Nedra Part 34

Six fleet fellows were sent over the hills to skirt the edge of the pa.s.s for its full length, a mile or more. They were to wait at the opposite end until the enemy revealed its approach and then hurry back with the alarm. Returning to the waiting army, Hugh and the king began the work of a.s.signing the men to their places. Two hundred were stationed in the trenches and behind the breastworks at the mouth of the pa.s.s, ready to intercept those of the enemy who succeeded in escaping the boulders and spears from the hilltops. These men stacked their spears behind them and then, at the command of the king, who had been instructed by the Izor, laid themselves upon the ground to sleep. This was an innovation in warfare so great that open rebellion was threatened. The novices in civilized and scientific fighting were fully convinced that the enemy was nowhere in sight and that they would be called when the proper moment came.

Then came the manning of the four hundred boulders on the top of the hills. All along the line of heavy rocks men were stationed with instructions to roll them into the pa.s.s when the signal was given, Both sides of the pa.s.s were lined with these boulders, The king was as near in ecstasies over the arrangements as one of his nature could possibly be. He prostrated himself a dozen times before the wonderfully clever genius who was in command, twice b.u.mping his head against exceedingly hard rocks that he had been unable to see when he began his precipitous collapse to reverence.

It was after midnight before the army in ambush was ready for the conflict. Hugh was amazed to find the men cool and submissive, obeying every order that he managed in some way to convey to them. With everything in readiness there was nothing to do but to wait for the crisis, so he threw himself on the gra.s.s at the top of the highest point on the ridge near the opening to the valley, and tried to sleep.

While he reclined there, thinking of a sweet-faced woman and her Reserves, fully eighteen hundred warriors were stealthily coming up from the sea. Six wakeful sentinels were waiting for them.

CHAPTER XXVII

THE LADY TENNYS RESERVES

The night pa.s.sed. One, two, three o'clock went by on the trip to sunrise. Hugh dozed at times despite the strain on his nerves. When at last he arose to stretch himself, he saw the faint gray meeting and mingling with the black in the skies, and knew that the crisis was almost at hand.

Swiftly, silently through the darkness came six forms, hurrying from the distant end of the pa.s.s with the alarm. They sped into the presence of the king and Hugh just as the first gleam of light began to make itself visible in the east. The messengers had seen the enemy, by that time entering the pa.s.s from the north. In an instant Hugh's little army was in a state of wild perturbation. One could have heard the gnashing of teeth had he walked among the groups receiving final orders from King Pootoo. Silence reigned again--the silence of death.

Something that sounded like the heavy breathing of a man came to the ears of the waiters. It was the sweep of naked feet over the pebbly, sandy bottom of the pa.s.s, the cautious movement of bodies through the air, sounds growing plainer until they resembled the rustling of gra.s.s through which a snake is gliding. To Hugh the intense moments seemed like hours. Would they never come to view? Would the ambush succeed? Why were they so slow? He could have gone ten miles while they were covering the scant mile, he swore in his fever of anxiety.

At last the king pointed excitedly down the dark gulch, and, for the first time, Ridgeway realized that he was facing an enemy in battle. His eyes did not blink, so intently were they glued upon the dim, uncertain objects that moved in the distance. The sword at his side was gripped in a fierce but unconscious grasp. He placed his hand over his throbbing heart; a damp chill seemed to break through every pore in his body.

"In five minutes this place will be h.e.l.l!" he muttered, and the king looked at him inquiringly.

Slowly the moving ma.s.s resolved itself into a thousand ent.i.ties, swarming towards the opening at the end of the pa.s.s. It required all of his coolness and self-possession to control the wild impulse to begin the fight long before the proper moment. To his surprise, not one of his men moved from his position.

In advance of the main body of invaders was a small detachment of scouts. Hugh saw that they would reach the trenches ahead of the army and that the trap would be revealed. His heart almost failed him as he looked down upon that now distinguishable ma.s.s crowding up through the gorge. There seemed to be thousands of them, strapping, fierce, well-armed savages. Their spears looked not unlike a field of dancing cornstalks.

It was necessary to check the little advance guard before the plans could go amiss. Ridgeway, suddenly calm and deliberate, despatched the king with instructions to have his men spear the scouts as they came up, driving them back. Pootoo wriggled stealthily to the breastworks below, reaching the position a few moments ahead of the Oolooz squad. Perhaps one hundred yards behind this detail came the swarm of battle men. There was something in the advance that suggested a cat stealing upon an unsuspecting bird.

By this time it was quite light, although sunrise was half an hour away.

In the gray, phantom-producing gloom Hugh could see his own men behind the boulders, awaiting his command. A sudden shriek broke on the stillness, causing him to leap as if some one had struck him violently.

Then there was a succession of yells and the rushing of feet. He glanced nervously toward the trenches. A dozen Oolooz men were flying back toward the main body, while not a sign of Pootoo or his men was visible.

They had delivered a few spears and had dropped back into the trench.

The main body in the pa.s.s swayed and jammed in the effort to halt, but the rear pushed forward so clamorously that the whole ma.s.s rolled up the ravine fairly into the death trap before it began to understand the meaning of the yells and the sudden retreat of the scouts.

"Now is the time," thought the American. His tall form sprang from behind the tree at the edge of the little cliff. His white face was whiter than ever, his eyes flashed, his long frame quivered. Up went his sword arm and loud came the cry from his lips:

"Fire!"

As if by magic two long rows of immutable boulders wabbled for a second and then thundered down the hillside, while ten score of wild, naked human beings sent up yells of horrid glee to the unveiling dome above.

No pen can describe the flight of those death-dealing rocks as they bounded over the sharp declivities, gaining speed with each revolution, scattering earth, gravel and underbrush with the force of a cyclone, leaping at last with a crushing roar into the very midst of the stupefied army. There was a sickening, grinding crash, an instant of silence, then the piteous wails and groans and the spectacle of a writhing, rolling, leaping, struggling mixture of human forms. Almost as the first volley of rocks left its position to roll upon the vanguard of the ambushed horde, the howling devils on the hill tops were scurrying toward the second row, farther to the right. Down poured this second storm of rocks, increasing the panic below, literally slaughtering the helpless wretches by the score.

Ridgeway looked upon this scene of destruction as if fascinated. He was powerless to move. He had not dreamed that his trap could produce such a havoc. The bottom of the pa.s.s was strewn with grovelling, shrieking bodies, trampled beneath the feet of their uninjured but insane companions. Dead and wounded, crushed and maimed, made up the surging humanity in the fatal pa.s.s. The rocks had mowed them down. Devastation had come like lightning from the skies. It was horrible!

Closing his eyes, he turned away, utterly sick. A moment later he glanced about, hearing the victorious, eager savages on the heights screeching like madmen. From all sides they were swarming toward him, concentrating for the swoop down the hillside at his command. He was awakened to action, his mind grasped the importance of immediate decision and he was entirely recovered from his momentary palsy. One particular feature of the horrid scene lingered in his memory till his dying day. The surprised Oolooz men, not knowing whence came the foe or the nature of the charge down the hills, had quietly turned their spears to receive the onslaught, expecting men instead of rocks. He never forgot the brief stand they made.

At first he believed that all had been killed--that the battle was over before it began. But even as he turned for another pitying glance below, the recovered foemen started up the hillside, shouting and screaming with rage. The ground was covered with prostrate or crawling forms, yet, to his amazement, there still seemed to be thousands of vigorous, uninjured warriors.

"Good Lord! There are a million!" he shouted. Leaping forward, he swung his sword on high and with every nerve aquiver he cried:

"Fire!"

It was the only command he had taught them. It meant fight, pure and simple. Across the gulch the command could not be heard, but the men over there were only too glad to follow the example set by their comrades, and from both sides a perfect storm of spears hissed through the air.

Up from the rear rushed scores of Oolooz warriors. Despite the vicious attack they crowded steadily up the hillside toward the crest on which stood Hugh and his practically unbroken front. Through some sort of natural generalship they confined their charge to the hills on one side of the pa.s.s. Ridgeway saw this with alarm. He knew that they would eventually force their way to the top. Yet the spears from above mowed down the climbing savages like tenpins, while their weapons did little or no damage. With each distinct volley from above the advancing foe fell back, but rallied like heroes. By this time hundreds of them were down; broad daylight made the pa.s.s look like a slaughter pen.

Ridgeway ran among his men, urging them to stand firm, to beat back the foe, and they responded with an ardor that was nothing less than fiendishness itself. Their spears were unerringly thrown, but the supply was diminishing; it was the question of a very few minutes before they would be without ammunition. Hugh's hope lay in the possibility that the foe would soon retreat, believing itself unable to cope with an adversary whose numbers were unknown and who held such an advantageous position.

He soon saw that he would have to quickly withdraw his men from the hill after one of the temporary repulses, taking them to the trench at the mouth of the pa.s.s. Almost as he was forming this plan, he realized that it would be necessary to carry it out at once.

Far down the pa.s.s, beyond his line, the enemy came swarming up the undefended slope, steep as it was, and some of the foremost were already scrambling over the last few feet intervening. He yelled to the men, pointing to the danger spot and then toward the trenches, making a sign immediately thereafter to deliver a telling volley into the struggling ranks.

The savages seemed to understand, and he devoutly thanked G.o.d, for they sent a shower of spears into the horde and then dashed helter-skelter in the direction of the trenches where lay the king and two hundred men.

Wild yells of triumph came from behind, and long before the descent to the valley was reached by the fleeing white man and his dusky army, the Ooloozers were pouring into the tree-covered summit like so many sheep.

Down the hill sped Hugh and his men. Pootoo saw them coming and waved his spear frantically. As the retreating army rolled headlong into the trenches and behind the breastworks, the enemy arrived at the crest of the hill. Breathlessly Hugh motioned for Pootoo to call the men from the opposite hill into action at once.

A volley of spears shot into and over the trenches, followed by a whirlwind of the long, slender messengers of death, several of them taking effect. Pootoo's men returned the volley from behind the breastworks, but the rampant chargers were not to be checked. Up to the very edge of the trench they rushed, and from that moment it does not lie within the power of the writer to depict the horrors of the conflict in detail. Hugh's men, well protected and well armed, hurled death into the ranks, of the fearless enemy as it crowded to the high breastworks.

And out from the mouth of the pa.s.s poured the ma.s.s of Ooloozers who had not ascended the hill.

Ridgeway, cutting viciously away at the black bodies as they plunged against the wall behind which they stood, felt the spears crash against his shield, heard them hiss past, saw them penetrate the earthworks all about him. At another time he would have wondered how he and his men could hope to withstand such an onslaught. One thing he did have time to observe, and that was the surprise, consternation, even fear that came into the enraged faces of the a.s.saulting savages when they saw him plainly. They were looking for the first time on the face of a white man--the new G.o.d of their enemies.

A sudden change in the tide of battle, though brief, transferred the brunt of conflict to another quarter. A withering rain of spears struck the enemy on the flank and rear, and down from the opposite hilltop rushed the mob that had formed the other boulder squad at the beginning of the fight, but who had done nothing after the first charge of the Oolooz men up the hill. They threw themselves upon the enemy and were soon lost in the boiling ma.s.s. Gaining fresh courage and a renewed viciousness, the men in the trenches forsook the shelter and poured into the open, Hugh being powerless to check them.

"It is all over," groaned he, when he saw his crazy forces jump into the very centre of the seething ma.s.s. With a white man's shrewdness he remained behind the friendly breastworks, a dozen of his warriors fighting by his side. Repeated rushes against his position were broken by the desperate resistance of this small company. Hugh's heavy sword was dripping with blood; it had beaten in the skull of many a foe, had been driven beneath the shields and through the bodies of others. To him it seemed hours instead of minutes since the battle began; his arm was growing tired, his brain was whirling, his body was dripping with perspiration. Still his blood boiled and surged with savage enjoyment; he was now yelling with the same frenzy that filled the wild men; pure delight grew out of the fall of every opponent that went down under his sword.

At last the Oolooz leader, a blood-covered savage as large as Pootoo, led his men up to the breastworks, driving the defenders into the trenches and down the gentle slope. Triumph was theirs apparently, and their yelling was full of it. But inch by inch Pootoo fought them back.

Once the king looked helplessly at Hugh, as if praying for him as a G.o.d to exert his influence in the unequal struggle. That glance was one of entreaty, surprise, but Hugh could also see disgust in it. It stung him strangely.

Although he had fought and killed more men than any one on either side, perhaps, he had not gone forth from behind the breastworks; he was not out in the thick of it. With a yell of encouragement to the men, he flung himself over the little wall, alighting on the soft body of a corpse. With his supporters at his heels he dashed to the king's side.

Inside of two minutes he was struck in the leg by a spear, his hand was cut by a glancing blow from a club and his shield arm was battered so fearfully that it required an effort to hold it in front of his body.

Blood streamed into his eyes and down his breast, his arms grew weak, his blows were feeble, his knees trembled, and he was ready to drop.

Twice he went to his knees only to stagger to his feet again. Three times Pootoo's mighty club beat down warriors who were about to brain him.

His mind was chaotic, filled with the now certain defeat and the heart-breaking thought that Lady Tennys would be left to the mercies of the victors. Tears were mingling with the blood; his very soul was crying for strength, for hope, for salvation. In his din-stricken ears ran that wail: "What will become of me if you are killed?" Her face seemed to float in front of his eyes, her voice came trembling and lulling and soft through the h.e.l.lish sounds, piercing the savagery with gentle trustfulness, urging him to be brave, strong and true. Then Grace Vernon's dear face, dim and indistinct, lured him forward into the strife, her clear voice, mingling with the plaintive tones of the other, commanding him to come to her. He must win! He must win!

But the great horde of Oolooz warriors were at last breaking down the smaller force and all seemed lost.

Suddenly new life sprang up among the battered defenders. Joyous yells bespoke a favorable turn of the tide. The enemy fell slowly back, relinquishing the vantage gained. Far behind Ridgeway's fainting form there arose the shouts of fresh factors in the fight.

He fell against the embankment and slowly turned his eyes toward the river. Once more Pootoo's gigantic weapon saved his defenceless head from the blow of an eager antagonist, but the white man knew naught of his escape. His dazed eyes saw only the band of warriors flying over the plain toward the field of battle. Far in their rear came a fluttering white form.

Hardly was he able to realize that help was at hand before the released, ferocious young fellows who had been left behind to guard her Ladyship were plunging over the breastworks all about him.

The Reserves to the rescue!

Exaltation, glorious and strength-giving, flushed through him and he leaped again into the fray. The new hope had come. He was once more battling with a mighty vigor. Fury reigned for a moment and then came the stampede. Down the little valley fled the foe, the conquerors in mad pursuit.