A Tale of the Summer Holidays Part 10

"Good," thought the boy. "At three the fun begins. Kind of them to give me warning."

Confident that he would have a few moments' breathing s.p.a.ce, his watchful vigilance relaxed. Instead of keeping a sharp lookout, he ran his eye once more over his defences, and was considering whether it would be better to use the shorter or the longer la.s.so, when Hal's voice made itself heard again.

"Two!" he shouted with the full force of his lungs, and simultaneously a wild war-whoop went up from his army. There was the sound of breaking branches, and from different quarters of the wood four of the besiegers broke into the open and advanced at the double.

This movement was the outcome of a deeply-laid plan of Hal's. He knew that if an advance was made at the word "two" the fort would be taken completely by surprise, and under cover of the attack from the front he was, in the meantime, bringing the heavy gun--the water-barrel--into position at the rear.

His surmise proved correct. The holder of the fort was taken at a disadvantage; he fired wildly in consequence, and had the mortification of perceiving that not one of his shots took effect.

The attacking party, of whom Hal was not one, reserved their fire, and seemed bent upon coming to close quarters. Grimly determined to make it warm for them when they did close with him, the defender sprang on to the roof, and, regardless of the fact that he was exposing himself recklessly, took up his stand by the flagstaff, and, throwing down his catapult, whirled his la.s.so wildly round his head.

On came the attacking party; he faced them, and with a coolness that did him credit at such a critical moment he picked out the one that he could most easily capture, and was in the act of hurling the la.s.so, when, up from the very midst of the hawthorn bushes at the back of the fort, Hal's voice was heard again.

"Three!" he shouted: and turning like lightning to meet this fresh foe, who he guessed would prove the most formidable, the boy saw an immense jet of water spurt high into the air. Twenty feet it rose, and then descended full and fair upon his head. A mingled shout of defiance and joy told Hal that his aim had been good, and he continued to ply the hose. At the same moment eight cannon-b.a.l.l.s, five at least of which hit him, were thrown at the hara.s.sed defender, whose helmet was now full of sand and water.

Choking and gasping and almost unable to see, so great was the force with which the stream was playing upon his face, the boy grasped the flag, determined not to surrender.

But the enemy now surrounded the fort on all sides, and were already scaling the walls. Both Jim and Drusie were anxious to gain the glory of capturing the flag, and a desperate fight raged round the flagstaff.

Twice Drusie laid hands upon it, and twice she was driven back.

The hose played upon besieged and besiegers alike, and all the combatants were being drenched to the skin. But the battle continued to rage, and, though he was hampered by his helmet and sorely outnumbered, the valour displayed by the holder of the fort might yet have gained him the day, if Jim, warned by a cry from Hal that the water in the barrel was giving out, had not succeeded in grasping the flagstaff.

"Jump with it, Jim, jump!" Drusie cried, and flung herself between them. But with one hand the boy tossed her aside, while with the other he clutched at the flag.

There was a short tug of war; then a sharp sound of tearing cloth; and while the gallant defender toppled backwards into the stream, carrying the greater part of the flag with him, Jim fell down on the other side, bearing with him the flagstaff and the fluttering remnant of the Union Jack.

Both sides would certainly have claimed the victory, for both held a portion of the flag, had not Drusie, scrambling out of the hawthorn bushes into which she had been tossed, jumped into the middle of the stream, and s.n.a.t.c.hed the part that he still held out of the hand of the prostrate, half-drowned enemy.

Then the fort had no choice but to capitulate, and the day was won by the besiegers.

"You all fought jolly well," said the holder of the fort, calmly sitting upright in the middle of the stream and removing his helmet, thereby disclosing to view the face of the boy who had come to Jumbo's rescue. "It has been warm work from first to last. It is quite jolly to sit here and get cool."

Then Hal, jubilant at the success which had attended his manoeuvre, emerged from the hawthorn bushes in which he had been concealed, and congratulated his late enemy on the splendid stand which the fort had made.

"It ought not to have been taken," Dodds said. "But that hose upset me completely; it came as such a tremendous surprise."

"I say," said Jim, who was standing on the bank panting from his exertions, "are you really Dodds?"

"That's my name," said the boy with a polite flourish of his helmet; "and I hear," glancing round at them all with an amused twinkle in his eyes, "that none of you like me."

"Oh, but we didn't know that you were Dodds," Drusie hastened to explain. "It was Dodds we did not like, not you."

"Well, as I am Dodds, you can't like me if you don't like him," the boy said with a laugh, in which they all were obliged to join, as they realized that they had really been liking Dodds all the time without knowing it.

"Well, as I am cool now," Dodds said, getting up and wading to the bank, "I think I'll go and put on some dry things. And I should think that you had better do the same. And then, isn't there a birthday feast to be eaten? I rather think I heard something about it too. You know, I was fishing here one day, and you were all in the fort talking about the fight, and wondering if Hal meant to hold it, and it struck me that it would be rather a good idea if I held it in his place. And so I just did. And jolly good fun it has been too.--Don't you think so, Hal? or do you still think that playing with kids is slow work?"

At that Hal began to grow red, and Drusie, who knew that he was sorry for that and for many other foolish things that he had said, interposed quickly.

"I think we had better go home and change too," she said; "and then we will all meet in the summer-house for the feast."

"Am I asked too?" said Dodds, who was not shy.

"Of course," they all cried.

"Right you are then," said Dodds, shaking himself and squaring his shoulders for a run. "I'll bring some contributions to the feast.

Let's see who'll get changed and be there first. I bet you I will."

But as it happened, his five hosts and hostesses were the first to reach the summer-house; and while they waited for their guest Hal took a small baby guinea-pig from his pocket, and gave it to the astonished, delighted Drusie.

"My birthday present to you, Drusie. I got it down at the village this afternoon. Isn't it a beauty?"

"Oh, it's a darling!" Drusie cried, covering both the guinea-pig and Hal with kisses. "How awfully, awfully good of you, Hal! Is it really my very, very own?"

"Yes, rather," said Hal, looking very gratified at her delight. "I went down into the village this afternoon and got it. I paid for it too," he added proudly. "Nurse advanced me the money."

Then Dodds arrived with a basketful of good things for the feast, and a very merry feast it was. And by the time it was finished Drusie and Jim wondered how they could ever have thought that Dodds was not a nice boy.

Hal was not surprised that they should like Dodds, but he was rather astonished to find how much Dodds got to like them. Hal had thought that Dodds would be far too big and grown up to care about playing with girls; but when he found out that Dodds actually enjoyed playing cricket with them, and thought a great deal of Drusie's bowling and Helen's smart fielding, he began to think that he had made a mistake in supposing that he had grown too old for them. So he ceased to speak to them as if he were years and years older than all of them put together, and remembered that he was Drusie's twin-brother, and that he was very fond of her.

THE END.