A DREADNOUGHT BOY AT BAY.
The Dreadnought Boy's challenge was still vibrating when, from every side, dark figures seemed to spring. They rushed at him like so many tigers. Ned struck out blindly.
It was hard to distinguish anything in the darkness, but twice in the first few seconds of his desperate battle against odds, he felt his fists encounter some one's features. The feeling gave him a sense of distinct satisfaction.
"One! Two!" counted the young man-o'-war's-man grimly, as his fists shot out right and left like sledge-hammers.
But Ned knew, as well as his opponents, that four to one are almost insurmountable odds. Already he had knocked two of his foes sprawling, when he was struck a blow from behind that staggered him. But it was only for an instant.The next moment he had turned and seized by the throat the man who had aimed the blow. He shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. He could hear the fellow's teeth chatter, but it was too dark to distinguish features.
In the meantime, his fallen opponents had picked themselves up. So far the fight had progressed in ominous silence, save for the deep breaths and stamping feet of those engaged in it. But now, fury at this unexpectedly stubborn resistance brought words to the lips of his foes. They were not nice words, and Ned thrilled with a desire to silence their utterers, for he was a clean-spoken boy, who hated profanity in any form.
Suddenly, as if by concerted consent, his foes ceased their separate attacks, and massed like a wolf pack preparing to finish its prey. Ned had hardly sensed the new situation and braced himself to meet it before they were upon him.
Thud! thud!
The lad's fists met their mark fairly, and oncemore two of his opponents reeled back. But this time they did not fall. Instead, they rallied to the attack.
As if they had been one, all four of his assailants hurled themselves on the Dreadnought Boy. Strive as he would, Ned felt his arms pinioned to his sides, and he was borne down by sheer weight of numbers. He struggled with every steel-like muscle in his powerful young body. With teeth set and eyes that flamed, he fought with every fraction of an ounce of strength he possessed. But, with two men hanging like bulldogs to his neck from behind, and two more clinging to his arms and battering him in front, the lad could do nothing. With a sickening sense of helplessness, he felt a leg slide under his, and tottered backward.
With his four foes still clinging like leeches to him, Ned felt himself borne to earth, and then, despite his frantic struggles, a hand was thrust rapidly into each of his pockets. A cry escaped him for the first time—a cry of rage.
The rascals were rifling him of the plans of the pontoon-equipped aeroplane!
All at once a voice struck into the scene. Some one was coming down the road. At the top of a pair of lusty lungs the approaching individual was singing:
"A sailor's wife, a sail-or's star should be!Star-r-r-r-r-r should be!Star-r-r-r-r-r should be!"
"A sailor's wife, a sail-or's star should be!Star-r-r-r-r-r should be!Star-r-r-r-r-r should be!"
"Herc!" shouted Ned.
"Ahoy, there!" came the hearty response, as Herc, who had been sauntering along the road, on his way to meet Ned, broke into a run. Something in the accent of Ned's cry had warned him that his comrade's need for help was urgent.
"Scatter!" came a sharp voice from one of the hitherto silent waylayers of the Dreadnought Boy.
Like so many leaves before a sharp puff of autumn wind, they instantly dissolved into thenight. Ned, dusty, battered and furious, picked himself up. As he did so Herc plunged into the dark patch in which the desperate fight had taken place. He hailed Ned and received an instant response.
"What on earth has happened?" he exclaimed.
Ned soon told his story. His voice throbbed with anger as he talked. Ned was slow to wrath, but once aroused he was whole-souled in his anger, and surely he had justification for his rage.
"The scoundrels!" burst out Herc, "couldn't you recognize any of them?"
"No. They chose the place well. I could hardly tell you if it wasn't for your voice."
"I'll bet the hole out of a doughnut that Merritt and Chance had something to do with this."
"I don't know. I hardly know anything I'm so mad. At any rate I must have marked one or two of them. My knuckles are skinned where I hit them."
"Let's hope that Merritt and Chance were thetwo you walloped. If so, we shan't have much difficulty in identifying two of your assailants."
"You talk as if you were certain they had something to do with it."
"I am," responded Herc briefly.
"Tell you what we'll do," said Ned, suddenly, "let's light a match and look the ground over. Maybe we can find some trace of the fellows' identity. There's one thing sure, they were not common robbers."
"That's evident enough. It was the plans they were after. But who that knows about them could use them to advantage?"
"That remains to be seen. In the meantime, on second thoughts, I can do better than matches. I've got that small electric torch I use about the aeroplane."
"Good. Switch it on and we'll see what we can see."
Ned drew out a small object from his pocket. There was a sharp click and a bright ray of light shot out. Here and there about the groundthe Dreadnought Boy flashed the tiny searchlight.
"Look here!" cried Herc suddenly.
In triumph he held up a tangled looking object.
"What is it?" asked Ned in a puzzled tone.
"That's easy. It's false hair like the kind we used on theManhattanwhen we gave that show. The chaps that attacked you were disguised and this was a part of their makeup."
"I think so, too. But—shades of immortal Farragut!—look here, Herc!" Ned, as he spoke, pounced on a roll of papers lying in the dust at one side of the road, right under a clump of alder bushes.
"It's the plans!" gasped Herc.
"That's right," rejoined Ned, opening the roll and glancing at its contents, "they're all intact, too. One of the rascals that took them must have placed them in his pocket. Then, in pushing into this brush to escape, they were caught and thrown out."
"I guess that's it, and a good thing for us, too. But—gee whiz!"
Without another word Herc plunged into the brush. He fought his way through it furiously. Happening to look up while they had been talking he had caught the glint of a pair of eyes as the light from Ned's torch reflected in them. One of the men had noted the loss of the plans and had returned for them. That much was evident. At any rate, Herc, as usual, acted before he thought, and in two bounds was swallowed in the brush.
Ned, not realizing in the least what had happened, and half inclined to think that Herc had gone suddenly crazy, followed instantly. Presently he found himself at Herc's side. The freckle-faced lad gasped out a few disconnected sentences. Broken as they were, they apprised Ned of what had happened.
"The rascal must have come back to get the plans," he concluded; "I suppose he was watching us and waiting his chance to emerge intothe road when the light glinted on his eyeballs."
"Oh, if we could only have captured him!"
"More especially," put in Herc dryly, "as I recognized the man as Chance."
"What! You did!"
"Sure. I could swear to it. This is the time they've overreached themselves. They tried to steal the plans for some reason best known to themselves, and failed. They tried to disguise their part in the job and failed. I guess their career in the navy has ended for good and all now. In the morning we——"
A pair of arms were thrown round Herc's neck from behind. Caught all unprepared, he was carried off his feet in a flash and in a second a stout cord had been whipped about his wrists confining his hands helplessly behind his back. While this had been going on Ned was served the same trick.
In a trice the two Dreadnought Boys were rendered helpless, where an instant before Herc had been crowing over their triumph.
Somebody aimed a vicious kick at Ned's face which he dodged by rolling over on his side. At the same time a spiteful voice snarled:
"Our career has ended, eh? Well, it looks to me more as if you were rapidly approaching your own finish."
The voice was that of Chance, and his chuckle of triumph was echoed by his three companions who stood about the recumbent boys, rejoicing in the bit of strategy which had wrought their undoing.
IN THEIR ENEMIES' HANDS.
"Well," said Ned, in the calm, even tone which seemed to come to him in all emergencies, "what do you mean to do with us now?"
"Yah!" jeered Chance, thrusting his face forward evilly, "you think we'll tell you, don't yer? You just lie there and don't get up if you know what's good for you."
As he spoke he produced a pistol as if to emphasize his warning.
"You can't scare us in that way, Chance," resumed Ned, "you wouldn't dare to——"
"You don't know what I'd dare," retorted Chance; "I hate you, Ned Strong, and now it's my chance to get even with you and with your butting-in chum."
"Come, don't talk any more nonsense," rejoined Ned, "I can make allowances for a smallnature actuated by motives of meanness and jealousy. But it's about time to end this nonsense. We'll be late for lights out if we don't all get back. If you'll come to your proper minds and end this foolishness, I'll promise not to report anything about to-night's work, unless questions are asked, and then I'll have to tell the truth."
Merritt had been talking apart with the two others, whom we know were Herr Muller and Bill Kennell, but whose identity was, of course, a mystery to the boys. He now came forward. He was just in time to catch Ned's last words.
"Maybe you won't get a chance to tell the truth or anything else, Ned Strong," he said; "as for injuring us with the navy, you couldn't do that if you tried. We're through with it."
"You're going to desert?" demanded Ned.
"Just what I'd have expected of you two rats," snorted Herc.
"Call it deserting, if you like," parried Merritt, "I call it quitting just as——"
"Oh, you're a quitter all right," struck in Herc, "a quitter from Quitterville—one of the first settlers there, I guess."
"Are you going to be quiet?" hissed Chance.
"When I get good and ready, as the thunderstorm said to the old maid who complained she couldn't sleep," responded the freckle-faced lad.
"Leave him alone," said Merritt, "we can afford to let them talk their heads off if they want, to; they'll be quiet enough before long."
"Well, come on. Let us be moving," interpolated Herr Muller's voice; "himmel! we have a long tramp before us."
"That's right," assented Merritt, then, turning to Chance, he went on in a low tone, "It was a good thing that we decided on that place this afternoon. It's not more than three miles from here. We can get there, put these two cubs under lock and key, and be snug in bed without giving the alarm, if we're cautious."
Chance nodded and gave his unpleasant chuckle.
"Has Muller got the keys?" he asked.
"Yes. On the plea that we wanted to explore the place the old watchman, who hasn't been near it for a month, loaned them to him."
Ned caught some of this conversation and his heart sank. It appeared plain enough that their rascally captors had already decided on a place to confine them. Some isolated building, so he judged, though what its nature could be he could not imagine.
"Come, get up," snarled Chance, addressing the lads as soon as his colloquy with Merritt was concluded.
"We will when you take these bracelets off our ankles," rejoined Herc, motioning with his head at the ropes which bound their feet.
Merritt and Chance quickly cut loose the Dreadnought Boys' foot thongs and Ned and Herc stood erect. But if they had entertained any idea of escape, it was quickly cut short.
"See this," warned Chance, tapping a pistol which belonged to Kennell. "It's got a silencer onit, and if either of you try to run you'll get a dose of lead, and, as the report isn't louder than an air rifle, nobody will be the wiser."
Ned nodded.
"I compliment you on your generalship," he said contemptuously.
A few seconds later they moved off. Muller led the way. By his side shuffled a figure strangely familiar to both lads, but neither of them could place it. All their efforts to catch a glimpse of the two leaders' features were cheated too, both by the light and the fact that they kept their faces studiously turned away.
They pressed on for a mile or two through woods and across fields, and presently a whiff of salt-laden air struck Ned in the face.
"We're getting near the sea," he thought. "I wonder if they mean to take us off some place in a boat?"
But conversation had now ceased between Chance and Merritt, and the others were too far ahead for the lads to catch a word. Before longthey emerged, without warning, from a clump of woods, directly upon a wide expanse of salt meadows. The lonely wastes stretched as far as the eye could see. Fleeting glimpses of moonlight, as the clouds swept across the sky, showed the glimmer of the ocean beyond. They could catch the sullen roar of the surf on the beach.
Without hesitation, Herr Muller struck out across the salt meadows, following a narrow path between the hummocks of salt grass. Here and there they crossed stretches of marshy land where the oozy mud came to their ankles.
All at once there suddenly shot up from the gloomy wastes the rectangular outlines of a large building of some kind. As they drew closer to the dark bulk the boys could see that the walls were pierced with numerous windows in monotonous rows. Soon the further fact became evident that each window was barred. There was something indescribably depressing about the aspect,—the gloomy, vast outlines of the dark, desertedbuilding ahead of them, and the pallidly moonlit wastes of salt meadow all about it.
What could the place be? No light appeared in any of the numerous apertures, and the silence hung heavily about it. Suddenly there flashed across Ned the recollection of a flight he had taken some days before when he had soared above a building which, in the daylight, resembled this lonely place. The sight of it standing isolated and vast in the midst of its wild surroundings had impressed him, and on his return he had inquired about it. They had told him that it was an old lunatic asylum. The state had erected it there some years before, but the atmosphere of the salt meadows had proved malarious, and it had been abandoned.
A bulbous-nosed, red-faced old tippler in the village had also been pointed out to him as a man who held down "a soft snap," by being appointed "watchman" to the deserted pile. Evidently the keys had been obtained from him and the gloomy buildings were their destination.
That this was the case they were speedily to learn. Herr Muller approached a stout-looking door, in the top of which was a small, grated opening. Inserting a key he turned the lock and flung the door open. A damp, decaying odor,—the breath of a deserted human dwelling place,—rushed out. In spite of himself Ned shuddered. It reminded him of the crypt of an old church he had inspected in Spain when the ships were on their European cruise.
Muller, who seemed to know the way, threaded several long passages carrying a candle which he had ignited at the doorway. In this manner they traversed a considerable distance. At every turn fresh corridors, long and empty, appeared. The place was a maze of passages and stairways.
At length he paused in front of a rather small door at the end of a hall which, judging from the stairs they had climbed, must have been near the top of the building. He flung this door open, and the next instant the candle was extinguished,—evidently with the intention of concealinghis features,—and the boys were roughly thrust forward.
If they had not been taken totally by surprise they might have resisted. But the shoves came suddenly, and projected them into a room through the door before they realized what was happening. The next instant the door clanged behind them, just as Herc hurled himself against it.
They heard the lock grate and some bolts clang heavily as they were fastened in.
"Bottled!" gasped Herc, truthfully if slangily.
But Ned had pulled out his pocket lantern and was examining the place in which they had been imprisoned. He was struck by something peculiar about it. He reached out a hand and felt the walls. They were smooth and yielding. They had been covered with some soft substance. High up was a small window with thick metal bars.
"What sort of a place is this?" gasped Herc as he, in his turn, felt the yielding, cushionedwalls. "These walls feel like the upholstered chairs in the skipper's cabin."
Ned battled with a catch in his voice before he replied. He had grasped the truth of their almost hopeless situation.
"Herc, old boy," he said, putting a hand on his shipmate's shoulder, "brace up for a shock. This place is a deserted lunatic asylum, and they've locked us in what was formerly used as a padded cell for solitary confinement."
"STOP WHERE YOU ARE!"
It is a curious fact that most absolutely overwhelming predicaments do not at first strike in upon their victims with the crushing force that would be imagined. This was evidenced by Herc's rejoinder to Ned's startling information.
"Great ginger!" he exclaimed, "I guess we're in just the place where we belong. If we hadn't gone blundering into that trap we wouldn't have been in this fix, and if we hadn't——"
"Left the farm and enlisted in the navy we wouldn't have been here either," retorted Ned.
A scrutiny of their prison confirmed Ned in his first judgment of its character. The walls, though padded, were solid, and seemingly impenetrable. The window was far too high up to be reached, and even if they could have got to it, it could be seen that the steel bars were setsolidly into the masonry. The door, which was examined in its turn, proved to be likewise of solid oak. No lock appeared on it. Doubtless this was to prevent any of the unfortunates formerly confined in the place from injuring themselves on projecting bolts.
At the bottom of the door, however, a peculiar contrivance appeared. It was a small, hinged flap, which, when raised, revealed an opening some six inches square. The thought suggested itself to Ned that it might have been used once as a means for giving food or drink to the incurables confined within during their violent spells.
He opened the flap and thrust his hand through. A vague hope had entered his mind that he might be able to reach up as far as the bolts on the outside. If he could have done this he could have opened them. But, as might have been expected, this was not feasible. Ned had the exasperating experience of being able, by the utmost exertion, to touch the bottom of the boltwith his finger-tips, but that was all. Even then he had to shove his arm so far through the hole that it was grazed and sore when he withdrew it.
"W-e-l-l?" said Herc slowly, as they sank down side by side on a sort of bench, padded like the rest of the interior of the place.
"W-e-l-l?" retorted Ned, "so far as I can see, if we were sealed up in one of theManhattan'sair-tight magazines we would have just about as good a chance of getting out as we have of escaping from this place."
"Same here," agreed Herc woefully. "What are we going to do? Do you think they'll starve us to death?"
Barren of hope as the situation appeared, Ned could not help smiling at Herc's woebegone tone.
"They'd hardly dare to do that," he rejoined; "this is the twentieth century, and such things as law and order prevail. No, I guess they have some sort of trickery on hand with which we might interfere, and they mean to keep us lockedup here till they have carried out their rascally plans."
"Talking of plans, did they take back the ones of the pontoon aeroplane?"
"No," exclaimed Ned, brightening, "thank goodness that's one thing they seem to have forgotten. Anyhow I suppose they know they have us at their mercy and can get them any time they want them."
"Reckon that's it," agreed Herc.
Silence ensued. The two boys sat side by side in the pitchy blackness of their prison, for Ned, anxious to reserve it for emergencies, had extinguished the electric torch. Neither of them was a nervous sort of youth, but the long vigil in the dark was enough to get on anybody's nerves.
"This is certainly a tough situation," remarked Ned after a time. He spoke more for the sake of hearing his own voice than for any novel idea the words might convey.
"Not giving up, are you, Ned?" inquired Herc.
"Giving up?" grated out the elder DreadnoughtBoy, "I'm like Paul Jones—I've just begun to fight."
"When did Paul Jones say that?" asked Herc.
"Why, that time that the British captain, Pearson, peered through the smoke surrounding his majesty's shipSerapisand the littleBonhomme Richard.
"Pearson hailed Paul Jones and shouted out, 'Have you struck your colors yet?'
"It was then that Paul Jones sent back that answer. Those were grand words, Herc. They ought to be framed and placed on board every vessel in Uncle Sam's navy."
"Yes, Paul Jones was a wonderful sea-fighter all right," agreed Herc, "but I wonder what he'd have done if he'd been cooped up in here."
"Figured on some way of getting out," rejoined Ned promptly. "Time after time British frigates hemmed him in. They thought they had him trapped. But every time he slipped through their fingers and resumed his career as a sea tiger. With his little bit of a junk-shopfleet he did more to establish the name of Americans as sea fighters than any man in the republic."
"But how about Ben Franklin, who advanced the money to buy the ships, or at least saw that it was raised?" asked the practical Herc.
"Well, of course he helped," admitted Ned, "but even he couldn't save Paul Jones from his country's ingratitude. Why, it was a hundred years or more before his bones were discovered in an obscure spot in Paris, where he died in poverty, and were brought back to this country and buried with the honors they deserved."
"Humph!" observed Herc, "that was a pretty shabby way to treat one of our biggest naval heroes. Wish we had him here now. What was that old anecdote you told me once about Paul burning his way out of a prison some place?"
"Oh, that!" laughed Ned. "I guess that was a bit of imagination on the part of the writer. At any rate it isn't mentioned in the histories.It was one time that they locked Paul Jones in the cabin of a British vessel. They thought they had him safe. But he ripped out the lining of stuffed cushions of the captain's sofas and burned a way out through a port hole that they thought was securely locked. I read it in an old book I picked up in Philadelphia, but I guess the book was more fiction than fact."
Another silence ensued, and then Herc spoke. He took up the conversation where it had been left off.
"It's worth trying," he said in a matter-of-fact tone.
"What's worth trying?" asked Ned, through the darkness.
"Why Paul Jones' trick—or rather the trick he is supposed to have played."
"Oh, burning himself out of prison?"
"Yes."
"I don't see the connection with our case."
"Then you are a whole lot denser than I gave you credit for being."
"Thanks. But I see you've got an idea of some sort simmering in that massive brain of yours. What is it?"
"Just this, that we duplicate the trick."
"By ginger, Herc, there's nothing slow about you. You mean that we burn ourselves out of here?"
"That's just what I do. See any obstacles in the way?"
"A whole fleet of them. For one thing we'd suffocate ourselves if we tried to burn the door down, which is, I suppose, what you are driving at. Another thing—how about matches?"
"I've got lots of those. Now see here, Ned," went on Herc enthusiastically, "my plan may seem just moonshine, but it's worth trying. You know that little swinging trap at the bottom of the door?"
"Yes."
"Well, we can build our fireoutsidethe door by thrusting our fuel through it and out into the passage. My idea is that the flames will riseagainst the surface of the door, and if we make them hot enough will burn off the bolts without setting the whole door on fire. The oak is thick enough, I think, to remove all danger of that."
"Humph!" said Ned. "There's only one thing you haven't thought of, Herc."
"What's that?"
"What are we going to build a fire with?"
"With the same stuff as Paul Jones did—or rather stuff somewhat like it—the soft lining of these padded walls."
"Say, Herc, you're a wonder! I always said you had a great brain," cried Ned banteringly, "but hasn't it occurred to you that your fire would burn out the floor of the passage and set the place on fire before it would get the bolts hot enough to make them drop off?"
"It might if the floors and walls were not concrete. I noticed them as we came along," rejoined Herc in a quiet voice.
"Herc, you ought to be director of the Smithsonian Institute or—or something big," declaredNed admiringly. "It does begin to look as if we might have a chance to get out, after all. At any rate, it's worth trying. It will give us something to do."
"Of course it will," responded Herc cheerfully; "and now, if you'll switch on that light of yours, we'll start pulling the materials for our fire off these walls."
It didn't take long to rip out a great pile of the batting and shavings with which the walls were stuffed. These were thrust through the hole in the bottom of the door into the passage outside as fast as they were pulled out. At last the pile was declared large enough, and, with a big heap in reserve for use when the other had burned out, the boys prepared to light the mass of inflammable stuff.
It blazed up fiercely when the match was applied, but, of course, as it was outside the door in the concrete passage, the flames did not bother the boys or imperil the building. On their handsand knees the two young prisoners crouched, feeding the flames assiduously when they showed signs of dying down. There was plenty of fuel, and a roaring fire was maintained.
The remaining bolt tore loose from its blackened foundations.
The remaining bolt tore loose from its blackened foundations.
The remaining bolt tore loose from its blackened foundations.
All at once there was a soft thud outside the door, and something dropped into the flames. It was one of the heavy bolts which had torn loose from its charred and weakened fastenings. A few minutes later another crash announced that the second one had fallen.
The lads waited a few minutes, till the fire died down, and then, with beating hearts, they put their shoulders to the door.
"Heave!" roared Ned, and the next moment, under their united efforts, the remaining bolt tore loose from its blackened foundations, and the two Dreadnought Boys stood outside in the smoke-filled passage.
"Let's give three cheers!" cried Herc.
"Better be careful about making a noise," counselled Ned. "No telling but some of thoserascals may be hiding in the building somewhere."
"That's right," agreed Herc. "Another thing has occurred to me, too. All the windows of this delightful place are barred, and if the door has been locked and the place vacated, we're going to have a hard time to get out, even now."
"That's right. Well, we'd better start on our tour of exploration right away."
Guided by Ned, with his torch ready for instant darkening, the two lads began to thread the maze of corridors and passages. They had been doing this for several minutes, and were beginning to get rather bewildered, when Ned stopped suddenly just as they entered a long corridor pierced with doors, with the same monotonous regularity as the others. He extinguished the light in the wink of an eye, and drew Herc swiftly into the embrasure of a doorway as he did so.
Far down the corridor a footstep had sounded, and another light had flashed. As they crouchedin the darkness, prepared for any emergency, a sudden voice sounded from the end of the corridor:
"Stop right where you are, or I'll fire!"
HARMLESS AS A RATTLESNAKE.
"I beg your pardon, sir, but could I speak to you a moment?"
"Certainly; come in, Chance," rejoined Lieutenant De Frees, who was sitting in his quarters on the aviation testing ground the morning after the events narrated in our last chapter.
"It's—it's about Strong and Taylor, sir, that I wished to speak," said Chance, twisting his cap in his hands. His crafty face looked more fox-like and mean than ever. His manner was almost cringing.
Lieutenant De Frees jumped to his feet.
"You've got news of them?" he exclaimed. "Out with it, my lad. They are not the boys to be absent without good reasons, although I fear that if they have overstayed their leave without just cause they must be disciplined."
"That's just it, sir," said Chance. "I—I don't want to make trouble, sir, but I'm afraid that Strong and Taylor are not all that you think them, sir. I would have spoken at roll-call this morning when they were reported absent without leave, but I thought that maybe they would turn up."
"Well, what do you know about them? Come, out with it," urged the officer sharply.
He had never liked Chance, and the seaman's furtive manner irritated him.
"Why, you see, sir, Merritt and I happened to be in town last night, sir, and we saw Strong and Taylor associating with some disreputable characters, sir. We warned them, but they laughed at us, sir. We continued to urge them to come with us, however, but they only swore at us."
"What!" exclaimed the officer, startled out of his official calm, "you saw Strong and Taylor in undesirable surroundings and with disreputable characters, and you mean to say that that is thereason for their non-appearance this morning?"
"That's just it, sir," rejoined Chance. "The last we saw of them was as they were turning into a drinking resort. I fear that some harm must have come to them, sir."
"Why—why—confound it all, I'd almost rather cut off my right hand than hear such a report, Chance. You are certain that you are correct in your report?"
"Absolutely certain, sir," was the response; "there could be no mistake. I hope I am not doing wrong in reporting this, sir?"
"No, no, my man, you have done perfectly right," was the answer, although the officer's face was troubled. The news that his most trusted pupils should have misconducted themselves had shaken him a good deal.
"Good heavens, can one place no trust in human nature?" he thought. "I'd have staked my commission that those boys were absolutely clean-lived and upright."
"Is—is there anything else you'd like to know,sir?" Chance edged toward the door as he spoke.
"No, no. That's all, my man. You may go."
"Thank you, sir."
And Chance, his despicable errand performed, slid through the door in the same furtive way in which he had entered.
"If they haven't returned by eight bells, and there is no news of them in the meantime, I'll have to send out a picket to bring them in," mused the officer when Chance had departed. "Then disgrace and 'the brig' will follow, and two promising careers will be blasted. Strong and Taylor, of all people. I can't understand it. And yet there can be no other explanation of their absence."
Dismissing the matter from his mind for the time being, Lieutenant De Frees continued his official work. Outside on the field his subordinates attended to the morning practice of the flying squad. Half an hour must have passed thus, when a sudden knock at the door caused him to look up.
"Come in!" he said, in a sharper voice than usual. The news that his favorites had so fallen from grace had distressed him more than even he cared to own to himself.
In response to his words, the door swung open, and there, framed in the doorway, stood the two very individuals whose absence had so worried him.
Ned and Herc clicked their heels together sharply and gave the salute in a precise manner.
"We've reported on duty, sir," said Ned in a steady voice.
The officer looked at them blankly. Their clothes were torn, although an effort had seemingly been made to mend them and clean them of traces of mud and dirt. A bruise appeared on Ned's face, while Herc's hair was rumpled and standing up wildly. Their appearance bore out the story the officer had heard. Two more disreputable-looking beings it would have been hard to picture.
"So this is the way you men repay my trustin you?" said the officer in sharp, harsh tones, very unlike his usual ones. "You will both consider yourselves under arrest, pending an inquiry. Remain standing till I summon a guard."
The lads' absolutely dumfounded looks at this reception did not escape the officer's attention.
"Well, have you any explanation to offer?" he demanded. "Mind, don't attempt to lie to me. I know all of your proceedings, dating from the hour that you, Strong, left my quarters."
"You mean that you have heard we have been engaged in some discreditable prank, sir?" asked Ned firmly, but respectfully, and still standing—as did Herc—stiffly at attention.
"I mean just that," was the response. "Since when has it been the custom in the United States navy for men to disgrace the service and go unpunished?"
"And yet," said Ned, in the same well-disciplined tones, "it hasn't been the custom to condemn men unheard, sir."
"I have heard quite enough, already," was thesharp answer. "If you have anything to add to what Chance has told me, you may. But I warn you that any explanation you may offer will be investigated thoroughly, and if it is found you have been lying, it will go harder with you than otherwise."
"I think you will find it is Chance who has been lying, sir," said Ned calmly. "May I tell you our side of the story, dating from the hour you mentioned?"
"You may, but make it brief. My time is fully occupied," was the cold response.
But, as Ned struck into his story, telling it in a calm, even tone, the officer's expression changed from one of hard incredulity to blank astonishment, passing rapidly to deep indignation.
"We were startled soon after gaining our freedom," related Ned, going on with his narrative from the point where we left the lads, "by the sound of a voice calling on us to halt. A few minutes later we found that the man who had given the order was the local constable, EzraTimmons. He is a farmer on the outskirts of the town, and had been driving home late from selling some produce, when he noticed lights in the old asylum. He decided to investigate, and did so. He found the door open, and, penetrating the place, soon encountered us. He took us home with him, and helped us clean up a bit, and then we hastened over here to report."
"And that's true, by gum, every dinged word uv it!" came a voice outside the open door. Farmer—and Constable—Timmons stepped into the room, dramatically throwing back his coat and exposing a big tin star, just as he had seen constables in rural dramas do.
"But they ain't told it all," he rushed on. "These two lads here saved my wife frum some ruffians what wanted ter rob her the t'other day. They sailed by in their sky-buggy jus' in time ter save ther spoons thet Gran'ma Timmons willed me on her dyin' bed, by heck!—-- and it's my idee that this same gang of roustabouts was consarned in thet, frum what I kin judge."
The officer pressed a button. An orderly responded, coming smartly to attention.
"Send for Merritt and Chance at once," he ordered.
The orderly saluted and turned like an automaton.
Constable Timmons gazed at him in amazement.
"Is thet feller real or jes' one uv them clockwork dummies yer read about?" he asked.
"He's real, constable," smiled Lieutenant De Frees, with some amusement. He then began questioning the boys concerning every detail of their experiences. Nor did he forget to acknowledge that he had wronged them on the word of a rascal.
"It must have been their intention to keep you there until they had made up their minds what to do with you," he said. "But they shall not go unpunished. If a summary court martial can deal with their cases it shall do so, and at once.Well?" he added interrogatively, as the orderly entered the room once more.
He saluted as before, to Constable Timmons' undisguised wonder, and then said in precise tones:
"There is no trace of the men you sent for, sir."
"What!" demanded the officer.
"They were last seen leaving the grounds in an automobile, sir."
"Good heavens! This is confirmation, indeed, of their guilt," said the officer. "Were they alone?"
"No, sir. The car was driven by a person some of the men recognized as a wandering photographer who has been around the grounds for some days, sir."
"Herr Muller!" exclaimed Ned, forgetting all discipline. "I know now why the third man seemed so familiar. I—I beg your pardon, sir, but——"
"That's all right, Strong," said the officer."Constable, you can rely on the department cooperating with you in every way to capture these men. I can't conceive how the photographer Muller fits into the matter, but if they can be arrested we shall soon find out."
But, despite the officer's hopes of capturing the gang that had made so much trouble for Ned and Herc, they managed to conceal their traces cleverly enough to avoid arrest. The automobile in which they had taken flight—and which had been hired from a local garage—was found abandoned near a small wayside station, where they might have boarded a train for some distant point. As for the presence of the automobile, it was assumed that Herr Muller had visited the abandoned asylum early that day and discovered that the prisoners had escaped. Realizing that he must act quickly, he had evidently set out at once to warn Chance and Merritt. Incidentally, it was found out that Muller, on account of his anarchistic tendencies, had once been confined in the abandoned asylum, before its condemnation,which accounted for his familiarity with it. He had been discharged as "harmless" some time before.
"Humph! He's about as harmless as a rattlesnake!" grunted Herc, when he heard of this.
FLYING FOR A RECORD.
On the day set for the flight to theManhattan, which had anchored two days before in the "Roads," Ned found that he was to be the only competitor. Herc had been anxious to take part, and so had several of the other naval aviators, but Lieutenant De Frees decided that the aeroplane which Ned was to fly was the only one really suited for the work.
This aeroplane, which had been equipped with pontoons, in order to test Ned's invention, presented a peculiar appearance. Under its substructure, long, galvanized metal tanks had been fitted, in much the same way as runners are attached to a sled. The tanks were cylindrical in shape, and provided with valves, by means of which they could be "ballasted." They had been already tested and found to be suited for thework for which they were designed. They were as light as was compatible with safety, and hung far enough above the ground so as not to interfere with the landing-wheels.
A holiday from routine practice had been declared about the aviation testing grounds on the day of the daring flight. The men hung about in little groups, discussing Ned's chances of winning out in the risky feat he meant to perform. It would be the first time such a thing had ever been attempted, and they were not slow to give him full measure of praise for his daring.
The flight was to be more or less of a secret. Few on board the battleship but the naval board invited to witness the attempt, knew of the test. As a consequence, there was nobody about the grounds but the regular quota of pupils and officers when, at 10:30 a. m. theManhattanwirelessed to the "Field outfit" maintained on the grounds, that all was in readiness for the trial.
A steel landing platform, made collapsible, so that it could be instantly stowed away, had beenerected on the after deck of the battleship. Ned knew its approximate position, but the time had been too brief to allow him to visit the vessel and make personal observations. But if Ned realized the risk he ran in thus undertaking a flight into the practically unknown, he did not show it. In fact, he was the coolest person on the field.
At length all was in readiness, and, drawing on a pair of gauntlets, and adjusting a life-preserver, Ned stepped up to the aeroplane and clambered into his seat.
A minute later the roar of the motor, as he set it going, drowned all other sounds. But the lad caught above the uproar of the engine Lieutenant De Frees' shouted farewell:
"Good luck, my boy!"
Ned responded with a wave and a shouted cry:
"Thank you, sir."
The next instant he waved his hand in token that he was ready to start. The men holding the struggling aeroplane released it, and it shotforward, taking the air within a few feet of the starting point. It rocketed skyward in a trail of blue smoke, leaving behind a reek of gasolene and burning lubricating oil.
Ned directed his course as high as possible, for he wished thoroughly to inspect the surroundings before he commenced his attempt. It was a bright, clear day, almost windless. As he rose higher, the glorious panorama of the open roadstead spread before his eyes. On its glistening surface lay a dark object, like a slumbering leviathan. Ned knew it in a flash for the anchoredManhattan—his goal.
Already a wireless had gone vibrating through the air announcing his departure, and a dozen glasses were aimed at the sky from the big fighting machine. Ned was watched for as eagerly as if he had been a real aerial enemy.
The lad circled about for a few minutes, making sure that his motor was working perfectly, and then he turned his prow toward the distant warship.
Straight toward her he flew, holding his course as true as a homing pigeon. The wind sang by his ears, and vibrated in the steel wire rigging of his sky-clipper as he raced along. The motor's drone behind him was as steady as a heart beat.
Ned's eyes shone with the desire of achievement. He was making a flight which might have a material effect upon the future armament of United States war vessels. He realized to the full the importance of his flight, and how much depended on it.
All at once his practiced eye detected, on the mirror-like surface of the stretch of water beneath him, a slight ruffle. It was some distance off. But Ned knew it spelled only one thing:
Wind!
"Bother it all," he thought, "just like the luck. However, it will only be a squall, I imagine."
He braced himself for a battle with the airman's greatest enemy. In a few seconds the squall was upon him. For an instant the aeroplanehesitated and thrilled like a live thing. Ned applied more power. Like a horse under the whip, his aeroplane shot forward. Every bolt and rivet in it strained and creaked under the tension. Ned was doing a daring thing in bucking the wind and fighting with it, instead of jockeying for some advantage.
But then Ned had a fighting nature in the best sense. An obstacle only aroused him to fresh effort. "Obstacles are things made to be conquered," he said, with another famous battler, whose name lives in history.
Zee-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e!
The wind screamed and tore about him, while below, the water was lashed into white-caps.
"Gee whiz!" exclaimed Ned to himself. "If anything parts, I'm due to test out the floating abilities of the pontoons sooner than I expected."
But, although sadly racked and strained, the aeroplane, under her operator's skilful handling, weathered the squall. Ned turned his head andwatched it go whistling and howling shoreward, with deep satisfaction.
"A fine end to the test it would have been," he muttered, "if I'd been dumped in the sea by a squall at the outset."
A few minutes later he was maneuvering above the big Dreadnought. The vessel looked queer and dwarfed from the height at which he hovered. But Ned could not help thinking what a fine object she would offer for an aerial marksman. As the lad knew, there is a limit to the perpendicular aiming of a gun, and skimming directly above the vessel, as he was, it was doubtful if the most skilful gunner on board could have hit his aeroplane.
At the stern of the big ship, the young aviator now noticed a platform—evidently the one on which he was expected to land. His heart gave a thump, as he gazed down on it.
"It doesn't look much bigger than a checkerboard," he thought, "and if I don't hit it—wow! as Herc would say."
As carefully and coolly as if he were on a practice flight, Ned regulated his levers. Then, with a quick intake of his breath, he darted downward.
Down—down, he shot, the blood singing in his ears with the rapidity of his descent. It was thrilling, desperate—dangerous!
Suddenly, as Ned placed his foot on a pedal and applied a warping appliance, there was a sharp "crack!"
The aeroplane hesitated for an instant.
Then, without the slightest warning, it lurched in sickening fashion, almost unseating him.
The next instant Ned was hurtling downward through space like a plummet. Disaster, swift and certain, rushed up to meet him from the steel fighting machine beneath.
A DROP FROM SPACE.
But even in that awful drop through space Ned's nerve did not desert him. His brain worked faster, in the few seconds allowed it to do effective work, than it had ever acted before.
Just as it seemed to those on board the battleship that the lad was doomed—in the event of the pontoons not working—to be drowned in the wreck of the aeroplane, they were astonished to see it recover and rise, from the very wave tips, in a graceful curve.
Straight up it shot—the motor whirring and buzzing deafeningly. Then, without an instant's hesitation, it dropped like a fish hawk toward the stern platform, and a moment later Ned Strong and his aeroplane rested on the solid foundation of the landing stage. The first flight from land to a fighting ship's deck had been successfullyperformed, with an added thrill thrown in for good measure, as it were.
Before Ned could clamber out of his seat, the officers, assembled to view the test, came crowding up on the platform. The lad was not embarrassed, but he felt a slight sense of shyness, which speedily wore off, as so many dignitaries pressed about him, shaking his hand and congratulating him.
"Jove, lad, but you gave us a fright for a minute!" exclaimed one gray-mustached captain. "I didn't think it possible that a heavier-than-air craft could recover from such a tumble as you took."
"Yes, tell us about it, lad," urged another naval dignitary.
"Well, gentlemen," said Ned, "I guess it was just one of those accidents that will happen in the best-regulated aeroplanes. Something went wrong with the warping appliances, that was all."
"Aren't your nerves shaken?" asked a youngofficer. "You'd better have a glass of wine."
"Thank you, sir, I never touch alcoholic liquors," rejoined Ned simply. "But I wouldn't mind a glass of water, sir. Flying is rather thirsty work."
An orderly was at once dispatched for a carafe and a glass, and while he was gone Ned obtained leave to locate and repair the break that had come so close to causing him disaster. It was soon found, and a new turnbuckle put on in place of the one that had cracked when a flaw in its construction parted.
By this time every jackie who could find business in the after part of the ship was on the decks below. A sea of faces was upturned to gaze at the flying marvel.
Questions flew thick and fast.
"Would it be possible to carry a sharpshooter, for instance, from the deck of this vessel, circle a hostile craft and return?" asked one of the naval officers standing about.
"I think so, sir," was Ned's response.
"Well, providing you feel there is no danger, why not try such an experiment?" asked Commander Dunham, Ned's old chief officer.
"I should like to, above all things, sir," rejoined Ned, with sparkling eyes; "but who will go?"
"I think you will have no lack of volunteers," smiled Commander Dunham, as half a dozen young ensigns and midshipmen pressed forward. "Mr. Shrike, I think you are as good a subject as any. At any rate, sir, your weight will not seriously embarrass the craft."
Mr. Shrike proved to be an extremely thin young midshipman, whose weight, as Commander Dunham had humorously hinted, was not excessive. In fact, among his intimates he was known as "The Shrimp."
He lost no time in preparing for the ride, providing himself with a light rifle. When all was in readiness, Ned showed him where to sit, and how to hold on, and then, the aeroplane having already been swung about, he started up theengine once more. Several blue-jackets had been detailed to hold the machine back, and at a given signal from Ned they let go. The aeroplane shot from the platform out over the stern of the battleship, and soared out above the sea. As they shot past Old Glory, waving proudly at the stern, Ned saluted with one hand. The young middy at his side followed his example.
The aeroplane took a perilous swoop as she dropped from the platform, but Ned had his craft well in hand. He averted the drop with a quick movement and speedily swung out seaward.
"See, there is a small sloop off there," said Midshipman Shrike presently. "Let's try if we can circle it, just as if it were a hostile vessel."
"Very well, sir," rejoined Ned, and steered straight for a white sail glistening some distance out at sea.
Closer and closer they drew to it, and before long they could see men on its deck pointing upward excitedly.
"They've seen us, anyway," laughed the middy. "Wonder if they think we're some big sort of a gull?"
Suddenly, as they drew closer to the sloop, Ned saw one of the men go in the cabin for a moment and emerge with a gun—or at least something that looked like one.
"Hullo! What's that fellow doing now?" asked Midshipman Shrike, as he saw this. "Is that a gun he has there, Strong?"
"Looks like it, sir," rejoined Ned, "and he's——"
"Aiming at us, by Jove! Hi, there, you rascal, put that gun down!"
A puff of smoke came simultaneously with the words. It was followed by a screaming sound, as a bullet whizzed past the aerial voyagers. It was followed by another and another, the rifle evidently being a repeater.
"I say, I can't stand this any longer," shrilled the middy, as Ned kept the aeroplane swinging in rapid circles. As he spoke, he jerked the rifleto his shoulder, and, with a cry of "Stop that shooting instantly!" fired a shot across the sloop's bow. Ned could see the white water whipped up as the bullet ricochetted.
But, in firing his weapon, the young officer had released his hold with both hands. At the same instant a puff of wind swung the aeroplane sharply on her beam ends. Ned righted her instantly, but, as he did so, he was horrified to observe that he was alone.
The sharp lurch had dislodged his companion, and below Ned saw him whirling downward. The midshipman's body struck the water close by the sloop and instantly vanished.
With the automatic movements of one in a nightmare, Ned dropped downward. As he did so, he was immensely relieved to see the young officer's head bob up to the surface for an instant. Ned shouted and an answering hail came upward.
"Thank heaven, I've got the pontoons on," he thought.
But even while his mind and body were thus busied, Ned had time to observe the sloop. She had taken advantage of the puff of wind, and was now rapidly slipping off toward a not far distant point of land. Ned's eye took in her every detail. She was black and squat, yet with a certain raciness of line, and heavily canvassed. Round her bulwarks ran a bright crimson line. She bore no name that Ned could see.
The aeroplane struck the water with a splash that threw the spray high above her planes. But the pontoons saved her from being submerged. A moment after she had struck the surface of the water she was floating like a sea-bird on its surface.
"Ahoy, there!" came a hail.
Ned glanced in the direction and saw the young middy striking out boldly for the floating aeroplane.
"Hurt, sir?" demanded Ned.
"Not a bit; the water's fine," was the cheeryresponse. "But, confound it all, I've lost my rifle."
Ned swung the aeroplane round, using the regular aerial propellers to drive her over the water. It was not many minutes before a dripping but cheerful middy was seated once more by his side.
"I say, Strong," he remarked, "I guess the less said about this adventure the better. You understand. I had no business to fire at those chaps on the sloop, as a matter of fact, but I couldn't help it. What do you think they fired at us for?"
"I've no idea, sir," was Ned's reply.
"Guess they were crazy, or had been drinking, or something."
"Possibly that was it, Mr. Shrike." But in the Dreadnought Boy's mind he had reached a far different conclusion. The shots that whistled about them had not been aimed by any irresponsible hand, of that he was sure. They had been aimed to do harm. That they had not succeededwas due to good fortune more than anything else. There were only certain men whom Ned could think of who could be guilty of such an outrage. Those men were the implacable enemies of himself and Herc.
"Better cruise about a bit till I get dried out," said the middy presently. "If they ask us why we dropped like that, I'll say we were trying out the pontoons, eh?"
Ned agreed. He did not countenance untruths or an approach to them, as a rule, but in this case he felt that to tell the whole story might get Midshipman Shrike in trouble, as well as involve him in some difficulties. However, he resolved that if questions were asked, he would tell the truth, as he would then have no other recourse. But, to his relief, no interrogations were put to him, and he supposed that the midshipman had explained the case, as was, indeed, the fact.
Soon after their return, Ned winged back to the shore. Here he was the recipient of more congratulations, but his mind was busy elsewherethan with his signal triumph in aerial navigation. As soon as he got a chance, he sought out Herc. The astonishment of the freckle-faced Dreadnought Boy, on hearing the news, may be imagined.
"Then you are sure that it was Muller and that crowd?" he asked.
"Practically certain," rejoined Ned. "Who else would have done such a thing?"
"Do you think they have some rendezvous in the neighborhood?"
"I'm sure of it. Their possession of the sloop indicates that. I'd like to unearth their hiding-place and put the rascals to rout."
"So would I," agreed Herc, "and maybe we will. At any rate, that sloop should be easy to identify."
"Yes. We'll keep a bright lookout, and perhaps before long we may have something tangible to work on."
That time was to come sooner than they expected.