The Weeping Ash (34 page)

Cameron discharged his own musket, and one of the pursuers toppled off his horse.

“Ha!” grunted the colonel. “
That's
made 'em ponder; and now they've got to reload again; they
still
have no notion of staggering fire, in spite of all I have taught them. Hurry up your beast, Therbah! Once we gain that bluff on the far shore we shall have the upper hand on them.”

The Therbah, however, was troubled. “Parvati not moving well, sahib.”

“Why, what is the matter? Can she have been hit? She did not cry out.”

The elephant did cry out now, though: a long, strange shrill trumpeting shriek of fright and dismay.

“Oh, what can it be?” exclaimed Scylla, and then, in horror, “Why, look, Colonel Cameron—she is sinking into the sand!”

“The devil! So she is! Poor beast—no wonder she was not able to go any faster. A quicksand, by God! Therbah! Can you not urge her out of it? Discharge your pistol behind her ear—that may help to startle her forward. If not—I fear we must prepare to abandon her forthwith. Miss Musson—Miss Paget—make ready to jump for it!”

“Into the
quicksand
?” exclaimed Miss Musson. “My
dear
Rob!”

“Devil take it, ma'am, what else is there to do? What an elephant may sink, a human may, with luck, venture safely—that is, if he looks sharp about it and don't dawdle—leap as far forward as you may, into the sand, then run fast, for your life, into the deeper water where you may swim.”

The Therbah discharged his pistol behind Parvati's ear, but to no avail. Indeed the wretched beast's floundering start of terror at the sound only served to sink her deeper into the quicksand.

“
Jump
!
” roared Cameron, and his fellow travelers launched themselves out of the howdah while he, hastily reloading, fired two more shots at the pursuing troop. Another man fell, and a horse staggered. A hail of fire came back in return, but the elephant was now interposed as a barrier between pursuers and fugitives; many of the shots, in any case, fell wide or short.

Scylla, leaping into shallow water, felt the horrible suck of treacherous sand beneath her feet; she struggled hastily forward until she was waist deep in water and could swim, then turned to see how her companions were faring. Cal, with a pack on his back, was assisting Miss Musson into deep water and had taken the baby from her; the Therbah, holding his musket above his head with one hand, swimming strongly in a deep narrow channel, had the elephant's lead rope in his teeth and was endeavoring to drag and persuade her forward.

“It is useless, Therbah!” Cameron called from the howdah. “One of those villains' shots has taken her in the neck; one way or another, I fear she is done for, poor beast. Here—be ready to catch these—”

He was hurling out of the howdah the rest of the scanty bundles that constituted their luggage. Fortunately the sandbank that had proved so treacherous to them was rather beyond the middle of the river, and many of the articles that he flung out reached the far bank or fell into shallows where they might be rescued.

“Rob! Do not be lingering there but come quickly!” called Miss Musson in agitation.

“Don't put yourself in a pucker, ma'am! Here I come,” replied Cameron, and, holding his weapon muzzle down, he sprang into the water from the slowly subsiding elephant, who was still trumpeting in despair and terror. In a few rapid strokes he had caught up with the rest of the party.

“Now—quick, before they have time to reload—make a dash for the shelter of those rocks and so up the bluff. Each for himself—who has the baby? All—very well.
Run
!
”

Scylla, in shallow water, dared not look behind her. One thing, she thought, there has been no time to worry about crocodiles. She gained the reedy bank, scrambled up it, turned to assist Miss Musson, who was close behind, and half led, half dragged the older woman up to the ridge of red rocks that outlined the shore to their left. In the shelter of this they sank down gasping. As they did so a prolonged, mournful bellow from the doomed elephant ended abruptly. Either she had been hit again or she had finally sunk under water. Stealing a glance above the rock, Scylla perceived that the surface of the river was empty: the poor beast had been completely submerged.

“Keep
down
, Miss Paget!” furiously roared the voice of Colonel Cameron. A shot smacked the sandy ground not twelve feet from Scylla.

The colonel was lying on his stomach nearby, reloading his weapon. “Aha!” he muttered. “Now their flank is thoroughly exposed,” and he fired through a crack between the rocks. “
Paget!
Why the
devil
are you not firing?”

“Well done, sir!” shouted Cal, ignoring this. “You got the fellow on the black.” Next moment he discharged his own weapon.

“That's given the villains something to think about, anyway,” grunted Cameron, lowering his musket to study the attackers through the crevice. “Yes; just as I thought; they haven't the pluck to attempt that river without their leader.”

The horsemen were conferring together at the spot where Parvati had entered the water, they were looking up and down the banks irresolutely. Evidently the elephant's fate had discouraged them. Cameron fired again and succeeded in picking another rider off his horse. Without more ado the rest of the troop turned and made off in the direction from which they had come.

“Dismal curs!” remarked Cameron. “If I were Mihal I'd behead the lot of them—as he probably will! Didn't even stop to hinder us from collecting our baggage. They might at least have waited until dark.”

As it was—after allowing a prudent interval to elapse—the survivors of the quicksand were able to go down to the water's edge and retrieve their scattered belongings—wet, certainly, but intact.

“All the flour is sodden!” lamented Miss Musson.

“Let that be a lesson to you, ma'am! Wrap up your supplies better in future. All the weapons, you will observe, are heavily greased, and the ammunition is encased in so many layers of oiled leather and silk that Neptune himself couldn't get at it.”

“Don't brag, Rob,” said Miss Musson sharply. “You, after all, are
used
to these sorts of alarums—it is your profession—but
we
are not accustomed to scampering off into the wild at short notice and being shot at.”

“Miss Musson is very kind,” here coldly put in Scylla, “but the fault regarding the flour was mine.
I
had charge of the stores and shall undertake next time—if there is a next time—to wrap the flour in as many layers of oiled silk as you please to direct, Colonel Cameron.”

All of a sudden she felt exceedingly angry with the colonel—if she had been asked why, she could hardly have said. Partly it was because he had shouted at her so loudly and rudely to put her head down when she was still shaking with fright and effort. Partly because he had seemed so callous regarding the fate of their poor elephant And partly just because she was cold and wet and exhausted and could not imagine what they were to do now.

As if to aggravate her indignation, Colonel Cameron now addressed Cal.

“Paget, why in heaven were you not quicker of the mark with your covering fire? By thunder! I wouldn't have
you
in a troop of mine, not if you couldn't get down and begin firing faster than that!”

“Sir,” very composedly replied Cal, “I was holding the baby; which I had taken from Miss Musson while we went through the water.”

“Holding the baby! — — the baby! Why couldn't you set it down, man?”

“Enough of this!” interposed Miss Musson. “We are all very much obliged to you, Colonel Cameron, but the main requirement at the moment—I fancy—is to put some distance between ourselves and the scene of this unfortunate occurrence. And then we had best light a fire and dry our possessions.”

“You are in the right of it, ma'am,” rather curtly replied the colonel.

Ruffled, wet, and not best pleased with one another, the party retired up the hillside into the gathering dusk. Still shaken by the recent adventure, they were inclined to straggle, but Cameron, visibly impatient, waited until they all came up with him and then harangued them.

“Listen to me if you please!” he said. “Heaven knows, I had no particular wish to become involved in this business; but since I
am
involved and, owing to my experience, am the most capable to take charge of the expedition, I must request that you all follow my directions and, particularly at moments of crisis, give me instant obedience. You, Paget! Did you hear me, sir?”

“What was that you said, Colonel?” absently replied Cal, whose thoughts evidently had been miles away—he had probably been, his sister suspected, composing an elegy on the drowning of the elephant. “Oh yes, instant obedience in times of crisis—certainly.”

“And don't straggle!” snapped the colonel, regarding them with exasperation. “In country like this we
must
all keep together. Soon we shall be entering a region of Kafiristan where headhunting is a regular practice. It is a sport for them, like polo: successful hunters, on returning to their villages, are showered with wheat. I must request you not to behave in a manner which will put your companions at risk by obliging them to halt and turn back in search for you. Do you understand?”

“Of course we understand, Rob,” replied Miss Musson calmly. “We none of us wish to lose our heads. You have experience, you are the leader, the children perfectly comprehend this. No one questions your authority.”

“Very well,” Cameron said. “Now: a further point. We are making for the pass of Lowacal, which is, I conjecture, some forty or fifty miles from here. We shall try to procure mules, but I doubt if we shall succeed; and part, indeed most, of the journey will in any case have to be done on foot—and it must be done
fast
; the rains are upon us, but as soon as the rains reach these lower valleys the rivers begin to flood and may become impassable; furthermore, higher up, the rains become snows, and Lowacal itself may be blocked unless we reach it with all possible speed. Therefore we must make haste. No dallying to pick bouquets or gaze at romantic vistas—is that understood?” he demanded, gazing sternly at Scylla.

She nodded, biting her lip; then, as he still held her eyes, replied in a cool detached manner, “Certainly it is, Colonel Cameron; you have made it abundantly clear.”

“Very well!” He added, “It is becoming dark, and we have put a fair distance between ourselves and the river, I think we may venture to stop here for the night.”

Their path was climbing beside a cliff face, and, at one point where it curved around, a rough cave had been dug in the mountainside, evidently used as a shelter by other travelers before them; one or two heaps of pebbles were crowned by withered marigolds, probably in propitiation of some mountain god.

Thankfully they set down their loads, the men gathered brushwood for a fire, Scylla fetched water from a spring to make lentil soup, Miss Musson fed the baby, and Cal returned in triumph from a wood-gathering excursion with a pouch full of walnuts.

They were all tired out and lay down as soon as they had eaten, wrapped in their half-dried cloaks, the women at the rear of the shallow cave, the men in front. A misty moon threw pine shadows on the rock wall; some beast howled in the distance.

“Are there wolves in these mountains, Rob?” Miss Musson sleepily inquired, and he answered briefly:

“Wolves, tigers, bears, leopards—hyenas, jackals, apes—”

“Oh well, I daresay they will not greatly trouble us,” she murmured. Next moment Scylla heard her softly singing an Urdu lullaby to the child: “‘
Roti, makan, chini, chota baba nini
(Bread, butter, sugar, little baby sleep).'” And she went on, even mote softly, into one that her own mother must have sung to her. “By-low, baby, my wee baby, By-low, baby, Mother's little lamb.”

Outside, an owl hooted among the pines; Scylla felt waves of sleep drifting over her.

In the cave entrance Cal said to the colonel, “How long do you think it will take us to reach the Lowacal Pass, sir?”

“We shall try to procure a guide in a mountain village. Then, with luck, perhaps three weeks.”

“Three
weeks
? To go fifty miles?”

Cameron merely grunted, “You will see,” and, burrowing his head into his sheepskin jacket, composed himself for sleep.

* * *

They did see. They soon began to understand how, in that country, it was sometimes a matter for self-congratulation if they achieved half a mile in an hour. They managed to obtain a guide in a hill village, where Miss Musson also purchased a goat. But mules were not to be had. The goat, Ammomma, sometimes seemed of more use man the guide; she had an infallible instinct for picking her way along a treacherous track that was half washed out by rain. The guide, Hazarah, a sad-looking little man with slightly mad, wandering eyes, appeared to be an outcast in the village where they hired him, and to Scylla he seemed the last person likely to be able to conduct the party through these confusing, precipitous hills to a far-distant mountain pass. But Cameron professed himself satisfied. “The man is a Kafir; he comes from Weran; he has trodden that trail many times.”

The trail itself was a nightmare. Sometimes it led over slopes of shale, which threatened at each step to slip down and set the whole hillside sliding into an avalanche; sometimes they must cross gorges, over crazy cantilever bridges of tree trunks; sometimes the bridge was but a single trunk with branches left on, or a trunk split in half. Sometimes, traversing the sides of a precipitous gorge, they found that the path became no more than a rickety platform of pine branches woven together and jammed into cracks in the rock, extending from the cliff face hundreds of feet up, over white water roaring among boulders, or wicked-looking black mountain lakes which the sun never reached, so deep were they sunk among their slimy cliffs; sometimes the party must clamber up nearly vertical slopes where the path was but a series of toe holds and a single slip would have meant a fall of half a mile; sometimes they were slogging knee deep through snow, high above the tree line in a windy valley, or exposed to frightful gusts, traversing some immense rocky shoulder; at other times, having gone down, down, down, exhaustingly, till the backs of their legs felt ready to split with agony and their toes threatened to push through the tips of their boots, they must cross rushing mountain torrents where already crusts of ice were beginning to form along the bank.