CHAPTER V.
SUNSET.
"What's that?"
The question sprung to every lip; yet all knew the answer. Themagazine had saved itself.
But in the main-guard, not six hundred yards off, where the veryground rocked and the walls shook, the men and women, pent up sincenoon, looked at each other when the first shock was over, feeling thathere was the end of inaction. Here was a distinct, definite challengeto Fate, and what would come of it? It was now close on to fouro'clock; the day was over, the darkness at hand. What would it bringthem? If Meerut, with its two thousand, was so sore bested that itcould not spare one man to Delhi, what could they, a mere handful,hope for save annihilation?
Yet even Mrs. Seymour only clasped her baby closer, and said nothing.For there was no lack of courage anywhere. And Kate, with anotherchild in her arms, paused as she laid it down, asleep at last, upon anofficer's coat, to feel a certain relief. If they were to fare thus,that bitter self-reproach and agonizing doubt for vanished Sonny wasunavailing. His chance might well be better than theirs.
Well indeed, pent up as they were cheek-by-jowl with four hundredunstable sepoys, and with the ominously rising hum of the unstablecity on their unprotected rear. Up on the Flagstaff Tower crowningthe extreme northern end of the Ridge, away from this hum, whereBrigadier Graves had gathered together the remaining women andchildren, so as to guard them as best he could with such troops as hehad remaining--many of them too unstable to be trusted cityward--theywere in better plight. For they had the open country round them--acountry where folk could still go and come with a fair chance ofsafety, since even the predatory tribes, always ready to takeadvantage of disorder, were still waiting to see what master the daywould bring forth. And they had also the knowledge that something wasbeing done, that they were not absolutely passive in the hands ofFate, after Dr. Batson started in disguise to summon that aid fromMeerut which would not come of itself. Above all, they had thedecision, they had the power to act; while down in the main-guard theycould but obey orders. Not that the Flagstaff Tower did much with thisadvantage; for it was paralyzed by that straining of the eyes for acloud of dust upon the Meerut road which was the damnation of Delhi.Yet even here that decisive roar, that corona of red dust brighteningevery instant as the sun dipped to the horizon, brought the convictionthat something must be done at last. But what? Hampered by women andchildren, what could they do? If, earlier in the day, they had sentall the non-combatants off toward Kurnal or Meerut, with as manyfaithful sepoys as they could spare, arming everybody from the arsenaldown by the river, they would have been free to make some forlornhope--free, for instance, to go down _en-masse_ to the main-guard andhold it, if they could. That was what one man thought, who, sevenmiles out from Delhi--returning from a reconnaissance of his own tosee if help were on the way--saw that little puff of smoke, heard theroar, and watched the red corona grow to brightness.
But on the Ridge, men thought differently. The claims of those patientwomen and children seemed paramount, and so it was decided to get backthe guns from the main-guard as a first step toward intrenchingthemselves for the night at the tower. But the men in the main-guardlooked at each other in doubt when the order reached them. Was thegarrison going to be withdrawn altogether, leaving merely a forlornhope to keep the gate closed as long as possible against the outburstof rabble, to whom it would be the natural and shortest route tocantonments? If so, surely it would have been better to send the womenaway first? Still the orders were clear, and so the gate was set wideand the guns rumbled over the drawbridge under escort of a guard ofthe 38th. That, at any rate, was good riddance of bad rubbish; thoughthe wisdom of sending the guns in such charge was doubtful. Yet howcould the little garrison have afforded to give up a single man evenof the still loyal 74th?--a company of whom had actually followedtheir captain to the ruins of the magazine to see if they could doanything, and returned, without a defaulter, to say that all wasconfusion--the dead lying about in hundreds, the enemy nowhere.
"How did the men behave, Gordon?" asked their commandant anxiously,getting his Captain into a quiet corner. And the two men, both belovedof their regiment, both believing in it, both with a fierce, wild hopein their hearts that such belief would be justified, looked into eachother's faces for a moment in silence. There was a shadowing branch ofneem overhead as they stood in the sunlight. A squirrel upon it waschippering at the glitter of their buckles; a kite overhead waswatching the squirrel.
"I think they hesitated, sir," said Captain Gordon quietly.
Major Abbott turned hastily, and looked through the open gate, pastthe lumbering guns, to the open country lying peaceful, absolutelypeaceful, beyond. If he could only have got his men there--away fromthe disloyalty of the 38th guard, the sullen silence of the 54th--ifhe could only have given them something to do! If he could only havesaid "Follow me!" they would have followed.
And Kate Erlton, who, weary of the deadly inaction in the room above,had drifted down to the courtyard, stood close to the archway lookingthrough it also, thinking, not for the first time that weary day, ofAlice Gissing's swift, heroic death with envy. It was something to dieso that brave men turned away without a word when they heard of it.But as she thought this, the look on young Mainwaring's face as hestood with others listening to her story, came back to her. It hadhaunted her all day, and more than once she had sought him out, notfor condolence--he was beyond that--but for a trivial word or two;just a human word or two to show him remembered by the living. And nowthe impulse came to her again, and she drifted back--for there was nohurry in that deadly, deadly inaction--to find him leaning listlesslyagainst a wall digging holes in the dry dust idly with the point ofhis drawn sword for want of something better whereupon to use it. Sucha young face, she thought, to be so old in its chill anger anddespair! She went over to him swiftly, her reserve gone, and laid herhand upon his holding the sword.
"Don't fret so, dear boy," she said, and the fine curves of her mouthquivered. "She is at peace."
He looked at her in a blaze of fierce reproach. "At peace! How dareyou say so? How dare you think so--when she lies--there."
He paused, impotent for speech before his unbridled hatred, thenstrode away indignantly from her pity, her consolation. And as shelooked after him her own gentler nature was conscious of a pride,almost a pleasure in the thought of the revenge which would surely betaken sooner or later, by such as he, for every woman, every childkilled, wounded--even touched. She was conscious of it, even thoughshe stood aghast before a vision of the years stretching away into aneternity of division and mutual hate.
A fresh stir at the gate roused her, a quick stir among a group ofsenior officers, recruited now by two juniors who had earned theirright to have their say in any council of war. These were twoartillery subalterns, begrimed from head to foot, deafened,disfigured, hardly believing in their own safety as yet. Lookingat each other queerly, wondering if indeed they could be theHead-of-the-nine and his second in command, escaped by a miraclethrough the sally port in the outer wall of the magazine, and so comeback by the drawbridge, as Kate Erlton had come, to join the refugeesin the main-guard. Was it possible? And--and--what would the worldsay? That thought must have been in their minds. And, no doubt, a vainregret that they were under orders now, as they listened while MajorAbbott read out those just received from cantonments. Briefly, to takeback the whole of the loyal 74th and leave the post to the 38th andthe 54th--about a hundred and fifty openly disloyal men.
A sort of stunned silence fell on the little group, till MajorPaterson of the 54th said quietly, officially to Major Abbott. "If youleave, sir, I shall have to abandon the post; I could not possiblyhold it. Some of my men who have returned to the colors here mightpossibly fight were we to stick together. But with retreat, and theexample of the 38th before them, they would not. I have, or I shouldhave, lives in my charge when you are gone, and I warn you that I mustuse my own discretion in doing the best I can
to protect them."
"Paterson is right, Abbott," put in the civil officer, who had stuckto his charge of the Treasury all day, and repelled the only attackmade by the enemy during all those long hours. "If I am to do anygood, I must have men who will fight. I don't trust the 54th; and the38th are clearly just biding their time. This retreat might have donesix hours ago--might do now if it were general; but I doubt it."
"Anyhow," put in another voice, "if the 74th are to go, they shouldtake the women with them--they couldn't fare worse than they are sureto do here. I don't think the Brigadier can realize----"
"Couldn't you refer it?" asked someone; but the Major shook his head.The orders were clear; no doubt there was good cause for them. Anyhowthey must be obeyed.
"Then as civil officer in charge of the Government Treasury, I ask forquarter-of-an-hour's law. If by then----"
The eager voice paused. Whether the owner thought once more of thatexpected cloud of dust, or whether he meant to gallop to cantonmentsin hope of getting the order rescinded is doubtful. Whether he went orstayed doubtful also. But the fifteen minutes of respite were given,during which the preparations for departure went on, the men of the38th aiding in them with a new alacrity. Their time had come. Only afew minutes now before the last fear of a hand-to-hand fight would beover, the last chance of the master turning and rending them gone. Itlingered a bit, though, for rumbling wheels came over the drawbridgeonce more, and voices clamored to be let in. The guns had returned.The gunners had deserted, said the escort insolently, and guns beingin such case useless, they had preferred to rejoin their brethren; asfor their officer, he had preferred to go on.
Kate Erlton, drawn from the inner room once again by the creaking ofthe gates, saw a look pass between one or two of the officers. Andthere stood the 74th, smart and steady, waiting for marching orders.No need to close the gates again, since time was up; the fifteenminutes had slipped by, bringing no help, just as the long hours haddragged by uselessly. So the gate stood open to the familiar, friendlylandscape, all aglow with the rays of the setting sun. Close at hand,within a stone's throw, lay the tall trees and dense floweringthickets of the Koodsia gardens, where fugitives might have foundcover. To the left were the ravines and rocks of the Ridge, fatal tomounted pursuit, and in the center lay the road northward, leadingstraight to the Punjab, straight from that increasing roar of thecity. There had been no attack as yet; but every soul within themain-guard knew for a certainty that the first hint of retreat wouldbring it.
How could it do otherwise? The decisive answer of the magazine, withits thousand-and-odd good reasons against the belief that the masterwas helpless, had died away. The refuse and rabble of the city hadceased to wander awestruck among the ruins, murmuring, "What tyrannyis here?"--that passive, resigned comment of the weaker brother inIndia. In the Palace, too, they had recovered the shock of the meantrick of the Nine, who, however, must, thank Heaven, be all dead too.
So as the gate stood open, and the sun streamed through it into thewide courtyard, glinting on the buckles and bayonets, Major Abbott'svoice rose quietly. "Are you ready, Gordon?" The drawbridge was clearof the guns now, clear of everything save the slant shadows.
"All ready, sir," came the quiet reply.
"Number!" called the Commandant, but a voice at his right hand pleadedswiftly. "Don't wait for sections, Huzoor! Let us go!" And another athis left whispered, "For God's sake, Huzoor! quick; get them outquick!"
Major Abbott hesitated a second, only a second. The voices were thevoices of good men and true, whom he could trust. "Fours about! Quickmarch!" he corrected, and a sort of sigh of relief ran down theregiment as it swung into position and the feet started rhythmically.Action at last!--at long last!
"Good-by, old chap," said someone cheerfully, but Major Abbott did notturn. "Good-by! Good-by!" came voices all round; steady, quiet voices,as the disciplined tramp echoed on the drawbridge, and a bar ofscarlet coats grew on the rise of the white road outside.
"Good-by, Gordon! Good-by!"
The tall figure in its red and gold was under the very arch, shining,glittering in the sunlight streaming through it. Another step or twoand he would have been beyond it. But the time for good-by had come.The time for which the 38th had been waiting all day. He threw up hisarms and fell dead from his horse without a cry, shot through theheart. The next instant the gate was closed, its creaking smothered inthe wild, senseless cry "To kill, to kill, to kill," in a wild,senseless rattle of musketry. For there was really no hurry; thehandful of Englishmen were helpless. Major Abbott and his men mightclamor for re-entry at the gate if they chose. They could not get in.Nor could the remnant of the 74th, deprived of its loyal companions,of the only two men who seemed to have controlled it, do anything. Andthe 54th were helpless also by their own act; for they had pushedMajor Paterson through the gate before it closed.
So there was no one left even to try and stem the tide. No one tocheck that beast-like cry.
"_Maro! Maro! Maro!_"
But, in truth, it would have been a hopeless task. The game was up;the only chance was flight. And two, foreseeing this for the lasthour, had already made good theirs by jumping from an embrasure in therampart into the ditch, while one, uninjured by the fall, hadscrambled up the counter-scarp, and was running like a hare for thosesame thickets of the Koodsia.
"Come on! Come on!" cried others, seeing their success. And then? Andthen the cries and piteous screams of women reminded them of somethingdearer than life, and they ran back under a hail of bullets to thatupper room which they had forgotten for the moment. And somehow,despite the cry of kill, despite the whistling bullets, they managedto drag its inmates to the embrasure. But--oh! pathos and bathos ofpoor humanity! making smiles and tears come together--the women whohad stared death in the face all day without a wink, stood terrifiedbefore a twenty-feet scramble with a rope of belts and handkerchiefsto help them. It needed a round shot to come whizzing a message ofcertain death over their heads to give them back a courage which neverfailed again in the long days of wandering and desperate need whichwas theirs ere some of them reached safety.
But Kate neither hesitated nor jumped. She had not the chance of doingeither. For that longing look of hers through the open gates hadtempted her to creep along the wall nearer to them; so that the rushto close them jammed her into a corner against a door, which yieldedslightly to her weight. Quick enough to grasp her imminent danger, shestooped instantly to see if the door could be made to yield further.And that stoop saved her life, by hiding her from view behind thecrowd. The next moment she had pushed aside a log which had evidentlyrolled from some pile within, and slipped sideways into a darkouthouse. She was safe so far. But was it worth it? The impulse to goout again and brave merciful death rose keen, until with a flash, thememory of that escape through the crowd came back to her; she seemedto hear the changing ready voice of the man who held her, to feel hisquick instinctive grip on every chance of life.
Chance! There was a spell in the very word. A minute after logs jammedthe door again, and even had it been set wide, none would have guessedthat a woman, full of courage, ay! and hope, crouched behind the pilesof brushwood. So she lay hidden, her strongest emotion, strange tosay, being a raging curiosity to know what had become of the others,what was passing outside. But she could hear nothing save confusedyells, with every now and again a dominant cry of "_Deen! Deen!_" or"_Jai Kali ma!_" For faith is one of the two great passions which makemen militant, The other, sex. But as a rule it has no cry; it fightssilently, giving and asking no words--only works.
So fought young Mainwaring, who, with his back to that same wallagainst which Kate had found him leaning, was using his sword to abetter purpose than digging holes in the dust; or rather had adopted anew method of doing the task. He had not tried to escape as the othershad done; not from superior courage, but because he never even thoughtof it. When he was free to choose, how could he think of leaving thosedevils unpunished, leaving them unchecked to touch her dead body,while he l
ived? He gave a little faint sob of sheer satisfaction as hefelt the first soft resistance, which meant that his sword had cutinto flesh and blood; for all his vigorous young life made for death,nothing but death. Was not she dead yonder?
So, after a bit, it seemed to him there was too little of itthere--that it came slowly, with his back to the wall and only thosewho cared to go for him within reach--for the crowd was dense, toodense for loading and firing. Dense with a hustling, horrified wonder,a confused prodding of bayonets. So, without a sound, he chargedahead, hacking, hewing, never pausing, not even making for freedom,but going for the thickest silently.
"_Amuk! Sayia! A-muk!_" The yell that he was mad, possessed, ranghideously as men tumbled over each other in their hurry to escape,their hurry to have at this wild beast, this devil, this horror. Andthey were right. He was possessed. He was life instinct with death;filled with but one desire--to kill, or to be killed quickly.
"_Saiya! Amuk! Saiya!_--out of his way--out of his way! _Amuk! Saiya!_Fate is with him! The gods are with him. _Saiya! Amuk!_"
So, by chance, not method; so by sheer terror as well as hacking andhewing, the tall figure found itself, with but a stagger or two,outside the wooden gates, out on the city road, out among the gardensand the green trees. And then, "Hip, hip, hurray!" His ringing cheerrose with a sort of laugh in it. For yonder was her house!--her house!
"Hip, hip, hurray!" As he ran, as he had run in races at school, hisyoung face glad, the fingers on the triggers behind him wavered insheer superstitious funk, and two troopers coming down the roadwheeled back as from a mad dog. The scarlet coat with its goldepaulettes went crashing into a group red-handed with their spoil, outof it impartially into a knot of terrified bystanders, while down thelane left behind it by the hacking and hewing came bullet afterbullet; the fingers on the triggers wavered, but some found a billet.One badly. He stumbled in the dust and his left arm fell oddly. Butthe right still hacked and hewed as he ran, though the crowd lessened;though it grew thin, too thin for his purpose; or else his sight wasfailing. But there, to the right, the devils seemed thicker again."Hip, hip, hooray!" No! trees. Only trees to hew--a garden--perhapsthe garden about her house--then, "Hip, hip----"
He fell headlong on his face, biting the soft earth in sheer despiteas he fell.
"Don't touch him, brothers!" said one of the two or three who hadfollowed at a distance, as they might have followed a mad dog, whichthey hoped others would meet and kill. "Provoke him not, or the demonpossessing him may possess us. 'Tis never safe to touch till they havebeen dead a watch. Then the poison leaves them. Krishnjee, save us!Saw you how he turned our lead?"
"He has eaten mine, I'll swear," put in another sepoy boastfully,pointing gingerly with his booted foot to a round scorched hole in thered coat. "The muzzle was against him as I fired."
"And mine shall be his portion too," broke in a new arrivalbreathlessly, preparing to fire at the prostrate foe; but the firstspeaker knocked aside the barrel with an oath.
"Not while I stand by, since devils choose the best men. As 'tis,having women in our houses 'twere best to take precautions." Hestooped down as he spoke, and muttering spells the while, raised alittle heap of dust at the lad's head and feet and outstretchedarms--a little cross of dust, as it were, on which the young body layimpaled.
"What is't?" asked a haughty-looking native officer, pausing as he rodeby.
"'Tis a hell-doomed who went possessed, and Dittu makes spells to keephim dead," said one.
"Fool!" muttered the man. "He was drunk, likely. They get like that,the cursed ones, when they take wine." And he spat piously on the redcoat as he passed on. So they left the lad there lying face down inthe growing gloom, hedged round by spells to keep him from harmingwomen. Left him for dead.
But the scoffer had been right. He was drunk, but with the Elixir ofLife and Love which holds a soul captive from the clasp of Death for aspace. So, after a time, the cross of dust gave up its victim; hestaggered to his feet again; and so, tumbling, falling, rising to fallagain, he made his way to the haven where he would be, to the side ofa dead woman.
And the birds, startled from their roosting-places by the stumbling,falling figure, waited, fluttering over the topmost branches for it topass, or paused among them to fill up the time with a last twitteringsong of goodnight to the day; for the sun still lingered in theheat-haze on the horizon as if loath to take its glow from that coronaof red dust above the northern wall of Delhi, mute sign of the onlyprotest made as yet by the master against mutiny.
And now he had left the city to its own devices. The rebels were freeto do as they liked. The three thousand disciplined soldiers, more orless, might have marched out, had they chose, and annihilated thehandful of loyal men about the Flagstaff Tower. But it wassunset--sunset in Rumzan. And the eyes of thousands, deprived even ofa drop of water since dawn, were watching the red globe sink in theWest, hungrily, thirstily; their ears were attuned but to onesound--the firework signal from the big mosque that the day's fast wasover. The very children on the roofs were watching, listening, so asto send the joyful news that day was done, in shrill voices to theirelders below, waiting with their water-pots ready in their hands.
Then, in good truth, there was no set purpose from one end of the cityto another. From the Palace to the meanest brothel which had belchedforth its vilest to swell the tide of sheer rascality which had ebbedand flowed all day, the one thought was still, "What does it mean? Howlong will it last? Where is the master?"
So men ate and drank their fill first, then looked at each otheralmost suspiciously, and drifted away to do what pleased them best.Some to the Palace to swell the turmoil of bellicose loyalty to theKing--loyalty which sounded unreal, almost ridiculous, even as it wasspoken. Others to plunder while they could. The bungalows had longsince been rifled, the very church bells thrown down and broken; forthe time had been ample even for wanton destruction. But the cityremained. And while shops were being looted inside, the dispossessedGoojurs were busy over Metcalfe House, tearing up the very books intheir revenge. The Flagstaff Tower lay not a mile away, almosthelpless against attack. But there was no stomach for cold steel inDelhi on the 11th of May, 1857. No stomach for anything except safemurder, safe pillaging. Least of all was it to be found in the Palace,where men had given the rein to everything they possessed--to theiremotions, their horses, their passions, their aspirations. Stablingsome in the King's gardens, some in dream-palaces, some in pigstyes ofsheer brutality. Weeping maudlin tears over heaven-sent success, andboasting of their own prowess in the same breath; squabbling insanelyover the partition of coming honors and emoluments.
Abool-Bukr, drunk as a lord, lurched about asserting his intention ofbeing Inspector-General of the King's cavalry, and not leaving man,woman, or child of the hell-doomed alive in India. For he had beenright when he had warned Newasi to leave him to his own life, his owndeath; when he had shrunk from the inherited bloodstains on his hands,the inherited tinder in his breast. It had caught fire with the firstspark, and there was fresh blood on his hands: the blood of a Eurasianboy who had tried to defend his sister from drunken kisses. Someone inthe melee had killed the girl and finished the boy: the Prince himselfbeing saved from greater crime by tumbling into the gutter and settinghis nose a-bleeding, a catastrophe which had sent him back to thePalace partially sobered.
But Princess Farkhoonda Zamani, safe housed in the rooms kept forhonored visitors, knew nothing of this, knew little even of thedisturbances; for she had been a close prisoner since noon--a prisonerwith servants who would answer no questions, with trays of jewels anddresses as if she had been a bride. She sat in a flutter, trying topiece out the reason for this kidnaping. Was she to be married byforce to some royal nominee? But why to-day? Why in all this turmoil,unless she was required as a bribe. The arch-plotter was capable ofthat. But who? One thing was certain, Abool-Bukr could know nothing ofthis--he would not dare--and suddenly the hot blood tingled throughevery vein as she lay all unconsciously enjoying the re
turn to theeaseful idleness and luxury she had renounced. But if he did dare? ifit was not mere anger which brought bewilderment to heart and brain,as she hid her face from the dim light which filtered in through thelattice--the dim, scented, voluptuous light from which she had fledonce to purer air?
And not a hundred yards away from where she was trying to steady herbounding pulse, Abool-Bukr himself was bawling away at his favoritelove-song to a circle of intimates, all of whom he had alreadyprovided with places on the civil list. His head was full of promises,his skin as full of wine as it could be, and he not be a mere wastrelunable to enjoy life. For Abool-Bukr gave care to this; since to bedead drunk was sheer loss of time.
"Ah mistress rare, divine, Thy lover like a vine With tendril arms entwine."
Here his effort to combine gesture with song nearly caused him to falloff the steps, and roused a roar of laughter from some sepoysbivouacking under the trees hard by. But Mirza Moghul, passing hastilyto an audience with the King, frowned. To-day, when none knew whatmight come, the Queen might have her way so far; but this idledrunkard must be got rid of soon. He would offend the pious to beginwith, and then he could not be trusted. Who could trust a man who hadbeen known to lure back his hawk because a bird's gay feathers shonein the sunshine?
But Ahsan-Oolah, dismissed from feeling the royal pulse once more, bythe Mirza's audience, paused as he passed to recommend a coolingdraught if the Inspector-General of Cavalry wanted to keep his headclear. It was the physician's panacea for excitement of all kinds. Butan exhibition of steel would have done better on the 11th of May.
There was no one, however, to administer it to Delhi, and even therefugees in the Flagstaff Tower were beginning to give up hope of itsarriving from Meerut. Those in the storehouse at Duryagunj still clungto the belief that succor must come somehow; but Kate Erlton, behindthe wood-pile, knew that her hope lay only in herself.
For how could Jim Douglas, as he more than once passed through the nowopen and almost deserted Cashmere gate, in the hope, or rather thefear, of finding some trace of her, know that she was hidden within afew yards of him? or, how could she distinguish the sound of hishorse's hoofs from the hundreds which passed?
She must have escaped with the others, he concluded, as he gallopedtoward the cantonments to see if she were there. But she was not. Hehad failed again, he told himself; failed through no fault of his own;for who could have foretold that madness of retreat from the gate?
So now, there was nothing to be done in Delhi save gather whatinformation he could, give decent burial--if he could--to AliceGissing's body, and, if no troops arrived before dawn, leave the city.