Yet it could not be believed that such a nation, a race originally so splendid in fibre, so dogged in courage, would take the onslaught of her rivals lying down. England, surely, now at the eleventh hour, would be roused to action. England would fight, and even dying breathe defiance to her foes. But, alas! England sorely needed leadership—the potent magic of some great personality to inspire her people with courage and enthusiasm. And in this hour of dire distress, Renshaw, the only leader who could have commanded a widespread patriotic following, was lost to England—lying scarred and beaten, it was said, chained like a dog in the prison of the Mahdi.
So thought most of those who thought of him at all. Yet, even while his name was on their lips, the Phœnix was reviving. Sir Robert Herrick knew it. General Hartwell and Linton knew it; and there were others, quick of hearing, keen of sight, who already heard the flapping of the wings; saw the Phœnix rising from the ashes of the past and speeding from afar towards our violated shores.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE FIGHT FOR THE FORT.
The enemy still held the fort. All through the night a terrific bombardment had been maintained, and even when the first grey line of dawn began to creep across the downs the insistent fury of the guns increased rather than diminished. Major Wardlaw estimated that during the last twelve hours over eleven thousand shots had been fired from the big guns of Fort Warden, while thousands of shrapnel hurled against its fortifications from the various encircling field batteries manned by British gunners were beyond all definite calculation. At the height of the bombardment not less than 80 per minute must have been directed by way of return against the British batteries, and in this onslaught the great guns (of which there were seven at work in Fort Warden) contributed the most overwhelming and terrible results. This deafening and incessant rain of fire was directed mainly against the Castle and Fort Burgoyne, but, incidentally, it had wrought ruin and convulsion on every side. Shells falling into the town of Dover had already reduced it to heaps of tumbled masonry. Here and there great volumes of smoke rose from the wreckage of shops and houses. The Town Hall—the ancientMaison Dieu, founded by Hugh de Burgh, Constable of Dover, in the reign of John—having escaped destruction during the night, caught fire about daybreak, the flames, rushing upward in the morning air, watched by thousands from the western heights, to which the terrified inhabitants had fled for safety.
On the Castle Hill the bluish haze caused by the ceaseless bursting of shells and shrapnel in some measure veiled the central scene of conflict; and this haze, spreading far and wide over the landscape, presently assumed the most delicate and beautiful colours as the sun rose up and threw its shafts of light on hill and dale. When the light grew stronger, cloud after cloud of smoke was seen to rush aloft from the contending forts, and every moment the sun, with growing glory, painted these rolling billows with glorious hues of burnished gold or bronze. Here and there, while the people watched, columns of earth and chalk rose high into the air, as shot and shell ploughed deep into the soil, while flashes of fire from the bursting shells, the pale smoke rushing like steam from the shrapnels, and the leaping fountains of soil, all combined to give the beholder the impression of some terrific convulsion of nature. So extraordinary and ghastly was the general effect produced that many of the spectators believed they were witnessing a volcanic eruption allied in some way with the seismic disturbances reported to have occurred at Bath and other inland watering-places.
Yet towards the awful crater of this man-made volcano, British troops were now advancing. It had been fondly hoped by the British staff that the tremendous bombardment from the big howitzers, maintained ceaselessly during the night, would have disabled Fort Warden to such an extent that an infantry attack in the morning would meet with but feeble resistance. Very few of the officers, however, had any true conception of the enormous strength and staying power with which Wardlaw had endowed his military master-piece.
Yet the onslaught had to be made. To the Highlanders—brought over from Shorncliffe—was entrusted the honour of leading the attack on one side, while the Royal Marines, from Chatham; were simultaneously to advance on the other. The hour of trial came. Firing not a shot, but with heads bent low, creeping forward, and taking advantage of every inequality in the ground for cover, the attacking force approached the flaming portals that confronted them. It was but a short distance, for during the night the saps had been carried close to the first circle of wire entanglements. Some of the wires, moreover, had been destroyed, leaving gaps through which the Highlanders were ordered to drag light scaling ladders and approach the moat, while others pushed sandbags before them to take the invaders' fire.
Suddenly the word of command broke hoarsely on their ears. As it came from the Commanding Officer, a bullet struck him in the heart. He fell with a groan that was hardly audible. At the last word of their beloved Commander the Highlanders sprang up, and with an angry yell rushed headlong towards the moat. But narrow though the space they had to cross, the withering fire from the machine guns made it impossible to traverse it. The leading ranks, officers and men alike, were beaten down by lead as hail beats down a field of waving corn. The rest wavered, turned, and in a moment the ill-starred regiment, all that was left of it, rushed down the hill in desperate flight. Attempts to rally them were futile. Neither man nor devil could, or would, stand against that awful overwhelming hail of shot and shell.
On the other side of the fort, the Marines had approached somewhat nearer to success. Here the gaps in the wire entanglements seen at close quarters afforded some encouragement. With an inspiringcheer, the men dashed forward, their bayonets fixed; but suddenly, as if from the earth itself, sprang up an opposing line of bayonets. The gaps in the entanglement were filled with German soldiers, and in an instant the combatants were engaged, man to man, in a furious hand-to-hand encounter. Deep groans and screaming blasphemies blended with the tumult of the guns. Here and there in the mêlée, men whose bayonets were broken off clubbed their rifles and savagely battered at each other's faces; but still more ghastly than the injuries thus exchanged was the hellish work effected by the hand grenades, of which the Fort contained large quantities. These explosives, now used for the first time on English soil, blew men literally to pieces. Neither skill nor courage could avert these horrible results. The methods of the anarchist had been allowed to find scope in the warfare of civilized peoples. The bombs, wherever they struck, made mincemeat of humanity.
The Marines, like the Highlanders, had been driven back, and there came a ghastly interlude when the Germans sought to rescue their wounded and distinguish and carry in the dead. Those who had been butchered by the hand grenades had to be hastily shovelled into sacks and baskets before their remains could be removed. No pen could dare describe in detail all the revolting sights which this small battle-field in a few brief moments had revealed. Severed heads rolled down the hill, the eyes wide open, the features fixed in horror. In one spot from ten to fifteen corpses, friends and foes together, involved and twisted in a shapeless mass, were suddenly discovered in a hollow. In many instances the force of the explosions had torn the clothing from the bodies of the soldiers. Arms and legs had beenwrenched from their trunks and blown away. From pyramidal heaps of mutilated English corpses stiffened fingers pointed towards the sky.
Many of the Marines who had escaped the hand grenades had had limbs clean amputated by the knife-like fragments of the high explosives ere the rush was made. In some instances the upper halves of bodies lay on the hill without marks of injury, the lower limbs having wholly disappeared. Yet terribly and suddenly as death had come to these devoted men, far more awful was the fate of those whom shell and bomb had shattered without absolutely killing. These slowly dying fragments of humanity lay moaning in their tortured state, praying as they had never prayed before for that last agony which should release them from sufferings that no tongue could utter and no imagination even picture.
Already the havoc wrought in human flesh had been accompanied with inconceivable disaster in all directions. Fort Burgoyne, its guns silenced by the more modern ordnance, was little better than a heap of ruins—ruins piled high above the dead and dying gunners. The more exposed batteries on the Western Heights had been dismantled long before the inhabitants of Dover climbed the hill and gazed across the valley. When, after the repulse of the British attack, the fury of fight was abated for a brief period, and the smoke of battle temporarily rolled away, the appearance of Dover Castle itself filled the spectators with amazement and dismay. So great was the destruction and the transformation that it was difficult to believe that what they now looked upon had any association with the great towers and massive walls which had been familiar objects to them all their lives. The Norman keep, with walls more than 20 feet thick, had been sobattered as to present the appearance of a jagged range of rock. Peveril's Tower had disappeared. The Cotton Gate, rising as it did to a height of 90 feet and 460 feet above sea-level, by some miracle had escaped all damage; but the Constable's Tower was reduced to half its former height. The upper half, it was conjectured, lay crumbling in the moat below.
What had happened to the Duke of York's School, which the boys had evacuated overnight, or to the batteries that had been placed in Northfall Meadows and on the Golf Links, could only be a matter of surmise. The Pharos and St. Mary's Church so far seemed to be untouched, possibly because the gunners in Fort Warden had not deemed it worth while to waste their fire on either.
In all the awestricken throng that stood upon the Western Heights and gazed across the ruined town towards Castle Hill, none had feelings that corresponded wholly with those of Major Wardlaw. Scanning the field of operations through his glasses, his face twitched as if in actual pain. The attention of the uninformed lookers-on was constantly diverted from one thing to another, the wreck of the Castle, the crash of a roof as it collapsed in the town below, or the woolly clouds caused by bursting shrapnel, which still was being fired at intervals. But Wardlaw heeded none of the more picturesque effects. His mind, his powers of observation, his poignant feelings, were intent on causes, not effects. Every inch of the scene of operations was known to him. He knew the position and capacity of each fort and field battery. He could distinguish, where others knew no distinction, between the work of the big guns, the siege guns, howitzers, mortars, and field artillery. A sudden and terrific detonation toldhim that a huge naval gun had been landed from one of the great ships in the Admiralty Harbour. It must have been a work of enormous difficulty to get that gun ashore, during the night, and a still more terrific task to drag it into position to play with full effect upon Fort Warden. It was the work, as he knew, of British seamen—British seamen at their best, which happily still meant that there were none better in the world. But, more than all, his thoughts ran on Fort Warden—the Fort itself.
Nearly all his life the study of fortification had obsessed him. While he looked at people, or even talked to them, his mind had been at work on parapets, banquettes, palisades, scarp and counter-scarp. All the technicology of the art of war and of the scientific defence of permanent positions was as familiar to this Engineer Officer as are household words to household people. Fort Warden, as already indicated, was the outcome of his concentrated mental labours and his soldier's instinct. In his younger days superior officers had looked rather coldly on his zeal. He had shown that he was a young man with ideas, and ideas are unwelcome to officials who love red tape and well-established grooves.
But as years went on and slow promotion at last came to him, he had gained the ear of men in military power. Thus advanced in confidence and authority, he had been allowed almost a free hand in designing the modernized defences of Castle Hill. It was so desirable to sooth the public mind that public money had been spent upon the works without any sort of stint. Everything that the Major thought Fort Warden ought to have was there. In construction his plans had been faithfully observed. He had been allowed to make experiments of everykind. Not satisfied with earthworks, moats, wire entanglements, and bomb-proof shelters for the trenches, Wardlaw had adopted a novel system of armour plates for the protection of the Fort—plates that were produced by the use of tantalum ore alloyed with steel. This hardy metal, imported from Australia, had been proved to possess the most remarkable qualities. In itself it was heavier than iron, and could be so treated as to increase by 30 per cent. the resisting power of any armour plates previously in use for naval or military purposes.
The success of Wardlaw's designs, the wisdom of his carefully-considered plans, the selection and apportionment of warlike material (in the preparation of which the chemist played a more important part than the armourer), had been only too amply justified. Results affirmed the first principle of fortification and of the art of gunnery, which principle lay in creating and arming a position of such strength and such resources that it could be held by a body of men greatly inferior in numbers to those by whom they were attacked. Fort Warden, the great outcome of the Major's career, the splendid achievement on the strength of which he had retired from active service, thus stood justified beyond all cavil or dispute.
Yet, as he gazed towards the work of his hands, Wardlaw's heart was full of grief and bitterness. There stood the Fort in all its pride and strength; around it lay the victims of its fury; within it less than three hundred foreigners still defied thousands of British troops on British soil. Above it floated, so far, in victory, two foreign Eagles—the flags of Germany and the United States.
CHAPTER XV.
IN THE HEART OF THE HILL.
While the dead were being buried and the wounded removed, there was a long cessation of the savage struggle. Indeed, the long lull in the firing almost led some people to believe that it would be heard no more. Crowds on the Western heights glanced curiously, anxiously, towards Fort Warden, with some idea that its picked garrison would now abandon their desperate and daring attempt to hold the position. It became known that the enemy's plans had been in part defeated—either by reason of some official blunder or through the watchfulness of the French at the other extremity of the Channel Tunnel. The German troops that were to have raided the French terminus, and then poured into England, under the protection of the guns of Fort Warden, already seized by their advance guard, had not arrived, and could not now approach to aid their countrymen. Movements of foreign warships and transports were hourly reported by telegraph and wireless messages, but the British Fleet had by this time formed a deadly barrier of iron and steel around the coast line of Kent and Sussex. There must be a great battle and a great defeat of our squadrons before another foreigner could set his foot on Kentish shore.
The brooding day wore on, tense with suspense and fear. In the stillness that accompanied the deepening of twilight, hundreds of field-glasses were finally directed towards the silent fort to discoverwhether the American and German flags had yet given place to the white flag of submission. Any such anticipation, however, proved unfounded. For suddenly, as the dusk increased, the roar of artillery was heard; the masked batteries of the British once more had opened simultaneous fire upon the Fort. Instantly the challenge was accepted. Fort Warden roared its defiance. The big naval gun thundered its repeated demand for surrender; the siege guns crashed in unison; the howitzers savagely chimed in, barking as in sudden fury, like monster dogs of war; and fifty field guns combined to swell the dreadful, deafening chorus.
Presently the fire from the Fort slackened. It seemed clear they were husbanding their strength for work more crucial. Or could it be that they were running short of ammunition? Perhaps, it was conjectured, more damage had been done to Wardlaw's Works than the British had supposed. Such speculations cheered the spirits of officers and men. But the wiser among them only shook their heads. They appreciated the mettle of the men who held the fort, realised that they had counted the cost, expected no quarter, and meant to win or die. The British staff knew that it would be folly to cry until they were out of the wood. They realised that many a man must bite the dust in agony before the British Standard floated over Wardlaw's Works again, if, indeed, it ever fluttered there at all! The invaders would, and must, hold the Fort till their last gasp—not because they in themselves could hope for ultimate triumph over the increasing forces that now surrounded them, but because to them time was everything—time for their countrymen to develop elsewhere the work of conquest; time for the American and German combined squadrons toland troops at unprotected spots of Great Britain and Ireland, while they, the daring three hundred, monopolised the attention of the flower of England's troops. The plans of the Allies were elaborate. This was but their first great move.
Meanwhile, imperative orders had been given for the British to attack the Fort again. The attempt was to be made directly darkness had set in, and it was only to pave the way for a new and even more determined onslaught that the guns had broken forth in the renewed bombardment already chronicled. Troops, Regular and Territorial, still were pouring into Kent.
No drum or bugle note disturbed the evening air; an interval of ominous silence, pregnant with dreadful threats and dire potentialities, preceded the renewed attack. When the hour had come, the word of command, uttered in a whisper, was whispered on from rank to rank. In open order, the swarming infantry battalions crept swiftly up the hill, simultaneously making for the Fort on every side. They reached a certain point, then paused under the last scrap of cover that remained available, while the field telephones sent swift messages to certain batteries. The signals served their purposes, and as the guns burst out again, the men sprang to their feet and doubled forward.
Those who were advancing from the South stopped almost instantly, dazzled and confused. The powerful searchlight of the Fort glared into their faces with bewildering suddenness, and the insistent racket of rifles and machine guns told them that their advance had been discovered. The doomed and blinded soldiers fell in scores, in hundreds, before a withering storm of bullets. Then, just as suddenly as it had been revealed, the flashlight was concealed;but only to glare forth again on the British supports that were hurried to the front. Thus, brilliant light and deepest darkness alternated in swift and bewildering succession, and through both alike the leaden messengers of death mowed down the advancing troops.
Rank after rank reeled back upon their climbing comrades. On the South side, once more, the attack had failed, and failed at heavy cost.
North, West, and East, the result had been the same—repulse, defeat. The night was now illumined with extraordinary brilliance. Star-shells, rising high into the air above the Fort, burst in quick and dazzling succession. The blinding glare lighted up the hill, the sea, and every field and building, revealing, too, the fleeing figures of the retreating force and the prostrate forms of hosts of dead and wounded. A hail of bullets from the Maxims persistently pursued the remnant of the fleeing soldiers, and swept the plateau and the hillside clear of living things.
Pom, pom, pom! the murderous machines of wholesale destruction continued their deadly work until the men who worked them could find no living thing to put to death.
Broken and beaten—many of them desperately and horribly wounded—the panting remnant of the attacking force heard, as, at last, they halted, a shrill shout of triumph from the jubilant defenders of the Fort.
But the night's work was far from finished. The Fort must fall—cost what it might, the Fort must fall. If it could not be captured above ground in the staring light of star-shells, the attack must be made by burrowing in darkness through the hill itself. Preparations for this desperate and dangerous work had been already started, and much progress made.For twelve hours or more, during what appeared to be a suspension of hostilities, the sappers had worked in relays with furious and unremitting energy. While their comrades above ground were being repulsed, while the star-shells went up in a rapid succession, and the implacable searchlight swept the hill in all directions, the picks of the Engineers, yard by yard, were steadily hacking a way towards the very foundations of the Fort.
These tunnelling operations would have been infinitely more tedious and more arduous had not an elaborate system of subterranean passages already been provided by Major Wardlaw. Various cunningly devised galleries bad been secretly cut in the hill in order to furnish the garrison of the Fort (on the assumption that the garrison would be English and acting on the defensive), with the means of taking an attacking force in the rear, and of laying mines for the destruction of any besiegers. But the tables had been turned, though how far, if at all, the invaders were aware of these hidden avenues and the method by which they could be made available, remained a matter of doubt and anxious speculation to the British Staff. Meanwhile, hour after hour, deep in the heart of the hill, the sappers sweated at their work. Nearer and nearer they approached to the spot at which a mine, if exploded, might be expected to shatter at least a section of the Fort, and open a way for British bayonets to enter.
A few more yards and the vital point would be reached. Then, suddenly, the sapper who was wielding a pickaxe in advance of all the rest paused in his work, listening intently. He raised his hand excitedly, and the officer in command of the party instantly crept forward, and with an imperious gesture stopped the work. The sappers, their facesshining in the lantern light, at first wondered what it meant. But soon enough they heard and understood. Faintly, as through a massive wall, there came to their ears the fateful sound of tapping—the click, click, click of other pickaxes. It came from below the tunnel they themselves were cutting. One thing, and only one, could explain the sound. The invaders had found out, or someone had betrayed to them, one of the secret tunnels of the hill.
The sappers, pale as death, gazed in each other's faces. In a flash they realised the awful jeopardy in which they stood. The invaders were counter-mining at a lower stratum! beneath their very feet. At any moment—while a breath was drawn or glances were exchanged—they might explode their mine!
There was an awesome pause, then the officer gave a sharp, half-whispered order. Instantly, boldly, the picks were at their work again. It was a desperate race for time—here in this cramped tunnel—in the smothering depths of mother earth; and no man's life was worth a moment's purchase. Yet iron self-discipline prevailed. The sappers worked with almost frenzied haste and vigour. After ten minutes of furious, exhausting labour, they were allowed to pause. The chests of the toilers heaved painfully; some of them tried to hold their breath; others shook their heads impatiently, as if to stop the singing in their ears. They wanted to listen, to hear, and know their fate.
No sound reached them. It was a moment of agonizing tension. Then, nearer than before, they heard the picks again. Suddenly the sound ceased. The invaders had completed their work. There was no time to lose. At a sign from the officer, who brushed a handkerchief across his face and drew alaboured breadth, a grim-faced sergeant began to crawl back swiftly to the distant opening of the tunnel for the dynamite. Another and more torturing pause ensued.
Which mine would be exploded first?
It was an affair of minutes, then of seconds. Their mine was not yet ready. But duty held them to their ground. Though hell should burst upon them on the instant, the flaming portals must be faced.
Out in the open, those who watched and waited suddenly heard a thunderous detonation. A huge mass of earth and chalk rose high in the air, and clouds of whitish smoke spread skyward in the full glare of the searchlights. Three engineers, half doubled up, now came rushing from the tunnel to the outlet, bursting among a little group of officers, who staggered back with horror in their faces.
"Done for ... countermined!" One of the sappers gasped out the fateful words, then sank exhausted on the ground.
"My God!" exclaimed Helmore, the officer in charge of the relief party, falling back a pace. Then, promptly recovering his self-control, he cried: "Forward to the rescue. Some of our men may be alive!" He himself dashed into the tunnel, followed by half a dozen men. At a little distance, the narrow avenue was blocked. The miners were entombed! but an indirect opening had been made by the concussion, which gave the rescuing party access to another tunnel. Following this, and finding it intact, Helmore, in advance of the party, raised his lanthorn and saw in the distance an exposed angle of a massive concrete wall. He understood at once that the exploded mine, working in a lateral direction as well as upward, had exposed the caponiere, or covered lodgment under the counter-scarp, which Wardlaw had sunk in that position designedly for the protection of the Fort. Therefore, the holders of the Fort, in a measure, were hoist with their own petard. Their mine had exploded first, but at the same time it had exposed a point against which a subterranean attack now might be directed.
The moat encircling the Fort was twenty-eight feet wide and eighteen deep. Strongly fortified everywhere, a special feature of its strength lay in the caponiere gallery. The walls of this gallery, constructed beneath the entire counter-scarp, were some seven feet thick. On this, the South side, as also on the East, the gallery was divided by concrete partitions into five communicating cells or chambers. These chambers, as Lieutenant Helmore knew from the confidential plans of the defence works, communicated, cell with cell, by low and narrow doorways. From the last of the five cells, by a narrow flight of steps, could be reached a door of massive steel, and on the other side of that door a passage five feet wide passed beneath the rampart and the moat into the interior of the Fort itself. This communication, of course, was intended to enable defenders of the Fort to reach the caponieres which jutted into the moat at intervals, and thence fire upon any troops that sought to bridge it.
The enormous importance of his discovery made Helmore forget for a moment the fate or peril of his ill-starred comrades—buried as they were in the adjacent débris. Indeed, it was apparent that nothing could be done for them. Their dreadful fate was sealed, and the faint groans that at first reached the ears of the would-be rescuers soon entirely ceased to be heard.
Helmore, after a moment's pause, sent a manback with news of the discovery to his commanding officer, who instantly grasped the requirements of the situation. He issued certain rapid orders, and a hundred men darted down the hill in prompt obedience. Meanwhile, the relief sappers, guided by Helmore, crept through the narrow tunnel into which an opening had been forced by the explosion. Without losing an instant, the Engineers began to chisel several holes in the exposed section of the concrete wall. A charge of dynamite was passed along, and all made ready. The men rushed back and waited. The crack and crash of a violent explosion followed, and the sappers, hurrying forward, followed by other troops, found that a broad gap had been made in the gallery of the caponiere. Through this breach they crept and crawled, to find themselves in the first of the five cells, or gallery-sections, that have been described.
Opposite to them was the arched doorway leading into the next chamber. But already the defending force had occupied it. Foreseeing that the entire gallery might be rushed chamber by chamber, they had brought heavy sandbags and piled them high, close to the first doorway.
Against these obstacles the attacking party hurled themselves, furiously but in vain. Half a dozen engineers immediately commenced to break through the wall itself, in the hope of thus reaching the adjoining chamber. Only a few men could work in so confined a space, and while they hacked against the solid wall, the German defenders now thrust their rifles between the gaps of the sandbags and fired at random. Four Englishmen fell dead, or desperately wounded. Their comrades dragged them back, making room for others. The Colonel's orders had now been carried out, and hand grenadeswere passed along from man to man. These fearful engines of destruction were only to be used in case of dire extremity; because, closed within these walls, beneath the hill, the explosives might well prove as fatal to the men who used them as to the enemy. For the same reasons, doubtless, the German soldiers engaged in this subterranean struggle, so far, had made no use of bombs.
The sappers having found it hopeless to cut a wider entrance through the wall into the adjoining chamber, another plan was quickly thought of and attempted. A can of kerosene was passed along and poured upon the sandbags; then another and another. The moment a light was applied, the soaked sandbags began to burn with so fierce a flame that the soldiers on each side were driven back, and for a brief space the chambers on both sides of the archway were left quite tenantless. Then, with a half stifled cheer, a dozen British soldiers, their rifles clubbed, dashed across the chamber and thrust the burning mass into the inner cell. The Germans in the opposite entry already were hastily piling more sandbags in position, but the gap was not wholly filled when the attacking party rushed upon them impetuously and with an excited shout. Bayonets crossed bayonets now, but neither side could get free play either for attack or for defence. Over the waist-high sandbags in this second archway, the combatants with desperate fury thrust and stabbed. Groans and savage oaths blended with the flash of steel. The place grew slippery with blood. Men fell and could not rise again. Comrade trod comrade under foot and heeded not.
Only one lanthorn now remained alight, half revealing the intent and savage faces of the combatants. The Germans seemed to have no light atall. And poor Helmore, who held the solitary lanthorn aloft to guide his men, thus helped to direct the fatal thrust that laid him low. With a hoarse cry, one of the Germans had hurled a bayonet through the doorway. It pierced deep into the lieutenant's throat. The lanthorn dropped from his upraised hand, and he fell against the wall. Blood gushed in a torrent from his mouth, even while he bravely strove to utter the last word of command:
"Forward, men, forward!" he gasped, then spoke no more.
A young soldier who heard him had marked well the position of the archway, ere darkness hid it, and, maddened at the fall of his officer, he hurled a hand grenade towards the opening. The effect was instantaneous and terrific. The dreadful shock was succeeded by a still more dreadful silence.
When a light was struck it was seen that every German in the inner chamber had been blown to pieces.
A moment's hesitation in face of the ghastly sight, then, as the light went out again, the British sprang into the inner cell to find, or rather feel, that it was splashed and smeared with blood and clogged with spongy fragments of the mutilated dead.
Cell number two, by some freak of the explosive, had not been affected, and as the third chamber thus was gained, a sergeant, shouting in the darkness, gave the eager word:
"Forward again! we'll have the Fort! By God, we'll have the Fort!"
Again the men pressed forward, but this time no defenders barred the way. In the distance there was a sound of hurrying footsteps. The Germans had retreated down the stone stair which led to the steel door of communication.
Reinforcements had now reached the gallery, and fresh lights were brought. Well might the newcomers shudder and turn sick at what those lights revealed in chamber number three. At the moment it was quite impossible to carry the dead and wounded to the rear. Officers and men were swarming in, and none could leave the gallery. But word was passed along for surgeons to be sent, and the wounded were laid against the walls, leaving a clear gangway. Then the advance was cautiously continued.
Another officer—Carlow, who had just obtained his company—now took command. Promptly but slowly, he headed the advance, for this silence, this sudden cessation of resistance, might betoken some deadly ambuscade.
The men went forward, two and two. Chambers four and five proved to be quite deserted. They reached the farther archway of cell number five, and there Carlow, halting, peered down into the darkness of the narrow stair.
As he stood, gazing, listening, strange and pungent fumes crept up between the walls. He gasped for breath and staggered back. The men behind him did the same. The fumes were rising, spreading—permeating the low gallery with extraordinary rapidity, travelling swiftly into every chamber. Only a few understood how this awful sense of suffocation was occasioned; and some who guessed that from an air-pump down below the Germans were pumping asphyxiating gas into the gallery guessed it too late. A few, before the gas had wholly overpowered them, fought their way back to the open, but more than a hundred men dropped where they stood in the close chambers—dropped and died.
CHAPTER XVI.
SIGNS AND WONDERS.
That important person, Miss Flossie Wardlaw, was extremely angry! Events were interfering with her plan of life, and upsetting all her theories of fitness. The preoccupation, the infatuation, shown by the only other member of her family for something outside domestic life was too exasperating. That tiresome fort at Dover was absorbing all her father's thoughts. He grew paler and more haggard day by day, bestowing less and less attention on the far more important interests that concerned his little daughter and the familiar programme of her daily life.
Flossie told herself that she was not unreasonable. She had been quite ready to make allowances. Alarming things, she knew, had happened close at hand. Impudent foreigners had seized Fort Warden by stealth. The ceaseless boom of the big guns disturbed the current of existence in the bungalow. Things were tiresome; indeed, quite worrying when they kept on like that! It was dreadful, that Englishmen, her father's soldier-friends, should be killed by foreigners—killed in England too, only ten miles away; usually they were only killed a long way off, and that seemed different. But, of course, it could only end in one way; the offenders would be turned out and most severely punished. Meanwhile, therepeated and prolonged absence of her father at Dover, and his preoccupied behaviour when he was at home, filled Flossie with mixed feelings of annoyance and sympathy, in which the former ingredient became more and more predominant. Her queenly power seemed to be undermined. Her faithful subject had deserted her. Oh! that horrid Fort!
Miss Flossie nursed the personal sense of injury, and husbanded her growing grievance, to the exclusion of thoughts concerning the national questions that arose. So much depends upon the point of view; and that, in turn, so much depends upon one's age.
Nevertheless, the issues of the struggle at Fort Warden were vitally important. They riveted the attention of many millions of the population of the world. Here in England itself the seizure of the fort had assumed a colossal significance, shaking the nation out of the ever-narrowing grooves of Parliamentary and municipal party conflict, compelling men to look back to a great history and forward to an era of littleness that gave pause even to the most selfish and complacent.
Cost what it might, the enemy must be driven out. Our Flag must wave above that fort again.
A spreading feeling of fury and resentment arose against the Government. To this complexion had we come! Pushing politicians, self-seeking wire-pullers of both sexes, had dragged England in the dust. So much for Petticoat Government! So much for the Amazonian craze, this make-believe of women-soldiers and girl-gunners. Woman had largely ousted man from place and power, and this was the result! A handful of foreigners had been emboldened to assail us on our own sacred soil.Popular anger expressed itself afresh by breaking out viciously into the old doggerel:—
"Old Nick and the Cat,With Johnnie and Jan,Have brought poor EnglandUnder a ban!"
Truly, Man was needed at the helm to which at this crisis woman clung so obstinately. Man was wanted in his old authority, and, behold! in every department of control woman was clinging to his coat-tails, hindering his action, dividing his counsels, prating of peace when there could be no peace, and exhibiting a rudimentary unfitness to grapple with an unprecedented and desperate situation.
The outcry came not from the men alone, but with increasing vehemence from the very sex that had struggled for supremacy. Women out of office—necessarily the vast majority—now began to discover that those aggressive or more fortunate representatives of their sex who had obtained salaried posts or prominence of some sort in public life, were in many cases frauds and failures. This rule of woman that had come to pass was not what the great mass of her sex had contemplated or intended. They confessed it to husbands and brothers; and husbands and brothers nodded in wise and ready acquiescence. Their faces plainly said: "I told you so."
Thousands of women ruefully admitted the impeachment. Successful rivalry—mostly vicarious—had brought them no real joy. They had gained power and lost love; and in their inmost hearts they knew that love was worth the world. Always it had been part of woman's character to strive for her own way, and always she had ended by despising the man who permitted her to gain it. Yes! woman's collective triumph in this new age, as shenow sadly realised, had cost her dear. With the gradual abandonment of man's protective affection had gone the true ingredients of her happiness; much that made up the grace and joy of life, tenderness and chivalry, caressing mastery, the rightful dominance of the stronger sex. Yes! love was worth the world.
The heel of woman disclosed her weakness—and revealed her strength. Fool and blind! grasping at the sceptre she had lost the kingdom; the kingdom of the heart, encircled and protected by the strong arms of a lover as the guardian-sea encircles England's shores. Like an electric spark this spirit of regret and discontent flew through the land. A little more, and it would mean a revolution. Away with the unnatural dominion of Woman! Back to the reign of Man!
It would have been idle to expect unanimity where pride and personal interest were so closely involved. The pushing leaders of social democracy and the Vice-President and her following were not likely to submit without a struggle to the restoration of hereditary authority. Woman in office and power throughout the State would be sure to cling desperately to her foothold, and no one could yet foresee the outcome of the swiftly dawning struggle.
The hands of a little band of energetic men, however, were busy throwing wide the floodgates, and no two men were more active than those veterans, one of the army, and the other of the law—General Hartwell and Sir Robert Herrick. To them it seemed that the signs of the times were full of deep significance, and pregnant with the highest hopes. They knew that there were still some men with grit in England, men who saw with bitter wrath the pass to which the nation had been brought. Intheir eyes the governance of this once glorious land had become a byword and a mockery. And it was because of this that the present humiliating spectacle was to be seen at Dover.
Nor was that all. In the midst of these alarms, there was something else that shook and terrified the people, filling the minds of thousands with forebodings and distress.
Strange symptoms of seismic disturbance had been reported not only from Bath, but also from other parts of England. Such awe-inspiring tremblings of the solid earth must ever produce a sense of apprehension which at any moment may grow into a universal panic. It was noticed that, so far, these disquieting indications were confined to the neighbourhood of thermal waters. At Matlock, Harrogate, Leamington, and Woodhall Spa, there had been a marked increase in the volume of the rising waters, with other signs of an abnormal earth activity.
What did these things betoken? Signs of the times, they were variously interpreted. As in the days of Noah! The great multitude of men and women laughed at the shipbuilder and went about the business of their daily lives, so now hosts of dull and unimaginative persons remained unmoved in their obtuse philosophy. Others there were who believed a providential influence was at work—conveying an admonition and a warning by some such solemn signs as those predicted to occur before the last great change of all. Were there not to be signs in the heavens, and signs in the quaking earth, the sea and the waves roaring, nation rising against nation, creation, animate and inanimate, preparing for the awful Armageddon foreshadowed in the page of Holy Writ?
Events were moving fast. A fanatic namedRichards, stalking wild-eyed through the land, broke out into fierce prophetic utterance, mocked and jeered at by many, but followed by rapidly increasing numbers. This strange man entered on a pilgrimage from one to the other of the inland watering places, where symptoms of earthquake had been felt, everywhere inspiring awe and wonder in breasts of thousands. In South London, which he first visited, he was followed by enormous crowds, consisting to a great extent of women. Here, on the Surrey side, there had been a corresponding departure from the normal, for the old forgotten Spa of Bermondsey had developed a new and disturbing energy. While this ancient spring rose in unexampled quantities, and at high temperature, the once famous Spa at Epsom, only some twenty miles away, exhibited a like activity. The argument was irresistible that such far-spread manifestations of the same character must necessarily spring from a common cause.
If so, then these mysterious subterranean workings also pointed to the pending evolution of some common result; it might take the shape of some terrific upheaval and convulsion that would reduce the British Isles to their primeval form, submerge them in the sea, or even change the face of Western Europe.
Still these were but dark shadows and dread potentialities. Time alone could show whether events would verify such grim forebodings. But, meanwhile, there was one concrete and absorbing fact—the presence in England of the invading foreigner. This, at least, was a stern reality, pressing and predominant. The terrible Three Hundred still held the Fort; the great guns still roared and boomed, the pom-poms worked incessantly. Stiffened formsin increasing numbers strewed Castle Hill; the numbers of the dead and dying mounted daily.
The highest military authorities now were constantly engaged in vehement and anxious conference with Major Wardlaw. The discussions, renewed again and again, early and late, had dealt with all aspects of the existing problem, had touched on and passed by many suggested expedients. One project, in particular, had excited much difference of opinion. Urgent advice had been given officially and through the newspapers to call the air-ships into play. Fort Warden, turtle-roofed, was supposed to be entirely bomb-proof, but it was argued that if all the air-ships in England—some 200—were to concentrate above the Fort and pour down bombs and explosives in great quantities, the result could hardly fail to terrify, if not to annihilate, the obstinate defenders. But Edgar Wardlaw shook his head. He alone knew the enormous resisting power that he had built up against this very contingency of warfare.
Moreover, there were the obligations of treaties to be remembered. Air-ships were not to be used in warfare. International compacts on the subject of aerial navigation must be respected. To set a dishonourable example by disregarding them for our own immediate purpose might lead to disastrous international results. Two, and more than two, could play at such a game as that!
And even, while the idea was being mooted, its immediate adoption became impossible. In a single night every English air-ship, the whereabouts of which was known, sustained mysterious, and, in most cases, irreparable damage. Such a discovery could not be concealed from the public. It was clear that some great and elaborate conspiracy was afoot, that the agents of the enemy were numerous, active, anddaring, here in the very heart of England. It was clear, too, that the Government had been caught napping, and only too probable that worse surprises might yet befall the country. The police, it is true, made several arrests of suspected persons, but prevention, not cure, was the national desideratum. While the grass grew the steed might starve. Of what avail the slow formalities of legal, investigation, the jog-trot of red-tape routine, when the enemy was already at the gate, aye, in the heart of the citadel?
In this crisis it transpired that theBladudwas the only air-ship unaccounted for. There were conflicting statements about her recent movements; but presently it became known that she had been lent by the late President to a young Canadian friend named Linton Herrick. Mr. Herrick had been seen to go up with Wilton, the Engineer, and it was believed that subsequently theBladudhad been identified with an air-ship that had been seen travelling rapidly, and at a considerable altitude, over the English Channel.
CHAPTER XVII.
HOW THE RAID FAILED.
Flossie had spoken. Silent resentment, obdurately nursed for quite two days, had given place to voluble reproaches. He was naughty, she told her father; never before had she known him quite so naughty. Why! he had hardly opened his lips for days and days; he had not taken her out, nor brought things home, or done anything. Waking that morning very early and very hungry, she had found nothing—not a thing—under her pillow—no, not even a lump of sugar; and he knew perfectly well that there were always lumps of sugar in the sideboard. No! he had forgotten. He did not love her, that was quite clear. His head was fuller than ever of that horrid Fort. If he did not look out he would go there and get killed himself presently, and that would be a nice thing to happen, wouldn't it?
Under the shower of these reproaches, Major Wardlaw hung his head. His silence and submissiveness slightly mollified the stern young lady. Like many others of her sex, Flossie must needs scold and then be sorry for the object of her reproaches. To-night there was something in her father's looks and bearing that arrested her vehemence. Why! goodness gracious! what was the matter?
"You know," she said shrewdly, looking at himas she stood between his knees with that steady gaze of youthful eyes that is often so disconcerting, "You know, if you weren't a great big man, I should say you were going to cry."
"Nonsense, nonsense," her father answered, and hugged her closely in his arms.
"Mind my hair," said Flossie sharply, "I'm very tired and I'm going to bed. I hope you won't be naughty any more. Promise!" He nodded with a queer look in his eyes. "Youlook tired, too! come up early. To-morrow we'll be just the same as ever, won't we? You shall be very nice, and I shall forgive you, because, after all, I do love you, don't I?"
"That's right," he said gravely.
"Yes, but you're not right. I've never seen you quite like this. I'm sure there's something. Where's my book?"
He picked up the story-book and she tucked it under her arm, smothering a yawn that suffused her blue eyes and showed all her pretty teeth.
"Good-night; be good," she said, and kissed him.
"Yes! But you've forgotten your hymn."
The child looked at him searchingly. His manner puzzled her more and more. His voice seemed hardly natural; he was grave, intensely grave, yet trying to cloak his seriousness by speaking in ordinary tones.
"Must I, to-night?" she asked, half closing her sleepy eyes.
"Yes, dearest, please, to-night."
She glanced down at the story-book under her arm, and her father understood the look. Flossie wanted to reserve her few mental energies to finish a chapter in bed. But with a little sigh of resignation, she began in drowsy tones the recitation of thehymn. The theme was resignation. Wardlaw seemed to hang upon the well-known words:
"If Thou shouldst call me to resignWhat most I prize, it ne'er was mine;I only yield Thee what is Thine;Thy Will be done."
He bowed his head.
Flossie, too heavy-eyed to notice, turned away. Her father looked up quickly.
"Kiss me again, darling."
He held her by the arms in front of him, firmly but lightly.
The child roused herself to sudden alertness.
"One for you, and one for me, and one for both together. That's three!" she observed after the third kiss—"Just for a treat."
His eyes followed her as she crossed the room. At the door, she turned and nodded warningly.
"Something nice to-night, mind, and don't stay up too late."
Wardlaw held his breath and kept his seat while Flossie went slowly, languidly, up the stairs. Then, with clenched hands and tortured eyes, he started to his feet.
The last time! God in heaven, could it be truly that?
Never to know the kiss of her childish lips again, never to feel her warm, clinging little arms around his neck!
With bloodshot eyes and still clenched hands he paced the room.
Away in the distance the booming guns broke out again with their dreadful monotone, recalled inexorably the work he had to do. He had weighed it well, pondered it, as he told himself, too long already. The Fort must fall! All other means hadfailed. Blood had been poured out like water, and to no purpose. Yonder on the hill, thousands of men, obedient unto death, his brothers in arms, had braved the weapons which he, Wardlaw, had stored within those impregnable defences, weapons which had been turned against his own country and his own people with such terrible results. England could not wait while the foreigners were starved into surrender. The Fort must fall without delay. He, Wardlaw, knew the master-key of the position, and also knew that he who used it must be prepared to lose his life. Why had he not used it before?
There were reasons which would satisfy reasonable people: the surprise of the situation, the slowness of the military authorities in inviting his assistance, the probability that, finding themselves without support in a hostile country, the invaders would throw up the sponge. But none of these probabilities had been verified. The Fort was still held by the foreigner; and the Fort must fall!
Edgar Wardlaw was a scientific soldier—not one of those men of bull-dog courage who, obedient to orders, would hurl themselves without thought into a bloody struggle. The mind that can devise and perfect death-dealing armaments is not necessarily, or even probably, a mind that inspires and braces the fighting quality of the every-day soldier. The red badge of courage can indeed be won by men of high-strung nerves and delicate organisation, but it is won at most tremendous cost. Wardlaw had been slow in coming to his resolution, but he would never recede from it. They were arms of love that had enchained him, at the last—the arms of a little child. But now he was breaking even those fond links asunder. He was ready—almost ready.
Pacing the room, he glanced at his watch. It wasnearly ten o'clock. Soon she would be asleep. He went over to the sideboard and made a quick yet careful search, finding a small fancy cake, some fruit, and sugar; as Flossie had said, there was always sugar, though other things might fail.
He must delay no longer. Carefully and on tiptoe he went up the creaking stairs. The servants were chattering and laughing in the kitchen, but in the child's bedroom there was not a sound. He entered cautiously. Yes, she was asleep, long lashes resting on the delicately flushed skin, lips slightly parted, one arm thrown out upon her open book.
Wardlaw moved cautiously across the room and stood looking down upon the sleeping child. He looked long, and who shall say with what poignant and unutterable agony of spirit. Then he slipped the paper bag containing what he had brought with him under the pillow, and gently moved the book, lest it should fall upon the floor and wake her. The volume contained two stories, bound up together—"Sintram and his Companions," and "Aslauga's Knight," stories whose leaves come out of the old Saga-land, bringing with them the romance and adventure that charm the children, while also they reveal to older folk the mystic conflict of the human soul. Sintram's Companions, as Wardlaw knew, were Sin and Death, Companions of us all. With Death by his side, Sintram had to ride amid the terrors of the narrow mountain gorge—just as the Pilgrim of the immortal Progress had journeyed through the Valley of the Shadow.
His eyes rested on the open page of the story-book:—
"When Death is coming near,When thy heart shrinks in fearAnd thy limbs fail,Then raise thy hands and prayTo Him who smoothes the wayThrough the dark vale."
He bowed his head and closed the book quietly, placing it near the child's pillow. Downstairs the clock chimed a quarter after ten—cheery little chimes, ticking off the flight of time as if endless days and years still remained for all who heard them.
And yet for him who listened only a few hours of life remained. Death called him—not in the heat and excitement of battle, but in this still hour of cool blood and calm reflection. It made it vastly harder to obey.
Never again would he hear those familiar tinkling chimes. This was his last farewell to all that he held dear. Death coldly beckoned him, as Sintram was beckoned at the entrance of the gorge. His hour had come to pass into the Shadow. The stern implacable demand of duty was ringing in his soul, and he dared gaze no longer on his sleeping child. If she should wake and look into his eyes, courage, honour, duty, all that makes man obedient unto death, might fail him even now. He dared not press his lips upon her cheek; he dared not even touch her hand.
She stirred and muttered something in her sleep. He quickly raised and kissed a few strands of her lovely hair; it was the last touch, the final leave-taking!
The father turned away. The child slept on.
A hundred yards from the bungalow—appointed to stay there, so that Flossie should not hear and wonder—a motor-car awaited him. The chauffeur belonged to his own corps—the Engineers. The mansaluted him and looked anxiously at the drawn—white face, on which the lamp-light fell. Not a word was spoken. Wardlaw took his seat, and immediately the car, like a sentient thing let loose, sped swiftly on the road to Dover.
It was a night of starshine and soft breezes. As they climbed the rising ground, the pure air from the sea grew stronger. Bracing, health-giving, breathing life, it fanned the face of the silent man who was rushing towards his self-appointed doom. Stiff and rigid, he sat, staring into the night, but conscious of nothing around him or before him. All his thoughts were of what was left behind—the dainty bedroom with the shaded light, the rosy sleeping child, the delicate dimpled face that he should see no more, his one ewe lamb of all the world.
"If Thou shouldst call me to resign...."
The burden of the hymn was ringing in his brain, insistent, agonizing.
On and on sped the car. Away to the South the flashlights were sweeping the Channel, and, ahead, the first outlying lights of Dover soon came into view. Every moment the dull, dogged voices of the guns grew louder.
Still Wardlaw remained rigid and voiceless, as one who is paralyzed by some dreadful nightmare, while ding-dong in his mind the words of the hymn persisted and repeated: "If Thou shouldst call me to resign.... If Thou shouldst call me to resign." ...
They were close to Dover now. The car sped down from the heights. Ahead of them on the hard white road a lanthorn was swinging to and fro, and the chauffeur slackened speed to answer the challenge of the guard. He gave the password, and again the car tore forward.
Houses on either side now were numerous. Presently the car wound down into the town. Silent, half-ruined, the unlighted streets gave an inexpressible impression of melancholy and disaster. Here and there the vibration caused by the passing car brought down loosened stone and brickwork with a sudden clatter. At one spot some fragments of mortar flew out and struck Wardlaw in the face. They pricked him into consciousness. He shook himself and gave a brief order to the chauffeur. The car turned down a side street, and presently drew up before a large house standing in the shelter of the Castle Hill.
There were lights in all the windows; shadows passed and repassed across the drawn blinds. A strained air of animation and activity pervaded the place. A group of orderlies stood about the entrance, and through the open doorway there were glimpses of officers hurrying from room to room with clank of spur and rattle of accoutrement. This house, the head-quarters of the military staff, contained for the time being the brain of the British Army—foiled, so far, but still feverishly bent on devising means for the expulsion of the obstinate invader.
As the car stopped, a tall officer hurried out and grasped Wardlaw by the hand. It was a grasp that told more than words could utter—a grasp that recognized the arrival of a supreme moment, at once the grip of friendship and the clasp of greeting and farewell.
"The General's expecting you. I'll take you to him at once!"
Wardlaw nodded, and, still as one that dreamed, followed the aide-de-camp into the house.
On the following day great news was wiredthroughout the length and breadth of England, and cabled far and wide throughout the civilised world.
The newspapers of London and the provinces, in eager competition, issued special editions in quick succession. Everywhere great placards announced in heavy type and infinite variety of colours, a gladdening fact: the Fort had fallen!
The hero of the hour was Major Wardlaw, but no sound of joy or triumph could ever reach his ears—Wardlaw was dead. The published particulars, though brief, were all-sufficient and convincing. The Major had calmly and deliberately laid down his life for his country and his comrades. What shot and shell and bayonet had failed to do, he, single-handed, had achieved. The episode was all the more tragic and impressive by reason of its great simplicity. A method was known to Major Wardlaw, as the designer, by which he could flood the Fort. The enemy would be drowned like so many rats in a gigantic trap. The master-key was in his hands, and though—high honour be to them—there were other volunteers for the fatal work, he had steadfastly refused to let another British soldier lose his life in that prolonged and dreadful struggle. He was prepared, resolved, to die—and death had come to him.
Single-handed he had gone into the heart of the hill. The furious inrush of the water stored in the reservoir, which his own hand had deliberately let loose, claimed him, as he knew it must, first victim of the overwhelming flood.
But the Fort was ours again! It was a counter-stroke with which the enemy had not reckoned; a danger which the invader was wholly unable to avert. As the waters of the Red Sea overwhelmed the Egyptian Warriors; as that ancient river, theriver Kishon swept away the foes of the armies of Israel, so, in a new and terrible way, the water floods had destroyed the invaders of England.
With a dull, elemental roar, with a suddenness that allowed of no flight, and a force that admitted of no resistance, ton after ton of water poured into the interior of the Fort. The sealed fate of its occupants was almost instantaneous. Of the survivors barely twenty men escaped with their lives, and these immediately fell into the hands of the encircling troops, and became prisoners of war.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE WRECK OF THE AIR-SHIP.
The little island of Herm possessed only one building of importance, a monastery of French refugees. In the great walled-in courtyard, there was present an object of special and curious interest to the monks. The arrival of theBladudhad been observed with astonishment by all the inmates of the monastery, who naturally associated its coming with that of a certain mysterious visitor—a sun-scorched, iron-grey emaciated man—who had recently landed on the island, coming, it was said, from the coast of France. The visitor, who remained in complete seclusion in the building, sedulously nursed back to health and strength, was treated with extraordinary deference and respect by the Superior. That much the monks could not fail to know; but any sly inquiries and surmises on their part were met with the sternest and most peremptory discouragement.
Excitement was quickened, therefore, when, only a few hours after the arrival of the air-ship, preparations were made for the distinguished visitor's departure. Linton stood in the courtyard, glancing anxiously at his watch, while Wilton, the engineer, put some finishing touches to the gear. The little man had proved himself a model of discretion. He asked no questions, but now and then threw quick glances towards the tall, thin stranger, who, at arespectful sign from Linton, had taken his seat in the stern of the boat.
Whether Wilton knew or suspected the identity of Wilson Renshaw, who now calmly waited for the voyage to commence, Linton could not tell. He suspected that he did, and, little guessing what a few hours would bring forth, he registered a mental promise that the silent, faithful little engineer should not go unrewarded. It struck him that there was a good deal of nervousness in Wilton's manner, as he threw upward glances at the sky.
While the preparations were being completed, the Superior of the Order stood close at hand, addressing in subdued tones his deferential and earnest farewells to Mr. Renshaw, and Herrick, raising his eyes, saw the peering faces of at least a score of monks at the upper windows of the monastery. Glancing higher still, he noted with some uneasiness that the scurrying clouds, copper-tinged from the setting sun, betokened the coming of a wild and stormy night. Fervently he breathed a prayer that the aerial voyage might have a happy issue. But by this time he knew enough of air-ships to be aware that there were perils which no scientific inventions, and no precautions, can wholly nullify: risks from defects and mishaps with machinery, dangers from both combined, that at any moment might bring about some irreparable catastrophe. Yet, to-night, everything must be hazarded. Not an hour, not a moment must be lost. The time had come. To let it pass unseized would be to miss the tide at the flood, to sacrifice the touchstone of fortune.
He glanced at Wilton:
"Ready?"
The engineer gave a quick nod and lifted a grimyfinger towards his cap. Linton, raising his own cap, turned towards the illustrious passenger:
"Shall we start, sir?"
"At once, please," was the answer.
Linton stepped aboard and grasped the helm. Wilton took his place forward, and the Superior, bowing obsequiously, moved to a safe distance from the aeroplane.
The faint preliminary throbbing of the engine instantly commenced. The boat began to rise, slowly at first, then more rapidly, as the elevating power obtained freer play. Every window of the monastery now was plastered with wondering, eager faces, intent on theBladudas she soared aloft. The Superior made angry and imperious gestures, but the monks did not, or pretended not to, see. This mounting of the aeroplane with such a passenger must not be missed. It was a spectacle the like of which they would not see again.
Higher and higher climbed theBladud, beating the air with her flapping wings. The cold breeze rushed through the wind-harp on the mast with a sighing, mournful sound as the boat swept in swiftly widening circles through the air. The passenger, impressed but not perturbed, glanced sharply round him; then, feeling the growing keenness of the wind, he drew his fur coat across his chest.
When they were high enough, Herrick, with one eye on the compass, put the tiller over and gave an order. Wilton lightly moved a switch, and immediately theBladudheaded at high speed for the open sea.
As the hours passed, night fell dark and thick about them; the wind became more violent, and ever and again chilly, sleety squalls affected tosome extent the equilibrium of the boat. No one spoke, except for an occasional query from Herrick, to which Wilton responded by act or gesture only.
Not one of the three men on board knew of any definite cause for anxiety, yet in the minds of at least two of them there was a growing sense of tension and disquietude. The muscles of Wilton's face twitched as he sat in silence, his eye watchful and his hand ready.
Yet, so far, all went well. To avoid prolonged dangers of the open channel, they tacked northwards towards the coast of France, intending to resume the sea course as nearly as possible above the Straits of Dover. Nearer land the air grew less cloudy. The twinkling lights of habitations far below became visible like distant glow-worms. From the numbers of these lights they could form an idea of the size of the towns and villages over which they passed. Some thirty-five were counted. Presently the silent passenger himself identified the locality and said that they were passing over the highlands between Cape Blanc and Calais.
It was time to give the ship a different course; and once again below them lay the wide expanse of sombre, tossing sea. But theBladudnow encountered the strength of a growing gale from the North-East, and soon it became apparent that she was being dangerously deflected from her proper course. It was a discovery silently made, but fraught with the fears of potential disaster. If they should be blown out to sea, there was but one ultimate certainty—death for all on board. The store of motive power could only last for a given number of hours, and already much of the power had been expended. Their hope must lie in reaching dry ground within a period that grew perilously shorter and shorter even while they thought of it.