CHAPTER XLIII EXPIATION

Whether it was the stifling desert air, or the anticipation of the morrow's battle, I cannot tell; but sleep for me was a thing impossible. We were encamped on the outskirts of a mighty plain, and within an hour's march the Mahdi lay entrenched awaiting our attack. Outside my tent all was bustle and stir in preparation for the morrow's fight, and a yellow moon was shining with a grim ghostly light upon our white tents, and the figures moving silently about.

There were many other reasons why I should be restless. We were within a day's march—they could not be further away, and they might be nearer—of my father and Burton Leigh. Every day came tidings of the two white men on whose heads the Mahdi had set an enormous price, and who lived in deadly peril for fear of the treachery of their wavering friends, and to-morrow their fate would be decided, for if the tribe of the Asarees seceded to the false prophet and joined in the fight, then they were most surely doomed. But if, on the other hand, they held aloof from the fight, then would my father and Burton Leigh have succeeded in their daring mission, and would reach us in safety to be received as heroes.

A shadow darkened my tent, and an orderly stood before me, saluting.

"Colonel Devereux would like particularly to see you in his tent, sir."

What could it mean! Neither word nor glance had passed between us since we left England on board the same ship. I followed the man with beating heart.

The vision of a man physically weak, who, after a mortal struggle with some fiendish sin, has cast it from him and come out of the fight dying but triumphant with a spiritual joy; it seemed to me that this was what I saw when I stood face to face with my Uncle Rupert. Ghastly pale, but firm, with deep lines suddenly engraven across his forehead, but with the light of a great, calm resolution in his eyes, he stood before me, and I trembled, for strong and clear the conviction of the truth flashed upon me. The day for which I had longed with such a sickening desire had come.

"Hugh," he said, quietly, "to-night is my last on earth. People may scoff at presentiments who never feel them. Like a still whisper from another world I have heard the truth. In to-morrow's fight I shall die!"

I would have spoken, but it was impossible. The words stuck in my throat.

"One word about this sin of mine, Hugh," he went on in a strange, calm tone. "It was done in a mad impulse of jealousy, in a moment of madness which a lifetime of misery has not expiated. Every one knows that I have been an unhappy man. Success and fame have only been glow-worms leading me on into a marsh of discontent. With a guilty conscience no man on earth can be happy!"

He took up a roll of papers from a table by his side, and summoned his servant.

"Greasely, go to General Fielding's tent and tell him I am ready."

I stood there still in silence. My uncle sank into a low chair and half covered his face. In less than a minute the opening to the tent was lifted, and our commander-in-chief, followed by a younger officer, entered.

"Colonel Devereux," he said, kindly but promptly, "in accordance with my promise I am here and I have brought Captain Luxton. I can spare you five minutes."

Like a gaunt spectre my uncle came out from the shades of the tent, and his sad, weary tone moved even my pity.

"Three will be sufficient," he said. "General Fielding, a quarter of a century ago you heard me commit perjury against my brother; and your father, Captain Luxton, pronounced the sentence. It is for this reason that I have asked you to witness my confession. You have already read it."

He took up his pen and signed the roll of paper. General Fielding and Captain Luxton immediately followed suit, and the former took possession of the document.

"General Fielding," my uncle continued, with a voice that commenced to shake a little, "I am already your debtor, inasmuch as you permit me to retain my commission until after to-morrow's fight. But I ask you still another favour."

The General bowed, and there was a decided gleam of compassion in his stern face.

"Let this matter be cleared up immediately after to-morrow's fight. If my brother be found alive, which God grant that he may, let my confession be read in open court-martial, however informal, at once," he pleaded.

"It shall be done. Luxton, we must be off. Gentlemen, good-night."

We were alone, my uncle and I. His unnatural calm seemed to be breaking up, and the look of agony on his face filled me with compassion—aye, compassion even towards him.

"There is something troubling you," I said quietly. "You are thinking of Maud."

He looked at me wildly. I knew that I was right.

"Maud's future will be in my hands," I told him in a low tone. "She loves me, and she will be my wife."

At first he seemed dazed, then, as he began to realise my words, a great sob of relief shook him from head to foot.

"And Francis," I added, after a short pause, "I will remember that he is my cousin—and my brother."

He stood up like one who has passed through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, yet with a look almost of peace upon his spiritualised face.

"Hugh, will you take my hand?"

I took it, wrung it warmly, and left him. What more could I have done? He was better alone.

*****

Like the sands of the desert before a fierce sirocco, the followers of the false prophet were flying far and wide. It had been a fierce fight. They had come down upon us like a whirlwind, with their lances gleaming like silver in the sunlight, and wild cries of "Allah! Allah!" bursting from their lips. But the maddening enthusiasm of fanatical zeal had quickly burnt itself out. We had driven them behind their trenches, only to carry them at the point of the bayonet and drive them out into the desert. The victory was complete.

With my broken sword still in my hand, and my face streaming with blood and perspiration, I kneeled with wildly beating heart by the side of my father's prostrate body. For I had found him lying white and still at the bottom of one of the trenches, and—oh, the horror of it!—with a great gaping wound in his side.

"My father! My father, speak to me!" I cried. "O God! if this should be death!"

He opened his eyes slowly, and, dimmed though they were, he recognised me at once.

"Hugh, Hugh, my boy. Thank God!" he faltered out.

"You are wounded," I sobbed. "Are you in pain? Tell me, father."

A spasm of agony passed over his face, but he answered me in a while.

"My side—a spear-head. 'Twill soon be over."

I passed my arm around him, and gazed into his face with streaming eyes.

"Father, you must live," I sobbed. "Rupert Devereux has confessed. All is known!"

He nodded, and smiled faintly.

"I know, Hugh. He was first over the trenches. They were murdering me. He fought like a devil. There they lie—five of them. He saved my life, and crawled here as he was dying—told me—everything. I forgave him. See."

I looked around, and there, scarcely a yard away, lay my Uncle Rupert, with a calm peace in his white face, turned to heaven, which in life he had never known.

*****

A strange scene. General Fielding, with a little crowd of officers around him at one end of the tent, and a little distance away my father lying on a stretcher, with a surgeon on one side striving to stanch the blood which flowed from that hideous, gaping wound, whilst on the other I knelt clasping his hands, and anxiously watching his face.

General Fielding had done all in his power. He had read my Uncle Rupert's confession, and had formally rescinded the verdict of General Luxton. The black stain of dishonour no longer rested upon my father's name. But this greatest of joys had surely come too late; for the hand which I held passionately clasped in mine was growing colder and colder every moment, and the surgeon's face was very grave.

"Is there hope?" I faltered out. But the doctor shook his head.

"Very little, I fear," he whispered. "I am expecting hemorrhage every moment."

A deep silence reigned in the tent, a silence which seemed ominously like the silence of death. Suddenly he re-opened his eyes, and a feeling of sickening agony stole over me, for there was a deeper film than ever upon them.

He smiled very faintly and struggled to speak, but the words died away on his lips. I bent closer still, and strove to catch his meaning.

"Hugh—my—s——" The fingers of his right hand were moving nervously about, and I knew what he meant.

"General Fielding," I said, standing up, with hot burning eyes, and with a choking in my throat, "he wants his sword."

The General stepped forward, and unsheathing his own, held it by the blade, and my father's long fingers, trembling with eagerness, wound themselves around it. Then he sank back with a little satisfied gasp, and I knew that he was at rest.