FIRST SHOW OF FORCE
On entering the room, when he returned, Edestone, although he was
aware that the King had been notified and the attendants been given
orders to admit him, did not advance, but took his stand near the
door, looking neither to the right nor to the left. He permitted the
young Prince, his escort, who had discovered that they had many
friends in common, and whose sister it was that had been his
fellow-passenger on the _Ivernia_, to inform His Majesty that
everything was in readiness for the exhibition of the moving pictures.
The King immediately beckoned the inventor forward and, picking up the
little instrument from the table, thrust it into Edestone’s hands,
almost with an air of relief.
“We appreciate the compliment you have paid us in believing that we
still play fair.” There was in both his tone and action a touch of the
bluff heartiness of the naval officer, which was natural to him, and
showed that he had thrown off all restraint. “But do not, I beg of
you, do this again, even in England. These are desperate times; and
nations, like men, when fighting for their very existence, are quite
apt to forget their finer scruples.
“My cousin in Berlin, I am convinced,” and there was perhaps a hint of
warning in his smile, “would give the souls of half his people to know
what that little box contains; and, in his realm, it is the religion
of some of his benighted subjects to give him what he wants.”
Bowing slightly, Edestone took the little case, and, without even
looking at it, slipped it carelessly into the inside pocket of his
coat.
“I knew that Your Majesty would understand me,” he said in a tone
intended for the Royal ear alone, and with more emotion than he had
yet displayed. As he spoke, too, he lifted his hand in obedience to an
involuntary and apparently irresistible impulse.
The King met him more than half-way. Reaching out, he grasped the
extended hand in his own, and standing thus the two men looked
straight into each other’s eyes.
The suppressed excitement which the scene created was so intense that
some of the spectators seemed to be suffering actual pain; and when,
after a fraction of a moment which seemed an age, the King released
the American’s hand and spoke, there was an audible sigh of relief
that pervaded the entire room.
“We will now look at the pictures,” said His Majesty simply, and,
leading the way, he set out in the direction of the Green Drawing
Room.
Edestone fell back and bowed respectfully in acknowledgment of the
pleasant glances which were thrown in his direction, as the Lords,
Generals, Admirals, and Ministers of State took their places in line,
clinging with an almost frantic tenacity, in response to the teachings
of the Catechism of the English Church, to their position “in that
state of life unto which it had pleased God to call” them.
Thoroughly amused at the situation which compelled him to bring up the
rear of the procession like the piano-tuner or the gas-man, Edestone
marched along at the side of an attendant in livery, who evidently
looked upon him as a clever vaudeville artist that had been brought in
to entertain the company. He told the visitor, with a broad grin, that
he had frightened the other flunkey almost out of his wits with his
magic tricks. Edestone, his sense of humour aroused, thereupon gravely
offered to give a show in the servants’ hall at two shillings a head,
half the receipts to be donated to the Red Cross, provided he was
given a guarantee of ten pounds; and when the fellow promised to
consider the proposal, pretended carefully to take down his name.
The King, who, in the meantime, seemed to be in a sort of brown-study,
passed down the corridor with the long file of dignitaries following
him in order of precedence. But when His Majesty reached the Green
Drawing Room and, looking around, saw nothing of the American, he gave
a slight frown of annoyance. Immediately he directed that Edestone be
brought up and placed in a chair near himself, while the attendants
drew the curtains and extinguished the lights.
After the room had been made perfectly dark, and the buzzing of the
cinematograph in its temporary cabinet indicated that everything was
in readiness, Edestone’s operator, in response to a word from his
employer, threw upon the screen two or three portraits of the King and
various members of the Royal Family. This was not only by way of
compliment, but also to give assurance that the machine was in proper
working order. Edestone proposed to run no chances of a bungling or
incomplete presentation of his pictures.
Satisfied at length, he rose and faced about toward his audience.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” he said, after addressing the King,--for from
the gallery had come sounds which showed that, as Colonel Stewart had
suggested, some of the ladies of the Court were taking an interest in
the exhibition,--“I shall not trouble you to listen to a long,
scientific discourse on the theory of my discovery, nor how I have
made practical application of it. I shall simply throw the pictures on
the screen, letting them speak for themselves; and then, with His
Majesty’s kind permission, shall be glad to answer any questions that
may be put to me. The first picture I shall show you is one of my
workshop in New York.”
There appeared on the screen a dark, somewhat indistinct interior,
which seemed to have been photographed from high up and looking down
through a long, shed-like building lighted from the roof. The immense
height of this roof was not at first apparent until it was compared
with the pigmy-like figures of the workmen who were busily engaged
about a great, black, cigar-shaped object, which had the general
appearance of a Zeppelin. In the dim light, there was nothing about
its aspect to distinguish it from the latest models of the German
air-ship, save that it seemed to be of heavier construction, as shown
by the great difficulty with which the men were moving it toward the
farther end of the shed, which was entirely open.
“I would especially call your attention to the track upon which moves
the cradle that carries the large black object in the centre of the
picture,” said Edestone. “The tires are made of hard rubber, and the
rails which are of steel rest on glass plates attached to each of the
tires. Thus, any object placed in the cradle becomes absolutely
insulated, and has no electrical connection with the earth, which, as
I have explained, are the requisite conditions to permit of
‘Deionizing’ by the use of an instrument similar to the one I have in
my pocket. Of course, though in actual operation we use a much larger
‘Deionizer’ than the little model I have shown you, and run it with a
hundred horse-power motor, instead of with a small spring and
watchworks. This track and cradle at which you are looking, although
they weigh many tons, can be easily taken apart and transported in
sections, as I stand ready to demonstrate.”
The film ended as he finished, and for a moment the screen was blank;
then with a little splutter from the cabinet, another picture
appeared.
This was of a great open space, the most desolate and lonely stretch
of country that could well be imagined, a broad, open plain that
stretched on for miles and miles, perfectly flat, treeless and
uninhabited. The wind apparently was blowing violently, judging from
the way it tossed Edestone’s hair about as, hatless, he walked back
and forth in the near foreground, shading his eyes from the sun with
his hand while he looked into the lens and called his directions to
the man who was working the camera.
“That disreputable-looking individual is myself,” he confessed. “My
hat had blown away, a circumstance quite inconvenient at the time, but
not without a certain element of present interest, as showing that a
high wind was blowing at that time.”
Behind him in the middle distance was a track and cradle similar to
the one shown in the first picture. The machine in the cabinet buzzed,
and clicked, and made a noise like that of a small boy rattling a
stick along a picket fence. A draught from some open window blowing
against the linen screen caused the flat, deserted plain to undulate
like the waves of the sea. The horizon bobbed up and down, showing
first a great expanse of sky, and then the foreground ran up to
infinity. The cradle was seen first at the right, and then at the left
of the picture. The clouds in the sky kept jumping about, as if the
operator was trying to follow some object aloft, but was unable to get
it into the field of his camera.
The audience began to grow impatient. Had the apparatus got out of
order, they wondered, and were they to be cheated of the promised
sensation? But just then the screen steadied, and there appeared in
the upper left-hand corner of the picture a faint, far-away dot which
gradually assumed the form of a dirigible. Across the desolate
landscape it sailed, growing more and more distinct as it drew nearer.
It circled, turning first to the right and then to the left, rising
and descending, as if responding willingly to the touch of its unseen
pilot, until with a majestic swoop it hovered like a great bird
exactly over the cradle, and came to a standstill.
To those among the spectators who had witnessed the evolutions of the
great battleships of the air over Lake Constance, there was nothing
notable about either the vessel or its performance, except that it
seemed larger, more solid, and had four great smoke stacks. In the
gale which was blowing, the volumes of inky smoke which poured from
the four great funnels were tossed about and flung away like long,
streaming ribbons; yet the ship itself was as steady as a great ocean
liner on a summer sea.
On closer inspection, too, it was seen that on the upper side of the
craft there was a platform or deck running its full length, where men
were working away like sailors on a man-of-war, and from portholes and
turrets protruded great black things which looked like the muzzles of
guns.
All at once, as if acting under an order from within, these were
trained on the spectators and simultaneously discharged, belching out
great rings of smoke. There was a stifled scream from the gallery at
this, but immediately the room grew quiet again, and the audience sat
as if spellbound awaiting further developments. A small door in the
starboard side now opened, and the figure of a man came running down a
gangway to a platform suspended under the ship, where, silhouetted
against the sky, he occupied himself in signalling to some one on the
ground. He was joined from time to time by others of the crew as the
vessel settled slowly toward the earth.
When it was about one hundred and fifty feet above the cradle,
Edestone was seen to walk out with a megaphone in his hand, and
through it communicate instructions to the man on the bridge, in
evident obedience to which the airship settled still lower, until it
was not more than twenty feet above the top of the cradle.
A ladder having then been lowered to Edestone, he climbed up it,
ascended the gangway, and disappeared into the interior of the great
cigar-shaped object, it all the time remaining absolutely stationary.
But he was not long lost to view. In a few minutes he re-appeared on
the top deck and a man by his side energetically waved a large flag.
And as the two stood there, the airship began to move.
Slowly at first, but gradually gaining momentum, it soared away across
the wastes, and soon was lost to sight.
There was a moment after that when the room was dark, while horizontal
streaks of light chased each other from bottom to top across the
screen, and disappeared into the darkness from which they had come.
Another picture followed, taken from the same viewpoint as the last.
“Here she comes!” cried Edestone, seeming to forget for the moment
where he was, as a small speck which represented the approaching
airship disclosed itself. “This time in the upper right-hand corner of
the picture. See! I am on board, and I am driving her at one hundred
and ten miles.” And he followed with his pointer the swift course of
the vessel, as it shot down the screen like a great comet, leaving a
long tail of smoke behind it. To the overwrought nerves of the
audience, the buzz and splutter of the moving-picture machine seemed
to increase in volume, and thus lend a semblance of reality to the
monster as it swept nearer and nearer.
Straight for the camera it was headed, grim, threatening,
irresistible, as if it were preparing to rush out of the screen and
destroy Buckingham Palace. The spectators with difficulty kept their
seats, and when the formidable thing dashed by and disappeared at the
side of the picture, they settled back in their chairs with an
unmistakable sigh of relief.
It appeared again, after making a great circle, returning slowly now,
and dropping lightly as a feather to the cradle, where it remained
perfectly still, while the black smoke enveloped it in a veil of
mystery.
The machine in the cabinet stopped, and some one was heard to say in a
loud whisper, “Lights!” Admiral Brown was the first of the assembly to
recover. He sprang to his feet and like a wounded old lion at bay
stood glaring at Edestone. His rugged weather-beaten face convulsed
with suppressed rage, which but for the presence of the King would
have exploded upon Edestone after the manner of the old-fashioned
sea-dog that he was, but holding himself in check he said loudly and
challengingly:
“If there is no objection I will ask the young man to repeat the last
picture, and I would also like to inquire with what material the
framework of this ship is covered, and what is the calibre of those
large guns--if they are guns?”
“Will you please be so kind as to answer the Admiral’s questions, Mr.
Edestone?” said the King.
“The material which I used through her entire length of 907 feet, both
top and bottom, is Harveyized steel, six feet thick; and the largest
gun is sixteen inches,” replied Edestone slowly, enjoying the look of
blank amazement which spread over the Admiral’s face as he dropped
back into his chair gasping and mopping his brow.
“This is the end of everything. I wish I had never lived to see the
day!” The old sailor sat like a man who had seen a vision so appalling
that it robbed him of his reason.