The sun had set ere Dick reached the narrowest part of the defile
where, even at midday, the shadows lay dark; and now, with the clouds
which had been creeping up from the eastward all the afternoon
obscuring the moon, it looked grim and threatening. He was standing at
an open turn, surprised at the warmth of the wind that came hurrying
down the gully, when the low whistling cry of the marmot rang through
the valley and died away among the rocks. A second afterwards the
whizz of a bullet, followed by the distant crack of a rifle, made him
drop in his tracks and seek the shelter of a neighbouring boulder.
Once again the marmot's cry arose, this time comparatively close at
hand. To answer it was the result of a second's thought, and the
silence which ensued convinced Dick that he had done the right thing.
But what was the next step? Whistling was easy work, but how if he met
some of these musical sentries face to face? Perhaps it would be wiser
to go back. He had almost made up his mind to this course when the
thought that these robbers, for so he deemed them, might out of pure
mischief have tampered with his beloved wires came to turn the balance
in favour of going on. A disused path leading by a _détour_ to the
southern side branched off about a mile further up; if he could reach
that safely he might manage to get home without much delay. Only a
mile; he would risk it. Creeping from his shelter cautiously he
resumed his way, adopting the easy lounging gait of the hill-people;
rather a difficult task with the inward knowledge that some one may be
taking deliberate aim at you from behind a rock. More than once, as he
went steadily onwards, the cry of a bird or beast rose out of the
twilight, prompting his instant reply. "If they would only crow like a
cock," he thought, with the idle triviality which so often accompanies
grave anxiety, "I could do that first-class."
Yet he was fain to pause and wipe the sweat from his face when he
found himself safely in the disused track, and knew by the silence
that he was beyond the line of sentries. A rough road lay before him,
but he traversed it rapidly, being anxious to get the worst of it over
before the lingering light deserted the peaks. As he stood on the
summit he was startled at the lurid look of the vast masses of cloud
which, rolling up to his very feet, obscured all view beyond. They
were in for a big storm, he thought, as he hurried down the slopes at
a break-neck pace; with all his haste barely reaching the shanty in
time, for a low growl of thunder greeted his arrival, and as he pulled
the latch a faint gleam of light showed him the empty room. He called
loudly; darkness and silence: again, as he struck a match; light, but
still silence. Quick as thought, Dick was at the signaller, and the
electric bell rang out incongruously. _Tink-a-tink-a-tink_ was echoed
from the eastward. But westward? He waited breathlessly, while not a
sound returned to him. Communication was broken; the wires had
possibly been cut, and Dick stood up with a curiously personal sense
of injury. His wires tampered with out of sheer mischief! Yet stay!
Might it not be something more? Where the devil had the _bâbu_ hidden
himself? After fruitless search an idea struck him, and he signalled
eastward once more. "Repeat your last message, giving time at which
sent." With ears attuned to tragedy Dick awaited the reply. "6 P.M. To
north side. 'Will send cocoa-nut oil and curry stuff by next mail.'"
The echo of Dick's laughter, as he realised that but an hour or so
before the _bâbu_ had been putting the telegraph to commissariat uses,
was the last human sound the shanty was to hear for many a long day.
For the next moment's thought roused a sudden fear. The _bâbu_ had
doubtless gone over the Pass with the troops for the sake of company;
that was natural enough, but if he was still in the north shanty
awaiting Dick's return, why had he not answered the signal sent
westward? It could not be due to any break in the wire, unless the
damage had been done after dark, for he had been able to telegraph
eastward not so long ago. Was there more afoot than mere mischief?
It was not a night for a dog to be out in, and as Dick stood at the
door he could see nothing but masses of cloud hurrying past, softly,
silently. Then suddenly a shudder of light zig-zagged hither and
thither, revealing only more cloud pierced by a few pinnacles of rock.
Not a night for a dog certainly; but for a man, with a man's work
before him? Belle would bid him go, he knew. A minute later he had
closed the door behind him, and faced the Pass again. Ere he reached
the end of the short ascent it was snowing gently; then, with a
furious blast, hailing in slanted torrents that glittered like
dew-drops in the almost ceaseless shiver of the silent lightning.
Everything was so silent, save for the wind which, caught and twisted
in the gullies, moaned as if in pain. Ah! was that the end of all
things? Round him, in him, through him, came a blaze of white flame,
making him stagger against the wall of rock and throw up his hands as
if to ward off the impalpable mist which held such a deadly weapon.
Half-blinded he went on, his mind full of one thought. If that sort of
thing came again, say when he was passing the snow-bridge, could a man
stand it without a start which must mean instant death? The question
left no room for anything save a vague wonder till it was settled in
the affirmative. Then the nickname of "lightning-_wallahs_," given by
the natives to the telegraph-clerks, struck him as being happy, and
Afzul's reference to fire from heaven passed through his mind. More
like fire from hell surely, with that horrible sulphurous smell, and
now and again a ghastly undertoned crackle like the laughter of
fiends. There again! Wider this time, and followed by a rattle as of
musketry. But the snow which was now sweeping along in white swirls
seemed to shroud even the lightning. Horrible! To have so much light
and to be able to see nothing but cloud, and the stones at your feet.
How long would he see them? How long would it be before the snow
obliterated the path, leaving him lost? He stumbled along, tingling to
his very finger-tips, despite the cold which grew with every
explosion. The very hair on his fur coat stood out electrified, and
his brain swam with a wild excitement. On and on recklessly, yet
steadily; his footsteps deadened by the drifting snow, until he stood
at the threshold of shelter and threw open the door of the shanty.
Great Heaven, what was this! The _bâbu_, green with fear, working the
signaller, while Afzul Khân, surrounded by six or seven armed Pathans,
stood over him with drawn knife. "Go on, you fool!" he was saying,
"your work is nearly finished."
The full meaning of the scene flashed through Dick Smith's excited
brain quicker than any lightning. Treachery was at work, with a coward
for its agent. His revolver was out in a second, and before the
astonished group had time to grasp the unexpected interruption, the
_bâbu's_ nerveless fingers slipped from the handles, as with a gasping
sob, rising above the report, he sank in a heap on the floor.
"By God and His Prophet!" cried Afzul, carried away, as men of his
kind are, by the display of daredevil boldness which is their
unattained ideal of bravery. "Yea, by the twelve Imaums, but it was
well done."
"Liar, traitor, unfaithful to salt!" cried Dick, whose extraordinary
appearance and absolutely reckless behaviour inspired his hearers with
such awe that for the moment they stood transfixed. The revolver was
levelled again, this time at Afzul, when the memory of other things
beside revenge sobered the lad, and a flash of that inspiration which
in time of danger marks the leader of men from his fellows made him
throw aside the weapon and fold his arms. "No!" he said coolly, "I am
faithful. I have eaten the salt of the Barakzais; they are my
friends."
"Don't hurt the lad," cried Afzul, not a moment too soon, for cold
steel was at Dick's throat. "God smite you to eternal damnation,
Haiyât! Put up that knife, I say. The lad's words are true. He has
eaten of our salt, and we of his. He hath lived among us and done no
harm to man or maid. By Allah! the lightning has got into his brain.
Bind him fast; and mark you, 'twill be worse than death for him to lie
here helpless, knowing that the wires he made such a fuss about have
lured his friends to death. I know his sort. Death?--this will be
seventy hells for him; and we can kill him after, if needs be."
Dick, as he felt the cords bite into his wrists and ankles, ground his
teeth at the man's jeering cruelty. "Kill me outright, you devils!" he
cried, struggling madly. It was the wisest way to ensure life, for the
sight of his impotent despair amused his captors.
"Give him a nip of his own brandy, Haiyât, or he will be slipping
through our fingers," said one, as he lay back exhausted.
"Not I; the bottle's near empty as it is."
Tales of his boyhood about drunken guards and miraculous escapes
recurred to Dick's memory, and though he felt to the full the
absurdity of mixing them up with the present deadly reality, the
slenderest chance gave at least room for hope. "There is plenty more
in the cupboard," he gasped. "The key is in my pocket."
"True is it, O Kâreem, that the Feringhi infidel cannot die in peace
without his _sharâb_," remarked Haiyât virtuously. But he did not fail
with the others to taste all the contents of the cupboard, even to a
bottle of Pain-killer which had belonged to the _bâbu_. Meanwhile
Dick, lying helpless and bound, felt a fierce surge of hope and
despair as he remembered that behind those open doors lay something
which could put an end to treachery. Five minutes with his
field-instrument in the open, and, let what would come afterwards, he
would have done his work. The thought gave Dick an idea which, if
anything, increased the hopelessness of his position, for the only
result of his offer to work the wires on condition of his life being
saved, was to drive Afzul, who saw his dread of Dick's getting his
hands on the instrument in danger of being over-ruled, into settling
the question, once and for all, by severing the connection with a
hatchet.
"I know him better than that," he said; "he would sit and fool us
until he had given warning. Let him lie there; if he has sense, he
will sleep."
There was something so significant in his tone that Dick felt wisdom
lay in pretending to follow the advice. He strained his ears for every
whispered word of the gang as they crouched round the fire, and
gathered enough to convince him that the sudden change of plan at
head-quarters had endangered some deep-laid scheme of revenge, and
that Afzul Khân, believing Dick had gone on to the camp, had suggested
a false telegram in order to lure the regiment into the open. A
frantic rage and hate for the man who had suggested such a devilish
prostitution of what constituted Dick's joy and pride roused every
fibre of the lad's being. Lecoq, that greatest of examples to
prisoners, declares that given time, pluck, and a cold chisel, the man
who remains a captive is a fool. But how about the cold chisel? Dick's
eyes, craftily searching about under cover of the failing fire-light,
saw many things which might be useful, but all out of reach.
"I am cold," he said boldly; "bring me a rug or move me out of the
draught."
They did both, in quick recognition of his spirit, and, with a laugh
and an oath to the effect that the dead man would be a warm
bed-fellow, dragged him beside the wretched _bâbu_ and threw a
sheepskin rug over both. Dick's faint hope of some carpenter's tools
in the far corner fled utterly: but his heart leaped up again as he
remembered that his cowardly subordinate had always gone about armed
with revolvers and bowie-knives. Rifling a dead man's pockets with
your hands tied behind your back is slow work, but the rug covered a
multitude of movements. Half an hour afterwards Dick's feet were free,
and with the knife held fast between his heels he was breaking his
back in obstinate determination of some time and somehow severing the
rope upon his wrists. Some time and somehow--it seemed hours; yet when
he managed at last with bleeding hands to draw the watch from his
pocket he found it was barely two o'clock. Hitherto his one thought
had been freedom; now he turned his mind towards escape. There was
still plenty of time for him to reach the camp ere dawn found the
regiment on the move; but the risks he might have to run on the way
decided him, first of all, to try and secure his field-instrument from
the cupboard. He lay still for a long time wondering what to do next,
furtively watching Afzul Khân as he busied himself over the fire,
while the others dozed preparatory to the work before them. Having
possessed himself also of the dead _bâbu's_ revolver, Dick felt
mightily inclined to risk all by a steady shot at Afzul, and immediate
flight. But the remembrance of those sentries on the downward road
prevented him from relying altogether on his speed of foot. Yet Dick
knew his man too well to build anything on the chance of either wine
or weariness causing Afzul to relax his watch. It had come to be a
stand-up fight between these two, a state of affairs which never fails
to develop all the resources of brain and body. Dick, keenly alive to
every trivial detail, noticed first a longer interval in the
replenishing of the fire, and then the fact that but a few small logs
of wood remained in the pile. Thereafter, whenever Afzul's right hand
withdrew fresh fuel, Dick's left under cover of the noise made free
with more. The sheepskin rug had shelter for other things than a dead
body and a living one.
"It burns like a fat Hindoo," muttered the Pathan, sulkily, as the
last faggot went to feed the flame. "Lucky there is more in the
outhouse, or those fools would freeze to death in their sleep."
Dick's heart beat like a sledge-hammer. His chance, the only chance,
had come! Almost before the tall figure of the Pathan, after stooping
over him to make sure that he slept, had ceased to block the doorway,
Dick was at the cupboard. A minute's, surely not more than a minute's
delay, and he was outside, safe and free, with the means of warning
carefully tucked inside his fur coat.
Too late! Right up the only possible path came Afzul, carrying a great
armful of sticks. To rush on him unprepared, tumble him backwards into
a snowdrift alongside, deal him a crashing blow or two for quietness'
sake and cram his _pugree_ into his mouth, was the work of a minute;
the next he was speeding down the descent with flying feet. The storm
was over, and the moon riding high in the heavens shone on a white
world; but already the darkness of the peaks against the eastern sky
told that the dawn was not far off.
The first dip of the wires, he decided, was too close for safety,
besides the drifts always lay thickest there. The next, a mile and a
half down the valley, was best in every way; and as he ran, the keen
joy of victory, not only against odds but against one man, came to him
with the thought of Afzul Khân gagged and helpless in the snow.
But he had reckoned without the cold; the chill night air which,
finding its way through the open door, soon roused the sleepers by the
ill-replenished fire. Haiyât, waking first, gave the alarm, and the
discovery of their leader half suffocated in the snowdrift followed
swiftly. Yet it was not until the latter, slowly recovering speech,
gasped out a warning, that the full meaning of their prisoner's escape
was brought home to them.
"After him! Shoot him down!" cried Afzul, staggering to his feet. "He
can bring fire from heaven! If he touches the wires all is lost. Fool
that I was not to kill him, the tiger's cub, the hero of old! Curse
him, true son of Byramghor, born of the lightning!" So with wild
threats, mingled with wilder words of wonder and admiration, Afzul
Khân, still dazed by the blows Dick had dealt him, stumbled along in
rear of the pursuit.
The latter's heart knew its first throb of fear when the signal he
sent down the severed wire brought no reply. After all, was the
outcome of long months of labour, the visible embodiment of what was
best in him, about to fail in time of need? Again and again he
signalled, urgently, imperiously, while his whole world seemed to wait
in breathless silence. Failure! No, no, incredible, impossible; not
failure after all! Suddenly, loud and clear, came an answering trill,
bringing with it a joy such as few lives know. A shout from above, a
bullet whistling past him; scarcely fair that, when his hands were
busy, and his mind too, working methodically, despite those yelling
fiends tearing down the slope. "_Major from Dick--treachery_."
Something like a red-hot iron shot through his leg as he knelt on the
cliff, a clear mark against the sky. Lucky, he thought, it was not
through his arm. "_For God's sake_--" He doubled up in sudden agony
but went on "_Stand fast_."
There was still a glint of life left in him when Afzul Khân,
coming up behind the butchers, claimed the death-blow. Their eyes met.
"Fire--from--heaven!" gasped Dick, and rolled over dead. The Pathan
put up his knife gloomily. "It is true," he said with an oath. "I knew
he was that sort; he has beaten us fairly."
An hour afterwards, heralded by winged clouds flushed with the
ceaseless race of day, the steady sun climbed the eastern sky and
looked down brightly on the dead body of the lad who had given back
his spark of divine fire to the Unknown. Perhaps, if bureaucracy had
not seen fit to limit genius within statutory bounds, Dick Smith might
have left good gifts behind him for his generation, instead of taking
them back with him to the storehouse of Nature. And the sun shone
brightly also on Belle Stuart's bed; but not even her dreams told her
that her best chance of happiness lay dead in the snow. She would not
have believed it, even if she had been told.