On the Road to Bagdad: A Story of Townshend's Gallant Advance on the Tigris

Then the pennons at the tips of the lances waved, a sharp order snapped down the ranks, and in a trice the lances were lowered. That trumpet blaring in the distance had set every horse in this other troop curveting and prancing, and now, as a note came from their own trumpeter, the horses were off, the men leaning low down in their saddles, their eyes glued on the enemy, their knees gripping their horses, and their lances pointed well out before them.

What a shout those Indian sowars gave! Their comrades coming from the opposite direction answered with a shrill yell of triumph, and then, like a flash, the two troops were launched against the enemy.

Converging as they came, till there were perhaps only some four or five hundred yards between the flanks of each of the troops, the horsemen plunged into the midst of the Arabs. Here and there they had left a horse rolling on the sand behind them, and there was more than one animal without a rider as they got close to the enemy; but nothing stopped the Indians, neither the shouts nor the bullets of the Arabs. With a crash they were in at them, thrusting right and left, riding them down, riding over them, and then it was over. What was left of those Arab horsemen scattered and fled in every direction, leaving the Indian Horse conquerors.

As for Geoff, his fingers trembled as he pulled Sultan in and dropped from his saddle.

"My word," exclaimed Daglish, offering him his cigarette case with a hand which jerked and wobbled badly, "but that was something! If that's war – the sort of war we're likely to have in Mesopotamia – then the more of it we have the merrier. Come here, Keith! I want to know what yarn you've been pitching to our Commander? You've been fibbing, eh? I asked him as we were trotting along through the palm-trees what report you had given. You said nothing about that flare-up with the Arab chief, about the bullets you were idiot enough to wait for, and about the way you captured him. My boy, there's a lively time coming!"

CHAPTER V

News of the Enemy

When the youthful and enthusiastic, and, let us add, immaculately and smartly dressed Daglish of the Indian Horse declared with such gusto to Geoff Keith that there was a lively time coming, and that that young fellow was likely to hear more of the adventure that had befallen him so soon after his landing in Mesopotamia, he attained to only a portion of the truth, and hinted only in some small degree at what our hero was to put up with. Like a flash the tale of his meeting with the Arab chief went round the camp after the return of the Indian Horse, and not even that exhilarating and most dashing charge could swamp the details.

"Wanted at Head-quarters, sir! Colonel – gave me horders to find you at once. Pressing, sir! Ve-e-ery pressing, sir!" said a British "Tommy", as he discovered Geoff in the act of leaving the horse lines, where Sultan had been picketed.

It was always a habit of Geoff's – as it is of every good horseman who possesses a fine animal, and is fond of it – to make it a custom and rule to see to the comforts of his mount before sitting down to eat and drink. Thus, as Geoff came striding away from beneath the palms where the Indian cavalry had picketed their horses, and where the officers' mounts were made fast to a long picketing-rope close beside them, he came face to face with this British "Tommy"; in fact, the man barred his way to the ship still unloading at the river bank, and arrested his further progress. A big, brawny chap, he was sweltering in the moist heat of Mesopotamia, with the perspiration pouring from his forehead and down both cheeks. His thin khaki-twill jacket was sticking to his manly chest in many parts, and showed a number of moist patches. From under his sun-helmet a pair of shrewd, sharp eyes peered at this young officer – the tale of whose adventures had reached the orderly's ears – while a fierce and somewhat grizzled moustache – for the man was an old soldier, who had seen many days' service in India – projected on either side of the chin-strap which secured the helmet. In the smartest possible manner he came to attention, and, shouldering his rifle, saluted briskly.

"Horders, very speshul, sir," he said, his eyes twinkling; and then to himself, and almost aloud – for this gallant fellow had a way of addressing his remarks to no one in particular, and his thoughts to the open: "Lor'! Bless me 'art! If he ain't no more'n a baby, just a mere shaver; and they tells me he speaks this 'ere lingo like a good 'un. Lingo, do they call it? Just a norrible mess o' words, that's what I says, and yer can't make not one of 'em understand. Why, bless me soul! I sees an old chap with coal-black eyes, an' a beard as white as snow, a-sittin' in a doorway o' one of the things round 'ere they calls 'uts – 'uts, is they? My word! My uncle! – as some of these 'ere orficer men calls it – just 'oles I call 'em. 'Uts! And there was that there man – more like a monkey he looked – and though I shouted at 'im, not a word could he understand, nor me the lingo he flung back at me. I should say – "

Geoff's rather short and abrupt "Well?" brought the good fellow's ruminating to a sudden ending; he coughed loudly to clear his voice, and those sharp eyes of his again twinkled.

"Bless my 'art! I was a-wanderin'," he told himself; and then aloud: "Horders, speshul, sir. Colonel – , sir, said I was to find you at once, and you was to report at Head-quarters immediately. Shall I dismiss, sir?"

"Please," Geoff told him, and stood watching the man and pondering – pondering not so much as to the reason for this order and the nature of the interview before him as to the reason which had produced what he was sure was a twinkling in the eyes of the man who had brought the message.

"Confound the fellow!" he was saying. "I'm sure he had a little joke on of his own, and was almost laughing; and I've seen him before somewhere. Now where?"

In his turn, he too was cut short abruptly, and enjoined to remember his orders, and not to allow himself to indulge in a species of "brown study". For if that gallant soldier had been duly and correctly dismissed, he was still and always a soldier, a punctilious fellow, who throughout long years had never failed to carry out the orders of a superior, and who, now that he had conveyed such an order to an officer, considered it only his mere duty to see that that young officer acted on the order promptly. He was standing near at hand, his rifle still at his shoulder, his head thrown back, those eyes of his watching Geoff shrewdly.

"Horders, speshul, sir," he muttered in guttural tones, which just managed to reach our hero. "Beg pardon, sir – "

But Geoff had already come to his senses again, and went striding off to the Head-quarters hut, with the orderly following closely. There he found himself confronted just outside the hut, and beneath a tope of palms which threw its grateful shade above some chairs placed there for the Staff of the expedition, by one of the senior Staff Officers.

"Ha, Keith!" he said genially enough. "Sit down, my boy, and have a cigarette. Now tell me all about it. By the way, that has been a very pretty little affair, that rounding up of those Arab horsemen and the charge of the troops we sent out, a very gallant little bit of business, and I shouldn't wonder if it brought credit to the officer in command. But, as I am chiefly concerned with the Intelligence Service, I'll leave that alone for the moment and get you to tell me of the news you obtained from your prisoner. That reminds me. Young Daglish has been telling us a fine tale. Very well done, Keith! Very well done indeed! Though I doubt the wisdom of an officer on special service – as you happen to be just now – making himself the open, unabashed target for Turkish bullets. Take the enemy fire like a soldier when you have to, but don't seek it out; don't look for points or for places where you can expose yourself. In other words, don't be reckless, or, to quote our friend Daglish again, don't 'behave like a careless idiot!' Now then, having said my say, let us get on with our particular business."

Very quickly Geoff gave him all the information he had been able to extract from the captured chief, and then, at a suggestion from the officer, the Arab was sent for, and presently appeared with an escort of sowars about him.

"If I may say so, sir," said Geoff, "I think we shall do far better by showing our trust in this prisoner and dismissing his escort. I do not assert that an Arab is to be trusted. As a general rule, speaking of those in Mesopotamia, he is certainly not; he will join the cause of the highest bidder, or he will leave any sinking ship if only he can discover the danger in which he is standing soon enough. But by making this man realize that we are not a sinking ship, and that his interests are best served by serving us, we shall be able to get from him not only information which he already has, but might even employ him to obtain further facts of importance. For that a liberal reward, to be paid some months hence, should be promised."

For a little while the Staff Officer regarded the chief sternly, and yet with interest. No Englishman could look at such man and fail to find in him much to attract attention. For, as we have said before, this Arab chief was an exceedingly fine specimen of Arab humanity. Tall and straight and austere-looking in his native costume, his features were refined and handsome. There was nothing of the negroid type about him; and indeed this man, dressed in European costume, might have made his appearance in the most exclusive parts of London, and one could guess that his features, his delicately shaped hands, his well-kept nails, his manners, indeed, would have rendered him by no means inferior to his fellows. The chief returned the officer's frank gaze with one just as frank, with one distinctly haughty, with a glance which told of courage, and pride, and also determination.

"Dismiss the escort," commanded the officer sharply, addressing the Indian officer in charge of them; "let them rest in the shade at the back of the Head-quarters hut. Now, Chief," he said, smiling at the captive, "sit down. Keith, ask him to make himself comfortable."

"The officer here wishes you to feel that you are a friend and not a captive," said Geoff at once, taking upon himself the liberty of somewhat enlarging upon his senior's pronouncement. "He invites you to sit down with us, and, as a chief of honour, he knows that by doing so you give your word that you will not attempt to escape, and that what shall be spoken between us will be the truth, and the truth only."

A beaming smile broke over the face of the chief instantly, and he nodded in friendly fashion to both officers; then, pulling a chair nearer, he sat down with an easy grace which proved beyond fear of refutation that if indeed he were a child of the desert, yet he had some knowledge of Western customs, and unlike his fellows was accustomed to a chair, and appreciated the comfort to be obtained by the use of it.

"My master," he told Geoff, "doubtless His Highness who sits there with us is a great chief in your country, and is one whose words should be honourably listened to. If he says that he desires Suliman as a friend rather than as a captive, and that at a time when he discovers this same Suliman a mere harmless and helpless prisoner, then, indeed, is he a man of great honour and liberality. And what should I say? I, who am a helpless, harmless captive, who am bid to sit as friend before him, and who thereby assents to join your forces. My master, from this day forward I am your man, sworn to your service, sworn to do my utmost for the British. If I depart from this saying, if it should happen that in later days I break my oath, then, indeed, may I be proclaimed to be a faithless scoundrel, one deserving of instant execution. My master, as a friend I sit before you, and I thank you for this great concession."

For more than an hour the three sat there in the shadow of the palms, Geoff acting as interpreter; and slowly, and little by little, as the Intelligence Officer asked questions which would never have occurred to Geoff, information of considerable value was extracted from the chief. Indeed, the latter was undoubtedly greatly delighted at the treatment afforded him – for to be kept a close captive had seemed to him inevitable. And partly by the judicious offer of a handsome reward – a small portion of which was to be paid within a month's time, so soon as he had produced results, and the remainder when the war was finished – together with the promise of certain allowances whilst he was with the British Expeditionary Force in Mesopotamia, the chief was led to give a most willing assent to aid his captors further.

"More than that, my master," he said eagerly enough, addressing Geoff while he looked across at the Staff Officer, "I can make even greater promises; for have you not honoured me much by thus making a friend of me rather than a captive? Listen, then! And as Allah hears us, treat this not as a promise, but as a plan to be carried out without doubt and of a certainty. You have treated me handsomely, and have made promises which will give me wealth if I but live to earn it. See, these men about me, these Indian horsemen, these British soldiers, these native troops whom you have brought across the water to fight the Turk and the Sultan and those white men – those unbelievers – who have joined your enemy! You pay those soldiers of yours, doubtless, my master; your British king has gold wherewith to fill their pockets?"

"Certainly, Chief," Geoff told him promptly. "Each man draws his regular pay and allowances. Every one of the soldiers you see here is a free man – free to join the army or not, just as he likes. But, once he has joined, he is paid just as a man who may work as a servant in one of your camps is paid, for the British king forces service upon no man."

"Then listen further, my master. There are in my tribe perhaps a thousand men, all well found with horses, all with great knowledge of this country, and not one of whom would fail to fight if the opportunity came to him. Give them money, pay them the same amount that you pay these Indian soldiers, and find them in certain necessaries and in ammunition. Promise this, and trust your slave still further. For then he will ride out to them, and if they be not willing to return with him and join forces with these soldiers, he himself will return – whether they wish it or not – and will render himself up again to you. My master, I am a man of honour, and this thing I will do, as Allah hears me."

The suggestion made by the captured chief was one which, naturally enough, needed much consideration, and, also, the consent of higher authority; yet, so excellent did the plan seem, and so clearly was Geoff able to put it before the Intelligence Officer, that by the following morning it was adopted, and, a good horse having been handed to the chief, and weapons also, he was allowed to ride out of the camp in search of his followers.

"Of course we may, or we may not, see him back," said the Staff Officer somewhat sceptically. "You tell me, Keith, that Arabs are not to be trusted, and that is a tale I have heard often enough before. Yet I have little doubt that many of them are just as trustworthy as people in our country."

"Just!" Geoff agreed with him promptly, if not warmly, for during his short residence in Mesopotamia, when he had been with Major Joe Douglas, he had met with, and lived with, more than one tribe of Arabs, with whom he had become more than usually friendly. Moreover, he had known them to be absolutely trustworthy; and though, during this coming conflict, some might already have sided with the Turks – who were their nominal rulers – and though, as the campaign went on, it might happen that they would leave that service and join the British – for such is a habit of nomadic Arab tribes – yet that did not prove them to be utterly devoid of trust or of honour.

"If I know a man at all, sir," he said respectfully, "I know this chief, whom I was instrumental in capturing. He has given us his word of honour, and he has called upon Allah to witness the words which he has spoken. That will compel him to carry out his promises whether he wills it or not; and should it happen that his followers arrest him, and do their utmost to prevent his return, yet I feel sure that he will make every effort to come back to us."

As a matter of fact, some three days later, when the embarkation of the British Expeditionary Force was completed, and the troops had settled down in their camps beside the river, the outposts – placed well beyond the encampment – reported a large column of horsemen approaching. The information was brought to Head-quarters, and within five minutes of its arrival that same Intelligence Officer had sent a hurried message to our hero.

"Get on your horse at once, Keith," he told him, "and come along with me. This force approaching may be our friend the chief bringing in his followers or it may be an enemy force come to try conclusions with us. If I happened to be an officer in the Indian Horse I rather think I should hope for the latter, for those boys are dying for more fighting. As it is, I trust that it will be the chief, and that he'll bring with him a lot of useful fellows. Horsemen used to the country and to the tricks of the Turks will be a valuable acquisition, and we shall be able to make the most of them."

Quickly mounting the fretful Sultan, Geoff was ready within a few minutes, and, together with the Intelligence Officer, made rapid progress to the outposts. Then, fixing his glasses to his eyes, he carefully scrutinized the force approaching across the desert. A tall figure in flowing robes, riding at their head, was without doubt the chief who had given them his promise, and, having reported this fact to the Intelligence Officer, the two of them rode out to meet the cavalcade approaching. Then they led them back into the camp, and within an hour the Arabs had settled down as if they had never been anything else but a portion of the British Expeditionary Force destined to advance so far up the River Tigris.

Two days later the camp broke up, and, with a naval flotilla steaming beside them up the river, they marched on Basra, which town they occupied, after meeting with only small resistance. They were now approaching the confluence of the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates, and were, indeed, within striking distance of that portion of the desert which, in days long gone by, was known as the Garden of Eden, where the toil of the inhabitants then living in those parts had converted what may have been a desert in their earlier days into a smiling garden the fame of which has descended through the ages. Yet now it was a desert, a sandy, gravelly stretch of dried-up, waterless, and inhospitable desert, peopled but sparsely, and for the most part only along the actual banks of the river, where the moisture, finding its way into the soil on either side, kept it fertile, and where grew a thick belt of palms, descending past Basra to the open sea. There were marshes, too, for the River Euphrates in particular, which traverses a flat country, has changed its course through the ages on numerous occasions. Some particular course may remain open for a considerable period, and have the appearance of being the main channel, yet always there are overflows, and often enough such a main channel is silted up with the dirt and debris coming from higher parts of the desert; then the water, bursting over the low banks, and particularly the southern bank, has gouged some other channel for itself, or has widened out into broad stretches of marsh – perhaps only two feet in depth – leaving no semblance of the river channel.

"It's there, amongst the marshes, that the Turks lie hidden," the chief told Geoff that evening. "Of their numbers and of their exact positions I know nothing, yet the rumour has reached me that they are there, and that soon they will attempt to come in behind the British and attack them. It were well, my master, if some of those ships that I see floating upon the water, and in particular some of the smaller ones, were sent into the marshes. There are channels deep enough to take them, and if careful search were made it may be that the Turkish enemy would be discovered."

Geoff was not such a young soldier that he could not at once perceive the importance of the information just conveyed to him. With the knowledge he already had of Mesopotamia, he had been able to inform his friend on the Staff that, above the town of Basra, wide stretches of marsh would be discovered, which at certain seasons of the year were greatly extended by the heavy rains which fell in that part of the world. But if residence in Mesopotamia had given him some idea of the course of the rivers, of the towns and villages dotted here and there, and of the numerous peoples who inhabited that region, he could not, naturally enough, be expected to know where the Turks had disposed their forces on the outbreak of this gigantic war. Some had undoubtedly been posted towards the mouth of the Shatt-el-Arab, for had not the Indian horse already had a lively brush with them? But where were the others? Higher up the river, preparing their defences and waiting for the onward march of the British forces, or sneaking in those marshes to the west of them, which spread themselves along the broken and irregular course of the River Euphrates, from a point perhaps fifty miles away to the spot where the river joined with the main channel of the Tigris? And if they were there, hidden in the swamps, perhaps camping on some piece of ground elevated sufficiently to give them a dry footing, then indeed they would be a menace to the safety of the forces invading the country. They might march down along the edge of the swampy ground, or if provided with native boats, known as bellums, might steal over the shallow waters and cut off the retreat of Geoff and his comrades.

"Chief," he said suddenly, "you know this marsh land, perhaps, and you would help us to discover these enemies?"

"My master, an Arab is a man of the desert, a man who is happiest when far away in the open, or when mounted upon his horse, with leagues of sandy soil before him. We are not given to venturing upon the water, and thus it follows that I am ignorant of these marshes, and could be of little service. But listen, my master! There is one within this town of Basra who could assist you. A man known to me – a native of these parts, of uncertain nationality. He is but a poor fisherman; and if His Highness, whom I have met, cares to arrest him, he has then but to command and the man will carry out his bidding."

"And suppose – for I must tell you, Chief, that we of Great Britain do not force our orders upon helpless and poor people – supposing a reward is offered to this man. What then?" asked Geoff.

"Then, indeed, you may count upon his assistance, his ready assistance," said the chief, "and for all I know he might be willing enough to carry out the work because of his hatred of the Turks. Yes, my master, they are hated in this part of the world. Though they molest the Arabs but little, and indeed fear us greatly, for we are swift to move from spot to spot, and can strike a blow and be gone in an instant, yet to those who live their lives on the bank of the river, where the Turks can reach them easily because of their boats, to these they are often harsh and cruel, taxing them heavily, and treating them as slaves, or little better."

Geoff gave himself a few moments in which to deliberate, and then, asking the chief to accompany him to Head-quarters, he sent in a message to the Intelligence Officer who has already been introduced to our readers. To him he promptly gave full information of the marshes, and of the rumoured Turkish forces lying hidden in them. It was apparent at once that this Staff Officer considered the news of the utmost importance; for, bidding Geoff stay outside the house taken over by the General, he disappeared inside, and remained there for quite a considerable period. When he came out again, it was clear from the expression on his face that he had come to some decision.

"Those Turks must be found, and routed," he told Geoff. "And of course we shall be glad to take advantage of the services of the native whom the chief has mentioned to you. That means that you must go along too, Keith, for otherwise there will be the language difficulty. Orders will be given to the naval contingent. There are some motor launches with them, and I imagine that one of them should be able to make its way through the marshes. In fact, the expedition will have to be a naval one almost entirely, with you and this native guide accompanying."