We had the best hot meal we’d eaten in months, in the dining-room, with a pair of the tarts to wait on us, and some tolerable port and a decent cigar afterwards. I took my turn at guard that night with only middling apprehension; there wasn’t a sign of Indians, the moonlit prairie was empty as far as one could see, and I was well used to the plaintive howl of the white wolves by now. I turned in shortly before dawn feeling not half bad; it was snug and jolly to see Susie snoring away in the dim candle-light, with one fine tit peeping out among the frills; I nibbled away until she squirmed into wakefulness, whereafter we set to partners, celebrating the first civilised bed we’d occupied since the Planter’s Hotel, if you like. It was comforting afterwards to sip punch and glance round the high white-washed walls in the knowledge that they were about six feet thick, with sharp eyes aloft, and the Indians could prowl about outside to their hearts’ content.
That’s what they were doing, too, next morning, and there must have been a trip in from somewhere during the night, for I counted above sixty of the scoundrels circling their ponies just out of range, whooping and working up a head of steam. I had every spare man up the east rampart above the gate; with the revolving rifles and six-shooters as well as our high walls we should be safe enough, unless they assembled in greater numbers than were visible now. So I remarked to Grattan, and he went off to the armoury in one of the corner towers to see what was available.
Just then there was a shout; the Indians had decided to warm us up a little. They charged in, well spread out like good light cavalry, letting fly a few shots and arrows, but plainly bent on testing our fire. I detailed three men only, and we downed one of their ponies; the dismounted brave capered and jeered and showed us his arse, and the rest drew off to reconsider. There was a chief in a war-bonnet who seemed to be haranguing them; presently he lifted his lance and howled, and the whole crowd came in like banshees, stirrup to stirrup, straight for the gate.
“Hold your fire!” bawls I. “Wait for the word!” And I was just about to give it when the cunning bastards wheeled right and left, making for the corners of the fort. We let fly just the same, and I dispatched three-quarters of our force around the other ramparts; even spread thin, we could put up enough fire to keep them at a distance, and a merry, useless little fight ensued, the Indians darting in and out, our fellows blazing away from cover and knocking one or two over, while the chief circled with a group of followers, for all the world like a general with his staff, looking to spot the best place for a concerted rush. I was taking my time with a Colt rifle, trying long pots at him and damning the sights, when Grattan was at my elbow again. Just at that moment a fire-arrow came whistling over and stuck smouldering in the parapet behind us; a teamster stamped it out, but it gave point to what Grattan had to say.
“Are ye ready for bad news?” says he, and for all he tried to keep the jaunty note in his voice, there was a wild glint in his eye. “Because I’m the one that’s got it, bigod! That armoury in the nor’-west tower, there – aye, well, some clever feller has laid a powder-train to the magazine, and there’s enough loose powder lying about to give an artillery-man the trots – with a burned-out slow fuse in the middle of it! Not only that, in the opposite tower there’s eighty kegs of the stuff, and another train to them! Which means,” says he, and the sweat on his face wasn’t from heat or exertion, “that whoever abandoned this fort intended to blow it sky-high, and would ha’ done, but for that faulty fuse!” By this time, you will understand, I had left off shooting and was giving the man my most earnest attention, palsied with fright.
“You follow me, captain?” says he. “We’re sitting in the middle of a powder-keg, and one spark’ll blow the whole place to kingdom come!”
Now you may not be aware, gentle reader, in these civilised days of manufactured cartridges and cased shells, precisely what a powder-train was. Skilful sappers used to make them by piercing large cartridges with a bodkin, and carrying the cartridge rapidly away so that the powder trickled out in a stream no thicker than a pencil lead, which they ran to the charge to be detonated – in the case of Bent’s Fort, I gathered, several tons of high explosive, with a similar confection in the opposite tower, just for luck. At the start of the powder-train you placed a slow-burning fuse, to enable you to get over the skyline before November the Fifth. Such a train is hard to see, even by daylight, since it is just a thin line of dust, and Grattan and I had barely glanced into the towers, and hadn’t been looking for trains or loose powder, anyway. But there they were, waiting for a spark – and hostile Indians had just started shooting fire-arrows at us.
I said: “What do you advise?” or words to that effect, and he didn’t know, so we had a brief discussion, the fruit of which was one of the rottenest ideas I’ve ever heard. My own first thought was to get over the wall, but with the Upper Arkansas Hairdressers’ Association on hand that wouldn’t answer, and when Grattan proposed that the sluts should set to work carefully to sweep up the powder-trains, I was fool enough to agree. He must have been as panic-fevered as I was, for he had six of them lined up at the north-west tower before the suicidal folly of it came home to me. Loose powder is as vicious an article as the plague germ; the friction of a foot can set it off, and the thought of those handless harlots scraping among it brought me down from the parapet like a stung ferret.
“It won’t do!” I bawled. “Water! From the well! Can you douse the trains?”
“If I could, there’s still the magazine, and another pile of kegs yonder big enough to blow us to Mexico!” says Grattan. “We’ll never soak them all,” and at that moment another fire-arrow came winging into the square and stuck blazing in Susie’s coach. Cleonie screamed, and the girls beat it out with cloths; I absolutely tore my hair in fear and consternation.
“Get the invalids!” I shouted. “Buckets of water! Post the doddering buggers about the place with as many buckets as you can find – the girls can make a chain from the well! We’ll need ’em on the parapets, too – hurry, for Christ’s sake! And make sure the tower doors are fast, and soaked in water!”
It was the only thing to be done; the invalids and girls must douse every burning missile the moment it struck; the mines were in stout-walled buildings, and short of a general fire they’d be harmless enough. Once we had beaten off our feathered friends we could set to work cautiously to remove the trains and kegs – in the meantime, it was back to the wall and try to sicken our attackers.
They were still full of sin and impudence, though, and had mounted a determined rush against the west wall from the corral, but the savaneros had made cool practice, and there were a half a dozen painted corpses under the wall to prove it. Our fellows had discovered that the best field of fire was from the towers, which projected sufficiently to enfilade two walls at once. We had thinned our attackers out a little, anyway, and no others had appeared; all told there were perhaps fifty, mostly on the north side, where there were no battlements but only upper bedrooms with flat unparapeted roofs. So far I don’t believe we’d taken even a flesh-wound on our side.
Suddenly they charged, again, and the 11th Hussars couldn’t have done it better. They came singly and in little packs, all along the north and east sides, converging at the last minute at the north-east angle, where there were windows in the upper floor and our range was the greatest. We blazed down the wall for dear life, some of the savaneros exposing themselves recklessly, for if just one of the bastards got inside we might well be done for; we hadn’t the men to go hunting through the fort. They surged under the wall, scrambling up on their ponies’ backs and leaping for the sill; we were firing into the brown and doing fearful execution, but a Colt revolving rifle takes time to reload, and if they hadn’t desisted when they did, I believe they might have got a man in. They rode off, howling, leaving dead and dying under the wall, and then screams of alarm from the courtyard brought us round to meet an even deadlier menace.
While we were engaged on the wall, a few fire-arrows had come over and been
promptly stifled by the invalids, who were in tremendous trim, bawling orders to each other and striding about like Nelson on the quarterdeck. But bowmen firing from behind the corral had put a couple of burning shafts into the roof of the stable against the west wall; it was wattle and went up like a muslin curtain with a great whoosh! It only burned for a few minutes, but sparks must have reached the roof of the billiard-room, for presently it began to flame, and the invalids had to beat a retreat, roaring for more water.
If the Indians had come in then, in one spot, neck or nothing, we’d have been done for. But they circled at a distance still, yelling, apparently content to let the fire do the work for a while. Which meant that we had a respite, and I was able to gibber in futile anguish. The girls at the well were running with buckets for the west steps, but I could see with half an eye that the billiard room was beyond hope, and from that the fire must spread across the whole west end of the fort, consuming the beams on which the adobe was plastered, raging out of control – until it reached the north-west tower with its tons of powder. That explosion would set the whole place alight, and the other tower would go up as well – but we’d be past caring by then. We’d all be blown to atoms or roasting in the burning ruins.
At such times, when hope is dead and there’s nowhere to hide, it’s astonishing how the mind clears, and you see with an icy brilliance of logic that there’s nothing for it but to run like hell. Fortunately, another man who’d considered that possibility, about ten minutes before I had, was Grattan Nugent-Hare, late of the Chainy Tenth and U.S. Dragoons. In the brief space between organising the bucket brigade, and the Indians’ attack on the north-east angle, he had been sending down every other savanero and teamster to put to the mule teams on the three coaches, and on a couple of the wagons in the little park behind the shops on the southern side. When I came bounding down from the north-west tower he met me at the steps, and nodded at the blaze that was spreading across the west roof; the heat was like a furnace.
“We’ll have to break out!” he shouted. “We’ve maybe got ten minutes before yon tower goes up. If we throw open the gates we can make a run for it with the wagons!”
“Where the hell to?” I demanded.
“The river – it’s barely a furlong from the south wall. If we can get the coaches and a couple of wagons that far we can corral and hold them off! It’s that or be blown to blazes!”
Now, beastly funk I may be, but show me the ghost of a loophole and I can think as smart as the next man – and be through it first, too, with luck. The three coaches were hitched up in the square, and a teamster was leading a wagon-team from the park. Black smoke was swirling across from the west side, and the beasts shied and bellowed with fear. From the two towers a couple of savaneros were firing occasional shots; evidently the Indians were still content to hold off. Grattan’s voice was hoarse.
“The women in the three coaches, with the three best drivers, and a rifleman to each coach – aye, and the invalids with a few revolvers. That’ll leave six or seven of us to man the south-east tower and cover ’em as they drive for the river. If a savage gets within touch of them, we should be ashamed of our shooting!”
“What then?”
“When they’ve made the river, we’ll break out with a couple of wagons. The redskins’ll be ready, but there ain’t above fifty of ’em. With luck we’ll maul ’em bad enough to leave us alone!”
You may imagine this conversation punctuated by the crackle of burning timber, wenches wailing and coughing, shots banging overhead, and the bespectacled invalid coming to attention crying: “We are at your disposal, sir! Cincinnati shall not fail! Name our task and it shall be done, yea, even unto the end!” I gave him a revolver and shoved him into the first coach, along with a brave but tearful Susie, who gave me a hasty slobber, and four terrified prostitutes. Grattan made for the gates while the coach-drivers hustled the other tarts and invalids into their vehicles, packing them like herring. I took a quick glance at the west wall; the blacksmith’s shop was ablaze now, and the flames were licking towards the catwalk leading to the north-west tower – dear God, would the heat set off the loose powder even before the flames got close? I went up the steps to the south-east tower four at a time.
Outside the fort our attackers were still keeping their distance, most of them on the north side, which was all to the good. I looked across to the north-west tower; there were two savaneros there, and I waved them across – if any Indian wanted to attack through the fire that was now shooting above the west wall, good luck to him. Down in the courtyard the drivers were in their places; a teamster with a rifle was at a window of the first coach; on the second, a savanero was sitting on the roof reloading his Colt.
With all the din I never heard the gates open; suddenly the lead driver was yahooing and whipping up, and we rushed to the parapet of the tower, rifles at the ready. As we looked down, the first coach shot out and wheeled right for the river, and a tremendous yell burst from the startled Indians, who came tearing in at the unexpected sally. Then the second coach, and we were firing as fast as we could, picking our men pretty neatly, I like to think. The main pursuit had to come close to the gate wall, and we fairly shot them flat; they must have lost a dozen riders in their first mad rush, and the three coaches were careering down for the river, with the redsticks yelling in fury, circling out to get at them, losing distance in their attempt to get away from our fire.
The first coach reached the river and wheeled among the cottonwoods, and then the second, lurching and bouncing on the rough prairie, lost a wheel with about twenty yards to go, but the driver must have cut the traces, for the mules ran loose, and there wasn’t an Indian close enough, thanks to our shooting and the rifle in the first coach, to do any damage as the girls and their guard scrambled out and reached the safety of the trees. The third coach, with its savanero performing like Deadwood Dick, came to rest beside the first one, and a tremendous cheer broke from our bastion. Grattan was down in the courtyard, yelling to us, and our fellows fairly tumbled down the steps to the wagons. I took a shot of the eye around; the Indians had pulled off on the east side, milling about two hundred yards or so from the fort gate; on the south side, between the fort and the coaches at the river, there wasn’t a savage to be seen.
“Come on!” bawls Grattan; he and the fellows were piling into the two wagons, preparing to make the run.
“Out you go!” roars the gallant Flashy. “I’ll cover you!”
He stared, but didn’t hesitate above a second. He sprang up beside the teamster, and the wagon lumbered into the gateway.
Now, you may be staring, too. For you will have concluded that it ain’t quite my style to be the last man out of the beleaguered garrison, and right you are. But if I have to fly from a fight, I prefer to do it my own way – and for the past five minutes at least I’d been reflecting that my way was certainly not in one of those crazy wagons. As I saw it, there were at least forty Indians out yonder, and they weren’t going to be taken by surprise a second time. Those wagons were going to have their beasts hamstrung before they got near the river, and then it would be every man for himself on foot. Odds on a man from the wagons getting to the river? About evens – and that ain’t good enough when there’s a safer way out.
One thing was certain, you see; with all the fun and frolic to the south and east of the fort, there wouldn’t be a brave left on the north side. And during our defence of the walls I’d noticed an interesting thing – whenever an Indian fell, more often than not his pony stayed by the body. Now, that’s nothing new, as any cavalryman knows; why, at Balaclava, in the hell of that Russian battery, I recall at least two of our mounts nuzzling at fallen troopers, and these redskins and their horses are close as lovers. After the attack on the north-east angle, there had been three or four ponies standing, heads hanging and lost, beside the Indian dead at the foot of the wall, and I was certain sure they’d still be there. I could drop from a window on the north side, climb aboard, and be off and
away round the fort, coming down to the carriages at the river by the west side, while Grattan and the lads occupied the Indians to the east, and stopped any arrows that might be going.
One last glance to be sure the north-west tower was still unscathed, and as the second wagon surged out of the gate and the Indian yelling redoubled, I was scuttling nimbly along the east parapet above the gateway and into the end upper-storey room on the north wall. I sped across to the window and took a cautious peep – not a soul in sight as far as the eye could see, and there below, beside the tangle of red corpses, were two Indian ponies! Your luck’s in again, old Flash, thinks I, chuckling as I gripped the frame to climb – and the room was shuddering like a match-box in a giant’s hand, a most appalling blast of thunder filled my ears, the floor gave way beneath me, and I was falling, falling through dense clouds of dust or smoke, crashing down with a shock that drove the breath out of me, and with a ghastly pain stabbing through my left ankle.
I believe it was the pain that kept me conscious. I was in clouds of swirling dust, choking as I tried to scramble on all fours; for seconds I was too dizzy to see, and then there was light before me from an open doorway, and I lunged towards it. I knew I must be in the ground-floor room; above me the ceiling had gone, and there were beams and broken timbers all about me. I reached the doorway and fell through it.
The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection Page 183
