Greenmantle - John Buchan

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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Trouble by The Waters of Babylon From that moment I date the beginning of my madness. Suddenly I forgot all cares and difficulties of the present and future and became foolishly lighthearted. We were rushing towards the great battle where men were busy at my proper trade. I realized how much I had loathed the lonely days in Germany, and still more the dawdling week in Constantinople. Now I was clear of it all, and bound for the clash of armies. It didn't trouble me that we were on the wrong side of the battle line. I had a sort of instinct that the darker and wilder things grew the better chance for us. 'Seems to me,' said Blenkiron, bending over me, 'that this joy-ride is going to come to an untimely end pretty soon. Peter's right. That young man will set the telegraph going, and we'll be held up at the next township.' 'He's got to get to a telegraph office first,' I answered. 'That's where we have the pull on him. He's welcome to the screws we left behind, and if he finds an operator before the evening I'm the worst kind of a Dutchman. I'm going to break all the rules and bucket this car for what she's worth. Don't you see that the nearer we get to Erzerum the safer we are?' 'I don't follow,' he said slowly. 'At Erzerum I reckon they'll be waiting for us with the handcuffs. Why in thunder couldn't those hairy ragamuffins keep the little cuss safe? Your record's a bit too precipitous, Major, for the most innocentminded military boss.' 'Do you remember what you said about the Germans being open to bluff? Well, I'm going to put up the steepest sort of bluff. Of course they'll stop us. Rasta will do his damnedest. But remember that he and his friends are not very popular with the Germans, and Madame von Einem is. We're her proteges, and the bigger the German swell I get before the safer I'll feel. We've got our passports and our orders, and he'll be a bold man that will stop us once we get into the German zone. Therefore I'm going to hurry as fast as God will let me.'
It was a ride that deserved to have an epic written about it. The car was good, and I handled her well, though I say it who shouldn't. The road in that big central plain was fair, and often I knocked fifty miles an hour out of her. We passed troops by a circuit over the veld, where we took some awful risks, and once we skidded by some transport with our off wheels almost over the lip of a ravine. We went through the narrow streets of Siwas like a fire-engine, while I shouted out in German that we carried despatches for headquarters. We shot out of drizzling rain into brief spells of winter sunshine, and then into a snow blizzard which all but whipped the skin from our faces. And always before us the long road unrolled, with somewhere at the end of it two armies clinched in a deathgrapple. That night we looked for no lodging. We ate a sort of meal in the car with the hood up, and felt our way on in the darkness, for the headlights were in perfect order. Then we turned off the road for four hours' sleep, and I had a go at the map. Before dawn we started again, and came over a pass into the vale of a big river. The winter dawn showed its gleaming stretches, ice-bound among the sprinkled meadows. I called to Blenkiron: 'I believe that river is the Euphrates,' I said. 'So,' he said, acutely interested. 'Then that's the waters of Babylon. Great snakes, that I should have lived to see the fields where King Nebuchadnezzar grazed! Do you know the name of that big hill, Major?' 'Ararat, as like as not,' I cried, and he believed me. We were among the hills now, great, rocky, black slopes, and, seen through side glens, a hinterland of snowy peaks. I remember I kept looking for the castrol I had seen in my dream. The thing had never left off haunting me, and I was pretty clear now that it did not belong to my South African memories. I am not a superstitious man, but the way that little kranz clung to my mind made me think it was a warning sent by Providence. I was pretty certain that when I clapped eyes on it I would be in for bad trouble. All morning we travelled up that broad vale, and just before noon it spread out wider, the road dipped to the water's edge, and I saw before me the white roofs of a town. The snow was deep now, and lay down to the riverside, but the sky had cleared, and against a space of blue heaven some peaks to the south rose
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GREENMANTLE by
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Flying Corps.
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I had just finished breakfast and w
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He laughed. 'You do yourself an inj
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Sir Walter lay back in an arm-chair
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if a man has a special knowledge to
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years—mostly young officers of th
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and premeditated, and I didn't seem
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advantageous position to take a han
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provide food and service. I kept th
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'V. I,' I read. 'There you have me.
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'I should add that it's about as sa
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lack the larger vision. They can be
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CHAPTER THREE Peter Pienaar Our var
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summer. The hills of Portugal were
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Beyers would have hanged him if he
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the predikant used to preach about
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ar-keeper, with a lot of Shangaan w
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Peter grunted a deep approval. 'Tha
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I had expected a big barricade with
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men with heavy eyes. No wonder, poo
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factory look like a house, though y
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'Maybe he wasn't,' said the giant i
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'You need men, and the men are wait
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As I walked dizzily away the big ma
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convalescent room, where people wer
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I did as I was bid, he followed, an
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a portfolio, and flung me a few sen
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shiver. But how can we strike? They
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had only heard a gurgle of somethin
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in about a quart of water, when Stu
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abominating the English and burning
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The door opened and Stumm entered.
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'There are thousands, sire,' I said
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veld ... Not but what,' he added, '
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German Crown.' I took the card and
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helpless. The man had a gorilla's r
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'The village is five minutes off at
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my idiot had been absorbed into the
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paling of rough stakes plaited with
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village. There were one or two peop
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Hampshire. The bouts had been short
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'Gruss Gott,' I replied. I leaned a
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danced through my head in a crazy f
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your stocking-foot and use it only
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my passport inside Germany, to join
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shoulder. The others wore thick jer
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Stumm's cordon had got busy at last
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dry crackle of wild geese going ove
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Peter was in the middle of the conv
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others, for I was not a prisoner of
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elieved it. I was a poor Dutchman t
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I did not pay much attention to the
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him short. 'Come along to the comma
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The Turk swaggered up and addressed
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clearly not approving of this wet a
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here for their pleasure, and but la
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Then Peter fired over their heads.
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for any trouble with demoniacs. Up
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I had had the good fortune to colle
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have been. Sandy had said that the
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passage and the empty shop, and out
Page 126 and 127: 'But I don't understand,' I stammer
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Page 130 and 131: understood a word of. "Maister Tamm
Page 132 and 133: 'I know,' I said; 'he is called Gre
Page 134 and 135: mine. Meantime, I've got to clear,
Page 136 and 137: sailor, Blenkiron flung him three o
Page 138 and 139: Petrograd and Mr Y. in London, or,
Page 140 and 141: He tore up the papers and enlarged
Page 142 and 143: fellow engineer, and translated par
Page 144 and 145: dwelling in my intestines. I'm like
Page 146 and 147: made me sick for the burning veld.
Page 148 and 149: top of them, and the three were off
Page 150 and 151: I told him in a hectic sentence, fo
Page 152 and 153: She led me through a long corridor
Page 154 and 155: Stumm and Rasta and the whole Germa
Page 156 and 157: passports. Say, do you come from En
Page 158 and 159: out to find my visitor in a brown s
Page 160 and 161: for the open country.' This confoun
Page 162 and 163: lacker one. Do you think that woman
Page 164 and 165: 'There was a time when the papers w
Page 166 and 167: I picked up the map and pocketed it
Page 168 and 169: different members of our gang. Pete
Page 170 and 171: swung along at a great pace with a
Page 172 and 173: It proved to be a wretched tumble-d
Page 174 and 175: About midday we descended on a wide
Page 178 and 179: glittering like jewels. The arches
Page 180 and 181: wretched horses. It is vitally impo
Page 182 and 183: was difficult driving. On both side
Page 184 and 185: With an effort Stumm recovered hims
Page 186 and 187: Sandy's somewhere outside, and he's
Page 188 and 189: I guessed he had gone to have a loo
Page 190 and 191: with the impetus right on our heads
Page 192 and 193: The Deve Boyun lines seemed to me m
Page 194 and 195: I had learned what I needed. We wer
Page 196 and 197: much that he broke open a wound in
Page 198 and 199: 'Drugged,' he cried, with a weary l
Page 200 and 201: Sandy's figure seemed to shrink and
Page 202 and 203: 'That's all right,' I cried. 'It is
Page 204 and 205: The outbuilding we were lodged in a
Page 206 and 207: On the road itself he would soon be
Page 208 and 209: the howitzers, and was thankful whe
Page 210 and 211: seemed to be a kind of cup between
Page 212 and 213: dislodge one ounce of snow. Still t
Page 214 and 215: 'They may not understand it,' said
Page 216 and 217: and looked at his map, and then put
Page 218 and 219: von Einem was getting ready for her
Page 220 and 221: Beside him rode a tall figure swath
Page 222 and 223: We stared blankly for a second, til
Page 224 and 225: sides to prevent them getting us in
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It was a woman's voice, high, penet
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woman had singled me out above the
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Blenkiron's field-glasses and had a
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ange for his whizz-bangs. We've got
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'Feeling good?' I asked. 'Fine. I'm
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The choice fell on one of the Compa
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deaf to the sound. Stumm had seen u
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for the rear of the fugitives, but
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*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG E
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1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perfor
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Section 2. Information about the Mi
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Greenmantle - John Buchan

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