Pieces Of Eight

by John Drake

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."

  * * *

  Chapter 29

  Late afternoon, 28th January 1753

  Fort Foremast

  The island

  Mr Joe looked carefully out between the big, earth-filled gabions that protected the gun emplacement on the south-facing side of the fort.

  "Where?" he said.

  "There, Cap'n!" said Johnny Bowden, and pointed. Mr Joe straightened his back in pride. They called him "Captain" as if the fort were a ship and himself in command. And they were doing it of their own free will. Nobody had told them to.

  Bowden was in charge of the gun. He and the five-man gun crew had hardly moved from it since they came in behind the walls. That was Silver's drill and it had saved their lives once already.

  "Me don't see nothin'," said Mr Joe.

  "Bah!" said Bowden, turning to his men. "You - Atty Atkins! You show the cap'n. It was you as saw it." Mr Joe frowned, straining to follow their conversation. It was always hard, no matter how long he'd known them. For he'd been raised in Jamaica, while they were from England's West Country. He had no ear for accent; to him, their speech sounded like dogs growling: "Arrrrrr; arrrr, arrrrr," they said.

  "It were a rag, Cap'n, a-wavin' on the end of a stick." Atty Atkins, who was a little taller than the rest, stretched up. He got his head clear over the gabion for a good look.

  "Well, bugger me!" he said. "There it is ag-"

  THACK! Something struck Atty Atkins's brow like a hard- swung cricket bat. He jerked back and a cupful of blood, brains, hair and bone-splinters burst out of the back of his head and all over his comrades.

 
At the forest edge, white smoke rolled in the breeze. Then all was silent and nothing moved.

  "Fuck me!"

  "Christ!"

  "Get down!"

  And five living men threw themselves flat beside the warm and twitching corpse of Atty Atkins.

  Ten minutes later, Johnny Bowden was shot dead, looking out over the barrel of his gun. Then another man was killed as they tried to block up the gun-slit with timber. After that Mr Joe ordered them away from the guns and behind the ramparts. But then a man was shot going to the water butts, where he should have been safe.

  "It came from up there, Cap'n," said one of his mates. "I saw the smoke! Them buggers is looking down on us from Foremast Hill, and they must be bloody magic, 'cos it's way out o' range."

  Mr Joe went up on the ramparts. His heart was pounding. He had to look. But if he put his head over; he might get shot. But if he didn't look… He gathered his courage, started to stretch up… but his nerve failed. Then he saw the men looking at him in fear, and being their captain he tried again… and failed again. Then he sobbed and stretched, and rested his telescope on the packed earth of the thick, musket-proof wall. He focused on the hill, which should have been too far away for accurate fire - as indeed it was, for musket fire. That's why the fort had been built in this spot.

  He blinked and swept the hill with the glass. There weren't so many trees up there. He could see bare ground, and bushes and… ah! He caught a flick of movement and saw a brown-skinned savage, crouched behind a rock, and he saw - actually saw - the puff of the lock and the muzzle-flash.

  CRASH! The telescope shattered, a deflected ball whined past Mr Joe's ear, and needle shards of glass slashed his right eye to dripping, slimy pieces.

  "Ahhhhh!" he cried, and fell back clutching the mess and the blood, screaming with the pain.

  But he was a stubborn man. He didn't give up. He clapped a bandage on his face and got all hands into the central redoubt, and up on the firing step behind the walls, and made sure the muskets, pistols and grenadoes were ready. He expected an assault at any minute. But none came. The blasted savages just waited until some poor fool couldn't contain his impatience and put his head up, and looked round… and got a bullet through the bridge of his nose.

  It was four men dead by nightfall.

  Next day, despite every precaution, the Indians shot two more.

  That made six out of the garrison of fifteen.

  "We got to abandon ship, lads," said Mr Joe. "We don't got no edge here no more. Them buggers pick us off day by day! We go over the side tonight, and we go to Fort Spy-glass."

  So they spiked the guns, and took what they could, and nine men crawled over the palisade in the dead of the night and crept like mice, southward towards the far end of the island, imagining be-feathered, staring-eyed savages behind every tree and blade of grass.

  But they saw no Indians. Not at first.

  Morning, 2nd February 1753

  Fort Silver

  The island

  "Left a bit, left a bit…" said Israel Hands, and the four- pounder creaked and groaned as the men heaved and it shifted in its carriage. "Well!" said Israel Hands, and took a final sight. He looked back to check all hands were clear of the recoil, and touched off the gun with a flash and a roar… and a spurt of earth and stones jumped up two hundred yards off, where a savage was getting down on his belly for a shot at the fort.

  "Huzzah!" cheered the gun-crew as the creature leapt up and ran back into the forest, fifty yards behind him. The ball didn't strike close enough to hurt him, but it told him there'd be no quiet target practice that day.

  "How's that, then, Cap'n?" said Israel Hands.

  "Well enough, Mr Gunner, but it don't change nothing," said Silver. "We're stuck behind these walls, just as I feared. They can't get in and we can't get out. We could be here for months!"

  "T'ain't so bad, John!" said Israel Hands. "We're better placed here than the other forts, and well provisioned besides."

  "Hmm," said Silver. Warily he looked out past the crenulations they'd raised atop the ramparts, working at night when the Indians couldn't shoot. That'd been Israel Hands's idea. Now the fort looked like a story-book castle, but a man could take a bit of shelter when he looked out. They had timber shields mounted round the gun-barrels too, with a slot for sighting, to hide the gunners so the swabs outside couldn't shoot into the emplacements.

  Yes, they'd learned some new tricks, and Fort Silver always had been the strongest. It was on rising ground, and they'd cleared the trees and bushes further out, for the work had been done early on when there was more time. The result was that the sharp-shooters with their long guns couldn't overlook the fort, and couldn't get close enough for their best marksmanship: not without a four-pound shot coming out to greet them!

  Now there were twenty-seven men and a boy inside the fort, counting Billy Bones, still in leg irons and not to be trusted, but not Ben Gunn, who'd gone off on his own when they manned the fort, since he couldn't bear being locked in, and Silver couldn't bear being locked in with him.

  "You're in command, Mr Gunner," said Silver.

  "Aye-aye, sir," said Israel Hands, and raised a hand to his hat. Silver went down the ramp from the walls and found Mr Joe, sat quiet in the shade by himself.

  "Hallo, lad," said Silver, and sat down with his one leg stretched out in front of him and the green parrot on his shoulder.

  "Pretty thing!" said Mr Joe, and reached out to touch the bird.

  "Wouldn't if I was you," said Silver.

  "Awwwwwwwwwk!" said the bird. "Bugger off!"

  "Sorry, lad, but this old bird's contrary, and she don't like it here, do you, Cap'n?" He stroked her head and ruffled her feathers, and she rubbed herself against him and nibbled his fingers.

  "John Silver! John Silver!" she said, and gently nipped his ear with a beak that could crack walnuts.

  Silver looked at the bandage over Mr Joe's eye.

  "How's it doing?"

  "It hurt a bit."

  "Is it hot? Swolled up?"

  "No. It bad when I got here. Very bad. But Mr Hands, he cleaned it out with a spoon." He tried to be offhand, tried to be bold, but he shuddered at the memory.

  "Had to be done, lad… But never mind, the girls'll like you with a patch!"

  "Huh!"

  "Them Indians…" said Silver.

  "Cap'n?"

  "You say they jumped on you in the woods outside Fort Foremast?"

  "Aye, Cap'n. And they catch all the rest. Eight men. But not me."

  "Why not?"

  "Me run fast. Me run to Fort Spy-glass. Me call out loud. They let me in."

  "So then what?"

  "Me tell them in Fort Spy-glass. Me tell them we got to come here."

  "To Fort Silver?"

  "Aye, Cap'n."

  Silver nodded. The garrison of Fort Spy-glass had been twelve men. Thirteen, including Mr Joe. Of that total, just seven had reached Fort Silver.

  "Blasted Indians!" said Silver.

  "Aye, Cap'n."

  "So why'd you come here?"

  Mr Joe blinked. It was obvious.

  "For you, Cap'n! You the big man. The best man. You know what to do!"

  Silver sighed.

  Night, 28th January 1753

  The forest by Foremast Hill

  The island

  Selena turned away. It was another council: long and protracted and herself forbidden to take part. She walked off. It was very dark. The few Patanq not already at the fireside looked sidelong at her as they edged past to get there: tall, dark figures, with gleaming skulls, black eyes, and the animal smell that hung over them. The smell was sometimes the first you knew of their presence, for they made no sound at all.

  She made them uneasy. They didn't know how to treat her. Bentham said they'd walk straight into one of their own women if she didn't get out of the way. They'd knock her down and never look back. But they didn't know how to treat a woman who wore men's clothes and carried pistols, and
who was ranked as an equal by Sun-Face, whom they treated with profoundest respect… and fear.

  Bentham said Dreamer thought Flint was the Devil - Satan, Lucifer, the Evil One - walking the Earth in a man's body… a nasty thought on a dark night! Selena shuddered and looked all around. Then she frowned. Bentham said too much! Bentham was always trying to talk to her, and it was Bentham that'd made it a joke that she'd come ashore to treat the wounded, and insisted that she should be part of the fighting instead. And Flint had laughed too, and Dreamer and the Patanq had looked on, blank-faced with their guns in their arms, and wondering what was a man and what was a woman among the white ones.

  "Selena!"

  She turned. Huh! It was Bentham himself… herself- whatever - following her. She stopped.

  "What do you want?" She put her hands on her pistols. She wasn't what she'd been a year ago. She knew what was in Bentham's mind - whatever Bentham was - and once it would have frightened her, and disgusted her. But things were changed. Bentham might be nearly twice her weight and a foot taller, but she'd seen how men dropped when she shot them, and saw no reason why Bentham shouldn't do the same.

  "Well?" she said.

  "I wants to talk," said Bentham in his soft voice.

  "That's close enough!" she said, half pulling a pistol.

  It was hard to see Bentham's expression in the dark forest, but he raised his hands and bowed his head.

  "Miss Selena," he said, "please listen. Please listen to what I'm offering. I wants you to know that my intentions -"

  That was as far as Danny Bentham got.

  "No!" said Selena. Flint was bad enough, but Bentham? "Now you listen to me," she said, "I don't know what you think you are, and I don't care. But I don't want any of it. Go away, Danny Bentham… you're just a woman dressed up as a man!"

  Bentham stopped dead. Nobody said that! Nobody dared! And it hurt. Especially from her. Bentham tried to be angry but couldn't. Instead, Bentham was belittled and bereft. And when Selena turned and walked away, Bentham couldn't find the will to follow her but stood with the slow tears flowing.

  Selena walked off and found a quiet place and stood with her hands over her face, burdened by all the old fears and hopes. Flint would kill Silver. She knew that now. Never doubt it. He'd been chuckling about the Patanq and their rifles, and said it was the end of Silver's forts, and he was already planning how he'd kill Silver when he got hold of him. So Silver was gone. But even if he wasn't, what would Silver, or Flint, or even Cowdray - who looked at her so moon-faced - what would they want with a black woman, even a lovely one, once they'd rolled her on her back? What did any white man want with a black woman? Even in Charlestown, they'd treated her as a doll, not an equal.