For a minute's space it was hot work, but then the
French began to fall back, and with a shout the English handful
followed. Fairburn pulled himself together and stood on the edge of
the rock-shelf where he had fallen breathless. To his horror, he saw a
Frenchman on the shelf below, taking deliberate aim at the lieutenant.
With a loud cry, the lad sprang down upon the enemy, regardless of the
steepness of the place, and in an instant the man was locked in his
arms, just as the musket report came. Down the two fell, bounding over
two or three shelves of rock, and then pitching headlong some twenty
or thirty feet into the thick brushwood below.
"You have saved my life, my lad; you are an Englishman worth knowing,"
were the next words the boy heard.
They came buzzing into George's ears some ten minutes later, when, the
brush with the French over, the Englishmen were hastening back to
report to the General.
"What happened when I fell, sir?" George asked with curiosity, as the
officer walked by the side of the litter. He was astounded to learn
that the Frenchman had been found still held in tight grip, his neck
broken. The enemy had been put to the rout and had fled, leaving their
flag behind them. Moreover, the French camp a couple of miles away had
been spied.
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