Collected Works of Gaston Leroux

by Gaston Leroux

  Suddenly there was a ripple on the surface. Amalia asked:

  “What suggested the idea all at once that you must within six months have a vessel like the Vengeance?”

  The Captain gave a start. He turned pale under his mask and leaning towards Amalia:

  “Yes, it was all at once,” he repeated...” the idea of the Vengeance did come to me all at once.”

  And then, mastering his extreme emotion, he pulled himself together, and speaking very quickly entered into particulars... technical particulars... which explained to some extent the submarine but did not explain Captain Hyx.

  “When all at once the idea occurred to me, I tried to find in England, France, America and in the world ‘not yet German’ a naval constructor of genius. There was much talk at that time of Mr. Simon Lecke, the great American shipbuilder at Bridgeport; the engineer and inventor whom his friends now call the new Edison. Simon Lecke was in possession of a few scraps of paper representing the nominal value of fifteen million francs, and bearing the signatures of Admiral Brandon, chief director, and Otto Extus, deputy-chief director of Krupps, and Vice-Admiral von Treischke, your husband, Madame. These fifteen millions on paper were the agreed price for an invention, but it has never been paid to him. Here are Mr. Simon Lecke’s statements:

  “‘ I have recently seen several German submarines, among others the V.G., and I have satisfied myself that externally they combine all the features of the invention which I was about to concede to the Kaiser. My floating superstructure has been embodied in every German submarine. And it would appear that these vessels are likewise provided with wheels, following my designs, which enable the vessel to move along the bottom of the sea and thus to avoid mines. They possess also my omniscope, my compartment for divers and my hydroplane.

  “‘Some ten years ago I entrusted to Krupps in addition to my home patents, a list of my foreign patents and photographs, and plans of them carefully numbered. The directors gave me their word of honour to treat them as secret. When at a later date I protested that the engagements entered into by the Kaiser had not been fulfilled, the Director of the German Patent Office simply replied that “ it was prohibited in Germany to patent any war invention.”

  “‘It was in this way that they repudiated their word and tore up the scrap of paper which bore the signatures of the Kaiser’s representatives.’

  “I myself offered these fifteen millions to Mr. Simon Lecke,” went on Captain Hyx, “so that he might devote his genius to the construction of the Vengeance and the realisation of my ideal. I cannot enter into the details of our conversation, but when he learnt from me, under the seal of absolute secrecy, what was in my mind, this honest man replied: ‘Shipbuilders have done better service. And in any case they are about to do even better still. Go and see Edison.’

  “I went to see Edison, who told me that in point of fact he was studying certain problems, affecting submarines, the solution of which, in his opinion, would render maritime war an impossibility. Consequently, if I had come to him with the object of making war, I might as well take my millions elsewhere. But if Edison is a great pacifist, I am a great philanthropist, and in the end I came to an understanding with one of his principal engineers.... Mesdames, allow me to offer you a cigarette.”

  The ladies accepted a cigarette with alacrity. As for me, my head turned giddy. Captain Hyx a philanthropist!

  CHAPTER XVII

  THE VISION UNDER THE SEA

  IT WAS MORE than I could bear. I could not restrain the word that trembled on my lips and I broke out: A philanthropist!

  They all stared at me. I was conscious of our host’s growing annoyance. I expected some sharp retort; but nothing happened. Captain Hyx changed the subject by giving a brief command, whereupon the tapestry representing Ruyter’s victory was lifted like the curtain in a theatre, and a wonderful scene met our astonished gaze.

  A number of panels in the hull of the Vengeance had been drawn back, and nothing stood between us and the depths of the sea but a huge oval glass held in place by a powerful framework of copper. The brightness of the electric lamps in the saloon was reduced, and the sea became visible to us through the beams of a powerful light.

  “The cold light of our searchlights,” observed Captain Hyx behind us, as we darted forward to the glass window like moths who cannot resist the light that is to destroy them. “It is another French invention which the Germans alone have known how to exploit. They use it in their zeppelins,” he continued. “It enables me to see where I am going under water. While every German submarine must proceed to sea like a thief in the night, I take my light with me to the very depths of the ocean.”

  “And this glass... is it safe...? “ inquired my beautiful Amalia in a tone at once of anxiety and admiration.

  “It can resist extraordinary pressure,” answered the Captain. “In this respect Captain Nemo was right. And our modern engineers have but improved upon him. He said that during his fishing experiments by electric light in the Northern Seas in 1864, he saw glass plates less than a third of an inch thick, resist a pressure of sixteen atmospheres while allowing powerful rays of light to penetrate them. Now the glass in the Nautilus was ten inches thicker than this in the centre; in other words, not less than thirty times thicker. My glass is fifty times thicker.”

  “And you are able to submerge...

  “Oh, we can plunge to a depth which you would hardly credit. Therein consists my strength.... lean go where I please... explore regions that are forbidden to other submarines because they cannot and dare not descend below some two or three hundred feet owing to the pressure of the sea. When all our hatches are closed with their triple armour of Edison steel, — the plates jointed with flexible T and X iron, — and with my system of ‘successive cushions of compressed air of different pressures,’ I can plunge as far down as any sounding apparatus.”

  These were brave words, but I attached no importance to them, considering them rather as expressions of justifiable pride in view of the sight that lay before us. Suppose the Vengeance could submerge to some two or three thousand feet, it would be in itself a splendid performance and enough for me!

  At that time, it seems, we were only about a thousand feet below the level of the sea; and we were making our way at a slow pace in the midst of a veritable shoal of tunny fish. As they darted hither and thither in fear and bewilderment, their movements were reflected in countless rays of light that flashed on them. Their deep blue backs, like the blue of polished steel, and their silver bellies gleamed and radiated in curious fashion amid the darker shadows.

  Some of these fish, of which the smallest was six feet in length, came up to our window, and half opening their venomous jaws, stared at us motionless with their big, round, bright, malicious eyes. Suddenly the vast host appeared to be seized with a frenzy. They scattered in battalions, rolling over each other in their desperation. A marine monster was the cause of the panic. He was gliding in the midst of them on his back, opening tremendous jaws. We saw that it was a shark.

  We fell back uttering a cry. The brute was probably thirty feet in length; and might well with one blow of his tail smash to pieces the plate glass panels which alone stood between us.

  Was it due to this fear? Or did Captain Hyx take compassion on our trepidation? Whatever the cause, he pressed an electric button and the inside panels were closed like steel lids over the ball of our tremendous glass eye.

  We were in semi-darkness. I imagined that the electric lamps would be switched on, but the Captain requested us not to move.

  “The spectacle is not over,” he said.

  Almost immediately we heard an explosion, and before there was time to inquire the cause, the steel eyelids were re-opened and the luminous waters appeared once more. They were red!

  It was like a sea of blood, in which the brute from whom a few minutes before we had shrunk in apprehension and the denizens of the sea had fled in terror, lay stretched out in the last convulsive agony of death. His st
omach was nothing but a mangled mass.

  “A small shell from one of our under-water machine guns did the business,” explained the Captain with a satisfied smile. And he added, stroking his chin, which, as I have said, was slightly puffed:

  “Oh, every monster has his day!”

  There was a short silence and he went on:

  “This fellow was not one of the least formidable. His strength must have been tremendous. And as to his speed, it has been calculated that a shark of this size and strength, moving along day and night, would travel round the globe in about thirty weeks.... He is so insensible to fatigue that he has been known to follow ships from Europe to America, sailing around them a thousand times but never leaving them for a moment. Look at his mouth... just look at his mouth. The circumference of the mouth is on an average equal to a third of the length. That means a mouth ten feet in circumference for a shark thirty feet in length. A jaw like that was enough to set the biggest appetities in the world adreaming. And the teeth... triangular, pointed, sharp, spiked.... There are six rows of teeth in a full-grown shark. What a beautiful set! They don’t yet manufacture them like that in the Friedrichstrasse. He has a skin capable of resisting a bullet — an ideal shield for the knights of the Rhine — an insatiable appetite, a fearlessness that nothing can intimidate, the ferocity of the tiger, the might of the sperm-whale. Such is the shark, the terror of his own world. His name in French is requin, which is derived from requiem.... An hour comes, however, when over the remains of the monster we repeat the prayers for the dead.”

  These last words were uttered in a hollow and strident voice totally at variance with his usual honeyed accents; a voice which seemed to contain a veiled threat, and Amalia and I exchanged a glance in which our anxiety, lulled for the moment, returned in all its force. Had this man, who treated us with such marked courtesy, really invited Amalia to lunch with him only to play upon her fears?

  Suddenly the panels were closed with a crash, shutting out the bloodstained sea and putting an end to the spectacle; the electric lamps in the saloons resumed their wonted brilliance, and we heard once more the soft, pleasant, engaging voice of the Captain exclaim:

  “Mesdames, my dear Monsieur Herbert, I cannot refuse you anything, and as Frau von Treischke has done me the honour to express the wish, let us make the tour of the vessel which she is longing to make.”

  I eagerly accepted the invitation. The more one knows of one’s prison the greater one’s chance of escaping from it.

  CHAPTER XVIII

  CAPTAIN HYX’S SUDDEN EMOTION

  IT IS NOT my intention to ask the reader to follow us step by step in our digestive promenade. We were in the centre of a miracle of machinery. No matter where we fixed our eyes, or our attention, we could only give voice to a general cry of admiration. Captain Hyx’s descriptions, guarded though they were, still further increased our amazement.

  And yet there was nothing in it all that would “turn the human brain,” for the genius of the twentieth century has paved the way for every scientific marvel, and for every triumph of mind over matter.

  The engine-room, of which we were allowed only a fleeting vision, perplexed my brain far less than the smart little white dining-saloon where champagne was drunk and from which a half-opened door led to “the shouting gallery.” And yet this engine-room was no ordinary sight. It was as comprehensive as a factory with its flying bridges, its huge wheels and gearing, its crank shafts connecting a dozen screw-propellers, which, driven by ten turbines, gave the vessel an instantaneous rapidity of movement, above and below water, which has never before been paralleled. The Vengeance could make over forty miles an hour submerged, the Captain told us.

  A crew of some thirty mechanics were at work, under the supervision of an engineer to whom we were introduced. As we met on a gangway, the engineer stared at me with some curiosity, and in a language that I did not understand, made a few remarks which appeared to produce an impression on Captain Hyx. Two or three minutes later, as I appeared to be particularly interested in a remarkable piece of machinery which lined a corner of the engine-room, and in which a strange combination of wire coils, as massive as the pillars of a temple, was displayed, surrounded by an incomprehensible tangle of levers and connecting rods, such as I had never before seen, the Captain tapped me on the shoulder and beckoned us to follow him.

  He opened a door and we were again in one of the alley-ways. Had I been too inquisitive? Was Captain Hyx and Edison’s great secret indeed before me? Had I bent over this scientific mystery with too deep an interest?

  Amalia and Dolores had observed nothing unusual. Captain Hyx looked at me in a manner which I felt inclined to resent and said:

  “That engineer, whose name is Mabell, was in the service of one of Edison’s friends. Edison as an American, had conscientious scruples against working out a definite design for a vessel which was to carry on a ruthless war with a nation with which his country had not even broken off diplomatic relations. Consequently Edison’s friend lent me Mabell, his chief assistant, who is a Canadian, and has his own reasons for not loving the sons of the Dragon. It was he who in the greatest secrecy, and in the course of six months, built the home of the Angels of the Waters.”

  “It’s a fine piece of work,” I answered, affected by the Captain’s peculiar tone and his apocalyptic reference to the sons of the Dragon and the Angels of the Waters; language which I had not hitherto heard from him. “And I am astonished that he was able to supply you with all the necessary parts without the secret of where they were put together being revealed.”

  “Perhaps you would like to know where they were put together,” bluntly inquired the Captain.

  What was the cause of this fresh outburst of ill-humour?

  “No... no,” I hastily protested, “ I don’t want to know anything.”

  “Still it won’t bore you to learn why it is that the Vengeance has nothing to fear from her enemies?”

  “No, if it doesn’t put you to any inconvenience,” I answered dryly, for I began to lose patience with the Captain’s manner.

  Amalia perceived the rift within the lute and interposed:

  “Captain, would you take us to the control room? I hope I’m not asking you too much, but I am very anxious to see for myself how you manage to do without a periscope.”

  The Captain bowed and hastened to show the way to the control-room which was a handsome compartment in the very centre of the ship, some distance from the conning towers. The room was crowded with small tables on which a number of instruments were set out, and Captain Hyx was good enough to explain their precise significance to us. There was an installation of underwater wireless telegraphy, but with whom he was in communication, and for what purpose, were points upon which he did not vouchsafe any information.

  Amalia, to show her knowledge, amused herself by naming several instruments, the object of which she had learnt from her husband the Vice-Admiral. Much of the machinery for control and direction was the same as that employed in other submarines. For instance, she gave us a little lecture on the gyroscope which corrects and modifies the workings of the magnetic compass.

  On every hand were wheels, rods, pipes, and electric buttons. From this compartment the water-ballast tanks were controlled. It was enough to touch a button and the water poured in, and to touch another button and the water poured out. Near at hand were a steel tube manometer, and the pressure gauge with pointer, which indicated the level of the water in the tanks, and the hand levers which connected the water-tanks with the compressed air, and by means of which the water was blown out and the buoyancy of the vessel secured.

  “We have now risen to about two hundred feet below the surface,” observed the Captain after exchanging a few words with the officer who was bending over a screen. “You are aware that a submarine will rarely risk diving even to this slight depth, and in any case it does not profess to be able to see what passes above water. Periscopes cease to be effective if their tubes are more t
han a few yards in length. But watch this screen, and you will see what is happening above water as accurately as if you were walking the upper deck of a liner.”

  The Captain was not exaggerating. Pictures of life above the surface could be seen on the screen as clearly as if we were watching them in the open air. We were astounded.

  Amalia, who was becoming more restless still, and as I plainly saw, was engrossed, like myself, with something more than a desire to improve her knowledge of mechanics and optics, pressed for further explanations with an eagerness that must have been highly flattering to the Captain’s pride.

  “We have superseded periscopes,” continued the Captain, “ with eyes that float upon the sea. We are not indebted this time either to an American or to a Frenchman for the principle of this invention. True, it was the great Edison who made the electric eye practicable, but he did no more than work upon data furnished by a Russian scientist, Gospodin Rorsing, who was the first to experiment in the problem of reviewing objects at a distance; a problem which is the same as that which confronts photography, or rather cinematography at a distance.

  “That picture on the screen is not simply the reflection of what is taking place, as can be seen in the object-bowl of a periscope with its sloping mirrors; this picture is the actual photograph of what is happening above water. Our “electric eye” is no more nor less than the transmitting station of electric photography or rather cinematography, and we are at this moment standing before the receiving station.

  “How is it that our moving camera which ‘floats upon the seas’ can automatically operate for us, photograph for us, see for us? Edison may, perhaps, let the world know one of these days. Personally, I could only make you ‘remotely’ understand the mechanism thanks to which we have thrown the antiquated and dangerous periscope on the scrap-heap. But I may tell you that the floating boxes designed to record the picture, and to transmit it to us by the electric wires which connect us, are so well hidden from view, or rather disguised, that it is absolutely impossible for them to attract any attention or, at all events, excite any suspicion. Some of them take the form of jelly-fish, others seaweed, and others again have the appearance of sponges. Well, these small, shapeless, floating objects against which no one is on his guard, are our eyes, our electric eyes. Don’t you think it wonderful?”