Part 42 (1/2)
Beverley leaned upon a rude fence, and for a time neglected to reload his hot rifle. Of course he was thinking of Alice,--he really could not think in any other direction; but it gave him a shock and a start when he presently heard her name mentioned by a little Frenchman near him on the left.
”There'll never be another such a girl in Post Vincennes as Alice Roussillon,” the fellow said in the soft creole patois, ”and to think of her being shot like a dog!”
”And by a man who calls himself a Governor, too!” said another. ”Ah, as for myself, I'm in favor of burning him alive when we capture him.
That's me!”
”Et moi aussi,” chimed in a third voice. ”That poor girl must be avenged. The man who shot her must die. Holy Virgin, but if Gaspard Roussillon were only here!”
”But he is here; I saw him just after dark. He was in great fighting temper, that terrible man. Ouf! but I should not like to be Colonel Hamilton and fall in the way of that Gaspard Roussillon!”
”Morbleu! I should say not. You may leave me out of a chance like that!
I shouldn't mind seeing Gaspard handle the Governor, though. Ah, that would be too good! He'd pay him up for shooting Mademoiselle Alice.”
Beverley could scarcely hold himself erect by the fence; the smoky, foggy landscape swam round him heavy and strange. He uttered a groan, which brought Oncle Jazon to his side in a hurry.
”Qu' avez-vous? What's the matter?” the old man demanded with quick sympathy. ”Hev they hit ye? Lieutenant, air ye hurt much?”
Beverley did not hear the old man's words, did not feel his kindly touch.
”Alice! Alice!” he murmured, ”dead, dead!”
”Ya-as,” drawled Oncle Jazon, ”I hearn about it soon as I got inter town. It's a sorry thing, a mighty sorry thing. But mebby I won't do a little somepin' to that--”
Beverley straightened himself and lifted his gun, forgetting that he had not reloaded it since firing last. He leveled it at the fort and touched the trigger. Simultaneously with his movement an embrasure opened and a cannon flashed, its roar flanked on either side by a crackling of British muskets. Some bullets struck the fence and flung splinters into Oncle Jazon's face. A cannon ball knocked a ridge pole from the roof of a house hard by, and sent it whirling through the air.
”Ventrebleu!--et apres? What the devil next? Better knock a feller's eyes out!” the old man cried. ”I ain't a doin' nothin' to ye!”
He capered around rubbing his leathery face after the manner of a scalded monkey. Beverley was struck in the breast by a flattened and spent ball that glanced from a fence-picket. The shock caused him to stagger and drop his gun; but he quickly picked it up and turned to his companion.
”Are you hurt, Oncle Jazon?” he inquired. ”Are you hurt?”
”Not a bit--jes' skeert mos' into a duck fit. Thought a cannon ball had knocked my whole dang face down my throat! Nothin' but a handful o'
splinters in my poorty count'nance, makin' my head feel like a porc'-pine. But I sort o' thought I heard somepin' give you a diff.”
”Something did hit me,” said Beverley, laying a hand on his breast, ”but I don't think it was a bullet. They seem to be getting our range at last. Tell the men to keep well under cover. They must not expose themselves until we are ready to charge.”
The shock had brought him back to his duty as a leader of his little company, and with the funeral bell of all his life's happiness tolling in his agonized heart he turned afresh to directing the fire upon the block-house.
About this time a runner came from Clark with an order to cease firing and let a returning party of British scouts under Captain Lamothe re-enter the fort unharmed. A strange order it seemed to both officers and men; but it was implicitly obeyed. Clark's genius here made another fine strategic flash. He knew that unless he let the scouts go back into the stockade they would escape by running away, and might possibly organize an army of Indians with which to succor Hamilton. But if they were permitted to go inside they could be captured with the rest of the garrison; hence his order.
A few minutes pa.s.sed in dead silence; then Captain Lamothe and his party marched close by where Beverley's squad was lying concealed. It was a difficult task to restrain the creoles, for some of them hated Lamothe. Oncle Jazon squirmed like a snake while they filed past all unaware that an enemy lurked so near. When they reached the fort, ladders were put down for them and they began to clamber over the wall, crowding and pus.h.i.+ng one another in wild haste. Oncle Jazon could hold in no longer.
”Ya! ya! ya!” he yelled. ”Look out! the ladder is a fallin' wi' ye!”
Then all the lurking crowd shouted as one man, and, sure enough, down came a ladder--men and all in a cras.h.i.+ng heap.
”Silence! silence!” Beverley commanded; but he could not check the wild jeering and laughing, while the bruised and frightened scouts hastily erected their ladder again, fairly tumbling over one another in their haste to ascend, and so cleared the wall, falling into the stockade to join the garrison.
”Ventrebleu!” shrieked Oncle Jazon. ”They've gone to bed; but we'll wake 'em up at the crack o' day an' give 'em a breakfas' o' hot lead!”
Now the fighting was resumed with redoubled spirit and noise, and when morning came, affording sufficient light to bring out the ”bead sights”