d to his knees and fell over on his side. The
knife dropped from his hand. Seeing he was safe for this instant, Raoul
took another ball-and-powder cartridge out of his case and shoved it
into the breech.

The Indian rolled over and pushed himself up on his hands and knees, a
long string of blood and spittle dangling from his mouth. Calmer now,
Raoul took careful aim and put a bullet in the shaven brown skull.

Two more dripping Indians were charging out of the water. Rifles went
off beside Raoul. One Sauk fell, then the other, just as he was swinging
his tomahawk at a man on the right end of Raoul's line.

The militiaman screamed. The steel head of the tomahawk was buried in
his buckskin-clad leg.

"See to him, Armand," Raoul said.

Armand, crouching, ran over to the wounded man. But first he attended to
the fallen Indian next to him. He grabbed the brave's head and twisted
it around. Raoul heard the crack of bones.

"To make bien sure," Armand said, teeth flashing in his brown beard.

Three men dead, two wounded. Eight men left. Maybe a hundred Sauk
warriors out there, maybe more.

_What a stupid time to die, right when the war's almost over._

Raoul gnawed on the ends of his mustache and peered into the
impenetrable forest. He and his men were all going to die. He was sure
of it. He felt fear, but more painful than the fear was an ache in his
heart for all that he was going to lose--all that was due him that life
hadn't paid out to him like he deserved. He wanted so much to live.

A line of Indians came out of the trees, some with rifles, some with
bows and arrows. There must be twenty or thirty of them. They weren't
whooping, as they usually did. They were silent, their eyes big, their
mouths set in lipless lines. They were like walking dead men, coming at
him. That was what they were. They knew they were going to die, but they
were going to take this little band of white men with them.

Raoul had all he could do to keep from curling up behind his tree
barricade, head in his arms, whimpering with grief and fear. He made
himself aim and fire. The Indian he'd picked out as a target kept on
coming.

_We're done for_, he thought, over and over again. _We're done for._

Slowly--he did not seem able to move quickly--he inserted another
cartridge into the breech of his rifle. All around him rifles were going
off with deafening booms.

And from behind him there was more booming.

He looked up. Indians were