The Gurkhas were pouring through the left gorge and over the heights at the double to the invitation of their Regimental Quick-step. The black rocks were crowned with dark green spiders as the bugles gave tongue jubilantly:—
In the morning! In the morning by the bright light!
When Gabriel blows his trumpet in the morning!
The Gurkha rear-companies tripped and blundered over loose stones. The front-files halted for a moment to take stock of the valley and to settle stray boot-laces. Then a happy little sigh of contentment soughed down the ranks, and it was as though the land smiled, for behold there below was the enemy, and it was to meet them that the Gurkhas had doubled so hastily. There was much enemy. There would be amusement. The little men hitched their kukris well to hand, and gaped expectantly at their officers as terriers grin ere the stone is cast for them to fetch. The Gurkhas’ ground sloped downward to the valley, and they enjoyed a fair view of the proceedings. They sat upon the boulders to watch, for their officers were not going to waste their wind in assisting to repulse a Ghazi rush more than half a mile away. Let the white men look to their own front.
‘Hi! yi!’ said the Subadar-Major, who was sweating profusely. ‘Dam fools yonder, stand close order! This is no time for close order, it is the time for volleys. Ugh!’
Horrified, amused, and indignant, the Gurkhas beheld the retirement of the Fore and Aft with a running chorus of oaths and commentaries.
‘They run! The white men run! Colonel Sahib, may we also do a little running?’ murmured Runbir Thappa, the Senior Jemadar.
But the Colonel would have none of it. ‘Let the beggars be cut up a little,’ said he wrathfully. ‘’Serves ’em right. They’ll be prodded into facing round in a minute.’ He looked through his field-glasses, and caught the glint of an officer’s sword.
‘Beating ’em with the flat—damned conscripts! How the Ghazis are walking into them!’ said he.
The Fore and Aft, heading back, bore with them their officers. The narrowness of the pass forced the mob into solid formation, and the rear-rank delivered some sort of a wavering volley. The Ghazis drew off, for they did not know what reserves the gorge might hide. Moreover, it was never wise to chase white men too far. They returned as wolves return to cover, satisfied with the slaughter that they had done, and only stopping to slash at the wounded on the ground. A quarter of a mile had the Fore and Aft retreated, and now, jammed in the pass, was quivering with pain, shaken and demoralised with fear, while the officers, maddened beyond control, smote the men with the hilts and the flats of their swords.