THE PASS OF PERIL

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22582, 21 November 1936, Page 15 (Supplement)

THE PASS OF PERIL

By EDMUND BARCLAY Author of " Karona." etc.

CHAPTER I. All day long the baggage-train had groaned its way with creaking wheels and lowing bullocks through the narrow valley, and all day long the whip-like crack of the snipers' rifles had beaten out a devil's tattoo of intermittent sound. Up in the hills, and heedless of the stabbing Indian sun, the Pathans now ran, now crept from rock to rock, pausing at intervals to send both a curse and a bullet to tho khaki-clad figures below them. Down in the valley, two white, .officers and fifty native troopers of tho Khyber .Mounted Rifles rode forward at a stolid pace, wlr.le bullock-drivers curled and cracked their fifteen-foot leather thongs as the heaving teams hauled the waggons carrying the regimental impediments.

The vicious leaden slugs whistled and sang over-head, now and again a dull thud proclaiming that a bullet had found a wooden billet, and slivers of wood pumped up from the waggons as a I'athan, more by good luck than by good shooting, found a solid target. The Pathan markmanship was worse than ever, or rather, from the point of view of the officer commanding the British detachment, better than ever. For three days they had been sniped, and vet never a man of them hit, but the constant tension was proving to be a severe drain upon nervous energy; physically the losses were nil, phychologically they were very high indeed Even at night there was little relief, for although the darkness brought a cessation of sniping, not a man of them dare sleep, soundly for fear of the sudden rush, the night attack, and the deadly, disembowelling thrust of tho double-handed sword

At the head of the column rodo Captain Michael Garvie, M.C., the heavy shadow cast by the pith helmet across the upper part of liis face emphasising the hard lines at the jawbone, and the taut lips and mouth. A face strong to the point of ugliness, Diost people thought, until he smiled, when the eyes which at first sight appeared to be grey had a disconcerting knack of revealing themselves as being of a twinkling blue. But he, was not smiling now. His eyes, haggard from three nights' loss of sleep, were puckered up into narrow slits as he watched the live brown blots which rode five hundred yards ahead of him, as his acivanro guard. The dancing waves of heat, and the dust clouds,distorted his vision, and more than once lie had tightened rein thinking that he had Been the upflung arm and horizontal rifle which signified Enemy in sight," hut in each case the supposed signal had resolved itself into a mirage-liko trick of tho strong sunlight. The young subaltern who rode by Garvio's sido displayed shocking traces of the strain which they had all undergone. Garvio's inner reserves of strength were almost untapped, but young Percy Convcrs was ncaring the end. He knew it, and so did Garvie. They had not spoken since they had shivered over biscuits and watered coffee-grounds in the cold, North-West Indian dawn, and now the sun had nearly reached its Zenith, each few minutes of the morning having been marked by tho faintly heard crack of a rifle and the whining cr y of the bullet, first from this side, and next from that. At last Percv broke out.

t " Michael," he said, in a dry whisper, ' I can't .stand much more of it, 1 tell Jon." impatiently flicked the sandflies from his face and neck, and swallowed hard, ile deliberately refrainod from speaking for some minutes, F 1 ' 1 '! lio had fully mastered the irritation which welled up within him a " rev's puerile complaints. There is nothing so wearing to the military temper as being forced by circumsta lines to sull'er the wasp-like stints or a guerilla foeman, without ever having the chance of retaliation. The ® n 'y thing the good soldier can do is to sit tight and grin. Grins are not eas ?> when fighting such a foe in such a country and climate, but Garvic have smiled his slow smile through it all. if it had not have been for the fact that the man riding by his side, who should have been his biggest help, was his biggest hindrance. Moreover, Percy had a sister down in v-iinla who wore Garvio's ring. When at last G'nryie did answer him, it was surprising gentleness. Not much longer now, old chap," ho said, "another day and we'll be out in the open country. They -wont fellow ns there. After all, what doos matter if they like to waste their Jfnnnunition by taking pot-shots at ns? I here's been nobody hit, yet! " "It wouldn't be so bad if only I

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could sleep at night," answered the subaltern. "L lie awake, waiting for the next bullet which never comes till dawn. Three days we've been sniped—it seems like three long ghastly years." The boyish face, for he was little moro than a boy, was etched with deeplvbitten lines, and the smears of dust and sweat which streaked from his brow to his chin gave him a woebegone expression, strangely at variance with his military clothing and accoutrements. Like his sister, he had long-lashed eyes almost violet in colour, and the full, pouting lips, which, though desirable in a woman, are danger-signals of weakness when found on a mail's face. His was the face of a dreamer, and his delicately shaped hands and long tapering fingers were more fitting to the imaginative artist than to the man of action. To him, anticipation was always more terrible than realisation, and ho would have found the impact of tho bullet upon his body loss frightening to his soul, than the waiting for the impact. "Is it sleep you want?" was Garvie's reply to his last remark. "I'll be putting you to sleep with a punch on the solar" plexus if you don't straighten yourself out," he went on jokingly. "Do take a good grip on yourself, old chap. Don't forget that our native troopers are looking to us to set them an example." "That's just it, Michael. The sepoys are sneering at me among themselves, I know they are. They look at me and laugh, and pass derisive remarks. 1 wish I could talk their beastly language like you do. I'd soon put a stop to their insults." "You're imagining things, Percy. They do nothing of the sort. All you've ..got to do is to keep a stiff upper lip. You'll have to get used to this longdistance sniping. It's a quaint old border custom, more annoying than dangerous. In a week or so's time, vou'll be laughing about all this, with Ruth."

"Confound Buth!" The young subaltern's face contracted, and lie bit his lip as another bullet, somewhat lower, whined its way over his head. "If it wasn't for Buth, I wouldn't be here," he continued. "That beastly sniping is driving me crazy. Why don't you do something? Are you going to let them shoot us to pieces?" "Don't be a stupid ass." rapped Garvie. "Our job is to take this bag-gage-train safelv through to the plains. Don't you see that the Pathans want us to chase them up into the hills? Once we got among those rocks, we'd be at their mercy. Here we arc, down in tho valley . . . and here we stay." "You're inhuman, Michael. I'm hanged if I know how you can stand it. I'll be hit soon. . . Wo can't go on much longer without a casualty, and I know it'll be me. . . I know it will. There's two lines of verse I remembered this morning, and ever since, they've been beating themselves into my brain, without stopping. Over and over again they conio with maddening insistence. . . . f can't get rid of them. . . "Tho men of the First Shikaris picked up their subaltern, dead. With ft big blue mark on his forehead and the back blown out of his head I"

Captain Garvie pulled his horse in closer to his companion, and laid a steadving hand upon the hoy's shoulder. "Listen Percy," he said, "you're behaving like a nervy young fool. For

God's sake pull yourself together. Don t give yourself away in front of the men like this. He was about to say 11101 e. when suddenly he received from the advance guard the signal for which he had so long waited . . . "Kncinv in sight." Ho reined his horse, and raised his right hand vertically above his head, and the long winding snake-like bullock-train halted within a few paces. Garvie leaned forward on his saddle nnd strained his eyes in an attempt to pick up further signals, but the advance guard had dismounted and taken cover behind an outcrop of rock, with the exception of one man who was now galloping back toward hini. Garvie recognised the horseman as Trooper Clark, his orderly, and the only other white man with the detachment. Garvie touched young Convers on the shoulder and pointed to the oncoming horseman. "For heaven's sake," he said, "don't give yourself away in front of mv orderly. He's riding back to us now. Thank the Lord, it looks as if wo were going to have a little action now, just by way of ;i change."

Riding recklessly over the stony track came Clark, a red-faced, freckled trooper, who cursed and praised his mount alternatively in a fluent Cockney idiom. He pulled up within arm's-length and delivered his report, which was to tho effect that a large body of Pathans —"nigger-minstrels," he called them — were in a position blocking the valley. "In what force are they?" asked Garvie. "Can they bo dislodged by Lewis guns?" "There's abart two 'undred of 'em, sir, dodging in and out of the rocks, and a tuning-iip their double-handed meat-carvers. Lewis guns won't be no use, sir, unless we've got some that can shoot round corners. But to get at us, they'll have to bunch up in a lump, sir." As he said this last, thero was a hopeful note in his voice which you may be sure his Captain did not miss, and Garvie smiled slightly, as he too, copying his orderly, loosened his heavy sabre in its scabbard. From tho hills came another burst of musketry, and Percy's horse snorted and reared as a bullet kicked up the dust between its forefeet. "That's a closer shave than you'll ever get with an army razor, sir," said Clark, liis privilege as being the only other white man present permitting him a certain freedom of sneech, and then the trooper gaped, as the dancing horse brought the subaltern's face to full-front view. What he saw /there was not good, and the trooper's cheerful expression instantly froze into something harder. This by-play was not lost on Garvie, but he had no time for personal considerations now, and lie rapped out an order to Clark: "Ride back to the rear, trooper, and give Subahdar Hira Trcwarri my compliments, and tell him to report to me at once, will you?" But even as he spoke, the native officer came clattering over the stones towards them, flinging rough jests to each side of him like a sower scattering seed, as ho threaded his horse at a hand gallop through the files of waiting native troopers.

"You might he wanting me, so I ride up, Captain-Sahib." he shouted, pulling his liorsc up with a jerk that forced it back, pawing and dancing on its hind legs. "These snipers are creeping down the hillside nearer to us, the uncleanly pariah dogs that they are. May they lie accursed of Vishnu!" "Our scouts report a large body of the enemy bunched together where tho nullah narrows in front of lis," said Garvie. "I will take 40 troopers forward with me, and see how they have learned their sabre-drill. Let us hopo they prove to he good pupils. I want you to remain behind with the bullockteams, subahdar. Start off as soon as I do. We'll be travelling at three times your pace. We'll wait for you, when we've cut the blighters up. Lieutenant Convcrs, keep close behind me, and whip in stragglers. You, Clark, ride on my flank." Quickly the orders •were transmitted into action, and soon Garvie, his two white companions, and the 40 troopers were riding forward at a steady trot, with drawn sabres. More than half of his troops were comparatively new recruits, and this their first campaign, hut tlie Englishman had little fear of the result. The Pathans had done what, lie had wished they would do; that is, leave the hillsides, and bunch themselves in the valley, where they were at the incrcy of the charging mass of horsemen. As they rounded tho bond the advance guard rode out from under cover and joined tho steady ranks of horse and men, and by this, judging the enemy to be near, Garvie gave tho signal which changed the trot into a canter. Up to a slight rise they swept, and then as they topped the brow, they saw and heard the yelling enemy, about 200 white-clad, turbancd hillmen, who, in their simplicity, had thought that by so bunching themselves in the. valley, the British troons would be forced to take to the hills where, amidst the rocks, they could be picked oft at short range, one by one. Alas, for their hopes! Garvie gave tho order to charge, and a compact and irresistible mass of men swept up to the raving hillmen, who greeted them with a volley of musketry. (To be continued daily)