CHAPTER XVIII
SIEGE
He never believed that they could hold the northeast corner for a
minute, so loud and unceasing was the uproar. Bullets spattered sharply
along the wall and sang overhead, mixed now and then with an
indescribable whistling and jingling. The angle was like the prow of a
ship cutting forward into a gale. Yet Rudolph climbed, rejoicing, up the
short bamboo ladder, to the platform which his coolies had built in such
haste, so long ago, that afternoon.
His high spirits went before a fall. As he stood up, in the full glow
from the burning go-down, somebody tackled him about the knees and threw
him head first on the sand-bags.
"How many times must I give me orders?" barked the little sea-captain.
"Under cover, under cover, and stay under cover, or I'll send ye below,
ye gallivanting--Oh! it's you, is it? Well, there's your port-hole." A
stubby finger pointed in the obscurity. "There! and don't ye fire till
I say so!"
Thus made welcome, Rudolph crawled toward a chink among the bags, ran
the muzzle of his gun into place, and lay ready for whatever might come
out of the quaking lights and darknesses beyond.
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