Part 36 (1/2)

Some of them were but a few steps ahead, and d.i.c.k, closely followed by his men, burst on to the terrace at their very heels. It was well that he did so; for the guard upon the terrace, seeing that all was lost below, were preparing to sell their lives dearly, and to make a long resistance at the top of the stairs. d.i.c.k and his men, however, rushed so closely upon the heels of their own comrades from below that they were taken completely by surprise. Some turned at once to fly, others made an effort to oppose their enemy; but it was useless. Two or three of the Sepoy leaders, calling to their men to follow them, made a rush at the British, and d.i.c.k found himself engaged in a hand-to-hand contest with Aboo Raab, the rebel leader. He was a powerful and desperate man, and with a swinging blow he beat down d.i.c.k's guard and inflicted a severe wound on his head; but d.i.c.k leaped forward and ran him through the body, just as the bayonet of one of the British soldiers pierced him in the side.

For a minute or two the fight was fierce, but every moment added to the avenging force, and with a cheer the soldiers rushed at them with the bayonet. In five minutes all was over. Many of the Sepoys leaped over the parapet, and were dashed to pieces, preferring that death to the bayonet; while on the terrace no single Sepoy at the end of that time remained alive.

When all was over d.i.c.k gave a shout, which was answered from above.

”Are you all right, Dunlop?”

”Yes, thank G.o.d; but Ned is delirious. Send some water up at once.”

d.i.c.k was too much shaken by the severe cut he had received in the head to attempt to climb the ladder, but the officer in command of the company at once offered to ascend. Several of the men had a little water left in their water-bottles, and from them one was filled, and slung over the officer's neck.

”I have some brandy in my flask,” he said, and started up the steps.

In a few minutes he descended again.

”Your brother is wildly delirious,” he said; ”they have bound his injured arm to his side with a sash, but they cannot leave him. How is he to be got down?”

”There is plenty of rope and sacking down below,” d.i.c.k said, after a moment's thought. ”I think that they had better wrap him up in sacking, so that he cannot move his arms, tie a rope round him, and lower him down close by the side of the steps, my father coming down side by side with him, so as to speak to him and tranquillize him.”

A soldier was sent below for the articles required, and with them the officer, accompanied by a sergeant to a.s.sist him in lowering Ned from above, again mounted. In a few minutes d.i.c.k's plan was carried out, and Ned was lowered safely to the terrace. Then four soldiers carried him below, and he was soon laid on a bed of sacks in the great hall, under the care of the surgeon, with cold-water bandages round his head.

Then d.i.c.k had time to ask his father how the preceding day had pa.s.sed.

”First tell me, d.i.c.k, by what miracle you got back so soon. To-morrow morning was the very earliest time I thought that relief was possible!”

d.i.c.k told his story briefly; and then Colonel Warrener related what had happened to them on the dome during the day.

”As soon as day broke, d.i.c.k, they opened a heavy musketry fire at us, but they were obliged to go so far off to get a fair view of us that the smooth-bore would hardly carry up, and even had we been hit, I question if the b.a.l.l.s would have penetrated, though they might have given a sharp knock. Half an hour later the artillery fire began. We agreed that Dunlop and I should by turns lie so as to command the stairs, while the other kept with Ned on the other side of the dome.

The enemy divided their guns, and put them on each side also. Lying down, we presented the smallest possible mark for them; but for some hours it was very hot. Nine out of ten of their shot, just went over the dome altogether. The spike was. .h.i.t twenty or thirty times, and lower down a good many holes were knocked in the dome; but the shots that struck near us all glanced and flew over. They fired a couple of hundred shot altogether, and at midday they stopped--for dinner, I suppose--and did not begin again. I suspect they were running short of ammunition. Once, when the firing was hottest, thinking, I suppose, to catch us napping, an attempt was made to climb the ladder; but Dunlop, who was on watch, put a bullet through the first fellow's head, and by the yell that followed I suspect that in his fall he swept all the others off the ladder. Anyhow, there was no repet.i.tion of the trial.

The heat was fearful, and Dunlop and I suffered a good deal from thirst, for there was not much water left in the bottle, and we wanted that to pour down Ned's throat from time to time, and to sop his bandages with. Ned got delirious about eleven o'clock, and we had great trouble in holding him down. The last drop of water was finished in the night, and we should have had a terrible day of it if you had not arrived. And now let us hear what the surgeon says about poor Ned.”

The doctor's report was not consoling; the wound was a very severe one, the collar-bone had been smashed in fragments; but the high state of fever was even a more serious matter than the wound.

”What will you do, father?”