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."