The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood

"I'll go bail he knows both, and English too, probably. He ought to be tried in Russian now: that's the language of the country. He is undoubtedly an impostor if he can't speak that. I wish we could try him in Russian. If he failed, the provost-marshal should hang him on the nearest post."

This conversation passed in the full hearing of McKay, and when Sir Colin stopped the sergeant-major stepped forward, again saluted, and said modestly—

"I can speak Russian, sir."

"You? An English soldier? In the ranks, too? Extraordinary! How on earth—but that will keep. We will put this fellow through his facings at once. Ask him his name, where he comes from, and all about him. Tell him he must answer; that his silence will be taken as a proof he is not what he pretends. No real Tartar peasant could fail to understand Russian."

"Who and what are you?" asked McKay. And this first question was answered by the prisoner with an alacrity that indicated his comprehension of every word that had been said. He evidently wished to save his neck.

"My name is Michaelis Baidarjee. Baidar is my home; but I have been driven out by the Cossacks to-day."

It was a lie, no doubt. Hyde had recognised him as a very different person.

"Ask him what brings him into our lines?" said Sir Colin, when this answer had been duly interpreted.

"I came to give valuable information to the Lords of the Universe," he replied. "The Russians are on the move."

"Ha!" Sir Colin's interest was aroused. "Go on; make him speak out. Say he shall go free if he tells us truly all he knows."

"Where are the Russians moving?" asked McKay.

"This way"—the man pointed back beyond Tchorgorum. "They are collecting over yonder, many, many thousands, and are marching this way."

"Do you mean that they intend to attack us?"

"I think so. Why else do they come? Yesterday there were none. All last night they were marching; to-morrow, at dawn, they will be here."

"Who commands them?"

"Liprandi. I saw him, and they told me his name."

"This is most important," said Sir Colin; "we must know more. Find out, sergeant-major, whether he can go back safely."

"Back within the Russian lines?"

"Exactly. He might go and return with the latest news."

"You would never see the fellow again, Sir Colin. He is only humbugging us—"

"Put the question as I direct you," interrupted the general, abruptly. "What we want is information; it must be got by any means."

"Yes, I will go," the prisoner promised, joining his hands with a gesture as if taking an oath; "and I would return this very night; you shall have the exact numbers; shall know the road they are coming, when to expect them—all."

"Let him loose, then," said the general; "but warn him, if he plays us false, that he had better not fall into our clutches again."

"You may trust him not to do that, sir," said McKay, rather discontented at seeing his prisoner so easily set free.

The general ignored the remark, but he was evidently displeased at its tone, for he now turned sharply on McKay, saying—

"As regards you—how comes it you speak Russian?"

"I was born in Moscow."

"Of Russian parents?"

"My father was a Pole by birth, but by extraction a Scotchman."

"What is your name?"

"McKay—Stanislas Anastasius Wilders McKay."

"Ah! Stanislas; I understand that. But how is it you were christened Wilders? And Anastasius, too—that is a family name, I think. Are you related to Lord Essendine?—a Wilders, in fact?"

"Yes, sir, by my mother's side."

"And yet you have taken the Queen's shilling! Strange! But it is no business of mine. Young scapegrace, I suppose—"

"My character is as good as—" "yours," McKay would have said, but his reverence for the general's rank restrained him. "I enlisted because I could not enter the British army and be a soldier in any other way."

"With your friends'—your relatives'—approval?"

"With my mother's, certainly; and of those nearest me."

"Do you know General Wilders—here in the Crimea, I mean?"

"My regiment is in his brigade."

"Yes, yes! I am aware of that. But have you made yourself known to him, I mean?"

The young sergeant-major knew that his gallantry at the Alma had won him his general's approval, but he was too modest to refer to that episode.

"I have never claimed the relationship, sir," he answered, simply, but with proud reticence; "it would not have beseemed my position."

"Your sentiments do you credit, young man. That will do; you can continue your march. Good-day!"

They parted; McKay and his men went on to Balaclava, the general towards the Second Division camp.

"Curious meeting, that, Shadwell," said Sir Colin. "If I come across Wilders I shall tell him the story. He might like to do his young relative—a smart soldier evidently, or he would not be a sergeant-major so early—a good turn."

CHAPTER XIII.

"NOT WAR!"

The spy, whatever his nationality, and however questionable his antecedents, was right in the intelligence he had communicated. A large Russian force was even then on the march from Tchorgorum, pointing straight for the Balaclava plain. The enemy had regained heart; emboldened by the constant influx of reinforcements, and the inactivity of the allies, he had grown audacious, and was ready to try a vigorous offensive. A blow well aimed at our communications and delivered with intention might drive us back on our ships, perhaps into the sea.

McKay had passed the night at Balaclava. The transport with the knapsacks was not yet in port, and he was loth to return to camp empty-handed. But next morning, soon after daylight, news came back to the little seaside town that another battle was imminent, on the plains outside.

The handful of Royal Picts were promptly mustered by their young commander, and marched in the direction of the firing, which was already heard, hot and heavy, towards the east.