The Great Airship
BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
50 Old Bailey, LONDON
17 Stanhope Street, GLASGOW
BLACKIE & SON (INDIA) LIMITED
Warwick House, Fort Street, BOMBAY
BLACKIE & SON (CANADA) LIMITED
1118 Bay Street, TORONTO
[Illustration: "AIRSHIP IN SIGHT, SIR!"
_Page_ 180
_Frontispiece_]
The Great Airship
A Tale of Adventure
BY
LT.-COL. F. S. BRERETON
Author of "A Boy of the Dominion" "The Hero of Panama" "On the Field of
Waterloo" "John Bargreave's Gold" &c.
_Illustrated by C. M. Padday_
BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
LONDON AND GLASGOW
* * * * *
By Lt.-Col. F. S. Brereton
On the Field of Waterloo.
The Great Airship.
With the Allies to the Rhine.
Under French's Command.
Colin the Scout.
With Allenby in Palestine.
A Hero of Panama.
Foes of the Red Cockade.
Under the Chinese Dragon.
A Sturdy Young Canadian.
How Canada was Won.
John Bargreave's Gold.
With Shield and Assegai.
With Rifle and Bayonet.
In the King's Service.
The Dragon of Pekin.
One of the Fighting Scouts.
A Knight of St. John.
Roger the Bold.
The Rough Riders of the Pampas.
Indian and Scout.
The Great Aeroplane.
Tom Stapleton.
A Boy of the Dominion.
_Printed in Great Britain by Blackie & Son, Limited, Glasgow_
Contents
CHAP. Page
I. THE FAME OF THE ZEPPELIN 9
II. ANDREW PROVOST'S RESOLUTION 25
III. DICKY HAMSHAW, MIDSHIPMAN 42
IV. THE GREAT AIRSHIP 58
V. A TOUR OF INSPECTION 77
VI. CARL REITBERG, SPORTSMAN 94
VII. EN ROUTE FOR ADRIANOPLE 111
VIII. THE BESIEGED CITY 126
IX. DICK HAMSHAW SAVES THE SITUATION 144
X. A THRILLING RESCUE 166
XI. SOME FACTS AND FIGURES 187
XII. CARL ABOARD THE BIPLANE 203
XIII. TO THE NORTH-WEST FRONTIER 222
XIV. A BRUSH WITH PATHANS 243
XV. THE GREAT ATTEMPT 260
XVI. RECORD HIGH FLYING 277
XVII. A DESPERATE SITUATION 297
XVIII. OFF TO NEW GUINEA 313
XIX. SAVED FROM THE NATIVES 331
XX. ADOLF FRUHMANN'S VENTURE 349
Illustrations
Facing Page
"AIRSHIP IN SIGHT, SIR!" Frontispiece
ARRIVED WITH A BUMP FACING COMMANDER JACKSON 80
THE COLLAPSE OF CARL REITBERG 272
THE QUARTET SET OUT FOR THE AIRSHIP 320
THE GREAT AIRSHIP
CHAPTER I
The Fame of the Zeppelin
There are exceptions, we suppose, to almost every rule, and this
particular Friday towards the end of June was such an exception. It was
fine. Not a cloud flecked the sun-lit sky. A glorious blue expanse hung
over a sea almost as blue, but criss-crossed in all directions by the
curling white tops of tiny wavelets, all that remained to remind one of
the atrocious weather which had prevailed. For the North Sea, Europe,
Great Britain, everywhere in fact, had been treated to a succession of
violent gales, to a continuous deluge of rain, to bitter hail, and
squalls of snow in some parts. And here and now, off the mouth of the
river Elbe the sun shone, the sky was a delight, a balmy breeze fanned
the cheeks of the passengers crowding the decks of the Hamburg-Amerika
liner.
"What a change! I began to wonder whether there was such a season as
summer. Have a cigar?"
Mr. Andrew Provost drew from an inner pocket of his jacket a
silver-mounted case, pulled the lid off and offered one of the contents
to his nephew.
"Not that one, Joe," he said, as the young man beside him placed his
long fingers on one of the weeds. "It's Dutch. Not that they're not good
smokes; I like 'em sometimes. But give me a Havana, and offer one to
your friends. There! That one! You'll like it."
"Thanks! I know 'em, Uncle. You always give me your best."
There was a smile on the handsome face of the young man as he obeyed the
directions of his Uncle Andrew. It was obvious indeed from their smiles,
the manner in which they paced the deck arm in arm, and from the
intimacy of their conversation, that the two were on the best of terms.
And why not? They were related, as we have stated. Then they had for
long been separated. Mr. Andrew Provost had not always been the
comfortable-looking individual he now appeared. For prosperous and
comfortable he looked without a doubt. Florid and sunburned, with white
hair and moustache which made his complexion seem to be even more ruddy,
he was tall, and slight, and gracefully if not robustly built. There was
something of a military air about him, and we whisper the truth when we
say that he was often enough taken for an old soldier, much to his own
secret gratification. Dark grey eyes looked out genially from a smiling
face upon the world and his fellows. His forehead was hardly seamed.
Care, in fact, seemed to have failed in its effort to reach him, or,
more likely perhaps, his genial, plucky nature had caused it to fall
easily from his shoulders. For the rest he was exceedingly well groomed,
and looked what he was, a prosperous, healthy gentleman.
"But it wasn't always like that, Joe," he told his companion, as they
paced the deck, basking in the sun. "Your Uncle Andrew wasn't always the
stylish dog he looks now. Not by a long way. I've been on my beam ends."
"Ah! Exactly."
"Know what that means?"
"To a certain extent. When you came home last Christmas I was down in
the dumps. Absolutely on my beam ends."
Andrew Provost turned to look with some astonishment at his nephew. He
inspected him critically from the top of his glossy Homburg hat to the
well-polished brown shoes which he wore. And the face finally drew all
his attention.
"Impossible!" he declared politely. "Joe on his beam ends! Joe in the
dumps--never!"
"True as possible, sir--I was desperate," repeated Joe, his face grave
for that moment.
"Well, well, perhaps so. I'm forgetting. I was young like you when I was
down. Young fellows make light of such matters. It's as well, perhaps,
or the world wouldn't go along half so easily. But I'd never have
thought it, Joe. You never said a word to me; you look so jolly."
No one would have denied the fact. Joe Gresson looked what he was, a
handsome, jovial fellow of twenty-seven. Fair and tall, and broader than
his uncle, he had deep-set eyes which gave to his smiling face an air of
cleverness. And the young fellow was undoubtedly clever. An engineer by
profession, he had graduated at Cambridge, had passed through the shops,
the drawing office, and other departments of one of the biggest
engineering concerns in England, and had finally struck out a line for
himself. He had been experimenting for the past four years.
"What's the good of being miserable because things don't go right,
Uncle?" he said with a smile. "I've told you how I took up engineering.
Well, I thought I had a good idea. I left the shops at Barrow and worked
on my own. Thanks to the few thousands I possessed I was able to carry
out some important experiments."
"Ah, my boy! Well, you succeeded?"
"Yes and no; I went so far with the work that I was sure that success
was possible. Then there was an accident. The whole affair was wrecked,
and I woke up to find myself without funds and in a terrible condition
of despair."
"On your beam ends, in fact--well, like me," said Mr. Andrew. "I'll tell
you about myself; then you'll give your yarn. I'll have to hear what
this work was. But my tale don't take long. Let's step up and down again
and I'll give it to you. Let's see--yes, I was a fiery, unmanageable
young idiot."
"Never!" interjected Joe.
"Like many other young fellows," proceeded Andrew, as if he had not been
interrupted. "I bluntly refused the post which my father offered me, and
cut away from home. I went to Canada, worked my way out aboard the
steamer, a cockleshell in those days, and half starved for the next few
months, for it was in the winter and there was no work to be had. But I
learned something. In the six months which followed my landing I acted
as a cook's boy, a porter, a fireman, and a clerk in a grocery store.
That's where I had my eyes opened. The country was opening up. I had
saved a few dollars. I set up a store of my own in one of the nearest
settlements, a mere hut knocked together with the help of a hammer and
some nails. But it paid. I saved all along. I built a real brick house,
and the sales went up like wildfire. Then I chose a manager and opened
up a second store away in the nearest settlement. It went on after that
almost by itself. I got to own a hundred stores. I bought property right
and left. Then I sold out. Now I'm merely an idler, come home to take a
long look round. On my beam ends one day, you see; up and prosperous in
the years that followed. Now, my boy, let's hear your yarn. Hallo,
what's the excitement? People are crushing over to the far side of the
ship."
The two had been so engaged in conversation that they had not noticed
the exodus of the other passengers, and now awoke to find themselves the
only tenants of that side of the deck. Arm in arm still they hurried
round the long deck cabin to join their fellow passengers. They found
them massed together on the starboard side, crushing towards the rails,
and for the most part with their eyes cast aloft.
"Wonderful! Marvellous! Extraordinary!" were some of the remarks they
overheard, emanating from the English people present. From the many
foreigners there came guttural cries of delight and shouts almost of
triumph.
"What is it? What's the fuss?" asked Mr. Andrew eagerly, craning his
head and looking aloft. "I can see nothing to cause such excitement."
"Nothing, mein Herr! Is that nothing--no?" asked a stumpy little
passenger against whom Andrew was leaning, twisting his portly frame
round with an effort. He shot a short, plump arm above his head, and
held a stumpy finger aloft. "Nothing?" he asked indignantly. "You call
that nothing at all, mein Herr? It is marvellous! It is magnificent!"
"But--but, what is? I--I--er--beg your pardon," said Andrew politely,
"but really I can't----"
"Look, Uncle," cried Joe sharply, pointing upwards himself. "It's a
little hard to see perhaps. That's what they aim at, of course. But
there's an airship there--a Zeppelin."
"Ah!" gasped Andrew, while the stumpy little foreigner, who had now
contrived to twist himself entirely round, stared angrily at him. Then a
broad, beaming smile of pride seamed his face, a fat, good-natured face
to be sure, while the light of recognition danced in his eyes.
"Ah! Mr. Andrew Provost," he exclaimed in thick but urbane tones. "We
have met again. This is fortunate. But you see now; you see the German
triumph. You see the Zeppelin with which they have conquered the air.
Ah, it is magnificent!"
Andrew had scarcely time to shake his hand and recognize this plump
little person. He was vastly impressed at the sight some four thousand
feet above him, and away to the left. He could have shouted with delight
himself. The object, in fact, claimed his whole attention.
"A Zeppelin!" he cried. "A real Zeppelin! One of Germany's air
dreadnoughts--magnificent!"
It was magnificent. Seldom yet have Englishmen had the opportunity of
seeing one of those leviathans of the air. At a period when balloons
have become common objects in the sky, when the whole world almost has
become accustomed to aeroplanes scooping through the air, the people of
most countries are still strangers to the sight of a mighty airship
swimming in space. And there was one, a long, sinuous hull of neutral
colour, so that even in broad daylight it was not too easily visible,
floating horizontally in the sky, like some gigantic cigar, while fore
and aft, immediately beneath the hull, were two boat-shaped objects, a
little darker than the mass above supporting them. There was the dull
hum of machinery too.
"Moving along slowly," gasped Andrew, still wonderstruck at such a
sight. "What's she doing?"
"Finishing a continuous run of twenty-four hours and more," declared the
little stranger, whom we will now introduce as Mr. Carl Reitberg. "Just
showing us how fresh she is, and how easy the task has been," he cried
in tones of the utmost pride. "See! She has more to show us. She has
taken in fuel from the steamer yonder, and could sail again for another
twenty-four hours. But she wishes to experiment with her bombs. Look,
mein Herr! There is a float down below her. She will pulverize it. She
will smash it. She will drop a bomb plumb into it, and, piff! it is
gone. That, mein Herr, is the work of the latest Zeppelin."
Perhaps a thousand passengers crowded the rails and watched the monster
of the air, and it was as Mr. Reitberg had so proudly announced. The
Zeppelin was manoeuvring away from the Hamburg-Amerika liner. Ahead of
her, some five miles to the east, was a dot upon the ocean. Andrew swung
his glasses to his eyes and fixed them upon that object.
"A float of some sort--yes," he said. "She is motoring towards it. Then
she will stop above it."
"No--not at all," declared Mr. Reitberg. "She will continue at her
fastest pace. Yet she will strike it. Watch. See--ah! Did I not say so?
It is marvellous! There!"
Was it imagination? Andrew fancied he saw a small, dark object fall from
one of the boat-shaped cars beneath the long Zeppelin. In a twinkling he
swung his glasses down upon the float half-immersed in the sea below.
Then a loud detonation reached his ears, while the float disappeared
miraculously, the sea being churned up and splashed all about it. Nor
was that all. There came from the ship above a succession of sharp
reports, while bullets of large size struck the sea immediately over
the spot where the float had been. Then another object dropped from the
airship. It burst into flames within two hundred feet of leaving the
hand which had projected it, and almost at once sent out a vast,
spreading mass of dense smoke, that spread and spread and spread till
the sky was obscured, till the airship was utterly hidden.
Mr. Carl Reitberg chuckled aloud, and danced with delight.
"Magnificent! Cunning! The latest thing!" he declared. "You see the
reason, Mr. Provost? No; then I will tell you. The ship, the air
dreadnought, you understand, discovers an enemy's ship, or shall we say
the enemy's war harbour, or arsenal, or magazine, or what you will? She
sails above it. She drops a bomb. Then, piff! the thing is done. The
ship is destroyed; the harbour is wrecked; the magazine explodes. Men
rush to and fro in panic--those who are left. For some are poisoned.
Yes, some die not from the effects of the explosion, but because the
airship has dropped also chemical bombs which burst and spread poisonous
fumes everywhere. But men are left, we will allow. There are gunners
there. They rush to the aerial guns. They load them; they attempt to
take aim. But--where is the ship? Gone? No--but where? The sky is all
smoke. There is no sign of her. She is invisible. _Nicht wahr?_ It is
too late; all the damage is done. The Zeppelin escapes to wreck more
ships, more harbours, more magazines."
He puffed out his stout little chest, gazed aloft at the dense and
spreading cloud of smoke, and waved his hands excitedly.
"It is magnificent!" he repeated for perhaps the tenth time. "It is a
triumph! None can approach it. Many have watched and scorned the idea.
Count Zeppelin has persevered. Germany has backed his efforts, and now,
_voila_!--there is the result. Triumph! The conquest of the air. Mastery
of the upper element; with none to gainsay us."
"But--but there are limits to the power of these ships," suggested
Andrew, his words almost faltering. "There are limits to their range of
travel."
Mr. Carl Reitberg put one fat finger artfully to the side of his nose.
It was perhaps a little peculiarity he had picked up in England, for we
hasten to explain that he was cosmopolitan. Carl Reitberg had spent many
of his fifty-three years in South Africa. There he had enjoyed the
protection of the Union Jack. He had a house in London now, and one also
at Brighton. It may be said that he had made his fortune, thanks to his
own astuteness and the opportunities given him by our British colonies.
But he was not English. He was not entirely German. He belonged to the
world. One day he was resident in Berlin, a second found him in London
or in Brighton, while as likely as not the following weeks saw him
parading the Champs Élysées in Paris, the Boulevards of Buenos Ayres,
the streets of Mexico, or Broadway, New York. In fact, and in short, he
was cosmopolitan.
"Limits, mein Herr!" he cried, still in those tones of pride, still
dancing on his toes. "None! That ship can sail continuously over a
thousand miles. Her wireless telegraph will reach within a hundred miles
of that distance. She can manoeuvre easily over a ship at sea and take
in further supplies. She is, in short, a cruiser. Do you wish to sail in
luxury to St. Petersburg? Hire, then, a Zeppelin. Do you desire to
escape _mal de mer_? Call for one of these huge airships and sail for
London. Do you fancy the conquest of some island kingdom? Mr. Provost,
you are rich; buy one of the air dreadnoughts and blow your enemies sky
high."
Andrew took his eyes from the spreading cloud of smoke overhead and
glanced at the excited orbs of the little fellow. Then he looked at his
nephew. And we tell but the truth when we say that his own eyes were
troubled.
"It is magnificent, but it is terrible," he said slowly. "Terrible for
those who have no aerial dreadnoughts. Yes, terrible. Their danger is
greater than I could ever have imagined. And you say that these
Zeppelins stand alone. There are no others?"
"None. But wait. Yes, there are others, also German. There are the
Parseval, the semi-rigid ships of the air," said Mr. Reitberg with a
truculent smile. "There are also the Gross ships; but the Zeppelins are
infinitely superior. Elsewhere there are none. France, what are her
ships? Russia, poof! we will not waste breath in discussing them.
England--mein Herr, she has the Alpha, the Beta, and the Gamma, mere
toy airships. They do not count."
There was a wide smile on his face now. Andrew winced at his words;
there were even beads of perspiration on his forehead, while lines had
knit themselves across his brow.
"You say that England has no such ships. Then she can build them, must
build them," he said.
"Must--yes! But can she? Impossible!" Mr. Carl Reitberg looked his pity.
"Impossible!" he repeated, while Andrew wiped his perspiring brow.
"I think not--hardly impossible, mein Herr," came in quiet tones from
Joe, a silent witness of all that had been passing.
"Eh! Not impossible? You think that a bigger Gamma would suffice? You
think that England could build such a ship as this Zeppelin without
experiment, without numerous failures--all, we will say, within a year?"
"I am sure."
"Sure! You joke. The thing cannot be done; I know England. Men are
clever there, but they have not studied these airships: they are
ignorant."
"Not quite--I disagree. In six months, in three, perhaps, such a ship as
sails above us could be erected; but better, with more power, a wider
range, and a greater capacity for destruction."
Mr. Carl Reitberg gasped; he pulled an elegant silk handkerchief from
his pocket and mopped his forehead. He was beginning to get annoyed
with the calm, not to say idiotic, assurance of this young man. He
looked Joe Gresson superciliously up and down, and then smiled urbanely.
"You are young," he said. "When you arrive at my age you will see your
error. I, who know, say that such a thing is impossible."
"And I, Herr Reitberg, while thanking you, say that it can be done. It
has been done, on a smaller scale. To-morrow, or let us say within three
months, England could possess an aerial dreadnought superior to any
Zeppelin. I am positive."
The smile left Mr. Reitberg's face. He looked at Joe as if he thought
him mad. As for Andrew, at first he had watched his nephew with every
sign of surprise, if not of disapproval. But now he smacked him on the
back encouragingly.
"Bravo, Joe!" he cried. "Stick to your guns. You say England could build
such a ship. Well, she's tried?"
"Yes; the Admiralty tried through their contractors, and failed."
"Ah, failed, yes!" lisped Mr. Reitberg. "So did Zeppelin. But he carried
on his experiments; he succeeded. Your people did no more."
"Others took on the work."
Joe returned the looks of his two companions firmly. "And succeeded," he
added.
"Who? You?" demanded Andrew eagerly.
"Yes; I did."
"Then I'd back you to do as you say. You declare that you could erect
such a ship as we have just lost sight of, but better, with greater
powers of movement, with greater range?"
"Certainly."
"Then why has mein Herr not done so?" asked Mr. Reitberg, with a lift of
his eyebrows and outspread hands. He was the essence, in fact, of polite
incredulity.
"I did on a small scale; then funds failed."
"Ah, yes! they always do, fortunately, mein Herr. Then your experiments
are ended. This ship is but a creation of your brain. It must remain so;
for funds are done with."
There was sarcasm in the voice. Andrew Provost resented the tone. He had
never liked Mr. Reitberg overmuch, though they had met in more than one
country and had dined together frequently. Besides, it roused his gorge
to feel that here was an example of British ineptitude. He knew his
nephew well enough by now, knew him to be a young man worth trusting. If
he said he could do this thing, then he could.
"By Jingo, I'll give him the opportunity!" he cried. "Joe, how much'd it
cost?"
"One hundred thousand pounds, perhaps. Not more; very likely a great
deal less."
"And within three months? Well, let us say, within six months?" asked
Mr. Reitberg incredulously. "Impossible! The money would be wasted. A
ship be built in that time, by men inexperienced in such work, a ship,
moreover, of almost unlimited range! You are dreaming, sir!"
Joe Gresson might have been excused if he had lost his temper. Instead,
he smiled at the little foreigner. "I am all seriousness," he said. "If
I had the means I would erect this ship, and prove her capacity to you.
She would sail where you wished; no part of the earth would be too far
for her."
"And I back him up in what he says. What this young fellow cares to
declare as in his power I feel is not impossible. Now, Mr. Reitberg,"
cried Andrew with no little warmth, "I'll stand by him."
Mr. Reitberg did nothing in a hurry. It was his very slowness which had
sometimes proved his success. But this discussion irritated him. He
liked to feel that the Zeppelin was beyond all attempts at imitation. He
considered that Joe was mad, or suffering from too great a shock of
confidence. In any case, it seemed to him that what he described as
possible was hopelessly out of the question. He tucked his short neck
deep into his collar, screwed his head on one side, and then began to
smile urbanely.
"Well, well," he said at last. "One hundred thousand pounds. What is it
to me, or to you, Mr. Provost? Build this airship. Prove her to be
better than a Zeppelin. Sail her round the world and then return to
England. If you do all this, say within nine months of this date, then I
return the cost of the venture. Is that a bargain?"
"Done!" shouted Andrew. "I'll back the boy. I'll find the money for him.
If we succeed within nine months, then the loss is yours. The ship
remains ours, while you pay for it. Let us step into the cabin. We'll
draft out a form of agreement. When that's signed we'll set to in
earnest."
It took but a half-hour to complete this necessary preliminary, so that
when they returned on deck again the huge cloud of smoke had
disappeared, while the Zeppelin was again in sight, a mere speck in the
distance.
"Like that, but better, faster, stronger, with greater range," said
Andrew, pointing up at her.
"Quite so--the impossible!" smiled Mr. Reitberg. "Do not blame me if you
fail, Mr. Provost. I hate taking other people's money, or running anyone
into large expense. Good luck to you!"
They shook hands on leaving the steamer at Southampton and parted. Joe
and his uncle took train for London, and that same evening found them
seated before the window of their private room at the hotel quietly
discussing the exciting future before them.