CHAPTER VI.
“COLD PIG” AND “SLING THE MONKEY.”
I was effectually roused from my slumbers on the following morning by the shrill bugle-calls which the drummer seemed to take a delight in blowing as near the gunroom tent as possible. On murderous thoughts intent, and clad in very scanty apparel, Fitzgerald and I made a desperate sortie, one carrying a huge bath-sponge saturated with water, and the other a well-knotted towel.
“What a lark!” exclaimed Fitzgerald, capering about with delight; “cold pig for the drummer, and a lambasting afterwards to warm him up and prevent any possibility of his catching cold whilst so far away from his mammy’s protecting care!”
Dawn had scarcely broken, and it was almost dark outside the tent and rather unpleasantly chilly. The bugle-calls had ceased, but we thought we distinguished the drummer some yards away just upon the point of raising his instrument of torture to his lips again.
“I’ll put a stopper on his little game,” said Fitzgerald hastily to me. “Ready! present! fire!” and he hurled the heavy sponge with admirable aim straight at the dusky little figure; whilst I darted forward with a sort of Red Indian war-whoop, waving the knotted towel over my head.
The sponge landed with a splosh full upon the head of the individual it was intended for, and the latter staggered and gave a shout of dismay and disgust as the highly-unpleasant projectile came into contact with him.
“Good shot!” I cried exultingly. The next moment I recoiled in horror, and Fitzgerald turned deadly pale, for we recognized in our unlucky victim the short but sturdy Mr. Triggs, the gunner, who, being a very early riser, had taken it into his head to emerge from his tent and endeavour to make out the Rattler through a pair of night-glasses. How would he take our explanation that we had mistaken him for the drummer-boy tooting on a bugle?
Before we had time to think or apologize for our mistake, the sponge was sent hurtling back through the air by the muscular arm of Mr. Triggs. I was relieved to see that it was aimed at the real delinquent, Fitzgerald, and not at me.
“O you mischievous middies!” shouted the gunner, running towards us; “you’re always up to some tomfoolery or other!”
Fitzgerald saw the sponge flying towards him, and tried to dodge it, but as ill luck would have it trod with his bare foot upon a sharp stone. The pain was so great that it brought him to the ground; but in trying to save himself he threw out his arms and they unfortunately encountered me, and I felt myself seized in a grip which there was no shaking off. In a moment we were both sprawling upon the ground, arms and legs inextricably mixed up in a sort of “limb hotch-potch.”
The gunner, chuckling with delight at our misadventure, now came running up, his hair and face dripping from the effects of his lately-inflicted “cold pig.”
“If I don’t pay you youngsters out, my name ain’t Timothy Triggs!” he exclaimed; “and ’tis a grand opportunity I’ve got,” and so saying he snatched the knotted towel out of my hand, and began belabouring us both with it with remarkable muscular energy.
“Stop, stop, stop!” I yelled; “we mistook you for the drummer, and are awfully sorry, Mr. Triggs!”
Whack, whack, whack! The blows fell with wonderful regularity and with marvellous impartiality, first on Fitzgerald and then on me.
All this time the gunner was chuckling with suppressed laughter, for he was thoroughly enjoying the joke, being at heart a most good-natured man.
“You can just imagine you’re playing ‘sling the monkey,’” he exclaimed; “’tis a right good game and no mistake!”
Fitzgerald and I, however, had by this time managed to disentangle our arms and legs, and we were on our feet again in a moment. We did not at all appreciate this novel kind of “sling the monkey.”
“Is that the enemy coming over the hill?” I exclaimed in an alarmed voice, and pointing away to the rising ground which, beyond the confines of the fort, rose steep and dark against the primrose-tinted sky.
Mr. Triggs promptly turned his head to look, and in an instant I had snatched the towel from his hand.
“Cut and run, Fitz!” I cried; “I thought I’d gammon him,” and so saying I fled precipitately in the direction of the gunroom tent, my brother-middy hobbling after me as fast as his wounded foot would allow.
Mr. Triggs, however, did not attempt to give chase, feeling, I suppose, that his skylarking days—now that he was on the shady side of fifty—were over. So the worthy warrant-officer contented himself with keeping up a hot and strong running fire of anathemas upon us as long as we remained in sight.
“The bath-sponge, Fitz, the bath-sponge!” I gasped out, as I ran panting into the tent and flung myself upon the ground, which formed the only flooring.
“By Jove! I forgot all about it,” said my hobbling messmate; “I hope old Triggs won’t appropriate it.”
At that moment the real drummer-boy passed our tent whistling a merry air.
I promptly stopped him.
“Do you mind seeing, like a good fellow, if there’s a bath-sponge lying just over there by that tent?” I said.
“All right, sir, I’ll have a look,” answered the drummer-boy, good-naturedly, and off he went.
In a minute or two he returned with it.
“Here you are, sir. Been playing Aunt Sally with it, I suppose?”
“No, Uncle Triggs,” I said laughingly. “You’ve had an awfully narrow escape, bugler, only you don’t know it. I should strongly advise you not to come near the gunroom tent in the early morning, for Mr. Fitzgerald there always gets a violent attack of homicidal mania about that time.”
An hour later the tents were struck and we had started on our march up country to the tune of “Rule Britannia,” played with tremendous energy by our fife-and-drum band.
Little did I anticipate what was before me—such adventures as even in my wildest dreams had not occurred to my mind.