S. O. S.
Meanwhile the other “wireless twin” was not asleep even though it was
after midnight. Back in Ferncliffe, Walter Burton was a very busy boy.
He and Tony had been enterprisingly industrious during Guy’s absence.
Tony had made a diligent study of wireless telegraphy and was already
showing promise of early proficiency, as he was naturally quick. Walter
had received several letters from Guy, and these were all long and full
of interesting detail. The boy on the other side of the Atlantic told
all about his doings in London, the acquaintances he made, and the
sights he saw. He devoted pages to a description of how he and Artie
Fletcher “saw London in a fog,” and this letter was followed by other
lengthy ones, telling of his association with Smithers and the hotel
clerk. He described these two characters so minutely that Walter and
Tony received clear mental pictures of them.
“Save these letters,” Guy requested in his second long writing to his
brother. “I’m telling you everything because I don’t want to forget
anything. I’m going to claim these letters as my own property when I get
back, if you don’t object. You won’t care nearly so much for them as I
do.”
The last letter informed Walter and his father that Guy and his mother
would return on the Herculanea. It contained information also as to the
day they would start and the expected time of reaching New York.
About a week before Guy and Mrs. Burton started on their return, the
last of the winter snows at Ferncliffe melted and spring weather
arrived. Although the coast was still dangerous, Walter and Tony got the
motor yacht in condition for a trip as soon as the weather became
sufficiently settled for safety. The craft was inspected and overhauled
from stem to stern, and with Mr. Burton’s consent, the gasoline tanks
were filled. Walter also transferred one of the wireless apparatus to
the deck house, extending several wires between the fore and aft service
masts for an aerial.
“We’ll have everything ready for a little cruise when Guy gets back,” he
said to Tony as they worked and discussed their plans.
After all the preparations were completed, Walter suggested to Det
Teller that they make a run out of the harbor, as the sea was calm and
there seemed to be a promise of pleasant weather; but the sailor-farmer
objected.
“This boat doesn’t stir out of this place until your father gets back,”
he said very decidedly. “When he says ‘go’, we go, but not until.”
That settled it, and Walter realized that he had made a foolish
suggestion. Mr. Burton had been called to New York on business the day
before and would remain there to meet his wife and Guy on their arrival
from Europe. Walter and Tony were therefore left alone in the house, as
Jetta was staying with Mrs. Teller during her mother’s absence.
Sometimes the boys ate at Mrs. Teller’s table and sometimes at Tony’s
home.
Naturally they ran things pretty much their own way when they found
themselves sole occupants of the house. Fortunately they were even
tempered youth, and “their own way” proved to be fairly sane, so that
they did not break the windows or burn the house down. But they had a
good time after boy’s fashion, reading, playing games, talking wireless,
and going to bed when they were too tired and sleepy to stay up longer.
In this latter respect they violated long established tradition. They
had learned that night is the best time for sending and receiving radio
messages, as the atmospheric conditions are then most favorable for the
transmission of electric waves, and they applied this information to
practice. The first night they were alone they stayed up until 10:30
o’clock, the second night until after 11, and the third—well, they were
up until after midnight and then something happened that drove sleep
from their minds till the next succeeding sunset.
After supper on this eventful night, Walter went to the yacht and Tony
went to the attic “den,” and, seated at their respective wireless
tables, they practiced sending and receiving for two or three hours.
Tony, of course, was still very slow, but he managed to spell out his
words with reasonable accuracy, and as Walter sent his messages in a
leisurely manner, they did very well. One of the observations sent by
Walter across the spark gap in the course of their exchange of wireless
witticisms was the following:
“Ben Franklin contradicted himself by discovering a spark-gap in the sky
and giving that ‘early to bed, early to rise,’ advice.”
“Why?” Tony dot-and-dashed back.
“Because you have to stay up late to wireless well,” Walter replied.
Shortly after ten o’clock he sent the following message to Tony:
“Come here.”
“Repeat,” requested the boy at the shore station, who read the message
but was in doubt as to whether he had read it correctly.
“Come here,” Walter flashed again.
“Why?”
“Some fun here.”
Tony hastened to obey the summons.
He was soon aboard the boat, which was tied up at the wharf, and eagerly
hastened to the deck house to find out what the fun was. Walter was
sitting at the table with the receivers at his ears and his hand on the
key. Observing that he was busy, Tony said nothing, but waited. The
varying expression on the operator’s face indicated an interesting
conversation with someone.
Tony watched and listened attentively and caught enough of his friend’s
messages to understand that the latter was engaged in a lively repartee
with another operator. Presently Walter found an opportunity to explain.
“I’ve got an operator on a big yacht, I think,” he said. “He was casting
around for someone to talk to and picked me up. He started by calling me
an undampt landlubber, and I called him a vacuum amplifier.”
“What’s a vacuum amplifier?” interrupted Tony, who knew little of the
technique of wireless.
“It’s a radio monstrosity,” Walter replied. “When you make a study of
the science of wireless, you’ll learn that the vacuum tube amplifier is
an important instrument for increasing the volume of wave impulse at the
receiving end. I left out the tube and called him a vacuum amplifier,
meaning that he increased the volume of nothing. He came back weakly by
calling me a vacuum detector, playing on the idea of a vacuum detective.
That gave me just my opening for a good punch and I flashed back that I
had detected him as the emptiest vacuum tube this side of a minus
quantity.”
“Wow!” broke in Tony again. “Did that silence him?”
“Not yet,” answered Walter. “He called me an alternating current of sky
juice and I shot back that he was an interrupted gooseberry—”
“Ha, ha, ha,” laughed Tony, “I’ll bet he quit then.”
“Yes, he did. But here he is again.”
“Hello there, kindergarten,” was the next greeting from the revived
radio banterer. “How far away are you from me?”
“How should I know?” flashed back the young amateur. “But I can make a
better guess than you can.”
“I bet you a spark gap you can’t.”
“That’s just like you—always dealing in nothing,” retorted Walter. “I
bet you a vacuum cleaner I can.”
“It’s a go, Smarty.”
“All right, Empty,” agreed Walter. “How far apart are we?”
“Three miles.”
“I say ten. Where are you?”
“Two miles off Rookery Point.”
“I win. You’re twelve miles from me. I’m near Ferncliffe. You owe me an
empty glass.”
“I’ll be generous and put something in it. What’ll you have?”
“Make it a gooseberry phosphate.”
“All right but you must furnish the sugar. It costs too much now.”
“You’re a cheap skate. When you die, your folks will go gooseburying.”
“Good-by, kindergarten,” interrupted the twice defeated wireless wit.
“Your ma wants you to go to bed.”
“There’s a lot doing in the air tonight,” Walter announced presently,
turning to his friend. “I’m going to see what I can pick up. Most of it
is big wave length. I’m going to tune up to it and see what’s doing. You
may listen in some of the time if you want to, Tony.”
“You go ahead,” said the latter. “You can read faster than I can. Tell
me what’s doing whenever there’s anything interesting.”
Meanwhile Walter’s left hand was pressing the left receiver, while his
right hand was busy with the three-slide tuning coil. Presently he
appeared to be satisfied with the adjustment, for he transferred his
right hand from the instrument to the right ear piece and pressed both
pieces hard against his ears.
And there was good reason for this sudden eagerness of attitude on his
part.
“Oh, Tony,” the radio eavesdropper exclaimed after a few moments of rapt
attention. “It’s two liners talking together, and one of them’s the
Herculanea, the ship mother and Guy are on.”
“What!” shouted the astonished Tony.
“Yes, it’s true. I spelled the name Herculanea as clear as can be. Keep
still now.”
There was silence again for a minute or two while Walter strained every
listening nerve to catch the dots and dashes in the receivers. Then he
said:
“Yes, its the Herculanea. I didn’t catch the name of the other liner,
but it’s warning the Herculanea to look out for icebergs.”
“They must be way up north,” said Tony.
“Yes, keep still. They’re talking again.”
Walter was an intent listener again for five minutes. Then he took a
pencil from his pocket and wrote several figures on a paper tab lying on
the table. Presently he looked up at his friend and said:
“Tony, get me that chart of the north Atlantic in the chart case. I’ve
got the location of the icebergs, and maybe I’ll get the location of the
Herculanea. I want to follow it if I can. I want to place the steamer on
the chart and follow it as long as I get messages from it.”
Tony dashed into the pilot house and soon returned with the desired
chart, laying it on the table before Walter.
“There’s where the icebergs are,” said the young operator, eagerly
indicating with his finger; “not far from Sable Island, two hundred
miles or more from Halifax.”
“That’s more’n four hundred miles from here, isn’t it?” said Tony.
“Where’s the Herculanea?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t found that out yet.”
Walter continued to listen in silence for some time, eagerly hoping to
catch the location of the vessel, but he was disappointed. She might be
100 or 500 miles from the icebergs. He caught many messages from the
Herculanea and other ships speaking with her, but no more latitude and
longitude.
Time passed rapidly, and the interest of Walter did not wane. In fact,
he would not have thought of going to bed at all, so long as he was able
to catch messages from the Herculanea, if Tony had not called his
attention to the lateness of the hour.
“Walter, do you know what time it is?” asked Tony after looking at his
watch. The ship’s clock was not wound and had struck no bells all
evening.
“I guess it’s pretty late,” replied the diligent radio listener
mechanically.
“No, it’s early in the morning—after midnight.”
“You don’t say. Well, we’ll have to quit soon and go to bed. But I do
hate to stop as long as I can get a message from Guy’s and mother’s
ship. Maybe Guy’s standing beside the operator right now. It’u’d be just
like him to hang around the radio room for hours at a time if they’d let
’im.”
“He’s more likely in bed.”
“Perhaps you’re right. Well, one more message, and I’ll quit.”
But it was a long time coming, measured by the impatience of the
listener. The operator on the Herculanea was silent for ten minutes or
more, while Walter sat at his table, eager to receive one more message
before turning in.
“Better give it up,” advised Tony, “He’s going to bed.”
“I won’t believe it till I have to,” replied the other. “No, you’re
wrong,” he added suddenly. “Here he is.”
Walter was now all eagerness again. But soon a marked change came over
his face. So startling was the change that Tony sprang forward to catch
his friend, believing him to be ill. The next instant he saw his
mistake.
Pale and trembling, Walter gripped the receivers with both hands, while
he listened with every nerve at high tension. He uttered one or two
gasps; then he snatched up his pencil and wrote several figures on the
tab. A moment later he was shouting orders to his companion.
“Tony, Tony!” he cried. “Run an’ wake up Det quick. Tell him to come
here right away. The Herculanea—S. O. S.—I got the message. She’s hit
something—wrecked—sinking—mother—Guy!”
Dazed, bewildered, Tony rushed out of the cabin, onto the wharf and up
the path toward the old sailor’s house, while Walter, with ghost-like
face and rigid muscles sat listening to the appeals of distress as they
came from the operator of the doomed liner.