Frederick Roberts with the infantry felt for the enemy along the road,
Hodson with the Guides and Coke with the guns marched along the right
bank of the Jumna Canal. Fortunately the rain had ceased, but the ground
had been turned into a quagmire; the horses trod over their fetlocks in
mud, and the progress of the column was slow. It was soon clear that all
hope must be abandoned of saving the village and the little Sikh post
guarding it. Still, the rebels must return to Delhi, and it was possible
to relieve them of any plunder they had gained and to teach them a
lesson.
The Guides marched on in the darkness. Ahmed had as yet attracted no
attention among the troopers. Hodson's servant had rummaged out an old
scarf which rolled up into a quite respectable turban, and a discarded
great-coat which was not unlike the chogah he had left on the ground
when escaping from the rebels. It was impossible to distinguish his
dress in the night, and if anything strange had been noticed about his
appearance, the fact that many had had to change their drenched garments
might have sufficiently explained it. He took care to keep out of
Sherdil's way; Sherdil was the most likely man to see through his
disguise, and while his mission in Delhi was yet unfulfilled in its
entirety, it was advisable to keep the secret.
Soon after daybreak the patrols came in sight of the enemy returning in
triumph from Alipur. They had fallen on the village, slain the Sikhs to
a man, burnt the place to the ground, and carried off a quantity of
plunder, including an ammunition wagon and several camel-loads of
small-arm cartridges.
At the sight of the rebel infantry in their red coats, Major Coke
unlimbered the guns and brought them into action. They were only light
field-pieces, and did little execution among the enemy, who, instead of
standing their ground and making use of their overwhelming numbers, fell
into a panic when the guns came within six hundred yards of them, and
bolted, flinging away their shoes, belts and other impedimenta, in their
mad haste to get away.
Then Hodson gave his eager men the word to charge. They swept down upon
the disordered ranks of the rebels, and were soon engaged hand to hand
with their cavalry. Shouting their war-cry "Wah-hah!" the Guides cut
their way through them, smiting right and left with their swords.
Hodson himself was in the thick of the fray, and escaped hurt as by a
miracle. His gallant horse, Feroza, was slashed with sabre cuts; his
bridle was severed, and a piece of his glove was shorn off. The men were
no whit behind their leader. Ahmed unhorsed one man with his lance, and
recovered from the stroke just in time to ward off a desperate thrust
from a sabre. The trooper at his side fell from his horse with a mortal
wound in his neck; several of the horses were so badly wounded that they
had to be killed. But the enemy would not stand, and the Guides' losses
were only the one man killed and six wounded.
So desperate was the rebels' flight that they left behind them all their
baggage and the spoil of their night's work at Alipur. Hodson would fain
have pursued them to the very walls of Delhi, but the horses were so
fatigued by their march over the heavy ground that they were incapable
of further efforts. Major Coke's guns, moreover, sank so deep into the
mud that they could scarcely be moved. The rebels were on higher ground,
and the Guides howled with disappointment when they saw them drawing
their guns away in safety. They came up with the tail-end of the
infantry ere the morning was past, and inflicted heavy loss upon them,
so that Bakht Khan, who had led the column in person, had little
satisfaction in his night's adventure. All that his five thousand men
had accomplished was the destruction of a small village, and the capture
of plunder which they were now forced to leave behind them on the field.
The encounter with the enemy having taken place between the road and the
canal, the British infantry could not come up in time to take part in
it. But they were so much exhausted by the scorching heat of the day,
following their march over the swamps, that many of the 61st sank down
beneath trees as they returned to camp, and remained there until
elephants were sent to bring them in.
As the Guides marched back to camp, Ahmed became the object of much
curious speculation on the part of his comrades. Many had noticed the
doughty way in which he had conducted himself during the brief
encounter, and wondered who this bearded warrior was who fought among
them in a garb so strange. He rode on gravely, not turning his head, nor
taking part in the talk of the others. They questioned one another in
low tones about him.
"Who is this stranger, and when did he come among us?" asked Rasul Khan,
of Sherdil, son of Assad, as they rode a little behind him.
"Allah knows," replied Sherdil. "I know him not. I spoke of him to
Hodson Sahib, and the sahib glared at me out of his blue eyes--eyes like
a hawk's, Rasul--and asked me whether he was not a good fighter and
worthy of the Guides. 'Verily he is, sahib,' I said, 'but we know him
not.' '_I_ know him, is not that enough?' says the sahib. Peradventure
he is a new recruit, Rasul, or a candidate, and there being no time for
the tests the sahib bade him come with us and show what he could do. I
care not, so that he does not become a dafadar before me."
"I will even ask his name," returned Rasul, riding his horse beside
Ahmed's. "Thou of the black beard, what is thy name?"
"I am of the Guides," said Ahmed simply. "If thou desirest to know more,
ask of the sahib."
Whereupon Rasul fell back and told Sherdil that the black-bearded one
was either a very surly fellow or one of the sahibs in disguise. "For he
spake to me in the tone the sahibs have when they bid us do things and
we obey even as children. Of a truth he is a sahib, or at the very least
a sowar from one of the English regiments. That is it, he is an English
sowar, one of Blunt Sahib's men, perhaps, and his own clothes being wet
he put on those of a banijara. If that be not the truth, Sherdil, we
shall without doubt learn the truth when we come to camp. He is a good
fighter, that is sure."
That evening Hodson sent for Ahmed, who in common with all the members
of Coke's wearied force had slept through the day, and kept him for a
long time. Ahmed felt afterwards as if he had been turned inside out. He
related all that had happened to him since his departure from the Ridge;
his fight with the lathi-wallahs, his interview with Fazl Hak (at which
Hodson chuckled), his eavesdropping in Minghal Khan's house, the failure
of all his attempts hitherto to discover anything about Dr. Craddock. He
mentioned casually how he had seen the khansaman disappear through a
hole in the wall.
"The rascal!" said Hodson. "Without doubt he has some little hoard of
his own by which he sleeps. And you say that he talks foully about the
sahibs?"
"True, hazur."
"I hope the villain will get his deserts some day. Craddock Sahib will
without doubt be found--if he is yet alive--in some quiet garden or on
some roof-top. You will go back into the city. I am pleased with you.
You will find out all you can that will help us when the assault
comes--the numbers of rebels at the various gates, the haunts of the
ringleaders, the secret ways by which they may try to escape. And if you
can discover anything of their plans again, as you have done, you must
let me know. Have you money?"
"Enough, sahib, and I have still some goods to sell."
"Ah, I had forgotten your goods. I doubt whether you will find them as
you left them."
"Then the bhatiyara will suffer many pangs," said Ahmed simply, and
Hodson laughed.
It was many days, however, before Ahmed returned to Delhi. His exposure
on the night of his escape, followed by the march and fighting, and the
fatigues of returning in the heat, had brought on a slight fever. He lay
up in the quarters of the camp-followers, trusting to Nature for his
cure. And during these days he heard much talk of the incidents of the
camp. Cholera had broken out; General Barnard himself died of it after a
few hours' illness on the day after the sortie to Alipur. His successor,
General Reed, was in ill-health, and officers and men were discussing
who would really lead them. Many of the natives complained bitterly of
their treatment by the British soldiers. The cook-boys, who carried
their food, often had to dodge round shot from the city, and had become
expert at it, dropping down on their knees when they saw the shot
coming. And when they rose and went on with their pots and tins the men
would jeer at them, and curse them for being late with the food. Ahmed,
as he heard things like this, wondered whether all the sahibs had such
contempt for their poor native servants.
Between nine and ten one morning the bugles sounded the alarm, and
Ahmed, having recovered sufficiently to leave his charpoy, went out to
see what was happening. He had heard the sounds of firing so often while
lying sick that he would hardly have noticed it now but that it seemed
so much nearer than ever before.
In the drizzling rain a party of cavalry was seen approaching a battery
near the churchyard. One of the gunners had a portfire lighted in
readiness for firing his gun, but Lieutenant Hills ordered him to
refrain, judging from the horsemen's movements that they were a picket
of the 9th Irregular Native Cavalry. All at once, however, it struck him
that the picket was unusually large, and being now a little suspicious,
he ordered his men to unlimber and open upon the horsemen. Before this
could be done some fifteen or twenty of the enemy dashed over the canal
bridge into the camp and rode straight for the guns.
Lieutenant Hills--he was a second lieutenant and a little fellow--saw
that time must be gained for his men if the guns were to be saved.
Without a moment's hesitation he charged the rebels single-handed, cut
down the first man he met, and had just flung his pistol at a second
when two sowars dashed upon him. Their horses collided with his in a
terrific shock; the horse was rolled over, and Hills sent flying to the
ground, thus escaping the swords of the enemy, one of which, however,
shore a slice off his jacket. Half stunned, he lay still, and the rebel
sowars left him for dead.
But Hills was not dead; in a minute or two he rose to his feet and
looked about for his sword. There it was, on the ground about ten yards
away. No sooner was it in his hand than three of the enemy returned--two
on horseback, the third on foot. One of the horsemen charged him, but he
leapt aside and dealt the man a blow that toppled him wounded from the
saddle. The second man made full at him with his lance. Hills parried
the thrust with a quick movement, and wounded the sowar in the head.
Then up came the third man--a young, limber fellow. Hills was panting
for breath after the violence of his exertions. In his fierce and rapid
movements his cloak had in some way wound itself about his throat, so
that he was almost suffocated. But after dealing with the horseman he
stood to meet the last of his opponents, and as he came within reach
aimed a shrewd blow at him with his sword. The new-comer was fresh and
unwearied. He turned the stroke, seized Hills' sword by the hilt and
wrenched it from his grasp. Thus left weaponless, a man might not be
blamed if he took to flight. Not so Hills. He had neither sword nor
pistol, but he had his fists, and he set upon the rebel with ardour,
punching his head and face with such swift and vigorous blows that the
man was quite unable to use his sword, and gave back. Unluckily, Hills
slipped over his cloak on the sodden ground and fell flat. The rebel had
just lifted his sword to cleave the fallen man's skull, when up galloped
Major Tombs, his troop-captain, who had heard of the rebels' attack from
a trooper of the Irregular Cavalry. In an instant he saw Hills' danger.
He was still some thirty paces away, and before he could reach the spot
the fatal blow would have been struck. Checking his horse, he rested his
revolver on his left arm and took aim at the mutineer, shooting him
through the body.
Major Tombs and the Lieutenant returned to their men, who had chased the
rebels some little distance past the guns. Coming back by and by to
secure the unlimbered gun, they saw another mutineer coolly walking off
with the pistol which Hills had hurled at a rebel's head early in the
fight. Hills closed with him: the man was a clever swordsman, and for a
time it was a fencing-match between them. Then Hills rushed in with a
thrust; the rebel jumped aside and dealt Hills a cut on the head that
stretched him on the ground. Once more Major Tombs came to the rescue,
and ended the matter with his sword.
This incident was the talk of the camp, and Ahmed, who had seen it all,
learnt by and by that the officers were to be recommended for the
Victoria Cross. He had never heard of this, and inquired what it was.
"Oh," said the bhisti to whom he put the question, "'tis a little brown
cross that the great Memsahib over the black water pins to the dhoti of
a soldier who is very brave."
"And is it given only to the sahibs, or to us folks of the country as
well?"
"That I know not. I never heard of any one but a Feringhi getting it.
But why dost ask! Dost think that thou, who art but a banijara, art
brave enough to please the great Memsahib?"
"What I think matters nothing, O bhisti. But there are brave men
everywhere, even among bhistis."
And Ahmed had now a new goal at which to aim.
CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH
Asadullah
Bahadur Shah, King of Delhi, was holding darbar in his private hall of
audience--the Diwan-i-khas. It was an imposing scene: the pure white
marble of the walls, ornamented with delicate inlaid work; the rich
decorations and gorgeous colour of the ceiling; the arches with mosaic
traceries, giving views of beautiful gardens: all this would have made a
fit setting for a mighty monarch's court. The old king, tremulous with
age and anxieties, sat in the centre on a dais of white marble, and no
doubt deplored at times the cupidity of his predecessor Nadir Shah, who
had turned into money, a hundred years before, the wondrous peacock
throne, in which the spread tails of the birds were encrusted with
sapphires and rubies and diamonds and other precious stones, cunningly
arranged in imitation of the natural colours. But his monarchy was sadly
diminished in wealth and dignity. Successive invaders had all taken
something for themselves; and though he was in courtesy styled king, and
received royal salutes from the guards at his doors, his territory had
been confined, since the British imposed their rule upon him, to his
palace; and instead of the untold wealth that had once been his, he had
been granted the mere pittance of L120,000 a year. And now it seemed
that he would lose even this, for the British still held the Ridge; his
generals and their forty thousand men had as yet made good none of their
confident boasts of sweeping the handful of Feringhis away, and the old
king wished with all his heart that the mutineers had let well alone. He
was depressed, wretched; what a mockery seemed that gilt scroll of
Persian on the arches above his head--
"If on earth is a bower of bliss,
It is this, it is this, it is this."
The hall was thronged. There was Bakht Khan, the commander-in-chief, the
square blunt soldier, who was yet said by some to hide under his
bluffness a character of cunning and duplicity. To him the querulous old
king turned a cold shoulder; for he had been for several weeks in the
city, and yet no success had attended his arms save the burning of
Alipur--a trumpery feat. There was Mirza Mogul, daily growing more
jealous of his supplanter. Bakht Khan's men had received six months' pay
in advance ('tis true it was the product of their own plundering), while
Mirza Mogul had the greatest difficulty in squeezing a few thousand
rupees out of the treasury to satisfy his clamorous troops. There was
Ahsanullah, the king's physician, a thin fox-faced man in black; and
Mirza Nosha, the poet, with verses in his pocket composed to celebrate
the victory when it was won; and near him Hassan Askari, who had in his
pocket Bakht Khan's order for the construction of five hundred ladders,
so that the sepoys might escape over the walls if the English took the
city. All the notabilities of Delhi were there, and for hours the old
king sat, receiving petitions, hearing demands for redress from
merchants who had been plundered, listening to the Kotwal's reports of
the misdeeds of the young prince Abu Bakr, who was constantly
intoxicated and engaged in riotous disorder. Saligram, the banker,
complained that all his papers and chests had been rifled, and he was a
ruined man. A messenger came in and reported that the English were
constructing a new battery within half-a-mile of the walls. A poor old
man, who said he was the king's cousin, made an offering of two rupees
in aid of the holy cause. Another messenger entered with news that a
detachment of the Nimuch brigade had gone out to fight the English, who
had all run away. The king called him a liar; he had heard such news
before. And then, just as the darbar was closing, there entered one of
the king's attendants, and asked if the Lord of the World would
graciously condescend to receive a chief from the hill country, who had
entered the city at the head of three hundred well-mounted men.
"Who is he?" asked the king.
"Hazur, his true name no one knows; but his horsemen call him Asadullah,
and in truth he is a very lion in wrath and courage. He has done great
things among the Feringhis at Agra and Gwalior, and being at one time a
prisoner of the English he hates them with a bitter hatred. And now he
comes with three hundred brave men whom he has gathered, and craves
leave to present a nassar to the Pillar of State, and to offer his
services in the cause."
"We desire not to receive him," said the king. "Have we not soldiers
enough in Delhi to pay, without adding more? If the English cannot be
beaten with the forty thousand we now have, how shall three hundred help
us?"
This was mere querulousness, as every one in the hall knew. The king
dared not offend anybody at this critical moment in his affairs,
certainly not a chief who could command a body of troops. After bidding
the man wait, and keeping him waiting for a long time while he went
through the form of consulting his advisers, the king announced that he
would see this warrior whom men named the Lion of God. The official
retired. In a few minutes there entered the hall a stately figure with
flowing white beard and red turban. He made obeisance to the king,
handed him a nassar of a hundred rupees, and declared in a strong,
resonant voice that he was ready to fight the English, he and his three
hundred men.
There was a group of officers at the end of the hall from which entrance
was had to the Akab baths. They were so much preoccupied with a matter
they were discussing, that the proceedings in the centre of the hall had
for some time escaped their notice. Now, however, at the sound of that
ringing voice, one of them, Minghal Khan, started, and immediately
afterwards changed his position in such a way that he was partially
hidden by one of the columns supporting the arcade. And there he
remained until the rising of the king signified that the audience was at
an end. Then he made towards the door among the throng, keeping close to
the wall, and moving in the manner of one who avoids observation.
But the crowd was thick, and its departure slow, so that when the chief,
whom his men had named Asadullah, left the side of the king--who had
kept him in talk, having apparently taken a fancy to him--it chanced
that as his eyes ranged round the hall, they fell upon the face of
Minghal Khan, who at that very moment had turned a little aside to look
at the new-comer. Their glances crossed; a light flashed in the eyes of
each; and Asadullah, whom Minghal had known as Rahmut Khan, took a step
forward as though to hasten after his enemy. But he checked himself. The
king's palace was no place for the settlement of a personal quarrel: no
doubt there would be opportunities. Each of the chiefs knew, as he
caught the look in the other's eyes, that the fact that they were
engaged in a common cause would not weigh for a moment if they came
within reach of one another. The many discordant elements in Delhi were
held together for the time by their common hatred of the English; if
that bond were relaxed, they would fly apart with shattering force.
Minghal Khan got out of the palace before Rahmut Khan, and hastened
immediately to his house. He then dispatched his khitmutgar to bid the
attendance of one of the jamadars of his regiment.
"Salaam, Azim Ali," he said in response to the officer's greeting. "I
have but now returned from the palace. The old king grows more feeble,
and his authority less and less. There was much talk among us of the
arrears of pay; but it is indeed true that the treasury is all but
empty, and it will never be full while Wallidad Khan is collector of the
revenue, and such pitiful nassars are brought to the king as were
brought to-day. Imagine, Azim Ali, a bent old dodderer who claimed
kinship with the Lord of the World, and offered him two rupees!"
"It is indeed pitiful," said the jamadar. "What is to be said to the
sowars? They will assuredly plunder the shops if they get no pay, and
the general has said that all plunderers shall be hanged."
"What, indeed? Is it not hard that our men, who have been enduring the
heat and burden, throwing away their lives in fighting the English,
should be worse off than such brigands as the men whom this Asadullah
has brought into the city? The general forbids plunder: well, he is a
friend of mine, and must be obeyed. But these new-comers, have they not
plundered? What have they done but load themselves with the loot of
villages, and snapped up ill-defended convoys--enterprises of little
difficulty and less danger? There is great talk of this old freebooter
as a man of high courage: hai! it is false. Do I not know of him? They
call him lion; a more fitting name would be pariah dog. He is not a man
to risk his skin. And yet, forsooth, he comes into Delhi at the head of
these three hundred, and the king slobbers over him, and without doubt
he will squeeze from the treasury what rupees he can, and then, when the
word comes to fight, he will shelter himself behind us who know what
fighting is, and expect his full share of plunder when the English are
beaten. Hai! it is a shame and a scandal."
"True, most noble subahdar; it is enough to make our men rise up and
claim that all who enter thus with full hands should share what they
have among us."
"And what they could not keep but for us; for are there not princes in
the city who, were these men left undefended, would swoop down like
hawks upon them and strip them of all they have? Without us, trained
soldiers, would not the English assuredly catch them and hang them up?
Is this thing to be endured? Here are we, lodged within a shout's
distance of them, and we starve while they live on the fat of the land."
Minghal knew the man he was talking to. He was a simple ruffian, who
grew more and more indignant as his superior artfully stimulated his
discontent.
"It would not be a matter of surprise to me," Minghal continued, "were
the men to rise in their wrath and secure for themselves what is their
just due. As a servant of our lord the king, and a loyal lieutenant of
Bakht Khan, our commander-in-chief, I could not countenance such a
transgression of his strict command; but I am a man like them: I know
what hunger is: am I not myself often at my wit's end for the
wherewithal to buy a meal, with many months' pay due to me? And as a man
I could assuredly not blame any action that our sowars might take."
The simple jamadar gulped at the bait. Minghal had no need to say more.
That same night, a Pathan trader who had entered the city by the Ajmir
gate at sundown, just before all the gates were closed, witnessed a
scene not unfamiliar in Delhi at this time of unrest and relaxed
authority. In the space before a serai near the Jama Masjid, a great
crowd of men was engaged in desperate rioting. He thought at first that
it was one of those little affairs in which the princes of the blood,
notably Abu Bakr, sometimes disported themselves: a raid upon a banker,
or a silversmith, or some merchant who was suspected of having feathered
his nest. But inquiring of an onlooker who stood out of harm's way
watching the conflict, he learnt that the regiment of Minghal Khan--that
bold warrior, and friend of the commander-in-chief--was attacking the
quarters of a troop of three hundred Irregulars, men of all castes and
no country, who had arrived in the city that day and been granted
quarters in this serai by the king.