The Far Pavilions by M. M. Kaye
The two jawans climbed the stairs in search of the doctor, and peering in through an open doorway saw him leaning over Sir Louis, who was lying on a bed with his knees drawn up and one hand to his head. The sight did not dismay them, since everyone knew that the ‘Burra-Sahib’ had been wounded in the head early on in the siege; and supposing him to be suffering from the after-effects of that wound (and being unwilling to call the doctor away from such an exalted patient) they turned back and went below again to wait until he should come down.
But Sir Louis had not collapsed from concussion. He had been hit again: this time in the stomach and by a bullet that had smashed through the wooden shutter into the room in which he had been standing, a bullet fired from one of the English-made rifles that a previous Viceroy, Lord Mayo, had presented to Yakoub Khan's father, Shere Ali, as a good-will gift from the British Government…
Sir Louis had managed to reach the bed, and the sowar who had been firing through a loophole to one side of the window had run down to fetch Surgeon-Major Kelly. But there was nothing that Rosie could do beyond giving him water to drink – for he was very thirsty – and something to deaden the pain. And hoping that the end would come quickly.
He could not even stay with him, for there were too many others who needed his help, some of whom could be patched up sufficiently to continue fighting. Nor was there any point in letting it be known that Cavagnari-Sahib was mortally wounded, since such news could only serve to take the heart out of everyone in the garrison, and the assault upon their spirits was already severe enough without that, the rabble in the street and on the house-tops immediately behind it having begun to call upon their fellow-Mussulmans to join them, exhorting them to slay the four Sahibs and help themselves to the treasure in the Residency…
‘Kill the Unbelievers and join us!’ urged the stentorian voices of unseen men who were sapping the flimsy, mud-brick wall. ‘We have no quarrel with you. You are our brothers and we wish you no harm. Only give up the Angrezis to us and you will all go free. Join us – join us!’
‘Thank God for young Wally,’ thought Rosie, listening to that continual stream of exhortations. ‘If it wasn't for him, some of our fellows might be tempted to do just that and save their own skins.’ But Wally seemed to know just how to counter those shouted lures and keep up the spirits of the garrison, not only of his own jawans but of the countless non-combatants who had taken refuge in the Residency, both servants and clerical staff. He also appeared to have mastered the art of being in half-a-dozen places at once – one moment on the roof of one or other of the two houses, the next over at the barracks or in the courtyard, and the third in the rooms in which the wounded and dying lay – praising, encouraging, comforting; rallying the fainthearted, cracking jokes, singing as he raced up the stairs to hearten the dwindling band of Guides who held out on the roof, or over to the barracks to encourage those who knelt firing at the insurgents from behind the inadequate shelter of the parapets.
Rosie looked down at the dying Envoy on the bed, and thought: ‘When he is gone, the whole responsibility for the defence of this rat-trap is going to fall on young Wally's shoulders… it's there now. Well, it couldn't be on better ones.’ He turned and went out, shutting the door behind him and calling one of the servants to sit in front of it and allow no one in to the room, as the Burra-Sahib's head was paining him and he must be allowed to rest.
The room was an inner one and comparatively cool, but as Rosie left it the heat and stench outside met him like a blow, for by now the sun was overhead and there was little shade to be found in the enclosed courtyard… and none at all for the Guides on the rooftops. The freshness of the early morning had vanished long ago, and now the hot air reeked of sulphur and black powder, while from the ground-floor rooms of both houses rose the sickening, all-pervading stench of spilt blood and iodoform – and other, uglier smells that Rosie knew would get worse as the day advanced.
‘We shall be out of drugs soon,’ he thought, ‘and bandages and lint. And men…’ He glanced back over his shoulder at the closed door behind him and lifting his hand in a half-unconscious gesture of salute, turned and went back down the stairs to the stifling heat and stench of the rooms below, where buzzing clouds of flies added to the torments of the uncomplaining wounded.
Many of the mutineers had already crept back to the compound to take cover again in the stables, and behind the numerous mud walls in which they were now hacking loopholes so that they could fire at the barracks and the Residency, but Wally no longer had enough men to attempt another sortie against them. Between the enemy in the compound and the ever-increasing numbers on the surrounding house-tops, his inadequate defences were subjected to such a blizzard of fire that it was a wonder to him that anyone in the garrison still survived. Yet survive they did, though their numbers were shrinking rapidly. The fact that the enemy had suffered even more severely gave him no consolation, knowing as he did that they had inexhaustible reserves to draw on, and that however many times the Guides drove them back and however many they killed, a hundred others would spring up like the dragon's teeth to replace them. But there was no replacement for the dead and wounded in the Residency. And still no word from the palace, or any sign of help…
He had been organizing counter-measures against the sappers on the far side of the courtyard wall, when a breathless sowar ran down the three flights of stairs from the Mess House roof and panted out that the mob in the street had fetched ladders and were thrusting them out laterally from the houses on the far side, to form bridges across which they were clambering like monkeys. Some had already reached the roof and what were the defenders to do? They could not hold out against the numbers that were getting across.
‘Tell them to retreat down the stairs,’ directed Wally urgently – ‘but slowly, so that the Afghans will follow.’ The man fled back, and Wally sent a similar message to the Guides on the roof of the Envoy's House, and calling to Jemadar Mehtab Singh to follow him with every jawan who could be spared, ran for the roof.
The Guides had managed to thrust off the first two ladders and send them hurtling down on the heads of the crowd below. But there had been others – half-a-dozen at least – and though the first Afghans to reach the roof had fallen, shot at point blank range, it had been impossible to stem the tide of those who scrambled across behind them, and the survivors of the little band of Guides retreated to the stairwell and descended, a step at a time.
Wally met them on the top landing with reinforcements at his back, and though he held a loaded revolver he did not fire it, but waved them on downward, issuing terse instructions that were barely audible above the yells of the Afghans, who, seeing them in retreat, tore after them and came leaping down the stairs brandishing their tulwars and jostling each other in their haste. And still the Guides retreated, stumbling ahead of them in apparent disorder and looking back over their shoulders as they went…
‘Now!’ yelled Wally, leaping onto a cane stool that stood outside his bedroom door. ‘Maro!’ And as the Guides turned in the narrow hallway and fell upon the leading Afghans, he fired over their heads at those who were crowding down behind them and who could not turn because of the pressure of others treading on their heels.
Even a poor shot would have found it difficult to miss his mark at that range, and Wally was anything but a poor shot. Within six seconds half-a-dozen Afghans on the steep flight of stairs dropped forward with a bullet in their brains, and as many fell headlong over the bodies and came cascading down like a flock of sheep at a bank, to be cut down by the sabres and bayonets of the Guides.
Ambrose Kelly had heard the noise of the fighting, and realizing that the enemy must have broken into the Mess House, he abandoned his scalpel in favour of a revolver and dashed upstairs – only to be swept backwards by a mass of struggling men who stabbed and hacked and wrestled with each other (there was little room for sword-play) or used their carbines and rifles as clubs, there being no time to reload or, for that matter, for anyone
The fusillade of shots, the shambles on the stair and the uproar and confusion of the fight below made the rear ranks of the invaders suddenly aware that disaster had overtaken their leaders. They checked at the top of the stairs and some of them, losing their heads, fired wildly down at the murderous scrimmage below while others scrambled back and made no further attempt to invade the Residency from above. But of their comrades who had rushed so boldly down the steep stairway, not one came back.
‘Come on, Rosie,’ shouted Wally breathlessly, tossing back the empty revolver and hurriedly re-loading his own: ‘they're bolting. Now's our chance to clear ‘em off the roof.’
He turned to Hassan Gul, who leant against the wall of the landing panting from his exertions, and told him to call the others together and they would charge up the stairs and clear the roof. But the sepoy only shook his head and said hoarsely: ‘We cannot do it, Sahib. There are too few of us… Jemadar Mehtab Singh is dead, and Havildar Karak Singh also… they were killed in the fighting on the stairs… And of those who were on the roof, only two remain. I do not know how many there may still be in the other house, but here there are only seven left…’
Seven. Only seven left to hold the three floors of that tall, mud and plaster rat-trap that was pock-marked with bullet holes and crammed with wounded men.
‘Then we must block off the staircase,’ said Wally.
‘With what?’ asked Rosie tiredly. ‘We've already used almost everything we could lay our hands on to make barricades. Even the doors.’
‘There's this one –’ Wally turned towards it, but the doctor caught his arm and said sharply: ‘No! Leave it, Wally. Let him be.’
‘Who? Who is in there? Oh, you mean the Chief. He won't mind. He's only – He stopped abruptly, staring at Rosie with a sudden horrified comprehension. ‘Do you mean, it's serious? But – but it was only a head wound. It couldn't…’
‘He was shot in the stomach not long ago. There wasn't anything I could do except give him as much opium as I could spare and let him die in peace.’
‘Peace,’ said Wally savagely. ‘What sort of peace could he possibly die in, unless…’
He stopped and his face changed. Then, jerking his arm free, he turned the handle and went into the shadowed room where the only light came through the bullet-splintered slats of the shutters and the rough loopholes that had been hacked through those lath and plaster walls that still bore the scrawled names of the Russians who had been the last – and luckier – guests of an Amir of Afghanistan.
The closed door had kept out the heat that filled the courtyard and beat down upon the whole compound, but it could not keep out the flies that circled and settled in buzzing droves, or the sounds of battle. And here too there was the same choking smell of blood and black powder.
The man on the bed still lay in the same position and, incredibly, he was still alive. He did not move his head, but Rosie, following Wally into the room and shutting the door behind him, saw his eyes turn slowly towards them and thought, ‘He won't know us. He's too far gone: and too drugged.’
The dying man's gaze was blank and it seemed that the movement of those clouded eyes was no more than a reflex action. Then of a sudden intelligence returned to them as with a gigantic effort of will, Louis Cavagnari forced his conscious mind to drag itself back from the darkness that was closing in on it, and summoning the last shred of his strength, spoke in a harsh croak:
‘Hullo, Walter. Are we…?’
His breath failed him, but Wally answered the unspoken question:
‘Fine, sir. I came to tell you that the Amir has sent two Kazilbashi regiments to our assistance, and the mob are already on the run. I'm thinking it won't be any time now before the place is cleared of them, so you don't have to worry, sir. You can have a rest now, for we've got them licked.’
‘Good boy,’ said Sir Louis in a clear, strong voice. A trace of colour returned to his ash-white face and he tried to smile, but a sharp spasm of pain caught him unaware and turned it to a grimace. Once again he fought for breath, and Wally leaned down to catch the words he was struggling to say:
‘The… Amir,’ whispered Sir Louis: ‘… glad to know… not wrong about him… after all. We shall be… all right now. Tell William… send thanks and… telegraph Viceroy. Tell… tell my – wife -’
The hunched figure jerked convulsively and was still.
After a moment or two Wally straightened up slowly and became aware once more of the maddening drone of flies and the ceaseless surf-like roar of the mob, which together formed a background for the sharp crackle of musketry and rifle fire and the thwack of bullets striking the walls outside.
‘He was a great man,’ said Rosie quietly.
‘A wonderful one. That's why I – we couldn't let him die thinking that he…’
‘No,’ said Rosie. ‘Be easy, Wally, the Lord will forgive you the lie.’
‘Yes. But he'll know by now that it was a lie.’
‘Where he is, that won't matter.’
‘No, that's true. I wish -’
A musket ball smashed into one of the shutters and sent a shower of splinters across the floor, and Wally turned and walked quickly out of the room, not seeing where he was going because his eyes were full of tears.
Rosie paused for a moment to cover the quiet face, and following more slowly, found him already at work arranging to block the way to the roof with the only material available: the bodies and the broken weapons – tulwars, muskets and jezails – of the Afghans who had been killed on the stairs.
‘We may as well make them useful,’ said Wally grimly as he helped to pile the corpses one upon the other, wedging them into place with cross-bars made from the long-barrelled jezails, and constructing an effective chevaux-de-frise from the razor-sharp blades of tulwars and Afghan knives from which the hilts had first been removed. ‘I don't suppose it will hold them up for long, but it's the best we can do; there isn't anything else. I must see William and find out how many of our fellows are over in the other house. Now suno (listen), Khairulla' – he turned to one of the sowars – ‘do you and one other remain here and prevent the enemy from removing those bodies. But do not expend more ammunition than you need. A shot or two should be enough.’
He left them and went down the stairs to run the gauntlet of the open courtyard and break the news to William that Sir Louis was dead.
‘He was always lucky,’ observed William quietly.
The Secretary's face, like Wally's – like all their faces – was a sweat-streaked mask of blood and dust and black powder. But his eyes were as quiet as his voice, and though he had been firing or fighting without intermission for hours now, he still looked what he was: a civilian and a man of peace. He said: ‘How much longer do you suppose we can hold out, Wally? They keep tunnelling through like moles, you know. As fast as we block up one hole they make another. It's been fairly easy to deal with, because now we know what they're at, whenever we see a bit of plaster fall out we stand clear and then empty a shot-gun into the hole the minute it gets big enough. They don't fancy that. But it needs a lot of men to watch the whole length of the wall in the courtyard as well as inside both houses. I don't know how many you've got, but there are less than a dozen of your chaps left over here. And not so many more than that in the courtyard, I imagine,’
‘Fourteen,’ confirmed Wally briefly. ‘I've just checked. Abdulla, my bugler, says he thinks there are still between fifteen and twenty over in the barracks, and with seven in the Mess House -’
‘Seven!’ gasped William. ‘But I thought – What's happened?’
‘Ladders. Didn't you notice? Those bastards behind us got hold of ladders and managed to get onto the
‘I didn't know,’ said William numbly. ‘But if they're on the roof that means we're surrounded.’
‘I'm afraid so. What we've got to do now is to immobilize that gang on the Mess House, by stationing a couple of chaps with shot-guns by the inner windows of the Chief's office to blaze off the moment any scutt up there shows the tip of his nose. They may have chased us off it, but it won't do them any good if they have to huddle on their stomachs in the furthest corner of it. You'd better stay down here and deal with the lot who are trying to dig through the wall, while I –’ he stopped, and tilting his chin, sniffed the tainted air and said uneasily: ‘Can you smell smoke?’
‘Yes, it's coming from the street at the back. We've been getting a whiff of it through the holes those rats have been making. I imagine there must be a fire in one of their houses. Not surprising when you think of the number of archaic muzzle-loaders that are being loosed off in every direction.’
‘As long as it stays on the other side of the wall,’ said Wally, and was turning to leave when William stopped him.
‘Look, Wally, I think we ought to try again to see if we can't get a message through to the Amir. He can't have got any of the others. I won't believe that if he knew how serious things were with us he wouldn't do something to help. We've got to find someone to take another letter.’
They had found someone, and this time the messenger had won through, posing as one of the enemy. Dressed in blood-stained garments, with an artistic bandage about his head, he had actually succeeded in delivering William's letter. But the confusion that he found at the palace was far worse than when Ghulam Nabi (who still waited anxiously in an ante-room) had brought that second letter from Sir Louis, hours ago. This latest messenger was also told to wait for a reply: but no reply was ever given him, for by now the Amir had become convinced that when the mobs from the city had dealt with the British Mission, they would turn on him for having permitted the Infidels to come to Kabul, and make him and his family pay for it with their lives: