Flashman on the March

had been wound up and revived.

Whether Daoud and Co. had arrived in time to save Uliba from a fate which most ladies of my acquaintance regard as infinitely preferable to death, I still ain’t sure, but from her subsequent behav iour I rather think they didn’t, and he had his wicked will of her. But you’ll judge for yourselves.

Another mystery which I still can’t fathom is Malee. Her rage at Uliba’s desertion of Sarafa I can understand, and her later pretended repentance and reconciliation with her mistress while preparing to betray her. But deciding along the way to pass the night romping with the lodger don’t quite fit, somehow. I’m as immodest as the next man, but it seemed odd, and still does. Not to Uliba.

“I told you, anything I have, she must have also. She believed you were my lover; that was enough.” She shrugged. “Besides, she needs men as a drunkard needs tej. But she is no matter. Yando is.” She stood up, pacing across the chamber while I took happy stock of the proud Ethiopian profile with its heavy braids, and the elegant shape in the ridiculously scanty tunic. She turned to regard me gravely.

“He knows who you are. I was a fool not to realise that he has been watching this amba for a week past, hoping to surprise me. He saw me leave three nights ago to visit Napier effendi’s camp, where you and I met. He saw me leave again with you, and knew you must be a British soldier—what else could you be?” She gritted her teeth in self-reproach. “And I am reputed shrewd! I, the woman of excellent head, forgot that there are no spies like the spies of Habesh!”

“What of it? It don’t matter two straws to Yando that I’m British! He chased us here to get you, not me, and however sharp he and his spies are, he can have no notion why I’m here, or what for… why, Malee told him I was your lover! Well, there you are! Why should he suspect that I’m an envoy, going south to—”

“What he may suspect matters nothing!” cries she. “What matters is that he knew three days ago you were British, so did his men, and two of them escaped us! So how long, think you, will it be before the news reaches Theodore, who has an eye at every window and an ear at every door?” She came to kneel by the mattress, face and voice urgent.

“What says Theodore, then? He says, ‘Here is a British army advancing against me. Here is a British officer riding by night with Uliba-Wark, half-sister of Queen Masteeat of Wollo Galla. What can this mean? Can it be that the English general is sending an envoy to enlist the aid of my enemies against me?’” She broke off impatiently. “That much a child could guess, and Theodore is no child!”

My first thought was, well, there’s an end to my mission, thank God. My second was that Napier wouldn’t think so. He’d never stand my crying off; Galla was too vital for that, whatever the risk. And giving up didn’t even cross Uliba’s mind.

“So now our journey will be doubly dangerous,” says she. “Theodore will have his watchers out for us from Gondar to the Ashangi lake. God willing, they will be seeking an Englishman, not an Indian horse-pedlar.”

“They’ll be looking for you, too—”

“Which is why I must teach you enough Amharic to act as our purchaser and bid good day to passers-by.” She looked me over. “Are you strong enough to start tomorrow, before dawn?”

“I’m strong enough for more than that,” says I, and caught her arm before she could stand up, drawing her down beside me. She didn’t resist as I clasped her to me, revelling in the suppleness of her body, and when I clamped my mouth on her lips they remained closed only for a long teasing moment, suddenly opening avidly, her tongue thrusting against mine, her hands clasping fiercely behind my head. Trumpeter, sound! thinks I, digging my claws into her buttocks and doing my level best to eat her, at which she sud denly writhed free with surprising strength and scrambled up, gasping, her mouth quivering and her eyes wide and wild. I was lunging up in pursuit, but she stayed me with a hand.

“Wait!” says she. “First, there is something to be done—some thing you should see!”

She went to the ladder-stair and shouted down. A female voice replied, and after a moment a man’s. She barked out a command, and presently there were disputatious voices raised below, sounds of ascension, and here came the princely chap who I realised must be the timely rescuer Daoud, followed by a couple of strapping lads who, to my amazement, were bringing with them a damned disgruntled Yando.

He let out a tirade of screaming abuse at the sight of Uliba, one of his escorts hit him a smashing blow across the mouth, and the pair of them gripped him while another two sturdy minions appeared, and, at Daoud’s instructions, brought out that hellish cage in which I’d been given the fresh air treatment, and which had been tactfully hidden away in the shadows since I’d vacated it.

Yando squealed like a steam whistle at the sight of it, bloodshot eyes bugging and ape face contorted in panic, and I’ve seldom seen a sight more gratifying. As you know, I’m a cruel bastard, and if there’s one thing I enjoy it’s seeing another cruel bastard get his cocoa. In this case it was so dam’ poetic, too; my heart went out to Uliba as she stood there sneering, arms akimbo, and my one regret was that I couldn’t understand the taunts with which she was encouraging Yando as they encased him.

They had the devil of a job, for he was as strong as a bull, and for a reason which I didn’t understand until later, they hadn’t bound his hands. It took all four of them, and they had to beat him half-senseless before they had him caged and the pin in place. Then they hung the cage on the hook and threw back the trap and we all stood round appreciating his screams for mercy—I knew that’s what they were because they sounded so like my own. On Uliba’s instructions he had been placed in the cage face up, so we were treated to his interesting expressions as he was lowered slowly into the void, the men on the windlass stopping the process when he was only a bare yard below the floor level, not nearly as far down as I had been, but convenient for the spectators.

The long chain to the securing pin was coiled on the floor, and Uliba picked it up, holding it out for Yando to see and smiling down at him. She gave it a gentle tug, moving the pin just a little, and addressed what sounded like a question to him, which had Daoud’s followers in whoops. Daoud himself gave the ghost of a smile, and I had a feeling that he regarded the adored object’s conduct as not at all the thing (as Elspeth would say). He said something to her, and she shrugged and replied offhand, at which Daoud, after a long look at me, bowed to her and retired, followed by his gang mighty glum; they’d been looking forward to watching Yando take flight.

Uliba was in no hurry to put him out of his misery. She stood on the brink of the trap mocking him in a voice husky with excitement while he woke the echoes with his pleas and curses, writhing so that the cage jerked and swung like a cork on a string. A diverting sight, but I was more intent on studying her face, lips parted, laughing in delight as she toyed with the chain, drawing the long pin ever so slowly and then, with a last taunt, suddenly whipping it free.

The cage flew open, spilling him out—and now I saw that leaving his hands free had been the exquisite refinement of cruelty, for he was able to grab the edge of the cage even as he fell, and there he was, clinging for dear life as he swung over the giddy mist-streaked abyss, shrieking his ugly head off.

Talk about the female o’ the species if you like—Uliba cried in glee, clapping her hands, fairly revelling in the brute’s anguish, and now she sweetened his last moments with a gesture which I doubt even Ranavalona or the Empress Tsu-hsi or my little Apache charmer Sonsee-array would have thought of—and they knew how to tickle their male victims, I can tell you. She leaned over, jeering down into that glaring agonised face, and with slow deliberation undid the laces of her leather tunic and let it fall, leaving her naked but for a loincloth. She puckered her lips at him in a mockery of kissing, and told me to replace the trapdoor.

“Slowly, to give him time to think,” murmurs she, so I did as I was told, lowering the door gently; it couldn’t close entirely flush because of the suspending rope, but enough to cut off the horrid sight and sound of that wailing wretch, clinging in terror until pain and cold should loosen his hold. Uliba turned to me, her mouth shaking as if with an ague, and there was a light in her eyes which a lady novelist would certainly have called unholy. She flung her arms round my neck, pulling my face down to hers, gasping what I could only assume were indelicate suggestions, for in her agita tion the poor thing was babbling in Amharic. Let’s make hay while she’s hot, thinks I, and swung her up in my arms, unbreeching myself skilfully with one hand while clasping that lovely trembling flesh with the other, planted her firmly in the saddle to the accom paniment of gratifying squeals, and was making her the happiest of women as we subsided on to the mattress.

You never can tell, I’ve found, what different women will prefer as a stimulating accompaniment to la galop. I think of dear Lola with her hairbrush, Jeendan and her canes, Mandeville booted and spurred, Cleonie humming French nursery rhymes, and my own dear wife gossiping relentlessly to the last blissful moment and beyond. Each to her taste and God bless her, say I, but going at it like a Simla widow while a former admirer is dying by inches under the bed is not, I think, in the best of taste. Not that I gave a dam; Flashy