“You see,” I said to Denham, “they are in great force up there.”
“Yes, and no wonder,” was the reply, “for it’s a very strong position. Now then, all here, and forward once more.”
The men ran back into the rallying-place as quickly as so many rabbits, mounted, and once more we were in full retreat, with Joeboy trotting beside my horse holding on to the stirrup-iron, while Denham kept coming to me, to talk.
“Just to give you a few lessons in the art of war,” he said, with his eyes twinkling and a laugh beginning to show at their corners. “There, you see we have done exactly what the Colonel wanted us to do: made a regular reconnaissance and drawn the enemy’s fire, proving that he is holding the pass. What the old man will do now remains to be seen. He won’t go up here with us to try and dislodge them, but will try, I expect, to lure them down into the open somewhere, so as to give us a chance at them.”
“They’ll be too cunning,” I said. “They fight only from behind stones, and in holes.”
“Yes, they’re cunning enough,” said Denham; “but, like all over-clever people, they make mistakes, or find others quite as cunning. Look here: you’ll have to propose some dodge to the Colonel to coax them out to give us a chance.”
“I propose a plan to the Colonel?”
“Yes. Why not?” said Denham, laughing. “You’ve begun your soldiering by teaching me, and— Oh!”
He uttered a sharp cry, and clapped his right hand round to his back.
“What is it?” I said excitedly. “Not hit?”