aved behind the leaders. Rocks, earth, and rubble went up in clouds
into the air, and with them scores of the Chinese regular troops, under
whose very feet mines of the new explosive had been fired by Parker. And
the howling mobs in front were held up by barbed wire, while from the
despised trenches and breastworks a storm of lead swept the crowded masses
of the attackers away. At that close range every bullet from the machine
guns and rifles of the defenders drove through two or three assailants,
every bomb and grenade slew a group. Only in one spot by sheer weight of
numbers did they break through.

But like a thunderbolt fell the counter-attack. Stalwart Punjaubi
Mohammedans, led by Dermot, swept down upon them, and with bomb and bayonet
drove them out. The survivors turned and staggered up the hills again,
withering away under the steady fire of the sepoys, who adjusted their
sights with the utmost coolness as the range increased.

Again and again the assaults were repeated and repulsed, until the
undisciplined and demoralised Bhutanese refused to advance, and the Chinese
regulars attacked alone. But fresh mines exploded under them; the deadly
fire of the defenders' machine guns blasted them; and the Pekin general
looked anxious as his best troops melted away. He would not go far into
India if every small body of its soldiers took equally heavy toll of his
force. So he ordered a cessation of the assaults.

But there was no respite for the little garrison. Day and night the
pitiless bombardment by the mountain batteries and long-range fire of
rifles and machine guns never ceased. And death was busy among the
defenders.

On the third night of the siege Dermot and the subaltern knelt side by side
in what was now the last line of the defence.

"I ought not to ask you to go, Major," whispered Parker. "It's not possible
to get through, I'm afraid. I can't forget the awful sight of the fiendish
tortures they inflicted on poor Hikmat Khan and Shaikh Ismail today in full
view of us all. They tried to slip through last night with their naked
bodies covered with oil. It's a terrible death for you if they catch you.
It would be much easier to die fighting. Yet someone ought to go."

"Yes, they must be told at Headquarters," replied his companion in an
equally low tone. "We can't hold them two days longer."

"Not that, if they try to rush us again. Our ammunition is giving out,"
said Parker. "I'd go myself if I weren't com