Back across Hog’s Back, past the old mill, through the fields by La Forge, and along the hill-path by Les Laches, and down the hill, slipping and stumbling, and into the Creux tunnel with only one fear—­that I might arrive too late.

And I was only just in time.  As I ran in I heard them on the seaward side hauling at the timbers of our barricade; and with my chest going like a pump, and my hands all shaking with excitement, I drew Peter Le Marchant’s cutlass and sent it lancing through the openings wherever a body seemed to be.

Sudden oaths broke out, and the work stopped.  I pulled out one of my pistols, shoved the muzzle through a hole and pulled the trigger, and still had wit enough to wonder what would happen if it burst, as Aunt Jeanne had hinted.

It did not burst, however, and the discharge provoked a further outburst of curses.  I drew the other, and fired it likewise, and stood ready with my cutlass for the next assault.  But they had hoped to break through unperceived, and possibly the violence of my attack misled them into a belief in numbers.  They drew off along the shingle, and I leaned back against the side of the tunnel and panted for my life.

I heard a discussion going on, and presently they were at work at something, but I could not make out what.

I took advantage of the lull to strengthen my defences with some boats’ masts and any odd timbers I could find and lift, till I thought it impossible that any man should get through.

But I was wrong.  There came a sudden roar outside, and a shot of size came crashing through my barricade, sending pieces of it flying wildly.  They had a carronade, and had had to shift the boat to the end of the shingle to get the mouth of the tunnel into the line of fire.

Then I began to fear.  Men I could fight, but carronades were beyond me.

Still, even when they had knocked my barrier to pieces, the men must come at last.  The great iron shot could not reach me round the corners, though flying timbers and splinters might.  They would fire again and again till the way was clear, and then they would come in a heap, and I must do my best with my cutlass.  And it was not unlikely that the sound of the heavy guns might catch the ears of others and bring me help.  So I drew back out of the tunnel on the land side and waited.

A stumble over a piece of timber set me to the hurried building of a fresh barricade at this end, outside the mouth of the tunnel.  If it only stopped them for minutes, the minutes might be enough.  It would in any case hamper them, and I did not believe they could train their guns upon it.  So I groped in the dark, and dragged, and piled, and found myself using the wounded arm without feeling any pain, but also without much strength, till I had a not-to-be-despised fence which would at least give me chance of a few blows before it could be rushed.

Five times they fired, and the inside of the tunnel crashed with the fragments of the outer barricade, and then it was evidently all down.