Trapped by Malays: A Tale of Bayonet and Kris

The looking-glass in Archie Maine's quarters often told him that he was rather a good-looking young fellow; that is to say, he gave promise of growing into a well-featured, manl...

It was to Archie Maine like a bad attack of the fever from which he had suffered when he first went up-country in the gunboat from Singapore. There was that horrible beating and...

"Yuss," said Peter Pegg, as he sat in the profound darkness, for it was some hours before the moon would rise, and he was solacing himself with a piece of the bread-crust, which...

"There's a pretty go!" he cried, as he lifted the now light basket and put it down again, and peered once more into the earthen jar. "Suppose they meant the rations and water to...

Private Smithers had not long to wait, for as the glow of the burning cigar came nearer he challenged, the customary interchange took place, and then Archie Maine took up the co...

Peter Pegg started up into a sitting position, vacant of face and staring at the straightly streaked rays of sunshine that made their way through the plaited and latticed sides...

"Ah, there you are, Knowle!" cried the Resident, bustling up to the Major, who was marching slowly towards the parade-ground in full uniform, carrying his sword under the left arm.

The Doctor was busy with his patients in the heat of the day, loosening one poor fellow's bandage, and tightening another that an irritable sufferer had worked loose; while Mrs...

It was the morning appointed for the review, the preparations having been all made on the previous day; and the _reveille_ rang out, making Archie Maine turn over upon his charp...

"That Malay chap, sir--the big one with the squint. I should like to drop upon him and smug that kris of his. Just think of it! As soon as we made up our minds to toddle the fir...

Those two hours did soon slip away, and after assuring herself by the clock that the time had really fled, Mrs Morley went and stood in the veranda, gazing out in the full expec...

"Never!" said the Major warmly; and his ruddy, sun-browned face grew redder, while his stiff, silvery-grey moustache and short-cut hair seemed to bristle. "Of course I know you...

About an hour after the last conversation Sergeant Ripsy was giving a few final words of command to the little squad of men whom, to use his own words, he was about to plant, as...

Morning came with a rush, the rays of the sun seeming to do battle with the mist that floated over the surface of the river. The golden arrows of light cut and broke up the one...

In spite of the Resident's doubts and expressed opinion that the two Rajahs would display resentment, the neighbourhood settled down calmly enough. The village people nearest, n...

"Oh, you let your head alone, sir. That'll come right if only you keep on eating directly you begin to feel faint, if it is ever so little a bit."

"All right, old man," cried Peter Pegg, as he sprang up and crossed to the door, where his visitor was chuntering, as the lad called it, and making a succession of peculiar snor...

"It seems so stupid, Pete, going all this way round in the black darkness to get at the bungalow, when ten minutes at the outside would have taken us there."

It was no rash assertion. The small erection that it had been the Major's pride to erect by means of the men a short distance back and just inside the jungle, and to which he ha...

"You don't say so, my lad! A Malay and his wife who have been patients of the Doctor bringing in such news as that! Why, it's grand! Poor, dear girl! Tut, tut, tut, tut, tut, tu...

"Oh, bother!" The utterer of these two impatient words threw down a sheet of notepaper from which he had been reading, carefully smoothed out the folds to make it flat, and then...

Archie had been raising the boughs that concealed them as they drew nearer the upper landing-place, dropping very slowly along, their progress being checked by the manipulation...

Archie Maine had been round visiting posts in the faint hope of picking up some fresh news from the men, after the hurried mess dinner, glad to get out into the comparatively co...

The position of the beleaguered occupants of the Residency grew worse and worse. There had been three different brief despatches from the detachments, but the information convey...

"Ain't it been a mistake, sir?" said Peter Pegg. "We ought to have risked it both of us together, stirred him up with the spears or the point of that kris, and made him go on."

"Lie still. What have you got to fidget about? I have done all I can, and made a decent job of your head. It looks quite respectable now, after what I have done with the scissor...

Archie Maine's sensations as he marched beside his chief into the mess-room were such that he would far rather have escaped to his own quarters; but he began to pull himself tog...

To the great satisfaction of both, the upper layers of the cartridges proved to be quite dry, and, at Peter's suggestion, they made sure of having a couple of dozen handy by bes...

The mess dinner was over, and the officers were sitting back by one of the open windows, dreamily gazing out at the dark jungle and breathing in with a calm feeling of satisfact...

Three weeks had passed away. Morning had come at last, and Archie Maine was beginning to breathe more freely, after passing a very bad night. For, as if it had scented an easy p...

The sound of a step outside made Peter Pegg throw himself quickly down in a pile of the crushed leaves, burying his face in his hands, while Archie began to walk slowly up and d...

"Poor chap!" said Pegg, with a long-drawn sigh, as, utterly exhausted, Archie sank back upon his rough resting-place amongst the palm-leaves, and fell off at once into a deep, s...

"I'm getting better fast, Pete," cried Archie Maine, his voice sounding clearly above the _suck, suck_ of the elephant's feet in the deep old tracks, and the _whisk, whisk_ of t...

Meanwhile Archie, faint with heat and weariness, had made his way slowly to Peter, who was at his old post, doing double and quadruple duty as the sentry who commanded the appro...

The line closed up, and marched "easy" back towards the upper end of the parade-ground, with not a single stranger to represent the spectators, and, half ironically, they were r...

"A Guilty conscience needs no accuser," said Archie Maine to himself. "There's a splendid proverb. It can't mean a wigging this time. But if that pompous old pump, that buckled-...

"Oh, here you are, Mrs Smithers. Aunt was saying just now that she wondered you had not been up. I told her perhaps it was on account of the hot weather, for it has been terribl...

In the midst of the wild bursts of cheering given out again and again by the rescued men, wounded (who were many) and sound (who were very few), to those who had succoured them...

Archie Maine and Minnie Heath sat in the darkness, hand clasped in hand, the poor girl sobbing bitterly, nearly overcome with emotion, after, in a low, excited voice, asking que...

For a few minutes it seemed as if the success that had attended them was to be completely dashed, though it had become evident that, by a wonderful stroke of good fortune, they...

"You can't be sure, Pete. These elephant-paths through the jungle are all alike. There's the same half-dark, dense heat, the tangled walls on either side, the overhanging trees...

"What say?" cried Peter, springing up in a sitting position, to find it was daylight once more. "Oh, it's you, is it?" he cried, for there was a crackling by the door, and the g...

It was just as the shades of night were coming on that the great elephant stepped out of the tunnel into comparative light. The wall of verdure opened out on either side, and a...

Tramp, tramp, tramp, tramp, up and down on the regular beat, sometimes in the full silvery moonlight, sometimes in the shade cast by the hut; one minute only the footsteps to br...

There was nothing but the suggestion of the faint light of dawn stealing through the Rajah's hole, as Peter called it; but Archie knew well enough the way to the cocoa-nut and t...

Peter's conclusion was only a guess, but it soon became evident that a fire was raging somewhere in the direction of the station. But this did not seem to trouble the two Malays...