"There is that man again. I'm afraid of him, Billie. All the others, except Forsythe, have been civil to me; but he looks at me—so—so hatefully."
Billings, minus his clean white jacket, had come up the hatch and gone forward. He came back soon, showing a sullen, scowling face, as though his cheerful disposition had entirely left him.
As he reached the galley hatch, he cast upon the girl a look of such intense hatred and malevolence that Denman, white with anger, sprang to the hatch, and halted him.
"If ever again," he said, explosively, "I catch you glaring at this lady in that manner, parole or no parole, I'll throw you overboard."
Billings' face straightened; he saluted, and, without a word, went down the hatch, while Denman returned to the girl.
"He is an enlisted man," he said, bitterly, "not a passed seaman apprentice; so I downed him easily with a few words."
And then came the thought, which he did not express to Florrie, that his fancied limitations, which prevented him from being on the bridge, also prevented him from enlightening the morbid Billings as to the real source of the "terrible punch" he had received; for, while he could justify his silence to Florrie, he could only, with regard to Billings, feel a masculine dread of ridicule at dressing in feminine clothing.
Atsupper that evening they were served with prunes, bread without butter, and weak tea, with neither milk nor sugar.
"Orders from for'a'd, sir," said Daniels, noticing Denman's involuntary look of surprise. "All hands are to be on short allowance for a while—until something comes our way again."
"But why," asked Denman, "do you men include us in your plans and economies? Why did you not rid yourself of us last night, when you sent one of your number ashore?"
Daniels was a tall, somber-faced man—a typical ship's cook—and he answered slowly: "I cannot tell you, sir. Except that both you and the lady might talk about this boat."
"Oh, well," said Denman, "I was speaking forthis lady, who doesn't belong with us. My place is right here."
"Yes, sir," agreed Daniels; "but I am at liberty to say, sir, to you and the lady, that you'd best look out for Billings. He seems to be goin' batty. I heard him talking to himself, threatening harm to this lady. I don't know what he's got against her myself—"
"Tell him," said Denman, sharply, "that if he enters this apartment, or steps one foot abaft the galley hatch on deck, the parole is broken, and I'll put a bullet through his head. You might tell that to Jenkins, too."
Daniels got through the wardroom door before answering: "I'll not do that, sir. Jenkins might confine him, and leave all the work to me. But I think Billings needs a licking."
Whether Daniels applied this treatment for the insane to Billings, or whether Billings, with an equal right to adjudge Daniels insane, had applied the same treatment to him, could not be determined without violation of the parole; but when they had finished supper and reached the deck, sounds of conflict came up from the galley hatch, unheard and uninterrupted by those forward. It was a series of thumps, oaths, growlings, and the rattling of pots and pans on the galley floor. Then there was silence.
"You see," said Denman to Florrie, with mock seriousness, "the baleful influence of a woman aboard ship! It never fails."
"I can't help it," she said, with a pout and a blush—her blushes were discernible now, for the last vestige of the scalding had gone—"but I mean to wear a veil from this on. I had one in my pocket."
"I think that would be wise," answered Denman, gravely. "These men are—"
"You see, Billie," she interrupted. "I've got anew complexion—brand new; peaches and cream for the first time in my life, and I'm going to take care of it."
"That's right," he said, with a laugh. "But I'll wager you won't patent the process. Live steam is rather severe as a beautifier!"
But she kept her word. After the meager breakfast next morning—which Daniels served with no explanation of the row—she appeared on deck with her face hidden, and from then on wore the veil.
There was a new activity among the men—a partial relief from the all-pervading nervousness and irritability. Gun and torpedo practice—which brought to drill every man on board except Munson, buried in his wireless room, and one engineer on duty—was inaugurated and continued through the day.
Their natty blue uniforms discarded, they toiled and perspired at the task; and when, toward the end of the afternoon, old Kelly decided that they could be depended upon to fire a gun or eject a torpedo, Jenkins decreed that they should get on deck and lash to the rail in their chocks four extra torpedoes.
As there was one in each tube, this made eight of the deadliest weapons of warfare ready at hand; and when the task was done they quit for the day, the deck force going to the bridge for a look around the empty horizon, the cooks to the galley, and the machinists to the engine room.
Denman, who with doubt and misgiving had watched the day's preparations, led Florrie down the companion.
"They're getting ready for a mix of some kind; and there must be some place to put you away from gun fire. How's this?"
He opened a small hatch covered by the loose after edge of the cabin carpet, and disclosed a compartment below which might have been designed for stores,but which contained nothing, as a lighted electric bulb showed him. Coming up, he threw a couple of blankets down, and said:
"There's a cyclone cellar for you, Florrie, below the water line. If we're fired upon jump down, and don't come up until called, or until water comes in."
Then he went to his room for the extra store of cartridges he had secreted, but found them gone. Angrily returning to Florrie, he asked for her supply; and she, too, searched, and found nothing. But both their weapons were fully loaded.
"Well," he said, philosophically, as they returned to the deck, "they only guaranteed us the privilege of carrying arms. I suppose they feel justified from their standpoint."
But on deck they found something to take their minds temporarily off the loss. Sampson, red in the face, was vociferating down the engine-room hatch.
"Come up here," he said, loudly and defiantly. "Come up here and prove it, if you think you're a better man than I am. Come up and square yourself, you flannel-mouthed mick."
The "flannel-mouthed mick," in the person of Riley, white of face rather than red, but with eyes blazing and mouth set in an ugly grin, climbed up.
It was a short fight—the blows delivered by Sampson, the parrying done by Riley—and ended with a crashing swing on Riley's jaw that sent him to the deck, not to rise for a few moments.
"Had enough?" asked Sampson, triumphantly. "Had enough, you imitation of an ash cat? Oh, I guess you have. Think it out."
He turned and met Jenkins, who had run aft from the bridge.
"Now, Sampson, this'll be enough of this."
"What haveyougot to say about it?" inquired Sampson, irately.
"Plenty to say," answered Jenkins, calmly.
"Not much, you haven't. You keep away from the engine room and the engine-room affairs. I can 'tend to my department. You 'tend to yours."
"I can attend to yours as well when the time comes. There's work ahead for—"
"Well, attend to me now. You've sweated me all day like a stoker at your work; now go on and finish it up. I'll take a fall out o' you, Jenkins, right here."
"No, you won't! Wait until the work's done, and I'll accommodate you."
Jenkins went forward; and Sampson, after a few moments of scarcely audible grumbling, followed to the forecastle. Then Riley got up, looked after him, and shook his fist.
"I'll git even wi' you for this," he declared, with lurid profanity. "I'll have yer life for this, Sampson."
Then he went down the hatch, while Forsythe on the bridge, who had watched the whole affair with an evil grin, turned away from Jenkins when the latter joined him. Perhaps he enjoyed the sight of some one beside himself being knocked down.
"It looks rather bad, Florrie," said Denman, dubiously; "all this quarreling among themselves. Whatever job they have on hand they must hold together, or we'll get the worst of it. I don't like to see Jenkins and Sampson at it, though the two cooks are only a joke."
But there was no more open quarreling for the present. As the days wore on, a little gun and torpedo drill was carried out; while, with steam up, the boat made occasional darts to the north or south to avoid too close contact with passing craft, and gradually—by fits and starts—crept more to the westward. And Jenkins recovered complete controlof his voice and movements, while Munson, the wireless man, grew haggard and thin.
At last, at nine o'clock one evening, just before Denman went down, Munson ran up with a sheet of paper, shouting to the bridge:
"Caught on—with the United—night shift."
Then, having delivered the sheet to Jenkins, he went back, and the rasping sound of his sending instrument kept up through the night.
But when Denman sought the deck after breakfast, it had stopped; and he saw Munson, still haggard of face, talking to Jenkins at the hatch.
"Got his wave length now," Denman heard him say. "Took all night, but that and the code'll fool 'em all."
From then on Munson stood watch at his instrument only from six in the evening until midnight, got more sleep thereby, and soon the tired, haggard look left his face, and it resumed its normal expression of intelligence and cheerfulness.
Aftersupper about a week later, Denman and Florrie sat in the deck chairs, watching the twilight give way to the gloom of the evening, and speculating in a desultory manner on the end of this never-ending voyage, when Munson again darted on deck, and ran up the bridge stairs with a sheet of paper, barely discernible in the gathering darkness, and handed it to Jenkins, who peered over it in the glow from the binnacle.
Then Jenkins blew on a boatswain's whistle—the shrill, trilling, and penetrating call that rouses all hands in the morning, but is seldom given again throughout the day except in emergencies.
All hands responded. Both cooks rushed up from the galley, the engineers on watch shut off all burners and appeared, and men tumbled up from the forecastle, all joining Jenkins and Munson on the bridge.
Denman strained his ears, but could hear nothing, though he saw each man bending over the paper in turn.
Then they quickly went back to their places below or on deck; and, as the bells were given to the engine room, the rasping of the wireless could be heard.
As the two cooks came aft, Denman heard them discussing excitedly but inaudibly the matter in hand; and, his curiosity getting the better of his pride, he waited only long enough to see the boat steadied at east-northeast, then went down and forward to the door leading into the passage that led to the galley.
Billings was doing most of the talking, in a high-pitched, querulous tone, and Daniels answered only by grunts and low-pitched monosyllables.
"Gigantia—ten to-morrow—five million," were a few of the words and phrases Denman caught; and at last he heard the concluding words of the talk.
"Dry up," said Daniels, loudly and threateningly. "Yes, thirteen is an unlucky number; but, if you don't shut up and clear off these dishes, I'll make our number twelve. Glad you've got something to think about besides that woman, but—shut up. You make me tired."
Denman went back to Florrie somewhat worried, but no longer puzzled; yet he gave the girl none of his thoughts that evening—he waited until morning, when, after a look around a bright horizon dotted with sail and steam, he said to her as she came up:
"Eat all the breakfast you can this morning, Florrie, for it may be some time before we'll eat again."
"Why, Billie, what is the matter?" asked the girl.
"We've traveled at cruising speed all night," he answered, "and now must be up close to the 'corner,' as they call the position where the outbound liners change to the great circle course."
"Well?" she said, inquiringly.
"Did you ever hear of theGigantia?"
"Why, of course—you mean the new liner?"
"Yes; the latest and largest steamship built. She was on her maiden passage when this boat left port, and is about due to start east again. Florrie, she carries five million in bullion, and these fellows mean to hold her up."
"Goodness!" exclaimed the girl. "You mean that they will rob her—a big steamship?"
"She's big enough, of course, to tuck this boat down a hatchway; but these passenger boats carry no guns except for saluting, while this boat could sink her with the armament she carries. Look at those torpedoes—eight altogether, and more below decks. Eight compartments could be flooded, and bulkheads are not reliable. But will they dare? Desperate though they are, will they dare fire on a ship full of passengers?"
"How did you learn this, Billie? It seems impossible—incredible."
"Remember the gun and torpedo drill!" said Denman, softly, yet excitedly. "Our being in these latitudes is significant. They put Casey ashore the other night and robbed the captain and me to outfit him. I overheard some of the talk. He has reached New York, secured a position as night operator in a wireless station, studied the financial news, and sent word last night that theGigantiasails at ten this morning with five million in gold."
"And where do you think she is now?" asked the girl, glancing around the horizon.
"At her dock in New York. She'll be out here late in the afternoon, I think. But, heavens, what chances!—to wait all day, while any craft that comes along may recognize this boat and notify the nearest station! Why didn't they intercept the lane route out at sea, where there is no crowd like this? I can only account for it by the shortage of stores. Yes; that's it. No sane pirate would take such risks. We've plenty of oil and water, but little food."
That Denman had guessed rightly was partly indicated by the action of the men and the boat that day.
All hands kept the deck, and their first task was to discard the now useless signal mast, which might help identify the boat as the runaway destroyer.
Two engineers sawed nearly through the mast at its base, while the others cleared away the light shrouds and forestay. Then a few tugs on the lee shroud sent it overboard, while the men dodged from under. Beyond smashing the bridge rail it did no damage.
The dodging tactics were resumed. A steamer appearing on the east or west horizon, heading so as to pass to the northward or southward, was given a wider berth by a dash at full speed in the opposite direction.
Every face—even Florrie's and Denman's—wore an anxious, nervous expression, and the tension increased as the hours went by.
Dinner was served, but brought no relief. Men spoke sharply to one another; and Jenkins roared his orders from the bridge, bringing a culmination to the strain that no one could have foreseen.
The sudden appearance of an inbound steamer out of a haze that had arisen to the east necessitatedimmediate full speed. Riley was in charge of the engine room, but Sampson stood at the hatch exercising an unofficial supervision; and it was he that received Jenkins' thundering request for more steam.
Sampson, in a voice equally loud, and with more profanity, admonished Jenkins to descend to the lower regions and attend to his own affairs.
Jenkins yielded. Leaving Forsythe in charge of the bridge, he came down the stairs and aft on the run. Not a word was spoken by either; but, with the prescience that men feel at the coming of a fight, the two cooks left their dishes and the engineers their engines to crowd their heads into the hatches. Riley showed his disfigured face over the heads of the other two; and on the bridge Forsythe watched with the same evil grin.
But few blows were passed, then the giants locked, and, twisting and writhing, whirled about the deck. Florrie screamed, but Denman silenced her.
"Nothing can be done," he said, "without violating the parole; and even if—"
He stopped, for the two huge forms, tightly embraced, had reeled like one solid object to the rail, which, catching them at just above the knees, had sent them overboard, exactly as Sampson had gone before.
"Man overboard!" yelled Denman, uselessly, for all had seen. But he threw a life-buoy fastened to the quarter, and was about to throw another, when he looked, and saw that his first was a hundred feet this side of the struggling men.
He turned to glance forward. Men were running about frantically, and shouting, but nothing was done, and the boat still held at a matter of forty knots an hour. Riley grinned from the hatch; and, forward on the bridge, Forsythe turned his now soberface away, to look at the compass, and at the steamer fast disappearing in the haze that followed her.
Then, more as an outlet for his anger and disgust than in the hope of saving life, Denman threw the second life-buoy high in air over the stern, and led the shocked and hysterical Florrie down the stairs.
"Rest here a while," he said, gently, "and try to forget it. I don't know what they'll do now, but—keep your pistol with you at all times."
He went up with a grave face and many heartfelt misgivings; for, with Forsythe and Riley now the master spirits, things might not go well with them.
Inabout ten minutes Forsythe ground the wheel over and headed back; but, though Denman kept a sharp lookout, he saw nothing of the two men or the life-buoys. He could feel no hope for Sampson, who was unable to swim. As for Jenkins, possibly a swimmer, even should he reach a life-buoy, his plight would only be prolonged to a lingering death by hunger and thirst; for there was but one chance in a million that he would be seen and picked up.
After ten minutes on the back track, the boat was logically in about the same position as when she had fled from the steamer; but Forsythe kept on for another ten minutes, when, the haze having enveloped the whole horizon, he stopped the engines, and the boat lost way, rolling sluggishly in the trough.
There was no wind, and nothing but the long ground swell and the haze to inconvenience them; the first in making it difficult to sight a telescope, the second in hiding everything on the horizon, though hiding the boat herself.
But at last Forsythe fixed something in the glass,gazing long and intently at a faint spot appearing to the northwest; and Denman, following suit with the binoculars, saw what he was looking at—a huge bulk coming out of the haze carrying one short mast and five funnels. Then he remembered the descriptions he had read of the mightyGigantia—the only ship afloat with five funnels since theGreat Eastern.
Forsythe called, and all hands flocked to the bridge, where they discussed the situation; and, as Denman judged by the many faces turned his way, discussed him and Florrie. But whatever resulted from the latter came to nothing.
They suddenly left the bridge, to disappear in the forecastle for a few moments, then to reappear—each man belted and pistoled, and one bringing an outfit to Forsythe on the bridge.
Two engineers went to the engines, Forsythe rang full speed to them, and the rest, cooks and all, swung the four torpedo tubes to port and manned the forward one.
The big ship seemed to grow in size visibly as her speed, plus the destroyer's, brought them together. In a few moments Denman made out details—six parallel lines of deadlights, one above the other, and extending from bow to stern, a length of a thousand feet; three tiers of deck houses, one above the other amidships; a line of twenty boats to a side along the upper deck, and her after rails black with passengers; while as many as six uniformed officers stood on her bridge—eighty feet above the water line.
The little destroyer rounded to alongside, and slowed down to a little more than the speed of the larger ship, which permitted her to creep along the huge, black side, inch by inch, until the bridges were nearly abreast. Then a white-whiskered man on the high bridge hailed:
"Steamer ahoy! What do you want?"
"Want all that bullion stowed in your strong room," answered Forsythe through a megaphone; "and, if you please, speak more distinctly, for the wash of your bow wave prevents my hearing what you say."
The officer was handed a megaphone, and through it his voice came down like a thunderclap.
"You want the bullion stowed in our strong room, do you? Anything else you want, sir?"
"Yes," answered Forsythe. "We want a boat full of provisions. Three barrels of flour, the rest in canned meats and vegetables."
"Anything else?" There was as much derision in the voice as can carry through a megaphone.
"That is all," answered Forsythe. "Load your gold into one of your own boats, the provisions in another. Lower them down and let the falls unreeve, so that they will go adrift. We will pick them up."
"Well, of all the infernal impudence I ever heard, yours is the worst. I judge that you are that crew of jail-breakers we've heard of that stole a government boat and turned pirates."
"You are right," answered Forsythe; "but don't waste our time. Will you give us what we asked for, or shall we sink you?"
"Sink us, you scoundrel? You can't, and you'd better not try, or threaten to. Your position is known, and three scouts started this morning from Boston and New York."
"That bluff don't go," answered Forsythe. "Will you cough up?"
"No; most decidedlyno!" roared the officer, who might, or might not, have been the captain.
"Kelly," said Forsythe, "send that Whitehead straight into him."
Whitehead torpedoes, be it known, are mechanical fish of machined steel, self-propelling and self-steering,actuated by a small air engine, and carrying in their "war heads" a charge of over two hundred pounds of guncotton, and in their blunt noses a detonating cap to explode it on contact.
At Forsythe's word, Kelly turned a lever on the tube, and the contained torpedo dived gently overboard.
Denman, looking closely, saw it appear once on the surface, porpoiselike, before it dived to its indicated depth.
"The inhuman devil!" he commented, with gritting teeth.
A muffled report came from the depths. A huge mound of water lifted up, to break into shattered fragments and bubbles. Then these bubbles burst, giving vent to clouds of brown and yellow smoke; while up through the ventilators and out through the opened lower deadlights came more of this smoke, and the sound of human voices, screaming and groaning. These sounds were drowned in the buzzing of thousands of other voices on deck as men, women, and children fought their way toward the stern.
"Do you agree?" yelled Forsythe, through the megaphone. "Do you agree, or shall we unload every torpedo we've got into your hull?"
Old Kelly had calmly marshaled the crew to the next torpedo, and looked up to Forsythe for the word. But it did not come.
Instead, over the buzzing of the voices, came the officer's answer, loud and distinct:
"We agree. We understand that your necks are in the halter, and that you have nothing to lose, even though you should fill every compartment and drown every soul on board this ship. So we will accede to your demands. We will fill one boat with the bullion and another with provisions, and cast them adrift. But do not fire again, for God's sake!"
"All right," answered Forsythe. "Bear a hand."
Breast to breast, the two craft charged along, while two boats were lowered to the level of the main deck, and swiftered in to the rail. Sailors appeared from the doors in pairs, each carrying a box that taxed their strength and made them stagger. There were ten in all, and they slowly and carefully ranged them along the bottom of one of the boats, so as to distribute their weight.
While this was going on, stewards and galley helpers were filling the other boat with provisions—in boxes, barrels, and packages. Then the word was given, and the boats were cast off and lowered, the tackles of the heavier groaning mightily under the strain.
When they struck the water, the falls were instantly let go; and, as the boats drifted astern, the tackles unrove their long length from the blocks, and were hauled on board again.
Forsythe stopped the engines, and then backed toward the drifting boats. As the destroyer passed the stern of the giant steamer, a shout rang out; but only Denman heard it above the buzzing of voices. And it seemed that only he saw Casey spring from the high rail of the mammoth into the sea; for the rest were busy grappling for the boat's painters, and Forsythe was looking aft.
When the painters were secured and the boats drawn alongside, Forsythe rang for half speed; and the boat, under a port wheel, swung away from theGigantia, and went ahead.
"There is your man Casey," yelled Denman, excitedly. "Are you going to leave him?"
Forsythe, now looking dead ahead, seemed not to hear; but Riley spoke from the hatch:
"Hold yer jaw back there, or ye'll get a passage, too."
With Casey's cries in his ears—sick at heart in the belief that not even a life-buoy would avail, for the giant steamship had not stopped her engines throughout the whole transaction, and was now half a mile away, Denman went down to Florrie, obediently waiting, yet nervous and frightened.
He told her nothing of what had occurred—but soothed and quieted her with the assurance that they would be rescued soon.
Theengine stopped; and, climbing the steps to look forward, Denman saw the bridge deserted, and the whole ten surrounding an equal number of strong boxes, stamped and burned with official-looking letters and numbers. Farther along were the provision; and a peep astern showed Denman the drifting boats.
The bigGigantiahad disappeared in the haze that hid the whole horizon; but up in the western sky was a portent—a black silhouette of irregular out-line, that grew larger as he looked.
It was a monoplane—an advance scout of a scout boat—and Denman recognized the government model. It seemed to have sighted the destroyer, for it came straight on with a rush, circled overhead, and turned back.
There was no signal made; and, as it dwindled away in the west, Denman's attention was attracted to the men surrounding the boxes; only Munson was still watching the receding monoplane. But the rest were busy. With hammers and cold chisels from the engine room they were opening the boxes of treasure.
"Did any one see that fellow before?" demanded Munson, pointing to the spot in the sky.
A few looked, and the others answered with oaths and commands: "Forget it! Open the boxes! Let's have a look at the stuff!"
But Munson spoke again. "Forsythe, how about the big fellow's wireless? We didn't disable it. He has sent the news already. What do you think?"
"Oh, shut up!" answered Forsythe, irately. "I didn't think of it. Neither did any one. What of it? Nothing afloat can catch us. Open the box. Let's have a look, and we'll beat it for Africa."
"I tell you," vociferated Munson, "that you'd better start now—at full speed, too. That's a scout, and the mother boat isn't far away."
"Will you shut up, or will I shut you up?" shouted Forsythe.
"You'll not shut me up," retorted Munson. "You're the biggest fool in this bunch, in spite of your bluff. Why don't you go ahead and get out o' this neighborhood?"
A box cover yielded at this juncture, and Forsythe did not immediately answer. Instead, with Munson himself, and Billings the cook—insanely emitting whoops and yelps as he danced around for a peep—he joined the others in tearing out excelsior from the box. Then the bare contents came to view.
"Lead!" howled Riley, as he stood erect, heaving a few men back with his shoulders. "Lead it is, if I know wan metal from another."
"Open them all," roared Forsythe. "Get the axes—pinch bars—anything."
"Start your engine!" yelled Munson; but he was not listened to.
With every implement that they could lay their hands on they attacked the remaining boxes; and, as each in turn disclosed its contents, there went up howls of disappointment and rage. "Lead!" theyshouted at last. "All lead! Was this job put up for us?"
"No," yelled Munson, "not for us. Every steamer carrying bullion also carries lead in the same kind of boxes. I've read of it many a time. It's a safeguard against piracy. We've been fooled—that's all."
Forsythe answered profanely and as coherently as his rage and excitement would permit.
Munson replied by holding his fist under Forsythe's nose.
"Get up on the bridge," he said. "And you, Riley, to your engines."
Riley obeyed the call of the exigency; but Forsythe resisted. He struck Munson's fist away, but received it immediately full in the face. Staggering back, he pulled his revolver; and, before Munson could meet this new antagonism, he aimed and fired. Munson lurched headlong, and lay still.
Then an uproar began. The others charged on Forsythe, who retreated, with his weapon at arm's length. He held them off until, at his command, all but one had placed his pistol back in the scabbard. The dilatory one was old Kelly; and him Forsythe shot through the heart. Then the pistols were redrawn, and the shooting became general.
How Forsythe, single-handed against the eight remaining men, won in that gun fight can only be explained by the fact that the eight were too wildly excited to aim, or leave each other free to attempt aiming; while Forsythe, a single target, only needed to shoot at the compact body of men to make a hit.
It ended soon with Hawkes, Davis, and Daniels writhing on the deck, and Forsythe hiding, uninjured, behind the forward funnel; while Riley, King, and Dwyer, the three engineers, were retreating into their engine room.
"Now, if you've had enough," shouted Forsythe, "start the engine when I give you the bells." Then he mounted to the bridge and took the wheel.
But, though the starting of the engines at full speed indicated that the engineers had had enough, there was one man left who had not. It was Billings, who danced around the dead and the wounded, shrieking and laughing with the emotions of his disordered brain. But he did not fire on Forsythe, and seemed to have forgotten the animus of the recent friction.
He drifted aft, muttering to himself, until suddenly he stopped, and fixed his eyes on Denman, who, with gritting teeth, had watched the deadly fracas at the companion.
"I told you so. I told you so," rang out the crazed voice of Billings. "A woman aboard ship—a woman aboard ship. Always makes trouble. There, take it!"
He pulled his revolver and fired; and Denman, stupefied with the unexpected horror of it all, did not know that Florrie had crept up beside him in the companion until he heard her scream in conjunction with the whiz of the bullet through her hair. Then Denman awoke.
After assuring himself of the girl's safety, and pushing her down the companion, he drew his revolver; and, taking careful aim, executed Billings with the cold calmness of a hangman.
A bullet, nearly coincident with the report of a pistol, came from the bridge; and there was Forsythe, with one hand on the wheel, facing aft and taking second aim at him.
Denman accepted the challenge, and stepped boldly out of the companion. They emptied their revolvers, but neither did damage; and, as Forsythe reloaded, Denman cast a momentary glance at a black spot in the southern sky.
Hurriedly sweeping the upper horizon, he saw still another to the east; while out of the haze in the northwest was emerging a scout cruiser; no doubt the "mother" of the first monoplane. She was but two miles away, and soon began spitting shot and shell, which plowed up the water perilously near.
"You're caught, Forsythe," called out Denman, pointing to the south and east. "Will you surrender before we're sunk or killed?"
Forsythe's answer was another shot.
"Florrie," called Denman down the companion, "hand me your gun and pass up the tablecloth; then get down that hatch out of the way. We're being fired at."
She obeyed him; and, with Forsythe's bullets whistling around his head, he hoisted the flag of truce and surrender to the flagstaff. But just a moment too late. A shell entered the boat amidships and exploded in her vitals, sending up through the engine-room hatch a cloud of smoke and white steam, while fragments of the shell punctured the deck from below. But there were no cries of pain or calls for help from the three men in the engine room.
Forsythe left the bridge. Breathing vengeance and raging like a madman, he rushed aft.
"I'll see you go first!" he shrieked. He fired again and again as he came; then, realizing that he had but one bullet left in his pistol, he halted at the galley hatch, took careful aim, and pulled the trigger for the last time.
There are tricks of the fighting trade taught to naval officers that are not included in the curriculum at Annapolis. Denman, his loaded revolver hanging in his right hand at his side, had waited for this final shot. Like a duelist he watched, not his opponent's hand, but his eye; and, the moment that eye gave him the unconcealable signal to the triggerfinger, he ducked his head, and the bullet sped above.
"Now, Forsythe," he said, as he covered the chagrined marksman, "you should have aimed lower and to the right—but that's all past now. This boat is practically captured, and I'm not going to kill you; for, even though it would not be murder, there is no excuse in my conscience for it. Whether the boat sinks or not, we will be taken off in time, for that fellow over yonder is coming, and has ceased firing. But before you are out of my hands I want to settle an old score with you—one dating from our boyhood, which you'll perhaps remember. Toss that gun forward and step aft a bit."
Forsythe, his face working convulsively, obeyed him.
"Florrie!" called Denman down the hatch. "Come up now. We're all right."
She came, white in the face, and stood beside him.
"Off with your coat, Forsythe, and stand up to me. We'll finish that old fight. Here, girl, hold this gun."
Florrie took the pistol, and the two men discarded their jackets and faced each other.
There is hardly need of describing in detail the fist fight that followed. It was like all such, where one man is slightly the superior of the other in skill, strength, and agility.
In this case that one was Denman; and, though again and again he felt the weight of Forsythe's fist, and reeled to the deck occasionally, he gradually tired out his heavier, though weaker, adversary; and at last, with the whole weight of his body behind it, dealt a crashing blow on Forsythe's chin.
Denman's old-time foe staggered backward and fell face upward. He rolled his head to the right and to the left a few times, then sank into unconsciousness.
Denman looked down on him, waiting for a movement, but none came. Forsythe had been knocked out, and for the last time. Florrie's scream aroused Denman.
"Is the boat sinking, Billie?"
He looked, and sprang for a life-buoy, which he slipped over Florrie's head. The bow of the boat was flush with the water, which was lapping at the now quiet bodies of the dead and wounded men forward. He secured another life-buoy for himself; and, as he donned the cork ring, a hail came from abeam.
"Jump!" it said. "Jump, or you'll be carried down with the wash."
The big scout ship was but a few lengths away, and a boat full of armed men was approaching.
Hand in hand they leaped into the sea; and Denman, towing the girl by the becket of her life-buoy, paid no attention to the sinking hull until satisfied that they were safe from the suction.
When he looked, the bow was under water, the stern rising in the air, higher and higher, until a third of the after body was exposed; then it slid silently, but for the bursting of huge air bubbles, out of sight in the depths.
About a year later, Lieutenant Denman received a letter with a Paris postmark, which he opened in the presence of his wife. In it was a draft on a Boston bank, made out to his order.
"Good!" he exclaimed, as he glanced down the letter. "Listen, Florrie, here's something that pleases me as much as my exoneration by the Board of Inquiry." Then he read to her the letter:
"Dear Sir: Inasmuch as you threw two life-buoys over for us you may be glad, even at this late period, to know that we got them. The fight stopped when we hit the water, and sincethen Sampson and myself have been chums. I saw both buoys thrown and held Sampson up while I swam with him to the first; then, from the top of a sea, I saw the other, and, getting it, returned to him. We were picked up by a fisherman next day, but you will not mind, sir, if I do not tell you where we landed, or how we got here, or where we'll be when this letter reaches you. We will not be here, and never again in the United States. Yet we want to thank you for giving us a chance for our lives."We read in the ParisHeraldof your hearing before the Board of Inquiry, and the story you told of the mess Forsythe made of things, and the final sinking of the boat. Of course we were sorry for them, for they were our mates; but they ought not to have gone back on Casey, even though they saw fit to leave Sampson and me behind. And, thinking this way, we are glad that you licked Forsythe, even at the last minute."We inclose a draft for five hundred and fifty dollars, which we would like you to cash, and pay the captain, whose name we do not know, the money we took from his desk. We hope that what is left will square up for the clothes and money we took from your room. You see, as we did not give Casey but a little of the money, and it came in mighty handy for us two when we got ashore, it seems that we are obligated to return it. I will only say, to conclude, that we got it honestly."Sampson joins with me in our best respects to Miss Fleming and yourself."Truly yours,"Herbert Jenkins."
"Dear Sir: Inasmuch as you threw two life-buoys over for us you may be glad, even at this late period, to know that we got them. The fight stopped when we hit the water, and sincethen Sampson and myself have been chums. I saw both buoys thrown and held Sampson up while I swam with him to the first; then, from the top of a sea, I saw the other, and, getting it, returned to him. We were picked up by a fisherman next day, but you will not mind, sir, if I do not tell you where we landed, or how we got here, or where we'll be when this letter reaches you. We will not be here, and never again in the United States. Yet we want to thank you for giving us a chance for our lives.
"We read in the ParisHeraldof your hearing before the Board of Inquiry, and the story you told of the mess Forsythe made of things, and the final sinking of the boat. Of course we were sorry for them, for they were our mates; but they ought not to have gone back on Casey, even though they saw fit to leave Sampson and me behind. And, thinking this way, we are glad that you licked Forsythe, even at the last minute.
"We inclose a draft for five hundred and fifty dollars, which we would like you to cash, and pay the captain, whose name we do not know, the money we took from his desk. We hope that what is left will square up for the clothes and money we took from your room. You see, as we did not give Casey but a little of the money, and it came in mighty handy for us two when we got ashore, it seems that we are obligated to return it. I will only say, to conclude, that we got it honestly.
"Sampson joins with me in our best respects to Miss Fleming and yourself.
"Truly yours,
"Herbert Jenkins."
"Oh, I'm glad, Billie!" she exclaimed. "They are honest men, after all."
"Honest men?" repeated Denman, quizzically. "Yet they stole a fine destroyer from Uncle Sam!"
"I don't care," she said, stoutly. "I'm glad they were saved. And, Billie boy"—her hands were on his shoulders—"if they hadn't stolen that fine destroyer, I wouldn't be here to-day looking into your eyes."
And Billie, gathering her into his arms, let it go at that.
Thelong-expected crisis was at hand, and the country was on the verge of war. Jingoism was rampant. Japanese laborers were mobbed on the western slope, Japanese students were hazed out of colleges, and Japanese children stoned away from playgrounds. Editorial pages sizzled with burning words of patriotism; pulpits thundered with invocations to the God of battles and prayers for the perishing of the way of the ungodly. Schoolboy companies were formed and paraded with wooden guns; amateur drum-corps beat time to the throbbing of the public pulse; militia regiments, battalions, and separate companies of infantry and artillery, drilled, practiced, and paraded; while the regular army was rushed to the posts and garrisons of the Pacific Coast, and the navy, in three divisions, guarded the Hawaiian Islands, the Philippines, and the larger ports of western America. For Japan had a million trained men, with transports to carry them, battle-ships to guard them; with the choice of objective when she was ready to strike; and she was displaying a national secrecy about her choice especially irritating to molders of public opinion and lovers of fair play. War was not yet declared by either side, though the Japanese minister at Washington had quietly sailed for Europe on private business, and the American minister at Tokio, with several consuls and clerks scattered around the ports of Japan, had left their jobs hurriedly, for reasons connected with their general health. This was the situation when the cabled news from Manila told of thestaggering into port of the scout cruiserSalemwith a steward in command, a stoker at the wheel, the engines in charge of firemen, and the captain, watch-officers, engineers, seamen gunners, and the whole fighting force of the ship stricken with a form of partial blindness which in some cases promised to become total.
The cruiser was temporarily out of commission and her stricken men in the hospital; but by the time the specialists had diagnosed the trouble as amblyopia, from some sudden shock to the optic nerve—followed in cases by complete atrophy, resulting in amaurosis—another ship came into Honolulu in the same predicament. Like the other craft four thousand miles away, her deck force had been stricken suddenly and at night. Still another, a battle-ship, followed into Honolulu, with fully five hundred more or less blind men groping around her decks; and the admiral on the station called in all the outriders by wireless. They came as they could, some hitting sand-bars or shoals on the way, and every one crippled and helpless to fight. The diagnosis was the same—amblyopia, atrophy of the nerve, and incipient amaurosis; which in plain language meant dimness of vision increasing to blindness.
Then came more news from Manila. Ship after ship came in, or was towed in, with fighting force sightless, and the work being done by the "black gang" or the idlers, and each with the same report—the gradual dimming of lights and outlines as the night went on, resulting in partial or total blindness by sunrise. And now it was remarked that those who escaped were the lower-deck workers, those whose duties kept them off the upper deck and away from gunports and deadlights. It was also suggested that the cause was some deadly attribute ofthe night air in these tropical regions, to which the Americans succumbed; for, so far, the coast division had escaped.
In spite of the efforts of the Government, the Associated Press got the facts, and the newspapers of the country changed the burden of their pronouncements. Bombastic utterances gave way to bitter criticism of an inefficient naval policy that left the ships short of fighters in a crisis. The merging of the line and the staff, which had excited much ridicule when inaugurated, now received more intelligent attention. Former critics of the change not only condoned it, but even demanded the wholesale granting of commissions to skippers and mates of the merchant service; and insisted that surgeons, engineers, paymasters, and chaplains, provided they could still see to box the compass, should be given command of the torpedo craft and smaller scouts. All of which made young Surgeon Metcalf, on waiting orders at San Francisco, smile sweetly and darkly to himself: for his last appointment had been the command of a hospital ship, in which position, though a seaman, navigator, and graduate of Annapolis, he had been made the subject of newspaper ridicule and official controversy, and had even been caricatured as going into battle in a ship armored with court-plaster and armed with hypodermic syringes.
Metcalf had resigned as ensign to take up the study and practice of medicine, but at the beginning of the war scare had returned to his first love, relinquishing a lucrative practice as eye-specialist to tender his services to the Government. And the Government had responded by ranking him with his class as junior lieutenant, and giving him the aforesaid command, which he was glad to be released from. But his classmates and brother officers had not respondedso promptly with their welcome, and Metcalf found himself combating a naval etiquette that was nearly as intolerant of him as of other appointees from civil life. It embittered him a little, but he pulled through; for he was a likable young fellow, with a cheery face and pleasant voice, and even the most hide-bound product of Annapolis could not long resist his personality. So he was not entirely barred out of official gossip and speculations, and soon had an opportunity to question some convalescents sent home from Honolulu. All told the same story and described the same symptoms, but one added an extra one. An itching and burning of the face had accompanied the attack, such as is produced by sunburn.
"And where were you that night when it came?" asked Metcalf, eagerly.
"On the bridge with the captain and watch-officers. It was all hands that night. We had made out a curious light to the north'ard, and were trying to find out what it was."
"What kind of a light?"
"Well, it was rather faint, and seemed to be about a mile away. Sometimes it looked red, then green, or yellow, or blue."
"And then it disappeared?"
"Yes, and though we steamed toward it with all the searchlights at work, we never found where it came from."
"What form did it take—a beam or a glow?"
"It wasn't a glow—radiation—and it didn't seem to be a beam. It was an occasional flash, and in this sense was like a radiation—that is, like the spokes of a wheel, each spoke with its own color. But that was at the beginning. In three hours none of us could have distinguished colors."
Metcalf soon had an opportunity to questionothers. The first batch of invalid officers arrived from Manila, and these, on being pressed, admitted that they had seen colored lights at the beginning of the night. These, Metcalf remarked, were watch-officers, whose business was to look for strange lights and investigate them. But one of them added this factor to the problem.
"And it was curious about Brainard, the most useless and utterly incompetent man ever graduated. He was so near-sighted that he couldn't see the end of his nose without glasses; but it was he that took the ship in, with the rest of us eating with our fingers and asking our way to the sick-bay."
"And Brainard wore his glasses that night?'" asked Metcalf.
"Yes; he couldn't see without them. It reminds me of Nydia, the blind girl who piloted a bunch out of Pompeii because she was used to the darkness. Still, Brainard is hardly a parallel."
"Were his glasses the ordinary kind, or pebbles?"
"Don't know. Which are the cheapest? That's the kind."
"The ordinary kind."
"Well, he had the ordinary kind—like himself. And he'll get special promotion. Oh, Lord! He'll be jumped up a dozen numbers."
"Well," said Metcalf, mysteriously, "perhaps not. Just wait."
Metcalf kept his counsel, and in two weeks there came Japan's declaration of war in a short curt note to the Powers at Washington. Next day the papers burned with news, cabledviaSt. Petersburg and London, of the sailing of the Japanese fleet from its home station, but for where was not given—in all probability either the Philippines or the Hawaiian Islands. But when, next day, a torpedo-boat came into San Francisco in command of the cook, withhis mess-boy at the wheel, conservatism went to the dogs, and bounties were offered for enlistment at the various navy-yards, while commissions were made out as fast as they could be signed, and given to any applicant who could even pretend to a knowledge of yachts. And Surgeon George Metcalf, with the rank of junior lieutenant, was ordered to the torpedo-boat above mentioned, and with him as executive officer a young graduate of the academy, Ensign Smith, who with the enthusiasm and courage of youth combined the mediocrity of inexperience and the full share of the service prejudice against civilians.
This prejudice remained in full force, unmodified by the desperate situation of the country; and the unstricken young officers filling subordinate positions on the big craft, while congratulating him, openly denied his moral right to a command that others had earned a better right to by remaining in the service; and the old jokes, jibes, and satirical references to syringes and sticking-plaster whirled about his head as he went to and fro, fitting out his boat and laying in supplies. And when they learned—from young Mr. Smith—that among these supplies was a large assortment of plain-glass spectacles, of no magnifying power whatever, the ridicule was unanimous and heartfelt; even the newspapers taking up the case from the old standpoint and admitting that the line ought to be drawn at lunatics and foolish people. But Lieutenant Metcalf smiled and went quietly ahead, asking for and receiving orders to scout.
He received them the more readily, as all the scouts in the squadron, including the torpedo-flotilla and two battle-ships, had come in with blinded crews. Their stories were the same—they had all seen the mysterious colored lights, had gone blind, and a few had felt the itching and tingling of sunburn. And the admiral gleaned one crew of whole men from thefleet, and with it manned his best ship, theDelaware.
Metcalf went to sea, and was no sooner outside the Golden Gate than he opened his case of spectacles, and scandalized all hands, even his executive officer, by stern and explicit orders to wear them night and day, putting on a pair himself as an example.
A few of the men attested good eyesight; but this made no difference, he explained. They were to wear them or take the consequences, and as the first man to take the consequences was Mr. Smith, whom he sent to his room for twenty-four hours for appearing on deck without them five minutes afterward, the men concluded that he was in earnest and obeyed the order, though with smiles and silent ridicule. Another explicit command they received more readily: to watch out for curious-looking craft, and for small objects such as floating casks, capsized tubs or boats, et cetera. And this brought results the day after the penitent Smith was released. They sighted a craft without spars steaming along on the horizon and ran down to her. She was a sealer, the skipper explained, when hailed, homeward bound under the auxiliary. She had been on fire, but the cause of the fire was a mystery. A few days before a strange-looking vessel had passed them, a mile away. She was a whaleback sort of a hull, with sloping ends, without spars or funnels, only a slim pole amidships, and near its base a projection that looked like a liner's crow's-nest. While they watched, their foremast burst into flames, and while they were rigging their hose the mainmast caught fire. Before this latter was well under way they noticed a round hole burnt deeply into the mast, of about four inches diameter. Next, the topsides caught fire, and they had barely saved their craft, letting their masts burn to do so.
"Was it a bright, sunshiny day?" asked Metcalf.
"Sure. Four days ago. He was heading about sou'west, and going slow."
"Anything happen to your eyesight?"
"Say—yes. One of my men's gone stone blind. Thinks he must have looked squarely at the sun when he thought he was looking at the fire up aloft."
"It wasn't the sun. Keep him in utter darkness for a week at least. He'll get well. What was your position when you met that fellow?"
"About six hundred miles due nor'west from here."
"All right. Look out for Japanese craft. War is declared."
Metcalf plotted a new course, designed to intercept that of the mysterious craft, and went on, so elated by the news he had heard that he took his gossipy young executive into his confidence.
"Mr. Smith," he said, "that sealer described one of the new seagoing submersibles of the Japanese, did he not?"
"Yes, sir, I think he did—a larger submarine, without any conning-tower and the old-fashioned periscope. They have seven thousand miles' cruising radius, enough to cross the Pacific."
By asking questions of various craft, and by diligent use of a telescope, Metcalf found his quarry three days later—a log-like object on the horizon, with the slim white pole amidships and the excrescence near its base.
"Wait till I get his bearing by compass," said Metcalf to his chief officer, "then we'll smoke up our specs and run down on him. Signal him by the International Code to put out his light, and to heave to, or we'll sink him."
Mr. Smith bowed to his superior, found the numbers of these commands in the code book, and with a string of small flags at the signal-yard, and every man aboard viewing the world darkly through asmoky film, the torpedo-boat approached the stranger at thirty knots. But there was no blinding glare of light in their eyes, and when they were within a hundred yards of the submersible, Metcalf removed his glasses for a moment's distinct vision. Head and shoulders out of a hatch near the tube was a man waving a white handkerchief. He rang the stopping bells.
"He surrenders, Mr. Smith," he said, joyously, "and without firing a torpedo!"
He examined the man through the telescope and laughed.
"I know him," he said. Then funneling his hands, he hailed:
"Do you surrender to the United States of America?"
"I surrender," answered the man. "I am helpless."
"Then come aboard without arms. I'll send a boat."
A small dinghy-like boat was dispatched, and it returned with the man, a Japanese in lieutenant's uniform, whose beady eyes twinkled in alarm as Metcalf greeted him.
"Well, Saiksi, you perfected it, didn't you?—my invisible searchlight, that I hadn't money to go on with."
The Jap's eyes sought the deck, then resumed their Asiatic steadiness.
"Metcalf—this you," he said, "in command? I investigated and heard you had resigned to become a doctor."
"But I came back to the service, Saiksi. Thanks to you and your light—my light, rather—I am in command here in place of men you blinded. Saiksi, you deserve no consideration from me, in spite of our rooming together at Annapolis. You took—Idon't say stole—my invention, and turned it against the country that educated you. You, or yourconfrères, did this before a declaration of war. You are a pirate, and I could string you up to my signal-yard and escape criticism."
"I was under orders from my superiors, Captain Metcalf."
"They shall answer to mine. You shall answer to me. How many boats have you equipped with my light?"
"There are but three. It is very expensive."
"One for our Philippine squadron, one for the Hawaiian, and one for the coast. You overdid things, Saiksi. If you hadn't set fire to that sealer the other day, I might not have found you. It was a senseless piece of work that did you no good. Oh, you are a sweet character! How do you get your ultraviolet rays—by filtration or prismatic dispersion?"
"By filtration."
"Saiksi, you're a liar as well as a thief. The colored lights you use to attract attention are the discarded rays of the spectrum. No wonder you investigated me before you dared flash such a decoy! Well, I'm back in the navy, and I've been investigating you. As soon as I heard of the first symptom of sunburn, I knew it was caused by the ultraviolet rays, the same as from the sun; and I knew that nothing but my light could produce those rays at night time. And as a physician I knew what I did not know as an inventor—the swift amblyopia that follows the impact of this light on the retina. As a physician, too, I can inform you that your country has not permanently blinded a single American seaman or officer. The effects wear off."
The Jap gazed stolidly before him while Metcalf delivered himself of this, but did not reply.
"Where is the Japanese fleet bound?" he asked, sternly.
"I do not know."
"And would not tell, whether you knew or not. But you said you were helpless. What has happened to you? You can tell that."
"A simple thing, Captain Metcalf. My supply of oil leaked away, and my engines must work slowly. Your signal was useless; I could not have turned on the light."
"You have answered the first question. You are far from home without a mother-ship, or she would have found you and furnished oil before this. You have come thus far expecting the fleet to follow and strike a helpless coast before your supplies ran out."
Again the Jap's eyes dropped in confusion, and Metcalf went on.
"I can refurnish your boat with oil, my engineer and my men can handle her, and I can easily learn to manipulate your—or shall I sayour—invisible searchlight. Hail your craft in English and order all hands on deck unarmed, ready for transshipment to this boat. I shall join your fleet myself."
A man was lounging in the hatchway of the submersible, and this man Saiksi hailed.
"Ae-hai, ae-hai, Matsu. We surrender. We are prisoner. Call up all men onto the deck. Leave arms behind. We are prisoner."
They mustered eighteen in all, and in half an hour they were ironed in a row along the stanchioned rail of the torpedo-boat.
"You, too, Saiksi," said Metcalf, coming toward him with a pair of jingling handcuffs.
"Is it not customary, Captain Metcalf," said the Jap, "to parole a surrendered commander?"
"Not the surrendered commander of a craft that uses new and deadly weapons of war unknown to heradversary, and before the declaration of war. Hold up your hands. You're going into irons with your men. All Japs look alike to me, now."
So Lieutenant Saiksi, of the Japanese navy, was ironed beside his cook and meekly sat down on the deck. With the difference of dress, they really did look alike.
Metcalf had thirty men in his crew. With the assistance of his engineer, a man of mechanics, he picked eighteen of this crew and took them and a barrel of oil aboard the submersible. Then for three days the two craft lay together, while the engineer and the men familiarized themselves with her internal economy—the torpedo-tubes, gasoline-engines, storage-batteries, and motors; and the vast system of pipes, valves, and wires that gave life and action to the boat—and while Metcalf experimented with the mysterious searchlight attached to the periscope tube invented by himself, but perfected by others. Part of his investigation extended into the night. Externally, the light resembled a huge cup about two feet in diameter, with a thick disk fitted around it in a vertical plane. This disk he removed; then, hailing Smith to rig his fire-hose and get off the deck, he descended the hatchway and turned on the light, viewing its effects through the periscope. This, be it known, is merely a perpendicular, non-magnifying telescope that, by means of a reflector at its upper end, gives a view of the seascape when a submarine boat is submerged. And in the eyepiece at its base Metcalf beheld a thin thread of light, of such dazzling brilliancy as to momentarily blind him, stretch over the sea; but he put on his smoked glasses and turned the apparatus, tube and all, until the thin pencil of light touched the end of the torpedo-boat's signal-yard. He did not need to bring the two-inch beam to a focus; it burst into flame and he quicklyshut off the light and shouted to Smith to put out the fire—which Smith promptly did, with open comment to his handful of men on this destruction of Government property.
"Good enough!" he said to Smith, when next they met. "Now if I'm any good I'll give the Japs a taste of their own medicine."
"Take me along, captain," burst out Smith in sudden surrender. "I don't understand all this, but I want to be in it."
"No, Mr. Smith. The chief might do your work, but I doubt that you could do his. I need him; so you can take the prisoners home. You will undoubtedly retain command."
"Very good, sir," answered the disappointed youngster, trying to conceal his chagrin.
"I don't want you to feel badly about it. I know how you all felt toward me. But I'm on a roving commission. I have no wireless apparatus and no definite instructions. I've been lampooned and ridiculed in the papers, and I'm going to give them my answer—that is, as I said, if I'm any good. If I'm not I'll be sunk."
So when the engineer had announced his mastery of his part of the problem, and that there was enough of gasoline to cruise for two weeks longer, Smith departed with the torpedo-boat, and Metcalf began his search for the expected fleet.
It was more by good luck than by any possible calculation that Metcalf finally found the fleet. A steamer out of San Francisco reported that it had not been heard from, and one bound in from Honolulu said that it was not far behind—in fact had sent a shot or two. Metcalf shut off gasoline, waited a day, and saw the smoke on the horizon. Then he submerged to the awash condition, which in this boat just floated the searchlight out of water; and thusbalanced, neither floating nor sinking nor rolling, but rising and falling with the long pulsing of the ground-swell, he watched through the periscope the approach of the enemy.
It was an impressive spectacle, and to a citizen of a threatened country a disquieting one. Nine high-sided battle-ships of ten-gun type—nine floating forts, each one, unopposed, able to reduce to smoking ruin a city out of sight of its gunners; each one impregnable to the shell fire of any fortification in the world, and to the impact of the heaviest torpedo yet constructed—they came silently along in line-ahead formation, like Indians on a trail. There were no compromises in this fleet. Like the intermediate batteries of the ships themselves, cruisers had been eliminated and it consisted of extremes, battle-ships, and torpedo-boats, the latter far to the rear. But between the two were half a dozen colliers, repair, and supply ships.
Night came down before they were near enough for operations, and Metcalf turned on his invisible light, expanding the beam to embrace the fleet in its light, and moved the boat to a position about a mile away from its path. It was a weird picture now showing in the periscope: each gray ship a bluish-green against a background of black marked here and there by the green crest of a breaking sea. Within Metcalf's reach were the levers, cranks, and worms that governed the action of the periscope and the light; just before him were the vertical and horizontal steering-wheels; under these a self-illuminating compass, and at his ear a system of push-buttons, speaking-tubes, and telegraph-dials that put him in communication with every man on the boat, each one of whom had his part to play at the proper moment, but not one of whom could see or know the result. The work to be done was in Metcalf's hands andbrain, and, considering its potentiality, it was a most undramatic performance.
He waited until the leading flag-ship was within half a mile of being abreast; then, turning on a hanging electric bulb, he held it close to the eyepiece of the periscope, knowing that the light would go up the tube through the lenses and be visible to the fleet. And in a moment he heard faintly through the steel walls the sound transmitted by the sea of a bugle-call to quarters. He shut off the bulb, watched a wandering shaft of light from the flag-ship seeking him, then contracted his own invisible beam to a diameter of about three feet, to fall upon the flag-ship, and played it back and forth, seeking gun ports and apertures and groups of men, painting all with that blinding light that they could not see, nor immediately sense. There was nothing to indicate that he had succeeded; the faces of the different groups were still turned his way, and the futile searchlight still wandered around, unable to bring to their view the white tube with its cup-like base.
Still waving the wandering beam of white light, the flag-ship passed on, bringing along the second in line, and again Metcalf turned on his bulb. He heard her bugle-call, and saw, in varied shades of green, the twinkling red and blue lights of her masthead signals, received from the flag-ship and passed down the line. And again he played that green disk of deadly light upon the faces of her crew. This ship, too, was seeking him with her searchlight, and soon, from the whole nine, a moving network of brilliant beams flashed and scintillated across the sky; but not one settled upon the cause of their disquiet.
Ship after ship passed on, each with its bugle-call to quarters, each with its muster of all hands to meet the unknown emergency—the menace on a hostile coast of a faint white light on the port beam—butnot one firing a shot or shell; there was nothing to fire at. And with the passing of the last of the nine Metcalf listened to a snapping and a buzzing overhead that told of the burning out of the carbons in the light.