“And if he isn’t wise?” asked Lady Haigh.
“Well, he’ll scarcely be such a fool as to fight us and the Sardars together. But if he wants to be nasty, he’ll retreat into Nalapur, and hold one place after another till he’s turned out, and then wage a guerilla warfare until he’s hunted down, which would mean unlimited bloodshed and years of turmoil. That’s his only chance; and as he will be desperate and at bay, there’s every reason to fear he’ll take it. Well, I can tell you more next time I see you.”
The next occasion again arrived unexpectedly soon. It was on the morning of the second day—rumour, good and bad, having run riot in the interval—that Sir Dugald galloped up to the verandah, and before coming indoors, shouted for his bearer and gave him hasty orders, sending off also a messenger to Major Keeling’s house.
“We’re off to Nalapur,” he announced hastily, walking in and taking his seat at the breakfast-table, “to set the king on the throne of the kingdom, otherwise to put Ashraf Ali on the gadi.”
“Then has Wilayat Ali surrendered, after all?” cried Lady Haigh.
“Not voluntarily, exactly, but he has been removed. Sounds bad, doesn’t it? and I’m free to confess that the Sheikh-ul-Jabal has managed the affair with a cleverness worthy of a worse cause. We have been simply made use of, all along.”
“Oh, tell us what has happened! How can you think of breakfast just now?”
“How can I? Easily, when you remember that we start in half an hour. But I’ll do my best to combine breakfast and information. Well, when the messengers went to invite Wilayat Ali to abdicate in favour of his nephew, he very naturally sent back an answer breathing defiance, and containing libellous remarks about the Sheikh’s ancestors and female relations. The Sheikh promptly despatched a challenge to Wilayat Ali to meet him in single combat and decide things by the result. Of course Wilayat Ali returned a refusal, as any man in his senses would, who had everything to lose by such a combat, and nothing to gain but the removal of a single adversary. But here came in the Sheikh’s sharpness. As he told us before, the Amir’s camp was full of his adherents, and when they heard that Wilayat Ali meant to refuse the challenge, they raised such a to-do that they nearly brought the place about his ears. His soldiers became openly mutinous, and the camp-followers shrieked abuse after him. He must have seen then that he was cornered, for if he had tried to get back to his capital, he would pretty certainly have been murdered on the road, so he accepted the challenge as giving him his one chance. The Sheikh had laid his plans with such deadly dexterity that there was actually nothing else to do, for the Sardars were only too pleased to see him in a hole, after the way he had treated them. So the lists were set—that’s how the Chief put it—and we all stood to watch. The Sheikh left Ashraf Ali in Keeling’s charge, and rode out. They were to fight with javelins first, then with swords. The javelin part was rather a farce—they threw from such a safe distance, and I don’t think one of them hit, though one of the Sheikh’s javelins went through Wilayat Ali’s cloak. When they had thrown all they had, they drew their swords and really rode at each other. We couldn’t see very clearly what happened in the first round, but it looked as if something turned the edge of Wilayat Ali’s sword, and the Chief dashed forward and yelled, ‘It’s murder, absolute murder! Our man wears chain-armour under his clothes. It’s not a fair fight.’ He wanted to ride in between them and stop it; but we weren’t going to have him killed, whoever else was, so we simply hung on to him, and pointed out that as none of us had a spare suit of chain-armour we could offer to lend the Amir, and the Sheikh was probably proud of his foresight in wearing his, and would certainly refuse to take it off, things must settle themselves. He talked about Ivanhoe and the Templar, but we kept him quiet while they rode at one another again. This time we saw that, putting the armour out of the question, the Sheikh was the better man, quicker, more active, in better training—thanks to the desert life, I suppose. He avoided Wilayat Ali’s rush in the neatest way—the sword just shaved his shoulder as it came down—and turned upon him like King Richard in some book or other, standing in his stirrups and bringing down his sword with both hands. It’s a regular Crusader’s sword, by the way, with a cross hilt, and it cut through turban and head both, and the Amir dropped from the saddle as his horse rushed by. Then came the finest thing of all. The Chief was boiling over with rage—wanted to make the Sheikh fight him next, and so on; but on examining Wilayat Ali’s body we found that he had armour on too. They both wore armour, each trusting that the other didn’t know it, but each suspecting that the other wore it too, and that was why they both struck for the head, so that it was a fair fight after all—from an Oriental point of view. The Sheikh was proclaimed victor with acclamations, and Ashraf Ali’s right was acknowledged by most of those present; those who didn’t acknowledge it thought it best to slink away as unobtrusively as possible. Then the Sheikh turned to Keeling, and with the utmost politeness invited him to come to Nalapur as his guest, with an escort—not a force—to witness the youth’s enthronement. No British bayonets to put him on the gadi, you see. And we are going.”
“But hasn’t Wilayat Ali a son?” asked Lady Haigh.
“Yes, Hasrat Ali, who is officiating as governor of the city while his father is away. I imagine he would meet with an early death if we were not going to Nalapur; but as it is, the Sheikh intends to marry him to his niece, Ashraf Ali’s sister.”