Читать книгу Wilmshurst of the Frontier Force - Percy Francis Westerman - Страница 5
ОглавлениеCHAOS IN THE CABIN
It was a march of about five miles to the beach along a straight road bordered with palm trees. At some distance from the highway the country was thick with scrub, from which the sickly smell of the mangroves rose in the still slanting rays of the sun.
Most of the heavy baggage had already been sent down, but with the troops were hundreds of native carriers, each bearing a load of about sixty pounds, while crowds of native women and children flocked to see the last of the regiment for some time to come.
The embarkation had to be performed by means of boats from the open beach, against which white rollers surged heavily, the thundering of the surf being audible for miles. At a long distance from the shore, so that she appeared little larger than a boat, lay the transport Zungeru, rolling sluggishly at a single anchor, while steaming slowly in the offing was a light cruiser detailed to act as escort to the convoy, for more transports were under orders to rendezvous off Cape Coast Castle.
Amidst the loud and discordant vociferations of the native boatmen the troops boarded the broad, shallow-drafted surf boats, each man having the breech-mechanism of his rifle carefully wrapped in oiled canvas to prevent injury from salt water. In batches of twenty the Waffs left their native soil, but not before three boat loads had been unceremoniously capsized in the surf, to the consternation of the men affected and the light-hearted merriment of their more fortunate comrades.
Without mishap Wilmshurst gained the accommodation-ladder of the Zungeru, where brawny British mercantile seamen, perspiring freely in the torrid heat, were energetically assisting their black passengers on board with encouraging shouts of "Up with you, Sambo!" "Mind your nut, Darkie!" and similar exhortations. The while derricks were swaying in and out, whipping the baggage from the holds of the lighters that lay alongside, grinding heavily in the swell, fenders notwithstanding.
Having seen the men of his platoon safely on board Wilmshurst went below to the two-berthed cabin which he was to share with Laxdale, the subaltern of No. 2 platoon.
Opening the door Wilmshurst promptly ducked his head to avoid a sweeping blow with a knotted towel which his brother officer was wielding desperately and frantically.
"Hullo!" exclaimed Laxdale breathlessly. "Come in and bear a hand. Hope I didn't flick you."
"What's wrong?" enquired Dudley, eyeing with feelings of apprehension the sight of the disordered cabin. "Looks as if a Hun four-point-one had been at work here."
The "traps" of both subalterns were littering the floor in utmost confusion. Sheets, blankets and mosquito nets had been torn from the bunks, while a smashed water-bottle and glass bore testimony to the erratic onslaught of the wildly excited Laxdale.
"Almost wish it had," exclaimed the harassed subaltern. "I was unpacking my kit when a whopping big rat jumped out of this valise. I'll swear that rascal of a servant of mine knows all about it. I had to give him a dressing down yesterday for losing some of my gear. We'll have to find the animal, Wilmshurst. A rat is my pet abomination."
"Why not leave the door open?" suggested Dudley.
"An' let the bounder go scot-free?" added Laxdale, a gleam of grim determination in his eyes. "No jolly fear. We'll lay him out properly. Here you are, take this."
He handed Wilmshurst a towel roller made of teak, forming a heavy and effective weapon.
"This is where I think the brute's hiding," continued Laxdale, indicating a long drawer under the lowermost bunk. "I was stowing some of my gear away when I spotted him. After five minutes' strafing he disappeared, but goodness knows how he managed to get through that little slit. Now stand by."
Entering into the spirit of the chase Dudley knelt down and waited with poised stick while Laxdale charily opened the drawer. Like most drawers on board ship and frequently elsewhere it jammed. By frantic up and down movements the subaltern freed it. Then he waited, both officers listening intently. Not a sound came from within.
"Don't suppose the brute's there after all. He must have effected a strategic movement.... Look out, by Jove!"
Acting upon his impression Laxdale had tugged the drawer half open. Instantly there was a vision of a dark object darting with lightning-like rapidity.
Down came Wilmshurst's towel roller a fraction of a second too late for Mister Rat. At the same time Laxdale moved his hands along the ledge of the drawer and received the full force of the blow across the knuckles.
"Sorry!" exclaimed Wilmshurst.
Laxdale, nursing the injured hand, made no audible comment. Deliberately he relieved Dudley of the towel-roller, throwing his companion the knotted towel in exchange.
"Where's the brute now?" he asked grimly.
A scuffling noise in a tin bath suspended from the cork-cemented roof of the cabin betrayed the rodent's temporary hiding-place. Both men looked first at the bath and then at each other.
"It would be as well if we put our helmets on," suggested Wilmshurst, replacing his "double-pith" headgear. "Now, I'll shake the bath and you let rip when he falls. But please don't try to get your own back on me."
As a precautionary measure Dudley beat the side of the bath with the towel. It might have been efficacious if the subaltern had been engaging in apiarian operations, but as far as present events went it was a "frost."
"Tilt it, old man," suggested Laxdale.
Wilmshurst carried out this suggestion only too well. The bath, slipping from its supporting fixtures, clattered noisily to the floor, its edge descending heavily upon Dudley's foot. Again a momentary vision of the leaping rodent, then, crash! With a mighty sweep of the tower-roller Laxdale demolished the electric-light globe into a thousand fragments.
"Getting on," he remarked cheerfully. "There'll be a big bill for 'barrack damages' eh, what? Where's the brute?"
The rat, terrified by the din, had retired to a recess formed by the bulkhead of the cabin and the fixed wash-basin and was acting strictly on the defensive.
"Aha!" exclaimed Laxdale. "Now you're cornered. No use yelling 'Mercy, kamerad.'"
Levelling the roller like a billiard cue the subaltern prepared to make a thrust and administer the coup de grâce, but he had forgotten that he had not yet found his sea-legs. A roll of the ship made him lose his balance, and he pitched head foremost into the rodent's retreat. Like a flash the rat leapt, scampered over Laxdale's helmet, down his back and took refuge in the breast-pocket of Wilmshurst's tunic.
Dudley beat all records in slipping off his Sam Browne and discarding the tunic, for by the time his companion had regained his feet the garment lay on the floor.
"Stamp on it!" yelled the now thoroughly excited and exasperated subaltern.
"It's my tunic, remember," protested Dudley firmly as he pushed his brother-officer aside.
Just then the door opened, and Spofforth, another member of the "Lone Star Crush" appeared, enquiring, "What's all the row about, you fellows? Scrapping?"
"Shut that door!" exclaimed Laxdale hurriedly. "Either in or out, old man."
The hunters suspended operations to wipe the streams of perspiration from their faces and to explain matters.
"Ratting, eh?" queried Spofforth. "You fellows look like a pair of Little Willies looting a French chateau."
"Hullo! More of 'em," murmured Laxdale as the door was unceremoniously pushed open and another of the "One Pip" officers made his appearance. "Look alive, Danvers, and don't stand there looking in the air. Walk in and take a pew, if you can find one."
"I've come to borrow a glass," remarked the latest arrival. "Mine's smashed and my batman hasn't unpacked my aluminium traps. Judging by appearances, by Jove! I've drawn a blank. What's up—a toppin' rag, or have the water pipes burst?"
Wilmshurst and Laxdale sat on the upper bunk, Spofforth on the closed lid of the wash-basin stand, and Danvers found a temporary resting-place on the none too rigid top of a cabin trunk. Each man kept his feet carefully clear of the floor, while four pairs of eyes were fixed upon Dudley's tunic, the folds of which were pulsating under the violent lung-movements of the sheltering rodent.
"Why not shake the brute out?" suggested Danvers.
"You try it," suggested Laxdale, whose enthusiasm was decidedly on the wane. "Wilmshurst here has turned mouldy. He refuses point blank to let me use his raiment of neutral colour as a door-mat. I might add that if you've ever had the experience of a particularly active member of the rodent family scampering down your back you wouldn't be quite so keen."
"How about turning out the machine-gun section?" asked Spofforth. "Look here, if you fellows want to be ready for tiffen you'd better get a move on. Suppose——"
"Still they come!" exclaimed Laxdale, as a knock sounded on the jalousie of the cabin door. "Come in."
It was Tari Barl in search of his master.
"Tarry Barrel, you old sinner," said Wilmshurst, "can you catch a rat?"
"Me lib for find Mutton Chop, sah," replied the Haussa saluting. "Find him one time and come quick."
Dudley looked enquiringly at his cabin-mate, knowing that Mutton Chop was Laxdale's servant.
"Oh, so that rascal's the culprit," declared Laxdale. "Didn't I say I thought so?"
"Bring Mutton Chop here," ordered Wilmshurst, addressing the broadly smiling Tari Barl.
The Haussa vanished, presently to reappear with almost an exact counterpart of himself. It would be a difficult matter for a stranger to tell the difference between the two natives.
"What d'ye mean, you black scoundrel, by putting a rat into my traps?" demanded Laxdale.
"No did put, sah; him lib for come one time," expostulated Laxdale's servant. "Me play, 'Come to cook-house door,' den him catchee."
Producing a small native flute Mutton Chop began to play a soft air. For perhaps thirty seconds every one and everything else was still in the desolated cabin; then slowly but without any signs of furtiveness the rat pushed his head between the folds of Wilmshurst's tunic, sniffed, and finally emerged, sat up on his hind legs, his long whiskers quivering with evident delight.
Then, with a deft movement, Mutton Chop's fingers closed gently round the little animal, and to the astonishment of the four officers the Haussa placed the rodent in his breast pocket.
"Me hab mascot same as officers, sahs!" he explained. "No put him here, sah; me make tidy."
"And there's the officers' call!" exclaimed Dudley as a bugle rang out. "Dash it all, how's a fellow to put on the thing?"
And he indicated the crumpled tunic.
