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Page 86
"My God! Are you in the police yourself?"
"No."
"What business is it of yours, then?"
"It's every man's business to see justice done."
"You can take my word that she is innocent."
"Then you are guilty."
"No, I am not."
"Who killed Colonel James Barclay, then?"
"It was a just providence that killed him. But, mind
you this, that if I had knocked his brains out, as it
was in my heart to do, he would have had no more than
his due from my hands. If his own guilty conscience
had not struck him down it is likely enough that I
might have had his blood upon my soul. You want me to
tell the story. Well, I don't know why I shouldn't,
for there's no cause for me to be ashamed of it.
"It was in this way, sir. You see me now with my back
like a camel and by ribs all awry, but there was a
time when Corporal Henry Wood was the smartest man in
the 117th foot. We were in India then, in
cantonments, at a place we'll call Bhurtee. Barclay,
who died the other day, was sergeant in the same
company as myself, and the belle of the regiment, ay,
and the finest girl that ever had the breath of life
between her lips, was Nancy Devoy, the daughter of the
color-sergeant. There were two men that loved her,
and one that she loved, and you'll smile when you look
at this poor thing huddled before the fire, and hear
me say that it was for my good looks that she loved
me.
"Well, though I had her heart, her father was set upon
her marrying Barclay. I was a harum-scarum, reckless
lad, and he had had an education, and was already
marked for the sword-belt. But the girl held true to
me, and it seemed that I would have had her when the
Mutiny broke out, and all hell was loose in the
country.
"We were shut up in Bhurtee, the regiment of us with
half a battery of artillery, a company of Sikhs, and a
lot of civilians and women-folk. There were ten
thousand rebels round us, and they were as keen as a
set of terriers round a rat-cage. About the second
week of it our water gave out, and it was a question
whether we could communicate with General Neill's
column, which was moving up country. It was our only
chance, for we could not hope to fight our way out
with all the women and children, so I volunteered to
go out and to warn General Neill of our danger. My
offer was accepted, and I talked it over with Sergeant
Barclay, who was supposed to know the ground better
than any other man, and who drew up a route by which I
might get through the rebel lines. At ten o'clock the
same night I started off upon my journey. There were
a thousand lives to save, but it was of only one that
I was thinking when I dropped over the wall that
night.
"My way ran down a dried-up watercourse, which we
hoped would screen me from the enemy's sentries; but
as I crept round the corner of it I walked right into
six of them, who were crouching down in the dark
waiting for me. In an instant I was stunned with a
blow and bound hand and foot. But the real blow was
to my heart and not to my head, for as I came to and
listened to as much as I could understand of their
talk, I heard enough to tell me that my comrade, the
very man who had arranged the way that I was to take,
had betrayed me by means of a native servant into the
hands of the enemy.
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