CHAPTER XV

OUT OF ACTION

Frank's first proceeding when he awoke next morning was to start munching one of his loaves; his next, to read the despatch which chance had thrust upon him. It was addressed to the Anatolian captain. A battery of heavy guns was to be emplaced on Sari Bair. The convoy, coming by way of Kumkeni and Boghali, might be expected at Kojadere on the following morning. The captain was to abandon for the time the pursuit of the Englishman and to place himself at the disposition of the officer commanding the battery, to assist in transporting the guns up the hill.

Frank did not know Kojadere by name, but he knew Boghali, and conjectured that Kojadere must be the village at the south-east foot of the hill. It was visible from a spur about half a mile from his hiding-place. A rough path left the main track between Boghali and Kojadere at about the same distance from the latter place, and joined a similar path running direct from Kojadere up the hill. These facts Frank had learnt in the course of his wanderings, and he determined, simply from motives of curiosity, to make his way to a spot where he could see a sight new to him, the placing of a battery of guns. Abdi had gone, no doubt, to Chanak; the others would not for the present concern themselves with their elusive quarry; for he assumed that the contents of the despatch were known to the carrier; so it was with an easy mind that he betook himself to the elevated spot from which he could view the Boghali road.

It was chilly in the morning air. The valleys and the lower ground were blanketed in mist. The heights were clear, and Frank smiled as he saw in his mind's eye the scene of his night's adventure, invisible to his bodily eye, over the brow of the hill.

A light breeze was sweeping up through the hills from the sea, causing the mist to gyrate in swirling eddies, and here and there cutting a path through it. Gradually more and more of the Boghali road was exposed to his view. There was nothing moving upon it. He looked up in the direction of Biyuk Anafarta, towards the quarter in which the Anatolians should presently appear, in pursuance of their instructions. There was no sign of them yet; it was possible that the contents of the despatch were unknown to them after all.

After a time he caught sight of figures beyond Boghali where the road wound round a low hill to the north of that place. Ere long he was able to recognise the artillery train--long teams, whether of horses, oxen, or mules he could not tell even through his field-glasses, dragging heavy guns and ammunition wagons. The escort numbered, at a guess, some three hundred men. The train passed through Boghali, and took the right-hand road towards Sari Bair. A bridge spanned a stream fed by a number of rivulets rising on the eastern slope of the hill. Here the train came to a halt. There was a long delay; probably the bridge was not constructed for heavy traffic. Then one of the guns appeared on the western side; the others slowly followed.

By this time Frank felt pretty sure that the Anatolians were ignorant of the orders given in the despatch, otherwise they should long ago have reached Boghali by the direct road from Biyuk Anafarta. If they had resumed their hunt for him, it behoved him to be cautious. From the troops below he had little to fear. They were not looking for him, and in all likelihood were unaware of his existence. Keeping a careful look-out above, therefore, he stole down under cover of the scrub, which was very dense on this side of the hill, to take a nearer view of the work of the artillerymen.

Several mounted officers had pushed ahead to survey the ground and choose the easiest route for the guns. Some had taken the first track on the right of the road, others were riding quickly forward to Kojadere to examine the track from there. The two parties met at the junction, and from subsequent operations it appeared that the longer but easier gradient from Kojadere had been decided upon. Up this track, then, the officers despatched strong working parties, to clear away obstacles, and cut down the scrub which here and there encroached at the sides. Two officers, mounted on mules, slowly rode up to the summit, to select an emplacement for their battery.

Frank watched all this from a sheltered spot at some distance from the track. These troops were not looking for him, it was true; but in their course they must work round his position, and he was careful not to expose himself.

The way having been prepared, the men in charge of the first gun whipped up their team, which hauled the heavy weapon about a third of the distance up the track. Then there was a check. The slope was very irregular. For some yards its angle was low; then it would suddenly make a sharp rise. It was at one of these abrupt acclivities that the gun had now arrived. The ascent seemed an impossible one, and the track, with on one side the rocky hill and on the other a steep incline, hazardous in the extreme. The team attached to the second gun was unhitched and brought up to assist the first. Urged by vociferous shouts and much cracking of whips, the united teams, straining and hauling, managed to draw the gun up a few feet at a time, large blocks of wood being placed behind the wheels at each stoppage to prevent it from slipping back.

Frank looked on at all this with interest, and a certain sympathy for man and beast, which was increased when one of the officers, a German, rode down the hill and vented his irritation at the delays in foul abuse and violent threats. "They are working jolly hard," was his inward protest. The gun moved on again, and a turn in the track hid it from his view. He looked around to make sure that he was in no danger of being seen from the rear, then crept up through the scrub to reach a spot where he could again follow the operations.

"I wonder what they are going to all this trouble for?" he thought. "Those guns aren't a match for our naval guns, and in any case they are no good here as a defence of the forts."

A little way further up the hill he came upon a gully scarcely three feet wide, much overgrown with bushes. It appeared to lead down towards the track, on which, to judge by the renewed shouts of the men and the cessation of the rumbling of the wheels, the gun had again been brought to a halt. Frank crept down this gully stealthily foot by foot, and presently discovered the cause of this new check. The gully intersected the track and fell down the slope beyond. Though it was now dry, at some time it had evidently been a watercourse, and the water had scored a deep channel across the track, an effectual obstacle to heavy traffic. At this moment the men were toiling with pick and spade to fill up the channel, a task that would clearly occupy some time.

Frank looked on for a few minutes. Then his eyes strayed down the track. The mules were stationary in a long line, quite unattended. The team hauling the second gun lower down was out of sight. "Pity I can't spike the gun," Frank thought, "though to be sure spiking is impossible in these days. But a slip would send it crashing down the track, or over the slope. I wish----" And then an idea flashed into his mind. The gun was hauled, not by leather traces, but by heavy chains. Quickly raising his field-glasses, he levelled them at the attachments of the chains to the gun-carriage. Each one ended in a massive iron ring, which was looped over a long hook. Now that the gun was halted, and the wheels stopped by blocks of wood, the chains were hanging slack.

Replacing his glasses, he crept down under cover of the scrub until he came opposite the gun. All the men were still engaged above. He looked up, down, around. No one was in sight, except the men working with their backs towards him a hundred yards up the hill. Inch by inch he stole nearer to the track; paused a moment to collect himself; then darted rapidly from cover, lifted the ring from the hook on the side nearest him, hitched the chain so that it appeared to be in place, and slipped back breathlessly into the scrub. It had taken him no more than a quarter of a minute.

"Will it work?" he asked himself as he lurked in his hiding-place a few yards above the track. All depended on whether the drivers examined the attachments before they moved on again. There seemed no reason why they should do so; hitherto the drivers had walked at the head of their teams; but there was a chance that when they came down to lift the blocks of wood one of them might happen to notice that something was wrong.

He waited in feverish impatience. How slowly the men were working! What a bully that German officer was! If the trick succeeded, these patient long-suffering Turks would have had their labour for nothing: the German would make them pay for it. Well, they must pay for allowing themselves to be fooled by the Germans.

At last came the word of command. The drivers hastened to the heads of the mules; two men hurried down to lift the blocks of wood when the gun had started. There were loud shouts and cracking of whips; the mules strained at their collars; the heavy gun lurched forward. And then Frank thrilled with delight. Secured only on one side, the gun skewed round with a jerk. For a brief moment it hung over the edge of the slope. The mules slipped backward; the sudden slackening of the chains released the second ring from its hook; and to the sound of startled yells and frantic invocations of Allah the gun hurtled down the slope and crashed into a ravine two or three hundred feet below.