I listened to John explaining the details of his plan, Kyrlos listening gravely, and Andros’s quick brain ready with ever-pertinent questions. The plan as plan was quite simple. Wrexham with ten men with powder-bags would cross the bridge and lay their charges. With them would go ten of Henga’s men to protect them in their work as far as protection was possible; but the chief danger lay in missiles from the walls, and against these little could be done. Behind them would be twenty picked stalwarts of Stephnos’s troops with bags of earth to damp the powder, and lastly, six men with lighting gear, led by the crooked-nosed engineer. If the charges could be laid and fired--both of which propositions were distinctly doubtful in view of the narrow approach, the poor powder, and the uncertain fuses--there was no doubt that the Shamans--completely unaccustomed to explosives--would be thrown into such confusion that Henga’s party should be able to rush the gate defences, and we should then win our way into the city. But John was confident that it could and would be done. “I’m laying six fuses, and some of them must work. I’ve drilled my party day after day at Miletis until they’re word perfect. I had a mud replica of the gateway made, same as we used to do before attacks in the war, and every man knows his job. I suppose we’ve laid that charge thirty times, and the dummy puffs I put in at the end generally went off. The only thing missing was the Shamans popping at us through the loopholes. But with a decent modicum of luck we shall do it.” Certainly if it could be done he was the man to do it; and early next morning, as I watched the shadowy masses of men collecting noiselessly in position for the assault, saw the dim glitter of cap and weapon, heard the soft chink of mail and the swish of leather, listened to the whispered words of command, I felt that, if energy and resolution counted at all in the scales, we deserved to win. With three seasoned fighters like Andros, Henga, and John Wrexham to direct, youths of the type of Stephnos to lead, and infantry of the kind I had commanded at the Astara to follow, given an open road not all the Shamans in Shamantown could block our way. “Time’s getting on,” said Wrexham, looking at his wristwatch, luminous in the darkness. “We shall be able to see the walls in another twenty minutes.”