Lance Carlyon was right in trusting Dr. Dillon's power of doing without help until Providence chose to send some. This was the easier task, in that he had made up his mind deliberately beforehand as to what his best course of action would be should an alarm of this sort occur. Therefore that imperativekling-klingof the telegraph bell which roused him in a second from his bed, where, ready dressed for any such emergency, he was sleeping the sleep of the just, found him alert, prepared for anything and everything.
So it has come, he thought, as he hastily wired back the comprehensive reply, "All right, await you." He felt as a doctor does when a dangerous symptom which he has foreseen as a possibility, shows itself. He had been on the lookout for this for days, but as the dawn would end the period during which it might be expected, he had, as in the outbreak of the cholera, had hopes that danger was over. His last thought, as he slept, had been this; he woke to find that the complication must be faced. Woke with a strong regret, but a stronger instinct of fight. So he slipped his feet into his shoes, jammed his big mushroom hat on his head out of pure habit, and so, armedcap-à-pie, with a brain quick to work, and a body ready to follow and obey, he ran across the sandy road to the Smiths' bungalow, realizing as he did so that a dust-storm was just beginning. That would delay both attack and relief. On the whole, this would be an advantage, since, once things were secure, half an hour or so would make no difference in the latter; whereas, he wanted every minute he could get now for preparation.
He had not warned Eugene Smith of his fears. There was never any use alarming people by mere probabilities, unless by so doing you could forearm them. And this was not the case here; since the safest--in fact the only--place of refuge for Mrs. Smith and the child, should trouble arise, was the semi-fortified roof above the gate of the gaol; and that he knew to be ready for use. He had, therefore, only to wake them, as quietly as might be, so as not to give the alarm to the servants. Fortune favoured him in this; for, just outside the verandah, he ran full tilt upon Eugene himself, tall, gaunt, in his sleeping-suit, carrying a roll of bedding on his back like a snail's shell. The heat of the evening had enticed him to sleep outside, as he preferred,à laRobinson Crusoe, and the dust-storm was sending him in.
"Hello, Dillon!" he cried, "what's up?--nothing wrong with my wife or the child--I hope--No!--" he gave a sigh of relief, "then it's the beastly dust-storm disturbed you, I suppose. Isn't it sickening to think how many times in the next six months we shall have to take up our beds and walk."
"H'm! Hope I shall have the chance," replied the doctor, dryly, recovering his breath. "No, it isn't the storm. They're going to try a row, Smith. Just had a wire from the Fort. There's a plot on, to come here and set the prisoners free, and that's dangerous. So, till the troops come, I think you'd better bring Mrs. Smith and Gladys to the gate--it's the safest place, and I've got everything ready. It mayn't be much; but the devils, whoever they are, might turn and rend you--especially if they fail with me."
Eugene Smith had dropped his snail-shell and sat down on it, aghast, in surprise; but he was up again before the doctor finished.
"By Jove!" he said rapidly, calmly as the doctor himself. "That's a taking up one's bed with a vengeance. I'll have 'em both ready in a jiffy--anything else?"
"No. I'll rummage round till you return--one forgets things to the last, sometimes. And I shall want your Remington and such like--I know where to find 'em."
A moment after he was striking a match to light the tall floor-lamp in Mrs. Smith's drawing-room. She had turned it out herself a few hours before, thinking, as she looked round the room, full of soft rose-shaded light, how pretty, how cosey it was. It had the same air of refined security now. Everything, down to a copy of the last 'Queen' lying on an inlaid table by her favourite chair, was so exactly what one would have expected to find in her room; the room of a delicate, cultivated, civilized, society woman.
And now?
Now the delicacy, the culture, the civilization, the society, and the security belonging to them, had been invaded in an instant. By what?
The dust--you could almost see it springing into the air in these sandy stretches--had already settled thick over the dainty furniture, and as Dr. Dillon, standing by the table in the pink glow of the lamp, asked himself the question, he yielded to the imperious fascination which a smooth sand-surface has for humanity. But he did not write his name upon it; only the idle answer to the question.
"God knows."
The writing lay upon the table beside the latest fashions, staring up into the pink paper shade, after George Dillon had passed rapidly to Eugene's office to choose this, that, and the other, and make them into a bundle with a table-cloth.
When he returned to the drawing-room, Muriel Smith was standing by that writing in the sand: a fragile figure in a blue dressing-gown, all frilled and embroidered like the pictures in the paper. She looked more forlorn than frightened; forlorn and pathetic.
"Is it warm enough?" said the doctor, as he entered. "Your dress, I mean. There's a storm on, and it generally brings rain."
"It is flannel," she answered, and he nodded.
There was no excitement, no heroics. Only that. That, and the writing on the sand, and her forlornness--the forlornness of a delicate Dresden shepherdess set to drive a flock of real sheep to the shambles. But the needlessness, the pity of it, made Dr. Dillon set his teeth.
"Eugene will be here directly with Gladys," she said. "We thought it best not to wake her, and he said we had better start at once; for you see I can't walk nearly so fast as he does."
There was no trace of fear in her voice, but there was none of resistance either, and she turned at the door to look back with an almost reproachful acquiescence.
"Poor room," she said softly, "it seems so strange--such a pity; but I suppose it can't be helped." She turned to the darkness again with a little shiver, and went on, "Vincent sent the wire, I suppose."
"I didn't ask," replied Dr. Dillon curtly; then, repenting him, added, "I suppose so. He will be here directly I expect. And--and we will all take care of you and Gladys, as long as we can. You know that; and we can't do more--can we?"
She smiled quite tenderly. "Of course you will. And I am really not a bit afraid--except of being in the way."
She seemed to accept the necessity of this; perhaps rightly. For the storm itself was no joke in these desert stretches, where the sand rose in choking clouds, yet left enough to make each step a toil. Muriel stumbled along breathlessly, but so slowly that, when her husband joined them, striding along with Gladys, still sleeping, wrapped in a blanket in his arms, the doctor bade them come at their leisure and wait until he gave the signal before entering, then ran on swiftly to the gaol. For there was no time to lose; though, on the other hand, there was very little to be done. The less the better, if his plan was to be successful; since that involved the utmost quiet, and the keeping of the prisoners from all knowledge of what was going on as long as possible.
As he faced the choking darkness, the hot blasts of causeless wind, blowing all ways at once, George Dillon reckoned up his chances fairly. The storm would certainly make it easier to keep such knowledge from those within, and make it more difficult for those without to establish communication with the former. So far, good. On the other hand, no amount of the light at his command would enable him to see, even from his coign of vantage on the gateway roof, what was going on, either outside or inside. And darkness was the diggers' best friend; while digging was the recognized enemy of mud walls. Especially of those inside walls which divided the gaol into sections. Yet the best, the only chance of keeping the prisoners quiet, lay in preserving their segregation into companies.
For the gaol was of the cart-wheel pattern. That is, a huge circle of outside wall, thick as an earthwork, the felloes of the wheel, as it were. Then a small central cylinder of brick, like a lime kiln, the nave of the wheel, as it were. Between these two the spokes. Spokes of twelve feet high mud wall, dividing the whole into seven wedges of prison, absolutely distinct, blank, aperture-less, save for one heavily stanchioned door in the apex of each wedge, leading into the central tower. Exit or entry was therefore impossible to six of these wedges, except through the tower; that is the citadel, the key, as it were, of the gaol proper.
The seventh wedge, however, gave, at its wider end, on the entrance-gate, which was a square, semi-fortified building, pierced by a tunnel, gated at each end, and further protected by an outside yard, or roofless porch, also gated. The inmost of these three gates opened on to a small courtyard, and this narrowed again into an alley which gave access to the central tower. Briefly then the whole gaol consisted of six wedges opening, by a door in their narrow end, into the central cylinder; and a seventh wedge split in two by an alley leading between high mud walls from the gateway to that central tower; the key to the position.
In the two halves of the split wedge lay the warders' barracks, the solitary cells, the cook rooms, the hospital; and the entry to these was by a door on either side of the little courtyard, just beyond the inner gate. From the corner of this, also, rose the outside stair leading to the roof of the square, brick gateway.
Thus the fifteen hundred prisoners were broken up into companies of about two hundred each, and were absolutely without possibility of communication so long as the central tower was in the hands of authority. Unless there was time to undermine the mud walls, and tools, also, wherewith to work. Of these, however, there were none in the gaol. Nothing, even, that could be used to take their place, except in that seventh section which held the executive of the gaol; and there Dr. Dillon meant to leave no hands to use them, if he could compass it.
As he pulled up to regain his breath before walking up to the gate and giving the countersign, the whole place lay quiet and dark. So far, good. There was the risk, however, of the plot being known, and of the sentry refusing him entrance. It was not, however, and the next moment, calmly as if he was merely on one of his not infrequent rounds of unexpected night inspections, Dr. Dillon passed from the outer porch to the tunnel, and told the sentry at the inner gate to light the lamp in the little office room to one side.
"Call the superintendent," he said to the first man, "and you can tell him I am going to inspect the solitary cells."
He added this because he knew it would give time, since the superintendent would be sure to give a private look round, first, to see all was in order, and remove possible traces of tobacco or opium,--those luxuries out of which so much money can be made by gaol officials.
No sooner, however, had the first sentry gone through the door to the left section, than he sent the second one on a similar message to the right, where the hospital lay. Then, the coast being clear, he rapidly unlocked the private safe in the office which held his set of keys in case of accidents, and locked both the right and left doors. Secure for a moment, therefore, from interruption, he ran outside, saw that the tool rooms, etc., were closed, gave the signal to Eugene Smith, hurried the refugees up the stairs; and then, after unlocking the two doors again on his way back to the office, sat down in his usual chair and began to look over a register.
He was engaged in this calm occupation when, a minute or two after, the native superintendent--a big, dignified person, in a blatant undress due largely to his bulk--arrived breathless.
"Darogah-jee!" began Dr. Dillon, instantly, and the mere tone of the title made the man quiver, "I've had constantly to complain of the tobacco and opium smuggling that is going on among the warders, and I mean to stop it. I've had information to-night which will clinch the business. So take the night guard, rouse every warder, bring everyone here, even those on guard in the sections--the hospital orderlies--everyone, in fact, who is free to go out of the gaol. They are to come at once. No time allowed for arrangements. If they are not all here in five minutes I shall think you are in league with the smugglers."
Thedarogah'sfat flesh shook, yet he winked as he went off. If the doctor-sahibexpected to find anything in this fashion except, maybe, a smell of the forbidden drugs, he was mistaken. On such a night, too, when the dust was in everyone's eyes. Well! it might have been worse; for, though he knew nothing definitely of any plot, he could not fail to know that there was more to excite men in the gaol, that night, than tobacco or opium! So he went about his summons with a sigh of relief, and before the five minutes were over had his posse of minor officials together, including a file of unfettered prisoners, with good conduct badges, who were used as gang leaders. He himself finally coming down the alley, with a stupendous bunch of keys, followed by the little group of night warders he had collected from the other sections.
"All here?" asked Dr. Dillon, lighting a cigar. "The register, please,darogah. They will answer to their names, pass out through the wicket into the porch, and stay there until I've tallied the lot. I'm going to have itpakka[11]this time."
Some of the men grinned, some looked uneasy, and some few frowned; but all obeyed, though they cuddled themselves into their blankets as they slipped through the wicket, and faced the whirling, swirling storm in the open porch, the doors of which were barred, not solid.
"Kishen Rao?" came Dr. Dillon's voice, after a long series of names, followed by brief "presents!" and swift exits. There was no answer. He turned to thedarogahfor explanation.
"Absent!" explained the latter, timorously.
A little more decision might have saved him the quick question, "With or without leave?"
"Huzoor" palpitated the fat man, "he went out to bathe in the Holy Pool by permission this morning. He is of the utmost sobriety. A Brahmin, promoted by your Honour to, as your Honour knows, general head ward-keeper. He is not to be suspected."
"Leave till 5 P.M.," commented the doctor, looking over the register. "Mark him down absent without leave. Go on."
So, rapidly, the last man ducked under the wicket.
"Is that the lot?"
"Everyone, Protector of the Poor," protested the burly official, with smiles. "The prison is empty of the unfettered."
"Then let it remain so for the present," said Dr. Dillon, coolly, as he stepped forward, closed the wicket, slid the bolt to its place, and turned on thedarogah, all in one swift sequence.
"Now, then!" he went on sharply, "you and I have to settle a bit of business. Your keys--" he took out a revolver, and laid it on the table beside him--"every key you have; duplicates, triplicates, everything! I'm going to keep this gaol myself for a bit. Do you understand?"
"Huzoor!" bleated the man, helplessly, putting his big bunch on the table.
Dr. Dillon smiled sarcastically. "Won't do, my friend. I want the lot by the list. Where's the register?"
When it came he ticked them off rapidly by it. "Sections B and C, warder's duplicate; where's that?" he asked.
The official grew green. "Kishen Rao--" he began--"but he is of the utmost--"
Dr. Dillon turned on him like lightning. "You're a damned scoundrel, sir! What else is missing?" He ran over the rest swiftly, then looked up suddenly with a scowl that made the man literally collapse. "So that's it, is it? Duplicate of B and C sections missing, and duplicate of the alley doors. A pretty little game!" he laughed sardonically.
"Kishen Rao--" gurgled thedarogah--"by your Honour's promotion--of the utmost--"
"But it won't play, my friend; it won't play!" went on the doctor, with a curious elation. "I hold the thirteenth trump, now. You go in there,"--he pointed to an inner store-room behind the slip of an office; a windowless place, pitch dark, where the clothes in which the prisoners arrived awaited their release in piles--"and thank your stars you're in such good quarters."
All but that brief order, "You go in there," was spoken in English, as a sort of outlet for the intense satisfaction which was filling him at his own success,--so far.
The next minute he had turned the key on thedarogah, and was up the stairs calling Eugene Smith in a low voice to come down and help to bolt and bar; but to come as quietly as he could.
"I've got rid of the lot," he said joyously, after he had explained the position in a few rapid words; "there isn't a soul in this section except the solitary cellers--who, of course, are ironed--a few sick people, and the assistant surgeon; butbaboo-jeeis an agnostic, and is so confoundedly afraid of the possibility of a future life that he may be trusted to go into green collapse if he hears a shot fired."
So, rapidly, the two men set to work, undisturbed by more than a protesting "Huzoor, what shall we do?" from the posse outside the first gate, and a low knocking at the wicket.
There were double doors here, however, and of the sort which it would need time to negotiate, without powder.
"They will hold out for an hour, at least," said the doctor; "then there will be the inner one, and after that the alley door--unless--" he remembered Kishen Rao, and frowned. That was the only weak spot in his armour. "We can count on an hour and a half, at least," he continued, carefully allowing for the worst; "longer, perhaps. Now then, Smith, for the toughest job! I've got a couple of crowbars here. Those first six steps--eight if we can--of the stairs must come down. There aren't enough of us to hold them."
So, for fully a quarter of an hour, no sound was heard above the curious vibration of the storm except the grinding and crushing of the bricks as they were rapidly eased out, one by one, from the mud mortar. The light of one of the office lamps, set on the ground, showed by that time a sheer drop of eight or ten feet, and Eugene Smith, working above, jammed his crowbar into a crevice of the wall against which the steps clung like a swallow's nest, and gave Dr. Dillon, who had been working below, a rope and a hand up.
The latter set down the keys and the lamp he had brought up with him, and deliberately dusted the knees of his trousers.
"There, that's done," he said. "Couldn't be better."
"Yes, it seems pretty safe," assented Eugene Smith, a trifle dubiously.
"Safe!" echoed the doctor, enthusiastically, "I haven't felt so safe for the last fortnight. Hullo! what's that?"
That was a sudden bugle-call. The doctor's face fell. "What, already! I didn't expect relief so soon. However, it can't be helped. I'll just go up and tell Dering what I've done, so that he may be prepared for the locked out ones!"
He took the light in his hand and crossed to the outer parapet.
"Hello, Dering!" he began, peering down. Then a couple of shots whizzed past his head and he ducked. At the same moment, as if roused by the concussion, the first crackling thunderclap of the dust-storm, sounding muffled through the thick air, followed like a roll-call, and reverberated dully, sluggishly, through the black darkness.
When it passed, Dr. Dillon's voice rose quietly.
"There will be no relief, Smith; those are the troopers, and they're against us. So now--we've got it to ourselves, Smith, for some time."
There was a certain satisfaction at the monopoly in his voice.
The sound of those two shots greeted Vincent Dering as, after infinite difficulty, owing to the darkness, the fitful gusts of wind, and the sand-banks, he drew up the canoe against what he knew must be the high bank below the off-take of the canal.
It had only been by trusting the stream to guide him, and refraining at times from the use of his paddle, that he had managed to steer his way at all.
So he knew he was late; felt, indeed, that he must be too late to use his influence with the men, and yet, despite this knowledge, a keen disappointment filled him when those shots proved him to be so; since by long experience he knew that once open resistance began, there could be no more question of words.
What then, was there for him to do?
If he, in his light canoe, helped, wherever possible, by every atom of strength his arms possessed, had taken so long to come down that mile or two of stream, the raft could not possibly arrive for another half hour.
He could not sit still for half an hour; he felt, indeed, as if he could not sit still for half a minute. A passion to act, to sweep away the past, to forget, was upon him. He had had time during his strange journey--so often idle perforce--to realize his position; time to piece the still stranger events preceding his journey into a reasonable sequence; so that he had, by now, arrived at a fairly accurate guess as to the cause of much, that, when it happened, had seemed causeless.
For instance, Laila's dress, "given her by someone." That, joined to the knowledge that she was connected with the late Nawab's family, of which Roshan Khân might with justice claim the headship, had brought the latter's action within the bounds of credibility. Jealousy! revenge! these were potent causes. Laila, then, must have been playing with Roshan's pretensions. Playing like a child with a toy; playing, rather, like a woman who hesitates at nothing for the sake of the man she loves. And she had hesitated at nothing; not even at this, to give him pleasure, to make things match with his passion! The thought, the remembrance, made him for a moment feel inclined to fling up his hands, and let the canoe take him where it chose; take him down stream utterly. Then a half choking, yet wholly strenuous desire to escape from the whole story, a wild instinctive effort for a more wholesome atmosphere, like that of a drowning man for a breath of fresh air, had sent the canoe bounding onhisway;hisway and none other's, in swift obedience. With a rush, he had grasped that there was more in life--that he had allowed himself to be a slave! But that was past,--he would shake himself together--he would forget the thraldom of sex--and he would forget the past.
Yet, as he cast about in his mind for the best method of applying the half hour's leisure, the remembrance of a woman came to him, as if to mock at his resolution. Muriel, and dear little Gladys who called him "Derin' darling"; where were they? His eyes grew soft in the remembrance, stern at the probability of their being in danger. Why had he not thought of it before? How could he ever have paused, wondering what to do?
He set the red light, which he had taken from the fateful balcony, carefully in the canoe--though, even should some gust of the rising wind not blow the light out, it could scarcely be of any use in that outer darkness--as a signal to the raft should it, by an off chance, drift past in his absence, then struck across the sand in the direction in which he knew the Smiths' bungalow must lie; that was, a little to the rear of the gaol.
The storm, as he faced it, was so fierce that the doubt rose inevitably if an unwieldy raft could make way against it. If so, then there would be no help. The only thing would be to defend himself and others until the end came; the end which would at least end the past.
He had almost to feel his way, the darkness was so intense. It was a relief to stumble against something which he knew must be the low mud fence of Muriel's garden; that garden in which she tried to defy Providence, and rear English flowers. He knew his feet must be crushing her treasures as he passed on towards a faint glow, a red glow. But everything that was not the blackness of outer darkness to-night seemed red--blood red.
A minute after, with a vast relief at the silence, the solitude, he was in Muriel's pretty drawing-room. The pink-shaded lamp was still alight, showing red through the fog of dust. He passed to it instinctively, and as he did so, noticed the writing on the table. But many an earth-atom had fallen on that confession of ignorance since George Dillon had made it idly, and so, as Vincent Dering bent quickly to see if by chance it was some message left for those who might come after, he also had to frown and say, "God knows!"
Was it possible that Eugene and his wife were still asleep? The doors stood open, but that was to be expected at that season of the year, unless someone had been awake to close them against the storm. He must make sure, however.
But there was no one to be found in any of the rooms. It occurred to him, then, that they must have taken refuge in the gaol, and he told himself he was a fool not to have thought of that before. Dillon would, of course, have seen to that. He, Vincent, might have remembered so much, at least; might have remembered that he himself was not the only slave. Then he gave an odd, bitter little laugh. Was it never possible to get beyond a woman's apron-strings?
And here he was wasting time over the question, when he ought to be doing something better.
But what?
Go back and wait for the raft, or on to the gaol? There was a big tamarisk tree at the end of the garden. Only two days before he had pointed it out to Muriel and said that an active man accustomed totrapezework might swing himself from it astride the high mud wall of the gaol, and so gain the roof of the gate. Dillon had denied it; and she had said, laughingly, that no one ever tried to break into a gaol, only out of one.
Curious; still, if it had only been light, it would have been worth the risking. But it was impossible now in the dark.
So, suddenly, a remembrance came to him. The search-light!
Was it only last night he had been dining here, in this house, after bringing Muriel home from the Mission, where they had seen that huge ray piercing the shadows? Was it only yesterday that he had listened to Eugene's lamentations over his unused electricity, which was sure, he said, to vanish into space from his rude contrivances. Was it only yesterday that, in obedience to that pathetic look of martyrdom on Muriel's face, which still seemed--to one part of Vincent's nature--to call for instant sympathy, he had, to appease the honest inventor, shown an interest in search-lights which was purely fictitious, and learned a variety of facts about buttons and stop-cocks? And had all this happened yesterday on purpose that to-day, when he was in need of light--
He was up on the roof with the thought. If only the blessed thing had go enough for that! As he picked his way rapidly through the litter, three or four cigar-ends, a half-finished whiskey-and-soda, seen by the flash of the hurricane lantern he had sought out and lit, told him that Eugene must have been at work over his new toy till late. So much the better for his chance--for everybody's chance; since a signal like that might make all the difference to the raft; all the difference to Dillon in the gaol--
George Dillon was, indeed, beginning to realize this himself. His almost triumphant mood had passed; it had come home to him that the unexpected revelation of the troopers' complicity in the plot, whatever it was, had changed the whole aspect of affairs. Now, there was no question of keeping the gaol quiet until help should arrive. He was face to face, now, with the fact that he must not rely on any aid at all. What had really happened, he could not guess. For all he knew, the troopers and pioneers might have risen and killed their officers, killed everybody who would be likely to help. His aim, now, was to sell his life, and--and hers--as dearly as he could; but in the dead darkness, like a rat in a hole, what could be done? Except wait--wait for the walls to be dug through, the gates to be mined, that poor eight or ten feet drop at the foot of the stairs scaled. Then a rush, still in the dark, and--the greatest Darkness of all!
Not even the chance of a shot; and he had plenty of ammunition. It would at least have passed the time to take pot-shots at the devils; and though these would have brought retaliation, there would have been no need for exposure. The parapet walls were high enough, and properly loopholed.
So, for a few minutes, he sat almost sullenly beside those, for whom alone he now felt responsible, in the little turret, which, as is always the case in India, rose at one corner of the flat roof giving fair shelter for the time. In his first hurried recognition, which had come with the shots, that not help but attack lay outside, he had blown out his light, fearing lest Eugene Smith might also be exposed to similar attentions; so it was pitch dark. And the now almost constant reverberations, which seemed to send the sand-laden air in pulse-beats on your face, deadened all other sounds into vague confusion. But he knew that the warders within the porch, the troopers without, were trying to force the barred gate. That would not take long; though the two doors blocking the ends of the tunnel would be a tougher job.
And he heard, closer at hand, a sleepy whimper from the child, a low comforting from a mother's voice.
The sound made him set his teeth.
God! if there was only light to kill withal.
And then, in a second, as if by a miracle, it came. A great flood of shining light, contemptuous, at that short distance, even of that outer darkness. For it was electricity against electricity; a house divided against itself.
The first thing he saw by it was that fragile figure in its dainty blue frills, a child's golden head; and so, naturally, the next instant found his hand on a rifle.
"The search-light! by all that's lucky! Well! everyone has not been killed, anyhow," cried Eugene Smith.
"Killed," echoed Dr. Dillon, savagely. "No one has been killed yet, but it won't be long before they are."
It was not; for a trooper engaged in staring stupidly at the velvety black circle out of which the intruding light seemed to spring, suddenly threw up his hands, swirled round, and fell face upwards in a crumpled heap.
There was an instant's scare in the crowd, in that hundred and fifty or more of troopers and conspirators, thrown into black and white relief, like a shadow pantomime, about the outer gate. Then the startled murmurs of "the light--theDee-puk-râg" which were passing from lip to lip, changed into a yell.
The fight had begun in earnest.
"Shoot straight," remarked Dr. Dillon, a few minutes after, "we shan't have such a good chance long. The gate is almost gone. Then most of the game will be out of range--too close to the wall. And once they get into the tunnel we shall have to soundcease firinguntil they come out on the other side; but then we ought to do decent damage, if the prisoners don't get at us first." He paused, and shot on steadily till, with a hoarse shout, the attackers surged inwards. Then he laid his rifle aside, remarking that it would be as well to keep an eye gaolwards, in case of complications.
So far as could be seen in that curious chequering of dense darkness and sharp glittering light; light which was palpably an intruder, which seemed absolutely apart from the things it showed--even from the dust-atoms--there was none as yet. At least the uppermost portion of that vast wheel of wall stood out, perfect, unbroken. The roof of the Smiths' bungalow, where the light stood, being, however, but little higher than these walls, much of what lay below in the sections themselves was necessarily hidden in shadow; especially on the side nearest the light. But the narrow alley leading up to the central tower, being in straight line with the ray, showed clear as daylight, save just under the citadel itself. So did most of the little courtyard, with its doors opening to the right and left. George Dillon gave a sigh of satisfaction at the sight, since, whether the foe elected--when once inside the gates--to rush the roof, or press on to liberate the prisoners by those six doors in the round tower, there would be fair chance of a good bag, for a straight shot!
Or, even if the convalescents in hospital were to set free the solitary-cell convicts--a contingency which had occurred to him too late for any plan of minimizing the danger--and were to swarm into the courtyard to help against the last gate (which, of course, was partly barred from the inside), he could settle their hash also. And that, now, was his one idea. The idea of all brave men when they find themselves in a tight place--to kill before being killed.
As yet, however, there was no sign of life even within the vast wheel, with its rims and spokes of light, its centre of shadow. It lay dim, curiously still behind the dust-atoms that danced in the ray, like motes in a sunbeam.
There was not a sound, not a sign within. Only the tumult of voices, the intermittent shots without, rising above the dull, muffled hum in the air.
Stay! that was something. Half way round the circle, where the shadow of the tall tamarisk tree in the Smiths' garden cut a jagged gap in the white rim of wall, there was some change, something that had not been there a moment ago.
The gap had moved; had changed place and form, though for a time the air was still with one of those breathless, suffocating pauses, when the dust above seems to sink on the dust below, and fill one's very lungs. And now the gap was back again, as it had been before. But it had left something clinging for a second to the wall like a limpet: the next astride it safely.
"Reach me over my rifle, Smith," said the doctor, briefly; "there's a brute trying to sniggle along the wall; must have come up that tree in your garden. Wish I'd taken Dering's advice and cut it down. Thanks! I don't want to take my eye off him, for fear he means to drop into a section. I'll shoot, if that seems his game; if not, I'll wait till he comes closer."
He leant over the parapet, waiting. Just below him, the inner wall of the gate against which the stair clung, and which was prolonged into the turret where Muriel and the child were sheltering, joined the circular outside wall of the gaol. The man, thought Dr. Dillon, trusting to their being occupied in front, must be trying to steal a march on them, slip down the stair, and take them in the rear. There was plenty of time to prevent that, however.
Muriel Smith, roused by the sound of Vincent's name from the sort of lethargy into which she had fallen,--since she was not wanted either by her husband or the doctor,--rose to her knees and peered over the parapet cautiously.
"From the tree in the garden," she said, dreamily. "Yes! I remember. You said it couldn't be done, and I said no one would ever want to do it, and he said he could--" she paused, and gave a little cry--"It is Vincent himself!" she gasped; "don't shoot, doctor! It's Vincent! I know it! I feel it! I knew he would come, if he could! Vincent! Vincent!"
"What's up?" asked Eugene, still firing steadily at all that was to be seen.
"Only your wife says the man is Captain Dering; and--and, by Jove! I believe she is right."
"Of course I'm right," she sobbed, half hysterically--"I knew he would come--I knew he wouldn't leave me to die alone!"
Eugene Smith laid down his rifle, and crawled over in cover deliberately, with an odd look on his face.
"Yes! that's Dering; plucky fellow. He's swung himself up. I always knew he was a nailing gymnast."
There was no grudge in his voice, only a curious challenge as he looked at his wife, then laid his big hand on her shoulder. "Keep more down, please--your head's showing. He'll get here, all right, never fear; we'll lower a rope to him when he comes alongside."
"But I would rather look--I'd rather seeanythinghappen--" she moaned; "it seems so unkind not to watch--not to be there--with him--" She was shivering all over, the patient self-control, the steady acquiescence even in her own danger which had been hers till then, gone utterly.
George Dillon felt a great pity, a vast impatience.
"So you were right, Smith," he broke in hastily, to cover her sudden break down. "They aren't killed; now we shall have a chance of knowing what's at the bottom of all this foolery!"
But when, five minutes later, Vincent Dering reached the roof in safety, the doctor felt vaguely that the explanations only added to the general incomprehensibility; and that something was being kept back. What, he asked impatiently, had started the show?
Of course there were plots. Pidar Narâyan knew of them, but, as such things generally did, they had seemed abortive. What, then, had upset the apple-cart?
Vincent gave a gesture of despair. "What does it matter?" he cried. "We can think of that--if wecanthink--when it's over! And if we can't--what does it matter?"
"You can bet your bottom dollar on one thing," said Eugene, who, in this pause for a council of war, was methodically loading various weapons for future use. "It is either the sex, or sin. This world would be a paradise of peace if people didn't want virtue or vice,--I don't say which is which, mind you." He spoke suddenly, harshly; and once more George Dillon came to the rescue.
"As Dering says, it doesn't matter. But the fact that the pioneers are staunch, and may be expected before long, alters our tactics a bit, Smith. We must husband our ammunition, and stick on as long as possible--don't you think so, Dering?"
Vincent, kindly always, had stooped to take little Gladys, who had crept over to him, in his arms; and now the child, her arms round his neck, was cuddling close to him. "I'm so glad oo's come, Derin' darlin'," she whispered. "And so's mum--aren't 'oo, dearest?"
Vincent unclasped the soft, little, clinging hands almost resentfully, and pulled himself together.
"Yes!" he said briefly, "we've got to hold out. So it will be better to reserve ourselves, and try to keep the gaol itself quiet. It will take the brutes some time to force those gates unless they get help from within, and then there is the alley, and the doors. Still, we shall want every minute; for, unless the storm lessens, Carlyon will scarcely get the raft here before dawn. It was awful on the river."
It was, indeed.
Even Am-ma had lost himself utterly, while Lance, after paddling, and drifting, and shouting after a dozen false hopes, was still as far from finding the raft as ever.
What could have become of it? Had it started sooner than he had expected, and passed down before he had found Vincent? Or had it never started at all? Had the men, after he left, turned round onher?
This fear had come to him early in his search, and he had felt inclined then and there to paddle back to the Fort, and satisfy himself it was not so. But the thought of her face, if he allowed care for her to cause delay, had kept him to his task steadily, till he could no longer doubt that something had gone wrong.
But what? And what was he to do?
Then, in a flash, had come back her words after she had bidden him think hard. "You must go down to the spit, cut across it by the mission house, get round, if you can, to the police camp."
That had been her verdict, involving her being left to take her chance.
And now either the raft, the relief for the gaol, had started, or it had not. If the former, he might, of course, by a stern chase overtake it; but Erda was there and Vincent would meet her; they could do without him. But if it hadnotstarted, what then? Then matters were exactly as they had been, when she had bidden him leave her.
So, with a feeling that, if this were so, he cared little what happened, he steered, so far as he could judge, for the sand-banks of the spit to the right.
Am-ma, on the contrary, steered instinctively to the left, towards the high bank, the deepest stream. It would at least float his logs to their destination, and that was something. Kings had come and gone, and battles had been won and lost, but the logs had always had to go down the river, whatever happened.
And among the men, also, an apathy seemed to have settled, as they drifted on and on in the dark. Erda, crouching in a dry spot beside the ammunition, alert to the uttermost for the least hint of Lance, realized this from the very tone of their voices as they talked under their breath to each other. She felt instinctively that the inaction, the darkness, the lack of a leader, were lessening the value of those twenty men each minute.
If Lance would only turn up! What could have become of him? The time seemed interminable; she felt sure that they must already have drifted past the gaol; she began to wonder if Am-ma was not playing false. For the darkness, the uncertainty, had its grip on her also. It was like some horrid nightmare, to drift on and on, hearing the muffled drumming of the storm, feeling the strange vibration in the air, the sharp sand tingling on your face, and to know nothing--nothing at all, save that you were there.
"Am-ma!" she cried sharply, at last, certain of but one thing, that she must act,--"I believe we have passed the gaol; steer to the right, do you hear?"
A laugh, not exactly insolent, but tolerant, came from the group of men. "Tis easy to give orders, Missy-baba," said a voice; "but not so easy to obey them, when the Lord is against your side, and sends darkness!"
Erda's heart gave a great throb, not of fear, but comprehension. That was the beginning; a minute or two more and these men would be out of hand.
"Am-ma!" she called again, "do what I tell you. Remember the child! Remember we have theDee-puk-râg."
Another laugh came from the men. "If you have theDee-puk-râg, send it now. We need light, for sure, and--"
The voice ended in a gasp--
For it was there! A long ray of light, showing them that they were, indeed, just opposite the gaol.
"Am-ma!" came Erda's voice again, and there was a hush and yet a triumph in it, "to the right--steer to the right."
The raft edged slowly towards the ray, but the soldiers still crouched inactive; awed, yet not certain.
Then suddenly that quick crack of George Dillon's first shot echoed over the river, then the yell, then the answering shots.
And following on their heels rapidly came a stir among those crouching figures, and one of them stood up excitedly--"It has begun!--see you, Prag! Lehna, give the boatman a hand! Lo! do as the Miss-bababade thee, quickly, son of a pig! Steer for the light--they have begun!"
Erda gave a sigh of relief.Thatdanger was over.