CHAPTER IX
FRIENDS OR FOES?
Feeling that he was now reasonably safe, Burnet led the horse through the stretch of marsh land that bordered the river until he reached a dry spot, screened by tall grasses, where he could rest and think out his course.
To begin with, he had lost a whole day. With the utmost expedition, and no accidents, he could hardly reach the tell at the time appointed with Captain Ellingford. Moreover, the horse, to which he owed his escape, was now an encumbrance and an embarrassment. The remainder of his journey lay over a parched and barren plain, that provided sustenance for neither man nor beast. The small stock of dates which he had purchased in Meshed Ali would suffice for himself, but not for the horse as well. True, the Arab horse was accustomed to go long distances with little or no food, but it would be two days at the best before he reached the tell, and two days' fast was beyond even the Arab's endurance. Further if by good luck he should meet Captain Ellingford—and that was now doubtful—what could he do with the horse then? He could not return to the British lines except by aeroplane: yet it went much against the grain to abandon the noble animal that had served him so well. If turned adrift and left to forage for himself, the horse would probably pick up a subsistence until he found a new master. A new master! In these regions that could hardly be any one than an enemy. Turkish troops were constantly on the move in the plains between the Euphrates and the Tigris. Burnet was loth to let his prize fall again into Turkish hands. The problem how to save the horse and yet not fail in his appointment with Captain Ellingford was a very hard nut to crack.
When Burnet had pondered the question for some time, a light suddenly dawned upon him. The stronghold of the young chief Rejeb, which he had heard described in the course of the interview between General Eisenstein and Major Burckhardt, was about one march distant from the tell, in a south-easterly direction. As nearly as he could judge, the spot where he had crossed the river was almost due south of the tell. In all probability, then, the stronghold was not less than fifteen nor more than twenty-five miles to the east. Could he discover the stronghold, leave the horse in Rejeb's care, and yet keep his appointment with Captain Ellingford?
There were several circumstances to take into consideration. In the first place, it was clear from what the Germans had said that the stronghold was not easy to discover. Its locality was not well known to the authorities in Bagdad; they had had recourse to Major Burckhardt; it was certain that Rejeb had chosen a place far from the tracks of the desert travellers, and by its very nature hard of access. Then, too, the expedition organised against it might already be on foot; the stronghold might, indeed, have already fallen. To approach it might be to jump into the lion's jaws. On the other hand, General Eisenstein had anticipated delay. The month he had allowed for the organisation of the expedition was barely up, and there might be time to gain the stronghold before operations began, and, indeed, to give Rejeb warning of what was to come.
On the whole Burnet decided that it was worth attempting. If he failed to find the stronghold, he could make up for lost time by riding instead of walking to the tell, and the horse must then, after all, be turned adrift.
Having made up his mind, he shared a few dates with the horse, ventured to drink a little water from a pool, then mounted and set off eastward. He had expected that in proportion as he increased his distance from the river the country would grow less swampy; on the contrary, the farther he went, the worse it became. Again he found it necessary to trust largely to his horse. The necessity of making detours was annoying, because they involved loss of time. But as the animal picked its way unerringly through the marshy patches, Burnet began to realise the defensive possibilities of this water-logged region. If this was the country chosen by Rejeb's tribe as their refuge, the stronghold should give its assailants a vast amount of trouble. Unhealthy it might be; it was certainly secure.
As the day wore on, Burnet wondered whether he had decided rightly. Progress was terribly slow. The zigzag course necessitated by the nature of the ground, made it difficult even to maintain his general direction. Without a compass, without definite knowledge of the position of the stronghold, it seemed that he might wander for days in this desolate region without gaining a single clue. At nightfall he was almost in despair. Fatigue, the reaction from the strain of the escape and the pursuit, told heavily upon his spirits, and when he sought a secluded spot where he might rest during the night, he was a prey to that heart-sickness and despondency which assails at times even the bravest.
He found a clear and fairly dry space, with a background of shrubs, which seemed to promise security for the night. Tethering his horse to a stout bush, he fastened his revolver to his wrist, and lay down, with his back to the wall of vegetation, his face to the open. Weary though he was, he intended to keep awake, but he dozed more than once, shook himself, got up and walked about, lay down again when he thought himself fully roused, only to fall at once into a profound sleep.
In the dead of night he was suddenly startled into consciousness by a shrill whinny from his horse. He was in the act of springing to his feet when a number of forms closed in upon him silently out of the darkness. Before he could use his revolver he was seized, thrown violently back upon the ground, and in spite of his struggles securely held. It was so dark that he could not count his captors; but while he lay in their grasp there was the sound of others approaching; he heard no voices; the men who held him had said nothing, and one had pressed a hand upon his mouth. Presently a light was struck: Burnet remembered as an incongruous detail in such a spot that it was a safety match; and a small lantern was lit. By its feeble light he saw himself surrounded by a score of well-armed Arabs. He tried to speak, but the pressure upon his mouth did not relax. Two of the men swiftly tied his hands; another gagged him with a strip of dirty cloth cut from his garment; then he was lifted up, his horse was released, and the whole party, preceded by the man carrying the lantern, quitted the open space and started to march through the tall grasses below.
A CAPTIVE IN BONDS
The silence of his captors, their rapid yet stealthy movements, suggested the caution of men travelling in an enemy's country, or at any rate in the neighbourhood of a hostile force. They followed their leader, who held the lantern, in single file, each keeping closely in touch with the man before him. Burnet had been placed about half-way down the line, and immediately behind him came the man leading his horse.
Glancing at the sky, he knew by the position of the stars that the general direction of their march was eastward, and he wondered with a certain hopefulness whether their destination was the stronghold which he had set out to find. Their muteness had prevented him from picking up clues from conversation, and they might, for all he could tell, be a part of the force of Rejeb's enemy the chief Halil. But it seemed much more probable that they were Rejeb's men, and Burnet was vexed that their over-caution in gagging him prevented him from explaining that he was a friend of their chief.
The march continued without pause through the rest of the night. The leader made so many turns in seeking practicable paths through the swamp that the distance covered must have been three times the distance as the crow flies. Burnet, tired when he started, was ready to drop with fatigue; but he was resolved to "stick it out," and to show no sign of his condition. It was not until the darkness began to break that the embargo of silence was lifted. The leader appeared to consult with some of the men at the head of the line. Their tones were so low that Burnet could not hear what was said, and after a few minutes they again fell silent. When, however, it was quite light they halted. Two or three of the men went ahead in different directions, evidently to scout, and when they returned after a brief interval, the leader gave a grunt of satisfaction, and the whole party, at his signal, opened their wallets and prepared to take a meal. At another signal the man who had marched behind Burnet removed the gag, and placed him before the leader.
This man, a swarthy hook-nosed Arab of about thirty-five years, looked keenly at his prisoner.
"That is a fine horse," were his first words. "Where did you steal it?"
Burnet could not help smiling. The man had shrewdly hit the mark. What should he reply? He thought it best for the present to temporise.
"Truly he that borrows meaning not to pay back is a thief," he said: "yet it is not theft if it is done openly."
"Wallah!" grunted the man. "What is your name, whence do you come, and on what errand?"
These questions came after a slight pause, during which Burnet had thought rapidly. His captors must have recognised the military trappings of the horse; they must know that it had belonged to some one in the Turkish service, and their suspicion that he had stolen it, together with the absence of any note of indignation in the leader's question, seemed to argue that they were at any rate no great friends of the Turk, and to confirm his surmise that they were Rejeb's men. He resolved on a bold stroke.
"Is it for servants to know their master's business?" he said. "My errand shall be told to your chief. Send word to Rejeb your master that Yusuf the boatman would have speech with him."
He had spoken in loud tones so that all might hear, and the start of surprise which he noticed in a rapid glance around the company at the name Rejeb convinced him that he was right.
"We have heard of Yusuf the boatman," said the leader, with a marked change of tone. "Are you indeed the man who saved Rejeb out of the hand of Halil's creatures?—the man whom our chief bade us hold in honour?"
"I am he. And that there be no delay, send a man upon this horse to your chief, telling him that Yusuf the boatman is here."
The leader ordered one of his men to ride off with the message, and the rest to resume their march.
"May not my hands now be unbound?" Burnet asked, as he set off with the rest.
"Nay, that is for our chief to order," replied the man. "What if you are some paltry horse-thief that has taken the name of Yusuf the boatman with some evil design? Your dress is rather that of a camel-driver than of a boatman."
"Truly your chief has faithful servants. So be it, then, until his eyes fall upon me."
Something less than an hour later, a small party of horsemen was seen in the distance, approaching at speed. One of them had a led horse. In a few minutes Rejeb rode up at the head of his men.
"Peace be with you!" he cried, springing from his horse, and coming towards Burnet with an eager light in his eyes. "This is a day of rejoicing. But what is this? Your hands are bound!"
"Your servant here kept me faithfully bound until assured that I am what I said I was."
"Mashallah! Loose him at once," he cried to the man. "Know that this is the brother of whom I told you, saying that he had saved my life, and that I and my people are bounden to him for ever. And now, my brother, mount this horse that I have brought for you: that horse the messenger rode was weary and famished and is being well cared for."
He put no questions to Burnet, treating him as a guest who had been expected. The horsemen rode off, Rejeb commanding the unmounted party to follow as rapidly as they could. During the ride there was little conversation between Rejeb and Burnet, though the latter guessed from the young chief's manner that he either had important news to give, or expected to hear something of importance.
After about half an hour's easy trot they came in sight of extensive ruins on a mound surrounded by swamp, and as they drew nearer to them, Burnet wondered how the stronghold, if this it was, could be approached, for it appeared to be completely encircled by wide expanses of water, broken here and there by areas of mud or reeds. Presently, however, they came to a broad wady that must in ancient times have been one of the major irrigation works of the district. Here the party fell into single file, and Rejeb, apologising for riding in front of his guest, led the way along the narrow embankment of the channel. At intervals the embankment was intersected by smaller wadys: these the horsemen waded through.
When they at length arrived opposite the mound, Rejeb turned abruptly to the right and pushed through a clump of reeds on to a narrow stone causeway, fringed on both sides with tall rushes which completely hid it from view. It led directly to the mound, almost half a mile ahead in a straight line. Burnet learnt, later on, that the causeway was believed to date from the Babylonian age; it was supposed to have been built, not for the passage of the swamp—for in those days the surrounding country was probably dry land, carefully irrigated from the wadys—but as a means of access to the temple which then crowned the mound, in times of flood due to abnormal rainfall. Centuries of neglect had turned the land once well drained into permanent swamp, but the solid masonry of the causeway had withstood the ravages of time, though when Rejeb's people first discovered it it had been much overgrown with rampant vegetation. They had at once perceived the advantages of the mound as a natural fortress and of the causeway as the only means of access. They cleared away the overgrowth except at the edges, where the vegetation that was allowed to remain made the causeway a sort of secret lane.
On riding up the mound, Burnet saw that the ruins were even more extensive than they had appeared at a distance. They covered a space nearly half a mile long and a third of a mile wide. He conjectured that the place had been the site of a temple and the dwellings of a community of priests. The lower part of what had once been a large tower was in a fair state of preservation, and dominated the rest of the ruins. It was here that Rejeb and his family were lodged; for, young as he was, he had already a wife and children. No other buildings had been habitable when the mound was chosen as a harbour of refuge; but the young men of the tribe had made for themselves fairly serviceable shelters out of the fragments of masonry with which the site abounded.
These details were explained by Rejeb as he led the way to his tower. He explained also that only part of his tribe had found refuge here. The rest were dispersed. Many of them, especially the old men, women, and children, had been received by friendly tribes in the southern desert. With the exception of Rejeb's own family, the occupants of the tell were nearly all fighting men. They had with them all their most valuable horses, and were armed with rifles of various patterns. Their great difficulty was the supply of food and fodder. They had brought with them a considerable stock of dates, meal, and dried goat's flesh, which they kept in underground cellars excavated for the purpose; and this they supplemented by periodical forays upon the plantations and flocks of the weaker tribes of the marshes. But it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep up the supply, especially of fodder for the horses. A great part of the surplus produce of the neighbouring tribes was sold to the Turkish army, and the sympathies of these people was naturally on the side of their customers. They would just as readily sell food to the British, but the British were still barred by the entrenchments at Kut el Amara. The smaller communities of Arabs, moreover, were dominated by the large and powerful tribe of Halil; and Rejeb's people, obliged to retreat into their fastness, were not in a position to exchange and barter commodities. Their only means of supplying themselves was to swoop suddenly, most often by night, upon the settlements of their less warlike neighbours, and of late they had only too often returned from these forays unsuccessful.
It was not until Rejeb had conducted Burnet to his tower that the important matters each had at heart were entered upon. In a bare stone room, as comfortless as a hermit's cell, the two young men, seated on blocks of stone, exchanged confidences.
"You know me as Yusuf the boatman," Burnet began. "I owe it to you to tell you that I am really an Englishman—the son of Burnet Aga of whom you may have heard."
The Arab gave no sign of surprise.
"Did not my heart tell me you were not as you seemed?" he said.
"I would tell you all my adventures but that I have little time to spare," Burnet went on. "I promised to join a British officer to-day at the tell where you and I met. Let it suffice that I have been to Bagdad on a secret errand, that I fell into the hands of Turks as I came to seek you, and escaped on the horse of their officer. The rest of my story must be told at leisure on some future day. Now, my friend, Firouz Ali, the barber of Bagdad, sent a messenger to inform you that the Turks have joined hands with Halil to root out you and your tribe. Did the man reach you?"
"He came but a few days ago, and departed immediately to carry his tidings to your general below Kut, for it is a matter that concerns your army weightily. The talk of the country is that Kut is a locked door which your countrymen will never open. Yet there must be some among the Turks who fear that the lock will one day be burst: if it were not so, why should they help Halil to destroy a small tribe like mine? Is it not because they know that my people hate the Turks, and will lend assistance to all who are the Turk's enemies? When the barriers at Kut are burst, and your army pours through the open doorway to attack Bagdad, my people will help to protect them on the side of the Euphrates. This the Turks well know, and therefore it is that they go about to destroy me, as it were to pluck a thorn from a foot. I bade the messenger tell these things to your general, but I cannot hope that he will send me help, for he is a great way off, and moreover he will not move a part of his army so far from his main body. There is no help for me until Kut has fallen. Wallahi! I must guard my own skin. In my father's days his tribe withstood more than once the power of the pashas of Bagdad; they will do so again, though in truth the odds are heavy against them now, when the Germans have furnished the Turks with new and terrible engines of war such as my father never knew. But we will make a stout defence in this our stronghold, and Allah is merciful to those who fight in a good cause."
Burnet admired the young chief's courage, though he doubted whether, even in a position so strong by nature, all the valour of the Arabs would prevail against the superior arms of the enemy. Rejeb informed him that the parties of scouts whom he sent out daily had as yet learnt nothing of the expedition, and his great hope was that the British would have broken through at Kut before the menace became pressing.
It was necessary that Burnet should depart betimes if he was to reach his rendezvous with Captain Ellingford while daylight lasted. After consultation with Rejeb it was arranged that he should ride out under the escort of a few picked mounted men, who would conduct him by the shortest route to the tell. They would not actually approach the tell, lest the sight of Arabs near the spot should deter Captain Ellingford from alighting. Having brought Burnet within two or three miles of it, they would return, taking his horse with them, and leaving him to perform the remainder of the journey on foot. They would furnish him with food and water enough for two or three days. If by ill luck the captain should not keep the appointment, Burnet would return on foot to Rejeb's stronghold, and endeavour to reach the British lines by a long detour.
Rejeb summoned six of his men, explained that they were to serve Burnet as they would serve himself, and gave them the orders that had been agreed upon. A little more than an hour after his arrival at the stronghold Burnet quitted it, riding the Turk's horse, and accompanied by the six Arabs, on mounts little inferior to his own.