The plan answered admirably; the stream carried the log
end-foremost between two of the boats, which were moored twelve
feet apart, while Gerald and Rupert each floated on the other side
of the mooring chains of the boats; round these chains they twisted
the ropes, and by them the log lay anchored as it were under the
bridge, and between two of the boats forming it. If there were any
sentries on the bridge, these neither saw nor heard them, their
attention being absorbed by the expectation of an attack upon the
breaches of Fort Saint Michael.
The party now set to work. With the gimlet holes were made a couple
of feet above the water. In them the hooks were inserted, and from
these the petards were suspended by ropes, so as to lie against the
sides of the boats, an inch only above the water's level. The fuses
were inserted; and all being now in readiness for blowing a hole in
the side of the two boats, they regained the log, and awaited the
signal.
The time passed slowly; but as the church clocks of the town struck
eleven, a sudden outburst of musketry broke out round Saint
Michael's. In an instant the cannon of the fort roared out, the
bells clanged the alarm, blue fires were lighted, and the dead
silence was succeeded by a perfect chaos of sounds.
The party under the bridge waited quietly, until the noise as of a
large body of men coming upon the bridge from the town end was
heard. At the first outbreak Gerald Dillon had, with some
difficulty, lit first some tinder, and then a slow match, from a
flint and steel--all of these articles having been most carefully
kept dry during the trip, with the two pistols, which were intended
to fire the fuses, should the flint and steel fail to produce a
light.
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