Pieces Of Eight

Chapter 28

As soon as it was light, Flint and Dreamer sent out the Patanq warriors. In a single day's swift running, they scouted the entire island and found all Silver's forts. It was childishly easy for them. They sighed and shook their heads at the paths, the hacked undergrowth, and the clumsy tramplings of men who seemed utterly ignorant of bushcraft — as indeed they were, being seamen; just as the Patanq didn't know a keelson from a kedge anchor.

They did, however, know about forts. And on the next day at dawn, Flint and Bentham stood beside Brendan O'Byrne, Tom Allardyce and some others of their crews within sight of the fort nearest the northern inlet. They stood well back, though, because it was time for the Patanq to earn their gold. So Flint and the rest hid behind the trees that filled most of the plain up in the northwest corner of the island, and they watched the Indians go forward.

There were three hundred Patanq on the move, led by Dark Hand the war sachem, who took precedence over Dreamer in time of battle. They were highly organised — by clan and family — into small companies, as disciplined as a regiment of the line but without the polish and buttons, for they fought almost naked, wearing just leggings and loincloths as protection from the undergrowth, and going barefoot for silence.

And they were profoundly silent. They moved like smoke. They gave nothing away: their brown bodies — crossed and speckled with tattoos — merged among the shadows as they moved out from the cover of the trees and crept over the scrubland towards the fort that Silver's men had built by Foremast Hill, which had been selected for assault… and which seemed so utterly unaware of their coming.

They hid behind tussocks. They slid along folds in the ground. They signalled with gentle bird calls so each company could keep its place in the advance. They were almost invisible: the bright feathers and glittering adornments were gone, leaving only knives and hatchets, guns and ammunition. The guns were fusils and fowling pieces rather than heavy regimental muskets, which were too cumbersome for the Patanq mode of warfare.

Slowly, carefully, led by Dark Hand with Dreamer following, the Patanq moved out into the dawn… and disappeared. There was utter silence save for the birdsong — if it was bird- song — and the booming of the island's surf.

"Where are they?" whispered Bentham to Flint, after ten minutes. "Can you see them?"

"Over there," said Flint, pointing to the east of the fort. "I think they're trying to get the sun behind them as it comes up." He paused. "Leastways, I think it's them. I'd fixed one with my eye, trying to follow him. But it's hard…" He shook his head. "No," he admitted, "I don't know where they are." He smiled his gleaming smile. "So much the better. What a surprise for Silver's men!"

"Aye," said Bentham. "Damned if I'd like the Patanq creeping up on me!"

Ba-Ba-Ba-Bang-Bang-Bang! Smoke and flame as the Patanq rose together, right up against the fort's palisade, and gave a single thundering volley, and a demon's shrieking of war cries. Half dropped their guns and leapt at the wooden fencing, hatchets between teeth. Half plied rammer, powder and bullet- bag, and delivered a crackling fire on the ramparts. The noise was deafening. The excitement was intense. Flint and his companions leapt to their feet, cheering loudly. "Go to it, me buckos!" cried Bentham. "Kill 'em! Rip 'em!" cried Flint, round-eyed and staring. "Chop their bastard bollocks off!" cried O'Byrne. They danced in their glee. It was magnificent entertainment: a wonderful spectacle wonderfully executed. It was the classic Patanq dawn raid, polished in frontier warfare between France and England, with the Patanq on whichever side suited them, tomahawking whichever enemies. It was a perfect delivery of a perfect surprise attack, to negate the advantages of those in the fort, to minimise losses to the attackers, and to win the day in a single, rolling, over-the-wall assault.

Except that it didn't achieve surprise.

Mr Joe saw to that.

He had everything ready just as John Silver had insisted:

… guns primed, and loaded with canister

… matches burning in tubs

… crews at their guns

… muskets loaded

… grenadoes ready

… sentries alert

And above all, no man showing his head over the ramparts, such that the Patanq attackers had nothing to aim at, and fired purely to terrify the defenders, whom they doubtless thought asleep. But they weren't asleep, just hiding, and the three guns that bore to the eastward fired together in a thundering detonation. Each was charged with over sixty musket balls. Each blasted directly down upon packed ranks of Patanq warriors as they scrambled over the palisade, clambered out of the moat, or stood shooting at the ramparts.

And when they'd fired, the gunners rammed home prepared charges, made up by Blind Pew into sail-cloth cartridges, with powder and shot together for speedy loading. Then a jab down the touch-hole with a priming wire to pierce the cartridge, a sprinkle of fine powder, and the gun trained into the reeling mass of bleeding bodies, a stab of the red match — and another bellowing roar and blast of dragon's breath, and still more Patanq drilled like colanders and blinded and burned and thrown down kicking and wriggling.

Dark Hand felt the blow of the lead ball. He staggered but took instant appraisal and raised a great shout, telling his men to retreat. To stay was to die. As the guns fired, he sped from man to man, turning them, shoving them, sending them running. Dreamer, and all who were heads of families, did likewise, even those who were broken and bleeding. By their leadership and example, no living man was abandoned. Even as they were scourged by gunfire, warriors died trying to carry away their wounded comrades rather than leave them behind.

No regiment of the Old World could have fallen back under fire with more selfless and magnificent courage. And these virtues the Patanq displayed not through imposed discipline but because every man knew every other. Each was a brother, a father, a son, or a cousin, or a little boy who'd played in the long house before ever he became a man.

Dark Hand was the last to come away, and only when he saw that all those who lived were safe did he retreat to the forest and fall and allow his wound to take him to the next world.

A total of forty-five men were killed in the failed attack, and of those who escaped, another three soon died and six were crippled. Since landing on the island the Patanq had lost ninety-nine men without inflicting a single casualty on their enemy. It was a cataclysmic disaster, for the men on the field that day were not just the flower of Patanq manhood, they were all of it. They were the entire strength of the Patanq nation. Every death was a tragedy. Losses On this scale were unthinkable.

Flint watched the bedraggled survivors go past him, deeper into the woods. He groaned, seeing the failure of all his plans, and beside him Danny Bentham cursed and spat and told O'Byrne to get ready to up anchor and set sail.

Dreamer alone was not dismayed. He walked back with his gun in his arms. He didn't flinch. He didn't weep. He found Dark Hand's brother, Cut Feather, and raised him to the rank of war sachem. He found a clearing in the forest, far away from the fort, and he brought together his men. There, as Flint and the other whites looked on in wonder, he dressed in his finest clothes, and his best robe, and his most sacred wampum, and he made a speech in memory of those who'd died.

He named the fallen: every one of them, beginning with Dark Hand. He spoke of Tears, Throat, Heart, the sacred ways of combating Grief: that dark power of the newly dead which causes the living to lie on the long-house floor with ash on their faces, waiting for death.

"It can happen, my brothers," he said. "I have seen it. And I have seen the future of our nation, which is not to perish here in battle. Trust me! I have seen it and I know…"

He spoke for a long time. He spoke with the poetry and rhythms of Patanq oratory. He reminded them that the only salvation for the People, was to move north. He reminded them that this could not be done without pain. He assured them that the People would survive, and that the present suffering was worthwhile.

He gave strength to those who were burdened.

He gave courage to those who were afraid.

He gave faith to those who doubted.

He was a very great speaker and a very great man.

With the speech made, and the warriors content — as often happened when Dreamer was at peace after great effort — the lights flickered black-yellow-violet. They flickered in his eyes just as they did in his wampum belt. The lights were followed by great pain, and by sickness and visions.

It was not until the next day that he was able to speak to the white men, explaining the second way to deal with forts.

Cowdray found Selena in Flint's cabin, dressed in her usual rig of shirt and breeches, boots and pistols. She was standing by the open stern windows, looking into a mirror as she wound a red scarf round her hair.

The surgeon stared. Her movements were extraordinarily feminine. He'd noticed that before. He thought it was something to do with the slenderness of her hands and wrists and the dainty grace of everything she did… that and the fact that raising her arms lifted her breasts tight up against her shirt and made them bounce.

Oh dear. Cowdray sighed. A sensible man knows his limits, and it was a pleasure to be accepted as her friend: a wise, older friend who wasn't supposed to be dreaming about kissing her tits and giving her a thundering good shafting.

"Cowdray!" said Selena, and she smiled. She was lovely when she smiled. It was beautiful to see: a real pleasure. Not pleasure enough, but it would have to do. Cowdray smiled in his turn… and locked other thoughts in the cellar.

"Selena," he said, and looked over his shoulder. There was nobody about, but he was careful. "I think I can get you ashore."

She lowered her hands, abandoning the kerchief-winding, and considered him carefully.

"Why should you do that? Flint says I'm to stay aboard. He's frightened I'll run."

"Do you want to run…" he lowered his voice to a whisper "… to Silver?"

"What's it to you?"

"I asked you before if you wanted him… and you didn't say no."

"And I didn't say yes!"

"Look… do you want to come ashore or don't you?"

"I don't know…"

"I think you should. At least then you'd have the chance."

"To run?"

"Yes."

"So how would you get me ashore? Against Flint's word."

"He's busy. He still thinks he can conquer this island."

"Don't you?"

Cowdray went quiet. "You saw Sweet Anne under fire as we came in."

"We both did!"

"And you heard the cannonading, yesterday?"

"Yes."

"That was a Patanq attack being thrown back with dreadful losses."

"Yes. I heard. Some of the men told me."

"I think John Silver has made most careful preparations."

"What preparations?"

"Forts, entrenchments, infernal engines… All very clever. I'm no soldier, but he seems to have achieved much success… and you might be safer with him than Flint."

"Hmm… So how would you get me ashore?"

"Ah! These matters are connected."

She shrugged her shoulders as if bored. "Which matters?"

"For God's sake, woman, show some interest and don't play cat and mouse!"

"I'm sorry." She reached out and touched his arm. She smiled and Cowdray tingled with delight. He was more smitten than he'd thought. It was such a joy when she smiled at him. "Ah-hem," he said, hoping he wasn't making a fool of himself.

"Well," he said, "I've set up a hospital ashore, where the wounded are being treated. There are about a dozen of them, all Patanq savages, and they need the attentions of a nurse…" "A what?"

"A nurse."

"Me?"

"Well, yes. You are a woman, the only one here."

"That don't mean I'm dancing round with piss pots, wiping men's butt ends!"

"Dammit, Selena, all the world thinks that's women's work; even Flint and his crew! They'd accept it as natural, and it'd get you ashore!" He paused, and in his confusion, he took refuge in Latin: "Now est ad astra mollis e terris via!"

"What's that?"

"Seneca: There's no easy way from Earth to the stars."

Selena frowned. It was time to decide exactly what she did want.

The day after the attack on the fort, Flint set up camp close to where Silver's battery had been. Tents were raised, stores unloaded, and all hands sent ashore who hadn't duties aboard. And when the noonday heat passed, he took a stroll along the beach accompanied by Danny Bentham.

"This is the very spot where my career began," said Flint. "Those few timbers there…"

"Would be HMS Elizabeth," finished Bentham.

"Why, Danny," said Flint, "how well you know my story!"

"How well indeed, Joe!"

Flint smiled. Bentham smiled, and all the other leading men of the expedition clustered round, and they smiled, too, as they gazed upon the wreck of a fine ship. Like Bentham, these men — Allardyce, O'Byrne and the rest — were keeping constant company with Flint, for Flint knew where the gold was buried, and nobody else did. More than that, they'd heard about Flint… how he'd raised mutiny, killed his own captain, murdered most of his shipmates, and became a gentleman of fortune… before meeting John Silver and falling out as badly with him as he had with King George.

For Flint was the rollicking boy, and no mistake! You jumped when he said jump. You doffed your hat. You addressed him as "sir". You didn't dare cross him. And you didn't turn your back on him, not for a second — not ever! You wanted Flint in front of you, where at least you could keep an eye on him, for all the good it'd do you.

On the way back to the camp, Flint and his followers met Dreamer, Cut Feather and five others of the Patanq, who'd come from their own camp, which by mutual consent had been set up apart from Flint's.

The Patanq had their nose-rings and bracelets again, and their formal robes and moccasins.

"Joe," said Bentham, "they've come to talk. We'll have to sit down with them."

Flint sighed. He didn't like the long-windedness of Patanq negotiation. It was tedious… except that this time it wasn't. It was fascinating.

Dreamer led them to the treeline where the beach merged into forest, and they sat in a circle, the Patanq spreading elaborately decorated deerskin bags on the ground in front of them. After formal greetings on either side, Dreamer nodded and the Patanq unfastened the bags and took out long, slender guns with little brass trapdoors in the butts, and double triggers, and barrels that weren't round but octagonal in cross-section.

"These are not common guns," said Dreamer. "These are long-rifles. They are new. There are few in all the land and only seven in the Patanq nation." The white men nodded. Dreamer continued. "Sun-Face," he said, "after the battle, I promised you a better way to take the forts."

"Yes," said Flint.

"This is the way," said Dreamer. "With these rifles."

"But rifles are for hunting," said Flint, "not for war."

"These rifles are for both," said Dreamer.

"But rifles can't stand against muskets," said Flint, frowning. "They shoot too slowly. I've seen it. You load an oversized ball, knock it down the barrel with a mallet and ramrod for the ball to grip the rifling. And a man with a musket fires five times while you do that!" He shook his head. "No — rifles are fine for hunting, where the beast don't shoot back, but they won't serve for fighting."

"Aye!" said most of the other white men, for it was the universal opinion of fighting men.

Dreamer, however, was unmoved.

"Do not the German white men use rifles in war?" said Dreamer. "In their homelands across the sea?"

"Perhaps," said Flint, uneasy at Dreamer's knowledge of the world. "But I don't know. I'm a sailor, not a soldier!"

"Wait a bit," said O'Byrne. "I was a soldier once, and I know Germans. I served under Frederick of Prussia. And he had men called Jaegers, the which are huntsmen that are used as scouts. And they shoot rifles." He pointed at Dreamer's rifle: "But not like that. Theirs are short, with thick barrels."

"You speak truth," said Dreamer. "For many years I have spoken with the Germans of Pennsylvania. I know their ways. They are the best gun-makers in all the land, and their rifles are just as you have said… But I have caused new rifles to be made: differently and to my own wishes. See-"

And he explained, using his own rifle.

A musket took a ball of fourteen to the pound, and a Jaeger rifle some twenty. But Dreamer's rifle took balls of fifty to the pound, and the powder charge was proportionately smaller, enabling far more rounds to be carried — vital to a far- travelling woodsman. And the barrel was long for accuracy's sake, and to burn all the powder and waste none, and drive the ball fierce and hard. And there was no need for a mallet in loading; a measured charge went down the barrel from a powder horn, then a thin, greased leather patch — from the trapdoor in the butt — on the muzzle, and a ball on the patch, and both driven home with a steady pressure of the ramrod.

Priming was the same as for any gun, but then there were two triggers.

"How do they work?" said Flint.

"I will show you," said Dreamer. "Stand!"

Flint stood up, brushing the sand from his clothes. Dreamer stood. He loaded smooth and easy. Then he primed the rifle and set it to half-cock. He passed it to Flint.

"Sun-Face," said Dreamer, "do not touch the triggers!"

"At your command, sir!" said Flint, and bowed.

"Raise the gun," said Dreamer.

Flint levelled at the horizon. He frowned.

"The barrel's heavy," he said. "It's clumsy! It don't come up to the shoulder like a musket."

"No matter," said Dreamer. "Now, there are two triggers — yes?"

"Aye-aye, sir!"

"One trigger is broad and curved. One is thin and straight. Yes?"

"Aye-aye, sir!"

"Good. Now cock the rifle fully."

"Aye-aye, sir!"

"Now… carefully… pull the curved trigger."

Flint pulled. Click went the lock. But the rifle didn't fire. Not yet.

"Good," said Dreamer. "You have set it. All is ready. Now… take your aim. And when you are ready, touch the second trigger."

Flint aimed out to sea. He reached for the second trigger with his finger…

Whoof-BANG! said the rifle.

"Ah!" said Flint. "But I barely touched it!"

"No," said Dreamer. "It has a hair-trigger. It sets off the gun with a touch that does not disturb the aim." He nodded. "The German white man calls this stechabzug."

"Oh!" said O'Byrne, sitting up. "Sie sprechen Deutscb?"

"Ja," said Dreamer. " Icb babe eine bischen."

"Huh!" said Flint. "But how well does it shoot, this special gun?"

"I will show you," said Dreamer, and he began to reload.

Cut Feather and another Patanq stood up, and while Dreamer was loading Cut Feather found a piece of driftwood about a foot long and six inches wide and set off walking away from them. The other man brought a log and placed it at Dreamer's feet. Dreamer finished loading… he carefully touched the rifle against his wampum belt… he closed his eyes briefly… then stood waiting with the rifle butt on his foot, to save it from being scratched by the rough ground, and with his arms wrapped round the barrel. He looked steadily at Cut Feather, and an excited murmuring arose from the white men.

When Cut Feather had gone about a hundred paces, he turned and stood facing Dreamer. Dreamer laid down in the sand. He put the rifle to his shoulder and balanced the long barrel on the log.

"Sun-Face?" he said.

"Yes?" said Flint.

"See — the weight does not matter. I do not hold it."

"I see," said Flint.

There was complete silence. Cut Feather raised the piece of wood till it was next to his face. He nodded.

Dreamer took aim.

Click! said the hair trigger.

Whoof-BANG! said the rifle.

Smack! said the piece of driftwood and jumped from Cut Feather's hand.

Calmly he picked it up, walked back, and gave it to Flint. A sharp round hole ran through its centre.

"Sun-Face," said Dreamer, "this way we shall take the forts."