The Half-Hearted

by John Buchan

  CHAPTER XXVII

  THE ROAD TO FORZA

  The road ran in a straight line through the valley of dry rocks, a dull,modern road, engineered and macadamized up to the edge of the hills.The click of hoofs raised echoes in the silence, for in all the greatvalley, in the chain of pools in the channel, the acres of sun-driedstone, the granite rocks, the tangle of mountain scrub, there seemed nolife of bird or beast. It was a strange, deathly stillness, andoverhead the purple sky, sown with a million globes of light, seemed sonear and imminent that the glen for the moment was but a vast jewel-litcavern, and the sky a fretted roof which spanned the mountains.

  For the first time Lewis felt the East. Hitherto he had been unable tosee anything in his errand but its futility. A stupider man, with asharp, practical brain, would have taken himself seriously and come toBardur with an intent and satisfied mind. He would have assumed the airof a diplomatist, have felt the dignity of his mission, and in successand failure have borne himself with self-confidence. But to Lewis thebusiness which loomed serious in England, at Bardur took on the colourof comedy. He felt his impotence, he was touched insensibly by the easycontent of the place. Frontier difficulties seemed matters for romanceand comic opera; and Bardur resolved itself into an English suburb, alltea-parties and tennis. But at times an austere conscience jogged himto remembrance, and in one such fitful craving for action and enterprisehe had found this errand. Now at last, astride the little Kashmir pony,with his face to the polestar and the hills, he felt the mystery of astrange world, and his work assumed a tinge of the adventurer. This wasnew, he told himself; this was romance. He had his eyes turned to a newland, and the smell of dry mountain sand and scrub, and the vault-like,imperial sky were the earnest of his inheritance. This was the East,the gorgeous, the impenetrable. Before him were the hill deserts, andthen the great, warm plains, and the wide rivers, and then on and on tothe cold north, the steppes, the icy streams, the untrodden forests. Tothe west and beyond the mountains were holy mosques, "shady cities ofpalm trees," great walled towns to which north and west and southbrought their merchandise. And to the east were latitudes morewonderful, the uplands of the world, the impassable borders of theoldest of human cultures. Names rang in his head like tunes--Khiva,Bokhara, Samarkand, the goal of many boyish dreams born of clandestinesuppers and the Arabian Nights. It was an old fierce world he was onthe brink of, and the nervous frontier civilization fell a thousandmiles behind him.

  The white road turned to the right with the valley, and the hills creptdown to the distance of a gun-shot. The mounting tiers of stone andbrawling water caught the moonlight in waves, and now he was in a coldpit of shadow and now in a patch of radiant moonshine. It was a worldof fantasy, a rousing world of wintry hill winds and sudden gleams ofsummer. His spirits rose high, and he forgot all else in plainenjoyment. Now at last he had found life, rich, wild, girt withmarvels. He was beginning to whistle some air when his pony shiedviolently and fell back, and at the same moment a pistol-shot crackedout of a patch of thorn.

  He turned the beast and rode straight at the thicket, which was a verylittle one. The ball had wandered somewhere into the void, and no harmwas done, but he was curious about its owner. Up on the hillside heseemed to see a dark figure scrambling among the cliffs in the frettedmoonlight.

  It is unpleasant to be shot at in the dark from the wayside, but at themoment the thing pleased this strange young man. It seemed a token thatat last he was getting to work. He found a rope stretched taut acrossthe road, which accounted for the pony's stumble. Laughing heartily, hecut it with his knife, and continued, cheerful as before, but somewhatless fantastic. Now he kept a sharp eye on all wayside patches.

  At the head of the valley the waters of the stream forked into twotorrents, one flowing from the east in an open glen up which ran theroad to Yarkand, the other descending from the northern hills in a wildgully. At the foot stood a little hut with an apology for stabling,where an old and dirty gentleman of the Hunza race pursued his callingtill such time as he should attract the notice of his friends up in thehills and go to paradise with a slit throat.

  Lewis roused the man with a violent knocking at the door. The oldruffian appeared with a sputtering lamp which might have belonged to acave man, and a head of matted grey hair which suggested the sameorigin. He was old and suspicious, but at Lewis's bidding he hobbledforth and pointed out the stabling.

  "The pony is to stay here till it is called for. Do you hear? And ifHolm Sahib returns and finds that it is not fed he will pay you nothing.So good night, father. Sound sleep and a good conscience."

  He turned to the twisting hill road which ran up from the light into thegloom of the cleft with all the vigour of an old mountaineer who hasbeen long forced to dwell among lowlands. Once a man acquires the artof hill walking he will always find flat country something of a burden,and the mere ascent of a slope will have a tonic's power. The path wasgood, but perilous at the best, and the proximity of yawning precipicesgave a zest to the travel. The road would fringe a pit of shade, blackbut for the gleam of mica and the scattered foam of the stream. It wasno longer a silent world. Hawks screamed at times from the cliffs, anda multitude of bats and owls flickered in the depths. A continuousfalling of waters, an infinite sighing of night winds, the swaying andtossing which is always heard in the midmost mountain solitudes, thecrumbling of hill gravel and the bleat of a goat on some hill-side, allmade a cheerful accompaniment to the scraping of his boots on the rockyroad.

  He remembered the way as if he had travelled it yesterday. Soon thegorge would narrow and he would be almost at the water's edge. Then thepath turned to the right and wound into the heart of a side nullah,which at length brought it out on a little plateau of rocks. There theroad climbed a long ridge till at last it reached the great plateau,where Forza, set on a small hilltop, watched thirty miles of primevaldesert. The air was growing chilly, for the road climbed steeply andalready it was many thousand feet above the sea. The curious salt smellwhich comes from snow and rock was beginning to greet his nostrils. Theblood flowed more freely in his veins, and insensibly he squared hisshoulders to drink in the cold hill air. It was of the mountains andyet strangely foreign, an air with something woody and alpine in theheart of it, an air born of scrub and snow-clad rock, and not of his ownfree spaces of heather. But it was hill-born, and this contented him;it was night-born, and it refreshed him. In a little the road turneddown to the stream side, and he was on the edge of a long dark pool.

  The river, which made a poor show in the broad channel at Bardur, wasnow, in this straitened place, a full lipping torrent of clear, greenwater. Lewis bathed his flushed face and drank, and it was as cold assnow. It stung his face to burning, and as he walked the heartsome glowof great physical content began to rise in his heart. He felt fit andready for any work. Life was quick in his sinews, his brain was aweathercock, his strength was tireless. At last he had found a man'slife. He had never had a chance before. Life had been too easy andsheltered; he had been coddled like a child; he had never roughed itexcept for his own pleasure. Now he was outside this backbone of theworld with a task before him, and only his wits for his servant. Etonand Oxford, Eton and Oxford--so it had been for generations--aneducation sufficient to damn a race. Stocks was right, and he had allalong been wrong; but now he was in a fair way to taste the world's ironand salt, and he exulted at the prospect.

  It was hard walking in the nullah. In and out of great crevices theroad wound itself, on the brink of stupendous waterfalls, or in theheart of a brushwood tangle. Soon a clear vault of sky replaced theout-jutting crags, and he came out on a little plateau where a very coldwind was blowing. The smell of snow was in the air, a raw smell likesalt when carried on a north wind over miles of granite crags. But onthe little tableland the moon was shining clearly. It was green withsmall cloud-berries and dwarf juniper, and the rooty fragrance was forall the world like an English bolt or a Highland pasture. Lewis flunghimself prone and buried his face among the small green leaves.
Then,still on the ground, he scanned the endless yellow distance. Mountains,serrated and cleft as in some giant's play, rose on every hand, whilethrough the hollows gleamed the farther snow-peaks. This little bareplateau must be naked to any eye on any hill-side, and at the thought hegot to his feet and advanced.

  At first sight the place had looked not a mile long, but before he gotto the farther slope he found that it was nearer two. The mountain airhad given him extraordinary lightness, and he ran the distance, findingthe hard, sandy soil like a track under his feet. The slope, when hehad reached it, proved to be abrupt and boulder-strewn, and the path hadan ugly trick of avoiding steepness by skirting horrible precipices.Luckily the moon was bright, and the man was an old mountaineer;otherwise he might have found a grave in the crevices which seamed thehill.

  He had not gone far when he began to realize that he was not the onlyoccupant of the mountain side. A whistle which was not a bird's seemedto catch his ear at times, and once, as he shrank back into the lee of aboulder, there was the sound of naked feet on the road before him. Thiswas news indeed, and he crept very cautiously up the rugged path. Once,when in shelter, he looked out, and for a second, in a patch ofmoonlight, he saw a man with the loose breeches and tightened girdle ofthe hillmen. He was running swiftly as if to some arranged place ofmeeting.

  The sight put all doubts out of his head. An attack on Forza wasimminent, and this was the side from which least danger would beexpected. If the enemy got there before him they would find an easyentrance. The thought made him quicken his pace. These scatteredtribesmen must meet before they attacked, and there might still be timefor him to get in front. His ears were sharp as a deer's to theslightest sound. A great joy in the game possessed him. When hecrouched in the shelter of a granite boulder or sprawled among the scrubwhile the light footsteps of a tribesman passed on the road he felt thatone point was scored to him in a game in which he had no advantages. Heblessed his senses trained by years of sport to a keenness beyond atownsman's; his eye, which could see distances clear even in the mistymoonlight; his ear, which could judge the proximity of sounds with anice exactness. Twice he was on the brink of discovery. A twig snappedas he lay in cover, and he heard footsteps pause, and he knew that apair of very keen eyes were scanning the brushwood. He blessed hislucky choice in clothes which had made him bring a suit so near the hueof his hiding-place. Then he felt that the eyes were averted, thefootsteps died away, and he was safe. Again, as he turned a cornerswiftly, he almost came on the back of a man who was stepping alongleisurely before him. For a second he stopped, and then he was backround the corner, and had swung himself up to a patch of shadow on thecrag-side. He looked down and saw his enemy clearly in the moonlight; along, ferret-faced fellow, with a rifle hung on his back and an uglycrooked knife in his hand. The man looked round, sniffing the air likea stag, and then, satisfied that there was nothing to fear, turned andwent on. Lewis, who had been sitting on a sharp jag of rock, swung anaching body to the ground and advanced circumspectly.

  In an hour or two he came to the top of the slope and the beginning ofthe second tableland. A grey dimness was taking the place of the dark,and it had suddenly grown bitterly cold. Dawn in such high latitudes isnot a thing of violent changes, but of slow and subtle gradations oflight, of sudden, coy flushes of colour, of thin winds and brightfleeting hazes. He lay for a minute in the scrub of cloud-berries, thecollar of his coat buttoned round his throat, and the morning wind,fresh from leagues of snow, blowing chill on his face. Behind was theslope alive with men who at any moment might emerge on the plateau. Hewaited for the sight of a figure, but none came; clearly the muster wasnot yet complete. A thought grew in his brain, and a sudden clearnessin the air translated it into action; for in the hazy distance acrossthe tableland he saw the walls of Forza fort.

  The place could not be two miles off, and between it and him there wasthe smooth benty plateau. He might make a rush for it and crossunobserved. Even now the early sun was beginning to strike it. Theyellow-grey walls stood out clear against the far line of mountains, andthe wisp of colour which fluttered in the wind was clearly the Britishflag. The exceeding glory of the morning gave him a new vigour. Whyshould not he run with any tribesman of the lot? If he could but avoidthe risk of a rifle bullet at the outset, he would have no fear of theissue.

  He glanced behind him. The place seemed still, though far down therewas a tinkle as of little stones falling. He stood up, straightenedhimself for one moment till he had filled his lungs with the clean air.Then he started to run quickly towards the fort.

  The full orb of the sun topped the mountains and the dazzle was in hiseyes from the first. If he covered the first half-mile unpursued hewould be safe; otherwise he might expect a bullet. It was a comicfeeling--the wide green heath, the fresh air, the easy vigour in hisstride, the flush of the morning sun, and that awkward, nervous weaknessin the small of his back where a bullet might be expected to find alodgment.

  He never looked back till he had gone what seemed to him the properdistance, and then he glanced hurriedly over his shoulder.

  Two men had emerged from the scrub and stood on the edge of the slope.They were gazing intently at him, and suddenly one lifted a Snider tohis shoulder and fired. The bullet burrowed in the sand to the right ofhim. Again he looked back and there they were--five of them now--cryingout to him. Then with one accord they followed over the plateau.

  It was now a clear race for life. He must keep beyond reasonablerifle-shot; otherwise a broken leg might bring him to a standstill. Hecursed the deceptive clearness of the hill air which made it impossiblefor his unpractised eye to judge distances. The fort stood clear inevery stone, but it might be miles off though it looked scarcely athousand yards. Apparently it was still asleep, for no smoke wasrising, and, strain his ears as he might, he could hear no sound of asentry's walk. This looked awkward indeed for him. If the people werenot awake to receive him, he would be potted against its wall as surelyas a rat in a corner. He grew acutely nervous, and as he drew nearer hemade the air hideous with shouts to wake the garrison. A clear race inthe open he did not mind; but he had no stomach for a game ofhide-and-seek around an unscalable wall with an active enemy.

  Apparently the gentry behind him were growing despondent. Two riflebullets, fired by running men, sang unsteadily in his wake. He was nowso near that he could see the rough wooden gate and the pyramidal nailswith which it was studded. He could guess the number of paces betweenhim and safety. He was out of breath and a little tired, for thescramble up the nullah had not been a light one. Again he yelledfrantically to the dead walls, beseeching their inmates to get out ofbed and save his life.

  There was still no sound from the sleeping fortress. He was barely ahundred yards off, and he saw now that the walls were too high to climband that nothing remained but the gate. He picked up a stone and flungit against the woodwork. The din echoed through the empty place, butthere was no sound of life. Just at the threshold there was a patch ofshadow. It was his one way of escape, and as he reached the door andkicked and hammered at the wood, he cowered down in the shade, prayingthat his friends behind might be something less than sharpshooters.

  The pursuit saw its chance, and running forward to get within easyrange, proceeded to target practice. Lewis, kicking diligently at thedoor, was trying to draw himself into the smallest space, and his mindwas far from comfortable. It needs good nerves to fill the position ofa target with equanimity, and he was too tired to take it in good part.A disagreeable cold sweat stood on his brow, and his heart beatviolently. Then a bullet did what all his knocking had failed to do,for it crashed into the woodwork and woke the garrison. He heard feethurrying across a yard, and then it seemed to him that men werereconnoitring from the top of the wall. A second later--when the thirdbullet had buried itself in dust a foot beyond his head--the heavy gatewas half opened and a man's hand assisted him to crawl inside.

  He looked up to see a tall figure in pyjamas standing over him. "Now Iwonder who the deuce you
are?" it was saying.

  "My name's Haystoun. H-a-y-s;" then he broke off and laughed. He hadfallen into his old trick of spelling his name to the Oxford tradesmenwhen he was young and hated to have it garbled.

  He looked up at the questioner again. "Bless me, Andy, so it's you."

  The man gave a yell of delight. "Lewis, upon my soul. Who'd havethought it? It is a Providence. By Gad, I believe I'm just in time tosave your life."