But the stillness endured for only a few moments. It was broken by the American fleet, which seemed to draw itself together into closer and more compact form. An order in a low tone, but sharp and precise, was carried from boat to boat, and it seemed to strengthen the men anew, heart and body. They straightened up, signs of exhaustion passed from their faces, and every one made ready all the arms that he had.
Paul, like the others, had felt the sudden silence, but perhaps most acutely of all. His whole imaginative temperament was on fire. He knew—he would have known, even had he not heard—that the sudden cessation of the firing was merely preliminary, a fresh drawing of the breath as it were for another and supreme effort. He clasped his hands to his temples, where the pulses were beating rapidly and heavily, and his face burned as if in a fever. But it was a fever of the mind not of the body.
"It's a big battle, Paul," said Shif'less Sol, who had come with Tom Ross into their boat, "but it's wuth it. The arms and other things that we carry in these boats may be wuth millions an' millions to the people who come after us."
"Do you think we'll ever break through, Sol?" asked Paul.
"Shorely," replied the shiftless one. "Henry's got the plan, and we're goin' to cut through like a wedge druv through a log. Something's got to give. Up, Paul, with your gun! Here she goes ag'in!"
The battle suddenly burst forth afresh and with greater violence. All the American twelve pounders were now in a row at the head of the fleet, and one after another, from right to left and then from left to right and over and over again, they began to fire with tremendous rapidity and accuracy at the schooner. All the best gunners were around the twelve pounders. If one fell, another took his place. Many of them were stripped to the waist, and their own fire lighted up their tan faces and their brown sinewy arms as they handled rammer and cannon shot.
The fire of the cannon was supported by that of scores and scores of rifles, and the enemy replied with furious energy. But the supply fleet was animated now by a single purpose. The shiftless one's simile of a wedge driven into a log was true. No attention was paid to anybody in the hostile boats and canoes. They could fire unheeded. Every American cannon and rifle sent its load straight at the schooner. All the upper works of the vessel were shot away. The men of Alvarez could not live upon its decks; they were even slain at the port holes by the terrific rifle fire; cannon shot, grape shot, and rifle bullets searched every nook and corner of the vessel, and her desperate crew, one by one, began to leap into the water and make for the shores.
A shout of exultation rose from the supply fleet, which was now slowly moving forward. Flames suddenly burst from the schooner and ran up the stumps of her masts and spars, reaching out long arms and laying hold at new points. The cannon shots had also reached the inside of the ship as fire began to spout from the port holes, and there was a steady stream of men leaping from the schooner into the water of the bayou and making for the land.
The American shout of exultation was repeated, and the forest gave back the echo. The Indians answered it with a fierce yell of defiance, and the forest gave back that, too.
But Adam Colfax had been watching shrewdly.