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XXXVII. HIS GREAT HOUR
Saturday night at eight o'clock.
So the fiat had gone forth, with no concession to be made on account ofweather.
As Oswald came from his supper and took a look at the heavens from thesmall front porch, he was deeply troubled that Orlando had remained soobstinate on this point. For there were ominous clouds rolling up fromthe east, and the storms in this region of high mountains and abruptvalleys were not light, nor without danger even to those with feet wellplanted upon mother earth.
If the tempest should come up before eight!
Mr. Challoner, who, from some mysterious impulse of bravado on the partof Brotherson, was to be allowed to make the third in this small band ofspectators, was equally concerned at this sight, but not for Brotherson.His fears were for Oswald, whose slowly gathering strength could illybear the strain which this additional anxiety for his brother's lifemust impose upon him. As for Doris, she was in a state of excitementmore connected with the past than with the future. That afternoon shehad laid her hand in that of Orlando Brotherson, and wished him well.She! in whose breast still lingered reminiscences of those old doubtswhich had beclouded his image for her at their first meeting. She hadnot been able to avoid it. His look was a compelling one, and it haddemanded thus much from her; and--a terrible thought to her gentlespirit--he might be going to his death!
It had been settled by the prospective aviator that they were to watchfor the ascent from the mouth of the grassy road leading in to thehangar. The three were to meet there at a quarter to eight and awaitthe stroke and the air-cars rise. That time was near, and Mr. Challoner,catching a glimpse of Oswald's pallid and unnaturally drawn features, ashe set down the lantern he carried, shuddered with foreboding and wishedthe hour passed.
Doris' watchful glance never left the face whose lightest change wasmore to her than all Orlando's hopes. But the result upon her was not toweaken her resolution, but to strengthen it. Whatever the outcome of thenext few minutes, she must stand ready to sustain her invalid throughit. That the darkness of early evening had deepened to oppression, wasunnoticed for the moment. The fears of an hour past had been forgotten.Their attention was too absorbed in what was going on before them, foreven a glance overhead.
Suddenly Mr. Challoner spoke.
"Who is the man whom Mr. Brotherson has asked to go up with him?"
It was Oswald who answered.
"He has never told me. He has kept his own counsel about that as abouteverything else connected with this matter. He simply advised me that Iwas not to bother about him any more; that he had found the assistant hewanted."
"Such reticence seems unpardonable. You have--displayed great patience,Oswald."
"Because I understand Orlando. He reads men's natures like a book. Theman he trusts, we may trust. To-morrow, he will speak openly enough. Allcause for reticence will be gone."
"You have confidence then in the success of this undertaking?"
"If I hadn't, I should not be here. I could hardly bear to witness hisfailure, even in a secret test like this. I should find it too hard toface him afterwards."
"I don't understand."
"Orlando has great pride. If this enterprise fails I cannot answer forhim. He would be capable of anything. Why, Doris! what is the matter,child? I never saw you look like that before."
She had been down on her knees regulating the lantern, and the suddenflame, shooting up, had shown him her face turned up towards his in anapprehension which verged on horror.
"Do I look frightened?" she asked, remembering herself and lightlyrising. "I believe that I am a little frightened. If--if anything shouldgo wrong! If an accident-" But here she remembered herself again andquickly changed her tone. "But your confidence shall be mine. Iwill believe in his good angel or--or in his self-command and greatresolution. I'll not be frightened any more."
But Oswald did not seem satisfied. He continued to look at her in vagueconcern.
He hardly knew what to make of the intense feeling she had manifested.Had Orlando touched her girlish heart? Had this cold-blooded nature,with its steel-like brilliancy and honourable but stern views of life,moved this warm and sympathetic soul to more than admiration? Thethought disturbed him so he forgot the nearness of the moment they wereall awaiting till a quick rasping sound from the hangar, followed by thesudden appearance of an ever-widening band of light about its upper rim,drew his attention and awakened them all to a breathless expectation.
The lid was rising. Now it was half-way up, and now, for the first time,it was lifted to its full height and stood a broad oval disc against thebackground of the forest. The effect was strange. The hangar had beenmade brilliant by many lamps, and their united glare pouring from itstop and illuminating not only the surrounding treetops but the broadface of this uplifted disc, roused in the awed spectator a thrill suchas in mythological times might have greeted the sudden sight of Vulcan'ssmithy blazing on Olympian hills. But the clang of iron on iron wouldhave attended the flash and gleam of those unexpected fires, and hereall was still save for that steady throb never heard in Olympus or thehalls of Valhalla, the pant of the motor eager for flight in the upperair.
As they listened in a trance of burning hope which obliterated all else,this noise and all others near and distant, was suddenly lost in a loudclatter of writhing and twisting boughs which set the forest in a roarand seemed to heave the air about them.
A wind had swooped down from the east, bending everything before it andrattling the huge oval on which their eyes were fixed as though it wouldtear it from its hinges.
The three caught at each other's hands in dismay. The storm had comejust on the verge of the enterprise, and no one might guess the result.
"Will he dare? Will he dare?" whispered Doris, and Oswald answered,though it seemed next to impossible that he could have heard her:
"He will dare. But will he survive it? Mr. Challoner," he suddenlyshouted in that gentleman's ear, "what time is it now?"
Mr. Challoner, disengaging himself from their mutual grasp, knelt downby the lantern to consult his watch.
"One minute to eight," he shouted back.
The forest was now a pandemonium. Great boughs, split from their parenttrunks, fell crashing to the ground in all directions. The scream ofthe wind roused echoes which repeated themselves, here, there andeverywhere. No rain had fallen yet, but the sight of the cloudsskurrying pell-mell through the glare thrown up from the shed, createdsuch havoc in the already overstrained minds of the three onlookers,that they hardly heeded, when with a clatter and crash which at anothertime would have startled them into flight, the swaying oval before themwas whirled from its hinges and thrown back against the trees alreadybending under the onslaught of the tempest. Destruction seemed thenatural accompaniment of the moment, and the only prayer which sprang toOswald's lips was that the motor whose throb yet lingered in their bloodthough no longer taken in by the ear, would either refuse to work orprove insufficient to lift the heavy car into this seething tumult ofwarring forces. His brother's life hung in the balance against his fame,and he could not but choose life for him. Yet, as the multitudinoussounds about him yielded for a moment to that brother's shout, and heknew that the moment had come, which would soon settle all, hefound himself staring at the elliptical edge of the hangar, with ananticipation which held in it as much terror as joy, for the end of agreat hope or the beginning of a great triumph was compressed into thistrembling instant and if--
Great God! he sees it! They all see it! Plainly against that portionof the disc which still lifted itself above the further wall, a curiousmoving mass appears, lengthens, takes on shape, then shoots suddenlyaloft, clearing the encircling tops of the bending, twisting andtormented trees, straight into the heart of the gale, where for onebreathless moment it whirls madly about like a thing distraught, thenin slow but triumphant obedience to the master hand that guides it,steadies and mounts majestically upward till it is lost to their view inthe depths of impenetrable da
rkness.
Orlando Brotherson has accomplished his task. He has invented amechanism which can send an air-car straight up from its mooring place.As the three watchers realise this, Oswald utters a cry of triumph,and Doris throws herself into Mr. Challoner's arms. Then they all standtransfixed again, waiting for a descent which may never come.
But hark! a new sound, mingling its clatter with all the others. It isthe rain. Quick, maddening, drenching, it comes; enveloping them in wetin a moment. Can they hold their faces up against it?
And the wind! Surely it must toss that aerial messenger before it andfling it back to earth, a broken and despised toy.
"Orlando?" went up in a shriek. "Orlando?" Oh, for a ray of light inthose far-off heavens For a lull in the tremendous sounds shivering theheavens and shaking the earth! But the tempest rages on, and they canonly wait, five minutes, ten minutes, looking, hoping, fearing, withoutthought of self and almost without thought of each other, till suddenlyas it had come, the rain ceases and the wind, with one final wail ofrage and defeat, rushes away into the west, leaving behind it a suddensilence which, to their terrified hearts, seems almost more dreadful tobear than the accumulated noises of the moment just gone.
Orlando was in that shout of natural forces, but he is not in thisstillness. They look aloft, but the heavens are void. Emptiness is wherelife was. Oswald begins to sway, and Doris, remembering him now andhim only, has thrown her strong young arm about him, when--What is thissound they hear high up, high up, in the rapidly clearing vault of theheavens! A throb--a steady pant,--drawing near and yet nearer,--enteringthe circlet of great branches over their heads--descending, slowlydescending,--till they catch another glimpse of those hazy outlineswhich had no sooner taken shape than the car disappeared from theirsight within the elliptical wall open to receive it.
It had survived the gale! It has re-entered its haven, and that, too,without colliding with aught around or any shock to those within, justas Orlando had promised; and the world was henceforth his! Hail toOrlando Brotherson!
Oswald could hardly restrain his mad joy and enthusiasm. Bounding to thedoor separating him from this conqueror of almost invincible forces, hepounded it with impatient fist.
"Let me in!" he cried. "You've done the trick, Orlando, you've done thetrick."
"Yes, I have satisfied myself," came back in studied self-controlfrom the other side of the door; and with a quick turning of the lock,Orlando stood before them.
They never forgot him as he looked at that moment. He was drenched,battered, palpitating with excitement; but the majesty of success was inhis eye and in the bearing of his incomparable figure.
As Oswald bounded towards him, he reached out his hand, but his glancewas for Doris.
"Yes," he went on, in tones of suppressed elation, "there's no flaw inmy triumph. I have done all that I set out to do. Now--"
Why did he stop and look hurriedly back into the hangar? He hadremembered Sweetwater. Sweetwater, who at that moment was steppingcarefully from his seat in some remote portion of the car. The triumphwas not complete. He had meant--
But there his thought stopped. Nothing of evil, nothing even of regretshould mar his great hour. He was a conqueror, and it was for him now toreap the joy of conquest.