Chapter 6: A Perilous Adventure.
They retraced their steps, without adventure, until they reached thevillage they had first stopped at.
"There are soldiers here," Surajah exclaimed, as they entered.
"We can't help it, now," Dick said. "There is nothing for it, but togo on boldly. I suppose that Tippoo has sent troops into all thesefrontier villages, to prevent any chance of news of his movementsbeing taken to the plains.
"Ah! There is the old chap who spoke to us last time. Let us stop atonce, and talk with him."
"So you are back again," the peasant said, as they came up to him.
"Yes," Surajah replied. "We told you we should come back here, unlesswe got news of some tiger being marked down near one of the othervillages. We have been as far as the edge of the jungle, and althoughwe have heard of several, not one of them seems to be in the habit ofcoming back regularly to the same spot; so we thought we could not dobetter than return here, at once, and make it our headquarters.
"I see you have got some soldiers here."
"Yes," the old man said, discontentedly, "and a rough lot they are.They demand food, and instead of paying for it in money, their officergives us bits of paper with some writing on them. He says that, whenthey go, we are to take them to him, and he will give us an orderequal to the whole of them, for which we can receive money from thetreasury at Seringapatam.
"A nice thing, that! None of us have ever been to Seringapatam, andshould not know what to do when we got there. Moreover, there would beno saying whether one would ever come back again. It is terrible.Besides, we have only grain enough for ourselves, and shall have tosend down to the plains to buy more; and where the money is to comefrom, nobody can tell."
"I think I could tell you how you had better proceed, if you will takeus into your house," Surajah said. "This is not a place for talking.There are four or five soldiers there, watching us."
The old man entered the house, and closed the door behind them.
"How would you counsel us to proceed?" he asked, as soon as they hadseated themselves on a divan, formed of a low bank of beaten earth,with a thick covering of straw.
"It is simple enough," Surajah said. "One of you would take the order,on the sultan's treasury, to a large village down in the plain. Youwould go to a trader, and say that you wished to purchase so muchgrain and other goods, and would pay for them with an order on thesultan's treasury. It would probably be accepted as readily as cash,for the trader would send it to a merchant, or banker, at Seringapatamto get it cashed for him, to pay for goods he had obtained there; andeither to send him any balance there might be, or to retain it forfurther purchases. An order of that kind is better than money, fortrading purposes, for there would be no fear of its being stolen onthe way, as it could be hidden in the hair, or shoe, or anywhere amongthe clothes of the messenger."
"Wonderful!" the old peasant said. "Your words are a relief, indeed,to me, and will be to all the village, when they hear them."
"And now," Dick broke in, "let us talk about tigers. While you havebeen speaking, those soldiers have passed the door twice, and havebeen looking suspiciously at the house. If they take it into theirheads to come here, and to ask who we are and what is our business, itwould not do to tell them that we have been discussing the value ofthe orders on the sultan's treasury.
"Now, if our advice has been of any assistance to you in this matter,you, in turn, can render us aid in our business of killing tigers. Wewant you to find out, for us, when a tiger was last seen near thevillage; where its lair is supposed to be; and whether, according toits situation, we should have the best chance of killing it by digginga pitfall, on the path by which it usually comes from the jungle; orby getting a kid and tying it up, to attract the tiger to a spot wherewe shall be stationed in a tree."
"I will assuredly do that, and every one here will be glad to assist,when I tell them the advice I have received from you--and would,indeed, do so in any case, for it will be a blessing to the village,if you can kill the tiger that so often carries off some of our sheepand goats."
At this moment, there was a loud knocking at the door. On the peasantopening it, a group of soldiers demanded to see the men who hadentered.
"We are here," Surajah said, coming forward. "What do you want?"
"We want to know who you are, and where you come from."
"Any one in the village could have told you that," Surajah said. "Weare shikarees, and have come here to destroy tigers. We werearranging, with this old man, to find us guides who can point out thetracks of the one which has, for some time, been preying on theiranimals."
"Yes, and our children," the old man put in; "for three of them werecarried off, from the street here, within the last month."
The soldiers looked doubtful, but one of them said:
"This is for our officer to inquire about. The men are strangers tothe village, and he will want to question them."
"We are quite ready to be questioned," Surajah said. "Our host, here,will bear me out in what I say, and there are others in the villagewho will tell you that we have been arranging, with them, to killtigers in this neighbourhood; though as yet we have not settled whatthey will pay us for each beast we destroy."
Accompanied by the peasant, they went with the soldiers to the guardhouse, with which each of the frontier villages was provided. Itconsisted of a group of huts, surrounded by a thick wall of sunburntbricks. They were taken into the largest hut, where the officer of theparty was seated on a rough divan.
"Who have you here?" he asked irritably, for he had been awakened froma doze by their entry.
"They are two young fellows, who are strangers here. They say they areshikarees, who have come into the village to gain a reward for killinga tiger that has been troublesome."
"They were here three days ago, Sahib," the villager said, "and askedus many questions about the tigers, and were, when the soldiers cameto the door, questioning me as to the tiger's place of retreat, andwhether a pitfall, or a kid as a decoy, would be most suitable."
"Where do you come from?" the officer asked Surajah.
"We live in a little village, some distance down the ghauts. We heardthat tigers were more abundant, in the jungle country up here, thanthey are below; and thought that we would, for a time, follow ourcalling here. We can get good prices for the skins, down below; andwith that, and what we get from the villages for freeing them from thetigers, we hope, in a few months, to take back a good store of money."
"Your story is a doubtful one," the officer said, harshly. "You may bewhat you say, and you may be spies."
"If we had been spies," Surajah said, "we should not be here, but atBangalore or Seringapatam. These villages are not the places wherenews is to be gained."
This was so self evident that the officer had nothing to say againstit.
"At any rate," he said, after a pause, "there is no confirmation toyour story, and, as I have orders to put all suspicious persons underarrest, I shall detain you."
"It is very hard--" Surajah began; but the officer made an impatientgesture, while two of the soldiers put their hands on the shoulders ofthe prisoners, and led them from the hut.
"You need not look so downcast," one of them said good naturedly. "Idon't suppose you will be kept here long; and will, no doubt, bereleased when the sultan has gone down the passes, with his army. Aweek or two here will do you no harm--the tigers can wait for a bit.
"There, give us your weapons. I daresay you will get them back again,when we go on; as I hope we shall do, for there is nothing to eat andnothing to do in this miserable place."
The arms were taken into the officer's hut, and as there was a sentryat the gate, no further attention was paid to them.
"I will get you some provisions, and bring them in," the old man said."It is hard, indeed, that men cannot go about their business withoutbeing interfered with."
"Thank you, but we have enough for two or three days. When that isgone, we will give you some
money to buy more; for we have a fewrupees with us, as we knew it might be some time before we should beable to kill a tiger."
As soon as the old man had left them, they seated themselves on alarge faggot of wood that had been brought in by the villagers, forfuel.
"We cannot stay here, Surajah. It is most important that we should getback with the news, and I have no doubt that pig-headed brute in therewill do as he says, and will hold us prisoners until Tippoo has gonedown the passes. We must get off tonight, if possible. We are notlikely to be looked after very sharply. I don't think that fellowreally suspects us, but is simply keeping us to show his authority.There ought to be no difficulty in getting out. I suppose we shall beput into one of the soldiers' huts tonight, and if we crawl out whenthey are asleep, we have only to make our way up those narrow steps tothe top of the wall, and then let ourselves down the other side. It isnot above fifteen feet high, and even if we dropped, we should not belikely to hurt ourselves."
"There will, most likely, be a sentry at the gate," Surajah observed,"and there is a moon tonight."
"There ought to be no difficulty in pouncing on him suddenly, gagginghim before he can give the alarm, and then tying him. We will walkround and see if there is any rope lying about. If not, I will tear mysash into strips. We can use yours to lower ourselves over the wall. Ishould like to get our weapons, if we could. The guns do not matter,but the pistols are good ones. And, if there is an alarm given, we mayhave to fight. Besides, it is not impossible that we may come across atiger, as we go along. I vote that, when we have secured the sentry,we pay the officer a visit."
Surajah nodded. He was quite ready to agree to anything that Dickmight suggest, and felt a strong desire to repossess himself of hisarms, for it seemed to him that it would be a humiliation to go backwithout them.
"Of course," Dick went on, "if the sentry gives the alarm, before wecan secure him, we must give up part of our plan; for, in that case,we should have to bolt. Once over the wall, we should be all right.They may fire away at us as we run, but there is no fear of theirhitting us, half asleep as they will be, and not quite sure what it isall about. If we get a fair start of them, we need not have much fearof their catching us."
"Not as long as it is straight running, Sahib; but if they follow usfar, they may come up within range of us as we are making our way downsome of those nasty places, where we came up the face of the ghaut."
"If we once get well away from them, we will hide up somewhere, andthen strike off on another line."
"We might do that," Surajah agreed; "but you know, the place where wecame up was the only one that seemed to us climbable, and it would becertainly better to make for it again, if we can find our way."
"I quite agree with you there, Surajah. It would never do to go andfind ourselves on the edge of a precipice that we could not get down,with the soldiers anywhere near us. Besides, it is of the greatestimportance that we should take the news back as soon as possible, asevery hour may be of importance. I only wish we could find out whichpass Tippoo means to go by, but I don't suppose that will be knownuntil he starts for it. Anyhow, our news will be very valuable, for atpresent he is supposed to be over on the other side, and he would havetaken our troops entirely by surprise, if he had suddenly poured outonto the plain. So we must give up my idea of hiding up, for if we didso we should have to lie there all day, and it would mean the loss oftwenty-four hours; for I would not go down those ghauts for any money,except in daylight. It is a very different thing going downhill togoing up, and if we were to attempt it in the dark, we should breakour necks for a certainty. If we can get away early, tonight, we shallbe at the edge of that steep place by nine o'clock in the morning, andif we strike the right point, we might be back to the Rajah bynightfall."
"It will be difficult to find our way back in the dark," Surajah said.
"No doubt. Still, we can keep in the general direction, and even if wedo not hit upon the stream tonight, we shall find it in the morning."
It was late in the afternoon when they reached the village, and it wasnow growing dark. Two soldiers came up to them, and bade them followthem into one of the huts, and there pointed to the farther corner astheir place. They wrapped themselves in their blankets, and at oncelay down.
"If they take it into their heads," Dick whispered to Surajah, "to puta sentry on guard at the door, it will upset all our plans. It wouldnot be very difficult to cut our way through the mud wall behind us,but in the first place they have taken away our knives; and, even ifwe had them, it would be risky work trying it.
"The chances are that they will sit and talk all night. Of course, wemight surprise the sentry, but it would be a great risk with thosefellows close at hand, and we should have to run straight for thesteps, and might get a dozen balls after us, before we were over thewall."
"I don't think there would be much chance of their hitting us,"Surajah said. "Jumping up from their sleep in confusion, they would bea minute or so before they could find out what had happened, and weshould be at the foot of the steps before they saw us, and then theywould fire almost at random.
"But, in that case, we should lose our weapons," he added regretfully.
"We cannot help that. The arms are of no consequence at all, comparedto our getting away--unless, of course, any of them happen to overtakeus."
For three or four hours, the soldiers, of whom there were ten in thehut, sat eating, talking, and smoking round the fire, which they keptburning on the earthen floor. One by one, however, they left it andlay down. When but three remained, one of them got up, with a grumbleof discontent, took his musket, which was leaning against the wall,and went out of the hut.
"What a nuisance!" Dick whispered. "He is evidently going on sentryduty."
"Perhaps he has gone to the gate?" Surajah suggested.
"I am afraid not. I expect the other hut is furnishing the sentrythere. Listen!"
During the pauses of the low conversation of the two men still sittingby the fire, they could hear a footfall outside.
"That settles the question," Dick said. "Now, the sooner those fellowsgo to sleep, the better."
"We had better wait for some time, after they do," Surajah replied."One or two of the men, who lay down first, are sure to get up and goto the door and look out. They always do that, once or twice duringthe night. The sentry will soon get accustomed to the door beingopened, and won't look round sharp."
"That is a good idea," Dick agreed. "The moon is at the back of thehut, so we shall be in the shadow. I will spring upon him, and willtry and grip him by the throat, so that he can't holloa. You wrenchthe musket from his hands, and snatch his belt of cartridges. Thatwill give us a weapon, anyhow. As soon as you have got it, I will givehim one sharp squeeze, and throw him down. It will be some time beforehe gets breath enough to holloa."
In half an hour, the two men by the fire lay down. It was not longbefore, as Surajah predicted, one of the sleepers sat up and stretchedhimself; then he rose and walked to the door, opened it, and stood atthe entrance; a moment later he was joined by another figure, and fora few minutes they stood, talking together. Then he came in again,shut the door, and lay down.
During the next hour, three of the others followed his example, thelast of them leaving the door ajar behind him, when he came in.
"Now is our chance, Surajah. We must give him ten minutes to fallasleep again. Then we will move. Should one of them be lying awake,and notice us--which is not likely, for it is too dark in here to seefigures distinctly--and ask where we are going, say, 'To the door, toget cool.' They won't imagine that we are thinking of escape, with onesentry at the door, and another at the gate."
"Don't you think, Sahib, that it would be safer to kill the sentries?"
"Safer or not, Surajah, we will not do it. At present, they have doneus no harm. They are only acting as their officer ordered, and we haveno grudge against them. When they take to shooting at us, we mustshoot at them; but to kill this sentry would be nothing short ofmurd
er."
After waiting a few minutes longer, Dick said:
"We had better be off, now. If we were to wait longer, we should haveanother fellow getting up."
They rose quietly to their feet, made their way to the door, andopened it noiselessly. The sentry was standing, leaning on his longmatchlock, a few feet away. Suddenly a voice behind exclaimed, "Who isthat?"
The sentry was in the act of turning round, when Dick sprang upon him,and grasped him by the throat. No cry came from the man's lips, butthe gun fell from his grasp, as he clutched convulsively at Dick'swrists, and went off as it fell.
"Pick it up," Dick shouted, "and run."
He released his grip from the man's throat, snatched the bandolierfrom his shoulder, and, tripping his feet from under him, threw himheavily to the ground, and then turned to run.
The whole had occupied but a few seconds, but as he started a soldierran out from the hut, shouting loudly. He had a gun in his hand. Dickchanged his mind, turned, threw himself upon him, wrenched the gunfrom his hold, and, as the man staggered back, struck him with hisright hand under the chin.
The man fell back through the open door, as if shot. Dick seized thehandle and closed it, and then ran, at full speed, towards the foot ofthe steps. They were but some twenty yards away.
"Up you go, Surajah. We have not a moment to lose!"
Dick sprang up the steps, Surajah following. As they reached the topof the wall, a shot was discharged at them by the sentry at the gate,who, ignorant of the cause of the sudden uproar, had been standing inreadiness to fire. He was, however, too excited to take aim, and thebullet flew harmlessly over their heads. In another instant, theysprang over the parapet.
"Lower yourself by your arms, and then drop."
The wall, like many others of its sort, was thicker at the base thanon the top, and the foot projected two feet beyond the upper line, sothat it was a sharp slide, rather than an absolute fall. It was wellthat it was so, for although only some twelve feet high inside, it waseight feet higher on its outer face, as a dry ditch encircled it. Bothcame down in a heap on the sand that had crumbled from the face of thewall.
As soon as they picked themselves up, Dick exclaimed, "Keep along thefoot of the wall, Surajah," and they dashed along until they reachedthe angle. As they turned the corner, they heard a burst of voicesfrom the wall where they had slid down, and several shots were fired.Dick led the way along the ditch to the next angle, then left it andentered the village, and dashed along the street.
The sound of firing had roused many of the peasants. Doors wereopening, and men coming out. Exclamations of surprise were heard, asthe two figures rushed past, but no one thought of interfering withthem. As they left the houses behind them, Surajah said:
"You are going the wrong way, Sahib. You are going right away from theghauts."
"I know that well enough," Dick panted; "but I did it on purpose. Wewill turn and work round again. They will hear, from the villagers,that we have come this way, and will be following us down the roadwhile we are making our way back to the ghauts."
They ran for another hundred yards, then quitted the path, and madeacross the fields. From the fort and village they could hear a greathubbub, and above it could make out the voice of the officer, shoutingorders. They continued to run, for another quarter of a mile, and thenturned.
"Now we can go quietly," Dick said, breaking into a walk. "This linewill take us clear of the fort and village, and we have only to makestraight for the ghauts. I think we have thrown them well off thescent, and unless the officer suspects that we have only gone theother way to deceive him, and that we are really making for theghauts, we shall hear nothing more of them."
"It is capital," Surajah said. "I could not think what you were doing,when you turned round the corner of the fort and made for the village,instead of going the other way. But where did you get that gun from?"
Dick told him how it had come into his possession.
"It was not so much that I cared for the gun," he said, "as that Iwanted to prevent the man from using it. If he had followed meclosely, he could hardly have helped hitting one of us, as we went upthe steps. By shutting the door, we gained a few moments, for theywere all in confusion in the dim light inside, and would certainly notlearn anything, either from the man I pitched in among them, or fromthe sentry outside.
"I don't suppose any of them had an idea of what had happened, untilthe sentry shouted to them that we had got over the wall. Then theyrushed up, and fired at random from the top, thinking that we shouldbe running straight from it."
They walked along for a short distance, and then Dick said:
"I have got my wind again, now. We will go on at a jog trot. Imistrust that officer. He had a crafty face, and as we said webelonged to a village down the ghauts, he may have a suspicion that wehave been trying to throw him off our scent, and think we should besure to double back and make for home."
They kept on their way, sometimes dropping into a walk, but generallygoing at an easy trot, until day broke.
"As soon as it gets a little lighter, Surajah, we will go up on to oneof these rises, so as to have a good look down over the line we havecome. If they are following us, we must go on at the top of our speed.If we see nothing of them, we can take it quietly. Of course, theycan't have been following our steps, but it is quite likely that someof the villagers may know that the ghauts can be climbed at the pointwhere we came up. You know we noticed signs of a path, two or threetimes, on the way up. In that case, if the officer really did think ofpursuing us, he would take one of the villagers as guide."
Half an hour later, they ascended a sharp rise, and threw themselvesdown on its crest.
"I don't think that there is the least chance of their coming,"Surajah said, carelessly. "When they had gone some distance, withoutovertaking us on the road, they may possibly have suspected that wehad turned and made this way; but by the time they got back to thevillage, they would know, well enough, that there was no chance ofovertaking us."
Dick made no answer. He had a sort of uneasy conviction that theofficer would at once suspect their plan, and that pursuit would havecommenced very shortly after they had re-passed the fort. For someminutes, no words were spoken. No sign of life was to be seen; but inso broken a country, covered in many places with jungle or wood, aconsiderable body of men might be coming up, unperceived.
Suddenly, Dick grasped Surajah's arm.
"There they are. You see that I was right. Look at that clump of bush,half a mile away, well to the left of the line we came by. They havejust come out from there. There are ten or twelve of them."
"I see them," Surajah said. "They are running, too, but not veryfast."
"We will crawl back, till we are out of their sight, and then make arun for it. They must have got a guide, and are, no doubt, taking amore direct line than we are, for we may be a good bit off the streamwe followed as we came along. I have not seen anything I recognise,since it got light, though I am sure we have been going somewhere nearthe right direction. Now, we have got to run for it."
They dashed off, at a rate of speed much higher than that at whichthey had before been travelling; keeping, as much as possible, inground covered from the sight of their pursuers; and bearing somewhatto the left, so as to place the latter directly behind them, and tostrike the path Dick had no doubt their pursuers were keeping.
"It is no use running too fast," he said, a few minutes later. "Thereis a good long way to go yet--another ten miles, I should think; andanyhow, I don't think we can get down that steep place, before theycome to the edge of the cliff above. You see, we are not certain as towhere it is. We might strike the cliffs a mile or two on either sideof it, and I have no doubt they will go straight to the spot. I expectthe man they have got as a guide has been in the habit of going downthe ghauts, and knows his way.
"If it were not that we are in such a hurry to get to Uncle with thenews about Tippoo, it would be much better to turn off, altogether,and stay i
n a wood for a day or two. They would not stop very long atthe top of the ghauts, for they cannot be sure that we are going thatway, at all, and when a few hours passed, and we didn't come, theofficer would suppose that he was mistaken, and that we really kept onin the line on which we started."
They trotted along for some time in silence, and then Surajah said:
"Do you not think that it would be better for us to make for the passto the left? It is twenty miles off, but we should be there by theevening, and we should surely find some way of getting into it, belowwhere the fort stands."
Dick stopped running.
"Why not go the other way, and make for the pass we know?" he said."It can't be more than fifteen miles, at the outside, and once belowthe fort we know our way, and should get down to the village twelvehours sooner than if we went round by the other pass."
"It would be the right plan, if we could do it," Surajah agreed; "butyou know the rocks rise straight up on both sides of the fort, and theroad passes up through a narrow cleft, with the fort standing at itsmouth. That is why I proposed the other pass."
"I think we had better try it, nevertheless, Surajah. We should not bemore than three hours in going straight there, and shall have ampletime to follow the edge of the precipice for the last five miles. Wemay discover some break, where we can get down. If we should find itimpossible to descend anywhere, we must sleep till sunset, then strikethe road above the fort, go down at night, and manage to slip past thesentry."
"The only thing is, Sahib, that it seemed as if the fort lay rightacross the entrance to the gorge, and the road went through it."
"It did look like that, Surajah. Certainly the road went through agateway. But there must be a break somewhere. We could see that, inthe wet season, a lot of water comes down there, so there must be somesort of passage for it; and if the passage is big enough for the stormwater to go through, it must be big enough for us."
Surajah agreed, and they turned off from the line that they had beforebeen following; no longer hurrying, but walking at a leisurely pace.They were not pressed for time. There was no chance, whatever, ofpursuit; and as they had been going, for some six hours, at the top oftheir speed, they were both feeling exhausted.
After proceeding for two miles, they came upon a small stream. Herethey sat down, lighted a fire, mixed some flour and water--foralthough the ghee had been taken from them, when they were disarmed,they had been allowed to retain their supply of flour, for theirsustenance in prison--and made some small cakes. These they cooked inthe glowing embers. They could not be termed a success, for theoutside was burned black, while the centre was a pasty mass. However,they sufficed to satisfy their hunger, and after an hour's rest, theyagain went forward.
It was not very long before they stood on the edge of the rock wall.They followed this along, but could nowhere find a spot where adescent seemed at all possible. After walking for an hour, they saw aroad winding up a long valley below them.
"That is our road," Dick exclaimed. "That clump of houses, Surajah,must be the one where we generally turned. I know that, from below,these rocks looked as steep as walls, so there is no chance of ourfinding a way down anywhere, between this and the fort."
Surajah nodded. To him, also, the ascent of the ghauts had seemedimpracticable.
"It is no use following this line any more," Dick went on. "We may aswell strike across, until we come onto the edge of the pass, somewhereabove the fort; find a place where we can descend easily, and then liedown and sleep, till it is time to make our attempt."
In another hour, they were looking down on the road, a mile or soabove the fort. The slopes here were gradual, and could be descendedwithout the least difficulty, even in the dark.
"There! Do you see, Surajah? The water course runs along by the sideof the road. There is a little water in it now. You know we used tomeet with it, down below, and water our horses at a pool close to thatruined village. When we start, we can follow the road until we getclose to the fort, and then crawl along in the water course, and takeour chances. If we should find it so blocked up that we can't getthrough, we must then see how we can get past the place in some otherway. If the gate is only barred, no doubt we should be able tooverpower the sentry, and get the gate open before any alarm is given.If it is locked, we must do the best we can. We may calculate upontaking the sentry by surprise, as we did in the prison, and onsilencing him at once; then we should have time to break up somecartridges, and pour the powder into the keyhole, which is sure to bea big one, make a slow match, and blow the lock open. We could makethe slow match before we start, if we had some water."
"Shall I go down to the stream, and get some?"
"You have nothing to carry it up in, Surajah; and besides, someonemight come along the valley."
"We shall only want a little water. I will take off my sash, and dipit in the stream; that will give us plenty, when it is wrung out."
"At any rate, Surajah, we will do nothing until it is getting dusk.See! There are some peasants, with three bullocks, coming down thevalley, and there are four armed horsemen riding behind them. We willgo back to those bushes, a hundred yards behind us, and sleep thereuntil sunset; then we will make our way down to that heap of bouldersclose to the stream, manufacture our slow match, and hide up thereuntil it is time to start. We want a rest, badly. We did not sleeplast night, and if we get through, we must push on tonight without astop, so we must have a good sleep, now."
The sun was low when they woke. They watched it dip below the hills,and then, after waiting until it began to get dusk, started for thevalley. No one was to be seen on the road, and they ran rapidly downthe slope, until they reached the heap of boulders. Surajah tore off astrip of cotton, six inches long by an inch wide, from the bottom ofhis dress, went forward to the stream, and wetted it. When he cameback, they squeezed the moisture from it, broke up a cartridge, rubbedthe powder into the cotton, and then rolled it up longways.
"That will be dry enough, by the time we want to start," Dick said. "Ihope we sha'n't have to use it, but if there is no other way, we mustdo so."
They remained where they were, until they thought that the garrison ofthe fort would be, for the most part, asleep. Then they crossed thestream, and walked along by the side of the road, taking care not toshow themselves upon it, as their figures would be seen for a longdistance, on its white, dusty surface. Presently, the sides of thevalley approached more closely to each other; and, just where theynarrowed, they could make out a number of dark objects, which were,they doubted not, the houses occupied by the garrison. They at oncetook to the bed of the stream, stooping low as they went, so thattheir bodies would be indistinguishable among the rocks.
They could hear the murmur of voices, as they passed through thevillage. Once beyond it, they entered the gorge. Here there was butroom enough for the road and the stream, whose bed was several feetbelow the causeway. A few hundred yards farther, the gorge widened outa bit, and in the moonlight they could see the wall of the fortstretching before them, and a square building standing close to it.
"That is the guard house, no doubt," Dick said, in low tones. "It istoo close to be pleasant, if we have to attack the sentry."
Very carefully, they picked their way among the rocks, until close tothe wall; then Dick gave a low exclamation of disappointment. Thestream ran through a culvert, some twelve feet wide and ten feet high,but this was closed by iron bars, crossing each other at intervals ofonly five or six inches, the lower ends of the perpendicular barsbeing fixed in a stone dam, extending across the bed of the stream.Dick waded across the pool formed by the dam, and felt the bars, butfound them perfectly solid and strong.
"It is no good, Surajah," he said, when he returned. "There is nogetting through there. There is nothing for it but the gate, unless wecan find the steps up to the top of the wall, and get up unnoticed.Then we might tear up our sashes longways, knot them together, andslip down.
"The first thing to do is to have a look round. I will get up
close tothe wall. It is in shadow there."
Entering the pool again, he climbed up the steep bank, which was herefaced with stones. He stopped when his eyes were above the level, andlooked round. There was the gate, twelve feet away, and to his delightno sentry was to be seen. He was about to whisper Surajah to join him,when he heard voices. They came from above, and he at once understoodthat, instead of a man being posted behind the gate, two were on guardon the wall above it. He beckoned to Surajah to join him, and when hedid so, whispered what he had discovered.
"If the gate is only barred, we are all right now, Surajah; exceptthat we shall have to run the risk of being shot by those fellows onthe wall. We shall be a pretty easy mark, on that white road bymoonlight. Our only plan will be to keep close to the wall, when weare through the gate, get down into the bed of the stream again, andthen crawl along among the rocks. The bottom will be in shadow, and wemay get off without being noticed. The only fear is that we shall makea noise in opening the gate.
"Now, let us try it."
Keeping close to the wall, they crept to the gateway. This projectedtwo feet beyond the gate itself, and standing against the latter theycould not be seen, even in the unlikely event of one of the sentrieslooking down. The only risk was of anyone in the guard house comingout. This, however, could not be avoided, and they at once began toexamine the fastenings of the gate, which consisted of two massivebars of wood, running across it. These, by their united strength, theyremoved one after another. But when they tried it, they found the gatestill immovable.
"The beastly thing is locked," Dick said. "There is nothing to do, butto blow it open."
He broke off the ends of three cartridges, poured the powder in at thekeyhole, and then inserted the slow match.
"Stand in the corner there, Surajah. I will go down to the streamagain, to light the tinder. The noise is less likely to be heardthere."
He stole back again, sat down at the edge of the water, placed histinder box in his lap, took his turban off and put it over his hands,so as to deaden the sound, and then struck the steel sharply againstthe flint. The first blow was successful. The spark fell on thetinder, and at once began to extend.
He listened intently. The men on the wall were still talking, and thesound had evidently not reached their ears.