"What's your pleasure?" demanded Asa.
Upon this the captain stuck a dirty pocket-handkerchief upon the point of his sword, and laughing with his officers, moved some twenty paces forward, followed by the troops. Thereupon Asa again shouted to him to halt.
"This is not according to the customs of war," said he. "The flag of truce may advance, but if it is accompanied, we fire."
It was evident that the Spaniards never dreamed of our attempting to resist them; for there they stood in line before us, and, if we had fired, every shot must have told. The Acadians, who kept themselves all this time snug behind the cotton-trees, called more than once to the captain to withdraw his men into the wood; but he only shook his head contemptuously. When, however, he heard Asa threaten to fire, he looked puzzled, and as if he thought it just possible we might do as we said. He ordered his men to halt, and called out to us not to fire till he had explained what they cane for.
"Then cut it short," cried Asa sternly. "You'd have done better to explain before you burned down our houses, like a pack of Mohawks on the war path."
As he spoke, three bullets whistled from the edge of the forest, and struck the stockades within a few inches of the loophole at which he stood. They were fired by the Creoles, who, although they could not possibly distinguish Asa, had probably seen his rifle barrel or one of his buttons glitter through the opening. As soon as they had fired, they sprang behind their trees again, craning their heads forward to hear if there was a groan or a cry. They'd have done better to have kept quiet; for Righteous and I caught a sight of them, and let fly at the same moment. Two of them fell and rolled from behind the trees, and we saw that they were the Creole called Croupier, and another of our horse-dealing friends.
When the Spanish officer heard the shots, he ran back to his men, and shouted out "Forward! To the assault!" They came on like mad a distance of thirty paces, and then, as if they thought we were wild-geese to be frightened by their noise, they fired a volley against the blockhouse.
"Now then!" cried Asa, "are you loaded, Nathan and Righteous? I take the captain—you, Nathan, the lieutenant—Righteous, the third officer—James, the sergeant. Mark your men, and waste no powder."
The Spaniards were still some sixty yards off, but we were sure of our mark at a hundred and sixty, and that if they had been squirrels instead of men. We fired: the captain and lieutenant, the third officer, two sergeants, and another man writhed for an instant upon the grass. The next moment they stretched themselves out—dead.
All was now confusion among the musketeers, who ran in every direction. Most of them took to the wood, but about a dozen remained and lifted up their officers to see if there was any spark of life left in them.