An open door on my right showed me a small room, absolutely empty, except for a row of tins against the wall. Knowing that petrol was carried in such tin drums I went and examined them. The next moment Allan heard a shout that brought him hastily inside, wondering whether I had gone mad, had been bitten by a wild beast, or was being murdered.
"Look!" I cried, as he came running up to me. "Look at those tins and tell me what's inside!"
Allan seized hold of one of the drums, read what was written on it, gave it a shake, and we could both hear the blessed sound of lapping inside.
"It's petrol, sir," he whispered in an awed voice.
Petrol in the desert – petrol where one would as soon have expected to find a Bond Street jeweller!
At first we could neither of us believe it. Personally I imagined we had both got temporary jim-jams, but Allan, with his usual stolid, common sense, opened one of the drums, tested the contents, and pronounced it to be first-class petrol. There were seven drums, each containing four gallons.
"This means we'll motor, not walk into Robat after all, sir," said Allan, with a grin and sigh of relief. The thought of those miles of desert – nearly two hundred of them – which confronted us after the mishap had been haunting us both like a nightmare.
At this moment the chokidar returned, in great trepidation, fearing a dressing-down for being absent from duty. But I was far too elated at the turn of events to want to swear at anyone.
I asked him where the petrol had come from, and whose it was. He shook his head, and said he had no idea. It had always been there. It belonged to no one, and no one had put it there, so far as he knew. He had never seen a car there before; in fact, he had never seen a car anywhere before, and could not understand how it was that men could travel on a thing which was not alive, which was not like any horse or camel he had ever seen.
This was all very good hearing, so I proceeded to tell him that the petrol belonged to me, and, as he quite cheerfully acquiesced, I gave him a receipt which he could show to any Government official in case of needed absolution in the future. As we now had means to finish our journey by car, I decided to spend the night at the rest-house.
After a simple camp meal Allan, worn out with the strenuous work of the past two days and night, was quickly snoring in the deep sleep of exhaustion, so I went for a stroll.
As I paced up and down I tried to draw up some preliminary plan for the coming campaign. But such occupation was somewhat futile, as, until I could reach Robat, I had no knowledge at all as to the strength and composition of the force that would be at my disposal. But upon one thing I made up my mind – even at that early stage – I would do my utmost to show these Raiders, who were doing us so much harm, that they could not do this with impunity. The lesson once driven home, an endeavour should be made to become friendly with them, to win them back to our side, and, so to speak, appoint them as doorkeepers of the Baluchistan frontier; but doorkeepers with their rifles pointed at our enemies instead of at ourselves.
In the midst of these meditations I found myself stumbling with fatigue, so, with a last look at the beauty of the night, I turned indoors, and in a few minutes was sound asleep, and making up for the "whiteness" of the night before.
CHAPTER II
THE ROAD TO ROBAT
On the third day we made good progress, fate being kind in helping us to avoid the sandy pitfalls which had hitherto been our undoing, and, by nightfall, we found ourselves approaching the post of Mushki-chah.
Here we found the road blocked with a number of camel caravans carrying Government food supplies for our scattered posts along the frontier. These posts were already in difficulties owing to the Raiders' interference with their commissariat.
As can be imagined there was a great deal of noise, the native drivers gesticulating and talking in a way which proved that something was afoot. I got out of the car and asked who was in charge of the caravan. A huge native contractor was pointed out to me, and, summoning him to my side I asked him what all the hubbub was about.
He was in a state of great agitation and told me that he had received information from several reliable sources that the whole of the countryside ahead of them was in the hands of the Raiders, and that, therefore, it was useless to go a step further.
I expostulated with the man, pointing out that, by the terms of his contract, he must go on, and that if he did not the soldiers for whom he was bringing supplies would die of starvation.
But he was dogged. He knew too well the methods of the Raiders with the men they captured.
"It's no use, Sahib," he said, respectfully but firmly. "My men will not go on as they are unarmed, and a single armed Raider is enough to hold up the whole caravan."
I knew the man was right, but persisted in my efforts to persuade him to chance it, pointing out that he might be lucky enough to elude the Raiders and to win through.
"If the Government will give me a military escort I will go, but not without," was his final word.
I had no authority to compel him to go on, so gave up the struggle. But I realised more than ever how imperative it was to endeavour to reach Robat without a moment's unnecessary delay, and start conclusions with the Raiders, whose menace was growing more dangerous every day.
We were, therefore, on the road very early next morning, for I hoped to make Saindak that night. I had intended to go by Borgar, but now that I knew – for I had verified the contractor's statements, and believed them to be correct – that that place was in the hands of the Raiders, I elected to go by an alternative route, known as the Webb-Ware route, which is practically out of use nowadays, hoping, thereby, to avoid the enemy.
It was still dark when we set off on the most strenuous part of our journey; climbing, making détours, digging the car out again and again till we were all three worn out in body and temper. We hardly halted that day, for the necessity for speed was as fully realised by Allan as by myself.
When night fell we had not yet sighted Saindak, but I knew we could not be very far off, and cursed the coming of the night which made it impossible to see where we were. I knew we had got off the camel track somehow, for the ground was even more bumpy than it had been, and was frequently intersected by nullahs or rocky ravines, which made the going positively dangerous. If the car were knocked right out of action our difficulties would reach the last stage of disaster.
At last, in despair, Allan stopped, saying it was useless going on any further. We might overturn the car at any moment and smash it as well as ourselves. He submitted that the only sane thing would be to camp just where we were and wait for daylight, when we might regain the camel track.
I knew he was right, but said I would make one final effort on foot to find the track, and directed him to give me the hurricane lamp we carried on the car.
Stumbling and slipping over the broken ground in the pitch darkness, the lamp barely lighting up my immediate path, I had wandered some distance from the car when I heard voices. Instantly I thought of the Raiders who were over-running the district. It would be too galling, too humiliating to be captured by them before the campaign, on which I was building such high hopes, had even begun.
Noiselessly I put out the lamp and listened in the dense darkness. There was absolute silence for some minutes, and I stood stock still. Then voices sounded again, and I conjectured that there were not more than two, or at the most three, speakers.
I thought rapidly, and finally decided that there would not be many men in front of me. Had there been anything approaching an encampment of the Raiders in the neighbourhood, there would have been lights, camp fires