"These are high words," said he, "to one who has been the master of a thousand slaves. You have asked for war to the knife, and you shall have it. It is apparent from the way in which you speak that you know little or nothing of the man with whom you have to deal. You shall see. I shall prove to you that I am not one who uses empty words."
At that he turned sharply on his heel, entered the hut, and was gone.
[CHAPTER XXI—The Last Cartridge]
During the next four days the siege continued, and though their enemies continued to increase in numbers, the Germans were fortunately still without artillery, which would have battered the old fort to dust and ashes in the space of half an hour.
On each occasion when the Germans ventured to assault they were driven back with considerable loss. Indeed, their dead lay so thick upon the path upon the hill-side that those who followed after mounted on the bodies of those who had gone before.
On one occasion a company of native troops actually gained the parapet of the fort. It was a dark night, and they had crept up the hill-side unobserved. With a savage yell, and as one man, they hurled themselves upon the ramparts.
The majority were thrown back in disorder under a brisk fire from the defence, but some half-dozen leapt the ditch and clambered over the wall. Thereupon a brief hand-to-hand encounter ensued. It was an affair of seconds, of fierce cries and groans and savage oaths, and in the end the enclosure of the fort was free of the enemy—except for six motionless forms that lay silent on the ground.
Days passed, and still the defence held out. Indeed, they had actually put off their retreat until too late, for one night they were brought face to face with the unexpected fact that the Germans had discovered the entrance to the tunnel. Fernando, who had passed almost to the mouth of the tunnel, which lay in the midst of the bush, returned to the fort with the news that a large party of German regular soldiers was guarding their only line of retreat. Fernando had little doubt that the Black Dog had found some means by which to betray them.
The Germans apparently hesitated to advance through the tunnel itself, since they were still in ignorance of the strength of the little garrison; and in any case the narrowness and exceeding darkness of the passage would make an advance an extremely costly affair, whereas ultimate success was by no means assured. They could no longer be blind to the fact that those in the fort were running short of ammunition, and they could afford to play a waiting game.
The situation of Harry Urquhart and his companions was not of the pleasantest; indeed, they could no longer hope. Even Fernando, who had so often proved himself a man of iron, could see no chance of their deliverance.