Twice more the boudjon sounded, and then the word passed from man to man in the crowd. “Felizardo! Felizardo himself! He has sworn they shall be hanged, because of what they had planned to do.” Before the third blast had died away, every bolo had been sheathed, and every man was standing still, shivering a little.
Basil Hayle thrust his revolver into his holster again, and came back to his place in front of his men, where he stood very still whilst they did justice on Juan Vagas and his fellows. Then, when it was over, for the second time in his life, he raised his hand in salute to the little old man on the grey horse, and also for the second time Felizardo lifted his hat. A moment later the bush had swallowed up him and his men.
There were three reporters at the execution, and the copy they handed in rejoiced exceedingly the hearts of their respective editors. But Mr Commissioner Furber and Mr Commissioner Gumpertz and one or two other Commissioners used violent language. “The scoundrel’s impertinence must be stopped at once,” they said; whilst, in the Walled City, the ex-generals and colonels and majors of the patriot forces gnashed their teeth with fury, and began to evolve new schemes against Felizardo.
CHAPTER VIII
HOW MR COMMISSIONER FURBER MET FELIZARDO
The night after the hanging of Juan Vagas, the insurrecto, who had tried to raid Igut and carry off Mrs Bush, Basil Hayle dined at the Military Club, where they made much of him, although, as a rule, the Army regarded the Constabulary much as it regarded the Civil Service, as being beneath its notice, which was quite unjust—so far as the Constabulary was concerned.
It was well after midnight when Basil left the Club in the company of old Major John Flint of the Infantry. They were both staying at the same hotel, and their way back led through the narrow streets of the Walled City, and thence across the Bridge of Spain, into the newer part of Manila. They passed one or two native police slouching along, looking what they really were, more like thieves than thief-takers. With the exception of these, however, the streets seemed to be absolutely deserted; consequently, when, from out of a dark gateway, a couple of natives, or rather mestizos, armed with knives, sprang at Basil and his companion, the white men were taken absolutely unawares.
Basil dodged to one side as his assailant struck, and the knife merely caught him a glancing blow on the ribs, doing little damage; then he himself got a grip on the mestizo’s throat, lifted him bodily off the ground with the other hand, and flung him at the man who was attacking Major Flint. The second mestizo staggered, dropped his knife, then took to his heels and fled down the street, right into the arms of a gigantic Sikh watchman from a neighbouring Government building—you can make your Little Brown Brother into a judge of the High Court, but you cannot trust him to guard Government stores—who, hearing shouts, had hurried up. The Sikh did not waste either time or words. He took that mestizo by the collar of his coat with one hand, and by his belt with the other hand, and forthwith dashed his brains out on the pavement, then tossed the body into the middle of the street, and began to wonder how he should purify himself after having touched such an unclean thing.
Basil was binding his handkerchief round an ugly flesh wound in the major’s forearm, and keeping his foot on the neck of the other mestizo, when the Sikh came up and saluted.