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Towards evening, as they reached the western end of the pass, three men, evidently an outpost of the enemy, were seen to bolt from behind some rocks and make good their escape, in spite of an attempt by the Levies to catch them. The descent from the pass to the village of Laspur is some two miles long, and down a steep and rather narrow ravine.
I then asked him who he was, and found he was our long-lost child I mean levy who had been captured at Laspur. The enemy had not treated him badly, but had taken his carbine and his choga, hence the dressing-gown; in return he had sneaked a gun when the enemy were flying. I set the Kashmir troops to work, and then went back, meeting Humayun and his captives on the way.
Borradaile was to receive all the coolie transport, which he was to send back as soon as he got across the pass, in order that we might follow with the remainder of the troops. His orders were to entrench himself at Laspur, which was the first village across the pass, and if possible open communications with Mastuj.
A whistle to the Levies and a wave of the hand brought them back, and we scrambled down the hill again, and were back in camp before dark. Here I heard that the Punyal Levies had been sent for from Laspur to come along at once. As soon as I had explained the enemy's position to Colonel Kelly, orders were issued for the attack next day. They were short and simple.
At Rahman, two miles farther on, they left the snow behind, much to everybody's delight, and by one o'clock entered the village of Gasht, some eleven miles from Laspur, and about half-way to Mastuj, the Levies crowning a small knoll in the middle of the valley at the lower end of the village.
Hayward takes one long look on all this loveliness, and turns towards his executioners men say that even they hesitated. Mahomed Rafi, who was supposed to have actually killed Hayward, was now Hakim of Laspur, and, as I have said, had joined the enemy.
We dropped over the bluff and forded the Laspur stream, which was hardly over the men's knees, and then kept along the bed of the river, with a few scouts well up the hills on our left, the Mastuj or Yarkhun river protecting our right.
But now we were in Chitral territory, and a Mussulman country, so we were free to kill cows, but did so unostentatiously, as nearly all our force were Hindus. The dark deed was accomplished thus: on the houses being searched on the arrival of the first party at Laspur, an innocent little calf was found in one of the houses, and quick as thought then and there despatched.
Before he got to Laspur he was so snow blind that until we got to Mastuj I had to open his eyes for him every morning and bathe them with hot water before he could see, and he was hardly well again a month later. We got into camp that night before dusk, pretty well fagged and wet, and as soon as the coolies came in with our kits, we scraped a hole in the snow and pitched the colonel's small tent.
The distance from Langar to Laspur on the other side of the pass is only ten miles, but though Borrodaile's party of Pioneers and Levies started early next day, they did not reach Laspur till evening. The villagers were as surprised as though the party had dropped from the moon, and thought it expedient to be friendly.
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