The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood Part 67

Yet he slept again, and was in a dazed, half-stupid state when they fetched him out next morning and marched him down to the water's edge, where he was put into a man-of-war's boat and rowed across to the north side of the harbour.

Prince Gortschakoff, the Russian commander-in-chief, had sent for him, and about noon he was taken before the great man, who had his headquarters in the Star Fort, well out of reach of the besiegers'

fire.

The Prince, a portly, imposing figure, of haughty demeanour, and speaking imperiously, accosted McKay very curtly.

"I know all about you. Whether you are spy or traitor matters little: your life is forfeited. But I will spare it on one condition. Tell me unreservedly what is going on in the enemy's lines."

"I should indeed deserve your unjust epithets if I replied," was all McKay's answer.

"What reinforcements have reached the allies lately?" went on the Prince, utterly ignoring McKay's refusal, and looking at him fiercely.

"Speak out at once."

Our hero bore the gaze unflinchingly, and said nothing.

"We know that the French Imperial Guard have arrived, and that many new regiments have joined the English. Is an immediate attack contemplated?"

McKay was still silent.

"Ill-conditioned, obstinate fool!" cried the Prince, angrily. "It is your only chance. Speak, or prepare to die!"

"You have no right to press me thus. I refuse distinctly to betray my own side."

"Your own side! You are a Russian--it is your duty to tell us. But I will not bandy words with you. Let him be taken back to a place of safety and await my orders."

Once more McKay gave himself up for lost. When he regained the wretched casemate that was his prison he hardly hoped to leave it, except when summoned for execution.

But that day pa.s.sed without incident, a second also, and a third.

Still our hero found himself alive.

Had they forgotten him? Or were they too busily engaged to attend to so small a matter as sending him out of the world.

The latter seemed most probable. Another bombardment, the most incessant and terrible of any that preceded it, as McKay thought.

Although hidden away, so to speak, in the bowels of the earth, he plainly heard the continuous cannonade, the roar of the round-shot, the murderous music of the sh.e.l.ls as they sang through the air, and presently exploded with tremendous noise.

He was to have a still livelier experience of the terrible mischief caused by the ceaseless fire of his friends.

Late in the afternoon of the fourth day he was called forth, always in imminent peril of his life, and taken round the head of a harbour which was filled with men-of-war, past the Creek Battery, and up into the main town. They halted him at the door of a handsome building, greatly dilapidated by round-shot and sh.e.l.l. This was the naval library, the highest spot in Sebastopol, a centre and focus of danger, but just now occupied by the chiefs of the Russian garrison.

McKay waited, wondering what would happen to him, and in a few minutes narrowly escaped death more than once. First a sh.e.l.l burst in the street close to him, and two bystanders were struck down by the fragments; then another sh.e.l.l struck a house opposite, and covered the neighbouring s.p.a.ce with splinters large and small; next a round-shot tore down the thoroughfare, carrying everything before it.

It was no safer inside than out. Yet McKay was glad when they marched him in before the generals, who were seated at the open window of the topmost look-out, scanning the besiegers' operations with their telescopes.

"What is the meaning of this fire? Have you any idea?" It was Todleben who asked the question. "Does it prelude a general attack?"

"I cannot tell you," replied McKay.

"Was there no talk in the enemy's lines of an expected a.s.sault?" asked another.

"I do not know."

"You must know. You are on the headquarter-staff of the British army."

"Who told you so? You have always denied my claim to be treated as an English officer."

"Because you are a traitor to your own country. But it is as I say. We know as a fact that you belong to Lord Raglan's staff; how we know it you need not ask."

The fact was, of course, made patent by the English commander-in-chief, in his repeated attempts to secure McKay's release and exchange. But the prisoner had been told nothing of these efforts, or of the peremptory refusal that had met Lord Raglan's demands.

"I told you it would be no use," interrupted a third. "He is as obstinate as a mule."

"Stay! what is that?" cried Todleben, suddenly. "Over there, in the direction of the Green Mamelon."

Three rockets were seen to shoot up into the evening sky.

"It is some signal," said another. "Yes; heavy columns are beginning to climb the slopes away there to our left."

"And the British troops are collecting in front of the Quarries."

At this moment the besiegers' fire, which had slackened perceptibly, was re-opened with redoubled strength.

"Let everyone return to his station without delay," said Todleben, briefly. "A serious crisis is at hand. The attack points to the Malakoff, which, as you all know, is the key of our position."

"Hush!" said one of the other generals, pointing to McKay.

"What matter?" replied Todleben. "He can hardly hope to pa.s.s on the intelligence."

But the words were not lost upon our hero, although he had but little time then to consider their deep meaning.

"What shall we do with the prisoner?" asked his escort.

"Take him back to his place of confinement."

McKay's heart was lighter that evening than it had been at any time since his capture. He remembered now that this was the 7th of June, the day settled for the night attack upon the Mamelon and Quarries, and he hoped that if these succeeded, as they must, they would probably be followed by a further a.s.sault upon the princ.i.p.al inner defences of the town.

He spent the evening and the greater part of the night in the deepest agitation, hoping hourly, momentarily, for deliverance.

None came, no news even; but that the struggle was being fought out strenuously he knew from the absence of the men that occupied his casemate, all of whom were doubtless engaged. But towards daylight one or two dropped in who had been wounded and forced to retire from the batteries. From them he learnt something of what had occurred.

The French had stormed the works on the left of the Russian front, and had carried them once, twice, three times. The Russians had returned again and again to recover their lost redoubts, but had been obliged to surrender them in the end.

In the same way the English had attacked the ambuscades--what we call the Quarries--and between night and dawn the Russians had made four separate attempts to recover what had been lost at the first onslaught.

"And now it is over?"

"No one can say. We have suffered fearfully; we are almost broken down. If the enemy presses we shall have to give up the town."

"Pray G.o.d they may come on!" cried McKay, counting the moments till relief came.