Samba Part 28

But the attempt had been so nearly successful that he resolved to lose no time in completing the work of protection already begun. The moment was come, too, for showing Elbel that he could only maintain a thorough investment of the fort with the acquiescence of the besieged. At any time a sally must break the chain of pickets, for Elbel's force was not large enough to support them adequately all round. Averse as Jack was from shedding blood, he felt that it was necessary to teach the enemy a wholesome lesson.

Before he could do anything, however, he must know how the force was distributed, and how the pickets were placed. He remembered his half promise that Samba should be allowed to go scouting that night. No other could be trusted to move so warily or act so intelligently.

Samba was accordingly let down into the gully. While he was gone Jack explained to Barney the plan he proposed to try should the boy's information favour it.

"I shall lead some of the men out, I don't know yet in what direction.

At least it will surprise Elbel. I hope it will alarm his men and throw them into confusion. You must take advantage of it to go on with our defences. Let down more boulders from the roof, and build them up as fast as you can to form a facing three or four feet high to the two northern blockhouses. You'll only have about half an hour for the job, for Elbel will have got his whole force together by then, and I shan't be able to fight them all. But we've plenty of men to turn on to it, and when I give the signal they must tumble over the wall and get to work."

Within an hour Samba returned. He reported that the enemy had all retired to their camp except the pickets. About forty men were posted about a camp fire up stream near the place where the barrels had been rolled down. Another picket of the same strength was lying at the edge of the copse about a quarter of a mile to the east, and a third picket lay across the gully to the west. Samba had had great difficulty in eluding this western picket, and would have returned sooner but for the detour he had been obliged to make.

All favoured Jack's enterprise. The pickets were so far from the camp below the southern face of the fort that some time must elapse before help could reach them. They could only support one another, and the idea of a ruse to prevent that had already flashed through Jack's mind.

Selecting fifteen of his steadiest riflemen, including Makoko and Lepoko, Jack had them lowered one by one into the gully, and then himself followed. The night was fortunately very dark; all the flames from the barrels had gone out, and he trusted that the enemy would be quite unprepared for any movement from the fort. When all were a.s.sembled, they crept up the gully in dead silence, walking as far from the water as the steep sides allowed, so as to avoid kicking stones into it and making a splash. At first the gully was at least twelve feet deep, but it became more shallow as they proceeded, until by and by its top barely rose above their heads.

They had not gone far when they heard laughing and talking beyond them.

However Elbel might regard his defeat, it had evidently not affected the spirits of his men; the negro's cheerfulness is hard to quench. At a bend in the stream, out of sight from the fort, shone the faint glow of the camp fire; and Jack, peeping cautiously round, saw a sentry on each bank, moving backwards and forwards, but stopping now and again to exchange pleasantries, or more often fatuous remarks about food, with the rest of the picket at the fire. It was nothing new to Jack that the Congo soldier's idea of sentry-go is somewhat loose.

Again Jack was favoured by circ.u.mstances. The glow of the fire did not extend far into the darkness of the gully; the noise of the laughing and talking was loud enough to drown all slight sounds for some distance around. Thus the sixteen men in the gully could approach very near the camp fire without being seen or heard. Jack's plan, already half formed before he started, was quickly adapted to the conditions.

Silently gathering his men together, he ordered them in a whisper to follow him in a charge with the bayonet; not to fire except at the word of command; not in their pursuit of the enemy to go beyond the camp fire. It would have been easy to dispose of at least a third of the picket by firing upon them from the darkness; the distance was only about a hundred yards, and every shot would tell, for they were huddled together. Such an act would be justified by all the rules of warfare.

Jack knew that in a like case he would receive no mercy from the enemy; but he was too young a campaigner to deal with them as they would deal with him; he could not give the order to shoot them down unawares.

When his men clearly understood what was required of them he led the way, and they all crept forward again. The glow of the fire now made them dimly visible to one another, but not to the picket, who were in the full light, nor to the sentries, whose attention was largely taken up by the proceedings of their comrades. When the sound of talking lulled for a few moments, Jack halted; when it grew in force, and he heard the sentries join in the chatter, he seized the opportunity to steal forward a few yards more. So by slow degrees they approached within forty paces.

To go further without discovery seemed to Jack impossible. Pausing for a moment to whisper once more to his men, he suddenly shouted the order to charge, and, springing up the bank, dashed forward with a cheer that was reinforced by the yells from fifteen l.u.s.ty throats. The sounds of joviality about the camp fire died on the instant; the cheer from the river, echoed by the rocky walls of the gully, seemed to come from a host of men. Yells of alarm broke from the dusky figures by the fire.

Some of the men seemed for the moment spellbound; others leapt to their feet and made a dash for the rifles stacked close by, tumbling over one another in their agitation; the majority simply scurried away like hares into the darkness, only anxious to get as far away as possible from this shouting host that had sprung as it were out of nothingness.

As Jack's men rushed up there were a few reports of rifles hastily shot off, and eight or nine men made as if to stand firm near the camp fire; but they could not face the steel gleaming red in the glow. One or two hapless wretches were bayonetted before they had time to run; the rest, with a wild howl, flung down their weapons and bolted.

The sound of the conflict, Jack knew, would be taken by Barney as the signal to begin work outside the blockhouses. What would be its effect on the enemy? Would it draw their pickets on the right and left to the support of their comrades? Or would they be so much alarmed that nothing but flight would occur to them? He thought the probabilities favoured the former, for the firing having ceased, the immediate cause of alarm would seem to have been removed. Without staying to consider that the chain of investment would be broken by their action, the outer pickets would in all likelihood move towards each other for mutual support.

Here was an opportunity which Jack was quick to seize. Without a moment's loss of time, he called his men together and hurried back down the gully, where he ordered them to line the banks on both sides, keeping well in shadow from the light of the fire. The position they took up was about forty yards below the bivouac, almost the same spot from which the charge had been made. The men had only just established themselves when the picket from the eastern quarter came running up.

Jack's situation was now so serious that he had no longer any compunction. As the negroes emerged from the gloom into the light of the camp fire, he ordered his men on the opposite bank to shoot.

Several of the enemy fell; the rest turned tail, finding their comrades falling about them without being able to see their a.s.sailants. But they did not run far; when they had pa.s.sed beyond the circle of light they halted.

Meanwhile all was quiet from the direction of the other picket beyond the gully. If this was advancing, it was with more caution. For some minutes no sound was heard; then on his left hand Lepoko detected a slight rustle in the brushwood, and he whispered to Jack that the enemy were creeping forward, feeling their way. At the same time there were sounds of movement on the right.

Now was the chance to attempt a ruse. Withdrawing his men stealthily down the stream for a hundred yards, Jack halted. The camp fire was dying down for want of fresh fuel; he hoped that the two parties would mistake each other in the gloom. A quarter of an hour pa.s.sed. Then the air rang with shots and shouts; the two pickets had met and come into conflict. The error was soon discovered, and then there arose a terrific clamour as each party accused the other.

Jack considered that the work of the fort should have been completed by this time, all danger of interruption by the pickets having been removed by his sortie. He therefore led his men back along the gully, and arrived to find Barney putting the finishing touches to the work by the light of his bamboo lantern.

"All well?" said Jack.

"All well, sorr. You're not hurt at all?"

"Not a bit. None of us scratched. Now we'll get back. I don't think they'll try that particular dodge again."

They had hardly returned within the stockade when they heard the sound of a considerable body of men moving up the opposite bank of the stream towards the pickets above.

"Too late!" said Jack with a chuckle.

"Truth, sorr. That Elbel was niver intended for a sojer, 'tis plain.

But who are the two white men wid him, thin? Sure, I thought he'd brought 'em wid him to tache him what to do, but they would all seem to be birds uv wan feather, sorr."

"We may find out by and by, perhaps to our cost. Meanwhile we had better man the walls and blockhouses in case he's going to favour us with a night attack."

But the sounds of movement among the enemy ceased, and the remainder of the night pa.s.sed in unbroken quietness.

CHAPTER XX

David and Goliath

Next morning Jack's men found resting against the stone wall of the fort several barrels of resin which had not burned. The b.u.mping they had received in rolling down the slope had shaken out the fuses. This was a lucky discovery. The inflammable contents of the barrels would come in useful--for making fireb.a.l.l.s, if for no other purpose. Jack had them carried into the fort and stored in the magazine.

Very soon after daybreak Jack saw what seemed to be the greater portion of Elbel's force moving up the hill. He counted at least five hundred men, and noticed that only about a hundred of these were riflemen, the remainder carrying spears, or tools of some kind.

"You see what they are at, Barney?" he said.

"Shifting their camp, by what it appears, sorr."

"No, I don't think that's it. Elbel has failed with fire; he's now going to try water. He's going to cut off our water supply."

"Sure he's ent.i.tled to, as we don't pay rates, which is rubber. But we can do widout his water supply, sorr, having a private distillery uv our own."

"I'm pretty sure I'm right, for you see the men are going a great deal farther up the hill than they need if they're merely looking for another base of attack."

"Bedad, why shouldn't we have a little rifle practice at 'em, sorr?

'Tis long range firing, indeed, but mighty good practice."

"No. Our ammunition is too precious to be wasted; and even if we hit a few of them, that wouldn't stop Elbel's scheme, whatever it is. We'll keep our eye on the river and see if there's any shrinkage."

It was not until late in the afternoon that he got positive proof that Elbel was in fact diverting the stream. He had fancied for some time that the height of the water was less, but only about four o'clock did the fall become decided. After that, however, the stream dwindled very rapidly, until, towards nightfall, there was only a thin trickle of water in the river bed below the fort, where in the morning the stream had been twenty feet broad and nearly six feet deep. At the same time a remarkable change in the appearance of the country east of the fort had attracted the attention of the natives, who swarmed upon the platform on that side and gazed in amazement. Lokolobolo had brought water into their camp; but who had made water run in a swift river where no river had ever been before?

Nearly a mile away to the east, a broad shallow stream was rushing down the slope that extended from the precipice on which the fort stood to the foothills two miles beneath. The river, dammed no doubt by boulders far up the hill, had now been forced into the course which, but for a rocky barrier, it would long since have discovered for itself.

"A very pretty scheme, bedad!" said Barney. "And I just wish we could set a fountain going, like those in Trafalgar Square, just to show Mr.

Elbel that he may have his river all to himself if he pleases."

"That wouldn't do at all, Barney. We don't want to flaunt our good fortune. In fact, our best course is to keep Elbel in the dark.

Indeed I think we had better stop that overflow from our tank. Now that the cataract has dried up, the overflow would easily be seen."

"But what'll we do wid the overflow, sorr? Sure, we don't want a flood in the camp!"

"Certainly not. We'll break it up into a number of tiny trickles, and let them find their way through the wall at different points. They'll be sucked up or disappear before they reach the ground below."

"Bedad, now, I would niver have thought of that! Mr. Elbel will think we get our water from heaven, sorr, if he's iver heard uv it."

The work of damming the river having been accomplished, the main body of the enemy marched down just before dark and regained their camp. As they pa.s.sed within earshot of the fort, Elbel's negroes could not refrain from flinging taunts at the men of their colour within the walls, telling them that they could no longer cook their food, much less wash their babies. This made the men very angry; they prepared to blaze away with their rifles at the gibing enemy, and Jack's command to drop their weapons might, perhaps, for once have been disregarded had not Samba suddenly struck up the song which one of the men had composed, chronicling Lokolobolo's great deeds with water and fire: