“‘The last I saw of it, sir,’ I answered, ‘was in the ditch, and Colin Archibald, corporal, lying on his stomach over it.’
“‘Dead?’
“‘Dead, I think, sir.’
“‘H’m!’ said the General. ‘I hope my brother’s drum’s all right, at any rate.’ He turned and cried up the picket. ‘I want you, drummer,’ he said, ‘to go up that lane with this picket, playing the assembly. You understand? These devils fighting and firing there have already shot at three of my officers, and are seemingly out of their wits. We will give them a last chance. I don’t deny there is danger in what I ask you to do, but it has to be done. The men in there are mostly of Pack’s Portuguese and the dregs of our own corps. If they do not come out with you I shall send in a whole regiment to them and batter their brains out against the other end, if the place is, as I fancy, a cul-de-sac. March!’
“I went before the picket with my drum rattling and my heart in my mouth. The pillagers came round us jeering, others assailed us more seriously by throwing from upper windows anything they could conveniently lay hand on (assuming it was too large or too valueless to pocket), but we were little the worse till in a lamentable moment of passion one of the picket fired his musket at a window. A score of pieces flashed back in response, and five of our company fell, while we went at a double for the end of the lane.
“‘By Heaven!’ cried the sergeant when we reached it, ‘here’s a fine thing!’ The General had been right—it was a cul-de-sac! There was nothing for us then but to return.
“You have never been in action; you cannot imagine,” Urquhart went on, “the exasperating influence of one coward in a squad that is facing great danger. There were now, you must know, but six of us, hot and reckless with anger, and prepared for anything—all but one, and he was in the fear of death. As I went before the picket drumming the assembly and the sergeant now beside me, this fellow continually kicked my heels, he kept so close behind. I turned my head, and found that he marched crouching, obviously eager to have a better man than himself sheltering him from any approaching bullet.
“‘You cowardly dog!’ I cried, stepping aside, ‘come out from behind me and die like a man!’ I could take my oath the wretch was sobbing! It made me sick to hear him, but I was saved more thought of it by the rush of some women across the lane, shrieking as they ran, with half a company at least of Portuguese at their heels. With a shout we were after Pack’s scoundrels, up a wide pend close (as we say in Scotland) that led into a courtyard, where we found the valorosas prepared to defend the position with pistol and sword. A whole battalion would have hesitated to attack such odds, and I will confess we swithered for a moment. A shot came from the dark end of the entry and tore through both ends of my drum.
“‘We’re wretched fools to be here at all,’ said lily-liver, plainly whimpering, and at that I threw down my outraged instrument, snatched his musket from him, and charged up the close with the other four. The Portuguese ran like rabbits; for the time, at least, the women were safe, and I had a remorse for my beloved drum.
“I left the others to follow, hurried into the lane, and found the poltroon was gone, my drum apparently with him. Ciudad Rodrigo was darker now, for the fires were burning low. It was less noisy, too; and I heard half-way up the lane the sound of a single musket-shot. I ran between the tall tenements; the glint of bright metal filled me with hope and apprehension. A man lay in the gutter beside my drum, and a Portuguese marauder, who fled at my approach, stood over him with a knife.