He gained some time by a sortie from either flank, cutting off the men who were climbing above him, but this only forced them to make a wider circuit and postponed their eventual success. He returned from this sally, a smoking carbine in his hand, his face smeared with heat and dust, and a bullet-hole through his helmet, to find Rose standing in the sangar which he had quitted, watching him with proud admiration. The enemy's centre was following the sortie back with every rifle that could bear upon it, and bullets were striking in front of the sangar and flying over it like brazen winged bees. Two or three men had been hit, and Terrington stooped to lift one of them into safety before he could speak to Rose. "Go back!" he said almost angrily. "What are you doing here?" "I shan't!" she returned defiantly. "I'm going to be with you." Terrington turned to direct the carrying of the wounded down to the road: then he put his hand upon her shoulder and said quietly. "Go back, please, for my sake, to the doolie, we're all going forward in a few minutes." Gholam, who had been standing beside her, with an expression, turned towards Terrington, of absolute impotence, gave a little jump and clapped his hand to his elbow. "Are you hit?" said Terrington. The man withdrew his hand, looked at it, all smeared with blood, and salaamed. "The Sahib's servant has the honour," he replied gravely. Terrington placed himself more completely between Rose and the enemy's fire. "Take him down, dear, will you, and tie him up?" he said. The little endearing word moved her more than the command. "Come!" she said, as though it were rather the servant than herself that was responsible for the trouble, and walked straight down to the doolie. The enemy had made another dash on the centre after the sortie, and as it was driven back the signal was given Dore for which he had so eagerly been waiting, Terrington's hand having been forced by the increasing number of the enemy in front of him, the Guides being still a long way to the rear. A bugle call replied to the signal, and Dore's men opened fire instantly on the crowded road beneath them. The Saris turned at the sound, to find themselves penned between two lines of fire and the precipices of the defile. It was little wonder that panic seized them; the long deferred disclosure of the trap adding to their apprehensions. Those nearest Dore's ridge dashed for the gap without an attempt at resistance, and those in front, seeing their supports in flight, fell back, firing wildly in both directions. The Bakót men finding the foe in retreat began to shoot with more effect, but Terrington, trusting rather to their knives for slaughter and feeling that the decisive moment was come, signalled to the Guides, still three miles away, to press forward, and ordered a general advance.