The Golden Age of Science Fiction Novels Vol 05

by Anthology

  For nearly half an hour he watched with interest that fast intensified into anxiety as nothing further happened. The Gigantic had slowed down, and he could see from the moving lights on her deck that she was getting her own guns ready for action. The cruiser, after picking up the crews of the sinking torpedo-boats, had overtaken her and exchanged signals with her, and the other members of the flotilla were rapidly coming up astern.

  Still cursing the lack of weapons which made him a helpless spectator of the drama which had already become a tragedy, he was just beginning to fear that the war-ship's broadside had blown the Destroyer out of the water, when he saw a quick pale flash to the northward, followed by the outburst of a sphere of brilliant flame on the cruiser's deck. By the momentary blaze of light he saw human forms hurled in all directions prone on her upper deck. Then came, almost immediately afterwards, the short, sharp bang of the explosion. Then long streams of flame burst out from her side and the roar of a second broadside mounted to his ears. Hardly had it died away than another pale flash gleamed out from the northward, fully a thousand yards from where the first had shown, and a moment later a second shell burst on the cruiser's deck, this time square between her funnels.

  "Bravo, friend Franz!" cried Max in his conning-tower; "they haven't hit you yet, and you've hit them twice. That's something like shooting! There goes another broadside. Missed him again, of course. Who could hit a thing they can't see and which doesn't stop in the same place two seconds together? Fancy the little Destroyer tackling a big cruiser and a couple of torpedo-boats like that. It's just the sort of daring that commands success.

  "Ha! there's the other fellow coming into action. They'll try to head him off between them, I suppose. I wonder what the other two torpedo-boats are up to. Ah, there they are, running out to the northward full speed, with the flames showing a yard above their funnels. Good to shoot at, that, I should think; and Franz hasn't shown a light or a spark of flame yet except from his guns.

  "Ah, there he is again! That second cruiser's searchlight just got him for an instant. C¾sar, what a speed he's going at! Forty knots if it's a yard. Another broadside - blaze away, mes amis, you're only firing into the sea. Hullo, what's that? One of the torpedo-boats gone. He's rammed her, I suppose. Only one lot of flames now. Bang - there goes the other one. Blown her clean out of the water.

  "I wonder what those shells of Franz's are. He doesn't need to strike twice with them, anyhow. I'd give something for a handy gun and a few of them up here. Wouldn't I give those two cruisers fits, firing down on their deck without their being able to send a shot back! Yes, that'll be something like business when we can do that. I wonder what he's up to now. Vanished again. He's picked his night well with this haze; those searchlights don't show anything half a mile off; and that gun of his carries a good two miles.

  "Ha! there he is again, south of them now. He's sailed half round them while they've been wondering where he was. That was a nasty one for cruiser number two. Smashed up her forward funnel, as far as I can see. That'll knock a knot or two off her speed. I'll be hanged if I don't think he'll smash the pair of them up before daylight.

  "There goes a torpedo home at last," cried Max in a tone of savage exultation, as a dull roar came up from the surface of the water, and the few remaining lights of the first cruiser swerved slowly to one side, and then one by one disappeared. That was all he saw, but it meant a tragedy in which five hundred gallant fellows lost their lives in the space of a few minutes, most of them drowned like rats in a trap, as the great ship went down nearly broken in two by the explosion of the terrible missile which had come out of the darkness to strike its irresistible blow.

  The second cruiser was now near enough to see the catastrophe that had overwhelmed her unhappy consort. Her searchlights were instantly concentrated in a broad fan of light which overspread the area of swirling eddies sprinkled with life-buoys, hen-coops, overturned boats, and odds and ends of flotsam and scores of struggling forms of men making a last struggle for life.

  In two minutes her boats were in the water and pulling hard on their errand of mercy. But here they had reckoned without the pitiless ferocity of their invisible assailant. This was just the opportunity that the pirates had counted on to enable them to complete their triumph in the strangely unequal battle in which speed, cunning, and dexterity had so hopelessly outmatched a force apparently so vastly superior.

  No sooner did the searchlights betray the position of the second cruiser, than shell after shell came up out of the darkness, never twice from the same point of the compass, and burst in her upper works, shattering her projectors, and spreading death and ruin about her decks. So rapidly did they come, and so widely distant were the points of fire, that it seemed as though the pirates numbered three or four instead of only one vessel. Before the work of rescue was nearly accomplished, the cruiser had been put into total darkness, and was unable to show a single ray of light that would have enabled her crew to guard against the last deadly assault that was now inevitable.

  Rashly enough, the American liner began to use her projector, in the hope of picking up the pirate and making it possible to pour the united fire of the five vessels on her, but, the moment the electric ray gleamed out, a shell, fired almost at right angles to the beam, pierced her thin plates and exploded, as ill-luck would have it, in her engine-room, and burst the steam-pipe of her starboard engine. A moment later a hail of six-ounce shot from a machine gun crumpled up her projector, and the other boats, taking the hint, abstained from showing their lights.

  It was hard, but it was necessary. Armed and all as they were, it was quite impossible for the liners to fight under the circumstances. The captain of each of them was responsible for more than a thousand lives, and the unseen enemy had by this time conclusively proved that he could sink them one by one without giving them a chance to retaliate. All they could do was to wait, and hope that the morning would bring help that would compel the retreat of the pirate before he had accomplished the work of plunder that would begin as soon as the last cruiser was disposed of.

  To run for it was out of the question. The first one that attempted that would be crippled before she had steamed a mile. What was the good of twenty-five knots against thirty-five or perhaps forty?

  As soon as she had administered her warning to the American boat, the Destroyer took a wide circuit round the now almost disabled cruiser, which she was able to locate by the light of the lanterns that she was obliged to show for the guidance of her boats, and then, stealing up to within half a mile of her on the opposite side, turned round, backed slowly up for another hundred yards or so, and deliberately discharged her two stern torpedoes at her.

  The aim was carefully taken, and both the missiles took effect, one under the quarter and the other under the side. The roar of the combined explosions told those in the boats and on board the liners that the last fatal blow had been struck, and that the four big ships, with all the lives and treasure on board of them, now lay practically at the mercy of the pirates.

  "Splendidly fought, mon brave Franz!" exclaimed Max, as the sorely-stricken war-ship literally doubled up and went down like a mass of iron plunged into the water. "That ends the fighting part of the business, I should think. Now I fancy I can do something for you. A little timely bravado will make those four liners deliver themselves into our hands as tamely as though they hadn't a gun on board."

  Five minutes after he had said this to himself, the officers and crew of the Gigantic - all the passengers had of course been sent below long ago - were almost paralysed with amazement, not altogether unmixed with fear, by the apparition of a huge floating shape which suddenly dropped from the clouds and darkness over their heads and flashed a blinding, dazzling ray of light down on her deck. It moved to and fro for a moment or two, and then stopped over the bridge on which the bewildered captain was standing, staring upwards, in the midst of a group of his equally bewildered officers.

  "Steam to the northward, and signal to y
our consorts to do the same at ten knots. Quick, or I'll sink you where you lie. Do as I tell, and every life shall be spared, and when we've done with you, you shall go in peace."

  "Who in Heaven's name are you, and what do you want with us?" almost gasped the captain.

  "This is the aerial cruiser Vengeur," replied Max, "consort to the vessel which has just disposed of your cruisers and torpedo-boats. What we want is your specie and any odd valuables your passengers can spare, and the sooner you give them up, the sooner you can go on your journey.

  "Now which is it - surrender or fight?"

  "Fight?" exclaimed the captain of the Gigantic, in a tone in which wonder and disgust were about equally blended; "how can we fight? Make the course north, Mr. Thomson," he continued to his chief officer. "It's no good. We must think of the lives of the passengers first. That fellow could blow us to bits at his ease, and we couldn't touch him with a shot. A whole fleet couldn't fight an airship, and that's one, there's no doubt about it. It's horrible, but there's nothing else to do. We're helpless. Put the helm over."

  "I'm glad to see you take such a sensible view of the situation, captain," said Renault, as he saw the great liner swing round to the northward in obedience to his order. "You have saved a needless slaughter that I should have regretted very much. Can you signal to the others to follow you, as I asked you to do?"

  "No," shortly replied the captain, "I can't; and if I could, they mightn't obey me."

  "Very well," said Max; "then I'll go and tell them what to do myself. Keep due north, and mind, if you fire a gun or attempt to make a signal, I'll blow you out of the water."

  While this conversation was going on, the Destroyer had prudently kept out of sight. Franz Hartog, who was in command of her, startled as he at first was by the sudden and unexpected appearance of the air-ship, was not long in coming to the conclusion, from what he saw, that she could only be the long-expected craft which Max had promised to bring from Utopia nearly four years before. Why he had taken no part in the battle until now he could not understand, but he was quite content to wait for an explanation, and that he very soon got. He exhibited a flash light for an instant, and Max, divining his intention, swooped down to where he was lying, a couple of miles astern of the Gigantic.

  "Destroyer, ahoy!" he sang out, as the Vengeur sank gently down to the surface of the water alongside the dim grey shape of the pirate craft. "Is Franz Hartog on board?"

  "Ja, mein lieber Max, he is here," replied a familiar voice. "And is dot you at last mit der air-ship? I alvays said you vould come some time, but you haf been der teufel's own time coming, and vy der donnerwetter didn't you help us to smash up dem cruisers, ven you haf a beautiful air-ship like dot? - and, mein Gott, she's a beauty, vot I can see of her!"

  "Because I couldn't, Franz," laughed Max in reply. "I haven't a gun or a shell on board. I had to come away in a hurry with this thing, or I shouldn't have got her at all. I've nothing better than a rifle and a revolver with me, and they wouldn't be much good, but those fellows don't know that, so I've told the big one to steer off due north at ten knots, and not fire a shot or make a signal, or I'll blow him to bits. He believed me, and he's doing as I told him. Now I'm going to tell the others the same thing. Can you spare me a few shells, just to convince them with in case they don't see the force of the argument?"

  "Ja, mein friendt, you can haf as many as you like," replied the little German, delighted at the idea of Renault's ruse.

  Max brought the Vengeur down lower still, until a sliding door in her hull amidships was level with the bridge of the Destroyer, and through this a couple of dozen twelve-pounder percussion shells were rapidly passed to him.

  A few moments later the crews of the three liners were thrown into a condition bordering on panic by the astounding vision of the air-ship coming towards them, with her single brilliant ray of light projected almost vertically downwards.

  The first on whose decks it fell was the Cunarder Horania, a big boat built on the model of the Lucania and Campania, but with triple screws and a speed of twenty-four knots, or rather more than half a knot less than that of her huge rival, the Gigantic. The same orders were given to her as had been given to the White Star boat, and perforce obeyed under similar compulsion.

  Then the Vengeur visited in turn the American and North German boats, and within twenty minutes the four captured liners were on their way northward at ten knots, the highest speed that the crippled American boat could make, with the Vengeur flying to and fro in a zigzag course over their mastheads, and the Destroyer bringing up the rear, about half a mile astern. No lights were permitted, and, of course, none were shown by the captors.

  It was now a few minutes after one in the morning, and therefore, as the sun would not rise till ten minutes past eight, they had seven hours' steaming before daylight, enough to carry them well northward of the winter tracks of all the transatlantic lines, excepting that of Halifax to Liverpool. Twenty miles south of this track the flotilla was halted, and the American boat was ordered to tranship her specie and valuables to the North German liner Bremen, the smallest of the four, but a fast, handy boat, which the pirates had decided to take as their transport for the time being.

  The Destroyer put a dozen men, armed to the teeth, on board the American boat, to watch the transhipment of the specie and to collect the money and valuables which the passengers were compelled to surrender. The fate of the New York was still too fresh in their memories for anyone to dream of resistance. The transfer was rapidly and quietly effected, and then the half-disabled boat was dismissed to make the best of her way to port. The other three were then ordered to resume the northward course at the highest speed of which the Bremen was capable - that is to say, about twenty-two and a half knots.

  Morning at length broke, grey and dull and cold, over a sea on which not a sail or a smoke-cloud was visible. By mid-day on the 6th they had reached a region which is totally unfrequented from the beginning of winter to the end, and which is only traversed even in summer by the Greenland whalers and a few adventurous yachts.

  Here the liners were halted and ordered to bank their fires, so that as little smoke as possible might show from their funnels. The specie and everything that was worth taking was transhipped from the Gigantic and the Morania to the Bremen, and the passengers and officers of the North German boat were divided between the Cunarder and the White Star liner, and these two, after their guns had been rendered useless, and their ammunition taken out of them, were allowed to depart in peace, which they promptly did at full speed to the eastward.

  Thus was accomplished, as the newspapers put it, when the amazing story was made public, the greatest, the most daring, and the most successful act of piracy ever perpetrated on the high seas.

  While in Europe and America the exploits of the Destroyer and the Vengeur were being anxiously discussed, the chief actors in the ocean tragedy were securing their enormous booty, and laughing over the discomfiture of their plundered foes.

  In a deep rock-bound creek on the north-west coast of Africa, between Cape Bojador and Cape Garnett, protected seaward by reefs and shoals, and landward by the illimitable wastes of burning sand, which none but a few wandering Arabs ever thought it worth while to cross, lay the Destroyer and the Vengeur with their treasure-laden prize.

  The sailors and firemen and engineers of the Bremen had been compelled, under pain of immediate shooting, to work the vessel to within two hundred miles of the coast. Then they bad been given her boats, with sails, provisions, weapons, and ammunition, and £150 a man for their services, and told to make the best of their way to the Canaries. This had been done just before nightfall, and the next morning there was not a trace of the pirates or their prize to be seen.

  The inlet was one of a dozen equally well-chosen refuges which Hartog had picked out in different parts of the Atlantic, and he had so far followed the traditions of his predecessors in piracy, that in every one of them he had concealed treasure to a very large amount.
He had been very careful never to visit the same hiding-place twice in succession, so that, in case of his being seen entering one of them, and information being given to the war-ships on the look-out for him, it would be no use for them to go and lie in wait for him there.

  In half a dozen secret depots on each side of the Atlantic he had laid up stores of ammunition and the condensed petroleum fuel, treated according to a secret process known only to himself, which was burned in the smokeless furnaces of the Destroyer, and the positions of these had been so skilfully chosen that he was never more than a couple of thousand miles from a refuge that was at once a hiding-place and a depot.

  As the Destroyer could steam four thousand miles at full speed, and over seven thousand at half speed, without refilling her fuel bunkers, his capture was to all intents and purposes an impossibility, unless a collapse of the machinery or some very improbable accident put him at the mercy of his enemies.

  Heartless and soulless as the little engineer was with regard to all other subjects, he was something more than an enthusiast where machinery was concerned. He was wont to say that his heart only beat properly while his engines were working. He loved them with an affection surpassing the love of man for man, or even for woman, and it is probable that if he had been confronted with a really perfect machine, he would have fallen down and worshipped it as the best possible substitute for the Deity, in whose existence he did not believe.