms of the agreement made with Jaimihr; he remembered it included the sparing of all of Alwa's men, and not the firing on them.
A thousand of Jaimihr's cavalry swooped from the shelter of the infantry, opened out a very little, and, mistaking Cunningham's delay for fear, bore down with a cheer and something very like determination.
They were met some ten yards their side of the half-way mark by Cunningham's three squadrons, loosed and led by Cunningham himself. Outridden, outfought, outgeneralled, they were smashed through, ridden down, and whirled back reeling in confusion. About a hundred of them reached the shelter of the infantry in a formed-up body; many of the rest charged through it in a mob and threw it into confusion.
Too late Jaimihr decided on more reasonable tactics. Too late he gave orders to his infantry that no such confused body could obey. Before he could ride to rally them, the Rangars were in them, at them, through them, over them. The whole was disintegrating in retreat, endeavoring to rally and reform in different places, each subdivision shouting orders to its nearest neighbor and losing heart as its appeals for help were disregarded.
Back came Cunningham's close-formed squadrons, straight through the writhing mass again; and now the whole of Jaimihr's army took to its heels, just as part of the five-feet-thick stone palace-wall succumbed to the attacks of crowbars and crashed down in the roadway, disclosing a dark vault on the other side.
Jaimihr made a rush for the six-horse carriage, and tried vainly to get it started. Cunningham shouted to him to surrender, but he took no notice of the challenge; he escaped being made prisoner by the narrowest of margins, as the position next him was cut down. The other postilions were un-horsed, and six Rangars changed mounts and seized the reins. The Prince ran one man through the middle, and then spurred off to try and overtake his routed army, some of which showed a disposition to form up again.
“Sit quiet!” called Cunningham through the latticed carriage window. “You're safe!”
The heavy, swaying carriage rumbled round, and the horses plunged in answer to the Rangars' heels. A moment later it was moving at a gallop; two minutes later it was backed against the wall, and Rosemary McClean stepped out behind three protecting squadrons that had not suffered perceptibly from what they would have scorned to call a battle.
“Now all together!” shouted Cunningham, whose theories on the value of seconds when tackling reforming infantry were worthy of the Duke of Wellington, or any other officer who knew his business; and again he led his men at a breakneck charge. This time Jaimihr's disheartened little army did not wait for him, but broke into wild confusion and scattered right and left, leaving their elephants to be captured. There were only a few men killed. The lance-tipped, roaring whirlwind loosed itself for the most part against nothing, and reformed uninjured to trot back again. Cunningham told off two troops to pursue fugitives and keep their eyes open for the Prince before he rode back to examine the breach in the wall that Jaimihr had been to so much trouble about making.
He had halted to peer through the break in the age-old masonry when Mahommed Gunga spurred up close to him, touched his arm, and pointed.
“Look, sahib! Look!”
Jaimihr—and no one but a wizard could have told how he had managed to get to where he was unobserved—was riding as a man rides at a tent-peg, crouching low, full-pelt for Rosemary McClean!
Cunningham's spurs went home before the word was out of Mahommed Gunga's mouth, and Mahommed Gunga raced behind him; but Jaimihr had the start of them. Duncan McClean, looking ill and weak and helpless, crowded his daughter to the wall, standing between her and the Prince; but Jaimihr aimed a swinging sabre at him, and the missionary fell. His daughter stooped to bend over him, and Jaimihr seized her below the arms. A second later he had hoisted her to his saddle-bow and was spurring hell-bent-for-leather for the open country.
Two things prevented him from making his escape. Five of Alwa's men, returning from pursuing fugitives, cut off his flight in one direction, and the extra weight on his horse prevented him from getting clear by means of speed alone—as he might have done otherwise, for Cunningham's mare was growing tired.
Jaimihr rode for two minutes with the frenzy of a savage before he saw the futility of it. It was Cunningham's mare, gaining on him stride over stride, that warned him he would be cut down like a dog from behind unless he surrendered or let go his prize.
So he laughed and threw the girl to the ground. For a moment more he spurted, spurring like a fiend, then wheeled and charged at Cunningham. He guessed that but for Cunningham that number of Rangars would never have agreed on a given plan. He knew that it was he, and not Cunningham or Alwa or Rosemary McClean, who had broken faith. He had broken it in thought, and word, and action. And he had lost his prospect of a throne. So he came on like a man who has nothing to gain by considering his safety. He came like a real man at last. And Cunningham, on a tired mare, met him point to point.
They fought over a quarter of a mile of ground, for Jaimihr proved to be as useful with his weapon as Mahommed Gunga's teaching had made Cunningham. There was plenty of time for the reformed squadrons to see what was happening—plenty of time for Alwa, who considered that he had an account of his own to settle with the Prince, to leave his squadron and come thundering up to help. Mahommed Gunga dodged and reined and spurred, watching his opportunity on one side and Alwa on the other. It would have suited neither of them to have their leader killed at that stage of the game, but the fighting was too quick for either man to interfere.
Jaimihr charged Cunningham for the dozenth time and missed, charged past, to wheel and charge again, then closed with the most vindictive rush of all. Again Cunningham met him point to point. The two blades locked, and bent like springs as they wrenched at them. Cunningham's blade snapped. He snatched at his mare and spun her before Jaimihr could recover, then rammed both spurs in and bore down on the Prince with half a sabre. He had him on the near side at a disadvantage. Jaimihr spurred and tried to maneuver for position, and the half sabre went home just below his ribs. He dropped bleeding in the dust at the second that Alwa and Mahommed Gunga each saw an opportunity and rushed in, to rein back face to face, grinning in each other's faces, their horses' breasts pressed tight against the charger that Jaimihr rode. The horse screamed as the shock crushed the wind out of him.
“You robbed me of my man, sahib, by about a sabre's breadth!” laughed Alwa.
“And you left your squadron leaderless without my permission!” answered Cunningham. “You too! Mahommed Gunga!”
“But, sahib!”
“Do you prefer to argue or obey?”
Mahommed Gunga flushed and rode back. Alwa grinned and started after him. Cunningham, without another glance at the dead Prince, rode up to Rosemary McClean, who was picking herself up and looking bewildered; she had watched the duel in speechless silence, lying full length in the dust, and she still could not speak when he reached her.
“Put your foot on mine,” he said reassuringly; “then swing yourself up behind me if you can. If you can't, I'll pick you up in front.”
She tried hard, but she failed; so he put both arms under hers and lifted her.
“Am I welcome?” he asked. And she nodded.
Fresh from killing a man—with a man's blood on his broken sword and the sweat of fighting not yet dry on him—he held a woman in his arms for the first time in his life. His hand had been steady when it struck the blow under Jaimihr's ribs, but now it trembled. His eyes had been stern and blazing less than two minutes before; now they looked down into nothing more dangerous than a woman's eyes and grew strangely softer all at once. His mouth had been a hard, tight line under a scrubby upper lip, but his lips had parted now a little and his smile was a boy's—not nervous or mischievous—a happy boy's.
She smiled, too. Most people did smile when young Cunningham looked pleased with them; but she smiled differently. And he, with that blood still wet on him, bent down and kissed her on the lips. Her answer was as characteristic as his action.
“You look like a blackguard,” she said—“but you came, and I knew you would! I told Jaimihr you would, and he laughed at me. I told God you would, and you came! How long is it since you shaved? Your chin is all prickly!”
They were interrupted by a roar from the three waiting squadrons. He had ridden without caring where he went, and his mare had borne the two of them to where the squadrons were drawn up with their rear to the great gap in the wall. The situation suited every Rangar of them! That was, indeed, the way a man should win his woman! They cheered him, and cheered again, and he grinned back, knowing that their hearts were in the cheering and their good will won. Red, then, as a boiled beet, he rode over to the six-horse carriage and dismounted by her father—picked him up—called two troopers—and lifted him on to the rear seat of the great old-fashioned coach.
“Get inside beside him!” he ordered Rosemary, examining the missionary's head as he spoke. “It's a scalp wound, and he's stunned—no more. He's left off bleeding already. Nurse him!” He was off, then, without another word or a backward glance for her—off to his men and the gap in the wall that waited an investigation.
The amazing was discovered then. The treasure—the fabled, fabulous, enormous Howrah treasure was no fable. It was there, behind that wall! The jewels and the bullion in marketable bars that could have bought an army or a kingdom—the sacred, secret treasure of twenty troubled generations, that was guarded in the front by fifty doors and fifty corridors and three times fifty locks—the door of whose secret vault was guarded by a cannon, set to explode at the slightest touch—was hidden from the public road at its other side, its rear, by nothing better than a five-foot wall of ill-cemented stone! Cunningham stepped inside over the dismantled masonry and sat down on a chest that held more money's worth than all the Cunninghams in all the world had ever owned, or spent, or owed, or used, or dreamed of!
“Ask Alwa and Mahommed Gunga to come to me here!” he called; and a minute later they stood at attention in front of him.
“Send a hundred men, each with a flag of truce on his lance, to gallop through the city and call on Jaimihr's men to rally to me, if they wish protection against Howrah!”
“Good, sahib! Good!” swore Alwa. “Howrah is the next danger! Make ready to fight Howrah!”
“Attend to my orders, please!” smiled Cunningham, and Alwa did as he was told. Within an hour Jaimihr's men were streaming from the four quarters of the compass, hurrying to be on the winning side, and forming into companies as they were ordered.
Then Cunningham gave another order.
“Alwa-sahib, will you take another flag of truce, please, and ride with not more than two men to Maharajah Howrah. Tell him that I want him here at once to settle about this treasure.”
Alwa stared. His mouth opened a little, and he stood like a man bereft of reason by the unexpected.
“Are you not still pledged to support Howrah on his throne?”
“I am, bahadur.”
“Would plundering his treasure be in keeping with your promise to him?”
“Nay, sahib. But—”
“Be good enough to take my message to him. Assure him that he may come with ten men without fear of molestation, but guarantee to him that if he comes with more than ten—and with however many more—I will fight, and keep his treasure, both!”