Flashman on the March

He stopped on the edge of the precipice, a bare couple of furlongs from the spot where he’d massacred the prisoners (whose corpses, you’ll be charmed to know, were still lying in heaps on the rocks below, in our full view) and ordered the musketeers to fall in against the cliff which rose sheer behind us. The road on which we stood was no more than a narrow ledge between the cliff and the drop. Theodore beckoned me to his side, and when the pris oners hove in view round a bend in the road he sent his lad Gabr to tell Rassam to approach alone. At this Engedda, who had stalked after us with a face of thunder, demanded to know what was to do.

“Will you let them go?” bawls he. “Will you fawn on this crea ture—and you, a king, and he a white cur?” Talk about bearding the lion, but Theodore only waved him away and went to meet Rassam, shaking hands, inquiring warmly after his health, sitting him down on a rock and asking if he wanted to go down to Napier now, or wait till next day, since it would soon be dusk. Rassam said, whatever suited his majesty, and Theodore began to cry, and burst out: “Go now, then, and the peace of God go with you! You and I have always been friends, and I beg you to bear in mind that if ever you cease to befriend me, I shall kill myself!”

If I’d been Rassam, I’d have gone while the going was good, for with Theodore it never stayed good for long, but he was a sparky little ha’porth, glancing back at the others waiting, and then looking a question at Theodore, who cried: “Or I may become a monk!” Rassam asked, what about the others, and Theodore shouted: “You had better go! Yes, go now!” He gestured angrily as Rassam hesi tated before turning away. “Go, I say! Begone, in the name of God!”

But Rassam didn’t go more than a yard before he stopped, and Theodore snatched a piece from the nearest musketeer and cocked it, Engedda gave a cry of triumph, and I thought, oh, Jesus, this is where it ends, for even if he spares Rassam who’s his favourite he means to do for the rest of us including me… for he’d turned away from Rassam to face the remaining prisoners, and he was mouthing and weeping and presenting his musket as they began to walk towards us.

There weren’t above a dozen of them, and who most of ’em were I can’t tell you, for I never inquired, but the one in front saved all their lives, and no doubt mine. He was Henry Blanc, the Bombay medico, bluff, burly, and a bearcat for nerve, for he was sure his time was up, but here he came at a steady stride, head high and beard a- bristle, and “Good day, your majesty!” says he, while Theodore glared tearfully with his finger twitching on the trigger, and that brisk greeting, so unexpected, had him all adrift, and he gave back a pace, lowering his piece, and absolutely asked Blanc how he did, and bade him farewell as he passed by to join Rassam. And I know, for I’ve seen things on the knife-edge all too often, that if Blanc had shown fear, or even hesitated, the Abyssinian expedition would have ended in bloody failure with the prisoners butchered by that madman and his musketeers. Well, he didn’t funk nor hesitate, and since it’s thanks to him that I’m here to write this memoir, well, here’s to Henry Blanc, M.D., staff assistant surgeon to H.M. Bombay Army. Saluel [50]

After that it was plain sailing, for Theodore’s wild fit passed, he put aside his musket, and cried farewell blessings on the others as they edged past him on the narrow road, all smiles in their relief except Cameron, limping on his stick, for when Theodore said he hoped they were parting friends, Cameron bade him adieu with a curt nod and went by.

And that was how the famous prisoners of Magdala walked down the Fala track to freedom—not all of ’em, by any means, for there were about forty more still up on the amba, women and kids and hangers-on, but Cameron’s little crowd were the principals, the ones the fuss had been all about. [51] When the last of them had gone by, Theodore stood staring after them as if they’d been his departing family, and blow me if he didn’t start to blubber again, and sank down on a rock with his head in his hands. It was too much for Engedda.

“Are you a woman, that you cry?” shouts he. “Let us bring them back, those white men, kill them, and run away! Or let us fight and die!”

Theodore was on his feet in a second, blazing. “Fool! Dog! Donkey! Have I not killed enough these past two days? D’you want me to kill these, too, and cover Habesh in blood?”

I’d never seen a man stand toe to toe with Theodore, and if he’d pistolled Engedda on the spot I’d not have been surprised, but he just stared him out of countenance, and Engedda growled in disgust and turned on his heel. Theodore passed a hand over his eyes and gestured after the departing prisoners. “Do you not wish to go with your friends, Ras Flashman? It is done now. You are free to go.”

Ironic, you’ll agree. A few hours earlier, I’d have been up and away with a roundelay… but since then Prideaux had brought Napier’s orders, and they were not to be disobeyed, not if I was to keep my credit. Well, it was no great matter now; Theodore was crying uncle, the Queen’s man was back in the Queen’s keeping, and all that remained was the occupation of Magdala by her forces—and the disposal of its ruler, whatever that might entail. I was bound to stay, so I came to attention, regimental as you please.

“Thank’ee, your majesty, but with your permission I’ll stay awhile. Perhaps I can be of service to your majesty.”

He frowned, bewildered, and then the tears were welling in his eyes again, coursing down the black cheeks as he clasped my hand and regarded me with owlish emotion.

“Oh, my friend, my dear friend in Christ! My soldiers betray me, my people turn against me, my generals revile me… and from the ranks of my enemies comes one friend to stand by me!” He wrung my fin like a pump handle. “Ah, you strange British! I did not know you until now! There are no people like you in all the world! None, none, I say!”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” says I, but he swore in choked accents that it was so, and sat down on his rock again, howling with sentiment and mopping his face. Then he had a quick pray, saying he had hardened his heart for many years, but now God had softened it, with some assistance from me, and Satan had been at work on him, but was now driven out, and he regretted the dis courtesy of his letter to Napier, and must put that right.

“For this is Easter, and we are all Christians and friends,” says he. “You are my best friend of all, and I shall open my heart to you and to all your people!”

Which he did next day with a civil note to Napier and a gift of a thousand cattle and several hundred sheep; [52] bent on reconcilia tion he might be, but he was no fool, knowing that if Napier accepted them, it was tantamount to a truce and might even be regarded as a settlement, since he’d freed the prisoners, which was supposedly all that was required. Crafty old Theodore—but equally crafty old Napier, for he refused the gift, but responded with a decent gesture, sending up the body of old Gabrie, which our stretcher-bearers had collected from the battle-field of Arogee.

Flad brought it back, and Theodore was much moved; because of some misunderstanding by the interpreters, he didn’t realise at this time that Napier had rejected his cattle, so he was all gladness and good humour, bidding Flad jovially to go up to Magdala and collect Mrs Flad and the remaining prisoners, “and God give you a happy meeting.” So Flad went, and a stranger procession you never saw than that which presently emerged from the Kobet Bar, for where I’d expected about forty Europeans, there was a caravan of more than two hundred folk, mostly black or chi-chi, for most were servants, with a few Ab wives and chicos of the prisoners. There were more than three hundred beasts laden with baggage, and it looked like the Exodus as they churned up the dust down the winding track from Magdala rock, through the empty market stalls at the foot, and out across the deserted plain of Islamgee. There was hardly an Ab soldier in sight, for they’d struck their camp and withdrawn to Selassie and Fala.

Theodore watched them go by from his pavilion. He’d sent for his queen—the real one, Tooroo-Wark, a lovely slip of a lass—and her son, little Alamayo, and at her request sent a nurse to one of the prisoners’ wives, a Mrs Morris, who was about to pup, and indeed did so the next day in the British camp; they called the kid Theodore in appreciation. Mrs Morris had a palki; Mrs Flad and the other wives were on mules, and presently they disappeared down the road to Arogee, men, women, beasts, babes in arms, porters, bags and baggage—and that, Theodore seemed to think, was the end of it.

How wrong he was he learned on that sunny Easter Sunday evening, when word came that Napier had turned back his cattle, and it sank in at last that we would settle for nothing less than unconditional surrender, which must mean what he had always dreaded: the delivery of his royal person to a foreign enemy. Perhaps that fear was in his mind when he had his gun-teams drag the artillery from the Fala summit to the far end of the Islamgee plain, either in an effort to convince Napier of his peaceful intent or to prepare a last defence for Magdala. I don’t know which, but I know that his high spirits when the prisoners left wore thin as the hours went by, and no good word came from Napier.

“What more can they want? Oh, my friend, have I not done all that they asked? They have beaten my army