MORE STRANGE DISCOVERIES.
Within the breech of the gun was disclosed a chamber enclosing a small
cylinder of steel. This was ribbed by metallic strips connected with
electric wires and capable of being superheated by electrical current.
Inside this chamber was placed the explosive projectile which it was
desired to launch.
This done, a small amount of water was admitted to the electrically
connected chamber, and a switch turned which caused the metal to become
superheated. In a flash steam, at terrific pressure, was formed, and by
a twist of a handle it could be released when desired. Simple as the
device appeared, Mr. Dancer informed the boys that in some experiments
that he had made it had proved most effective.
With the inspection of the gun their survey of the craft practically
was over, except for the exhibition by Mr. Dancer of the anchoring
device and other minor details.
When they stood once more on the top of the curved deck Jack exclaimed
with enthusiasm:
“You have the finest craft of its kind I have ever seen or read of, Mr.
Dancer.”
But, far from seeming elated, the inventor only sighed.
“It appears all right, I know,” he said, “and it cost me almost all my
fortune to build it; but there is one fatal defect in it: the diving
devices do not work properly.”
The boys regarded the gray-haired scientist with astonished eyes.
“It won’t dive?” asked Jack, at length.
“No; that is, not properly. You see, I had devised a sort of double
skin for it in parts, and I imagined that I could fill this with water
and make the craft sink when I so desired, and then pump out the water
when I wished to rise.”
“And you did not do so?” queried Jack.
“Yes, I equipped it with the tanks all right; but I found that I would
have to install such large pumps that it would be impracticable to work
them with the power I had; so that now, as I told you some time ago,
you find me at a standstill.”
“You mean that you cannot think of any other plan of making your craft
ascend and descend in the water?”
“That’s just it. I’m up against a stone wall. They call you the ‘Boy
Inventors.’ I’ve heard how you have aided other inventors in trouble.
Can you think of a way to make the _White Shark_ dive?”
“Not off-hand,” declared Jack positively; “but I promise you we’ll give
the matter thought and do our best to help you. And now, Mr. Dancer, we
should be getting back. It is late and my father, for whom we ran into
town to purchase some electric apparatus, will be worrying about us.”
“But the wreck of the car has blocked the road and I have no vehicle
handy that you can use.”
“I thought I noticed a wireless apparatus on the _White Shark_; is it
working?” asked Jack.
“Yes; but its radius is limited. You see, I had to install the aërials
inside the hull of the submarine; but with the powerful current I can
command I can send a message up to twenty miles, or even more, under
favorable conditions.”
“If you don’t mind, then, I’ll send a message to High Towers asking
Jupe, that’s our colored man, to come right over with the automobile.”
“What, you have a colored man who can take wireless messages?”
“Yes indeed, Jupe learned all of that on our trip to the Gulf of
Mexico.”
“True, I recall now reading about the colored man in some magazine
account of your adventures. You must have had a stirring trip and some
exciting times.”
“We did, indeed,” was Jack’s reply.
Readers of “The Boy Inventors’ Wireless Triumph,” the first volume of
this series, will agree with him. This story told of the finding of
Tom’s father, an explorer long lost in the mysterious land of Yucatan,
and also related the odd quest of Prof. Chadwick, including the
astonishing adventures of the two young inventors in a wonderful craft
of their own designing.
After returning from this exciting trip they encountered, and aided
materially, the inventor of a vanishing gun, designed to fight
airships. Unscrupulous men tried to steal the plans of the gun, and
finally succeeded, but through the boys’ pluck and cleverness their
purposes were ultimately foiled. These experiences form a part of the
story entitled, “The Boy Inventors and the Vanishing Gun.”
We now find them on the threshold of even stranger adventures than have
already befallen them and, having made this necessary digression, let
us follow our enterprising lads once more within the hull of the _White
Shark_, the diving craft that so far had not dived.
Jack found the wireless of the usual type and lost no time in sending
out his call for High Towers. After some delay, Jupe answered. Jack
told him to bring the small runabout to the place, which he described,
as soon as possible.
The colored man agreed to be with them in half an hour, and, much
relieved, the boys sauntered out of the shed with Mr. Dancer to await
the arrival of the auto.
They were standing in the road outside the gates of the carefully
secluded workshop, when a man on a high-powered motorcycle suddenly
appeared from the direction of the grade down which the runaway car had
dashed.
Mr. Dancer uttered an exclamation as he saw him.
“It’s Adam Duke!” he exclaimed, in a rather perturbed tone.
The words had hardly left his lips before the motorcycle chugged up to
where the little group was standing, and the rider swung himself from
his seat.
When he pushed up his goggles, after alighting, the boys saw that the
newcomer was a tall, well-built man of middle age. But what might have
been a clever, good-looking face was marred by an expression of fixed
sullenness and aggression.
“Well, what’s all this?” he muttered rather gruffly, as he stared at
the two lads. As for Mr. Dancer, even if his exclamation of recognition
had not told them, the boys would have known that he was no stranger to
the new arrival.
“What do you want?” he exclaimed, as the man motioned inquiringly
toward the two boys.
“A few words with you alone, Mr. Dancer.”
Then, as the inventor hesitated:
“Come; I’m in no mood to be trifled with.”
Under the tan that overspread his rather wizened features the inventor
turned pale.
“You must excuse me a minute,” he said, turning to the boys.
Then he and the newcomer turned, the latter having leaned his
motorcycle against the fence, and they entered the territory beyond the
forbidding palings that marked the dwelling place of the _White Shark_.