Then silence. Motionless Indians lay on the forest floor.
But so did two more of Raoul's own men. One lay face down, perfectly still. The other was on his back, head propped against a tree trunk. An arrow, feathers black and white, stuck out of his chest. His eyes were open but saw nothing. His arms and empty hands jerked, the movements less like a human being's than like a dying insect's. Raoul felt bile rising in his throat and bit his lips hard to stop himself from puking.
That could just as easily have been me.
Another man had an arrow in his arm. Armand pulled it out of him with a mighty jerk. The man screamed, and Armand clapped a big hand over his mouth.
Raoul's nine remaining men looked from the two dead men—the second man's arms had stopped jerking—to Raoul. Were they just waiting for orders, or were they accusing him?
"Injuns're gettin' ready for another charge," Levi Pope said. "I can see them skulkin' out there."
"Pull back!" Raoul ordered. "Pick up those dead men's rifles." His voice rang out strangely in the still forest.
Reloading and walking backward, rifles pointed up, Raoul and his men retreated to the tip of the island. Armand carried the extra rifles. They piled up fallen trees to make a hasty barricade.
Raoul lay behind tree trunks long enough for the sweat to cool on his body. Mosquitoes and little black flies stung him incessantly. He wondered if the Indians would ever attack. He'd gotten himself into a very bad spot.
Rifles went off, and bullets plunked into the tree barricade. Brown bodies came leaping out of the forest. Raoul suddenly remembered how the Indians had rushed out from behind the Lake Michigan dunes twenty years ago, and for a moment he was a terrified little boy. His hands shook so violently he almost dropped his rifle.