CHAPTER X
THE TRYST
It was nearly noon when Burnet and his escort reached the spot, between two and three miles from the tell, where they were to part company. Autumn was merging into winter, and the midday heat was not so great as to necessitate a long halt. Burnet took leave of the Arabs, confided his horse to their care, and went alone on foot across the plain. The route chosen for him by his guides was not direct, and the journey took him twice as long as it would have done had he followed his own judgment; but it was safe; he met no one; and he arrived at the tell a little after two o'clock.
There was no sign of Captain Ellingford. Burnet went down to the underground chamber, exchanged his Arab dress for his own uniform, then returned to his former look-out post on the mound, field-glasses in hand. It was a case for the cultivation of oriental patience. Two or three hours passed. He had frequently scanned the horizon, without catching a glimpse either of the expected aeroplane or of figures on the plain. At last, however, almost at the same moment, he noticed, away to the north-west, a dust cloud moving on the ground, which speedily resolved itself into a strong body of horsemen, and some distance to the east of them a speck in the sky which grew larger moment by moment and was undoubtedly an aeroplane, flying at a height of about two thousand feet. Burnet had just focussed it through his field-glasses when it dropped swiftly earthwards, and vanished from his sight. He had not had time to distinguish its make; but it was unlikely that an enemy machine was flying in this direction on the very day when Captain Ellingford had promised to return to the tell. On the other hand, if the machine was piloted by the captain, why had he alighted so far from his destination? Was he the victim suddenly of the airman's chief foe, engine trouble?
Burnet turned his glasses towards the body of horsemen. They had changed their course, and were now galloping eastward, in the direction in which the aeroplane had come down. Smitten with misgiving, Burnet slipped the glasses back into their case, hurried down the slope, and set off at his best pace towards the spot where he feared his friend was in peril. It was hard going. When he had left the sandy neighbourhood of the tell, he had to skirt swamps, cross wadys, and sometimes to force his way through thick masses of reeds. To make matters worse, his view was circumscribed by the rushes and tall grass, so that he could only gauge his general direction by the sun.
After half an hour's exhausting progress he began to wonder whether he had not overshot the mark. He had seen no sign of the horsemen, nor of the aeroplane, which must stand higher than they. In this trackless and desolate region he might wander as in a maze. But just when the difficulties of the situation were weighing his spirits down to the point of despair, he was suddenly startled by the rattle of a machine-gun not far ahead, the crackle of musketry, and loud cries.
At this moment he was on the edge of a reedy swamp, like those which he had skirted more than once since he left the tell. He felt that it was no time for caution, and plunged into the yielding surface, sinking in first up to his ankles, and soon finding himself in deep water where it was necessary to swim. Wading toilsomely through the slime beyond, he scrambled ashore, coated with mud and green scum, and dashed through the reeds, guided always by the continuous sounds of conflict. A quarter-mile of stumbling, wading, dragging his mud-caked boots brought him to the edge of a belt of rushes that separated the morass from a broad clear space beyond, and as he plunged through the tall flags he dreaded what he might see on the other side.
By this time the firing had ceased. When he parted the screen of rushes and peered through he saw the aeroplane not far from the centre of the open space. Near it Captain Ellingford lay on the ground, guarded by two Turkish troopers. Forty or fifty other Turks were intently examining the machine. A little beyond it were several prone forms, and farther away the horses of the troop were bunched together in the charge of half a dozen men.
The Turks were too much occupied and interested to observe the face peering at them through the rushes. After a rapid glance that took in all the details of the scene Burnet stepped silently back under cover. There came to his ears the sounds of an animated conversation between the officer in command and his subordinates. He could not understand what they said, but guessed that they were discussing in perplexity the question what to do with their prize. Presently the officer gave a series of sharp orders, and parting the rushes to make for himself a peep-hole, Burnet saw the greater number of the men cross the space and mount their horses. A few of them then rode off in different directions, no doubt to act as vedettes and give warning if an enemy approached. The remainder lined up and awaited further orders.
Meanwhile the officer resumed his conversation with the men he had retained. It was clear from their puzzled looks that they could come to no conclusion about the disposal of the aeroplane. Burnet guessed that they were unwilling to destroy a machine which would be useful to their own army; but the problem how to convey it to their lines, probably a good many miles away, over country that was one long succession of swamps, was evidently beyond them.
After a time, however, it appeared that light had dawned. Burnet heard the word wady several times repeated, and though his ignorance of Turkish prevented him from understanding in what connection it was used, it gave him a clue to their next step. The officer sent one of the men to convey an order to the mounted group. A dozen of the troopers rode away westward, in the direction of the Euphrates. The rest dismounted again. While some of them brought picketing ropes and attached them to the aeroplane, others began to beat down the rushes that edged the northern boundary of the open space. Then two of the horses were yoked to the ropes, and dragged the machine slowly towards the track which the troopers were hastily making. Burnet came to the conclusion that they intended to draw the aeroplane to a wady somewhere to the north, float it there, perhaps on an extemporised raft, and so convey it to the river.
As soon as the aeroplane began to move, the officer gave an order to the two men standing sentry over Captain Ellingford, and then Burnet saw for the first time that his friend was wounded. The Turks helped him to his feet, with a care that showed a certain chivalrousness, and supported between them he limped after his machine.
Burnet felt utterly helpless. Alone against forty or fifty men, he could do nothing, either to rescue his friend or to save the aeroplane. True, night was approaching: the Turks could not complete their preparations for floating the machine that day; he might follow them up on the chance of finding an opportunity in the darkness of getting the captain away, if not of destroying the engine. But on second thoughts he recognised the almost certain futility of such a course. Ellingford was wounded, probably unable either to endure the fatigue of walking or to sit a horse. It was scarcely likely that circumstances would again favour such audacious but hazardous schemes as had already twice won success. Burnet felt that an attempt to make off with a couple of horses would be to strain good fortune too heavily. Yet it went utterly against the grain to allow a British officer to remain a prisoner with the Turks, or a British aeroplane to take place in a Turkish flight.
One resource remained, but Burnet's heart sank as he thought of it. Rejeb might help him, but Rejeb was twenty odd miles away. Was it possible, tired as he was, to tramp all those weary miles back to the stronghold, with only an hour's daylight left, and after that no guide but the stars? How he wished that he had retained his mounted escort until he had actually met Captain Ellingford! But regrets were vain. The attempt must be made, and without loss of time, for he had to reckon with the chances of going astray, consequent delay, arriving at the stronghold too late for Rejeb to render any effective assistance, the possibility that troopers had already been despatched northward to acquaint the Turkish authorities with the capture of the aeroplane, and that by the morning the small body of cavalry would have been augmented.
"Carry on!" Burnet said to himself. "There's nothing else for it. Carry on!"
He scraped some of the mire from his clothes, wrung out the water, and set off while daylight lasted to find a way around the swamp: to swim again through that foul expanse was more than he could face. Keeping a wary look-out for the troopers who had been sent scouting, he worked his way back to the drier ground and regained the tell as the sun was sinking below the horizon. There he stayed just long enough to swallow a little food; then he started on his lonely march.
The next five hours, when he tried to remember them later, were almost a blank to him. It seemed to him that he had trodden as in a dream the plain over which he had ridden earlier in the day. He must have kept his course by the stars, though he had no recollection of calculating from their positions. Settling into a steady pace, he tramped on and on, over sand and swamp, scarcely conscious of his movements, but feeling vaguely that he was racing against time. If he had paused to think, he might well have yielded to despair, for he had travelled the route but once, and the odds were all against his keeping a straight course in the starlight, and discovering the causeway by which alone he could reach Rejeb's stronghold. A cold wind swept over the plain, but he gave no thought to its possible effect, striking through his damp clothes. He was deaf to the sounds of animals and birds in the marshes, heedless of possible pitfalls in the way; and thought only of Captain Ellingford a prisoner behind him, and of Rejeb somewhere ahead, on whom all his hopes rested.
It is doubtful whether he would have reached his goal had not Fortune bestowed her favour upon the brave. He was several miles westward of the stronghold, on a course that would have brought him to the Euphrates, when, in crossing a stretch of open country, he saw a line of horsemen pass a little ahead of him, riding slowly from right to left. The sight roused him. Rejeb's men were accustomed to go forth on their forays by night: was this a foraging party from the stronghold, or a hostile band? Apparently the men had not seen him, for they neither interrupted their march nor broke their line. They were proceeding at a walking pace, as if heavily laden: he could follow them, and join them if he could assure himself that they were friends.
Changing his course, he struck off to the left, keeping the horsemen in sight, and gradually drawing closer to them. He could now see that every horse had a large bundle on each side of its rider, and he had no longer any doubt that, in this neighbourhood and at this hour, the men were of Rejeb's tribe, returning home from a successful foray. Just as he had come to this conclusion, the horsemen quickened their pace, and fearful of losing them, he almost unconsciously uttered a cry. Instantly the men sprang from their saddles, formed up their horses in a crescent-shaped line, and took post behind them, resting their rifles on the animal's backs. Burnet called to them again, staggered towards them, and fell upon his face.
Five minutes later he was perched on the saddle behind the leading man, clasping him tightly, though half asleep. And he awoke to full consciousness only when he was lifted down and carried into Rejeb's tower.
"What harm has befallen you?" cried the young chief.
"None has befallen me, but the British officer who was to meet me is in the hands of the Turks. His aeroplane fell; Turkish cavalry surrounded him; he fought and was wounded. The Turks are conveying him and the aeroplane to the Euphrates. I come to seek your help."
"It is yours, even to the last of my people. And you have come alone, on foot, and in the night! Surely Allah must have directed your steps."
"Time is precious," said Burnet. "What can you do?"
"Tell me where this mischance befell your friend."
"A little beyond the tell The Turks spoke of a wady running into the river——"
"Well I know it. How many are these Turks?"
"Forty or fifty."
"Mashallah! They are delivered into our hands. I will take fifty of my best men, and we will fall upon these Turks before they come to the river. Doubt not that we will save your friend and also his machine, though that we cannot carry away: we can but destroy it."
"Will you not take a larger force?"
"What need? Shall it be told that an Arab of Rejeb's tribe is not equal to a dog of a Turk? I will go now and choose my best warriors and most skilful riders. You are very weary. When you have eaten, a couch shall be laid for you, and before you awake from sleep we shall have accomplished our work and returned."
"But I must go with you."
"Ahi! were it not better to take repose and refresh yourself for what the morrow may bring forth?"
"Believe me, I could not rest. I must join your party."
"So be it. But there is yet time for rest. It is scarcely the middle of the night. The journey that has taken you since sunset on foot will take us but half the time. If we start in the third watch we shall still come upon the Turks some while before daylight. Sleep, then; I will awake you at the seasonable hour, and your horse, who has been well tended, will carry you nobly."
Burnet needed no further persuasion. He was, in fact, dead beat, and fell asleep before the food which Rejeb ordered to be prepared for him was brought. Rejeb had him carried to his own couch, laid rugs over him with his own hands, and placed the food by his side, in readiness for his awakening.