Chapter 23

He went up, supported by Ahmed. Together they crawled across the roof to the parapet and peeped over. There was a confused hubbub below. In the street at the front of the house they saw Minghal Khan with a group of sepoys, but the greater part of the mob consisted of Irregulars, and their numbers were much increased since the beginning of the attack.

For a time there was a lull; but ere long it became apparent that the enemy were intending a new move. Men appeared on the roof of a house on the far side of the road opposite the doctor's gateway. Others at the same time crowded at the upper windows. A preliminary shot from one of the windows showed that the new position occupied by the enemy dominated the compound in front of the doctor's house, for one of the Sikhs was wounded by it. Indeed, the doctor wondered whether the men could be withdrawn safely from their position underneath the front wall. In running the gauntlet over the exposed portion of the compound, many of them would probably fall beneath the muskets of the enemy in the house opposite. Seeing for a moment that there was no threatening of danger from the direction of the lane at the rear, he bade Ahmed crawl over the roof and send the khansaman, who was acting as orderly, to summon four men from the back of the house. These he ordered to keep up a brisk fire on the men on the roof and at the windows of the house opposite. The doctor's house being higher than the latter, the enemy here were at a great disadvantage. They maintained the musketry duel for a few minutes, then vacated the position; but although the roof of the doctor's house was higher than that of the neighbouring buildings, with the exception of one at some little distance, it was not so much higher as to afford, with its low parapet, complete protection. A fusillade from several buildings at once would make the roof almost untenable, if only by reason of the splinters of brickwork.

That the enemy had realized the weakness of the position on the roof was evident some ten minutes later. Shots began to patter upon the parapet from several directions. The commanding building at a little distance was now occupied. Here the besiegers were on more level terms with the besieged, and bullets began to sing across the roof. First one man and then another was hit, either by bullets or by fragments of the parapet.

"This will never do," said the doctor. "We must go."

They crawled back to the trap-door and descended into the house. But in a moment the doctor saw that the evacuation of the roof would have serious consequences for the gallant band in the front compound. Unless the fire from the opposite house, now packed with marksmen, could be dominated, the next attack on the compound must inevitably succeed. As soon as its defenders showed themselves in attempting to charge the assailants from the wall, they would become the targets for muskets at no more than fifty or sixty yards' range.

"Run down and bring the men into the house," said the doctor.

Ahmed hastened below and gave the order in the sahib's name, adding a caution to beware of flying bullets. The men scampered back along the foot of the wall, crouching low. They were not visible from the opposite house until they had covered half the distance to the door; then the enemy espied their movement and fired a volley. But the men were going rapidly in single file; only one was struck, by a bullet rebounding from the wall, and in another ten seconds the whole band was safe within the house.

The withdrawal was not a moment too soon. There was suddenly a sound of many hammers falling upon steel. The enemy were making an attack upon the walls both at the front and back, driving iron spikes into them with the object of making loopholes. The walls were stoutly built, and it was a full quarter of an hour before the iron bars began to show on their inner side. In half-an-hour at least twenty loopholes had been pierced both in the front and back, and a continuous fusillade was kept up upon the shutters and doors of the house. As soon as one man fired outside, apparently his place was taken by another with a newly-loaded musket, and the new-comer only waited until the smoke had partially cleared to discharge his piece. The woodwork of the house was both thick and hard; only a small proportion of the bullets penetrated the interior; but the range was no more than thirty or forty yards, and there were many good marksmen among the sepoys. Two of the garrison standing behind the loopholes were struck, and one musket was rendered useless. The khansaman ran to inform the doctor, who had the injured men carried upstairs, where he extracted the bullets and bound up their wounds. For a few minutes more the work of loopholing the wall continued, and the defences were battered with an uninterrupted hail of bullets. Gradually the shots found weak spots in the woodwork. Another man was hit, this time through a fissure torn in the shutter by a previous bullet. Every now and again a yell from the outside told that a bullet from the defences had made its way through the loopholes of the wall. These apertures were a good deal larger than those in the doors and shutters of the house, and offered a far better mark. The assailants could afford to lose twenty men to one of the besieged. And when the mutineers noticed that the firing from the house was less in volume owing to the casualties, they became more and more eager. The British columns had retired to their positions near the ramparts; the report had flown through the city that the fourth column had been annihilated; the rumour was spreading that the great Nikalsain himself was dead. The fanatical crowds in the streets still indulged a hope that the British would be repelled; and meanwhile, to Minghal Khan and his mob, it seemed that the little party in the house would ere long fall an easy prey.

The sultry afternoon was drawing on towards night. All sounds of combat elsewhere in the city had ceased. The attack upon the house had as yet failed: but the outworks had been rendered untenable, and the defence must now be confined to the house itself. It seemed that Minghal Khan was satisfied with what he had gained so far; for the firing suddenly ceased, and as darkness sank down upon the scene it appeared probable that the final assault was deferred until the morning. The doctor scarcely expected a night attack. The enemy had already suffered severely, and, numerous as they were, they were not likely to court the heavy losses that an assault in the dark upon strong defences must entail. That he was right was proved as time passed. A close watch was kept upon the house; fires were lighted both front and back; and men could be heard talking; but there was no sign of a renewal of the assault.

The little garrison was glad enough of the respite. They were tired out after the strain of work and fighting during the hot hours of the day. The doctor ordered all the men in turn to act as sentries, one at the back and one at the front, keeping watch while the others slept. It was only at the entreaty of the khansaman that he went to his own bed, and he insisted on being awaked at the first sign of movement among the enemy.

Day had hardly dawned when there came a great yelling from the street, and the rumble of distant wheels. The rumbling sound came nearer moment by moment until it suddenly stopped.

"Go to the roof," said the doctor to Ahmed. His face wore an expression of great anxiety. Ahmed hurried up through the trap-door and crawled to the parapet. He was at once seen from the roof of the loftiest house, and bullets pattered round him; but he looked over and saw--what he had expected to see. A gun had been brought down the street, and stood in the gateway of the house immediately opposite the gate of the compound. There were no horses: evidently the gun had been dragged to its position by men. The gunners were in the act of loading. Ahmed rushed back across the roof, with less caution than before, and was just descending through the trap-door when a bullet whizzed past his left ear, carrying away a lock of his thick hair. He leapt down the steps, and ran to acquaint the doctor with the new peril in which the house lay.

Dr. Craddock was perturbed. Neither the gate of the compound nor the door of the house, nor even the walls themselves, could stand a battering from round shot, and if a breach was once made the house would swarm with the fanatical mutineers, against whom resistance would be vain.

"We must spike the gun, sahib," said Ahmed.

"Impossible! You would rush to your death," replied the doctor.

"Nay, sahib, it must be done; and there is no time to be lost. Give the order, and we thy servants will obey."

The doctor turned, still hesitating, to one of the corporals and explained what Ahmed had suggested: he felt that he could hardly order so desperate an undertaking unless the men would volunteer.

"Spike the gun! Right you are, sir," said the corporal cheerfully. "Them Pandies never can stand a charge. We'll do it, by Jehosopher we will. Blowed if an Englishman is going to be licked by a blooming Pathan."

Ahmed had already seized a hammer and a heavy nail.

"Give them to me, you Pathan," cried the corporal.

"Let him alone," said the doctor. "Get all the men together: nine of you follow the Guide: the rest man the loopholes. Make your rush when they have fired the gun; quick! you haven't a moment to lose."

The whole garrison ran to the front door. Ahmed drew the bolts. The two corporals and seven of the Sikhs stood ready; the rest went to the loopholes. They had hardly taken their places when there was a tremendous roar; the gate of the compound was shattered to splinters; and through the gap and the smoke a crowd of yelling sepoys began to pour into the enclosure. But the men at the loopholes had their muskets ready: at a word from Ahmed they fired a volley, concentrating their aim on the gateway. The foremost of the besiegers fell, and those behind, taken aback by the sudden volley, paused. At that instant Ahmed flung wide the door, and dashed straight for the gate at the head of nine cheering men with fixed bayonets.

Pandy never waited for the touch of cold steel. There was a wild stampede from the gateway. The sepoys tumbled over one another in their panic. While the men behind were pushing on, those in front were pushing back. The crowd fell apart as the cheering band drove through them, and made a path through which Ahmed and the two corporals headed the rest towards the gun. The gunners stood as if paralyzed; before they could flee the bayonets had done their fell work.

Ahmed was on the point of spiking the gun when a sudden inspiration seized him. The gun had been partly prepared for the next charge. Round shot and grape lay ready. The mutineers up the street, charged by the Sikhs, were huddled together like a flock of sheep chased by a dog, and the space around the gun was clear. Ahmed dropped his hammer, and began to ram in a charge of grape.

"Right you are!" said one of the corporals, divining his intention. "We'll slew her round. Come on, Bill."

The two corporals with Ahmed's assistance rammed in the charge, and slewed the gun round so that it pointed down the street, where the crowd was already beginning to surge back. Then Ahmed snatched up the burning portfire that lay on the ground and applied it to the touch-hole.

There was a babel of yells from the throng as the shot sped among them. In so dense a crowd the havoc was terrific. The instant the gun was fired, before the smoke had cleared away, Ahmed drove his spike into the touch-hole, and raising his voice to its highest pitch shouted to the Sikhs to return. In a few moments the whole party was dashing back through the gateway into the compound. Bullets sang about their ears, fired from the neighbouring houses; but the smoke still lay thick over the street, giving them partial protection. One man was struck; him Ahmed and another caught up and carried between them. They were the last to reach the door, and had not entered when the crowd, frantic with rage at their losses and the spoiling of their weapon, came surging in at the gate. The door was shut just as the first of them, not stopping to fire, was making a fierce cut at Ahmed.

Breathless but exultant at the success of their desperate enterprise, Ahmed and the little party went to the loopholes and fired a volley at the assailants which again daunted them. But now a strident voice was heard among the shouts outside. Fierce yells answered it, growing in volume every moment.

"A fakir!" cried a Sikh.

"I've heard the like of that screeching in Seven Dials of a Saturday night," said one of the corporals.

"And, by gum, it means mischief," said the other. "He'll work those Pandies up into a perfect fury, Jack, and they'll be that mad they'd charge into hell."

"Well, screeches won't break down the door."

"No, but a battering-ram will, and dash me if the beggars haven't got one."

A score of mutineers were hauling a heavy log through the gateway. At the same moment there was a great uproar from the rear of the house. The attack in that quarter had not been resumed since the previous night, the rebels having apparently determined to concentrate on the front, trusting to win an easy victory with the aid of their gun. Owing to the casualties among the defenders, only ten men were now available, and the division of forces necessary to cope with simultaneous attacks in both front and rear laid a heavy handicap upon them. Half ran to the back to repel the assault. The furniture had already been massed against the door, and Ahmed saw with relief that by firing through the loopholes in the shutters the attackers could for the present be held off. It was otherwise in front. Several of the men carrying the log were shot down, but others took their places before the defenders could reload, and the ram was launched against the timber. The whole building trembled under the impact, and though the door for the moment held fast, it was plain that it could not long withstand such a battery.

The doctor was alive to the situation. He called to the men to prepare for a rush up the staircase, bidding one of them get ready the nail-studded plank for laying lengthwise on the stairs. While the men were still holding their position at the loopholes, they heard the sound of wrenching woodwork above, and in a few minutes there was a large gap in the ceiling of the hall. Immediately afterwards there came from above the sharp sound of hammers on metal. Ahmed could not guess what the doctor and the khansaman were doing, but felt sure that whatever it was the defence would gain by it.

Meanwhile the battering on the front door had at last loosened the hinges; it was time to retire. Ahmed and the five men with him went a few steps up the staircase. Then he laid the plank on the treads, so that none of the enemy could mount without crossing five feet of sharp iron points. The massive timber withstood several more assaults before there was a final crash, and it hung half open, disclosing a part of the yelling crowd outside. Ahmed and his comrades were only dimly visible to the besiegers, while the latter in the open courtyard were in full view of the besieged. A second after the door burst open the six men on the stairs fired together. There was no chance of missing the densely packed throng--every shot claimed its victim. For a second or two the crowd recoiled. The little firing party ran up to the landing. Then the doctor, limping to the top of the stairs, gave directions to the khansaman to pour down the plank the contents of a huge blue bottle. Shots were whistling round them from the muskets of the rebels who had swarmed into the hall, but neither showed the slightest concern. Kaluja had just finished his work when, led by the shrieking fakir, the mob made a rush for the stairway. Several men, heedless of the nails, scrambled up for a foot or two. Then with shrill cries of rage and pain they jumped backwards, overturning their comrades who were pressing on behind them. The plank was smoking with the strong acid which the khansaman had poured upon it. Most of the mob were barefooted, and even their tough soles could not withstand the effects of the burning liquid, the fumes from which set those above choking.

The hall was now packed tight with yelling rebels, so closely pressed together that to use their muskets was impossible. They had no escape from the shots fired by the men above as fast as they could reload. Then a new terror was added to the scene. Ahmed now saw the meaning of the knocking he had heard. Over the gap in the floor the khansaman had laid the doctor's sitz-bath, in the bottom of which he had pierced a number of holes. He was now engaged in emptying the contents of his master's bottles into the bath, the doctor adding water from time to time. It would have puzzled the most expert chemist to define the chemical composition which fell in a steady shower on the heads of the panic-stricken mutineers. The liquid fizzed and smoked, and changed colour like a chameleon--now green, now yellow, now brown, now an indescribable mixture of tints. There was only one desire among the discomfited enemy: to escape from this cockpit in which they suffered pangs due to the hakim's mysterious art as well as to the more familiar weapons of war. Pushing, shouting, scrambling over each other, they forced their way out into the compound, and there was such a wringing of hands and such a chorus of groans as surely Delhi had never heard or seen before.

The attack at the front had been effectually beaten off. The doctor hoped that the enemy would now retire altogether. But Ahmed ran up to the roof to see whether they were indeed withdrawing. The street was still full of rebels, and an excited altercation was going on among them. The central figures were Minghal Khan, who had hitherto been content to hound the men on without showing much eagerness to lead them, and the fakir, who bore many marks of the chemical baptism he had received. The uproar was too great to allow Ahmed to hear what was being said; he could only guess at it by the gesticulations of the men and by what happened afterwards. The fakir had, in fact, called on the fanatics who surrounded him, to bring combustibles for the burning of the house. Against this Minghal vehemently protested: the king's orders were that no houses should be fired: this would be only to assist the Feringhis. But the fakir scoffed at orders: it was the duty of all the faithful to destroy the infidels by any means in their power. Then Minghal used another argument: there was valuable property in the house--his property, his all. The fakir's answer to this was a horrible laugh, and the taunt that Minghal had shown no disposition to go into the house and fetch his valuable property. Minghal was overborne. Devoted adherents of the fakir brought up shavings, pieces of wood, jars of oil. Then, waving his arms, his long beard dripping in many-coloured drops, the fakir led the shouting mob round to the lane at the back. Not even he cared to face the front again.

Ahmed was descending to inform the doctor of this new move, when he stopped suddenly. A fresh sound had caught his ear: the sound of firing, both artillery and musketry, far away. Were the British columns renewing their assault? Was Colonel Jones forcing his way through the city again towards the mosque? His heart leapt with a great hope. The mutineers were coming to fire the house: nothing could prevent them; but rather than die like rats in a trap, he and his comrades must make a dash through the compound, and try to cut their way towards their friends. Suddenly he remembered the doctor. He could not take part in such a sortie. He must not be abandoned. The idea must be given up: there was nothing for it but to hold out to the last moment.

The roofs and windows of the surrounding houses were deserted. No doubt their former occupants had learnt that the house was to be fired and had joined the mob below, hoping for a share in the expected butchery and plunder. Here was a chance of dealing the enemy a last blow. Through the trap-door Ahmed called to the men to bring up his musket and join him. The mob was already pouring down the lane behind the fakir--hundreds of men in the frenzied zeal of fanaticism. They came to the garden wall and began to swarm over it; some burst in the gate; they flocked through in numbers too great to be checked by the fire of the ten men above. A volley flashed; Ahmed took aim at the fakir: he and the men nearest him fell. Those behind leapt over their prostrate bodies, and with fierce cries threw themselves against the door. Once more the ten fired among them; then Ahmed saw that men were again appearing on the roof of the nearest house, and before the little party all descended through the trap-door a Sikh and one of the corporals were hit.

When the others reached the doctor, they found him quietly preparing a bomb. He had filled a canister with powder, attached a roughly-made fuse, and was about to light it and fling the bomb among the enemy. At the sight of it an alternative scheme flashed into Ahmed's mind. He quickly explained it to the doctor, then hurried away through the almirah into the secret chamber below. Placing the table on the doctor's charpoy, he mounted on it, and laid the canister in a little ventilating recess just below the fountain. Then he lit the fuse and rushed away, slamming the door behind him.

He was only half-way up the stairs when he heard the back door burst in with a crash. Immediately afterwards there was a terrific report, that shook the house. He ran back, waited a minute or two to allow the fumes of the explosion to clear away, and re-entered the room. It was a wreck. The fountain had fallen into it, and it was choked with rubbish. Creeping over obstacles he saw a gap above his head, through which, by and by, it might be possible to reach the garden. He hurried back to the surgery. Whatever might have happened to the crowd in the garden, those who had entered the house had kindled a fire; the room was already full of smoke. In another minute all the little company had descended the spiral stairs to the secret room, leaving the wall of the surgery closed behind them. Below they would be safe for a time, the underground room being connected with the house only by the stone staircase.

Meanwhile the mutineers, daunted by the sudden explosion, had withdrawn to the further side of the garden. Some in terror had recrossed the wall; but the fire was alight; there had been no sign of any attempt at escape on the part of the garrison; and the fanatical throng exulted in the belief that ere long their victims would be consumed with the house.

Half-an-hour passed. The waiting men noticed that the uproar above, which had diminished, now broke out again with redoubled clamour. And it was not yells of execration and of triumph, but the cries of men in fight, mingled with the sound of musketry. Ahmed ventured to mount on the heap of rubbish towards the small gap where the fountain had been. He came to the surface, and as he put his head cautiously out, the first sight that met his eyes was a red-coated British officer, with flashing sword, chasing the darwan across the garden. The chase was brief; the man fell; and the officer, turning to rejoin his men, caught sight of Ahmed, who had crawled out of the hole and was running towards him. He came with outstretched sword to deal with another mutineer, as he supposed, and observing the khaki uniform, hastened his step with a muttered imprecation: it was a new thing for the wearers of the khaki to turn traitors. But Ahmed drew himself up and stood at the salute.

"Hazur," he said, "there is a sahib below, and I am of Lumsden Sahib's Guides."