Chapter XLVI: The Black Landing

From that time on there was no lack of work. The spirits of the me, went up fifty per cent, and the general health improved in like ratio. Hard work proved the best of tonics.

And, of a truth, a tonic was needed. It took the Guards--the flower of the British army--two days march from Aladyn to the sea at Varna, a distance of ten miles. So reduced were they by sickness, that five miles a day was all they could manage, and even then their packs were carried for them.

For those in charge there was no rest, by day or Light, until the embarkation was complete. When Jim Carron followed his last horse on board the _Himalaya_, he tumbled into a bath and then into a bunk, and slept for twenty-four hours without moving a finger.

But he had ample time, when he woke up, fresh and hungry, to admire that most wonderful sight of close on seven hundred ships, of all shapes and sizes--from the stately _Agamemnon_, flying the Admiral's flag, to the steam-tug _Pigmy_, wrestling valiantly with a transport twenty times her size--as they crept slowly across the Black Sea, with 80,000 men on board for the chastisement of the Russian Bear. A sight for a lifetime, indeed, but one which no man who remembers or thinks of would ever wish to set eyes on again.

Jim and his fellows, however, rejoiced in it, for without doubt it meant business at last, and they had almost begun to despair.

So, in due time, they came in sight of the tented mountains and the coast; and after what seemed to the ardent ones still more vacillation and delays, the launches and flat-boats got to work, and the long strip of shingle which lay between the sea and a great lake behind became black with men.

All was eagerness and anticipation. The voyage had had a good effect on bodies sorely weakened by disease, and the prospect of active employment at last a still better effect on hearts that had grown heavy with disappointment.

But ten days of life-giving sea cannot entirely undo the mischief of the sickly months ashore. Numbers died on the voyage. Of those who landed, few indeed were the men they had been when they left England six months before, but hearts ran high if bodies were worn and weak.

That was the busiest day those regions had seen since time began. To the few bewildered inhabitants it seemed as though the whole unknown world was emptying itself on their shores.

Before sunset over 60,000 men were landed, and still there were more to come. All that coast, from Eupatoria to Old Fort, was like an ant-hill dropped suddenly on to a strange place, over which its tiny occupants swarmed tumultuously in the endeavour to accommodate themselves to the new conditions.

The weather, which had held up during the day, broke towards evening. The surf reared viciously up the shingle beach, and the rain came down in torrents. The tents were still aboard ship; men and officers alike sat and soaked throughout the dreary night in extremest misery. Jack among them. He had been sent on in advance of his corps to make observations and dispositions for the accommodation of the ordnance, and carried--according to instructions--nothing but his great-coat rolled up lengthwise and slung over his shoulder, a canteen of water, and three days' provision of cooked salt meat and biscuit in a haversack. The men had their blankets in addition, and their rifles and bayonets and ammunition.

When the deluge broke on them, and the spray came flying up the beach in sheets, drenching them alike above and below, the men huddled together and tried to improvise shelters with their great-coats and blankets. But Nature was pitiless and seemed to bend her direst energies to the task of damping their spirits. With their bodies she had her will, but their spirits were beyond her, for they were on Russian territory at last, and that meant business.

Jack sat on the wet shingle, back to back with one of his fellows, and the rain soaked through him, till his very marrow felt cold.

Some of the men near him, crouching under their sopping blankets, started singing, and "God save the Queen" and "Rule Britannia" rolled brokenly along the lines for a time. But by degrees the singing died away, the wet blankets exerted their proverbial influence, and silent misery prevailed.

The weather had broken before the cavalry got ashore, so Jim spent that night very gratefully in the comfort of his bunk on the _Himalaya_, and wondered how they were faring on land.

He was up before sunrise, however, and hard at work, though the waves were still high, and landing horses would be no easy matter.

And worse [end of line is blank]

He came on Jack prowling anxiously among the black masses just wakening into life again.

"Hello, Jim!" he said hoarsely. "Where were you? Did you get damp?"

"We're not landed yet. Too rough for the horses."

"Lucky beggars! I never had such a night in my life. It was ghastly. Why the deuce couldn't they let us have some tents? Those French beggars had theirs, and the beastly Turks too. We're the worst-managed lot I ever heard of."

"What's this?" asked Jim, staring open-mouthed at a muffled figure at his feet--stiff and stark, though all around were stirring. "Why doesn't he get up?"

"He's got up," said Jack through his teeth. "He's dead, and there's a score or more like him. Dead of the cold and want of everything. Hang it! why aren't we Frenchmen or Turks!" A sore speech, born of great bitterness.

And Jim felt it almost an insult be so warm and hearty and well-fed, with that dumb witness of the dreadful misery of the night lying silent at his feet.

And the thought of it all bore sorely on him and brought the lump into his throat. To pull through the bad times at Varna; to come all that way across the sea, indomitable spirit overcoming all the weaknesses of the flesh; to land at last in the high flush of hope,--and then to die like dogs of cold and misery, on the wet shingle, before their hope had smallest chance of realisation! Oh, it was hard! It was bitter hard!

When he reported on board it was decided to make for Eupatoria, where there was a pier, but before they got under way the weather showed signs of improvement, and presently the landing began, and for the next two days both the boys had so much on their hands that they had no time to think of anything but the contrarinesses of horses and guns, and the disconcerting effects of high seas on things unused to them.

In spite of all they lacked, however, the men's spirits rose as soon as the sun shone out and warmed them. They were on Russian soil at last, and that made up for everything. All they wanted now was Russians to come to grips with--Russians in quantity and of a fighting stomach.

Sebastopol was thirty miles to the south, and between them and it lay rivers, and almost certainly armies; and on the third day they set off resolutely to find them. And that day Jim had his first trying experience of playing target to a distant enemy in deadly sober earnest.

He had wondered much what it would feel like, and how his inner man would take it. As for the outer, he had promised himself that that should show no sign, no matter what happened.

The Hussars were feeling the way in advance, when a bunch of Cossacks appeared on the hills in front, and representatives of Britain and Russia took eager stock of one another. They were rough-looking fellows on sturdy horses, and carried long lances. They rode down the hill as though to offer battle, and the Englishmen were keen to try conclusions with them. But behind them, in the hollows, were discovered dense masses of cavalry waiting for the game to walk into the net. And when the wary game declined, the cavalry opened out and disclosed hidden guns, and the game of long bowls began.

The first shots went wide, and Jim watched them go hopping along the plain with much curiosity. Then came the vicious spurt of white smoke again, and the man and horse alongside him collapsed in a heap; the horse with a most dolorous groan, the man--Saxelby, a fine young fellow of his own troop--with a gasping cry, his leg shorn clean off at the knee.

Jim's heart went right down into his stomach for a moment as the blood spirted over him, and he felt deadly sick.

His first impulse was to jump down and help poor Saxelby, but he feared for himself if he did so--feared he would fall in a heap alongside him and perhaps not be able to get up, for he felt as weak as water.

He clenched his teeth till they ached. He dropped his bridle hand on to his holster to keep it from shaking, and clasped his horse so tightly with his knees that he resented it and began to fret and curvet. Jim bent over and patted him on the neck, and two troopers got down and carried Saxelby away. The horse stopped jerking its legs and lay still, with its eyes wide and white, and its nostrils all bloody, and its teeth clenched and its lips drawn back in a horrid grin.

The guns had found their range and were spitting venomously now. Half a dozen more of his men were down. He was quite sure he would be next. He thought in a whirl for a moment,--of Gracie; she would marry Jack, and all that matter would be smoothed out;--and of Mr. Eager, the dear fellow!--and his father, and he wished they had seen more of one another;--and Sir Denzil, he was not such a bad old chap after all. He thought they would be sorry for him. And Mme Beteta, he wondered---- Well, maybe he would know all about it in a minute or two.

Then his heart rose suddenly right up into his head, and he was filled with a vast blazing anger at this being shot at with never a chance of a stroke in reply. If they would only let them go for those d----d Russians he would not feel so bad about it! But to be shot down like pheasants! It was not business! It was all d----d nonsense! He began to get very angry indeed.

His quickened ear had caught the rattle of artillery coming up behind. But it had stopped. Why the deuce had it stopped? Why couldn't someone do something before they were all bowled over?

Then at last there came a roar on their flank, and some of the newer horses kicked and danced, and Jim, staring hard at the Russians, saw a lane cleft through them where the shot had gone.

He clenched his teeth now to keep in a wild hurrah. It was an odd feeling. He knew nothing about those fellows under the hill, but he hated them like sin and rejoiced in their destruction. He would have liked to slaughter every man of them with his own hand. If he had been able to get at them he would have hacked and slashed till there wasn't one left.

No more balls came their way now. The guns turned on one another, and presently the Russians limbered up and retired--and it was over, and he was still alive. And then he was thankful.

Jim went off in search of Saxelby and the other half-dozen wounded men, as soon as he came in, and found them trimmed up and bandaged, just starting in litters for the ships, and all very angry at being knocked out before they had had a chance.

Then they crossed the Bulganak and bivouacked for the night, in grievous discomfort still from lack of tents and shortage of provisions, but strung to cheerfulness by the fact that they were really in touch with the enemy at last--triumph surely of mind over matter. Notwithstanding which, the morning disclosed another pitiful tale of deaths from cold and exposure--brave fellows who would not knock under in spite of pains and weakness, and had dragged themselves along lest they should be "out of the fun," and died silently where they lay for lack of the simple necessities of life.

Rightly or wrongly the blame fell on the commissaries, and the dead men's comrades flung them curses hot enough to fire a ship. For meeting the Russians in fair fight was one thing, and altogether to their liking; but this lack of foresight and provision took them below the belt in every sense of the word, and was like an unexpected blow from the fist of one's backer.