# Beau Geste/Part 2/Chapter 5

CHAPTER V
THE FORT AT ZINDERNEUF
""They learn that they are not as others are, Till some go mad, and some sink prone to earth, And some push stumbling on without a star."
Things began badly and rapidly grew worse in this ill-omened mud fort, isolated in the illimitable desert like a tiny island in the midst of a vast ocean.
Cafard broke out early, and in a very virulent form, both suicidal and homicidal in its nature.
It took this terrible form, I verily believe, largely by reason of the fact that Captain Renouf, our Commandant, shot himself after a month of life in this dreadful oven of a place. I do not, of course, know his reason for doing this, but it was rumoured that he found he had contracted a horrible disease. This tragedy cast a deeper gloom over a place and a community already gloomy beyond description.
Within a week of this disaster, for a disaster it was to all of us, a most unusual manifestation of cafard was exhibited, when a corporal killed a sergeant and then committed suicide. What Corporal Gontran's grievance against the sergeant was, I do not know, but this again was an exceedingly unfortunate affair, as, like Captain Renouf himself, both these men were on the side of the angels, inasmuch as they were decent, fair-minded, and reasonable people.
But the Fates and the Furies had one more disaster in store for the unhappy garrison before they were ready to launch upon our luckless heads the final torrent of destruction.
Lieutenant Debussy, the new Commandant, sickened and died, and his place was taken by none other than Adjudant Lejaune.
From the moment in which it was known that the Lieutenant was dead, the atmosphere of Zinderneuf changed from bad to worse and rapidly from worse to the worst possible.
The lion-tamer had entered the cage, and the lions, sullen, infuriated, and desperate, knew that he held in one hand the whip that should drive them to revolt, and in the other the revolver that should instantly punish the first sign of it.

#### § 2.

Life at Zinderneuf was not really life so much as the avoidance of death—death from sunstroke, heat-stroke, monotony, madness, or Adjudant Lejaune.
Cafard was rampant; everybody was more or less abnormal and "queer" from frayed nerves, resultant upon the terrific heat and the monotony, hardship, and confinement to a little mud oven of a fort; many men were a little mad, and Adjudant Lejaune, in the hollow of whose hand were our lives and destinies, was a great deal more than a little mad.
From the point of view of the authorities, he was sane enough, for he could maintain an iron discipline; make all reports and returns, to the minute and to the letter; and, if attacked, he could be trusted to keep the Tri-couleur flying while there was a man alive in the Fort.
From the point of view of his subordinates, he was nevertheless a madman, and a very dangerous one.
At times, I was almost glad that Digby was not with us, much as I missed him; and at those times I almost wished that Michael was not, much as I depended on him.
Danger to oneself is unpleasant enough, when it is that of being murdered by a lunatic. When to it is added the danger, and constant fear, of a similar fate overtaking people whom one loves, it becomes ten times worse.
Michael and I both begged each other not to be so foolish as to play into Lejaune's hands, by giving him the faintest chance to accuse us of any breach of duty or discipline, or of so much as an insubordinate look, even under the greatest provocation. But we felt that the time would come when Lejaune would cease to wait for an excuse, and that all we could do was to put off the evil day. …
"I'm positively glad, now, that Dig isn't here," said Michael to me, one terrible afternoon, as we lay gasping on our burning cots during siesta hours, in our stifling caserne.
"Hank and Buddy too," he added. "One word of back-chat to Lejaune would have been fatal. … And Dig might have done it. Buddy more so. … Or if Hank once lost control he'd lay Lejaune out like a pole-axed ox. …"
"Somebody'll do for him one of these days, if we don't soon get a new commanding officer," said I. "And a good job too."
"Not it," contradicted Michael. "It would be one degree worse than letting him live. … These asses would give three loud cheers, march off into the desert, and survive about three days of it—if the Arabs didn't get them before they died of thirst."
"It'll happen," prophesied I. "Schwartz is getting very mysterious and important these days. Oh, it'll happen all right."
"That's what I think," said Michael, "and it's about the worst thing that could happen. And if no one goes and does it spontaneously, there'll be a plot to murder him—if there isn't one already, which I believe there is, as you say—and we should have the choice of fighting for Lejaune—(for Lejaune!)—or being two of a gang of silly, murdering mutineers with nothing but a choice of beastly deaths—thirst and Arabs in the desert, or court martial and a firing party at dawn. … Rotten."
"If he's promoted Lieutenant and kept in command here, he won't last a week," said I. … "What's going to happen if they make a plot to mutiny and we're the only two that refuse to join them?"
"We should join Lejaune instead, where dead men tell no tales, I expect," answered Michael.
"What would Sergeant Dupré and Corporal Boldini do?" I speculated.
"If it were a case of saving their skins they'd join the mutineers, I should say—if they were given the option," replied Michael. "They probably loathe Lejaune as much as we do, and neither of them is exactly the man to die for a principle. … If they woke to find a gang of bad men, with rifles, round their beds, they'd 'take the cash and let the discredit go,'—'Nor heed the rumble of a distant drum' from Tokotu," he added.
"I doubt if they'd be given the option," I said.
"So do I," agreed Michael. "They're not loved. They've been whips and scorpions in Lejaune's hands too long and too willingly."
"And if we were 'approached' on the subject of a mutiny and did our miserable duty in warning Lejaune and the others?" I asked.
"We should promptly get thirty days' cells from Lejaune for currying favour with horrible lies, and short shrift from the mutineers for being escrocs," said Michael. …
"Let us give thanks unto the Lord and count our many blessings, my brethren," he yawned, and, at that moment, Schwartz, Haff, Brandt, Bolidar, Delarey, and Vogué entered the room and joined Guantaio, Colonna, and Gotto at the other end of it. Here they conversed in low voices, with occasional glances at us.

#### § 3.

And to me, one night, came Schwartz, as I sat in a corner of the little courtyard, trying to imagine that the night was cooler than the day, and this spot, which faced north, less hot than the others.
He was a huge, powerful, hairy ruffian, who would have made a great pirate-captain, for he had brains, courage, and determination, quite unhampered by over-fine scruples of honour or mercy. He was further endowed with a magnetic personality and power of command.
"Are you enjoying life, Smith?" he asked, seating himself beside me.
"Quite as much as you are, Schwartz," I replied.
"Would you like a change?" he enquired.
"I am fond of change," said I.
A brief silence ensued.
"Have you ever seen a pig die?" he asked suddenly.
"No," I replied.
"Well, you soon will," he assured me.
"Feeling ill?" I enquired rudely. I did not like the gross Schwartz.
"You are going to see a big pig die," he went on, ignoring my vulgarity. "A sacred pig. An anointed pig. A striped pig. A promoted pig. Oh, an adjudant pig."
"So?" I murmured.
"Yes. Monsieur le Cochon is going to become Monsieur Porc."
"And are you going to become Monsieur Charcutier, 'Mr. Pork-butcher,' so to speak?" I enquired. There could be no harm in knowing all there was to know about this business.
"Aha! my friend," growled the German, "that remains to be seen. So many want a côtelette de porc or a savouret de porc. We shall have to cast lots."
He was silent for a minute and sat beside me, gnawing his knuckles. He was shaking from head to foot with fever, excitement, or diseased nerves.
"Do you want a chance to be charcutier?" he asked.
"I have had no experience of pig-killing," I answered.
"Look you," he growled, seizing my arm, "you will have the experience shortly, either as pig or as butcher, for all here will be cochon or charcutier—in a day or two. See? Choose whether you will be a pig or a butcher. … And tell your brother to choose. … Meantime, if any man comes to you and says 'porc,' you reply 'cochon.' Then he will know that I have spoken to you, and you will know that he is one of us. See? And you and your brother make up your minds quickly. We don't care either way. There are enough of us—oh, enough. …" And as somebody approached, he got up and slouched off.
That night I told Michael what I had heard.
The next day it was Guantaio. I was sitting in the same place and he crept towards me purposefully.
"Who's that?" he asked, and, hearing my name, came and sat down beside me, as Schwartz had done.
"It's hot," he said, removing his képi and puffing.
"It is," I agreed.
"Are you fond of hot … porc?" he enquired.
"Cochon!" said I playfully.
"Ah!" he replied at once. "What do you think of it all?"
"I never think," said I.
This silenced him for a minute.
"They are ten to one," he said suddenly. "Ten butchers to a pig. What chance has the big pig and one or two biggish pigs against a score of butchers?"
"Ah!" I said imitatively. "What do you think of it all?"
"I never think," said Guantaio, with a malevolent smile. I yawned and stretched and affected to settle myself to slumber.
"How would you and your brother like to be pigs if I could find two or three other pigs to join the big pig, and the one or two biggish pigs?" he enquired, nudging me.
I belied my statement that I never thought, and did some rapid thinking.
Had it been arranged that he should sound me as soon as Schwartz had hinted at the assassination of Lejaune? Was it his task to find out whether my name was to be put on the "butcher" list or on the "pig" list? Were all those who did not wholeheartedly join the "butchers" to be shot in their beds on the night of the mutiny?
Or, again, was the rogue trying to find out which was likely to be the stronger party, and did he intend to betray his friends to the non-commissioned officers, if he thought them likely to win?
"How should we like to become pigs, you say?" I temporised. … "I should hate to be butchered—shouldn't you?"
"Very much," he replied. … "But do you know," he went on, "I have heard of pigs attacking men. Taking them unawares and eating them up. …"
"I should hate to be eaten up by a pig—shouldn't you?" I observed.
"Very much," he agreed again. "One does not want to be slaughtered by butchers nor eaten by pigs."
"No," said I. "Need either happen?"
"Not if one is a wise pig—forewarned and forearmed—who attacks the butchers, taking them unawares," he replied.
"Has the big pig got his eye on the butchers?" I asked.
"No," replied Guantaio. "Nor have the biggish pigs."
"And are you going to open the eyes of the blind pigs?" I enquired.
"I don't know," answered Guantaio. And I had a very strong conviction that he was speaking the truth, for there was a ring of genuine doubt and puzzlement in his voice. At any rate, if he were lying when he said it, he was lying extraordinarily well.
No—he did not know what to do, I decided, and he was simply trying to find out where his private interests lay. Would it pay him better to stand in with his friends, and assist in the mutiny and the murder of Lejaune and the non-commissioned officers? Or would he do better for himself if he betrayed his friends, warned his superiors, and assisted them to defeat the mutineers?
That he was one of the ringleaders of the plot was obvious, since he was the bosom friend of Colonna, Gotto, Vogué, and the rest of Schwartz's band, and had always been one of the circle in their recent confabulations and mutterings together.
I followed the excellent, if difficult, plan of trying to put myself in Guantaio's place, and to think with his mind.
On the one hand, if I were Guantaio, I should see the great dangers attendant on the mutiny. It might fail, and if it succeeded, it could only be the prelude to a terrible march into the desert—a march of doomed men, hunted by the Arabs and by the French alike, and certain to die of thirst and starvation if not killed by enemies.
On the other hand, if I were the excellent Guantaio, I should see the advantages attendant upon playing the part of the saviour of the situation. Reward and promotion were certain for the man who saved the lives of his superiors and the honour of the flag, and who preserved the Fort of Zinderneuf for France. And, of course, it would be the simplest thing in the world for Lejaune, Dupré, Boldini, Guantaio, and a few loyal supporters to defeat the conspirators and secure the mutineers. It would only be a matter of entering the barrack-room at night, seizing the arms, and covering the suspects with the rifles of the loyalists, while the guard arrested them. Anyone resisting, could be shot as soon as he raised a hand.
Lejaune alone could do the business with his revolver, if he entered the room while all were asleep, and shoot any man who did not instantly obey any order that he gave.
In fact, I began to wonder why Guantaio should be hesitating like this. Surely it was to his interest to betray his friends?
Certainly he would not allow any ridiculous scruples to hinder him from committing any treacherous villainy, and certainly it was far less dangerous, in the long run, to be on the side of authority—for the mutineers' real danger only began with the mutiny, and it steadily increased from the moment when they set forth into the desert to escape.
More and more I wondered at his hesitation.
And then a light began to dawn upon my brain. This Guantaio was the henchman of his compatriot, Corporal Boldini. Boldini might be killed when the mutineers killed Lejaune; for hate and vengeance were the mainsprings of the plot, and Boldini was hated second only to Lejaune himself. He might not be given the option of joining the mutineers when Lejaune was murdered. Suppose the Italians, Boldini, Guantaio, Colonna, and Gotto, were a united party, led by Boldini, with some sinister end of their own in view? And might not Guantaio be doubtful as to whether the rôle allotted to him were not too much that of the cat's-paw?
Suppose the Boldini party intended to fish in troubled waters—for a pearl of great price? In other words, suppose they hoped to do what they had certainly tried, and failed, to do in Sidi-bel-Abbès, when they had induced Bolidar to attempt to rob my brother?
Most undoubtedly these rogues believed Boldini's story that we were a gang of jewel-thieves and that Michael carried about with him a priceless gem—to which they had at least as much right as he had. No—I decided—Guantaio spoke the truth when he said he did not know what to do. He was a knave all through. He would betray anybody and everybody. He was afraid that his share in the mutiny would be death, whether it failed or not, and what he really wanted to do was to follow the course most likely to lead him to the possession of two things—a whole skin and a share in the jewel—unless indeed he could get the jewel itself.
"It's a difficult problem, my friend," mused I sententiously. "One does not know which side to take. … One would like to be a pig, if the pigs are going to catch the butchers napping. … On the other hand, one would like to be a charcutier, if the butchers are going to act first. …"
We sat silent awhile, the excellent Guantaio making a perfect meal of his nails.
"And—that is a point!" I went on. "When are the butchers going to kill?"
"Monsieur le Grand Charcutier" (by whom, I supposed, he meant Schwartz) "talks of waiting till full moon," was the reply. "If a new Commandant has not come by then, or if Monsieur le Grand Cochon has been promoted and given command before then, it would be a good date. … Do it at night and have full moon for a long march. … Rest in the heat of the day, and then another big moonlight march, and so on. …"
"So one has three or four days in which to make up one's mind?" I observed.
"Yes," replied Guantaio. "But I don't advise your waiting three or four days before doing it. … Schwartz will want to know in good time. … So as to arrange some butchers for each pig, you see. …"
"And what about Lejaune?" I asked, since we were to use names and not fantastic titles. "Suppose somebody warned him? What then?"
"Who would?" asked Guantaio. "Who loves that mad dog enough to be crucified, and have his throat cut, on his behalf? Why should anyone warn him? Wouldn't his death be a benefaction and a blessing to all?"
"Not if things went wrong," I replied. "Nor if it ended in our all dying in the desert."
"No," agreed Guantaio, gnawing away at his nails. "No … I hate the desert … I fear it … I fear it. …"
Yes—that was the truth of the matter. He feared being involved in a successful mutiny almost as much as in an unsuccessful one.
"Suppose, par exemple, I went and warned Lejaune?" I asked.
"Huh! He'd give you sixty days' cellule, and take damned good care you never came out alive," replied Guantaio, "and he would know what he knows already—that everybody hates him and would be delighted to kill him, given a good opportunity. … And what would your comrades do to you?"
He laughed most unpleasantly.
No—I decided—friend Guantaio would not like me to warn Lejaune. If Lejaune were to be warned, Guantaio would prefer to do the warning himself.
"How would they know that I was the informer?" I asked.
"Because I should tell them," was the reply. "If Lejaune gets to know—then you and nobody else will have told him."
So that was it? Guantaio could turn informer, having sworn that I was going to do so! Not only would he save his own skin, but Michael would soon have a friend and brother the less, when Schwartz and his merry men heard who had betrayed them.
"Of course, you and your brother would be held to have acted together, as you always do," said Guantaio.
So that was it again? Michael and I being denounced to the mutineers as traitors, Guantaio might well be moved to murder and rob Michael—secure in his honourable rôle of executioner of justice upon a cowardly traitor.
The Legion knew no punishment too severe for infliction upon any man who acted contrary to the interests of his comrades. Guantaio need not fear the fate of Bolidar in such circumstances.
"What would you do if you were me?" I asked.
"Join the butchers," was the prompt reply. "You and your brother must follow Schwartz. Better the enmity of Lejaune than of half the barrack-room led by Schwartz. Lejaune couldn't come straight to your bed and murder you, anyhow. Schwartz could, and would. And he will, unless you join him. …"
Yes, undoubtedly the filthy creature was in grave doubt about the best course to pursue, and spoke from minute to minute as new ideas and fresh views occurred to him, and as his fears and hopes swayed him.
At present he saw the desirability of me and Michael being mutineers. Just now, he had seen some advantage in our not being of their party. …
Probably the most puzzling and baffling thing to a tortuous mind is simple truth. It is often the subtlest diplomacy, when dealing with such people as this. So I decided to speak the plain truth, and leave him to make what he could of it.
"I shall talk the matter over with my brother," I said, "and we will decide to-night. Probably we shall warn Lejaune. You can tell Schwartz that. And I can give him a definite answer to-morrow. Then he can do as he pleases."
"You won't warn Lejaune until you have told Schwartz you are going to do so, of course?" asked Guantaio, and I had seen his eyes light up as I announced the probability of our defying Schwartz. That seemed to suit him finely.
"No, I won't," I assured him. "Neither will my brother. … Provided, of course, that nothing will be done to-night? No mutinying, I mean. …"
"Oh, no," said Guantaio, "They're not ready yet. A few haven't joined. Schwartz would like to get everybody, of course; but failing that, he wants to know exactly who is to be killed before they start. It will prevent unfortunate accidents. … Also they want the full moon. …"
"Well—I shall decide to-night," I said. "And now please go away. I want to think—and also I'm not extraordinarily fond of you, Guantaio, really. …"

#### § 4.

The first thing to do now was to find Michael and decide as to what line we were going to take.
He was on sentry-go, and I must wait.
Meantime, I might find St. André, Maris, Glock, and one or two others who were fundamentally decent honest men of brains and character, and less likely than some of the rest to be driven by blind hatred of Lejaune, or the dominance of Schwartz, into murderous folly that was also suicidal.
St. André was lying on his cot in the barrack-room. He looked at me as I entered. Taking my belt and a polishing-rag, I strolled in the direction of his bed, and came to a halt near him, rubbing industriously.
"Are you fond of pork, mon ami?" I enquired softly, without looking away from my work.
"I am something of a cochon about it," he replied in a low voice, and added, "Anyhow, I would rather be that than a butcher."
So he had been approached, too.
"Follow me outside when I go," I said.
A few minutes later he found me in the courtyard, and I learned that Schwartz had sounded him that day; told him that he must choose between being a pig or a butcher; and had given him a couple of days in which to make up his mind. Schwartz had concluded by informing St. André that all who were not for him would be treated as being against him, and that eighty per cent of the men had willingly taken the oath to follow him and to obey him absolutely. …
"What are you going to do, St. André?" I asked.
"What you and your brother do," was the immediate reply.
He went on to say that he had thought of nothing else from the moment he had learnt of the plot, and that he had come to the conclusion that he would join with Michael and me, to do what seemed the best thing.
"You see, my friend," he concluded, "one, of course, cannot join in with these poor madmen—one has been an officer and a gentleman. Even if one had sunk low enough to do such a thing, and one eased one's conscience by saying that Lejaune deserves death, the fact remains that these lunatics can but step from the frying-pan into the fire."
"Exactly," I agreed.
"Here we live—in hell, I admit—but we do live, and we are not here for ever," he went on. "Out in the desert we shall not live. Those who do not die of thirst, will die by slow torture under the knives of the Arab women."
"They will," said I.
"Besides," he continued, "I would not join them if we could march straight into the service of the Sultan of Morocco and be welcomed and rewarded with high rank in his army. … I am a Frenchman and have been an officer and a gentleman. … I am here through no fault of my own. St. André is my real name. My brother is a Lieutenant in a Senegalese battalion. … But you and your brother are not Frenchmen, and if you could get to Morocco, each of you could be another Kaid McLean. … But you could not get to Morocco on foot from here. … You would be hunted like mad dogs, apart from all question of food and water. … You could not do it. …"
"We are not Frenchmen and we have not been officers, St. André," I replied; "but we are gentlemen—and we do not murder nor join murder-gangs. … And as you say—we could not do it and would not if we could."
"No, I knew you would not join them," said St. André, seizing my hand, "and I told myself I should do just what you and your brother did."
"Well—I'll talk it over with him as soon as he comes off duty, and we will let you know what we decide," I said, "but certainly it will not be to join them.
"Meanwhile," I added, "you get hold of Maris—he's a decent good chap, and see what he has got to say. You might try Glock, Dobroff, Marigny, Blanc, and Cordier, too, if you get a chance. … They are among the least mad in this lunatic asylum."
"Yes," agreed St. André, "if we can form a party of our own, we may be able to save the situation," and he went off.
I waited for Michael, sitting on a native bed, of string plaited across a wooden frame, that stood by the courtyard wall near the guard-room.
Seated here in the stifling dark, I listened to the gibberings, groans, yells, and mad laughter that came from the cellules, where some of Lejaune's victims were being driven more and more insane by solitary confinement and starvation.
When Michael was relieved, I followed him as he went to the barrack-room to put his rifle in the rack and throw off his kit.
"I'll be sitting on the angareb," I said. "More developments."
"I'll be with you in five minutes," he replied.
When he joined me, I told him what Guantaio had said, and I added my own views on the situation, together with those of St. André.
Michael listened in silence.
"Position's this, I think," he said, when I had finished. "Schwartz and his band of lunatics proposing to murder Lejaune and anybody who stands by him, Guantaio has given the show away to Corporal Boldini because he thinks the mutiny too risky. Boldini wants to join the mutineers if they're likely to be successful—but not otherwise. Probably he, Guantaio, Colonna, Gotto, and Bolidar are in league to get the mighty 'diamond'—one way or the other—out of this mutiny. If we join the mutineers, Boldini and Co. will join, too, with the idea of killing me and robbing me in the desert and getting to Morocco with the Cullinan-Kohinoor. … Or to put it more truly, Boldini would get the 'Co.' to do the murdering and stealing, and then kill or rob whichever of his gang brought it off. If we refuse to join the mutineers, Boldini's plan would then be to get Guantaio to murder me in my bed—ostensibly for being a traitor to the noble cause of mutiny—and pinch the Great Diamond from my belt. … Failing that, Boldini would use us in helping to suppress the mutiny, hoping that, in the scrap, I might get done in, and he could rob my corpse. He could do more than hope it. He could arrange it. …"
"On the other hand," said I, "Boldini may know nothing whatever about the plot, and Guantaio may be wondering whether to let the mutiny go on, or whether to warn his old pal Boldini and give the show away."
"Quite so," agreed Michael. "We're absolutely in the dark in dealing with hopeless congenital bred-in-the-bone liars like Guantaio. We can only go on probabilities, and, on the whole, the swine seemed to be egging you on to join the plot. … Well, that means he has some definite personal interest in our joining it. Obviously if he hadn't, he wouldn't care a damn whether we joined it or not."
"What's to be done, Beau?" I asked.
"Get together an opposition-gang of non-mutineers, and then tell Schwartz plainly that we are going to warn Lejaune and also going to obey Lejaune's orders on the subject," was the prompt reply.
"Exactly," said I. "Just about what I told Guantaio. … And St. André will stand in with us, whatever we decide to do.
"But suppose we can get no one else," I pondered.
"Then we and St. André will warn Lejaune and tell him he can count on us three to be true to our salt," said Michael.
"Without warning Schwartz?" I asked.
"Certainly not," replied Michael. "We can't sneak like that."
"Of course, Schwartz and Co. will do us in, as traitors," I observed.
"Probably," agreed Michael. "Try to, anyhow."
"If we can get up a strongish party, Schwartz's lot may chuck the idea of mutiny," he went on. "If they don't, it will be a case of who strikes first. We must warn Lejaune the moment we've made it quite clear to Schwartz that we're going to do so then and there, unless he gives up the whole idea. … Whether he gives it up, or not, will depend on the number we can get to back us."
We sat silent for a minute or two, pondering this cheerful position.
"Tell you what," he said suddenly, "we'll call a meeting. The Briton's panacea. To-morrow evening at six, the other side of the oasis, and we'll invite St. André, Blanc, Cordier, Marigny, and any other Frenchmen who'd be likely to follow St. André. Then there's Maris, Dobroff, Glock, and Ramon, among the foreigners, who might join us. … I wish to God that Digby, Hank, and Buddy were here."
"They'd make all the difference," said I.
"Well—if that lot will join us, we can probably turn Schwartz's murder-party into a mere gang of ordinary deserters, if go they must. …"
Shortly afterwards, St. André, looking for us, came to where we were sitting.
"I've spoken to Maris," said he, "and he's with you two, heart and soul. I also sounded Marigny, but he takes the line that we can't possibly be such curs as to warn the unspeakable Lejaune and betray our own comrades."
"We can't be such curs as not to do so," said Michael.
"Precisely what I tried to make him see," replied St. André. "It's a question of the point of view and of the degree of mental and moral development. … To us it is unthinkable that we should stand by and see murder done, the regiment disgraced, the Flag betrayed, and the fort imperilled. … We are soldiers of France. …"
He stood up and saluted dramatically, but not self-consciously, in the direction of the flagstaff.
"To Marigny and his kind," he went on, "it is just as unthinkable that, having been entrusted with a secret by a comrade, they should betray this secret and thwart and endanger the friends who have put their faith in them."
"The point of view, as you say," agreed Michael. "Personally, though, I've not been entrusted with a secret by a comrade. I have merely had a threatening and impudent message from a ruffianly blackguard named Schwartz. He tells me he is going to commit a murder. I reply that he is not going to commit a murder, and that unless he abandons the intention, I am going to warn his victim. That seems a clear issue to me."
"And to me," said St. André.
"I also found Blanc to be much of the same mind as Marigny," he went on. "Averse from promoting or even condoning murder, but even more averse from 'betraying' his comrades. … I've only spoken to those three so far. …"
"Well, look here," said Michael. "To-morrow at six, beyond the oasis. All our friends and all who are not actually of Schwartz's gang. You get Marigny, Blanc, and Cordier, and any other Frenchman you think might join us, and we'll bring Maris, Ramon, Dobroff, and Glock, and possibly one or two more. They'll come. … They'll come, because, obviously, it's a life-or-death matter for all of us. We must try to see that none of Schwartz's gang know about the meeting, at any rate until it's over—but if they do, we can't help it. I suppose we have as much right to lay plans as they have?"
"It's a good idea," agreed St. André. "I'll be there and bring whom I can. About six o'clock."

#### § 5.

Next evening, a handful of the better sort assembled near the shaduf in the shade of the palm-grove, out of sight of the fort. Besides Michael, St. André, Maris, and myself, there were Cordier, Blanc, Marigny, Ramon, Dobroff, Glock, Vaerren, and one or two others—fifteen or sixteen of us altogether—enough, as Michael remarked to me, to control events, provided a united party, with a common policy, could be formed.
But this proved impossible. Ideas of right and wrong, honour and dishonour, fair dealing and vile dealing, were too discrepant and probably tinctured by other thoughts and motives, such as those of fear, hatred, ennui, vengeance, and despair.
Michael addressed the meeting first.
"As you all very well know," said he, "there is a plot to murder Lejaune and the non-coms., to desert and to abandon the fort. Schwartz is the ringleader and says that those who do not declare themselves supporters will be considered as enemies—and treated as such. Personally, I do not do things because Schwartz says I must, nor do I approve of shooting men in their beds. Supposing I did, I still should disapprove of being led out into the desert by Schwartz, to die of thirst. Therefore I am against his plot—and I invite you all to join with me and tell Schwartz so. We'll tell him plainly that unless he gives up this mad scheme of murder and mutiny, we shall warn Lejaune. …"
Here a growl of disapproval from Marigny and Blanc, and some vigorous head-shaking, interrupted Michael's speech.
"I swear I will warn Lejaune," put in St. André, "but I will warn Schwartz first—and if he likes to drop the murder part of the scheme, he can do what else he likes. Any sacred imbecile who wants to die in the desert can go and do it, but I have nothing to do with mutinies. …"
"No treachery!" roared Marigny, a typical old soldier, grizzled and wrinkled; an honest, brainless, dogged creature who admired Schwartz and loathed Lejaune.
"Don't bray like that, my good ass," said Michael turning to him, "and try not to be a bigger fool than God meant you to. Where is the treachery in our replying to Schwartz, 'Thank you, we do not choose to join your murder-gang. Moreover, we intend to prevent the murder—so drop the idea at once.' Will you kindly explain how the gentle Schwartz is thus 'betrayed'?"
"I say it is betrayal of comrades—to tell an anointed, accursed, nameless-named dog's-tail like Lejaune that they are plotting against him. Treachery, I say," replied Marigny.
Michael sighed patiently.
"Well—what are you going to do, Marigny—since you must either be against Schwartz or for him?" asked Maris.
"I'm for him," replied Marigny promptly.
"A slinking, skulking murderer?" asked Michael contemptuously. "I thought you were a soldier—of sorts."
"I'm for Schwartz," said Marigny.
"Then go to him," snapped Michael. "Go on. … Get out. … We should prefer it—being neither cowards afraid of Schwartz, nor creeping murderers."
Marigny flushed, clenched his fists and, with an oath, put his hand to his bayonet and made as though to spring at my brother; but he evidently thought better of it as Michael closed his right hand and regarded the point of Marigny's chin.
With a snarl of "Dirty traitors!" the old soldier turned and strode away.
"Anybody else think as he does?" asked Michael.
"I can't agree to betraying old Schwartz," said Blanc, a Marseilles seaman, noisy, jolly, brave, and debonair; a rotund, black-eyed, bluff Provençal.
"Well—say what you are going to do then," said Michael sharply. "Join Schwartz's murderers or else join us."
"I can't join Lejaune's boot-lickers," said Blanc.
"Then join Schwartz's gang of assassins. You may perhaps be safer there," said Michael, and Blanc departed grumbling.
"I must join my compatriots, I'm afraid," said Glock.
"You are 'afraid'!" mocked Michael. "You have said it! It is Schwartz you are afraid of. You needn't be. You'll be safer outside that gang of murderers."
"I can't betray my compatriots," repeated Glock.
"Well—can you go to them and say—(what is the truth)—'I don't believe in murder and I am certain this business will end in the deaths of all of us. Drop it or I and my friends will make you.' Can you do that?" asked Michael.
Big, simple Glock, with his blue eyes and silly face, could only scratch his head and shuffle awkwardly from one foot to another.
"They'd kill me," he said.
"They certainly will kill you of thirst, if you let them lead you out there," argued Michael, with a wave of his arm to the encompassing desert.
"It seems we've all got to die, either way," said Glock.
"It's what I am trying to prevent, isn't it, fat-head?" answered Michael. "If the decent men of this garrison would act together and tell Schwartz to stop his silly tricks, no one need die."
"Except those whom Lejaune is killing," said Cordier, a clever and agreeable Frenchman who had certainly been a doctor, and whose prescriptions and treatment his comrades infinitely preferred to those of any army surgeon. "If that pariah cur of the gutters of Sodom and Gomorrah could be shot with safety to the rest of us—I'd do it myself to-night, and write my name among those of the benefactors of the human race."
"Oh? Where do you stand then?" asked Michael.
"I come in with you and St. André," replied Cordier, "though I admit my sympathies are wholly with Schwartz. Still … one's been a gentleman. …"
And in the end we found that only Cordier could really be depended upon to join Michael, St. André, Maris, and myself as a staunch and reliable party of anti-Schwartz, pro-duty-and-discipline non-murderers, prepared to tell the mutineers that they must drop their assassination plot, or Lejaune would be warned.
One by one, the others went off, some apologetic and regretful, some blustering, some honestly anxious to support what they considered Schwartz's brave blow for their rights, some merely afraid to do what they would have liked to do.
When we five were at length alone, Michael said, "Well, I'm afraid we're not going to scare Schwartz off his scheme."
"No," agreed Cordier. "It looks more as though we are only going to provide him with some extra labour. More little pigs. …"
"There won't be any pigs if Lejaune acts promptly," said St. André.
"None," agreed Maris, "and I'm almost tempted to vote for warning Lejaune before saying anything to Schwartz. It would give us more chance. …"
"No. No. We can't do that," said Cordier. "We must give old Schwartz a fair show. If he'll cut out the murder items from his programme, we'll say nothing, of course, and he can carry on. If he won't, we'll do our duty as decent folk, and give Lejaune his chance."
"Will he take it?" I asked. "Will he listen?"
"Not to one of us alone," said St. André. "But he'd have to take notice of a deputation, consisting of the five of us, all telling the same tale."
"A deputation consisting of ourselves, coming from ourselves?" smiled Cordier.
"After all, though," asked Maris, "does it matter if he believes or not? Suppose one of us goes and tells him the truth—isn't that enough? If he likes to punish the man and ignore his warning, that's his affair."
"Quite," agreed Michael. "But it's ours too! We don't want to be shot in our beds because Lejaune won't listen to us. … If Schwartz isn't forestalled, every man in this fort who hasn't joined his gang by the day after to-morrow will share Lejaune's fate."
"That means us five, Boldini, Dupré, and Lejaune," said Cordier.
"Unless Boldini is in with them,—which is quite likely," put in St. André.
"Yes, seven of us," mused Michael, "even without Boldini. If Lejaune listens to our tale of woe and acts promptly, we five and the two non-coms. are a most ample force for him to work with. … Simply a matter of acting a night before they do—and there need be no bloodshed either."
"Fancy fighting to protect Lejaune!" smiled Cordier. "Enough to make le bon Dieu giggle."
"We're fighting to protect the Flag," said St. André. "Lejaune is incidental. We're going to fight a murderous mutiny—and another incidental is that we are probably going to save our own lives thereby. …"
"Who'll tell Schwartz?" interrupted Cordier.
"I will," said Michael.
"We all will," said I. "Let us five just go to him together and warn him. We won't emphasise the fact that we speak for ourselves only."
"That's it," agreed St. André. "We'll tell Schwartz that we're a 'deputation' to him—and do the same when we go on to interview Lejaune—if that's necessary."
And so the five of us agreed to go in search of Schwartz then and there, to tell him that we would take no part in mutiny and murder, and to warn him that we should report the matter at once, unless he agreed to abandon the part of his scheme that included the slaughter of superiors and the coercion of comrades.

#### § 6.

As we left the oasis and strolled towards the fort, we met a man carrying pails, for water. As he passed, I saw it was the Portuguese, Bolidar, the man who had been so roughly handled for attempted theft in our barrack-room at Sidi-bel-Abbès. He had always pretended that, on that melancholy occasion, he had strayed, under the influence of liquor, into the wrong room, and that, when caught, he was merely getting into what he thought was his own bed!
Warned by Hank and Buddy, however, we, on the other hand, regarded the gentleman as the miserable tool of Boldini, who had taken him up when Guantaio, Colonna, and Gotto had declined to do his stealing for him.
As he passed Michael, he half stopped, winked, made as though to speak, and then went on. Looking back, I saw that he had halted, put his pails down, and was staring after us.
Seeing me turn round, he signalled to me to come to him, and began walking towards me.
Here was a man with whom a quiet talk might be very useful, particularly as he had made the first overtures.
"I want to speak to your brother and you," he whispered. "Privately. I daren't be seen doing it. I am in Hell—and yet I am going to Hell. Yes, I am going to Hell—and yet I am in Hell now."
He was evidently in a very unbalanced state of mind. He was trembling, and he looked terribly ill.
"Go into the oasis and wait," said I. "I'll bring my brother along soon."
"I must hide … I must hide … I must hide," he kept repeating.
"All right," I agreed. "You hide. I'll stroll along whistling 'Père Bougeaud' when I bring my brother."
"Lejaune will tear my throat out. … He'll eat my heart. … So will Schwartz. … So will Boldini. …"
"Well, you won't feel the second two," I comforted him, "and you haven't got three hearts. … You tell us all about it," I added soothingly. "We'll look after you. Pull yourself together now," for I thought he was going to burst into tears.
"You won't bring anybody else? You won't tell anybody else? Not a word?" he begged.
"Not a soul. Not a word," I replied. "You wait for us in the far clump of palms beyond the well," and I went after Michael.
As soon as I could speak to him alone, I told him about Bolidar.
"Good," said Michael. "We'll hear what the merchant's got to say before we tackle Schwartz. The bold Bolidar evidently wants to hedge a bit, for some reason. … 'When rogues fall out.' … Let's go straight back before he changes what he calls his mind."
Michael ran on and asked St. André and the others to wait a little while and do nothing until he returned.
We then went back to the oasis, and as we passed near the well, I whistling "Avez-vous vu la casquette de Père Bougeaud?" Bolidar joined us, trembling with fear and fever.
We went and sat down together with a high sand-hill between us and the oasis.
At first, Bolidar was incoherent and almost incomprehensible, but soon it was quite clear that the wretched creature was turning to us as a last hope and last resort in his extremity of anxiety, suspense, and terror.
Realising what it was that drove him to unburden himself to us—sheer cowardly fear for his own wretched skin—we never for one instant doubted the truth of what he said.
He oozed truth as he did abject funk, from every pore, and he showed it in every gleam of his bloodshot rolling yellow eyes, and in every gesticulation of his trembling dirty yellow hands.
"My friends," he gabbled, "I must confess to you and I must save you. I can bear it no longer. My conscience. … My rectitude. … My soul. … My sense of gratitude. …"
Michael winked at me. We did not value Bolidar's conscience and gratitude as highly as we did his state of trembling fright, when estimating his motives for "confession." …
"On that terrible night when I was so cruelly misjudged and so cruelly treated, you tried to save me. … Yes, even though it was you whom I was supposed to be trying to rob. … An absurd idea, of course …" and he laughed nervously.
There was no doubting the fact that the gentle dago was in a rare state of terror. His convulsive swallowings, drawn yellow features, tremblings and twitchings, clenched hands and wild eyes, were really distressing.
"Most absurd idea, of course," murmured Michael. "What is it you want to tell us?"
"Your diamond! Your diamond!" whispered Bolidar hoarsely, gripping Michael's wrist and staring into his eyes.
"Ah—my diamond. And what about it?" said Michael gently.
"Lejaune! Lejaune means to get it," he hissed. "And he'll kill me! He'll kill me! If he doesn't, Schwartz will. … Or Boldini. … What shall I do! What can I do!" he screamed.
Michael patted the poor rascal's shoulder.
"There! There! Never mind. No one's going to kill you," he soothed him, almost as though he had been a baby. "Now tell us all about it and we'll see what can be done. … You join our party and you'll be safe enough."
"Your party?" asked Bolidar. "What is your party? And what are you going to do?"
"Oh—we are a party all right. The stoutest fellows in the garrison—and we're going to warn Lejaune—if Schwartz doesn't agree to give up the murder part of the plot," replied Michael.
"You're going to do what?" asked Bolidar, open-eyed and open-mouthed.
"Going to warn Lejaune," repeated Michael.
Bolidar threw his hands up and shook with mirthless laughter.
"But he knows!—He knows! He knows all about it, and who's in it—and when it's to be—and every word that's said in the place!" cackled Bolidar in a kind of broken, hoarse voice.
Michael and I stared at each other aghast.
"Who tells him?" asked Michael.
"I do," was the proud reply of this shameless animal. "And when he has got your diamond, he will kill me," he snivelled.
I was absolutely staggered. If Lejaune knew all about it, what of our precious threat to Schwartz? And what was our position now?
"Why doesn't Lejaune do something then?" asked Michael.
"Oh, he'll do something all right," said Bolidar. "He'll do a good deal, the night before Schwartz and his fools intend to strike."
"Why does he wait?" we asked simultaneously.
"To see what you two are going to do," was the reply. "If you join Schwartz you'll be killed with Schwartz, the night before the mutiny is due—and I'm to secure the diamond. It is not really supposed that you'll join him though. And if you don't join Schwartz you are to be killed in the attack on him instead."
"By whom?" asked Michael.
"By me," replied Bolidar. "You see, if you should join Schwartz, I am to be loyal and enter the barrack-room with Lejaune and the others on the night. As we cover the mutineers with our rifles, mine is to go off and kill you. … If you don't join Schwartz, I am to be a mutineer, and when you enter the barrack-room with Lejaune and the loyal party, in the night, I am to shoot you from my bed. … Either way you are to die—and I am perfectly sure that I shall die too. … Oh, God! Oh, Jesus Christ! Oh, Holy Virgin! Oh, Saints in Heaven!" he blubbered.
"And suppose I refuse to give Schwartz any answer, and remain perfectly neutral?" asked Michael.
"Then I am to harangue the mutineers and urge them to kill you as a non-supporter! You and any others that won't join them, so that it will not look as though I have any personal motive or feeling with regard to you specially. Then I am to offer to 'execute' you. … Having done it, I am to get the diamond and give it to Lejaune. … Yes," he added with another whispered gasp, "Lejaune is going to shoot me if you are killed without my securing the jewel for him …" and he rocked his body to and fro in despair.
"He ought to have an apron to throw over his head and cry into—like an old peasant woman whose cow has died," said Michael in English.
"Yes," I agreed. "Let's get all we can out of the brute before we let him go."
"Is Boldini in this?" Michael asked Bolidar. "I mean, are he and Lejaune working together?"
"Well—Boldini knows that Lejaune knows," was the reply. "And those two are going to use Dupré and St. André and Cordier and Maris and you two, for the arrest of the unarmed mutineers in the middle of the night. That is, if you refuse to join Schwartz as they anticipate. … But I doubt if Boldini and Lejaune quite trust each other. Guantaio says they don't. He thinks that Boldini intends to get the diamond for himself, and that Lejaune suspects as much. At least that is what Guantaio tells me—but I don't wholly trust him. …"
"Don't you really?" said Michael.
"No. I don't think he's absolutely honest," said Bolidar doubtfully.
"You surprise me," admitted Michael. "The dirty dog!"
"He has made proposals to me which I have rejected with contempt," said Bolidar.
"Dangerous?" asked Michael.
"Absurdly," replied Bolidar. "Besides, how was I to know that I should get my share! It's bad enough to have to trust Lejaune as one is compelled to do—without risking things with a rascal like Guantaio."
"Has Boldini made—er—proposals which you rejected with contempt?" Michael enquired.
"Oh, yes. But as I pointed out to him—Lejaune is adjudant while Boldini is only caporal."
"And what did he say to that?" asked Michael.
"That a live caporal is better than a dead adjudant," was the interesting reply.
"Sounds sinister," I observed in English.
"Nice little crowd," said Michael in the same language. "One really doesn't know where one is, nor where to start on the job of making head or tail of the business.
"Let's get this clear now," he said to Bolidar. "You are Lejaune's—er—man. You warned him of Schwartz's plot to mutiny and kill him, while acting as though you were a ringleader. You have told every detail to Lejaune and kept him up to date with every development. Lejaune has given you the job of killing me. If I join Schwartz, you are to turn loyal, go over to Lejaune, and shoot me in my bed when we are arrested.
"If I refuse to join Schwartz you are to continue as a mutineer and shoot me, from your bed, when I come in with the loyal party to arrest you.
"If I decline to declare myself you are to be my executioner, self-appointed, on behalf of the worthy mutineers—who will have no neutrals about. And all this in order that Lejaune may get a diamond that is supposed to be in my possession. …"
Bolidar was sunk in a lethargy of miserable thought. He slowly nodded in affirmation.
"And probably Boldini has a plan of his own which involves a dead adjudant and leaves a live caporal—also in pursuit of a diamond! And Boldini's plan, I suppose, is to support Lejaune until he has got the diamond, and then withdraw the support—and the diamond? …"
Bolidar came out of his fit of brooding abstraction.
"That is what Guantaio said," he replied. "He wanted me to join Boldini, Colonna, Gotto, and himself. We were to plot, and kill Lejaune and those who stood by him against the mutineers, after those poor fools had been arrested and either shot (in 'self-defence,' of course) or put in the cells. When we had got the diamond we could decide whether to liberate the mutineers and use them in fighting our way to Morocco, or whether their mouths had better be closed. … We could set fire to the fort and clear out—and everything would be put down to the account of the Arabs. …"
"And why did you not fall in with this pretty scheme?" asked Michael.
"Well—who could trust Boldini? Or Guantaio? Or any of them, for that matter? They are not honest men. Once Boldini had the diamond, what would be the worth of the life of the man who had a claim on a share of it? To have the diamond would, of course, be death! To be one of a syndicate owning it would, of course, be death! Even to know who had got it would be death, for the man who had it would kill you lest you robbed him or demanded your share. … How can one work with such dishonest people?" and the speaker's voice broke with righteous indignation.
"And has Guantaio made any other proposals which you have rejected with contempt?" asked Michael.
"Oh—any number," replied Bolidar. "He seems to think I'm a fool. He actually proposed that I should rob you, and he and I should desert together, before all this mutiny business takes place. I was almost tempted—but—but——"
"Quite," said Michael. "It must be a great handicap."
"It is," agreed Bolidar. "And besides," he added, "how could two men walk across two thousand miles of desert, apart from the question of goums and the Touaregs? … And wouldn't Guantaio murder me directly we got to Morocco?"
"Unless you murdered him first," said Michael.
"Yes," agreed Bolidar, "but one might leave it too late …" and he meandered on about the untrustworthiness of Italians.
"Well, now. Let's get down to business," Michael interrupted. "What have you told us all this for? What do you want us to do?"
"Why," said Bolidar, "I felt I must deal with honest men and I must get away. It is certain death for me. If I get the diamond I shall be killed for it, or for knowing that Lejaune has got it. If I don't get it, Lejaune will kill me for failing him, or else for knowing too much when there is a court martial about the mutiny. …"
"Well?" Michael encouraged him.
"I thought that if I told you two all about it—the real truth to honest men—you would save my life and your own, and give me a share in the diamond."
"How save our lives?" Michael asked.
"All desert together before the mutiny, and you give me a third-part share in the diamond when we are safe."
"How do you know we should keep our promise?" asked Michael.
"Because you are English. … In Brazil, we say, 'Word of an Englishman!' and 'Word of an American!' when we are swearing to keep faith. If you promise, I know you will perform."
"This is very touching," said Michael. "But suppose I give you my word that I haven't got a diamond and never possessed a diamond in my life?"
Bolidar smiled greasily, as at one who must have his little jest.
"Oh, Sehor!" he murmured, waggling his head and his hands idiotically.
"One knows of the little parcel in your belt-pouch," he said.
"Oh, one does, does one?" smiled Michael. "Fancy that now!"
Silence fell.
"Well—as you just said, two or three people can't march off into the desert and expect to live for more than a day or two," observed Michael after a while.
"We might make a party," suggested Bolidar. "It is known that St. André, Maris, Cordier, and one or two more refuse to listen to Schwartz's plan to kill Lejaune."
"Nor are they deserters," said Michael.
"No—but when they know that they are to be killed by the mutineers if they don't join them, or to be killed by Lejaune if they do—what then? … Tell them the truth—that Lejaune is going to have no survivors of this mutiny—whichever side they may be on. No. He's going to have the diamond and the credit and glory of suppressing the mutiny and saving the fort single-handed. He'll teach les légionnaires to mutiny! Their mutiny shall end in death for the lot of them—and in wealth and promotion for Lejaune. He sees himself an officer and a rich man on the strength of this fine mutiny. … And what happens to the men who told him about the diamond—the men who helped him and risked their lives for him? What, I ask you? … Death, I tell you. Death! Death! Death!" he screamed, trembling and slavering like a trapped beast.
"And who did tell him about this wonderful diamond?" asked Michael.
"Boldini," replied Bolidar. "As soon as he rejoined, he told him of the gang of famous London jewel-thieves who had fled from the English police to the Legion. He and Guantaio and Gotto were to get it and give it to Lejaune, who would protect them and who would either place it and share with them, or keep it until they had all served their time. … I don't know."
"And they put you up to steal it in Sidi, eh?" asked Michael. "Why you?"
But Bolidar spurned such an unworthy suggestion.
"Anyhow, we're getting away from the point," Michael interrupted him. "What's to be done? We're certainly not going to desert. I wonder if one could possibly persuade the gentle Lejaune that there's no such thing as a diamond in Zinderneuf?"
"What—pretend you hid it and left it—at Sidi-bel-Abbès?" said Bolidar. "That's an idea! …"
Michael laughed.
"Did you leave it at Sidi?" asked Bolidar.
"I most certainly have not got a diamond here," replied Michael.
"Do you swear it by the name of God? By your faith in Christ? By your love of the Blessed Virgin? And by your hope for the intercession of the Holy Saints?" asked Bolidar.
"Not in the least," replied Michael. "I merely say it. I have not got a diamond—'Word of an Englishman.'"
"It's a chance," whispered Bolidar. "Dear Christ! It's a chance. Oh, lovely Christ, help me! … I'll tell Lejaune you left it at Sidi."
"Tell him what you like," said Michael.
Bolidar pondered.
"Huh! Anyhow, he'll make sure you haven't got it," he said darkly, and rose to his feet. "But I'll try it. I'll try it. There is a small hope. … I'll tell you what he says," he added.
"You'll tell us something, I've no doubt," replied Michael, as the heroic Portuguese took up his pails and slunk off.

#### § 7.

"Well, my son—a bit involved, what?" smiled my brother as we were left in solitude.
"What can one do?" I asked feebly.
"Nothing," replied Michael promptly and cheerfully. "Just await events and do the straight thing. I'm not going to bunk. And I'm not going to join any beastly conspiracy. But I think I'm going to 'beat Bolidar to the draw' as Hank and Buddy would say—when he tries to cover me with his rifle."
"In other words, you're going to shoot friend Bolidar before friend Bolidar shoots you?" I said.
"That's it, my son. If he's cur enough to do a dirty murder like that, just because Lejaune tells him to, he must take his little risks," replied Michael.
"And if that happens—I mean if I see him cover you and you shoot him—Lejaune is going with him. It is as much Lejaune's murder as it is Bolidar's," I said.
"You're going to shoot Lejaune, eh?" asked Michael.
"I am," said I, "if Bolidar covers you. Why should he cover you, in particular, out of a score or so of men, unless he has been told to shoot you?"
"Well—we'll tell Bolidar just what's going to happen, and we'll invite him to tell Lejaune too. It would be fairer, perhaps," said Michael.
"Golly," I observed. "Won't it make the lad gibber! One more slayer on his track!"
"Yes," smiled Michael. "Then he'll know that if neither Lejaune nor Boldini nor Schwartz kills him, I shall. Poor old Bolidar. …"
"What about poor old us?" I asked.
"We're for it, I should say," replied Michael. "Of course, Lejaune won't believe that this wonderful diamond they are talking about has been left at Sidi, and he'll carry on."
"I'm muddled," I groaned. "Let's get it clear now:
"One: We tell Schwartz we won't join his gang, and that we will warn Lejaune of the plot to murder him …"
"Or shall we tell Schwartz that Lejaune knows all about it?" Michael interrupted.
"Good Lord, I'd forgotten that," I said. "I suppose we'd better."
"Then they'll crucify poor old Bolidar for good, this time," grinned Michael. "Serve him right too. Teach him not to go about murdering to order . …"
"We need not say who told us that Lejaune knows," I observed.
"And then they will know that you and I are beastly traitors!" said Michael. "Of course, they will at once think that we told him ourselves."
"Probably Guantaio has told them that, and done it himself, meanwhile," I suggested.
"Oh, damn it all—let's talk about something else," groaned Michael. "I'm sick of their silly games."
"Yes, old chap. But it's pretty serious," I said. "Let me just go over it again:
"One: We tell Schwartz that we won't join his gang. And that Lejaune knows all about his plot.
"Two: Lejaune acts before Schwartz does, and he raids the barrack-room the night before the mutiny. We shall either be in bed as though mutineers, or we shall be ordered to join the guard of loyal men who are to arrest the mutineers.
"Three: In either case, Bolidar is to shoot you. But directly he raises his rifle in your direction, you are going to shoot him. (You'll have to take your rifle to bed with you if Lejaune is going to pretend that you are a mutineer.)
"Four: If I see that Bolidar is out to murder you, I shall shoot Lejaune myself. (I shall take my rifle to bed too, if we are left with the mutineers.)
"Five: If …"
"Five: The fat will be in the fire, nicely, then," interrupted Michael. "What can we do but bolt into the desert with the rest, if you kill Lejaune? You'd be the most badly-wanted of all the badly-wanted mutineers, after that. … They'd get us too, if they had to turn out a desert-column of all arms. …"
We pondered the delightful situation.
"Besides," Michael went on, "you couldn't do it. Of course you couldn't. It would be a different thing if Lejaune were raising a rifle to shoot you, as Bolidar will be doing to me, if I shoot Bolidar. You couldn't just blow Lejaune's head off, in cold blood. That is exactly what Schwartz is going to do. … And what we object to."
And it was so, of course. I might just as well go to Schwartz and offer to be the butcher.
"Well," said I, "suppose I cover Lejaune with my rifle and tell him I'll blow his head off the moment he moves—and then I tell him to …"
"Consider himself under arrest?" jeered Michael. "And what are you then, but the rankest mutineer of the lot? Besides, it's quite likely that Lejaune won't be there. He's brave enough—but he'd like to survive the show. In fact, he intends to be the sole survivor, I should say."
"Looks as though we've simply got to join Schwartz then," I said.
"Damned if I do," replied Michael. "I'm certainly going bald-headed for anyone who goes for me, but I'm not going to join any mutineers, nor commit any murders."
"Nor are you," he added, as I stared glumly out into the desert.
"What is to be done then?" I asked once again.
"Nothing, I tell you," repeated Michael. "We've got to 'jump lively when we do jump,' as Buddy says; but we can only wait on events and do what's best, as they arise. Meanwhile, let's hold polite converse with the merry Schwartz. … Come on."
And we got up and strolled through the starlit darkness to the Fort.
"I suppose we can take it that Sergeant Dupré knows all about the plot?" I said, as we passed into the stifling courtyard.
"No doubt of it," replied Michael. "I am inclined to think Lejaune would try to keep a nice compact 'loyal party' to deal with the mutineers, and hope they'd be like the Kilkenny cats, mutually destructive. … Say, Dupré, Boldini, and five or six légionnaires. … Some of whom would be killed in the scrap. … Of course, one doesn't know what his plans really are—except that he means to get a diamond, a lot of kudos, and a nice little vengeance on his would-be murderers. …"
As we entered the barrack-room, we saw that a committee-meeting of the "butcher" party was in session. They stared in hostile fashion at Michael and me as we went to our cots and got out our cleaning-rags from the little bags.
I sat down on my bed and began melting wax on to my belt and pouches, preparatory to astiquage labours.
The conspirators' heads drew together again.
Michael went over to where they were grouped at the end of the long table.
"Have you come with your answer to a question I asked you about some cochons?" growled Schwartz, scowling at him.
"I have come with some news about a cochon, my friend," replied Michael.
Half a dozen pairs of eyes glared at him, and I strolled over. So did St. André from his cot. Just then Maris and Cordier entered, and I beckoned to them.
"He knows all about it," said Michael.
Schwartz sprang to his feet, his eyes blazing, his beard seeming to bristle, and his teeth gleaming as he bared them. He was a dangerous savage-looking ruffian.
"You have told him!" he shouted, pointing in Michael's face. "You treacherous filthy cur, you have betrayed us!" and he glanced to where a bayonet hung at the head of his bed.
"And come straight here and told you?" sneered Michael coldly. "If you were as clever as you are noisy, you might see I should hardly do that. You're a pretty leader of a gang of desperate mutineers, aren't you?"
Schwartz stared in amazement, struck dumb by the cool daring of the person who had the courage and effrontery to taunt and insult him.
Michael turned to Brandt, Haff, Delarey, Guantaio, Vogué, and the rest of Schwartz's familiars.
"A remarkable leader," he said. "Here you are, the gang of you, making your wonderful plans, and Lejaune knows every word you say, and precisely what you are going to do—almost as soon as you know it yourselves! … Join you? No, thanks. You have talked cleverly about 'pigs' and 'butchers'—but what about a lot of silly sheep? You make me tired," and Michael produced a most convincing and creditable yawn.
"Well, what are you going to do?" he asked as they sat open-mouthed. "Whatever it is, Lejaune will do it first," he added, "so you'd better do nothing."
"And Lejaune will do it first," I put in.
Michael's coolness, bitter contempt for them, and his obvious sincerity, had won. They knew he spoke the truth, and they knew he had not betrayed them to Lejaune.
I watched Guantaio, and decided that save perhaps for a little courage, he was another Bolidar. Certainly Boldini would hear of Michael's action, if Lejaune did not, as soon as Guantaio could get away from his dupes.
"What to do!" murmured Schwartz. "What to do! If Lejaune knows everything! …"
"Declare the whole thing off," said Michael, "and then the noble soul who has told Lejaune so much, can tell him that too," and Michael's eye rested on Guantaio.
It rested so long upon Guantaio, that that gentleman felt constrained to leap to his feet and bluster.
"Do you dare to suggest …" he shouted and stopped. (Qui s'excuse s'accuse.)
"I did not know I had suggested anything," said Michael softly. "Why should I suggest anything, my friend?"
"If it were you—I'd hang you to the wall with bayonets through your ears, you yellow dog," growled Schwartz, glaring at Guantaio.
"He lies! He lies!" screamed Guantaio.
"How do you know?" asked Michael. "How do you know what Lejaune knows?"
"I meant that you lie if you say that I betrayed the plot," blustered Guantaio.
"I haven't said it," replied Michael. "It is only you who have said it. … You seem to be another of the clever ones. …"
Michael's coolness and superiority were establishing a kind of supremacy for him over these stupid creatures, driven and bedevilled as they were by cafard and by Lejaune.
They stared at each other and at us.
"What's to be done?" said Schwartz. … "By God! When I catch the traitor …" he roared and shook his great fists above his shaggy head.
"Nothing's to be done," replied Michael again, "because you can do nothing. You are in Lejaune's hands absolutely. Take my advice and drop this lunacy, and you may hear nothing more of it. … There may be a new Commandant here in a week or two …"
"Yes—and his name may be Lejaune," answered Schwartz.
"Anyhow—he knows, and he's got us," put in Brandt. "I vote we all join in the plot and then all vote it abandoned. Then he can't punish one more than another. He can't put the whole blasted garrison in his cursed cells, can he?"
"You're right," said Haff. "That's it. Abandon the whole scheme, I say. And find out the traitor and give him a night that he'll remember through eternity in Hell. …"
But the ferocious Schwartz was of a different fibre, and in his dogged and savage brain the murder of Lejaune was an idée fixe.
"Abandon nothing!" he roared, springing to his feet. "I tell you I …" And then Michael laid his hand on his arm.
"Silence, you noisy fool," he said quietly. "Don't you understand yet that whatever you say now will go straight to Lejaune?"
Schwartz, foaming, swung round on Guantaio.
"Get out of this," he growled menacingly, and pointed to the door.
"I swear I …" began Guantaio indignantly.
"Get out, I say!" bawled Schwartz, "and when the time comes for us to strike our blow—be careful. Let me only suspect you, and I'll hang you to the flagstaff by one foot. … By God, I will. … Go!"
Guantaio slunk off.
"Now listen to me again," said Michael. "As I told you, Lejaune knows all about your plot to murder him and desert at full moon. I did not tell him. But I was going to tell him, if, after I had warned you, you refused to abandon the scheme."
Schwartz growled and rose to his feet again.
"Oh yes," Michael went on, "I was going to warn you first, to give you a chance to think better of it—in which case I should have said nothing, of course. … But now get this clear. If I know of any new scheme, or any change of date or method, or anything that Lejaune does not already know—I shall tell him. … Do you understand? …"
"You cursed spy! You filthy, treacherous hound! You …" roared Schwartz. "Why should you …"
"Oh, don't be such a noisy nuisance, Schwartz," interrupted Michael. "I and a party of my friends don't choose to give Lejaune the chance he wants, and we don't really like murder either. … We have as much right to live as you, haven't we?"
"Live," snarled Brandt. "D'you call this living?"
"We aren't dying of thirst, anyhow," replied Michael. "And if we are chivvied and hunted and hounded by Lejaune, it's better than being hunted to our deaths by a camel-company of goums or by the Touaregs, isn't it?"
"And who are your precious friends?" asked Haff.
"There are five of them here, for a start," said St. André.
"And how many more?" asked Schwartz.
"You'll find that out when you start mutinying, my friend," said Maris. "Don't fancy that all your band mean all they say."
"In fact," put in Cordier, "you aren't the only conspirators. There is also a plot not to mutiny, d'you see? … And some good 'friends' of yours are in it too."
"So you'd better drop it, Schwartz," I added. "None of us is a spy, and none of us will report anything to Lejaune without telling you first and inviting you to give it up. And if you refuse—Lejaune is going to know all about it. You are simply surrounded by real spies, too, mind."
"You cowardly hounds!" growled Schwartz. "There isn't a man in the place. … Cowards, I say."
"Oh, quite," agreed Michael. "But we've enough pluck to stick things out while Lejaune is in command, if you haven't. … Anyhow—you know how things stand now," and he strolled off, followed by St. André, Maris, Cordier, and myself.
"This is a maison de fous," observed St. André.
"A corner of the lunatic asylum of Hell," said Cordier.
"Some of us had better keep awake to-night, I think," observed Maris.
"Especially if Bolidar is not in his bed," I added.
Michael drew me aside.
"We'll have another word with that sportsman," he said. "I think he'll have the latest tip from the stable, and I fancy he'll believe any promise we make him."

#### § 8.

After completing our astiquage and other preparations for the morrow, Michael and I strolled in the courtyard.
"What'll Schwartz do now?" I asked.
"Probably act to-night," said Michael, "unless he swallowed our bluff that our party consists of more than us five. He may be wondering as to how many of his supposed adherents will really follow him if he starts the show. …"
"He may see how many will take a solemn oath to stand by him and see it through, if he gives the word for to-night," I suggested.
"Quite likely," agreed Michael. "And if neither Guantaio nor Bolidar knows about it, Schwartz may pull it off all right."
"I don't somehow see Lejaune taken by surprise, when he knows what's brewing," I said.
"No," replied Michael. "But he may be relying on Bolidar giving him the tip."
"What are we going to do if we wake up and find that the show has begun?" I asked.
"Stand by Lejaune," replied Michael. "France expects that every halfpenny legionary this day will do his dooty."
"It'll be too late to save Lejaune if we're awakened by rifle-shots and 'alarums and excursions without,' won't it?" I observed.
"That won't be our fault," said Michael. "If they murder Lejaune and the others, all we can do is to decline to join the mutineers."
"If we survive and they desert, I suppose the senior soldier will carry on as Commandant of the fort," I mused. That will take some deciding if only St. André, Maris, Cordier, you, and I are left. …"
"St. André has been a French officer," observed Michael.
"Yes—but they'll select you, old chap," I said.
"Then I'll use my powers to appoint St. André," smiled my brother.
Someone passed and repassed us in the dark, and then waited near the lantern by the quarter-guard, to identify us by its light.
It was Schwartz.
"See here, you," he said as he recognised us. "Come with me. … Now. … What are you going to do if someone kills Lejaune without doing himself the honour of consulting your lordships?"
"Nothing," replied Michael, as we walked away from the light. "We shall continue in our duty as soldiers. We shall obey the orders of the senior person remaining true to his salt and the Flag."
"The devil burn their filthy Flag!" snarled Schwartz. "I spit on it."
"A pity you came under it, if that's what you think," said Michael.
"Then you and your gang of cowards and blacklegs will not interfere?" asked Schwartz.
"If you will desert, you will desert," replied my brother. "That is not our affair. If we know what you are going to do, we shall report it, if we can't stop it. If we can prevent mutiny and murder we shall. … As for deserting—I should say the Legion would be well rid of you."
"Oh, you do, do you, Mr. Preacher?" replied Schwartz, who was evidently putting great and unwonted restraint upon himself. "What I want to know is whether you are going to fight us or not?"
"Certainly—if ordered to," replied Michael.
"And if there is no one to order you?" sneered Schwartz.
"Then obviously we shall not be ordered to, my good ass," was the unsoothing reply. "And we certainly shan't hinder your departure. … Far from it," he added.
Schwartz turned to go.
"Look to yourselves! I warn you! Look to yourselves," he growled.
"Oh, we shall. Don't you worry," replied Michael.
"They'll do it to-night," he added, as we watched Schwartz disappear. "We must secure our rifles and we must keep awake."
I wondered how much longer we should be able to stand this intolerable strain, in addition to the terrific heat and monotony of hardship.
"Go and look for Bolidar," said my brother after a brief silence. "I'll hunt round too. Bring him here if you find him. We'll ask him what's likely to happen if they mutiny to-night. Then we can fix up a plan of action with St. André and the others."
I went back to the barrack-room.
Bolidar was deep in conclave with Schwartz, Brandt, Haff, Vogué, Delarey, and one or two others, round Schwartz's bed.
I pretended to go to my paquetage for something, and then retired and reported to Michael.
"That's all right then," he said. "Whatever the fools fix up for to-night will be reported to Lejaune to-night, and he will know what to do.
"We'll have a word with Bolidar though, by and by," he added. "Nothing like knowing what's going to happen."
Half an hour later, we returned to the reeking, stifling room. Most of the men were lying on their cots. Bolidar was sitting on a bench, polishing his bayonet.
"Will you polish mine too?" I said, going over to him. "Follow me out," I whispered, as I gave him my bayonet.
I strolled back to my cot, began to undress, and then, taking my mug, went out of the room as though for water.
Watching the lighted doorway I waited in the darkness.
Ten minutes or so later, Bolidar came out.
"Well?" I asked.
"Lejaune does not believe a word about the diamond not being here," he said, "and the mutineers are going to shoot him and all the non-coms. on morning parade to-morrow instead of at night. They think he will be expecting it at night, as some informer must have told him that is the plan. … He'll be off his guard. … They are going to kill Dupré and Boldini simultaneously with Lejaune. … If your party is a big one they are going to leave you alone, if you leave them alone. They will load themselves up with water, wine, food, and ammunition, and march out at sunset.
"Blanc, who has been a sailor, is going to lead them straight over the desert to Morocco, by Lejaune's compass. … Schwartz is to be Captain; Brandt and Haff, Lieutenants; Delarey and Vogué, Sergeants; and Glock and Hartz, Corporals. … There will be twenty privates. …"
"They are going to court martial Guantaio, and if he is found guilty they are going to hang him. … I know enough to get him hung, the dirty traitor. …"
"And you?" I asked.
"I am to shoot Lejaune," he replied, "to prove my sincerity and good faith. If I don't, I am to be shot myself. … Guantaio has been maligning me to Schwartz."
"Have you told Lejaune this?" I asked this astonishing creature.
"I am just going to do so now," he replied, and I gasped.
"And I suppose he'll arrest them to-night?" I asked.
"Probably. If he believes me," was the interesting answer.
"What if he doesn't?" I enquired, and, at that, the wretch had another "nerve-storm" or hysterical fit of trembling, with demented gesticulations and mutterings.
"What shall I do? What shall I do?" he kept on. "What will become of me? God help me! Help me! Help me!"
"Look here," said I. "You tell me and my brother everything—the absolute truth, mind—and we'll save you all right, provided you do nothing against us. No covering with your rifle, mind!"
He clutched my hand in his hot shaking fists.
"You stand in honestly with our party, and you'll be safe," I went on. "We'll prevent the mutiny, and nobody will be killed. Neither you nor anybody else."
I hoped I spoke the truth. Perhaps if I now told Schwartz that I knew about the new morning scheme, and assured him that Lejaune knew it too, he'd own himself defeated and give it all up. On the other hand, he might run amok, yelling to his gang to follow him. … Lejaune's prearranged plans would probably settle their business promptly. Would Lejaune then go and shoot whomsoever else he thought might be better dead?
Bolidar slunk off, and I went back to the barrack-room.
Taking my Arabic copy of the Q'ran from the shelf above my bed, I winked at Michael, and opening the book, seated myself beside him, and began to read in Arabic, as we often did.
Having read a verse, I went on in the same monotone, as though still reading, and said in Arabic:
"To-morrow. Morning. They will kill. One now goes to give information," and then went on with the next verse. I then gave the book to Michael, who followed the same plan. Soon I heard between actual verses:
"We have warned them. Say nothing. He will strike to-night. Do not sleep. I will tell our friends," and then another verse of the wisdom of the Prophet, before closing the book.
Soon after this, Bolidar entered the room and began to undress.
"What about my bayonet, you, Bolidar?" I called across to him.
"Oh—half a minute, Smith," he replied, and began polishing it.
A little later he brought it over, and as he bent over my bed to hang the weapon on its hook, whispered:
"I have not told him. … To-morrow," and went back to his place.
Under cover of the "Lights out" bugle, I repeated this to Michael.
"That's all right then," said he. "We shall have a quiet night."
And then perfect silence descended on the room as usual.

#### § 9.

It was an unpleasant night for me, nevertheless, for I by no means shared Michael's faith in its quiet.
What more likely, I thought, than that Lejaune should choose to-night for his anticipatory counter-stroke? He must have an iron nerve or very great faith in his spies, otherwise he could hardly continue thus to sit on the powder-barrel when the fuse was alight.
Or had he other and surer sources of information, than the tales of Bolidar, and Guantaio's reports to Boldini? Was one of Schwartz's most trusted lieutenants merely Lejaune's agent provocateur?
Could Schwartz himself be Lejaune's jackal? No, that was nonsense, and this horrible atmosphere of treachery and suspicion was poisoning my mind. Whereas Lejaune himself was wholly evil and was probably after Michael's fabulous jewel—patiently and remorselessly creeping towards it along a path that led through quagmires of treachery and rivers of blood—Schwartz was a comparatively honest and honourable brute, madly thirsting for vengeance upon a savage beast-tamer who had driven him to utter desperation by injustice and savage cruelty. And, save for Bolidar and Guantaio, his followers were like him, brave men of average character, de-humanised by an inhuman system and the more inhuman monster who applied it.
And why did not the monster strike? For what was he waiting, when every hour increased his danger? Surely it could not be merely the love of the fearless man for prolonging a terribly menacing and precarious situation?
Could it be that, before taking action, he really wished to know absolutely for certain what Michael and I were going to do when the mutineers rose?
Or was he waiting to be surer of Boldini or Dupré?
Of course, if he felt that in the presence of the "diamond" no reliance could be placed on either of these two colleagues, and if, as a shrewd and experienced judge of men, he estimated Bolidar and Guantaio at their true worth, or worthlessness—perhaps it was quite impossible for him to act at all. If practically every one in the garrison belonged to one of two parties—the "honest" mutineers determined to desert, or the rascally thieves determined to steal the great jewel and get away with it—what could the man do?
Was he hoping to use the thieves to fight the mutineers and to deal with the surviving party himself? Hardly that, for the mutineers greatly outnumbered the thieves.
On the other hand, could he not quite easily secure the arms of the mutineers, and arrest the men in their beds by employing the thieves? He could—but what then? The thieves would murder him and escape with the jewel—probably releasing the mutineers and organising them as the "diamond's" unsuspecting escort to Morocco. And each man of the thief-party (Boldini, Guantaio, Colonna, Gotto, and quite probably Vogué and Dupré) would hope that by good luck or more likely by good management—he would be sole survivior of the thief-party.
I tried to put myself in Lejaune's place.
What should I do if I were he, in such circumstances? If I wished first to save my life, and secondly to secure a gem of great price which I believed to be reposing in the pouch of one of the two or three men upon whom I could depend in time of trouble?
And I found it easier to ask the question than to answer it, since one party wanted my life and the other party wanted the jewel.
Having tried to put myself in Lejaune's place, I began to understand his delay in acting. He did nothing because he could do nothing.
I almost began to pity the man as I realised his position. He had not a soul to turn to in his loneliness and danger. Well—he was now reaping the reward of his consistent brutality to all who were his subordinates, as well as of his beastly avarice.
Hitherto he had always been backed by the immeasurable power and authority of his superiors, and could inevitably rely upon their inalienable support and unswerving approval. Now he had no superiors, and, face to face with the men whom he had so long outraged, bedevilled, and wronged, he must stand or fall alone.
And it looked as though he must fall.
Then an idea occurred to me. Had he sent for outside help? Was a column already on its way from Tokotu, where there were Senegalese as well as a mule-mounted company of the Legion? Was that what he was waiting for?
No. In the first place he would sooner, I felt absolutely certain, lose his life than send out an appeal for help against the very men he was supposed to command, the very men whose trembling disciplined fear of him was his chief pride and loudest boast. It would certainly be the end of all promotion for Adjudant Lejaune if he had to do such a thing as that. In the second place it might also destroy this chance of getting the fabulous gem. It was only in very troubled waters that he, in his position, could fish for that.
I decided that there had been no S.O.S. appeal from Zinderneuf to Tokotu.
I tossed and turned in my hot and uncomfortable bed as the problem tossed and turned in my hot uncomfortable brain; and my attempt to decide what I should do in Lejaune's place ended in my deciding that I simply did not know what I could do.
It almost seemed best for Lejaune to put himself at the head of the "honest" mutineers, arrest the thief-party, and then appeal to the others with promises of amendment in his conduct and reform of their condition. … But arrest the thieves for what? … And suppose the mutineers laughed at the promised amelioration of their lot?
It was a hopeless impasse. I gave it up and turned once more on to my other side. This brought my face toward the door and there, in the doorway, stood—Lejaune.
There stood Lejaune—looking from bed to bed. He was quite alone and he held a revolver in his hand. … Whom was he going to shoot?
Was this the beginning of the end?
Without thinking, I raised myself on my elbow.
He saw me at once, and, first placing a finger to his lips, beckoned to me.
I stared in amazement.
Frowning savagely, he beckoned again, with a swift and imperious movement of his arm.
What was the idea? Was he going to murder me outside? Or was he going to tell me to fetch Michael out? In that case, had I better refuse or just spring on him, get the revolver, and … and what? Neither murder nor mutiny was going to improve our precarious position.
As these thoughts flashed through my mind, I seized my trousers and tunic, struggled into them, and tiptoed to the door.
"Follow me," said Lejaune, and led the way to his quarters.
Closing the door of his bare, comfortless little room, and seating himself at the table, Lejaune stared at me in silence, his hot arrogant eyes glaring beneath heavy eyebrows contracted in a fierce evil-tempered frown.
"Do you and your miserable brother want to live?" he suddenly growled. "Answer me, you dog."
"On the whole, I think so, mon Adjudant," I replied, trying to strike a note between defiant impudence and cringing servility.
"Oh—on the whole, you do, do you?" sneered Lejaune, and again stared in silence. "Well—if you do, you'd better listen carefully to what I say, for only I can save you. D'you understand? Answer me, you swine."
"Yes, mon Adjudant," I replied.
"See here then, you infection," he went on, "there's some talk among those dogs, of a jewel. A diamond your gang of jewel-thieves got away with, in London. Also there is a plot among them to murder you both and steal it, and desert with it."
"Is that so, mon Adjudant?" said I, as he stopped.
"Don't you answer me! God smite you, you unspeakable corruption!" he roared. "Yes, it is so," he went on, mimicking me savagely, "and I know all about it, as I know everything else that is done, and said, and thought too—thought, I say—in this place. … Now I don't care a curse what you stole, and I don't care a curse what becomes of you and that anointed thief, your brother; but I won't have plots and plans and murders in any force under my command. Understand that! D'you hear me, sacred animal? Answer me."
"I hear you, mon Adjudant," I admitted.
"Very well then," he growled. "I am going to teach these sacred curs to attend to their duty and leave diamonds and plots alone. By God, I am! To that end, I am going to detail you and your brother and a few more—say, Légionnaires St. André, Cordier, and Maris, as a Corporal's guard to arrest the ringleaders among those impudent swine. And I myself am going to attend to the business. You'll act at my personal orders, under my personal command, and you'll shoot down any man whom I tell you to shoot—as mutineering mad dogs should be shot. D'you hear me, you fish-faced, cod-eyed, bug-eating, dumb crétin! Answer me!"
"I hear you, mon Adjudant," I replied.
"Well—say so then, grinning imbecile. And to put an end to this thrice-accursed nonsense, and prevent any more disturbances of this sort, your brother will hand over this diamond to me. I'll put it where no plots and plans will trouble it. … You and your cursed jewels! Wrecking discipline and causing trouble! You ought to be doing twenty years in gaol, the pair of you. … D'you hear me, blast your soul? Answer me, damn you."
"I hear you, mon Adjudant," I replied.
"Very well. To-morrow morning, you and your brother and the others will have duties assigned you. You'll be given ammunition. You or your brother or both, will be put over the magazine, and will shoot anyone, except myself, who approaches it. Anyone, you understand, whether non-commissioned officer or légionnaire. … I'll teach the swine—by God, I'll teach them! … Now then … it was your brother I wanted, but you happened to be awake and I saw no point in entering that cage of treacherous hyenas—go and tell your brother what I have said, and as soon as I have that diamond locked for safety in the Company treasure-chest, I'll give you a chance to save your worthless lives. …
"Listen carefully now. Creep back and wake your brother, St. André, Maris, and Cordier, and tell them to get up and steal silently from the room with their rifles. … I shall be at the door with that revolver and I'll shoot anybody—on the first movement that I don't like. … Go! …"
I saluted and turned about.
So the hour had come! And Lejaune was about to act! Moreover he was going to act on Bolidar's information that Michael, Maris, St. André, Cordier, and I had refused to join the mutineers, and so belonged to neither party. He was going to make us five loyal soldiers the executioners of the rebels.
He had a perfect right to order us to seize any mutineer and to shoot the man if he resisted arrest. Also it was our plain duty to obey him. …
But Michael? What would happen when Michael denied any knowledge of a diamond? How would he fare at Lejaune's hands when the mutiny had been suppressed? Lejaune's bare word was sufficient to send him to join the defeated mutineers—whether they were in the next world or in that antechamber of the next world, the Penal Battalion. …
"Make a sound—or a false move, and you'll be the first that dies—the first of many, I hope," growled Lejaune, as I crept down the passage between thick mud walls, and I felt the muzzle of his revolver jabbed into the small of my back.
The blood surged to my head, and I all but sprang round. One second's space of time for a drive at the point of his jaw—and I asked no more.
But he wouldn't give me that second, and I couldn't do much for Michael with my spine shattered by a ·450 expanding bullet. Lejaune would think as much of shooting me as he would of putting his foot on a scorpion. … And if, by any wild chance, I succeeded, and knocked him out and secured the revolver—how should we be any the better off? Boldini and his gang, and probably Dupré too, were after the "diamond," and would kill Michael to get it. …
With Lejaune following, I reached the door of our barrack-room. Here the adjudant halted, his revolver raised, and whispered:
"Your brother, Maris, Cordier, St. André—quick. …" I crept to Michael's bed.
What would happen if he sprang up with a shout, and roused the snoring sleepers around him? Could Lejaune overawe the lot, or would they, empty-handed, have the courage to rush him? Probably they would not. Everybody waits for a lead in a case like that.
I began whispering in Michael's ear.
"Beau, old chap! … It's John. … Don't make a noise. … Beau, old chap! … It's John. … Hush! Don't make a noise. …"
He woke, and was instantly alert.
"What's up?" he whispered.
"Take your tunic and trousers and boots, get your rifle, and go out. Lejaune is relying on our party. Take your bayonet. …"
He saw Lejaune in the doorway, near which was the night-lamp, and got off his cot.
I crept to St. André, and woke him in the same way.
"The adjudant wants us," I whispered. "He's at the door."
"Good!" said St. André. "It is time he did something."
Maris also woke quietly, and soon grasped what was wanted of him.
By the time I had roused Cordier, Michael was creeping from the room, dressed, his rifle in his hand. I saw Lejaune give him some cartridges from his bulging side-pockets. I crept out too, taking my rifle and bayonet, and Lejaune gave me ten cartridges.
"Go outside and load," he whispered. "Quick. … Then shoot any man, at once, if he sets his foot on the floor, after a warning."
We charged our magazines and stood behind Lejaune in the doorway, rifles at the ready. St. André joined us and received the same orders. Lejaune shook his fist at Maris and Cordier, and beckoned to them angrily. Not one of the sleepers stirred.
When the other two joined us, Lejaune said:
"St. André and Cordier—remain here until relieved. If any man wakes, order silence, cover him with your rifle, and say you'll shoot him if he leaves his bed. Do it at once, to any man and every man, who disobeys. Fail, and I'll shoot you myself. … Follow me, you others," and he quietly returned to his quarters.
"Guard the door, you," he said to Maris, "and shoot anybody who approaches. Anybody, I say."
"Now you, quick," he said, entering the room and closing the door. "Give me this wretched diamond that is the cause of all this trouble."
He glared at Michael.
"You jewel-thieves have corrupted the whole of this garrison, and are a menace to discipline. I'll take charge of it now; and then I'll take charge of some of those swine who think they can plot murder and robbery and desertion in my Company, by God! … Out with it, you thieving gaol-bird. … Quick. … Unless you want your throat cut by those mad dogs of mutineers who've fixed your business for this morning, at parade. … Oh yes, I know all about it. … Quick, I say—the Devil blast your dirty soul …" and he shook his fist.
Michael stared back, as one lost in astonishment and wonder.
"'Diamond,' Monsieur l'Adjudant?" he murmured.
Lejaune's swarthy face was suffused, his eyes bulged and blazed.
"You try any tricks with me and I'll blow your filthy head off—here and now!" he roared, picking up his revolver from the table where he had laid it.
"Give me that diamond, you scurvy hound, and I'll keep it until I know whose property it is. D'you think I'm going to have the discipline of this fort spoiled by every cursed runaway jewel-thief that chooses to hide here with his swag, and tempt honest men? … Out with it, you gallows-cheating gaol-breaker, before I put you where you belong. … Quick!"
"I have no diamond, mon Adjudant," replied Michael quietly, and giving back look for look.
"As I could have told you, mon Adjudant," I put in, "my brother has never had a diamond in his life and neither have I."
Words failed Lejaune.
I thought (and hoped) that he was going to have an apoplectic fit. His red face went purple and his eyes bulged yet more. He drew back his lips, baring his cruel-looking teeth and causing his moustache to bristle.
He raised and pointed the revolver, and I was just about to bring up my rifle, but had the presence of mind to realise that he could shoot twice with the lifted revolver, before I could even bring my rifle up to cover him. Michael did not turn a hair, and I was thankful that I, too, had sufficient restraint to stand motionless at attention. A movement would have been mutiny, and probably—death.
I felt certain that Lejaune would have shot us both, then and there (and would have searched Michael's body), but for the precarious position in which he himself stood, and the fact that he needed us alive—for the present.
At any moment we might hear the rifles of St. André and Cordier, as the mutineers rushed them. Or, at any moment, for all that Lejaune knew, the mutineers might burst into the room, headed by St. André, Cordier, and Maris, to kill him. He believed that, like Michael and me, these three were faithful—but he did not know they were.
He was a brave man. Situated as he was, his life hanging by a thread, he still attended to the business in hand. He turned his heavy glare from Michael to me.
"Oh? You would talk, would you?" he said, in a quiet and most sinister tone of terrible self-repression. "Well! Well! You haven't much more time for talking. Not many more words to say. … Would you like to make another remark or two before I shoot you? … No? … Won't you speak again, gaol-bird? A little prayer, perhaps? …" and the scoundrel turned the revolver from Michael's face to mine, and back again to Michael's.
It was most unpleasant, the twitching finger of an infuriated homicidal maniac on the hair-trigger of a loaded revolver, a yard from one's face—a maniac who longed for our deaths that he might enrich himself beyond the dreams of his own avarice!
He began to swear blasphemously, horribly, foully. All that he had learnt of vileness among the vile with whom he had consorted, he poured over us. He literally and actually foamed.
We stood like statues. He put the revolver down in front of him, the better to tear his hair with both hands.
I thought of the aborigines of the Congo over whom his power had been absolute, and whose lives and deaths were in his hand and mere questions of his profit and loss …
And then suddenly, a thought which had been clamouring for attention for some minutes suddenly occupied my mind and brought comfort and a curious sense of security.
Of course, Lejaune would do nothing to us until the mutiny was quelled, and he was again unthreatened and supreme.
We five were his only defence, the sole support of his authority, his one chance of saving not only his life, but his reputation and career. Obviously he would not kill two-fifths nor one-fifth of his loyal troops at the moment of his greatest need. It was absurd.
And then, without thought, I did what would have been the bravest thing of my life if it had been done consciously, and with intent. I defied, insulted, and outfaced Lejaune!
"Look here, Lejaune," said I coolly, and in the manner of an Oxford undergraduate addressing an extortionate cabman or an impudent servant. "Look here, Lejaune, don't be a silly fool. Can't you understand that in about two minutes you may be hanging on that wall with bayonets through your hands—and left there, in a burning fort, to die? Or pinned out on the roof with the sun in your face? Don't be such an ass. We've got no diamond and you've got five good men to fight for you, more's the pity! Stop gibbering about jewels and be thankful that we five know our duty if you don't. …"
"Very Stout Fella," murmured my brother. "Order of Michael for you, John."
What would happen if the meanest slave in his palace went up to the Emperor of Abyssinia and smacked his face? … I don't know. Nor did Lejaune, or he would have done it, I think.
Probably the Emperor would begin by gasping and feeling faint. Lejaune gasped and looked faint.
Then he sprang to his feet with a sound that was a mixture of a roar, howl, and scream. As he did so, Michael's left hand made a swift, circling swoop, passed under Lejaune's hand, and swept the revolver to the floor.
Almost as it clattered to the ground, my bayonet was at Lejaune's throat and my finger was round my trigger.
Whether Lejaune had been going to shoot or not, I do not know, but he certainly looked as though rage had destroyed the last of his sanity, and our death was all he cared about.
Anyhow, he couldn't shoot now.
"Move—and I'll kill you," I hissed dramatically, feeling like a cinema star and an ass.
Michael picked up the revolver.
"So you are mutineers, you beautiful loyal lying grandsons of Gadarene swine, are you?" panted Lejaune, moving his head from side to side, and drawing deep breaths as though choking.
"Not at all," said Michael calmly. "We're decent soldiers wishing to do our duty properly—not to babble about diamonds two minutes before a mutiny breaks out. … Man, don't you know the fort will be burnt, the garrison gone, and you dead (if you are lucky), in an hour's time—unless you do your job while you've a chance? …"
"'Cré bon sang de bon jour de bon malheur de bon Dieu de Dieu de sort," swore Lejaune, "and I'll deal with you after this chien d'une revolte. But wait! You wait, my clever little friends. Hell's bells! I'll teach you one of my little lessons. … If you don't both die en crapaudine, by God, you shall live en crapaudine. …"
"Reward for saving your valuable life, I suppose," said Michael.
"You'll do that as your simple duty, my little friend. Oh, you love your duty. You are 'decent soldiers wishing to do your duty properly and not babble about diamonds' I believe? … Good! Come and do your duty then. We'll see what you'll babble about afterwards, with your mouths full of salt and sand, en crapaudine, eh? Perhaps you'll prefer drops of water to diamonds then, eh? … You wait. …"
He turned to me.
"And you talked about hanging on walls. And being pinned out in the sun, my little friend, eh? Will you kindly wait until I have you strapped up in a cell, of which I alone have the key? Perhaps it will not be I who 'jabbers about jewels' then, eh? … You wait. …"
"Your turn to jabber now, anyhow, Lejaune," said I wearily. "You're a fatiguing fellow. What about doing something now, and less of this 'waiting' business?"
The man pulled himself together, exerted his undeniably powerful will, and got the better of his immediate impulse.
"Come with me," he said quietly, and with a certain dignity. "Our real conversation is postponed until I have dealt with a few other unspeakables. We will then see what happens to those that threaten officers and point rifles at them. … Put that revolver down. …"
"Open the door, John," said Michael. I lowered my rifle and did so.
Maris, on guard outside, looked at me enquiringly. Presumably he had heard Lejaune's roars of rage.
Michael put the revolver on the table.
Lejaune took it up and strode to the open door.
"Follow me, you three," he said, and led the way to the barrack-room, without hesitating to turn his back to us.
Apparently he had complete faith in our loyalty to duty, and knew that he could depend upon us to obey any proper military order. At the door of the barrack-room stood St. André and Cordier, faisant sentinelle.
"Any trouble?" growled Lejaune, as they silently sprang to attention.
"No one has moved, mon Adjudant," replied St. André.
"Put down your rifles," said Lejaune to us three, "and bring all arms out of this room, quickly and silently. You other two will shoot any man who leaves his bed."
We set to work, emptying the arms-rack of the Lebel rifles first, and then going from bed to bed and removing the bayonet from its hook at the head of each.
A steel bayonet-scabbard struck a tin mug, and a man sat up. It was Vogué.
"Cover him," said Lejaune, and the two rifles turned toward the startled man. He looked in the direction of the voice.
"Lie down, man," I whispered. Vogué fell back instantly and closed his eyes.
It was remarkable with what speed slumber claimed him.
On my last journey to the door, with a double armful of bayonets, the inevitable happened. One slipped and fell. As it did so, I shot out my foot. The bayonet struck it and made little noise, but my foot knocked against a cot and its occupant sprang up, blinking.
"Himmel! What's that?" he said.
It was Glock.
"Lie down, Glock," I whispered. "Look," and I nodded my head toward the door.
"Shoot him if he moves," said Lejaune calmly.
Glock lay down again, staring at Lejaune, as a hypnotised rabbit at a snake.
I passed on, and in another minute there was not a weapon in the room, nor was there a sound. None slept so deeply as Corporal Boldini, who was nearest to the door.
Lejaune took a key from his pocket. "Into the armoury with them, St. André, Cordier, and Maris, quick!" he said. "You, St. André, mount guard. Send the key back to me with Cordier and Maris, and shoot instantly any living soul that approaches the place, other than one of these four men.
"Now then," he continued to Michael and me, as the others crept off, laden with rifles, "some of these swine are awake, so keep your eyes open. … If several jump at once, shoot Schwartz and Brandt. Then Haff and Delarey. If only one man moves, leave him to me. …"
A very, very faint lightening of the darkness outside the windows showed that the false dawn was breaking. As I stared into the room, I found myself trying to recall a verse about "Dawn's left hand" being in the sky and,
"Awake! for morning in the bowl of night Has flung the stone that puts the stars to flight; And lo! the Hunter of the East has caught The Sultan's turrets in a noose of light."
I tried to put it into Arabic, and wondered how the original sounded in the liquid Persian. … Was it "turrets" or "terrace"? …
What sort of a stone was Lejaune about to fling into the bowl of night? …
Would he order the five of us, when the other three returned, to open fire and begin a massacre of sleeping men?—an indiscriminate slaughter? …
He was quite capable of it. These were mutineers who had threatened his life, and, worse still, his sacred authority and discipline.
Why should he wait, he would argue, for a court martial to do it? Besides, if he waited, there would never be a court martial. He could not permanently arrest the whole lot with only five men, and guard his prisoners, garrison his fort, carry on all the work of the place, and mount sentries, with five men. What would happen when the five slept, ate, cooked, mounted guard on the roof? It couldn't be done. It was their lives or his, and the very existence of the fort.
Perhaps he'd only shoot the ringleaders?
What should I do if Lejaune ordered me to open fire on unarmed men in their beds? What would Michael do?
What was my duty in such a case, with orders from such an officer? Private conscience said, "Absolutely impossible! Sheer murder! You are not an executioner. … Not the public hangman."
Military conscience said, "Absolutely necessary. These men are guilty of the greatest military crime. It is Lejaune's duty to save the fort at any cost. Your duty is to obey your officer implicitly. If you refuse, you are a mutineer, as criminal as they."
The windows grew lighter.
Maris and Cordier crept back, their work completed. Maris gave Lejaune the key of the armoury.
"St. André is on guard over the magazine, mon Adjudant," whispered he, saluting.
"Good!" said Lejaune. "Maris, Brown, and Cordier, remain here. Shoot instantly any man who puts his foot to the ground. If there's a rush, shoot Schwartz first. Your own lives depend on your smartness. They're all unarmed, remember. … Come with me, you, Smith, and I'll disarm the guard and sentries. … Use your wits if you want to see daylight again."
He glared round the room.
"Aha, my little birds in a trap," he growled. "You'd plot against me. Me, l'Adjudant Lejaune, would you? … Ah! …"
I followed him down the passage.
"I'll clear that dog of a sentry off the roof first," he said. "Then there'll be no shooting down on us when I disarm the guard. …"
Leading the way, he went up the stairs that opened on to the flat roof, round which ran a thick, low, crenellated wall, embrasured for rifle-fire.
A sentry patrolled this roof at night, though the high look-out platform was not occupied, for obvious reasons, during the hours of darkness.
Lejaune relieved the sentry and posted me. He then took the man's rifle from him and ordered him to go below to the guard-room and request Sergeant Dupré to come up to the roof.
"Now," said he to me as the man went, "come here. Look," and he pointed down into the courtyard to the open door of the guard-room. "I shall order Sergeant Dupré to take the rifles of the guard and sentries, and then to send one man out of the guard-house with the lot. If any man comes out with only one rifle, shoot him at once. Shoot anybody who comes through that doorway, except a man with half a dozen rifles. And shoot to kill too."
I raised my rifle and covered the lighted doorway below me, at the other side of the courtyard.
"You understand," growled Lejaune. "The moment Sergeant Dupré enters that guard-room, after I've spoken to him, you shoot anybody who carries one rifle. A man with a rifle is a proclaimed and confessed mutineer. …"
I felt that he was right, and that it was my duty to obey him, little as I relished the idea of shooting comrades like bolting rabbits.
Should I shout, "Drop that rifle!" before I fired, and shoot if the man did not do it? I wondered if Lejaune would kill me if I did so.
I saw the relieved sentry cross the courtyard and enter the guard-room, and a moment later Sergeant Dupré came out.
"Watch!" growled Lejaune. "That sentry will talk, and they may make a rush."
Nothing stirred below.
Sergeant Dupré came up the stairs, out on to the roof, and saluted Lejaune.
"I want the rifles of the guard and sentries, Sergeant Dupré," said Lejaune. "Send one man, and only one, to me here, with the lot. Shoot instantly any man who hesitates for a second. No man is to leave the guard-room (except the one who carries all the rifles), or he'll be shot as he does so. …" And he pointed at me, standing with my rifle resting in an embrasure and covering the doorway below.
Sergeant Dupré saluted and turned about with a quiet, "Very good, mon Adjudant."
He descended the stairs and emerged into the courtyard, crossed it to the gate beneath the gate-house, and took the rifle from the sentry there. The man preceded him to the guard-room. Dupré visited the other sentries, repeating the procedure.
A minute after the Sergeant's last visit to the guard-room, a man came out. I was greatly relieved to see that he carried three or four rifles over each shoulder, the muzzles in his hands.
"Watch," growled Lejaune. "They may all rush out together now. Open rapid fire if they do," and he himself also covered the doorway with the rifle he had taken from the sentry.
The man with the rifles, one Gronau, a big stupid Alsatian, came up the stairs. I did not look round, but kept my eyes fixed on the doorway through which a yellow light (from "where the great guard-lantern guttered") struggled with that of the dawn.
I heard a clattering crash behind me and then I did look round, fully expecting to see that the man had felled Lejaune from behind.
Gronau had released the muzzles of the rifles, they had crashed down on the roof, and he was standing pointing, staring, his silly eyes goggling and his silly mouth wide open.
So obviously was he stricken by some strange vision, that Lejaune, instead of knocking him down, turned to look in the direction of his pointing hand.
I did the same.
The oasis was swarming with Arabs, swiftly and silently advancing to attack!
Even as I looked, a huge horde of camel-riders swept out to the left, another to the right, to make a detour and surround the fort on all sides. There were hundreds and hundreds of them already in sight, even in that poor light of early dawn.
Lejaune showed his metal instantly.
"Run like Hell," he barked at Gronau. "Back with those rifles," and sent him staggering with a push. "Send Sergeant Dupré here, quick."
"Down to the barrack-room," he snapped at me. "Give the alarm. Take this key to St. André and issue the rifles. Send me the bugler. Jump, or I'll …"
I jumped.
Even as I went, Lejaune's rifle opened rapid fire into the advancing hordes.
Rushing down the stairs and along the passage, I threw the key to St. André, who was standing like a graven image at the door of the magazine.
"Arabs!" I yelled. "Out with the rifles and ammunition!"
Dashing on, I came to the door of the barrack-room.
Michael was pointing his rifle at Boldini's head. Maris was covering Schwartz, and Cordier was wavering the muzzle of his rifle over the room generally. Everybody was awake, and there was a kind of whispered babel, over which rose Michael's clear and cheerful:
"Show a foot anybody who wants to die. …"
Nobody showed a foot, though all seemed to show resentment, especially Boldini, with a loaded rifle a yard from his ear.
Taking this in at a glance, I halted, drew breath and then bawled, "Aux armes! Aux armes! Les Arbis! Les Arbis!" and, with a shout to Michael and the other two, of:
"Up with you—we're surrounded," I turned to dash back, conscious of a surge of unclad men from the beds, as their gaolers rushed after me. Whoops and yells of joy pursued us, and gleeful howls of:
"Aux armes! Les Arbis!" as the delighted men snatched at their clothes.
St. André staggered towards us beneath a huge bundle of rifles.
Dupré and the guard were clattering up the stairs.
As we rushed out on to the roof, Lejaune roared:
"Stand to! Stand to! Open fire at once! Rapid fire! Give them Hell, you devils! Give them Hell!" and, ordering Dupré to take command of the roof, he rushed below.
A couple of minutes later, a constant trickle of men flowed up from below, men in shirt-sleeves, men bareheaded and barefooted, men in nothing but their trousers—but every man with a full cartridge-pouch and his rifle and bayonet.
Lejaune must have worked like a fiend, for within a few minutes of Gronau's dropping of the rifles, every man in the fort was on the roof, and from every embrasure rifles poured their magazine-fire upon the yelling, swarming Arabs.
It had been a very near thing. A very close shave indeed.
But for Gronau's coming up and diverting attention from the inside of the fort to the outside, there probably would not have been a man of the garrison alive in the place by now—except those of the wounded sufficiently alive to be worth keeping for torture.
One wild swift rush in the half-light, and they would have been into the place—to find what? A disarmed garrison!
As I charged my magazine and fired, loaded and fired, loaded and fired, I wondered if these things were "chance," and Gronau's arrival and idle glance round, at the last moment that gave a chance of safety, pure accidental coincidence.
A near thing indeed—and the issue yet in doubt, for it was a surprise attack. They had got terribly close, the oasis was in their hands, and there were many hundreds of them to our little half-company.
And they were brave. There was no denying that, as they swarmed up to the walls under our well-directed rapid-fire, an Arab falling almost as often as a legionary pulled the trigger.
While hundreds, along each side, fired at our embrasures at a few score yards' range, a large band attacked the gate with stones, axes, heavy swords, and bundles of kindling-wood to burn it down.
Here Lejaune, exposing himself fearlessly, led the defence, controlling a rapid volley-fire that had terrible effect, both physical and moral, until the whole attack ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and the Touaregs, as the sun rose, completely vanished from sight, to turn the assault into a siege and to pick us off, in safety, from behind the crests of the sand-hills.
I suppose this whirlwind dawn attack lasted no more than ten minutes from the moment that the first shot was fired by Lejaune, but it had seemed like hours to me.
I had shot at least a score of men, I thought. My rifle was hot and sweating grease, and several bullets had struck the deep embrasure in which I leaned to fire.
Below, the plain was dotted over with little heaps of white or blue clothing, looking more like scattered bundles of "washing" than dead ferocious men who, a minute before, had thirsted and yelled for the blood of the infidel, and had fearlessly charged to drink it.
Our bugler blew the "Cease fire," and on the order, "Unload! Stand easy," I looked round as I straightened myself up, unloaded my rifle, and stood at ease.
It was a strange sight.
At every embrasure there was a caricature of a soldier—in some cases almost naked—at his feet a litter of spent cartridges, and, in one or two instances, a pool of blood. As I looked, one of these wild figures, wearing nothing but a shirt and trousers, slowly sank to the ground, sat a moment and then collapsed, his head striking with a heavy thud. It was Blanc, the sailor.
Lejaune strode over from his place in the middle of the roof.
"Here," he shouted. "No room nor time, yet, for shirkers," and putting his arms round the man, dragged him from the ground and jerked him heavily into the embrasure.
There he posed the body, for Blanc appeared to be dead. Into the embrasure it leaned, chest on the upward sloping parapet, and elbows wedged against the outer edges of the massive uprights of the crenellation.
Lejaune placed the rifle on the flat top of the embrasure, a dead hand under it, a dead hand clasped round the small of the butt, the heel-plate against the dead shoulder, a dead cheek leaning against the butt.
"Continue to look useful, my friend, if you can't be useful," he jeered; and as he turned away, he added:
"Perhaps you'll see that route to Morocco if you stare hard enough."
"Now then, Corporal Boldini," he called, "take every third man below, get them fed and properly dressed, and double back here if you hear a shot, or the 'Assembly' blown. If there's no attack, take below one-half of the rest. … Then the remainder. … Have all klim-bim and standing-to again in thirty minutes. … You, St. André, and Maris, more ammunition. A hundred rounds per man. … Cordier, pails of water. Fill all water-flasks and then put filled pails there above the gate. … They may try another bonfire against it. … Sergeant Dupré, no wounded whatsoever will go below. Bring up the medical panniers. … Are all prisoners out of the cells?" …
He glared around, a competent, energetic, courageous soldier. "And where's the excellent Schwartz?" he went on. "Here, you dog, up on to that look-out platform and watch those palm trees—till the Arabs get you. … Watch that oasis, I say. … You'll have a little while up there for the thinking out of some more plots. …" And he laid his hand on the butt of his revolver, as he scowled menacingly at the big German.
Schwartz sprang up the ladder leading to the high look-out platform that towered far above the roof of the fort. It was the post of danger.
"Now use your eyes, all of you," bawled Lejaune, "and shoot as soon as you see anything to shoot at."
Ten minutes or so later, Boldini returned with the men whom he had taken below, now all dressed as for morning parade. They took their places and the Corporal hurried round the roof, touching each alternate man on the shoulder.
"Fall out, and go below," he ordered.
Ten minutes or so later they were back, fed, clothed, and in their right minds. Gone like magic were all signs of cafard, mutiny, and madness. These were eager, happy soldiers, revelling in a fight.
With the third batch I went, hoping to be back before anything happened. Not a rifle-shot broke the stillness, as we hastily swallowed soupe and coffee, and tore at our bread.
"Talk about 'They came to curse and remained to pray,'" murmured Michael, with bulging cheeks. "These jolly old Arabs removed our curse and remained for us to slay. There'll be no more talk of mutiny for a while."
"Nor of anything else, old bean," I replied, "if they remain to prey."
"Never get in here," said Michael. "They couldn't take this place without guns."
"Wonder what they're doing?" I mused.
"Diggin' themselves in on the crests of the sand-hills," said Michael. "They can't rush us, so they're going to do some fancy shooting."
"Yes. What about a regular siege?" I asked. "And killing only one of us to a score of them that we kill? We should be too few to man the four walls eventually."
"What about relief from Tokotu?" suggested Michael.
"Over a hundred miles away!" I replied, "and no wires. Nor any chance to heliograph across a level desert, even if they could see so far."
"Chance for the médaille militaire," grinned Michael. "Go to Lejaune and say, 'Fear not! Alone I will walk through the encircling foe and bring you relief.' Then you walk straight through them, what?"
"Might be done at night," I mused.
"I don't think," said Michael. "These merry men will sit round the place in a circle like a spiritualists' séance, holding hands, rather than let anyone slip through them."
"Full moon too," I observed. "Anyhow, I'm very grateful to the lads for rolling up. …"
"Shame to shoot 'em," agreed Michael, and then Boldini hounded us all back to the roof, and we resumed our stations.
All was ready, and the Arabs could come again as soon as they liked.
Lejaune paced round and round the roof like a tiger in a cage.
"Hi you, there!" he called up to Schwartz. "Can you see nothing?"
"Nothing moving, mon Adjudant," replied Schwartz.
A moment later he shouted something, and his voice was drowned in the rattle and crash of a sudden outbreak of rifle fire in a complete circle all round the fort. The Arabs had lined the nearest sand-hills on all sides of us, and lying flat below the crests, poured in a steady independent fire.
This was a very different thing from their first mad rush up to the very walls, when they hoped to surprise a sleeping fort and swarm up over the walls from each other's shoulders.
They were now difficult to see, and a man firing from his embrasure was as much exposed as an Arab lying flat behind a stone or in a trench scooped in the sand.
There was a man opposite to me, about a hundred yards distant, who merely appeared as a small black blob every few minutes. He must have been lying on a slope or in a shallow sand trench, and he only showed his head for a few seconds when he fired. I felt that either he or I would get hurt, sooner or later, for he, among others, was potting at my embrasure.
It was certainly "fancy shooting" as Michael had said, waiting for the small object, a man's head, to appear for five seconds at a hundred yards' range, and get a shot at it. It was certainly interesting too, and more difficult than rifle-range work, for one's nerves are not steadied nor one's aim improved by the knowledge that one is also being shot at oneself, and by several people.
With unpleasant frequency there was a sharp blow on the wall near my embrasure and sometimes the high wailing song of a ricochet, as the deflected and distorted bullet continued its flight at an angle to the line of its arrival.
The morning wore on and the sun gained rapidly in power.
Unreasonably and unreasoningly I did not expect to be hit, and I was not hit, but I was increasingly conscious of the terrific heat and of a severe headache. I wondered if high nervous tension made one more susceptible, or whether the day was really hotter than usual. …
Suddenly, the man on my right leapt back, shouted, spun round and fell to the ground, his rifle clattering at my feet.
I turned and stooped over him. It was the wretched Guantaio, shot through the middle of his face.
As I bent down, I was suddenly sent crashing against the wall, as Lejaune literally sprang at me.
"By God!" he roared. "You turn from your place again and I'll blow your head off! Duty, you dog! Get to your duty! What have you to do with this carrion, you cursed, slinking, cowering, hiding shirker …" and as I turned back into my embrasure, he picked up the choking, moaning Guantaio and flung him into the place from where he had fallen.
"Stay there, you rotten dog," he shouted, "and if you slide out of it, I'll pin you up with bayonets through you," and he forced the dying wretch into the embrasure so that he was wedged in position, with his head and shoulders showing through the aperture between the crenellations on either side of him.
"I'll have no skulking malingerers here," he roared. "You'll all stay in those embrasures alive or dead, while there's an Arab in sight. …"
Suddenly the Arab fire dwindled and slackened and then ceased. Either they had had enough of our heavy and accurate fire, or else some new tactics were going to be introduced. I imagined that a camel-man had ridden all round the sand-hills, out of sight, calling the leaders to colloquy with the Emir in command.
Our bugles sounded the "Cease fire."
"Stand easy! … Wounded lie down where they are," rang out Lejaune's voice, and some half-dozen men sank to the ground in their own blood. I was thankful to see that Michael was not among them.
Sergeant Dupré with Cordier, who had been a doctor, went to each in turn, with bandages and stimulants.
"Corporal Boldini," barked Lejaune, "take the men down in three batches. Ten minutes for soupe and a half-litre of wine each. Come back at the 'pas gymnastique' if you hear the 'Assembly' blown. … St. André, replenish ammunition. Each man to have a hundred. … Stop that bandaging, Cordier, and stir yourself. …"
When my turn came, later, to go below, I was more thankful for the comparative darkness and coolness of the caserne than for the soupe and wine even, for my head was splitting.
"'Moriturus te saluto,'" said Cordier, as he raised his mug of wine.
"Don't talk rot," said I. "You're no more moriturus than—Madame la République."
"I shall be dead before sunset," replied Cordier. "This place will be a silent grave shortly … 'Madame la République—morituri te salutant!' …" and he drank again.
"He's fey," said Michael. "Anyhow, better to die fighting than to be done in by Lejaune afterwards. … If I go, I'd like to take that gentle adjudant with me. …"
"He's a topping soldier," I said.
"Great," agreed Michael. "Let's forgive him."
"We will, if he dies," said I. "I am afraid that he'll see to it that he needs some forgiving, if he and we survive this show, and he gets control again. …"
"Yes," said Michael. "Do you know, I believe he's torn both ways when a man's hit. The brute in him says, 'That's one for you, you damned mutineer,' and the soldier in him says, 'One more of a tiny garrison gone.'"
"He's a foul brute," I agreed. "He absolutely flung two wounded, suffering men back into their embrasures—and enjoyed doing it."
"Partly enjoyment and partly tactics," said Michael wiping his lips, and lighting a cigarette. "He's going to give the Arabs the idea that not a man has been killed. Or else that he has so many men in the fort that another takes the place of each one that falls. … The Touaregs have no field-glasses, and to them a man in an embrasure is a man. …"
"What about when there are too few to keep up any volume of fire?" I asked.
"He may hope for relief before then," hazarded Michael.
"He does," put in St. André, who had just joined us and taken a seat at the table. "Dupré told me so. The wily beggar has kept the two goums outside every night lately—presumably ever since he knew of the conspiracy. They had orders to go, hell for leather, to Tokotu, and say the fort was attacked, the moment they heard a rifle fired, inside or out."
"By Jove!" I exclaimed. "Of course! He wouldn't send to Tokotu to ask for help in quelling a mutiny of his own men, before it happened—but he wouldn't mind a column arriving because a goum had erroneously reported an attack on the fort."
"Cunning lad!" agreed Michael. "And he knew that when the conspiracy was about to bloom and he nipped it in the bud, he'd be pretty shorthanded after it, if he should be attacked—even by a small raiding party out for a lark!"
"Yes," said Cordier. "He saved his face and he saved the fort too. If a shot had been fired at the mutineers, the goums would have scuttled off as ordered, and the relief-column from Tokotu would have found an heroic Lejaune cowing and guarding a gang of mutineers. … As it is, they'll know to-morrow morning, at Tokotu, that the place is invested, and they'll be here the next day."
"Question is—where shall we be by then?" I observed.
"In Hell, dear friends," smiled Cordier.
"Suppose the goums were chopped in the oasis?" said Michael. "Taken by surprise, as we were."
"What I said to Dupré!" replied Cordier. "But Lejaune was too old a bird. They camped in the oasis by day, but were ordered to be out at night, and patrol separately, one north to south on the east and the other on the west, a half-circle each, from sunset to sunrise, Dupré says … Likely they'd have been chopped in the oasis in the daytime all right, sound asleep—but they wouldn't be caught at dawn. They were well outside the enveloping movement from the oasis when the Arabs surrounded the place, and the goums would be off to Tokotu at the first shot or sooner. … By the time …"
"Up with you," shouted Boldini, and we hurried back to the roof and resumed our stations. The wounded were again in their places, one or two lying very still in them, others able to stand.
On either side of me, a dead man stood wedged into his embrasure, his rifle projecting before him, his elbows and the slope of the parapet keeping him in position.
I could see no sign of life from my side of the fort. Nothing but sand and stones over which danced the blinding aching heat-haze.
Suddenly there was a cry from Schwartz on the look-out platform.
"The palms," he shouted and pointed. "They're climbing them." He raised his rifle and fired.
Those were his last words. A volley rang out a minute later, and he fell.
Bullets were striking the wall against which I stood, upon its inner face. Arab marksmen had climbed to the tops of the palms of the oasis, and were firing down upon the roof. From all the sand-hills round, the circle of fire broke out again.
"Rapid fire at the palms," shouted Lejaune. "Sergeant Dupré, take half the men from the other three sides to that one. Bring those birds down from their trees quickly. … Brandt, up with you on to the look-out platform. Quick. …"
I glanced round as I charged my magazine afresh. Brandt looked at the platform and then at Lejaune. Lejaune's hand went to the revolver in the holster at his belt, and Brandt climbed the ladder, and started firing as quickly as he could work the bolt of his rifle.
Michael was still on his feet, but, as I turned back, I saw his neighbour spin round and crash down, clutching with both streaming hands at his throat.
When I took another swift glance later, the man had been wedged into the embrasure and posed by Lejaune as a living defender of the fort.
Soon afterwards I heard a shout from above, and turning, saw Brandt stagger backwards on the high platform. He struck the railing, toppled over, and came with a horrible crash to the roof.
"Find a good place for that carrion, Sergeant Dupré," shouted Lejaune. "Make him ornamental if he can't be useful."
I then heard him call the name of Haff.
"Up you go, Haff," he shouted. "You're another of these brave risque touts. Up you go!"
Schwartz, Brandt, Haff! Doubtless the next would be Delarey and Vogué. … And then Colonna, Gotto, and Bolidar. … Guantaio was dead. … Why didn't he send Michael up there? Presumably he hoped to keep him, St. André, Cordier, Maris, and me alive until the mutineer ringleaders and the diamond-stealers were dead. … He wouldn't want to be left victorious over the Arabs, only to find himself defenceless in the hands of the mutineers and the thieves.
I glanced up at Haff and saw that he was lying behind Schwartz's body, and firing over it as though it were a parapet along the edge of the platform.
I wondered how long this second phase of the fight had lasted, and whether we could hold out till night fell and the Arabs could not see to shoot. … Would they shoot by moonlight? It was unlikely, the Arab being, as a rule, averse from any sort of night work except peaceful travelling. A dawn rush is his favourite manœuvre. …
It was agony to fire my rifle, for my head ached with one of those terrible eye-strain heat-stroke pains that give the feeling that the head is opening and shutting, exposing the brain. Every explosion of my rifle was like a blow on the head with a heavy hammer. I had almost come to the end of my tether when once again the fire of the Arabs slackened and dwindled and died away.
On the "Cease fire" bugle being ordered by Lejaune, I straightened up. I looked round as the words, "Unload! Stand easy!" rang out.
Michael was all right, but a good half of the garrison was dead or dying, for quite half the men remained partly standing, partly lying, wedged into their embrasures as the others obeyed the orders shouted by Lejaune.
Among the dead were both Sergeant Dupré and Corporal Boldini, and both had been stuck up to simulate living men. Haff must be dead too, for Delarey had been sent up to the platform, and was lying flat behind a little pile of bodies.
St. André was alive, for Lejaune called out:
"St. André, take rank as Corporal. One half the men to go below for soupe and coffee. Double back quick if you hear the 'Assembly' blown …" and St. André passed round the roof, touching each alternate man of those who were standing up, and saying, "Fall out, and go below."
In many embrasures was a man whom he did not touch.
Poor Cordier had spoken truly as concerned his own fate, for he remained at his post, staring out with dead eyes across the desert.
Maris was dead too. There were left three men—St. André, Michael, and myself, upon whom Lejaune could rely if the Arabs now drew off and abandoned the siege of the fort.
But this, the Arabs did not do.
Leaving a circle of what were presumably their best marksmen, to pick off any of the defenders of the fort who showed themselves, the bulk of them retired out of sight behind the oasis and sand-hills beyond it.
By Lejaune's orders, the embrasures were occupied only by the dead, the living being ordered below in small parties, for rest and food.
St. André was told to see that every man left his bed and paquetage as tidy as for inspection, and that the room was in perfect order. Lejaune himself never left the roof, but had soupe, coffee, and wine brought up to him.
To the look-out platform he sent Vogué to join the bodies of his fellow-conspirators, Schwartz, Haff, and Delarey.
Except for a crouching sentry in the middle of each wall of the roof, those who were not below, feeding and resting, sat with their backs to the wall, each beside his embrasure.
The fire of the Arab sharpshooters did no harm, and they wasted their ammunition on dead men.
And so the evening came and wore away and the moon rose.
Where we were, we lay, with permission to sleep, St. André having the duty of seeing that two sentries patrolled each wall and were changed every two hours.
By Lejaune's orders, Vogué, in the dusk before moonrise, pushed the bodies of Schwartz, Haff, and Delarey from the look-out platform to fall down to the roof. They were then posed in embrasures, as though living defenders of the fort. It seemed to give Lejaune special pleasure to thrust his half-smoked cigarette between Schwartz's teeth, and pull the dead man's képi rakishly to one side.
"There, my fine conspirator," said he when the body was arranged to his liking. "Stand there and do your duty satisfactorily for the first time in your life, now you're dead. Much more useful now than ever you were before."
"He's a devil! He's a devil! He's mad—mad! …" groaned Vogué as he dragged the body of Delarey past me.
"Up with him! Put him over there," growled Lejaune, when Vogué had got the body in his arms. "I'll allot your corpse the place next to his, and your pipe shall be stuck between your teeth. You are fond of a pipe, friend Vogué! Helps you to think out plots, eh? … Up with him, you dog …" and he kept his hand on the butt of his revolver as he baited the man. He then sent him back to the look-out platform, to be a target for the Touaregs when the moon rose, or the sun, if he lived to see it. …
I had a talk with Michael when our turn came to go below for a rest and food.
"Looks like a thin time to-morrow," said Michael. "If they pot a few of us and then rush, they should get in."
"Yes," I agreed. "They ought to keep up a heavy fire while their ammunition lasts, and then charge on camels in one fell swoop. And then climb up from the backs of the camels. A lot would be killed but a bigger lot would get in."
"Don't give them the tip, anyhow," grinned Michael. "Two or three hundred of the devils inside the place, and it would be a short life and a merry for the half-dozen or so of us who were left by that time. …"
"If we can stand them off to-morrow, the relief from Tokotu ought to roll up the next morning," I said.
"If either of those goums got away and played the game," agreed Michael. "They may have been pinched though. … The relief will find a thin house here, if they do come. … It'll mean a commission for Lejaune all right."
"Nice if he's confirmed in command here, and we survive!" I remarked.
"Yes," said Michael, "and talking of which, look here, old son. If I take the knock and you don't, I want you to do something for me. … Something most important … what?"
"You can rely on me, Beau," I said.
"I know I can, John," he replied. "There's some letters. A funny public sort of letter, a letter for Claudia, and one for you, and one for Digby, in my belt—and there's a letter and a tiny packet for Aunt Patricia. If you possibly can, old chap, get that letter and packet to Aunt. No hurry about it—but get it to her. See? Especially the letter. The packet doesn't much matter, and it contains nothing of any value, but I'd die a lot more comfortable if I knew that Aunt Patricia was going to get that letter after my death. …"
"Oh, shut it, Beau," I said roughly. "Your number's not up yet. Don't talk rot."
"I'm only asking you to do something if I'm pipped," said Michael.
"And, of course, I'll do it if I'm alive," I replied. … "But suppose we're both killed?"
"Well—the things are addressed and stamped, and it's usual to forward such letters and packets found on dead soldiers, as you know. Depends on what happens. … If we die and Lejaune survives, I doubt their being dispatched. Or rather, I don't doubt at all. … Or if the Arabs get in, there's not much chance of anything surviving. … But if we're both killed and the relief gets in here before the Arabs do, the officer in charge would do the usual thing. … Anyhow, we can only hope for the best. …
"Anything I can do for you if it's the other way round, John?" he added.
"Well, love to Dig, you know, and there's a letter for Isobel, and you might write to her if ever you get back to civilisation and say we babbled of her, and sang, 'Just before the battle, Mother,' and 'Bring a flower from Maggie's grave,' and all that. …"
Michael grinned.
"I'll say the right things about you to Isobel, old son," he said, "and if otherwise, you'll see that Aunt gets my letter, eh? Be sure I'm dead though. … I mean if I were captured alive by Arabs, or anything humorous like that, I don't want her to get it while I'm alive. … Of course, all five of the letters are important, but I do want Aunt to get hers …"
And then St. André ordered our little party up to the roof, and brought down the other one.
The Arabs had ceased their desultory firing, and might have been a hundred miles away. Only the sight of a little smoke from their camp-fires and the occasional scent of the burning camel-dung and wood betrayed their presence, for none were in sight, and they made no sound. No one doubted, however, that a very complete chain of watchful sentries ringed us round, and made it utterly impossible for anyone to leave the fort and bring help to his besieged comrades.
The fact that Lejaune sent no one to make the attempt seemed to confirm the story that Dupré had told Cordier as they bandaged the wounded, and to show that Lejaune believed that the goums had got away.
It would be a wellnigh hopeless enterprise, but there was just a chance in a thousand that a daring and skilful scout might be able to crawl to where their camels were, and get away on one. Nor was Lejaune the man to take any count of the fact that it was almost certain torture and death for the man who attempted it.
I decided that, on the one hand, he felt pretty sure the goums had got away to Tokotu directly the Arabs appeared, and that, on the other hand, the two or three men whom he could trust were just the men whom he could not spare.
Unless St. André, Michael, and I were with him, his fate would be the same whether he drove the Arabs off or not, and doubtless he would rather go down fighting Arabs, than be murdered by his own men.
I was ordered on duty as sentry, and, for two hours, patrolled my side of the roof with my eyes on the moonlit desert, where nothing moved and whence no sound came.
When relieved, I had a little chat with St. André after he had posted my relief.
"Dawn will be the dangerous time; they'll rush us then," he said, "and it will want quick shooting to keep them down if they come all together and on all four sides at once. They must be a hundred to one. … I wonder if they'll bring ropes and poles, or ride their camels right up to the walls. …"
"If they don't count the cost, I don't see how we can keep them out," I said.
"Nothing could keep them out," replied St. André. "But if they fail at dawn they won't try again until the next dawn. They'll just pepper us all day and tire us out. … They think they have all the time they want."
"Haven't they?" I asked.
"No," replied St. André. "Lejaune is certain that one of the goums got away. The Arabs couldn't get them both, he says, as they were at opposite sides of the fort, and half a mile apart always, at night."
"What about their ammunition?" I asked. "The Touaregs', I mean."
"The more they spend the more determined they'll be to get ours, and the more likely to put their money on a swift dawn-rush with cold steel. …"
I lay down and fell asleep, to be awakened by the bugle and Lejaune's shout of "Stand to!"
There was no sign of dawn and none of the Arabs.
From the centre of the roof, Lejaune addressed the diminished garrison of Fort Zinderneuf.
"Now, my merry birds," said he, "you're going to sing, and sing like the happy joyous larks you are. We'll let our Arab friends know that we're not only awake, but also merry and bright. Now then—the Marching Song of the Legion first. All together, you warbling water-rats—Now." And led by his powerful bellow, we sang at the tops of our voices.
Through the Legion's extensive repertoire he took us, and between songs the bugler blew every call that he knew.
"Now laugh, you merry, happy, jolly, care-free, humorous swine. Laugh. … You, Vogué, up there—roar with laughter, or I'll make you roar with pain, by God. … Out with it. Now. …"
A wretched laugh, like that of a hungry hyena, came down from the look-out platform.
It was so mirthless a miserable cackle, and so ludicrous, that we laughed genuinely.
"Again, you grinning dog," roared Lejaune. "Laugh till your sides ache, you gibbering jackal. Laugh till the tears run down your horrible face, you shivering she-ass. Laugh! … Now. …"
Again the hideous quavering travesty of a laugh rang out, and the men below roared heartily at the ridiculous noise.
"Now then, you twittering sniggering soupe-snatchers, laugh in turn," shouted Lejaune. "From the right—you start, Gotto."
Gotto put up a pretty good roar.
"Now beat that, next. Out with it, or, by God, I'll give you something to laugh at," Lejaune continued.
And so round that circle of doomed men, among the dead men, ran the crazy laughter, the doomed howling noisily, the dead smiling secretly out to the illuminated silent desert.
"Now all together with me," roared Lejaune, and great guffaws rang out, desecrating the silence and the beauty of the moonlit scene.
It was the maddest, most incredible business—that horrible laughter among the dead, from men about to die.
Certainly the Arabs must have thought us mad and certainly they were not far wrong. Anyhow, they knew we were awake and must have gathered that we were cheerful and defiant.
For Lejaune was justified of his madness, and no dawn attack came.
Whether the Touaregs regarded us as "The afflicted of Allah," and feared to rush the place, or whether they realised that there could be no element of surprise in the attack, I do not know, but it was never made.
And when the sun rose and they again lined the sand-hills and opened their heavy fire upon the fort, every embrasure was occupied by an apparently unkillable man, and every Arab who exposed himself paid the penalty.
But not all those who lined the walls of Zinderneuf were beyond scathe by Arab bullets. Now and then there would be a cry, an oath, a gurgling grunt or cough, and a man would stagger back and fall, or die where he crouched, a bullet through his brain.
And, in every case, Lejaune would prop and pose and arrange the body, dead or dying, in the embrasure whence it had fallen, and to the distant Arab eyes it must have seemed that the number of the defenders was undiminished.
As the morning wore on, Lejaune took a rifle, and, crouching beside each dead man in turn, fired several shots from each embrasure, adding to the illusion that the dead were alive, as well as to the volume of fire.
Later still, he set one man to each wall to do the same thing, to pass continually up and down, firing from behind the dead.
When the Arab fire again slackened and then ceased, toward midday, and our bugle blew the "Cease fire," I hardly dared to turn round.
With a sigh of relief, I saw Michael among the few who rose from their embrasures at the order "Stand easy."
It was a terribly tiny band. Of all those who had sprung from their beds with cries of joy, at the shout of "Aux armes!" yesterday morning, only Lejaune, St. André, Michael, Colonna, Marigny, Vogué, Moscowski, Gotto, Vaerren, and I were still alive.
The end was inevitable, unless relief came from Tokotu before the Arabs assaulted the place. All they had to do now, was to run in and climb. Ten men cannot hold back a thousand.
If we survived to see the arrival of a relieving force, it would be the dead who saved us, these dead who gave the impression of a numerous, fearless, ever-watchful garrison, who would cause an attack across open ground to wither beneath the blast of their rifles like grass beneath a flame.
"Half the men below, for soupe and coffee and half a litre of wine, Corporal St. André," ordered Lejaune. "Back as soon as you can—or if the 'Assembly' is blown …" and St. André took each alternate man.
Soon coffee and soupe were ready, although the cook was dead, and we sat at table as though in a dream, surrounded by the tidy beds of dead men.
"Last lap!" said Michael, as I gave him a cigarette. "Last cigarette! Last bowl of soupe! Last mug of coffee! Last swig of wine! Well, well! It's as good an end as any—if a bit early. … Look out for the letter, Johnny," and he patted the front of his sash.
"Oh, come off it," I growled. "Last nothing. The relief is half-way here by now."
"Hope so," replied Michael. "But I don't greatly care, old son. So long as you see about the letter for me."
"Why I, rather than you, Beau?" I asked. "Just as likely that you do my posting for me."
"Don't know, Johnny. Just feel it in my bones," he replied. "I feel I'm in for it and you're not, and thank the Lord for the latter, old chap," and he gave my arm a little squeeze above the elbow. (His little grip of my arm, and squeeze, had been one of my greatest rewards and pleasures, all my life.)
As we returned to the roof at the end of our meal, Michael held out his hand to me.
"Well, good-bye, dear old Johnny," he said. "I wish to God I hadn't dragged you into this—but I think you'll come out all right. Give my love to Dig."
I wrung his hand.
"Good-bye, Beau," I replied. "Or rather, au 'voir. … Of course, you didn't 'drag' me into this. I had as much right to assume the blame for the theft of the 'Blue Water' as you and Dig had. … And it's been a great lark. …"
He patted my shoulder as we clattered up the stairs.
Lejaune assigned one side of the roof to Michael and the opposite one to me. Vogué and Vaerren respectively were sent to the other two. Our orders were to patrol the wall and shoot from behind a dead man, if we saw an Arab.
St. André took Colonna, Marigny, Moscowski, and Gotto below.
Lejaune himself went up to the look-out platform with his field-glasses and swept the horizon in the direction of Tokotu. Apparently he saw no sign of help.
Nothing moved on the sand-hills on my side of the fort, and I watched them over the heads of my dead comrades. …
How much longer could this last?
Would the Touaregs draw off from this fort-with-an-inexhaustible-garrison?
Would the relief come in time? If not, would they be in time to avenge us? It would be amusing if the Arabs, having got into the fort, were caught in it by the Senegalese and mounted troops from Tokotu—a poetic justice—for not a man of them would escape!
Where did all the flies come from? … Horrible! …
St. André and his party returned to the roof, and now two men were posted to each wall, St. André and Lejaune remaining in the centre of the roof to support whichever side of the fort should need it most when the attack came.
When it did come, it was a repetition of the siege-tactics and attrition warfare, a desultory fire of sharpshooters, and most of it aimed at the dead.
Up and down his half of the wall, each of the defenders hurried, firing from a different embrasure each time.
The Arabs must have been completely deceived, for they came no nearer, and fired impartially at the silent corpse-guarded embrasures and at those from which our eight rifles cracked.
Glancing round, as I darted from one embrasure to another, I saw that both Lejaune and St. André were in the firing-line now, and that Lejaune had one wall of the fort to himself. There were only seven of us left. Michael was among them.
The Arab fire died down.
Lejaune himself picked up the bugle and sounded the "Cease fire." I saw that Vogué, Moscowski, and Marigny were dead and propped up in their places. St. André was dabbing his face with a rag, where a bullet had torn his cheek and ear.
Colonna, Gotto, and I were sent below to get food, and we spoke not a single word. When we returned, Michael, Vaerren, and St. André went down in their turn.
Lejaune walked up and down the roof, humming "C'est la reine Pomaré," to all appearance cool and unconcerned.
Not an Arab was to be seen, and not a shot was fired.
I wondered whether they withdrew for meals or for prayers—or whether they fired so many rounds per man from their trenches on the sand-hills, and then awaited their reliefs from the oasis.
Certainly it was a leisurely little war—on their side; and no doubt they were well advised to conduct it so. They must have lost terribly in their first attack, and they had learnt wisdom.
A shot rang out.
"Stand to!" shouted Lejaune, and blew the "Assembly" two or three times, as though calling up reserves from below to the already well-manned walls.
That fort and its garrison must have been a sore puzzle to the gentle Touareg.
The firing recommenced and grew hotter, and an ominous change took place in the Arab tactics.
While a heavy fire was maintained from the crests of the sand-hills, men crawled forward en tirailleur and scratched shallow holes in the sand, behind stones. … Nearer and nearer they came. … They were going to assault again.
I rushed from embrasure to embrasure, up and down my side of the roof, pausing only just long enough to bring my fore-sight on to an Arab. Time after time I saw that I hit one of the running or crouching crawling figures drawing ever closer to the wall.
Lejaune was like a man possessed, loading and firing, dashing from place to place, and rushing from one side of the fort to the other, to empty the magazine of his rifle. …
Why from one side to the other? … As I loaded and fired, emptied and recharged my magazine, I found myself asking this question.
Glancing round, I saw the reason. There was no one defending the two walls that ran to left and right of mine.
Lejaune was firing a burst from one, and then dashing across to the other—defending two walls at once.
Only one man was defending the wall behind me. Swiftly I looked across.
It was not Michael. …
Only Lejaune, St. André, and I were on our feet.
This was the end. …
Michael was gone—but I should follow him in a minute.
Cramming another clip of cartridges into my hot rifle, I looked across again.
The opposite wall was now undefended.
Rushing across the roof from left to right, Lejaune shouted:
"Both walls, damn you! To and fro, curse you! Shoot like hell, blast you!" and I dashed across and emptied my magazine from that side, a shot from a different embrasure each time.
Back again I ran, and got off a burst of fire along the opposite wall.
And so Lejaune and I (Lejaune and I!) held Fort Zinderneuf for a while, two against a thousand.
And when I was nearly spent, panting like a hunted fox, dripping with sweat, and nearly blind with eye-strain and headache, the Arab fire again dwindled and died, and there was perfect silence—an incredible dreadful silence, after those hours of deafening racket.
"Go below, you, quick!" shouted Lejaune, pointing to the stairs. "Boil coffee and soupe, and bring them here. Double back, quick, the moment a shot is fired. They may be at us again in a few minutes. … If we keep them off till dark, we're saved. …"
"Hurry, you swine," he roared, as I stood staring at where Michael lay on his face in a pool of blood.
I dragged myself to the stairs as Lejaune cursed me.
As I went down them I heard him merrily blowing the "Cease fire," and bawling fierce orders to imaginary defenders of the fort.
I stumbled to the cook-house.
"Keep them off till dark and we're saved," did he say?
I hadn't the very faintest desire to be saved. Why should I be saved when Michael lay there so still?
As I struck a match to light the oil-stove, I thought I heard a shot. Rushing back up the stairs, I saw that Lejaune was posing a corpse in an embrasure. One body still lay where it had fallen.
It was Michael's.
I must have been mistaken as to hearing the sound of a shot. At any rate all was silent now, and Lejaune, his back to me, was fitting the dead man's rifle to his shoulder and clasping the dead left hand round the barrel.
I turned and crept back to my duties as cook, placed twigs and wood beneath the soupe-kettle, and turned up the wick of the oil-stove. …
And as I watched the fire burn up, I imagined Lejaune posing Michael's body—perhaps long before life was out of it. … The thought was unbearable.
He might be in agony.
He might be so wounded that his life could be saved if he lay flat. Not all the killed had been killed outright—though many of them had died immediately, as only their heads were exposed and their wounds were in the brain or throat.
There was really no more reason why Michael should be spared than any of the others should be—but he was my dearly-loved brother, and I simply could not bear it. I could not have his poor wounded body flung about like a sack of potatoes, and stuck up by the jeering Lejaune with indignities and insults.
He might not yet be dead, and his life might depend on what I did now! I turned to run upstairs.
Was I then going to mutiny after all? Was I going to defy my superior officer and tell him what he should, and what he should not, do in the fort that he commanded? Was I going to tell him that Michael was of superior clay and not to be treated as all the others had been treated?
I was.
And as I ran up the stairs, another thought struck me.
Michael's last request and instructions! I must get those letters and the little packet that he had spoken about. I must say to Lejaune:
"I'll fight till I drop, and I'll obey you implicitly—but leave my brother's body alone—leave it to me. …"
After all, things were a little different now.
Lejaune and I were the only survivors. We had passed through Hell unscathed, and, at the last, two against a thousand, had kept the Flag flying.
Surely he could be decent now, unbend a little, and behave as a man and a comrade. …
As I came out on to the roof, Lejaune was bending over Michael.
He had unfastened my brother's tunic, torn the lining out of his képi, removed his sash, and opened the flat pouch that formed part of the money-belt that Michael wore.
Lying beside Lejaune, were three or four letters, and a torn envelope. In his hands were a tiny packet, bound up in string and sealing-wax, and an opened letter.
I sprang toward him, seeing red, my whole soul ablaze with indignant rage that this foul vulturous thief should rob the dead, rob a soldier who had fought beside him thus—a brave man who had probably saved his life, before the fight began.
"So he 'had no diamond,' had he? Didn't know what I meant, didn't he?" the ruffian jeered, holding up the packet and the letter in his left hand.
"You damned thief! You foul pariah-dog!" I shouted, and, in a second, his revolver was at my face.
"Stand back, you swine," he growled. "Back further. Back, I say. …"
One movement, and I should be dead.
And a good thing too, but I had a word or two to say first. As I stepped back, he lowered the revolver and smiled horribly. …
"I didn't know that men crept round robbing the dead, after a fight, Lejaune," I said. "I thought that was left to Arab women—of the vilest sort. … You dirty thieving cur—you should be picking over dust-bins in the Paris gutters, not defiling an honourable uniform—chiffonnier! …"
Lejaune bared his teeth and laughed unpleasantly.
"A fine funeral oration from a jewel-thief!" he snarled. "Any more grand sentiments before I blow out what brains you have? No? Well, I think I promised you that I would attend to you, all in good time. Now I'm going to do it. … I am going to shoot you now, where you stand. Half a dozen through the stomach, shall we say? I don't want to hurry you unduly out of this pleasant world. … Oh no, don't think I want you any longer. The Arabs won't attack again to-day, and they've settled all my mutineers nicely for me. … And a relief-column will arrive at dawn. … Then you and the rest of these cursed dogs will be given a hole in the sand for the lot of you—and I shall get the Cross of the Legion of Honour, a Captain's commission, and a trip to Paris to receive thanks and decoration. … And at Paris, my chatty little friend, I shall dispose of this trifle that your gang so kindly brought to the Legion for me!" and he again held up the little packet in his left hand.
"A rich man, thanks to you—and to this …" and as he said the last word, he actually kicked Michael's body!
Even as I snatched at my sword-bayonet, and leapt forward—in the instant that my dazed and weary mind took in the incredible fact of this brutal kick—it also took in another fact even more incredible—Michael's eyes were open, and turned to me.
Michael was alive! … I would live too, if possible. … My hand, still grasping my bayonet, fell to my side.
"Good!" said Lejaune. "Armed attack on a superior officer—and in the face of the enemy! … Excellent! I court martial you myself. I find you guilty and I sentence you to death. … I also carry out the sentence myself. … Thus …" and the revolver travelled slowly from my face to the pit of my stomach.
"There! …"
As Lejaune had spoken, Michael's right hand had moved. As the last word was uttered, the hand seized Lejaune's foot, jerking him from his balance, as he pulled the trigger in the act of looking down and of stumbling.
Blinded, deafened, and dazed, I leapt and lunged with all my strength and drove my bayonet through Lejaune. I stumbled, and it was torn from my hand. When I could see again (for I must have ducked straight at the revolver as he fired it, or else he must have raised it as his foot was pulled from under him), he was lying on his back, twitching, the handle of the bayonet protruding from his chest, the blade through his heart.
Lejaune was dead, and I was the mutineer and murderer after all! I was the "butcher" and Lejaune the "pig."