by Dora Benley
"If you fled from Yellowstone in any direction you would probably not survive its eruption unless you had made special arrangements ahead of time to be airlifted out of here," Dr. Geisling warned as he pointed at the map. "Your timing would have to be all too perfect. As soon as you saw Old Faithful kicking up ash by the tons, it would be way too late. And even if you got a headstart by plane, you would have to fly in the right direction. If you headed to California," he pointed in that direction on the map, "you would still be engulfed by ash. If you headed towards Arizona," he pointed at that state, "too bad for you! The radius of the eruption would be at least one thousand miles of pure destruction in every direction imaginable. He made a huge circle around the map. "You would have to plan to fly beyond Wisconsin Dells," he found it on the map, "to even begin to be safe. You would have to reach Chicago," he pointed at that city, "and places east of that to be sure to escape the wrath of the mighty Old Faithful volcano. And even then depending on the time of year and the vagaries of the weather you could have skies in the Eastern United States blackened by ash for months afterwards," he made a sweep along the East Coast of the United States. "It sounds as if unlike the mighty Roman Empire back in 79 AD, the United States might not even survive such an eruption."
"I see!" Edward flung out his arms on either side. "Germany would reign supreme across the vast Atlantic Ocean. Great Britain would no longer be able to rely on her allies in North America for her defense against Hitler and his plans for world domination. If the citizens of Great Britain realize that Hitler had anything to do with the demise of the United States in a plume of ash, well then they will be so frightened about his Zeus-like powers that they will sue for peace at any cost and will do exactly as Adolf Hitler wishes. Is that your plot?" he confronted them. "World domination through volcanic tricks?"
Frau von Wessel broke into radiant smiles. "Exactly!" She started to clap. Her husband took up clapping along with her.
Dr. Geisling added, "And if Yellowstone imitates Vesuvius on a grander scale which I think it will, there is not just ash, rock, and pumice to worry about. After hours of erupting ash and making it fall everywhere around several feet deep, there will be a hot mudslide of the type that engulfed Herculaneum. We do not know and cannot guess as well just how far that mudslide will extend. But it will not be good news. That is for certain."
Dora thought this conversation has gotten way out of hand. It was beginning to take on a certain nightmarish intensity all its own.
Edward suddenly raised his hands to clap. He stood there clapping alone. Dora was confused if she should clap, too, and join her fiance. "Marvelous performance if you were trying to scare us. Just like King Kong the last time we ran into you in Chicago. Bravo! I am sure you would have kow-towed anyone else. But I am afraid I am all too accustomed to dealing with Herr Hitler and his low, base tactics. Try out your games on somebody else. Leave us alone."
"You shall live to regret your decision!" Frau von Wessel predicted as Herr von Wessel, Dr. Geisling, and the Medusa-like creature turned away from the wooden map and started to march off towards the geyser.
Dora and Edward were left standing there all alone in the Old Faithful Lodge. Just at that moment Old Faithful Geyser started to erupt. Dora felt the thunder underneath her feet and turned to gape at it for a few seconds of uninterrupted terror. She could not get out of her mind what the von Wessels had threatened. Steam was starting to erupt just as Geisling had predicted and as was predicted on the park bulletin board. Now it was pouring from the vent and rising higher and higher into the sky in a giant plume. It was supposed to be a national park wonder. But now it could be the end of the world as they knew it instead.
It might be late in the evening but Dora and Edward could not retire to bed the way the other Yellowstone Park visitors must be doing right now. Edward led Dora out of the restaurant and paced about their cabin wondering what they should do next.
"Those bastards cannot be allowed to get away with this!" he thundered. He hit the timbered wall with his fist. "They catch me right when I have nobody to help me. Churchill was supposed to send a third agent, but he must have gotten captured and killed again. Otherwise we would obviously have made the transfer of the maps by now. Then we would be on our way. I doubt if the von Wessels and their attendant creeps would stick around if we were not here to torment."
Dora had to agree. The von Wessels and Hitler delighted in torturing them. They had recruited Michael's goons as well as the two other spies from Gettysburg to help them to create the worst possible atmosphere.
"I suppose we could just leave the park and contact Churchill later telling him what happened and why we left in such a hurry." Edward ran his hand through his blond hair now starting to go gray. "But I think I should pick his mind one more time before we go."
It might be late in the evening but Edward insisted on going up to the front desk at the Old Faithful Lodge and giving them another telegram to send. He recruited the same boy to pick up the message at Park Headquarters at Mammoth. He did not want the reply posted for public view, which was what the park might do otherwise.
They fell asleep that night lying in bed talking about what the von Wessels had threatened along with Dr. Geisling at their right hand. They gyrated about in bed and tried to make love if only in defiance of Hitler and his helpers. But they were obviously not in the mood.
Dora gazed out the cabin window at the foot of their bed and wondered if there was any sanity left in the world these days. King Kong seemed to be the order of the day along with colossal bad guys like Hitler threatening everybody and the world order.
"Hitler likes to use psychological warfare," Edward postulated as he lay there beside her. "He wants to make us so fearful that we become paralyzed and give in to everything he wants."
Dora shrugged. "That is what the new President just said. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Maybe he meant Hitler."
"Maybe so," Edward sighed. "I don't think he meant Hoover, though he was not very effective as a President and not very lucky either. It was at the very end of his administration that Hitler took office. I don't know what could be more unlucky than that. Though what could you Americans do way over here across the Atlantic if the British PM and his Government refuse to act?" Edward threw out his hands though he was still lying in bed. He propped himself up on one elbow. "It was more Britain's fault obviously. But all that is neither here nor there. We have to figure out what the bastards are up to if anything at all except intimidating us. Remember, they kept on threatening us with a push without ever specifying exactly what that means."
Knock! Knock! Knock!
Dora started up, clutching the covers to herself. Edward leaped out of bed fully dressed and answered the door.
It was the boy returning with a short telegram from Winston, of course. Edward tipped him. Dora peered over Edward's shoulder as he turned on the light and sat on the edge of the bed reading it. The telegram was cryptic and deliberately mysterious. All it said was: "My reply will be more devastating to Hitler than any volcano will be to us and to our cause."
Edward shook his head and sighed. "Who knows what Winston means by that?"
"I guess we will find out," Dora groaned as she glanced out the window at the geyser erupting in the darkness.
"That is Winston for you. He wants to keep everybody guessing," Edward agreed.
Edward flicked off the light. Dora grudgingly yanked the covers over herself and went back to sleep.
Chapter 32: A Visitor In The Night
Dora spent a lot of time staring at the ceiling and listening to Edward toss and turn. But when she at last closed her eyes it seemed as if she was no longer in bed. She was back on the highway involved in still another high speed chase with the von Wessels and their agents. In her dream she and Edward were fleeing the park in their blue Cadillac V 16. They had just turned off the road leading up to the East Entranc
e Drive and Sylvan Pass. They were driving south through Wyoming and linking up to the Lincoln Highway.
Suddenly behind them a huge gray cloud appeared in the sky. It was sunny and clear ahead. The big blue, sunny sky opened up beckoning them with both arms and crying, "Come!" She could hear it speak in her sleep as if it had a voice of its own.
The clouds were getting bigger and more ominous behind them.
"Edward, hurry up!" Dora cried. "They are catching up to us."
Edward floored it. The Cadillac leaped ahead. But it was doing only about sixty or seventy miles per hour. The clouds must be moving faster. They were overtaking them. Suddenly the clouds of gray smoke and ash were directly overhead raining down ash upon their car.
"Edward!" Dora screamed. "We are going to be buried alive. It really is just like Pompeii." She seemed to be reliving her visit to the archaeological ruin as a cruise passenger on a shore excursion as well as the research paper she had done on the last days of the doomed Roman city.
Edward floored it. They seemed to pull ahead of the pall of ash. Hundreds of miles later she thought they had finally escaped the clouds of black soot. They arrived in Pittsburgh and then Bethel Boro, though the streets did seem strangely deserted.
"Viola!" Dora cried as she slammed the Cadillac's door shut. She raced up the front stairs to greet her favorite maid as soon as they pulled into her old driveway at 3121 Bethel Church Road. Edward was right behind her. She recalled how they had escaped all those scenes of devastation and destruction farther west wreaked by the volcano.
She wondered why the good, old, familiar maid was not waiting for her. It troubled her. She threw open the door to the entrance hall to that telltale, all too familiar, sulfurous stench.
Dora thought, Oh no!
She raced inside but was instantly stopped by a pile of ash two feet high. She and Edward slogged from room to room, tramping through the ash the way you might tramp through a snow drift calling "Viola!" with still no answer. She finally reached the kitchen. There stood the maid with her hand on the burner turning it on.
"Viola?" Dora asked.
The lady could not move. She was frozen in place. In fact when Dora touched her it did not feel like the maid anymore. There was no flesh left, only a hardened plaster cast of what had once been her old friend and second mother. Dora heard Frau von Wessel remark from somewhere in the recesses of her mind, "Have you ever heard of Vesuvius?" Why it was just like the victims of the 79AD eruption! Viola had been turned to stone and preserved for all eternity!
Dora and Edward slogged through the ash around the house and up the stairs. The second floor was no better than the first. They came to her parents' bedroom. Dora flung open the door only to find both Winthrop Benley and Etta May sleeping there. She rushed to greet them. But their skin was as hard as plaster, too, just like Viola. The Yellowstone volcano had turned both her parents to stone!
She thought, I am getting out of here! It must be only a dream! Things like this just do not happen in reality.
She struggled to awaken. She fought with her eyelids. She pulled them up. They shut again, plunging her back into the dark nightmare world. The whole time she started to hear loud laughter that grew louder and more demonic all the time. First it was that woman, that creature, Frau von Wessel, chortling with glee. Next her husband, the evil Herr von Wessel, laughed and snickered. And finally, louder than all the rest, she heard the demonic guffaw of Adolf Hitler himself. His face, that she had once seen in person back at the Hofbrauhaus in Munich in 1923 grew larger than life. She saw King Kong again only this time he had the face of Adolf Hitler, the new Chancellor of Germany. With his ape-like paw he reached for her just as she was waking up.
The last thing she heard the ape say was to shout, "Heil Hitler!" just as she finally succeeded in opening her eyes and sitting up in bed.
Dora found herself back in bed at the Old Faithful Lodge in her cabin next to Edward. She had in actuality been nowhere else all night long. Edward was sleeping fitfully. He continued to moan, groan, and thrash from side to side. Despite her nightmare, everything here was dead silent.
Dora suddenly became aware of some sort of sound outside their cabin. She went to the window and peered out. She immediately picked out what resembled a head light some yards ahead on the boardwalk next to the Old Faithful Geyser. This is where they has stood yesterday evening before dark with the von Wessels and Dr. Geisling.
What was going on?
Dora immediately awakened Edward. She had to shake him a little to get him to stop his moaning, groaning, and thrashing from side to side. It sounded as if his nightmare must be worse than her own.
"What is it?" He sat up, immediately alert. He had continued his practice of sleeping without changing his clothes to be always ready for action.
She had imitated him tonight and had started on this trip to sleep in her clothes herself. Gone were the days of negligees and frilly nightgowns. Besides, she had not had a chance to pack any to take with her on her very unexpected trip across the United States.
Dora pointed out the window. "There is a light shining on the boardwalk next to the geyser," she said. "It looks big enough to be the headlight from some sort of vehicle, doesn't it?"
He nodded. At this point the headlights started to flash. It seemed that something suspicious must be going on. Dora assumed this could not be normal for Yellowstone National Park in the middle of the night in June.
Edward tried to crank open the window to listen. But the window would not open. He went to the door to the cabin and cautiously cracked it just a little and just enough to hear what was going on. Dora put her ear to the door also. Why, it was the voice of Frau von Wessel above the sound of the vehicle's motor!
"The dynamite is supposed to arrive via the East Entrance Drive any time now. It is all arranged," she told the truck driver in a low voice but her voice carried on the still night air with only the sound of insects and a few night owls to interrupt it.
Dora thought, Oh, no, they really are going to try to make the volcano explode! All her recent nightmares rushed back upon her.
"This is a particularly potent explosive," Herr von Wessel's voice could be heard bragging. "We had it made specially by a firm in Chicago that deals with explosives for unusual situations."
Dora thought of all the stories she had heard about wild and lawless Chicago with the likes of infamous gangsters such as Al Capone. No doubt they used explosives for illegal purposes, too. But custom explosives she would never have thought of!
"I am supposed to dump it over there?" the truck driver asked.
"Yes, and once you throw it all in the geyser cone, we will detonate it from a safe distance," Frau von Wessel promised. "Just throw it down and leave. You do not want to hang around here. It will become very dangerous at the Old Faithful Geyser Area very soon."
"I do not care if the job is dangerous or not," the truck driver said. "I need the money badly."
Dora thought, Of course! The Depression again! Everybody needs money.
"Here is the final payment we promised," Herr von Wessel must have handed the man cash. "The money has been advanced by the new Chancellor of Germany. He is very grateful for your cooperation."
"It is enough money for me to retire on," the truck driver said. "I will go get that dynamite right now. Another truck is waiting for me at the East Entrance in the mountains. I will be back as soon as I can." He leaped into his truck and drove off supposedly towards the East Entrance.
Edward quietly shut the door. "Damn it! And here we are trapped like rats."
"Edward," she gripped his arm. "I think we ought to just get out of here right now." She did not want to have to tell him about the details of her nightmare. He would think she was silly. But she sensed that it was coming true in front of her very eyes.
No sooner did she express her premonitions than there was a knock o
n their cabin door. Dora froze. Could it be the von Wessels? Had she and Edward been spotted from yards away in the dark? Had the German agents been keeping watch on their cabin in case there was trouble? Had they detected the door opening despite the fact that they did not have the lights on inside the room?
There was no spy hole on the door to check who was there before opening it. Edward bravely asked, "Who is it?"
"I am fresh from London sent here in the nick of time by our mutual acquaintance, the MP Winston Churchill, " came the prompt reply in a distinct upper class British accent. The man's voice projected an aura of brash confidence that seemed at odds with the danger of the situation and the explosive nature of the super volcano.
She and Edward exchanged glances. Was this what Churchill meant last night with his cryptic telegram saying he had already sent his reply, the reply that was going to be more dangerous to Hitler than the supervolcano was to them?
Edward opened the door a crack again, peered out, smiled, and then swung it wide open.
"Why, Professor Lindemann, this is a surprise!" Edward exclaimed, looking the man with the receding hairline and the moustache up and down as he shook his hand heartily.
Lindemann advanced into the cabin in his business suit and hat. Edward shut the door behind him and pulled up a chair. Lindemann shook Dora's hand, too. Edward said, "I cannot tell you how glad I am to see you. We are caught in the midst of a plot of what seems epic proportions," he warned Lindemann. "Potentially the most dangerous one I have ever been involved in."
Lindemann did not look surprised in his impeccable striped suit. "Yes, Winston filled me in on all the details days ago before I left Southampton to come here. He said he had sent two other agents before me to get the maps from you and take them back to England, but he was beginning to fear that they were not up to the job. I believe there might have been a murder or two?" He acted as if that sort of danger of getting bumped off in the line of duty did not concern him at all. It was all part of the job. He was unflappable the way Winston himself was unflappable, which was probably why the two were best friends and comrades. Lindemann, or the "Prof", was Winston's scientific friend and advisor. He was a physics professor from Oxford.