CHAPTER X
THE TRYST
It was nearly noon when Burnet and his escort reached the spot, betweentwo and three miles from the _tell_, where they were to part company.Autumn was merging into winter, and the midday heat was not so great asto necessitate a long halt. Burnet took leave of the Arabs, confidedhis horse to their care, and went alone on foot across the plain. Theroute chosen for him by his guides was not direct, and the journey tookhim twice as long as it would have done had he followed his ownjudgment; but it was safe; he met no one; and he arrived at the _tell_a little after two o'clock.
There was no sign of Captain Ellingford. Burnet went down to theunderground chamber, exchanged his Arab dress for his own uniform, thenreturned to his former look-out post on the mound, field-glasses inhand. It was a case for the cultivation of oriental patience. Two orthree hours passed. He had frequently scanned the horizon, withoutcatching a glimpse either of the expected aeroplane or of figures onthe plain. At last, however, almost at the same moment, he noticed,away to the north-west, a dust cloud moving on the ground, whichspeedily resolved itself into a strong body of horsemen, and somedistance to the east of them a speck in the sky which grew largermoment by moment and was undoubtedly an aeroplane, flying at a heightof about two thousand feet. Burnet had just focussed it through hisfield-glasses when it dropped swiftly earthwards, and vanished from hissight. He had not had time to distinguish its make; but it wasunlikely that an enemy machine was flying in this direction on the veryday when Captain Ellingford had promised to return to the _tell_. Onthe other hand, if the machine was piloted by the captain, why had healighted so far from his destination? Was he the victim suddenly ofthe airman's chief foe, engine trouble?
Burnet turned his glasses towards the body of horsemen. They hadchanged their course, and were now galloping eastward, in the directionin which the aeroplane had come down. Smitten with misgiving, Burnetslipped the glasses back into their case, hurried down the slope, andset off at his best pace towards the spot where he feared his friendwas in peril. It was hard going. When he had left the sandyneighbourhood of the _tell_, he had to skirt swamps, cross wadys, andsometimes to force his way through thick masses of reeds. To makematters worse, his view was circumscribed by the rushes and tall grass,so that he could only gauge his general direction by the sun.
After half an hour's exhausting progress he began to wonder whether hehad not overshot the mark. He had seen no sign of the horsemen, nor ofthe aeroplane, which must stand higher than they. In this tracklessand desolate region he might wander as in a maze. But just when thedifficulties of the situation were weighing his spirits down to thepoint of despair, he was suddenly startled by the rattle of amachine-gun not far ahead, the crackle of musketry, and loud cries.
At this moment he was on the edge of a reedy swamp, like those which hehad skirted more than once since he left the _tell_. He felt that itwas no time for caution, and plunged into the yielding surface, sinkingin first up to his ankles, and soon finding himself in deep water whereit was necessary to swim. Wading toilsomely through the slime beyond,he scrambled ashore, coated with mud and green scum, and dashed throughthe reeds, guided always by the continuous sounds of conflict. Aquarter-mile of stumbling, wading, dragging his mud-caked boots broughthim to the edge of a belt of rushes that separated the morass from abroad clear space beyond, and as he plunged through the tall flags hedreaded what he might see on the other side.
By this time the firing had ceased. When he parted the screen ofrushes and peered through he saw the aeroplane not far from the centreof the open space. Near it Captain Ellingford lay on the ground,guarded by two Turkish troopers. Forty or fifty other Turks wereintently examining the machine. A little beyond it were several proneforms, and farther away the horses of the troop were bunched togetherin the charge of half a dozen men.
The Turks were too much occupied and interested to observe the facepeering at them through the rushes. After a rapid glance that took inall the details of the scene Burnet stepped silently back under cover.There came to his ears the sounds of an animated conversation betweenthe officer in command and his subordinates. He could not understandwhat they said, but guessed that they were discussing in perplexity thequestion what to do with their prize. Presently the officer gave aseries of sharp orders, and parting the rushes to make for himself apeep-hole, Burnet saw the greater number of the men cross the space andmount their horses. A few of them then rode off in differentdirections, no doubt to act as vedettes and give warning if an enemyapproached. The remainder lined up and awaited further orders.
Meanwhile the officer resumed his conversation with the men he hadretained. It was clear from their puzzled looks that they could cometo no conclusion about the disposal of the aeroplane. Burnet guessedthat they were unwilling to destroy a machine which would be useful totheir own army; but the problem how to convey it to their lines,probably a good many miles away, over country that was one longsuccession of swamps, was evidently beyond them.
After a time, however, it appeared that light had dawned. Burnet heardthe word wady several times repeated, and though his ignorance ofTurkish prevented him from understanding in what connection it wasused, it gave him a clue to their next step. The officer sent one ofthe men to convey an order to the mounted group. A dozen of thetroopers rode away westward, in the direction of the Euphrates. Therest dismounted again. While some of them brought picketing ropes andattached them to the aeroplane, others began to beat down the rushesthat edged the northern boundary of the open space. Then two of thehorses were yoked to the ropes, and dragged the machine slowly towardsthe track which the troopers were hastily making. Burnet came to theconclusion that they intended to draw the aeroplane to a wady somewhereto the north, float it there, perhaps on an extemporised raft, and soconvey it to the river.
As soon as the aeroplane began to move, the officer gave an order tothe two men standing sentry over Captain Ellingford, and then Burnetsaw for the first time that his friend was wounded. The Turks helpedhim to his feet, with a care that showed a certain chivalrousness, andsupported between them he limped after his machine.
Burnet felt utterly helpless. Alone against forty or fifty men, hecould do nothing, either to rescue his friend or to save the aeroplane.True, night was approaching: the Turks could not complete theirpreparations for floating the machine that day; he might follow them upon the chance of finding an opportunity in the darkness of getting thecaptain away, if not of destroying the engine. But on second thoughtshe recognised the almost certain futility of such a course. Ellingfordwas wounded, probably unable either to endure the fatigue of walking orto sit a horse. It was scarcely likely that circumstances would againfavour such audacious but hazardous schemes as had already twice wonsuccess. Burnet felt that an attempt to make off with a couple ofhorses would be to strain good fortune too heavily. Yet it wentutterly against the grain to allow a British officer to remain aprisoner with the Turks, or a British aeroplane to take place in aTurkish flight.
One resource remained, but Burnet's heart sank as he thought of it.Rejeb might help him, but Rejeb was twenty odd miles away. Was itpossible, tired as he was, to tramp all those weary miles back to thestronghold, with only an hour's daylight left, and after that no guidebut the stars? How he wished that he had retained his mounted escortuntil he had actually met Captain Ellingford! But regrets were vain.The attempt must be made, and without loss of time, for he had toreckon with the chances of going astray, consequent delay, arriving atthe stronghold too late for Rejeb to render any effective assistance,the possibility that troopers had already been despatched northward toacquaint the Turkish authorities with the capture of the aeroplane, andthat by the morning the small body of cavalry would have been augmented.
"Carry on!" Burnet said to himself. "There's nothing else for it.Carry on!"
He scraped some of the mire from his clothes, wrung out the water, andset off while daylight lasted to find a way around the swamp: to
swimagain through that foul expanse was more than he could face. Keeping awary look-out for the troopers who had been sent scouting, he workedhis way back to the drier ground and regained the _tell_ as the sun wassinking below the horizon. There he stayed just long enough to swallowa little food; then he started on his lonely march.
The next five hours, when he tried to remember them later, were almosta blank to him. It seemed to him that he had trodden as in a dream theplain over which he had ridden earlier in the day. He must have kepthis course by the stars, though he had no recollection of calculatingfrom their positions. Settling into a steady pace, he tramped on andon, over sand and swamp, scarcely conscious of his movements, butfeeling vaguely that he was racing against time. If he had paused tothink, he might well have yielded to despair, for he had travelled theroute but once, and the odds were all against his keeping a straightcourse in the starlight, and discovering the causeway by which alone hecould reach Rejeb's stronghold. A cold wind swept over the plain, buthe gave no thought to its possible effect, striking through his dampclothes. He was deaf to the sounds of animals and birds in themarshes, heedless of possible pitfalls in the way; and thought only ofCaptain Ellingford a prisoner behind him, and of Rejeb somewhere ahead,on whom all his hopes rested.
It is doubtful whether he would have reached his goal had not Fortunebestowed her favour upon the brave. He was several miles westward ofthe stronghold, on a course that would have brought him to theEuphrates, when, in crossing a stretch of open country, he saw a lineof horsemen pass a little ahead of him, riding slowly from right toleft. The sight roused him. Rejeb's men were accustomed to go forthon their forays by night: was this a foraging party from thestronghold, or a hostile band? Apparently the men had not seen him,for they neither interrupted their march nor broke their line. Theywere proceeding at a walking pace, as if heavily laden: he could followthem, and join them if he could assure himself that they were friends.
Changing his course, he struck off to the left, keeping the horsemen insight, and gradually drawing closer to them. He could now see thatevery horse had a large bundle on each side of its rider, and he had nolonger any doubt that, in this neighbourhood and at this hour, the menwere of Rejeb's tribe, returning home from a successful foray. Just ashe had come to this conclusion, the horsemen quickened their pace, andfearful of losing them, he almost unconsciously uttered a cry.Instantly the men sprang from their saddles, formed up their horses ina crescent-shaped line, and took post behind them, resting their rifleson the animal's backs. Burnet called to them again, staggered towardsthem, and fell upon his face.
Five minutes later he was perched on the saddle behind the leading man,clasping him tightly, though half asleep. And he awoke to fullconsciousness only when he was lifted down and carried into Rejeb'stower.
"What harm has befallen you?" cried the young chief.
"None has befallen me, but the British officer who was to meet me is inthe hands of the Turks. His aeroplane fell; Turkish cavalry surroundedhim; he fought and was wounded. The Turks are conveying him and theaeroplane to the Euphrates. I come to seek your help."
"It is yours, even to the last of my people. And you have come alone,on foot, and in the night! Surely Allah must have directed your steps."
"Time is precious," said Burnet. "What can you do?"
"Tell me where this mischance befell your friend."
"A little beyond the _tell_ The Turks spoke of a wady running into theriver----"
"Well I know it. How many are these Turks?"
"Forty or fifty."
"Mashallah! They are delivered into our hands. I will take fifty ofmy best men, and we will fall upon these Turks before they come to theriver. Doubt not that we will save your friend and also his machine,though that we cannot carry away: we can but destroy it."
"Will you not take a larger force?"
"What need? Shall it be told that an Arab of Rejeb's tribe is notequal to a dog of a Turk? I will go now and choose my best warriorsand most skilful riders. You are very weary. When you have eaten, acouch shall be laid for you, and before you awake from sleep we shallhave accomplished our work and returned."
"But I must go with you."
"Ahi! were it not better to take repose and refresh yourself for whatthe morrow may bring forth?"
"Believe me, I could not rest. I must join your party."
"So be it. But there is yet time for rest. It is scarcely the middleof the night. The journey that has taken you since sunset on foot willtake us but half the time. If we start in the third watch we shallstill come upon the Turks some while before daylight. Sleep, then; Iwill awake you at the seasonable hour, and your horse, who has beenwell tended, will carry you nobly."
Burnet needed no further persuasion. He was, in fact, dead beat, andfell asleep before the food which Rejeb ordered to be prepared for himwas brought. Rejeb had him carried to his own couch, laid rugs overhim with his own hands, and placed the food by his side, in readinessfor his awakening.