With Rifle and Bayonet Part 17

"Well, what are you going to do?" asked Lord O'Farnel anxiously. "Don't throw your life away, old boy. Mount your pony and make a dash for it!

I'll take care of myself."

"Oh no, you won't!" exclaimed Jack sharply. "You're hurt, and I'm going to get you safely back to friends. I've two rifles and plenty of ammunition. These Boers will have to shoot pretty well to touch us here, and if they want to get closer they will have to cross the open ground. If they try that game I think I can promise to stop every one of them before they reach me. But when it gets dark I suppose the game will be up. If your leg wasn't broken I'd make a dash for it."

"Why not pack me up now?" asked Farney. "One rifle will be ample for you, for the magazine holds ten cartridges. Pull the lock out of the other, and tie my leg to it. I was shown how to make a gun splint by an army doctor and will put you up to the trick. Now open the lock, old boy. That's it! Put the b.u.t.t up under my arm and buckle it there with my belt. Now tie the leg to the barrel with my handkerchief and bandolier. That's it! you're a splendid surgeon, Jack. If you tie my other leg to the damaged one, you can do what you like without hurting me."

Jack did as he was directed. Placing the b.u.t.t of the rifle beneath the arm he secured it there with Farney's belt. Then he made the injured leg fast to the barrel, and with his own handkerchief and belt lashed both legs together.

By this time more than five minutes had pa.s.sed, and bullets had again begun to patter against the stones. But by dint of lifting a few more boulders into position Jack succeeded in constructing a few apertures through which he could see every part of the plain surrounding him. To reply to the shots directed against him was useless, for there was nothing but a series of faint puffs of flame to aim at. Still, he occasionally let off his rifle, to show the enemy that he was on the alert.

Lying flat on the ground, he crawled from side to side of the fort, keeping a particularly sharp watch in the direction in which the white flag had been shown. Suddenly he saw the flag lifted again, but this time it was waved rapidly to and fro, and then lowered. A moment later about a dozen dark figures burst from various parts of the ridge surrounding the hollow, and commenced to run towards him.

Leaning his rifle on a boulder, Jack took a steady aim and fired, the leader, who still carried the white flag attached to his weapon, falling forward on his face at once. Then he loaded again and picked off another of the attackers.

Within a minute he had discharged five more cartridges, his aim proving true on every occasion, so that as many as four Boers now lay motionless upon the ground, while three more were limping slowly away.

Then Jack made use of his magazine, and within as many seconds had shot two more of the Boers who happened to be close together.

The slaughter proved too much for the men who were attacking. At no time fond of exposing themselves in the open, they had dared it now knowing that only one rifle was opposed to them. But that rifle in Jack's hands was a deadly one, and, astonished and dismayed at the accurate shooting and at the loss they had already suffered, the remaining Boers turned and fled for their lives, Jack sending a few parting shots after them.

"They will let us alone for a little while after that," he exclaimed with a grunt of satisfaction. "Well, in a couple of hours it will be dark, and if they haven't taken me by then, I shall make a bolt for it.

Will you be ready, Farney?"

"Ready, old chap!" answered Lord O'Farnel with a gay laugh. "Of course I shall be! I dare say it will hurt a bit, but I don't want to become a Boer prisoner any more than you do. But how are you going to manage? I shall be awfully in the way. Why not leave me, and when you have reached the camp, come back for me with a few others to help you, and a stretcher?"

Jack glared at his friend.

"Did I not say I was going to get you out of this?" he said brusquely.

"I'm going to do it, and if you say another word I shall think you are afraid I shall hurt you!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed Farney. "Don't get annoyed. 'Pon my word, for a quiet inoffensive young chap, you are quite the boldest I have ever met.

Have a try at getting me out and you will not hear a groan from me.

But I wish I could help you. It's hateful to have to lie here and never fire a shot, whilst those fellows are sending showers of bullets at us."

"Very well," replied Jack in a softer tone, "wait till it is dark and we will get out of this. Half a minute, though. I think I shall be able to put these Boers off the scent."

Giving a sharp look round to see that a second rush was not being made, Jack slipped out of the fort, and, opening his knife, commenced cutting a big armful of gra.s.s and weed which grew beneath many of the boulders.

Then, still hidden from the Boers, he hacked at a small tree which stood near at hand, and crawled back to the fort dragging it after him.

Bundling the reeds and gra.s.s into as close compa.s.s as possible, he bound them round with others. Then he cut the branches off the tree and thrust the slim pole it left up through the centre of his bundle. With his friend's hat on top his dummy was completed, and a few moments later he had arranged a heap of stones with which to prop it up.

"There," he said, surveying the reeds with satisfaction, "as soon as it gets dusk we will put that up. That will make them think I am still here, and when night really falls I shall lift you as well as I can, get on Prince, and ride away in the direction in which we were galloping.

If they look for us anywhere, it will be towards the camp, so that by going the opposite way, and leaving our dummy up, we shall put them completely off the scent."

"Well, you are a 'cute one!" chuckled Farney. "Put them off the scent!

I should think it would! But you'll find me an awful weight, old chap.

Still, I've no doubt you'll manage it. You've stuck to this business like a brick, and as you've said you'll get me back to the camp I believe you'll do it."

It was already late in the afternoon, and the sun had sunk behind the sharp ridge of the Drakenberg range. But there was still sufficient light to see across the open ground to the circ.u.mference of the hollow, and since Jack had nothing more to do than to keep a good lookout, he opened his haversack and made a hearty meal of biscuits and a piece of cheese. Lord O'Farnel wouldn't touch a mouthful. Poor fellow! though evidently suffering acute agony from his broken leg, he never allowed so much as a groan to escape him. But his knitted forehead and the perspiration on his face showed that he was in pain, which was so severe that, though he had not touched a morsel since the previous night, he refused even to nibble a biscuit. But he drank all that remained in his water-bottle, and seemed much refreshed.

"Now, I think it is about time to stick our dummy up," said Jack, when it became so dark that the edges of the hollow were indistinct.

Slowly lifting the bundle, he perched it above the rocks, and wedged the stake between the stones; as he did so, a volley fired from some twenty rifles, showing that reinforcements had reached the Boers, was discharged at the figure, and a dozen or more bullets pa.s.sed through it.

For ten minutes the firing continued and then slackened off, till it ceased altogether. By this time it was almost pitch dark, so that Jack determined to set off.

Prince was already on his feet, and having placed him close to a boulder which he could use as a mounting-block, he went across to Lord O'Farnel, slung his rifle across his shoulder, grasped his pistol in his right hand, after having slipped one arm under his friend's legs, and, pa.s.sing the other beneath his shoulders, lifted him gently from the ground.

"Put your arms round my neck," he whispered. "Now hold on as tight as you can."

Stepping across the fort, Jack mounted the boulder and seated himself on Prince's back.

A touch with his heel sent the pony ahead, and soon they were out in the open, heading away from the camp.

About five minutes later Jack managed to hook his fingers in the reins and pull up, for the sound of approaching footsteps fell on his ear.

Then two dusky figures slipped by in the darkness, and having given them time to pa.s.s on, Jack once more set his animal going. When he had ridden about a mile, and was well clear of the hollow, there was a sudden burst of firing behind him followed by fierce shouts, changing almost immediately to angry cries, which reached him distinctly in the still night air.

"Ah!" he thought, "the Boers have been fairly taken in, and have rushed the fort, only to find a dummy there. I expect they are mad with rage."

Turning to the left, he now made a wide detour, and about two hours later rode into Craigside camp, utterly worn out with his exertions.

He was at once greeted with anxious questions as to the safety and whereabouts of the column with whom he and Lord O'Farnel had ridden.

But his first duty was to his friend, whom he carried towards the hospital tent. Here he found all the surgeons who were not out on the elopes of Talana Hill searching for the killed and wounded, hard at work treating the cases that had been brought in. But they had time to look to Lord O'Farnel.

"What's happened?" asked one of them, coming out of the tent and helping Jack to dismount with his burden. "Broken thigh? You've got that splint put on very nicely. Let us carry him in and look at him."

A minute later Farney was lying on a stretcher, and the splint was being taken off.

But the poor fellow knew nothing about it. Up to that he had borne the jolting, as he was being carried in Jack's arms, without a murmur, but when they reached the camp, his arms, which had been round his friend's neck, relaxed, and he went off into a dead faint. Jack waited long enough to see his clothes removed and the limb set. Then he went out of the tent and strolled back towards the quarters he had occupied on the previous night, leading Prince with him.

"Hi! Somerton!" someone shouted at this moment, "where are you?"

Jack walked towards the sound, and was met by a young officer carrying a lantern, and at once recognised him as one he had met in the Hussar mess on the previous night, and who was pointed out to him as being on the staff.

"I've been sent after you," the officer said, "to ask what has become of Moller's horse. You and O'Farnel rode out with them, I know, but none of them has returned up to this, though we heard firing in their direction. It begins to look nasty. Do you think they have been trapped?"

"I should not be at all surprised if they have been," Jack answered.

"O'Farnel and I were cut off and surrounded about a mile beyond the shoulder of the hill, and the remainder of our fellows rode on still farther. Towards evening I also heard firing right away behind, and there was more than one gun at work. I fear they have been taken. The Boer flight was a ruse. They certainly, bolted from the top of Talana Hill, but once they reached their friends with the guns they must have rallied. I know we were surrounded by about twenty of them."

"Then they have been taken," exclaimed the young staff-officer with conviction. "It's bad luck, and just spoils our victory. It was just like the plucky beggars to ride on when they must have known that hosts of Boers were near them. But how did you manage to get away, Somerton?

Our friends didn't let you go, I'm sure, and twenty to two, and one of those two wounded, is precious long odds to fight against."

"Oh, they did their best to bag us!" answered Jack quietly. "But we played their own particular game. O'Farnel was knocked over and badly hurt, so I stopped to help him. Then, when the Boers began to fire, I dragged him behind the stones, built up a kind of fort round us, and banged at them in return. They told me to surrender, and I advised them to clear off. Then they made a rush, but that didn't help them, for I was able to bowl several of them over long before they reached the fort.

After that they got under cover again, and as soon as it was dark we slipped away, leaving a dummy stuck up on a stick to make them believe we were there. They made a splendid rush in the dark and captured it, and weren't they wild when they found we had gone!"

"By Jove! do you mean to say you kept a lot of them at bay, and got clean away, bringing a badly-injured man with you?" exclaimed the officer. "Well, you're a plucky beggar, and I shall tell our general.

By the way, have you heard that poor General Symons was badly hit, and is now in hospital?"

"I haven't heard anything," Jack answered. "Tell me how many men we have lost."