The column was halted. It was halted because Lieutenant Hastings and Mr Midshipman Povey were arguing. They did it very discreetly but it was an argument nonetheless, and the marine sergeant and the other mids stood aside and pretended not to notice, and told the seamen to sit down and rest while the marines stood guard.
"We've been going an hour at least," said Hastings, "and all's well!"
"That's 'cos we've been lucky!" said Povey. "Lucky, that's all!"
"Dammit, Povey, I'm in command here!"
"Oh, shut up, George — I'm talking sense. We should throw out scouts!"
"Don't you damn-well talk to me like that! I'm your bloody superior!"
"George, listen! I've read about frontier warfare…"
"This ain't the bloody frontier!"
"Yes, it is. It's the bloody forest. It's the bloody same."
"No, it bloody ain't. This ain't bloody America and we ain't fighting Ind-"
He never said the word.
BA-BA-BA-BANG-BANG!
Thirty muskets fired point-blank from so close among the trees that anyone other than hopeless, useless, utterly incompetent woodsmen must have seen the fierce brown bodies hiding there.
Smoke, flame, screams and a dozen men went down bleeding and smashed, or bowled over, dead where they sat at ease.
More shrieks, fearsome and wild, and blood-chilling, as Nine-Fingers and his men closed in hand-to-hand to finish the job their gunfire had started.
It was a perfect ambush against wretchedly unprepared men. By all the conventions of frontier warfare it should have ended in the disintegration and flight of those ambushed, for the conventions of frontier warfare were always to run when ambushed, thus preserving arms and men, and falling back to a rendezvous point to re-form and carry on the fight another day.
But British seamen and marines didn't do that. There was nowhere to run in a ship-to-ship fight, and they were trained to grip like bulldogs and never let go.
George Hastings knew no tradition other than that, and he drew on it.
"Away borders!" he roared. "Oraclaesus!"
" Oraclaesus!" cried Povey, and the other mids — those that were left — and the sergeant of marines would've said the same, but he was down on his back with a musket ball in his belly and a Patanq warrior smashing in his face.
"Oraclaesus!" screamed the marines, and charged with musket and bayonet, the long barrels more encumbrance than use in forest fighting — which was why the Patanq had dropped their muskets to go in with knife and hatchet, screaming like fiends — and the marines went down, hacked and stabbed and dying.
"Oraclaesus!" screamed the seamen, and leapt up and drew pistols and cutlasses and charged as they'd have done when boarding the wreckage-strewn ruin of a battered ship, and this time the advantage in arms was with them.
Bang! Bang! Two shots per man from the neat, handy pistols, and Patanq warriors went over, struck by heavy service charges, and a hail of pistols was thrown at heads when empty, and the tars charged roaring and bellowing and laying on with twenty-seven-inch blades fresh from the grindstone, which outclassed and out-reached the puny knives and hatchets of their enemies.
The combination of thundering fire and razor steel hurled the Patanq back into the woods, and those of them that could fled silently away, leaving their muskets behind.
It was over in seconds.
Twelve seamen and marines were killed.
Another twenty were wounded, of whom five soon died.
Sixteen Patanq were laid out dead.
Eight Patanq, badly wounded, were trying to crawl away.
Shuddering from the fight, wondering if he were still whole and alive and not quite believing it, feeling his body to make sure, and finally rousing himself, Lieutenant Hastings ran round pulling his men off the wounded enemy, saving five from vengeful slaughter. He was joined by Mr Povey: they had both survived unharmed, if horribly shocked.
Nevertheless, they did their duty. They ordered firelocks reloaded. They put out scouts. They tended the wounded. They secured their prisoners, tending their wounds also. They fell back slowly, to the beach and the squadron, judging — rightly — that it was unsafe to penetrate the island interior except in full force.
And all the while they wondered why they were fighting American Indians on a tropical island, but could think of no reason.
Thus Nine-Fingers secured his objective of throwing back the noise-makers and giving time for Dreamer to prepare. This was doubtless a comfort to Nine-Fingers in the Spirit World, to which he was sent by three pistol balls and a tremendous cut to his shaven skull.
But Dreamer was warned and could act.
Chapter 38
Under way and outbound in the northern inlet
"John, what is it?" said Israel Hands.
"It's her, matey, it's her!"
Israel Hands didn't have to ask who he meant. There weren't no women but one on the island, and even if there'd been a thousand there'd have been only one for John Silver.
Oh, bugger me blind! thought Israel Hands, for Walrus was sailing bold and sharp and the hands were leaning over the rail yelling piss and derision on all those in her wake — even the nine hands that had been Flint's — and all the world looked sweet as ninepence for a bold new cruise and nobody hanged by the king or scalped by the savages. Oh no, he thought, for he knew what was coming. He'd known Long John too long. He knew what he'd do next.
Silver trembled with emotion. He stumped to the rail, he clung to the mizzen shrouds. He stared at the tiny figure on the beach. It was her, it was her, it was her…
And the first wave that hit him wasn't fear of cold steel and hot lead from those ashore, nor even fear that the crew wouldn't obey should he order the topsail backed and the ship hove to. For who should blame them as wouldn't risk their lives for another man's doxy, nor pull an oar in a boat that set out to fetch her? It was too much to ask, but even that wasn't Silver's first concern.
What really frightened him was the fear that now he'd found her… would she want him? Flint was a cracking fine man when all was said and done. Handsome as the devil, with all the air and manners of a gentleman, and well bred besides: a vastly finer man than a rough-handed, rough- speaking, cripple.
He looked again, the spy-glass trembling in his hand. She was standing, with her hands by her sides. It wasn't as if she was jumping up and down and waving. Not as if she was calling out to him, even if she knew he was there. He hadn't the slightest idea what was in her mind, and he was afraid. What in God's name would she think of him?
He sobbed. He actually sobbed as he reached up to pet the beloved bird with its fond gentleness towards himself, and its soft feathers and bright eyes… but which made so grotesque a figure of himself, together with his hideous disfigurement. What sort of a creature was he, that went on a wooden stick and had a parrot on his shoulder? Mr Joe with his eye-patch looked a rakish devil that the girls really would admire. But not John Silver. Not him. He was in despair. He didn't know what to do.
The gunfire woke Selena. Having fallen asleep curled up under a bush, with her pistols in her hands, she'd slept badly. As she got to her feet she was cold and damp, hungry and thirsty. She'd run into the forest the previous evening leaving Flint and Bentham fighting. She'd run even though she knew it couldn't be for long. Flint would send the Patanq after her and nobody could hide from them… But they didn't come. And she began to wonder: maybe Flint had other ideas?