Tom Willoughby's Scouts Part 21

He had given orders that no man was to fire until he sounded his whistle; but it was too much to expect that all his negroes, in the excitement of what was to many of them their first action, would exercise the self-control of disciplined troops. Only one of them, however, let off his rifle, and the single shot, fired at random, was hailed with a derisive yell by the askaris. Tom waited until they were half-way across the clearing; then he blew his whistle. Along the whole length of the barricade burst a shattering volley, not perfectly in time, but aimed low, as Tom had instructed. At so short a range the effect was inevitable. The first line of the a.s.sailants was broken; groans mingled with the shouts; the survivors wavered. The German non-commissioned officer from behind ran among them, threatening them with his revolver, and under this stimulus they charged forward, with the second line at their heels.

Now Tom gave the signal for a second volley. The enemy were barely fifty yards away. Many of them dropped; some flung themselves on the ground.

The few who struggled on found themselves baulked by the unsuspected moat; and the German having fallen, and no supports being at hand, they turned and fled. Before they reached the cover of the trees another storm of bullets swept upon them.

The Wahehe gave rein to their jubilation. They shouted, pranced, slapped their thighs. Some wished to dash out from the barricade in pursuit of the enemy; but Tom sternly ordered them to stand to attention. He was as much pleased as they were that the first a.s.sault had failed; unlike them, he knew that this was only the beginning of things. But it was of good omen for the future. Brief though the engagement had been, it had weakened the enemy in numbers, whether seriously Tom, ignorant of their reserves, could not tell. It had encouraged his own men; best of all, it had proved their steadiness. The three shots they had fired were all that their magazines contained; now that he could trust them not to waste ammunition, he could allow them to keep their magazines full.

For more than an hour there was no sign of a renewal of the attack.

Then, however, the bombardment was resumed. It would appear that while the defenders' attention was wholly taken tip with repelling their a.s.sailants, some of the enemy, unseen in the rear, must have "spotted"

for the gun, for the sh.e.l.ls now began regularly to pierce the barricade, exploding on impact, and tearing away ma.s.ses of the leafy boughs.

Crouching at the bottom of the muddy trench, the Wahehe suffered no hurt except bruises and abrasions from splinters of wood and metal; and Tom resolved to have the breaches in the barricade repaired during the night.

But nightfall did not bring a cessation of the bombardment. Every few minutes throughout the night the sh.e.l.ls cut new gaps. Work was impossible. Tom guessed that the enemy's object was not merely to prevent repairs, but to wear the defenders out by breaking their rest and keeping them constantly on the watch. In one way, however, the persistent bombardment was a source of satisfaction to him. While the sh.e.l.ls continued to fall, there was no likelihood that the enemy would again a.s.sault. The prospect of a night attack had caused him much anxiety, for the negro's morale is never at its best in the dark; further, in darkness and confusion the weight of numbers would tell heavily against him.

Tom knew nothing about artillery, and began to feel a certain contempt for the gun, so slight was the material damage done by its sh.e.l.ls. It was not, however, a field gun, but a small mountain gun, more easily transportable than a larger weapon. After the bombardment had continued for some hours neither he nor the men were much disturbed by the sh.e.l.l bursts, and he felt more and more confident of his ability to hold his own.

But when daylight came again he discovered that the enemy had had another purpose in their sh.e.l.ling. The bombardment continued. The scouts from their high posts above reported that they saw men's heads in the ground on the further side of the clearing. Unable to make out what they meant, Tom climbed the side of the nullah under cover of the bushes until he reached the trench, and cautiously looked out across the open s.p.a.ce beyond the barricade. Some thirty yards in advance of the edge of the forest, on the level of the ground, he saw the heads of several askaris moving up and down. At one moment a dozen heads were in sight, the next some of them disappeared, only to bob up again a few seconds later.

"By George, they're digging," he said to himself.

Quite ignorant of all military operations except those simple manoeuvres learnt in the course of field days with his school cadet corps, he was at first at a loss to understand why the enemy were digging a trench which was apparently to extend from the forest to the nullah. He had perhaps heard the word sap, but it conveyed nothing to his mind. It was not long, however, before he guessed the meaning of this unlooked-for movement. The enemy were digging a means of approach by which they would avoid the inevitable losses of a rush across the open, and the bombardment during the night had been designed partly to cover the sounds of their tools.

Watching intently, he noticed that the direction of the enemy's trench was not a straight line towards the barricade, but a series of short zigzags, obviously to minimise the risk of interference by enfilading fire.

"I ought to try to stop that little game," he thought.

He lifted his rifle, and took a shot at one of the moving heads.

Instantly they all sank down; whether he had hit he could not tell; and a fusillade burst from the trees on the other side of the clearing. For some minutes he saw no more of the diggers; then a head and shoulders showed for a moment, a little nearer than the nearest head had been before.

"I can't stop them, apparently," he thought, "but I can delay them."

Hurrying down to the trench behind the barricade, he sent a dozen of his best marksmen, including a couple of the askaris, to the position he had left, with orders to fire at the diggers whenever they appeared. At their first shots there was another fusillade from the forest; then an interval of about a quarter of an hour during which the enemy was silent, though Tom's men continued to snipe. After that the enemy, having located the position of the trench, began sniping in turn; but the men were so well hidden that they suffered no loss. Presently, however, a sh.e.l.l burst a few yards above the trench, scattering splinters upon its occupants; and a few minutes later another sh.e.l.l fell plump on the parapet at the northern end, killing two men and wounding several. Tom at once withdrew the snipers from their position, and sent them into the similar trench on the other side of the nullah. From this they sniped for a considerable time before they were again detected, and when sh.e.l.ls began to fall there also, Tom removed the men to comparative safety in the bed of the nullah. The wounds inflicted by the sh.e.l.ls were so severe that he did not feel justified in exposing his willing soldiers to injuries which he was unable to deal with satisfactorily.

The sniping being thus put an end to, and a sortie being out of the question, Tom had to reconcile himself to the inevitable. The bombardment slowed down, either because the enemy were satisfied that it had crushed opposition, or maybe to save ammunition. Several times during the day Tom went up to his observation post, and noted the progress of the zigzags. The sap was so narrow that the enemy would have to advance in single file, and he thought his men behind the barricade would have an easy task in shooting them down when the attack came.

Next morning, however, he saw with something like dismay that the enemy had dug a trench across the clearing, parallel with the barricade, and about eighty yards from it. The full meaning of their work was now clear to him. They would reach the trench by means of their zigzag path.

When the word was given, they would swarm out, and though their first wave must suffer from the defenders' fire, the distance they had to cover was so short, and they could be so safely reinforced, that they might overwhelm the defence by sheer weight of numbers. Some of the survivors of the first attack had come near enough to the barricade to see the moat, and no doubt, when the enemy attacked a second time, they would be prepared to meet that not very formidable obstacle.

All that day Tom anxiously awaited the a.s.sault. After a quiet morning, the gun opened fire, and for two hours pounded the barricade, until it was breached in many spots. When the sh.e.l.ling ceased Tom expected the attack to follow immediately; but minute after minute pa.s.sed, and his scouts gave no sign of any movement among the enemy. Taking advantage of this inaction, Tom set some of the men to fill up the gaps in the barricade, but they had no sooner started work than the enemy's snipers, unseen among the trees, began to pick them off. It was clear that the issue of the struggle would depend on the fighting capacity of the men, and not on the strength of the defences.

For the past two days the weather had been dull but dry, and Tom found himself longing for a downpour of rain, which would flood the enemy's approaches. His anxieties were the greater through his ignorance of their numbers. Since the first attack he had seen none of them except the sappers; whether the men biding their time in the forest were scores, hundreds, or even thousands he was utterly unable to guess. If he had known the German's contempt for "cannon-fodder" he might have suspected that their numbers were not very great, for a German officer with large resources would hardly have drawn off at the first check.

Darkness closed down upon the nullah. Tom dared not leave his post, weary though he was. Lying on a heap of twigs he waited, wondering what the night would bring forth.

CHAPTER XX--RAISING THE SIEGE

Midnight pa.s.sed: the still hours stole on; and Tom was dozing when Mwesa roused him.

"Noise dis way, sah," said the boy.

Tom sprung up. From the direction of the forest came slight sounds.

The enemy were on the move. He sent to the trenches above the men detailed to hold them: the rest he ordered to their posts behind the barricade. Their movements were silent.

The sounds from without were so faint that it was clear the enemy hoped for a surprise. Presently they ceased altogether, and Tom guessed that the men had a.s.sembled in their trench and only awaited the word. At each end of the barricade he had placed an askari with flares and matches.

The silence was brief. Suddenly a whistle sounded. The air was rent with a great shout as the enemy askaris leapt from the trench and surged forward towards the barricade. Instantly Tom gave a signal; two blazing flares soared over the barricade and fell on the ground beyond, lighting up a wide s.p.a.ce around them. Peering through a gap, Tom saw the line of black men pressing on. Some carried axes, others oblong hurdles--pontoons for throwing across the moat. Only a few seconds after the signal for the attack had been given, another whistle cut the air.

From the barricade and the trenches above rifles flashed, and there were gaps in the ranks of the a.s.sailants. In the pressure of a moment like this regular volleys were impossible: each man fired as fast as he could.

In spite of their losses the enemy pushed on with scarcely a check.

They had not yet fired a shot. Some crossed the moat with flying leaps and began to hack at the barricade with their axes. Others rushed over on the hurdles, and thrusting their rifles into the gaps, fired at random. The defenders here, having emptied their magazines, lunged at the foremost a.s.sailants with their bayonets, while the men in the raised trenches kept up a hot fire on the supports rushing up behind. But the stream seemed never to slacken. If a man fell back from the barricade, another took his place. A big askari forced his way through a gap, and wounded two men before he was transfixed by Mirambo's bayonet. Almost before the bayonet could be withdrawn others of the enemy came through at the same spot, and Mirambo and the men about him found themselves engaged in a fierce hand-to-hand struggle. The same thing happened at many parts of the defences, and though for every man who got through two or three had been hurled back into the moat or among their comrades, it was clear that by pressure of numbers the Wahehe must soon be overwhelmed.

Tom created a temporary lull in the attack by emptying his revolver on the largest group of the askaris. The flares having now gone out, he took advantage of the darkness to sound the signal for withdrawal, and his men, obedient to their training, rushed back into the trench and reloaded. From beyond the barricade the enemy were pouring a hot fire upon the higher trenches, and Tom knew by the sounds that there were still large reserves to deal with. Coming to the conclusion that the position at the entrance of the nullah could not be held much longer, he sent the greater part of his force to take up new positions at the bend, retaining a few to fight a rearguard action. But it appeared either that the first ranks of the enemy were exhausted, or that they had had orders not to push forward into the nullah at once after the entrance had been won. Their officers, who had not yet come into view, probably suspected that the nullah might have many traps and pitfalls for their men in the darkness, and reckoned on an easy conquest in daylight. At any rate there was no immediate pursuit, and within half an hour Tom had withdrawn all his men into the trench at the bend.

A few minutes afterwards a flame burst out at the entrance, spreading across the nullah from side to side. The enemy had set fire to the shattered barricade. None of them were visible in the glare: it seemed that, content with having forced the outer defence, the main body had had returned to their trench to await the dawn, now near at hand.

When Tom numbered his men, he found that thirteen were missing, and some thirty were wounded, many of them lightly. He felt a pang at the thought that some of the thirteen were lying seriously wounded on the field, but it was impossible to search for them.

He realised that he was now in the last ditch. If the enemy once rounded the bend, the village on the high ground a quarter of a mile beyond would be exposed to their fire, and for the sake of the non-combatants it would be necessary to yield. True, given time, another trench might be dug across the nullah, and the enemy's advance delayed again there; but his men were too weary to start digging at once, and, in any case, it was unlikely that the work could be completed in the short hour before dawn. There was nothing to be done but to hold the trench as long as possible, and inflict such losses on the enemy that they would be compelled to await reinforcements before attempting a final a.s.sault.

They might even be satisfied with having captured the entrance, and leave the rest to time and famine. Escape was impossible, for, knowing of the "back door," they would certainly take care to block exit that way, which could easily be done by posting a few men at the head of the narrow cleft.

What hope was there of relief from the British border? In reply to his note a Major Burnaby had bidden him "hold fast," a message that seemed to hold some slight promise of help. Would that help come in time? If the enemy were in sufficient strength, a few hours might see the defence overwhelmed and the little community at the mercy of the conquerors.

How many days was it since he had received Major Burnaby's message?

Three?--or four? He could not tell. He had lost count of time. So obsessed had he been with the problems of the defence that he had given scarcely a thought to what might have been pa.s.sing in the village. Moses had kept the fighting men supplied with food, sending down carriers under cover of night. The men on guard at the cleft had reported that all was well, and the single sentry who kept watch on the island prison had sent word that the firing had at first caused some excitement among the prisoners. They had grouped themselves on the sh.o.r.e, gazing down the nullah, talking to one another--all but Reinecke, who had stood apart from the rest, and sometimes walked up and down with quick impatient footsteps, twirling his long white moustache. Tom had not seen how the sound of the sh.e.l.ls had caused the women and children to huddle together and sit cowering and moaning in their huts. He had not heard their wails when word came that such-and-such were dead, nor their croons of pity and tenderness as they did their little best for those who were wounded. All his thoughts were centred on the one pressing problem: how to hold out, to wear down the enemy, to gain time.

When morning dawned he looked anxiously down the nullah. Its downward slope enabled him to survey its whole length to the entrance without unduly exposing himself. He saw a few figures moving about where the barricade had been, but between him and them none of the enemy was in sight. The vegetation on either side of the stream, growing to the bases of the precipitous sides, would shelter hundreds: had any of them crept up towards him under this cover during the night? He could not tell; nor dared he send out scouts to reconnoitre.

Presently he saw that the men at the entrance had been joined by two white officers. The Germans, who had kept in the background while the askaris fought at the barricade, had now come forward to inspect the position and direct the further operations. Their intentions were soon made manifest. There was a burst of smoke from the middle of the burnt barricade, and a sh.e.l.l exploded on the cliff-side just behind the trench. Tom at once withdrew his men to the cover of the bushes beyond the bend, leaving only a handful in the trench to fire if any of the enemy showed themselves within effective range. The bombardment thus opened did not greatly disturb him. The bend effectually protected his men from harm, and the gun was not of a calibre large enough to demolish the trench, of which only a portion was visible to the gunners. Some damage was done to the parapet on the eastern side, but the enemy's object was clearly to intimidate the defenders, for the futility of their shots, in a material sense, must have been clear to them.

It was clear, too, that they had learnt to respect the quality of the defence opposed to them. They gave no sign of an intention to advance in the open. The bombardment was vigorous and sustained, but except for the few figures moving about the gun at the entrance, not a man of them was seen. This inaction seemed ominous to Tom. He could not think that they meditated another night attack, for, unfamiliar with the ground, they would be at a disadvantage in darkness. Was it not more probable that, relying on the bombardment to distract the defenders and to drive them under cover, they were creeping through the brushwood nearer and nearer to the trench, and would by-and-by make a rush, with the hope of profiting by surprise? This was the movement that he most dreaded, because the result must depend absolutely on the numbers opposed to him.

Just after mid-day the bombardment suddenly ceased. For a few minutes there was a breathless silence in the nullah: nothing was heard but the gurgling of the stream. Then the storm broke. From the bushes on each side, within a hundred yards of the trench, burst a swarm of men at the double. Tom had already summoned his men to their posts in the trench, and the ma.s.ses of the enemy had covered only a few yards when they encountered a hail of lead from the parapet. In spite of many gaps in their crowded ranks they dashed forward with ferocious yells, and pressed the charge up to the very edge of the trench. There, however, they came under fire from some of the best marksmen, whom Tom had stationed in the block-houses and also in the bushes on higher ground in the rear. They reeled under the double fire; a few who sprang over the parapet into the trench were bayoneted or clubbed; the rest turned and fled panic-stricken into the cover they had lately left with such confidence, many of them falling to the shots of the triumphant Wahehe.

In the silence that followed, Tom was startled by sounds of firing from the north. It flashed upon him that the Germans had arranged a simultaneous attack on the cleft. The guard of twenty men he had posted there, behind their barricades, ought to be able to hold their own on ground so favourable to them; but Tom at this moment felt that he must see for himself how they were faring. The repulse of the main attack gave him at least a respite: he would not be absent more than thirty or forty minutes; so leaving Mirambo in command, he hurried up the nullah.

On the way he was met by Moses himself, running to tell him that the men above had sent word that the enemy was upon them, and asking that the m'sungu would come to their a.s.sistance. Knowing the nature of the ground they were defending, Tom guessed that the support they craved was rather moral than material. He did not care to send for reinforcements to Mirambo, who might yet be hard pressed; but as he pa.s.sed through the village he collected half a dozen men who had been slightly wounded in the first action, and ordered them to follow him up the ladder. Unknown to him they were joined by the armed sentry who patrolled the lake-side opposite the island. The man afterwards explained that he was tired of watching prisoners, and wished to have his share in useful work.

Tom found, as he had expected, that the men guarding the cleft had no reason to be alarmed. Posted behind the first of the barricades commanding a difficult pa.s.sage along which the enemy must come in single file, they could have held the position indefinitely. It appeared that the sight of a white officer among the askaris who had emerged from the end of the ravine had struck them with dread: how could black men stand against a m'sungu? They hailed Tom's arrival with shouts of delight.

Being for once unaccompanied by Mwesa, he was unable to cheer them with words; but he managed to make them understand by signs that he trusted them, stayed with them for a few minutes while they fired at the enemy, who showed no eagerness to risk the perils of advancing against a position so formidable; then, confident that all was safe in this quarter, at any rate for a time, hastened back to where the danger threatened.

Just before he came to the rock from which the lake was visible, he heard shouts of alarm and excitement from below. Surely the enemy could not already have broken through? There had been no firing. Hurrying down at some risk of a fall, he halted at the rock in amazement at an extraordinary drama that was being enacted.

Between the island and the sh.o.r.e a crazy raft was rocking in the water, under the paddles, rough branches of trees, wielded in desperate haste by the German prisoners. From Tom's high position the reason of their frantic exertions was only too apparent. He could see far into the clear water of the lake. About the raft it was alive with crocodiles.

The hideous reptiles swam round and round, sheering off where the water was churned by the paddles, but pushing their snouts on to the edges of the raft where the paddlers stood.

The scene would have been laughable but for a possible element of tragedy. The raft was so slight, evidently so hastily put together, that it dipped now on one side, now on another, under the strokes of the paddles or the pressure of the crocodiles' snouts. Water poured over it. The men dared not shift their positions, for every moment threatened to make it capsize. Divided between anxiety to gain the sh.o.r.e and the urgency of beating off their horrid foes, they used their futile paddles, now for propelling the raft, now for smiting the reptiles' heads.