The two of them went away to collect some men, and I heard either Ellis or Hartley running down the stairs from the roof to join them. Firing went on vigorously from the direction of those huts. I heard the buzz of excited voices as people collected under the windows, somewhere near the door in the wall, and waited to hear it opened and the sortie commence. Presently "boom" came the report of the six-pounder from the "_B.A._", and the Maxim overhead began rattling. Then the bolts of the door were thrown back, and I heard Mr. Scarlett’s voice yelling hoarsely, "Come along," and the crush of people pressing out through the door-way after him with rather half-hearted cheers. Miss Borsen entered the room and stood listening. "They’ve left me all alone," she said; "I am frightened," and the next moment, with a scared face, was at a window looking down the slope. "They are rushing down," she cried. "Mr. Fisher and your gunner and the man ahead of the others. A shell has just burst in the huts. I can’t see anyone firing at them. Oh, Mr. Fisher has tumbled down! He’s up again. He’s catching up your gunner." The Maxim overhead ceased firing. "Now they’re right among the huts. The telegraph people are nearly there—yes, they’ve got there too. Some of them have cans with them—paraffin cans. There they go! there they go! The Afghans are bolting down the slope! Smoke’s coming out of the huts. Why don’t they come back? "Now they’re coming. Your gunner is helping Mr. Fisher. He’s hurt; I know he is. I must go and see" and she ran away again. The "_B.A._" fired a few rounds of precious Maxim ammunition, and by the time all was quiet Mr. Scarlett had come to tell me, with a chuckle, that "That little business is all done correct, sir. Mr. Fisher got a bullet through his left shoulder, but it ain’t done much damage." Soon I heard the crackle of the flames and smelt the smoke from those huts, so knew they would not bother us any more. That bullet through his shoulder muscles (I think it broke off a bit of bone there) seemed to alter Mr. Fisher completely. When I saw him next—rather pale, and with his arm in a sling—he had given up all pretence of imagining that the Afghans would retire. In fact it was he now who suggested, feverishly, doing things to make the house ready to stand an assault. "But for goodness’ sake," he told me, "don’t let anyone suggest abandoning the telegraph buildings or going aboard the _Bunder Abbas_. I won’t do so until the very last moment—I can’t—I daren’t. If the Afghans got inside for even half an hour they’d wreck the whole of the transmitting instruments, and it would be six months before the cable would work again."