"God be thanked!" said the doctor, "there is a chance for us yet. I've just got word that my friend Skilman (whom I spoke of yesterday as the only man here that could deal with this case) has suddenly arrived at Kalipur. We must send off a swift messenger for him at once."
"I'll go myself," said Hardman, stepping towards the door.
"But—" began the dismayed doctor, through whose mind flashed instantly all the possible consequences of the commandant's absence from his post just when it might be attacked at any moment.
The colonel put aside the strong man like an infant, and said, in a tone which, though barely above a whisper, was terribly distinct—
"Don't talk to me—I'm going."
And, a few minutes later, he rode out of the fort into the deepening darkness, attended only by a Rajput trooper and his veteran scout, Lal Singh (Red Lion).
When the two Hindus saw their leader turn off from the high-road into the native path that led through the jungle to Kalipur, both knew well that although this way would save fully half the distance, they carried their lives in their hands by taking it, it being perilous not only from wild beasts and snakes, but from worse things still—for the robbers were said to be astir again at the far end of the valley.
But, trained to exact obedience, there was no thought in their gallant hearts of wavering or hanging back. Had the whole Mahratta army barred their path, they would have simply repeated their usual formula, "Jo hookum" (it is an order), and gone without a murmur to certain death.
From first to last, that match against time with death was like one of those wild and feverish dreams, in which you are for ever rushing at full speed over a boundless waste, without advancing a single foot nearer to the goal. On, on, mile after mile—passing with bewildering suddenness from darkness to moonlight, and from moonlight into darkness again—now splashing through a swollen stream, now plunging down into a gloomy hollow, now bursting with a crash through a mass of tangled creepers, now checking their horses, barely in time, on the brink of a yawning chasm.
Once, the lights waved by the Hindus made a kind of broken rainbow on the scaly bulk of a monstrous snake, which, coiled round a tree above them, thrust out its huge flat head with an angry hiss, only to draw it back in affright at the sudden glare. Farther on, two flaming eyes broke the gloom for an instant, and then a long, gaunt, striped body vanished ghost-like into the surrounding blackness, with a snarl of mingled terror and rage; and, a few minutes later, a pack of prowling jackals, scared by the hoof-tramp and the lights, flitted spectrally away into the thickets, whimpering like frightened children.