The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [515]
‘One of my men,’ explained Cavagnari briefly. ‘He says that we ought to keep down and stay out of sight, as Ali Masjid is held in force. Also that there is a picket not more than two miles away, and that as soon as the sun is up we shall be able to see it for ourselves.’
The Pathan ducked his head in salute to the Sahib-log, and at a word from Cavagnari, withdrew down the back of the ridge to the shelter of a tumble of rocks some twenty to thirty feet below, where he squatted down to wait, while above him the five men flattened themselves among the stones and took up their binoculars again as the featureless, pasteboard outlines of the hills took on shape and dimension and the morning mists shredded away.
The sky above them was no longer pearl-grey but cerulean, and from somewhere out of sight a partridge began to call. Then of a sudden the grass was streaked with long blue shadows, and four miles away as the crow flies, something glinted brightly in the blaze of the rising sun; pinpointing an insignificant hill-top that until then had been indistinguishable among a hundred others.
‘Guns,’ breathed Colonel Jenkins. ‘Yes, that's Ali Masjid all right, and as your Pathan friend says, it's been well and truly re-inforced. Just look at those breastworks.’
The fort, now suddenly visible, crowned a conical hill that barely showed above a stony ridge that was scored with lines of newly built breastworks which the binoculars showed to be well defended. There was also a cavalry encampment at the foot of the ridge, and presently a small body of horsemen emerged from among the tents, and riding up to the Shagai plateau, made their way across it to a little tower near the Mackeson road: presumably the picket that the Pathan had spoken of.
‘Time we went, I think,’ decided Major Cavagnari, putting away his binoculars. ‘Those fellows have got eyes like hawks, and we don't want to be spotted. Come on.’
They found the Pathan still squatting, frontier-fashion, among the rocks, his jezail across his knees, and Cavagnari motioned the others to go on ahead and went over to exchange a last word with him: but catching up with them a few minutes later as they hurried forward down the grassy hillside towards the safety of the plains and their own side of the border, he checked suddenly and called to Wigram, who stopped and turned:
‘Yes, sir?’
‘I'm sorry, but I forgot something –’ Cavagnari produced a handful of silver and a packet of cheap country-made cigarettes and thrust it at Wigram. ‘Be a good fellow and take this up to that man up there, will you? I usually give him a few rupees and some of these things, and I don't want him turning up in Jamrud to demand his baksheesh, and being recognized. We won't wait for you –’ He turned and hurried on downward as Wigram started back up the steep slope.
The chill had gone out of the morning and now the sun was hot on Wigram's shoulders and there were butterflies on the hillside: familiar, English-looking butterflies. Fritillaries, brimstones, meadow-browns and tiny common blues that reminded him of summer holidays long ago, when he and Quentin had been boys and gone butterfly-hunting in the fields and lanes of Home. There were birds too, twittering among the grasses, and when a shred of shadow flicked over him he looked up and saw a lammergeyer very high in the blue, soaring majestically above the tumbled ridges of the Khyber.
Now that the sun was up, walking back up the hillside was warmer work than it had been in the chill starlight before dawn, and as he plodded forward, sweat soaked his shirt and ran down into his eyes. He brushed the drops away irritably and wondered if Cavagnari's Pathan would still be there, and if not, what he was supposed to do about it. But a faint sound drifted