stamped his feet for a hold. ! When he had finally settled himself he started to draw again on the rope, but not with his full strength, for he pulled me in only an inch at a time. This, I supposed, was the final hideous refinement; I struggled like a fish on a line, but there was no resisting that steady, dreadful pull. I was perhaps ten feet from the lip when he turned away from me, as a tug-of-war team will when it has its opponents on the run, and I realised that if I was to make any last desperate bid it must be now, while I had a little space to play with. I had almost unbalanced him by an accidental yielding; could I do it deliberately? With the last of my strength I dug my heels in and heaved tremendously; it checked him and he glanced over his shoulder, surprise on the hideous face. Then he grinned and exerted his strength, lunging away on the rope. My feet slipped.
'Go with God, Flashman,' said Gul Shah ironically.
I scrabbled for a foothold, found it only six feet from the edge, and then bounded forward. The leap took me to the very lip of the culvert, and the dwarf Mansur plunged for-ward on his face as the rope slackened. But he was up like a jack-in-the-box, gibbering with rage, in an instant; planting his feet, he gave a savage heave on the rope that almost dislocated my shoulders and flung me face down. Then he began to pull steadily, so that I was dragged for-ward over the floor, closer and closer to the edge, while the Ghazis cheered and roared and I screamed with horror.
'No! No!' I shrieked. 'Stop him! Wait! Anything - I'll do anything!
Stop him!'
My hands were over the edge now, and then my elbows; suddenly there was nothing beneath my face, and through my streaming tears I saw the bottom of the culvert with the filthy worms gliding across it.
My chest and shoulders were clear, in an instant I should overbalance; I tried to twist my head up to appeal to the dwarf, and saw him standing on the far edge, grinning evilly and coiling the slack rope round his right hand and elbow like a washer-woman with a clothes line. He glanced at Gul Shah, pre-paring to give the final pull that would launch me over, and then above my own frantic babbling and the roaring in my ears I heard the crash of a door flung open behind me, and a stir among the watchers, and a voice upraised in Pushtu.
The dwarf was standing stock-still, staring beyond me towards the door. What he saw I didn't know, and I didn't care; half-dead with fear and exhaustion as I was, I recognised that his attention was diverted, that the rope was momentarily slack between us, and that he was on the very lip of the trench. It was my last chance.
I had only the purchase of my body and legs on the stone; my arms were stretched out ahead of me. I jerked them suddenly back, sobbing, with all my strength. It was not much of a pull, but it took Mansur completely unawares. He was watching the doorway, his eyes round in his gargoyle face; too late he realised that he had let his attention wander too soon. The jerk, slight as it was, unbalanced him, and one leg slipped over the edge; he shrieked and tried to throw himself clear, but his grotesque body landed on the very edge, and he hung for a moment like a see-saw. Then with a horrible piping squeal he crashed sprawling into the culvert.
He was up again with a bound, and springing for the rim, but by the grace of God he had landed almost on top of one of those hellish snakes, and even as he came upright it struck at his bare leg. He screamed and kicked at it, and the delay gave a second brute the chance to fix itself in his hand. He lashed out blindly, making a most ghastly din, and staggered about with at least two of the things hanging from him. He ran in his dreadful waddling way in a little circle, and fell forward on his face. Again and again the serpents struck at him; he tried feebly to rise, and then collapsed, his misshapen body twitching.
I was dead beat, with exertion and shock; I could only lie heaving like a bellows. Gul Shah strode to the edge of the culvert and screamed curses at his dead creature; then he turned, pointing to me, and shouted:
'Fling that bastard in beside him!'
They grabbed me and ran me to the pit's edge, for I could make no resistance. But I remember I protested that it wasn't fair, that I had won, and deserved to be let go. They held me on the edge, hanging over the pit, and waited for the final word from my enemy. I closed my eyes to blot out the sight of the snarling faces and those dreadful reptiles, and then I was pulled back, and the hands fell away from me.
Wondering, I turned wearily; they had all fallen silent, Gul Shah with the rest of them.
A man stood in the doorway. He was slightly under S middle height, with the chest and shoulders of a wrestler, and a small, neat head that he turned from side to side, taking in the scene. He was simply dressed in a grey coat, clasped about with a belt of chain mail, and his head was bare. He was plainly an Afghan, with something of the pretty look that was so repulsive in Gul Shah, but here the features were stronger and plumper; he carried an air of command, but very easily, without any of the strutting arrogance that so many of his race affected.
He came forward, nodding to Gul Shah and eyeing me with polite interest. I noticed with astonishment that his eyes, oriental though they were in shape, were of vivid blue. That and the slightly curly dark hair gave him a European look, which suited his bluff, sturdy figure.
He sauntered to the edge of the culvert, clicked his tongue ruefully at the dead dwarf, and asked conversationally: 'What has happened here?'
He sounded like a vicar in a drawing-room, he was so mild, but Gul Shah kept mum, so I burst out: 'These swine have been trying to murder me!' He gave me a brilliant smile. 'But without success,' cried he. 'I felicitate you. Plainly you have been in terrible danger, but have escaped by your skill and bravery. A notable feat, and what a tale for your children's children!' It was really too much. Twice in hours I had been on the brink of violent death, I was battered, exhausted, and smeared with my own blood, and here I was conversing with a lunatic.
I almost broke down in tears, and I certainly groaned: 'Oh, Jesus.'
The stout man raised an eyebrow. 'The Christian prophet? Why, who are you then?'
'I'm a British officer!' I cried. 'I have been captured and tortured by these ruffians, and they'd have killed me, too, with their hellish snakes! Whoever you are, you must-'
'In the hundred names of God!' he broke in. 'A feringhee officer?
Plainly there has almost been a very serious accident. Why did you not tell them who you were?'
I gaped at him, my head spinning. One of us must be mad. 'They knew,' I croaked. 'Gul Shah knew.'
'Impossible,' says the stout fellow, shaking his head. 'It could not be. My friend Gul Shah would be incapable of such a thing; there has been an unfortunate error.'
'Look,' I said, reaching out towards him, 'you must believe me: I am Lieutenant Flashman, on the staff of Lord Elphinstone, and this man has tried to do me to death - not for the first time. Ask him,' I shouted, 'how I came here! Ask the lying, treacherous bastard!'
'Never try to flatter Gul Shah,' said the stout man cheerfully.
'He'll believe every word of it. No, there has been a mistake, regrettably, but it has not been irreparable. For which God be thanked
- and my timely arrival, to be sure.' And he smiled at me again. 'But you must not blame Gul Shah, or his people: they did not know you for what you were.'
Now, as he said those words, he ceased to be a waggish madman; his voice was as gentle as ever, but there was no mistaking the steel underneath. Suddenly things became real again, and I understood that the kindly smiling man before me was strong in a way that folk like Gul Shah could never be: strong and dangerous. And with a great surge of relief I realised too that with him by I was safe: Gul Shah must have sensed it also, for he roused himself and growled that I was his prisoner, feringhee officer or not, and he would deal with me.
'No, he is my guest,' said the stout man reprovingly. 'He has met with a mishap on his way here, and needs
