vegetation above the beach.
It's not over yet! he realized. Just then a rabble of running men burst out of the jungle. They were almost a furlong further up the beach, between him and the river mouth, but he saw that they were a mixed bunch of Arabs and Turks. They were being driven down towards the water's edge by a pack of Beshwayo's warriors. The stabbing spears flashed, then were buried in living flesh, and the triumphant shouts of the warriors mingled with the screams and desperate cries of the enemy.
'Ngi dhla I have eaten!'
Mansur realized the fresh danger he was in. Beshwayo's forces were in a killing frenzy. None would recognize him as friendly: he was just another pale, bearded face and they would stab him with as much glee as they would any one of the Omani.
The wet sand along the edge of the water was hard and compacted. He ran along it towards the river mouth. The Arab survivors of the battle realized they were being driven into the sea and they turned at bay. In a last bitter stand they faced Beshwayo's men. There was only a narrow gap behind them but Mansur raced through it, although the pain in his eye made him grunt at each pace. He was almost clear, and the boat from the Sprite was through the surf and into the calm water. It would be on the beach before he reached it.
Then there was a shout behind him and he glanced back. Three of the black warriors had spotted him. They had left the surrounded Arabs to their comrades, and they were racing after him, yelping with excitement, hounds on the scent of the hare.
From ahead there were shouts of encouragement: 'We are here, Highness. Run, in the Name of God!' He recognized the voice and saw Kumrah in the bows of the boat.
Mansur ran, but his ordeal in the surf and the agony in his eye weakened him, and he could hear bare feet slapping on the wet sand close behind him. He could almost feel the glide of the steel through his flesh as an assegai stabbed between his shoulder-blades. Kumrah, in the boat, was thirty paces ahead, but that might just as well have been thirty leagues. He could hear the hoarse breathing of one man close behind his shoulder. He had to turn to face them and defend himself. He drew the scimitar from its scabbard and spun round.
The leading warrior was so close that he had already drawn back his assegai, low underhand, for the killing stroke. But with Mansur at bay he checked his rush, and called softly to his two companions, 'The horns of the bull!' This was their favourite tactic. They fanned out on each side of him, and in that instant Mansur was surrounded. Whichever way he turned his back would be exposed to a long blade. He knew he was a dead man, but he rushed at the man before him. Before he could cross blades with him he heard Kumrah shout behind him: 'Down, Highness!' Mansur did not hesitate but threw himself flat on the sand.
His adversary stood over him and lifted the assegai high. 'Ngi dhlal' he screamed.
Beshwayo's men had not yet realized the effects of close-range musketry. Before the warrior could make the stroke, a volley of musket fire swept over where Mansur lay. A ball hit the warrior in his elbow and his arm broke like a green twig. The assegai flew from his grip and he reeled back as another ball slapped into his chest. Mansur rolled over swiftly to face the other two warriors but one was on his knees clutching his belly and the other was on his back, kicking convulsively, half his head shot away.
'Come, Prince Mansur!' Kumrah called, through the veil of gunsmoke that had enveloped the boat. It blew aside, and Mansur saw that every man of the crew had fired the volley that had saved him. He dragged himself to his feet and staggered to the boat. Now that mortal danger was past he lacked the strength to pull himself over the gunwale, but many strong hands reached out for him.
Tom and Dorian had knelt side by side in the gun emplacement and rested their telescopes on the parapet. They studied Zayn's squadron of ships, which were anchored in a group below the walls of the fort on the far side of the bay and bombarding the walls.
Dorian had sited the long nine-pounder cannons with great care. From this height they could bring every part of the bay under fire. Once'; it came through the entrance no ship was safe from them. It had been a'; Herculean task to get the guns up to this eyrie. The sides of the bluff I were too high and steep, and the guns too heavy, to lift them straighti up from the shore.
Tom had cut a track through the thick forest along the rising spine of the ridge and, using this as a ramp, he had dragged the guns up with teams of oxen until they were directly above the chosen site. Then, on heavy anchor cable, he lowered them down into the concealed emplacements Once the guns were sited they ranged them on targets set up around the shore of the bay. Their first shots had flown far over and crashed into the forest beyond.
Once they were satisfied with the position of the guns, they built the charcoal furnace fifty paces from the powder magazine to reduce the danger of sparks flying from one to the other. They plastered the furnace with river clay. They made the bellows with fifty tanned ox hides, sealing the seams with tar. A gang of cooks, labourers and riffraff worked the handles to force air into the furnace. Once it reached full blast, it was not possible to look with the naked eye into the white-hot glare of the interior so Dorian had smoked a sheet of glass with the flame of an oil lamp: peering through this, they could judge when the shot was hot enough. Then they manhandled each cannon ball out of the furnace with long-handled tongs. The men doing the job wore thick leather mittens and aprons to protect them from the heat. They dropped each glowing ball into a specially prepared cradle, with long handles. These were carried by two men across to the gun, which was waiting with its barrel raised to the maximum possible elevation.
Once the ball was dropped down the muzzle, it was not long before it burned away the wet wads and spontaneously ignited the powder charge behind them. A premature discharge while the barrel was pointed skywards would tear it off its carriage, wreck the gun emplacement and kill or maim the gun-crews. This allowed only the briefest respite to lay the gun on its target and fire it. Then the whole dangerous, lengthy process had to be repeated. After a few shots the barrel overheated until it was on the point of bursting and the recoil was monstrous; it had to be sponged out and buckets of seawater poured down the sizzling muzzle before they dared ram a fresh charge of powder into it.
Over the previous weeks, while they awaited the arrival of Zayn al Din's fleet, Dorian had instructed and exercised the gunners in handling hot shot. They had encountered all these complications for themselves and learned by hard experience, which culminated with the explosion of one of the guns. Two men had been killed by flying fragments of the bronze barrel. All of the crews now had a deep respect for the glowing cannon-balls, and none was looking forward to firing the remaining three weapons in earnest.
The foreman had come from the furnace to report to Dorian with an expression of awe and dread: 'We have twelve balls ready, mighty Caliph.'
'You have done well, Farmat, but I am not yet ready to open fire. Keep the furnaces hot.' He and Tom turned back to continue their surveillance of the action taking place below them. The bombardment
from Zayrv's ships covered the whole bay and the edges of the forest with smoke, but through it they saw the defenders abandon the fort and run out through the gates.
'Good!' said Dorian, with satisfaction. 'They have remembered their orders,' He had ordered a token defence of the fort merely to lure Zayn's fleet deep into the bay.
'I hope they remembered to spike the guns on the parapets before they left,' Tom growled. 'I do not fancy them being turned on us.'
The bombardment died away, and they watched the boats filled with the assault party leave the war-dhows and head in for the beach, to occupy the deserted fort. Both Tom and Dorian recognized Guy Courtney in the bows of the leading boat.
'His Britannic Majesty's honourable consul general in the flesh!' Dorian exclaimed. 'The scent of the gold was too strong for him to ignore. He has come in person to retrieve it.'
'My beloved twin brother!' Tom agreed. 'It does my heart good to see him again after all these years. When we last parted he was trying to kill me. It seems that things have changed not at all since then.'
'It will not take him long to find that the cupboard is bare,1 Dorian said, 'so now it is time to slam the door shut behind them.' He called to the runner who waited eagerly at the back of the redoubt for just this summons. He was one of Sarah's orphans, and he rushed forward grinning widely and trembling with eagerness to please. 'Go down to Smallboy, and tell him it is time to close the gate.' Dorian had barely finished speaking before the boy had jumped over the wall and was racing down the steep pathway. Dorian had to shout after him, 'Don't| let them see you!'
Smallboy and Muntu waited with the teams of oxen already hitche to the heavy anchor cable. This was strung out across the entranc of the bay to the heavy piles of logs on the far bank. The slac cable was weighted to lie on the bottom of the channel until pulle taut. The war-dhows had sailed in over it without being aware of it! presence under their keels.
The boom was made up off seventy huge logs. Many had been felle the previous year and stacked in the sawmill yard at the back of fort, ready to be sawn into planks. Even with this stockpile, they we still short of twenty logs to span the channel.
Jim and Mansur had taken every available man into the forest to c i down more of the giant trees, and Smallboy's ox teams had drag
them to
