together some kind of jury-rig and get steam to the cylinders. It just depends on the damage she’s suffered down there. But at the best I doubt we’ll get more than a few pounds of pressure into the line.”
Ryder straightened up and looked around. He saw the dark shape of Tutti Island no more than a cable’s length downstream from where they wallowed, powerless, under the Dervish guns. What the Dervish cannon fire lacked in accuracy, it made up for in rapidity. From the sheer weight of shells being hurled at them, it could not be long before they received another direct hit.
He watched the changing bearing of the island for a moment longer. “The current is carrying us past the island. If we anchor in its lee it will screen us from the guns.” He left them and shoved his way through the passengers, shouting for Bacheet and his mate Abou Sinn. “Clear this rabble out of the way, and prepare to anchor at my command.”
They jumped to their stations, shoving and kicking aside the bewildered ask ari and stowaways to give themselves room to work. Bacheet freed the retaining tackle from the ring of the heavy fisherman’s anchor that hung at the bows. Abou Sinn stood over the chain where it emerged through the fairlead of the chain locker with the four-pound hammer ready.
Ryder peered back at the land, watching the muzzle flashes of the Dervish guns and judging his moment. For a few minutes he held his breath while it seemed that they would be driven ashore on the island, then an eddy in the current pushed them clear and they drifted so close to the eastern side of the island that they were sheltered from the Dervish batteries.
“Let go!” Ryder shouted to Abou Sinn, and with a blow of the sledgehammer he knocked the pin out of the anchor shackle. The anchor splashed into the river, the chain roaring out after it, and found the bottom. The chain stopped running and Bacheet secured it. The this came up hard and short, and spun round in the current to face upstream, with the timber barge behind her on her tow line. The Dervish cannon fire tapered off as the gunners found themselves deprived of their target. A few more shells screeched high overhead or burst ineffectually into the sandbanks of the screening island, then the gunners gave up and silence descended.
Ryder found Jock sitting on the bunk in the cabin, being attended to by all the Benbrook ladies. “How are you feeling?” he asked solicitously.
“Not so bad, skipper.” He indicated his arms: “These bonny little lasses have done a fine job on them.” Rebecca had bandaged both arms with strips that the twins had torn from one of the threadbare cotton bedsheets, then fashioned a double sling from the same material. Now she was brewing a mug of tea for him on the stove in the tiny galley next door. Jock grinned. “Home was never so good. That’s why I ran away.”
“Sorry to interrupt your retirement, but can I trouble you to take a peek at your engine?”
“Just when I was really enjoying me self Jock grumbled, but rose to his feet.
“I’ll bring your mug down to the engine room for you, Mr. McCrump,” Amber promised.
“And I’ll bring one for you, Ryder,” Saffron called.
Jock McCrump followed Ryder down to the engine room. Bacheet and Abou Sinn carried away the stoker’s corpse, and by the light of a pair of hurricane lamps they assessed the damage. Now that Jock was able to examine his beloved engine more closely, he grumbled bitterly to disguise his relief. “Bloody heathens! Can’t trust them further than you can throw one of them. No sense of common decency, doing this to my bonny Cowper.” However, only the main steam line shot was through; the engine itself was untouched.
“Well, there’s naught I can do for the steam line this side of my workshop in Khartoum. In the meantime, though, perhaps I can cobble something together to get a mite of steam through to the engine, but I reckon we’ll not be breaking any speed records with the old girl.” Then he held up his bandaged arms. “You’ll have to do the donkey work, skipper.”
Ryder nodded. “While we’re at it, I’m going to send Bacheet to move all our uninvited passengers across to the barge. That will correct my trim and give me a little more manoeuvrability and control. It will also give the crew more room to work the ship properly.”
While the passengers were trans hipped Ryder and his engineer began the repairs. Working quickly but carefully, they bled off the remaining steam from the boilers and drew the fires from the grate. Then they used the in-line valve cocks to isolate the damaged section of the main steam line. Once this was done, they could begin rigging a bypass line to carry steam through to the power plant. They had to measure the lengths they needed and cut the new pipe sections to length by hacksaw, then clamp them into the heavy vice on Jock’s workbench and cut threads into the ends of the pipes with the haijd dies. They packed the joints with asbestos thread and tightened the elbows and connectors with their combined weight on the long-handled pipe wrench. They ended up with a mare’s nest of convoluted improvised piping.
The work took the rest of the night, and by the time they were ready to test its integrity dawn was showing through the engine-room portholes. It took another hour to set the fires in the grates and work up a head of steam in the boiler. When the needle of the pressure gauge touched the green line Jock gingerly eased open the cock of the steam valve. Ryder stood beside him and watched anxiously, hands black with grease, knuckles bruised and bleeding from rough contact with steel pipes. They held their breath as the needle on the secondary pressure gauge rose, and watched the new pipe joints for the first sign of a leak.
“All holding,” Jock grunted, and reached across to the port-engine throttle. With a suck and a hiss of live steam the big triple pistons began to pump up and down in their cylinders, the rods moved like the legs of marching men, and the propeller shaft rotated smoothly in its bearings.
“Power up and holding.” Jock grinned with the pride of accomplishment. “But I cannae take the chance and open her full. You’ll have to take what you get, skipper, and thank the Lord and Jock McCrump for that much.”
“You’re a living, breathing miracle, Jock. I hope your mother was proud of you.” Ryder chuckled. When he wiped the sweat off his forehead, the back of his fist left a black smear. “Now, stand by to give me everything you can just as soon as I can get the anchor weighed and cat ted He charged up the ladder to the bridge. Abou Sinn followed him and ran to the controls of the steam winch.
As the this pushed slowly forward against the river current, the anchor chain came clanking in through the hawser hole The flukes broke free from the riverbed and Ryder eased open the throttle. The this responded so sluggishly that she made little headway against the four-knot current. Ryder felt a cold slide of disappointment. He glanced over the stern at the barge. Drawing deeply under its cargo of cordwood and uninvited passengers, it was behaving with mulish recalcitrance. Dozens of pathetic faces stared across at him.
By God, I’ve half a mind to cut you free and leave you to the mercy of the Mahdi, he thought venomously, but with an effort set the temptation aside. He turned instead to David, who had joined him silently. “She’ll never be able to hold her own in the Shabluka Gorge. When the entire flow of the combined Niles is forced through the narrows the current reaches almost ten knots. With only half her power the this will be helpless in its grip. The risk of piling up on the rocky cliffs is too great to accept.”
“What other choice do you have?”
“Nothing for it but to battle our way back to Khartoum.”
David looked worried. “My girls! I hate to take them back to that death-trap. How long will Gordon be able to hold out in the city before the Dervishes break in?”
“Let’s hope it’s long enough for Jock to finish his repairs so that we can make another run for it. But now our only hope is to get back into the harbour.” Ryder turned the this across the current and headed her for the east bank. He tried to keep the bulk of Tutti Island between the ship and the Dervish batteries, but before they were half-way across the first shells were howling above the river. However, with the current giving him some assistance Ryder opened the range swiftly, and the skill of the Bedlam Bedouin and his comrades was not up to the task of hitting a target as small as the Intrepid this at a range of over a mile, except by the direct intervention of Allah. This day, however, their prayers went unanswered, and although there were a few encouraging near misses the this and her barge made good their crossing of the mainstream, then turned south for the city, hugging the furthest edge of the channel at extreme range for the Krupps.
The Dervish feluccas sallied out from the west bank and made another attempt to intercept the steamer, but by now the sun was high. General Gordon’s artillery on the riverfront of Khartoum was able to direct furious and remarkably accurate fire upon the enemy flotilla as it came within easy range. Ryder saw four small boats blown into splinters by direct hits with high explosive and correctly fused shells. The severed limbs and heads of the crews were hurled high in the yellow clouds of lyddite fumes. This discouraged all but a few of the bravest, most foolhardy captains, and most of the small boats turned back for the shore.
Three of the attack boats pressed on across the river, but the wind blew strongly from the south and the
