Midnight Webs. Fenn George Manville
next minute the sentry hurried up, and we had a man posted as nearly over the window as we could guess; and then I had my orders in a minute:
“Take two men and the sentry at their door, rush in, and secure them at once. But if they have got out, join Sergeant Williams, and follow me to act as reserve; for I am going to make a sally by the gate to stop them from the outside.”
I roused Harry Lant and Measles, and they were with me in an instant. We passed a couple of sentries, and gave the countersign, and then mounted to the long stone passage which led to where the prisoners had been placed.
As we three privates neared the door, the sentry there challenged; but when we came up to him and listened, there was not a sound to be heard; neither had he heard anything, he said. The next minute the door was thrown open, and we found an empty room; but a hole in the wall showed us which way the prisoners had gone.
We none of us much liked the idea of going through that hole to be taken at a disadvantage; but duty was duty, and, running forward, I made a bold thrust through with my piece in two or three directions; then I crept through; followed by Harry Lant, and found that room empty too; but they had not gone by the doorway which led into the women’s part, but enlarged the window, and dropped down, leaving a large opening – one that, if we had not detected it then, would no doubt have done nicely for the entrance of a strong party of enemies.
“Sentry here,” I said; and leaving the man at the window, followed by Harry Lant and Measles, I ran back, got down to the courtyard, crossed to where Sergeant Williams with half a dozen men waited our coming, and then we were passed through the gate, and went along at the double to where we could hear noise and shouting.
We had the narrow alley to go through – the one I have before mentioned as being between the place we had strengthened and the next building; and no sooner were we at the end, than we found we were none too soon; for there, in the dim starlight, we could see Captain Dyer and four men surrounded by a good score, howling and cutting at them like so many demons, and plainly to be seen by their white calico things.
“By your left, my lads, shoulder to shoulder – double!” says the sergeant.
Then we gave a cheer, and with hearts bounding with excitement, down we rushed upon the scoundrels to give them their first taste of the bayonet, cutting Captain Dyer and two more men out, just as the other two went down.
It was as fierce a fight that, as it was short; for we soon found the alarm spread, and enemies running up on all sides. It was bayonet-drill then; and well we showed the practice, till we retired slowly to the entrance of the alley; but the pattering of feet and cries told that there were more coming to meet us that way; when, following Captain Dyer’s orders, we retreated in good form in the other direction, so as to get round to the gate by the alley, on the south side.
And now for the first time we gave them a volley, checking the advance for a few seconds, while we retreated loading, to turn again, and give them another volley, which checked them once more; but only for a few seconds, when they came down upon us like a swarm of bees, right upon our bayonets; and as fast as half-a-dozen fell, half-a-dozen more were leaping upon the steel.
We kept our line, though, one and all, retiring in good order to the mouth of the second court, which ran down by the south side of the palace; when, as if maddened at the idea of losing us, a whole host of them came at us with a rush, breaking our line, and driving us anyhow, mixed up together, down the alley, which was dark as pitch; but not so dark but that we could make out a turban or a calico cloth; and those bayonets of ours were used to some purpose.
Half-a-dozen times over I heard the captain’s voice cheering us on, and shouting, “Gate, gate!” Then I saw the flash of his sword once, and managed to pin a fellow who was making at him, just as we got out at the other end with a fierce rush. Directly after I heard the captain shout “Rally!” and saw him wave his sword; and then I don’t recollect any more; for it was one wild fierce scuffle – stab and thrust in the midst of a surging, howling, maddened mob, forcing us towards the gateway.
I thought it was all over with us, when there came a cheer, and the gate was thrown open, a dozen men formed, and charged down, driving the niggers back like sheep; and then, somehow or another, we were cut out, and, under cover of the new-comers, reached the gate.
A ringing volley was then given into the thick of the mutineers as they came pouring on again; but the next minute all were safely inside, and the gate was thrust to and barred; and, panting and bleeding, we stood, six of us, trying to get our breath.
“This wouldn’t have happened,” says a voice, “if my advice had been taken. I wish the black scoundrels had been shot. Where’s Captain Dyer?”
There was no answer, and a dead chill fell on me as I seemed to realise that things had come now to a bad pass.
“Where’s Sergeant Williams?” said Lieutenant Leigh again; and it seemed to me that he spoke in a husky voice.
“Here!” said some one faintly; and turning, there was the sergeant seated on the ground, and supporting himself against the breastwork.
“Any one know the other men who went out on this mad sally?” says the lieutenant. “Where’s Harry Lant?” I says. There was no answer here either; and this time it was my turn to speak in a queer husky voice, as I said again, —
“Where’s Measles? I mean Sam Bigley.”
“He’s gone too, poor chap,” says some one. “No, he ain’t gone neither,” says a voice behind me; and turning, there was Measles tying a handkerchief round his head, muttering the while about some black devil. “I ain’t gone, nor I ain’t much hurt,” he growled; “and if I don’t take it out of some on ’em for this chop o’ the head, it’s a rum ’un; and that’s all I’ve got to say.”
“Load,” says Lieutenant Leigh shortly; and we loaded again, and then fired two or three volleys at the niggers as they came up towards the gate once more; when some one calls out, —
“Ain’t none of us going to make a sally party, and bring in the captain?”
“Silence, there, in the ranks!” shouts Lieutenant Leigh; and though it had a bad sound coming from him as it did, and situated as he was, no one knew better than I did how that it would have been utter madness to have gone out again; for even if he were alive, instead of bringing in Captain Dyer, now that the whole mob was roused, we should have all been cut to pieces.
It was as if in answer to the lieutenant’s order that silence seemed to fall then, both inside and outside the palace – a silence that was only broken now and then by the half-smothered groan of some poor fellow who had been hurt in the sortie – though the way in which those men of ours did bear wounds, some of them even that were positively awful, was a something worth a line in history.
Yes, there was a silence fell upon the place for the rest of that night, and I remember thinking of the wounds that had been made in two poor hearts by that bad night’s work; and I can say now, faithful and true, that there was not a selfish thought in my heart as I remembered Lizzy Green, any more than there was when Miss Ross came uppermost in my mind; for I knew well enough that they must have soon known of the disaster that had befallen our little party.
Story 1-Chapter XIII
Whatever those poor women suffered, they took care it should not be seen by us men; and, indeed, we had little time to think of them the next day. We had given ourselves the task to protect them, and we were fighting hard to do it, and that was all we could do then; for the enemy gave us but little peace – not making any savage attack, but harassing us in a cruel way, every man acting like for himself, and all the discipline the sepoys had learned seeming to be forgotten.
As for Lieutenant Leigh, he looked cold and stern; but there was no flinching with him now: he was in command, and he showed it; and though I never liked the man, I must say that he showed himself a brave and clever officer; and but for his skilful arrangement of the few men under his charge, that place would have fallen half-a-dozen times over.
We had taken no prisoners, so that there was no chance of talking