He dared not move about, but sat crouched on the ground beside the Pathans with his rifle across his knees, listening for any sign of the approach of the enemy. More than once he had to stir up his companions when they dozed, until he grew tired of it; he would rely on himself, and wake them at the first threatening of danger. But he found it increasingly difficult to resist the soporific influence of the cold, and of the monotonous lullaby sung by the river as it flowed past at the foot of the shelving bank beneath him. Every now and then he got up, stretched himself, and sat down again, not venturing even to slap himself with his arms for fear of putting the enemy on the alert. He gazed up into the sky, and tried to count and to identify the stars, which, in this deep valley, appeared to him, he thought, as they would appear to an observer at the bottom of a well. From time to time he exchanged a few whispered words with his companions, until this resource failed him through their slumberousness. When, at the end of the first two hours, the men were relieved, the circumstances of the change had the effect of rousing him a little; but the second pair were even more sleepy than the first, and he lacked the energy to be continually prodding them.
At length, when, in spite of his utmost efforts, he was nodding with drowsiness, his ear was suddenly caught by a slight sound beneath him. He pulled himself together, and listened intently. There was no repetition of the sound. He began to think that he had been mistaken, or that the sound had been made by some small animal scurrying along the bank. But a few seconds later he heard it again; it was like that of a small stone rolling down the rocky shelf. Now fully awake, he nudged his companions and in a whisper bade them keep quiet and listen. The Pathan passes from profound sleep to complete wakefulness in an instant. They sat erect, all their senses on the alert. For a few moments nothing was heard but the gurgling rush of the river; then with startling suddenness the three watchers were aware that men were scrambling up the slope. They sprang up. Dark shapes were dimly outlined beyond the rocks. The Pathans fired, aiming as it were at shadows. Their shots did not check the rush. In another moment, clubbing their rifles, Lawrence and they were raining blows upon a swarm of figures that seemed to spring out of the black depths beneath them.
Neither Lawrence nor either of the men could afterwards give a lucid account of the confused scramble that ensued. All that they were sure about was that, if they saw a form between them and the river, they hit out at it. It soon became impossible to distinguish friend from foe. In spite of their swift and weighty strokes the enemy, whose number seemed only to increase, pressed ever more closely upon them.
Lawrence had just brought the butt of his rifle down with a rattling thud upon what he hoped was a Mongol skull, when the weapon was seized, and he felt himself jerked forward. He clung to the barrel tenaciously, but in trying to hold his own in this tug-of-war he lost his footing, let go the rifle perforce, and found himself rolling, or rather jolting, down the bank. Grasping at the sharp knobs of rock, he checked his fall before he came to the water's edge, and lay for an instant to collect himself. It was perhaps a minute since the tussle had begun.
Hitherto the enemy had preserved a remarkable silence. The two Pathans, on the other hand, had raised lusty shouts, calling to their companions by name. Roused by the shots, and urged on by their comrades' cries, the Pathans behind the rocks some little distance up-stream came bounding to the rescue. Lawrence heard scrambling footsteps above him; he was kicked in the side by a man coming hastily down the bank, and the sound of splashes near at hand seemed to show that the enemy, in full retreat, were plunging into the river. Their surprise having failed, they had lost heart. Climbing the bank on all fours, Lawrence found his whole party assembled above. Just as he reached them, the newcomers opened fire upon several figures which they saw swinging themselves over by the rope. At the first shot these men halted, turned, and began frantically to work themselves back towards the farther side. Then Fyz Ali sprang forward on to the tangled debris of the bridge, and with two sweeping strokes of his knife cut the rope in twain. There was a mighty splash, a howl of rage, and then silence.
"What orders, sahib?" said the Pathan. In the short, sharp, confused struggle, the men were unaware of Lawrence's narrow escape, and were no more concerned about him than about themselves. Every one of them bore some mark of the conflict--bruise, abrasion, or knife-cut. Lawrence felt bruised from top to toe. But in the dark no man could see his fellow's wounds, and it would have been thought childish to talk of them.
"We had better stay here for the rest of the night," said Lawrence, in reply to Fyz Ali's question. "You have quite done for the bridge, and it's no use to anybody. But those badmashes got over some other way, and they would do it again if we weren't here to stop them."
"That is true, sahib--if they like to put their fingers into the fire."
"How did they get across? They could hardly swim up against the current."
"Mashallah! Who can say? But we shall know in the morning, sahib."