Fix Bay'nets: The Regiment in the Hills

“We shall have plenty of time for that to-morrow,” said Bracy. “We must manage by tying on handkerchiefs for to-night, and pulling up the great collars as if they were hoods.”

A short time after, each with his handkerchief over his head, the pair crouched behind two stones, upon which their helmets had been placed; and beside them the two sticks were planted, so that at a short distance any one would have been deceived and made to believe that a couple of men were on the watch for danger.

Two men were on the watch for danger, but in a different way, both lying prone, Bracy, with his glass to his eyes, carefully sweeping the distance, and keeping it fixed upon the enemy, who looked strangely quiet, as they grouped together and seemed to be feasting.

“Looks as if they meant to settle there, then, for the night, sir,” said Gedge, as Bracy reported to him everything he noted.

“Yes; it looks so.”

“But we don’t trust ’em, bless yer, sir. That’s their artfulness; foxing – that’s what they’re doing. Won’t be able to see ’em much longer – will you, sir?”

“No; it’s getting dark very fast; but I can make them out, I dare say, till they begin to move.”

“Hope you will, sir,” said Gedge softly, and lying with his knees bent, kicking his feet about in the air, after the fashion of a boy in a field on a sunny day, and looking quite unconscious of the fact that this night might be one of the most terrible they had ever been called upon to pass.

Some minutes elapsed now in perfect silence, during which a fiery look on the topmost peak of one of the mountains died out slowly into cherry red, and finally became invisible, a few stars twinkling out as the red light died.

“Gedge,” said Bracy in a quick whisper, such as he might have uttered had the enemy been close upon them, and about to spring, instead of many hundred yards away.

“Sir?”

“They are on the move.”

“Can’t see ’em, sir.”

“No; and they cannot see us, but I can dimly make them out with the glass. They are separating from their centre, and coming on. Ha! gone. I can see no more.”

He put away the glass in the darkness, which now seemed to roll down upon them like a cloud from the mountains, giving the snowfield a ghastly look which made Bracy hesitate.

“I’m afraid it would be better to go off to the left among the stones.”

“Don’t, sir, pray,” said Gedge earnestly.

“But our dark bodies will show against the snow.”

“Not they, sir. We’ll roll in it, and it’ll be darker in half-an-hour. They’ll be all that before they get here – won’t they?”

“Quite. They are sure to come on very slowly, and allow time for part of them to get right into our rear.”

“Yes, sir; that’s right.”

“Now, then, are you ready?”

“Yes, sir.”

There was again silence, and, but for the ghostly glare of the snow, all was very dark.

“We seem to be going into the most dangerous place,” whispered Bracy, with his breath coming thickly.

“And that’s the very place they’ll never think we should hide in, sir, if they were likely to think we were going to hide. No, sir: their keen eyes ’ll just make out them two ’elmets, and they’ll think o’ nothing else but driving their long knives into them as wears ’em, from behind. I do hope we shall hear ’em blunting the points against, the stones.”

“Have you everything?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then, forward! Go fifty paces slowly over the snow. I shall follow close behind you in your steps.”

The snow yielded, so that they were knee-deep, but it was still loose and so sand-like in its grains that as each foot was withdrawn the icy particles flowed together again into each freshly-made hole.

Five minutes later the adventurous pair lay softly down, and rolled over and over a few times, before lying prone upon their chests, each with his head towards the invisible helmets, and near enough to whisper or touch one another with the hand. Their rifles lay by their sides, with the cartouche-boxes handy: and, in case of a close attack, their revolvers were in the right sides of their belts, half dragged round to the back, while each held his dagger-like bayonet in his band.

“Do you feel the cold, Gedge?” whispered Bracy.

“Cold, sir? Why, I’m as hot as hot. This work’s too warm for a fellow to feel the cold. Do you, sir?”

“No; my face burns as if with fever, and every nerve tingles with excitement. There, we must not even whisper again.”

“Right, sir.”

“The first moment you hear a sound of any one approaching, touch my left arm.”

“Right, sir; but hadn’t I better lie t’other side of you? They’ll come that way.”

“They’ll come from all round at once, my lad. There, don’t be afraid. If we are going to have trouble, I dare say you will get your full share. Now, silence; and when they come you must hardly breathe.”

Then silence ensued, and seemed to Bracy the most oppressive that he had ever encountered in facing danger. For the solemnity of the night in the great mountains was brooding over them, out of which at any moment death, in the shape of a keen knife, might descend. There was not a breath of air, but an icy chill dropped down from above, making the snow crystals turn sharp and crisp, crackling softly at the slightest movement. But the frosty air had no effect upon them, save to make their blood tingle in their veins and a peculiar, pricking sensation play about their nostrils as they drew their breath, tiny needles of ice twining as they respired, and making a hoar-frost upon Bracy’s moustache.

The time went on as if the movement of the earth had been checked by the frost; but, listen as they would, the silence was profound, and a full hour seemed to have passed, though it was not a fourth part of that time.

“They will not come,” thought Bracy, as his eyes were turned in every direction he could force them to sweep, and the change appeared very striking from the black atmosphere in front, and right and left to the faint light suggestive of electricity or phosphorescence which made the snow dimly visible.

But the enemy made no sign: and, with that horrible stillness as of death reigning and seeming to crush them into the snow, they lay waiting and longing for some sound – for the coming of the enemy; for the wild excitement of an encounter would, Bracy felt, be far preferable to that maddening suspense.

As he lay there and thought, his ever-active brain was full of suggestions regarding what would take place. The enemy would not dare to come, and a night’s sleep would have been lost – they would come, see them with their penetrating eyes, pounce upon them, there would be a few savage unexpected strokes, and all would be over; while poor Colonel Graves would watch and wait, looking ever for the succour that did not come.

“But he will not lose faith in his messengers,” Bracy thought, with a thrill of satisfaction running through him. “He will know that I strove to do my best.”

Then his thoughts took another direction. Why should not – after the careful preparations made – the ruse be successful, the enemy be deceived, and go in pursuit according to their ideas, leaving the two adventurers free to make their fresh departure? But that, the most natural outcome of the plan, Bracy, in his excitement, set aside as being the least likely to occur, and he lay in agony, straining every nerve to condense his faculties into the one great sense of hearing, till it seemed to him that his companion’s breathing sounded preternaturally loud.

“Why, he’s asleep! The miserable, careless scoundrel!” thought Bracy. “Those men have no thought beyond the present. How can one trust them? How easily we might be surprised if he were the watch!”

A flush of shame made the thinker’s cheeks burn the next moment, he had, in his annoyance, stretched out his left hand to reach dodge’s shoulder and give him a violent shake. But half-way he checked the progress of his hand; for, sotting aside the danger of waking a sleeper and making him start and utter some ejaculation, which might betray them to a lurking enemy, he recalled the fact that a touch was to be the signal to announce the coming of the enemy.

The next moment, as his hand lay upon the snow where he had let it fall, another hand was laid upon it, and his fingers were gripped by a set of fingers which held it fast and gave it a firm, steady pressure, to which he warmly responded, his heart beating fast, and a genial glow of satisfaction running through him in his penitence for misjudging his faithful companion.

Then the hand that grasped his was snatched away, and he lay listening and gazing in every direction that he could command for the danger just signalled to him by Gedge. Nothing to right or left, and he dared not stir to look back over the snow. Nothing in front, not a sign of any one near; and in his excitement he began to wonder whether his companion had made a mistake in his over-eagerness, for the silence was more oppressive than ever.

“What was that?”