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Updated: June 20, 2025
He stopped, and seemed to hesitate whether to say more; but after a moment or two he moved slowly away. Desmond watched him. Had he discovered the trick? Would he go below and waken Fuzl Khan? Desmond could not still a momentary tremor. But the serang did not rejoin his mess mates, nor go below. He walked up and down the deck alone. Apparently he suspected nothing.
But just as, with the instinct of rescue, he was about to lower himself into the depths, he heard a low hail from the vessel at the end of the line nearest the shore. A moment afterwards Fuzl Khan came stumbling towards him. "I have fired another gallivat, sahib," he said, his voice ringing with fierce exultation. "Well done, Fuzl Khan," said Desmond. "Now we must be off.
A quarter of an hour after Desmond quitted the deck of the Kent, he was put ashore at a sandy bay at the farther extremity of the isthmus, hidden from the fort by a small clump of mango trees. "Now, Fuzl Khan," he said, "you will wait here for a few minutes till it is quite dark, then you will row quickly along the shore till you come to within a short distance of the jetty.
The last news at Gheria was that it was in the Company's hands, though there was a rumor that it might be handed over to the Peshwa. We should not now see Angria's grabs coming out of Suwarndrug. But if it is Suwarndrug, Fuzl Khan, why put about? As fugitives from Gheria we should be assured of a welcome at Suwarndrug. We should be as safe there as at Bombay."
The Gujarati relaxed his grip on the man's throat; he made another attempt to cry out; but the firm fingers tightened their pressure and the incipient cry was choked in a feeble gurgle. Once more the hapless serang tried to rise; Fuzl Khan pressed him down and shook him vigorously. He saw that it was useless to resist, and lay limp and half throttled in his captor's hands.
If he could only cause them to hold their fire for a time! Knowing that the Gujarati had a stentorian voice, and that a shout would carry upwards from the water to the parapet, in a flash Desmond saw the possibility of a ruse. He spoke to Fuzl Khan. The man at once turned to the fort, and with the full force of his lungs shouted: "Comrades, do not fire. We have caught them!"
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