"Suppose," I said, "you do not succeed in all you propose. Suppose you are defeated, or your retreat cut off. Then where would Adiba be? She would have lost the services of a hundred trained fighting men, and who would be left to repel the eventual attack on the town?"
"There are plenty of others for the purpose," said Haroun, "and the defence of the town walls is no concern of mine. As you are aware, I and my men have nothing to do with Adiba, and it is only my personal friendship for the Governor that has induced me to espouse his cause. To be honest, I am a child of the desert, and a friend of anyone who hires me. The rôle of my men is to smite in the open, and not to sit down behind the walls of a town—that is the duty of the town guard."
"I am beginning to understand," I said. "Hitherto I was under the impression that the Governor regarded you as his sirdar."
"He himself is sirdar," was the reply, "and he has already ordered every able-bodied man to be at his allotted post on the walls this afternoon, so that he may inspect them in fighting array."
While we were talking, a messenger came to ask us to wait on the Governor, who had assembled the chiefs of the various quarters of the town in the Audience Hall. We went at once, and found rows of respectable-looking old Arabs seated on the ground in front of the Governor's daïs. With many of them we were already acquainted, and all greeted us most cordially. The Governor then opened the discussion by explaining that, as Europeans, his two guests were thoroughly acquainted with the barbarous methods of European warfare, of which they themselves were entirely ignorant. He had therefore decided to beg us to undertake the defence of Adiba, and show them how to defeat their enemies. The suggestion quite staggered me; for I knew what broken reeds the unfortunate people were being forced to lean on. George Edwards, civil surgeon, aged twenty-three, Walter Henderson, ex-Sandhurst cadet—and a failure at that—aged twenty-one, suddenly appointed to the joint command of all the forces of Adiba! But, knowing that it was a case of the superiority of one-eyed men over the blind, we accepted the responsibility without a blush, and we were soon bustled off to inspect the fortifications and their defenders. Had it not been that we considered the state of affairs as most serious, we should have laughed at the whole thing as a huge joke. There were some rusty old guns and mortars, which probably had remained loaded and undischarged for half a century, and behind each loophole on the parapet squatted a matchlock-man, in deadly earnest and intent on slaughter. But it was no time for jesting, and, having seen all that there was to see, Edwards and I had a long consultation with our host and Haroun. In the end we two promised to think out a plan for defending the town, and lay it before Ali Khan the next morning.
We now went off with note-book and pencil, and walked leisurely round the whole extent of the walls, making notes and sketches at various points, and carefully examining the surrounding country. The town was of no great size, covering an area of barely half a square mile; and from outside had the appearance of a square fort, situated in a slight depression. The walls in most parts were some fifteen feet thick at the base, and stood about twenty feet above the general level of the plain, but were somewhat higher at the four angles, in one of which, as I have said, was situated that portion of the palace given over to us. There were four gateways, known as the Hayil, the Majma, the Bussorah, and the Baghdad, and placed each in the centre of one of the side walls, our quarters occupying the angle between the Hayil and the Baghdad gates. From attacks by ordinary Arabs, armed with no better weapons than matchlocks and spears, the place had nothing to fear, the walls being unscalable, and the gateways being so planned as to be capable of great resistance. Against modern arms of precision it would stand no chance whatever, unless strenuous efforts were made to provide some sort of cover for the defenders, as well as for the women and children.
All that night we sat up, with pencils and paper, working out our scheme, which was simplicity itself. We decided that, as we might have to withstand a siege of some duration, and as it would be quite impossible to store sufficient fodder for horses and camels for more than a few days, we would send Haroun, in command of all the horsemen and camelmen, out of the place, with instructions to keep well away to the north, and to watch his opportunity for dealing a blow at the enemy. We thought it would be useless to tie him down to stringent orders, since he knew more about the country and the methods of desert warfare than we did. Moreover, we knew that he was an independent individual, and would take his own line. With regard to the actual defence of the town, there was no time to do more than provide shelters from the bombardment which we anticipated. These we arranged to place close under the walls which faced towards Hayil and Majma, and we went into all the details of each portion of work, so that we might be able to tell the Governor exactly how many men would be required for digging and such-like operations at every point, and how long they should take to complete the work. In order to have a good margin, we calculated to get the defences finished within three days, after which, any time that remained could be devoted to drilling the inhabitants to seek shelter rapidly.
"There," said Edwards, standing up and stretching himself, "that is good enough for them. I am quite anxious to see the result."
"So am I," said I. "Give me another cup of coffee, and then let us go up on to the roof and watch the day break."