Next morning the world read at its breakfast table that the Mississippi
River had frozen over just below St. Louis, and that the water was
rising rapidly. The river had frozen solidly up to the surface. The
level rose, and the water started to flow over the top of the ice cake,
only to be turned into ice as it did so. Hour by hour the level rose,
and hour by hour the solid ice barrier rose with the water level. Men
had tried to blast a way through for the rushing waters, but without
effect. As fast as the water tried to flow through the opening made by
a charge of dynamite it froze again and plugged the hole through which
it was attempting to escape.
Hastily improvised levees were thrown up, but the water outstripped
the efforts of the builders. The lower part of St. Louis was flooded,
and a great part of the population made homeless. Then low-lying lands
beside the river were gradually submerged. In twenty-four hours there
were calls for help all along the upper part of the Mississippi Valley.
The rising water had flooded immense areas of cultivated land, and even
larger areas were threatened. In another day a thousand square miles
of crops were under water, and the loss in live stock was assuming
formidable proportions. The new cold bomb in New York harbor had crept
up to the Battery, as Teddy had foreseen. The Norfolk cold bomb had
exploded, fortunately without loss of life. Gibraltar had witnessed
three almost simultaneous blasts, and was again free of ice, but the
whole world knew that it was at the mercy of Varrhus.
Davis, Evelyn, and Teddy were discussing the matter dolefully. Davis
had been coming to the laboratory daily in the hopes of hearing that
Teddy had devised some plan for the frustration of Varrhus' ambitious
schemes. Teddy found himself liking Davis immensely, but with a
peculiarly illogical annoyance that Evelyn seemed to like him quite as
well. When he had phoned her of his safety after the fight with Varrhus
he could hear a flood of thankfulness in her voice, but when he saw
her the next day she was almost distant. He saw traces of real anxiety
on her face, but she had not been really natural until they had worked
nearly all day on the silver bracelet, trying to find what had been
done to the surface to give it its peculiar property of allowing heat
to pass in one direction, but not in the other. They were as far as
ever from the solution. Davis was quite ignorant of abstract chemistry
or physics and could not join in their discussions, but Teddy fancied
that he was much more interested in Evelyn than was necessary. He was
annoyed to find that he resented it. He had always looked on Evelyn
as a comrade, and he could not understand this feeling that took
possession of him. It did not occur to him to speculate upon the fact
that he found ideas coming to him much more readily when working by
Evelyn's side, or that he rarely attempted anything without asking
her opinion. Teddy had never thought much of romance, and he did not
suspect how much Evelyn's companionship meant to him.
Davis was reiterating for the fortieth time his disappointment at
Varrhus' getting away.
"We almost had him," he said disgustedly. "Our explosive bullets were
playing all over his infernal flying machine. We'd have landed one
in that little glass cabin of his and smashed him nicely in another
minute, when he skipped off like that. And I'll swear to it we were
doing a hundred and eighty miles an hour."
"He ran away from us pretty easily," said Teddy dismally. "Isn't there
a faster machine than yours we could get hold of?"
"Nothing but a single-seater, and not so much faster at that,"
said Davis. "A hundred and ninety-five is the best even the latest
single-seater combat planes will do at a low altitude."
"Even for a short burst of speed?" asked Evelyn.
"Diving, you'll run up faster than that," Davis explained. "When we
went straight down after Varrhus, we must have gone over two hundred,
but for straightaway work we've nothing that will catch Varrhus."
"What's the official speed record?" asked Evelyn, toying with a test
tube. She looked singularly pretty in the long white apron she wore in
the laboratory.
"Two hundred and fifteen, I think," said Davis. "Some Spanish aviator
made it. He'd doped his gas with picric acid, though."
"What does that do?" asked Teddy quickly.
"It's explosive, and about doubles the force of your explosions. It
eats your engines right up, though. They used to use it in motor-boat
races until a rule was made against it. You see, an engine is ruined
after twenty minutes or so, and it made the racing unfair for people
who couldn't buy a new engine for every race."
Teddy's face grew thoughtful.
"Picric acid," he said meditatively. "Suppose we used it in the gas of
your plane. Would we have a chance of catching Varrhus?"
"I don't know," Davis said thoughtfully. "I hardly think so. It would
make our speed better, but if it were anything of a chase our motors
would be ruined before we'd gone far."
"The acid attacks the steel of the cylinders and makes the bore too
large?" Teddy seemed to be thinking rapidly.
"Yes. You lose all your compression."
Teddy looked at Evelyn.
"Suppose the pistons and the interiors of your cylinders were plated
with platinum? Platinum is one of the hardest metals, and should stand
up under a great deal of wear."
"Would platinum resist the attack of the acid?" Davis grew excited.
"Surely."
Davis jumped to his feet.
"Then we've got him! New piston rings will let you plate the cylinders
without reboring them unless you're going to plate them heavily. Can
you do the plating?"
"Try," said Teddy.
"We make a hundred and eighty with straight gasoline," said Davis
excitedly. "With doped gas----How long will it take to fix my motors?"
"Four or five hours. We'll borrow the acid vats of some electro-plating
concern. Evelyn will mix the solution of platinum salts. I'll go
arrange to borrow the vats while you get your motors disassembled and
brought here on a motor truck."
Teddy hastily began to put on his coat.
"You're going to try to fight Varrhus again?" asked Evelyn anxiously.
"Are we?" asked Davis cheerfully. "Just ask me! We are."
"You hit him several times in the last fight," said Evelyn faintly,
"and it didn't do any good."
"We'll use armor-piercing bullets this time," said Davis exuberantly.
"Or we may be able to mount a one-pounder automatic. I think the plane
will stand it. And at worst we can ram him."
Evelyn turned a trifle pale. "That means you'll both be killed."
Davis smiled. "Maybe not. We'll take a chance anyway, won't we, Gerrod?"
Teddy nodded shortly. "I'm going to get Varrhus or he's going to get
me," he said succinctly.
They started for the front door. The commissioner of police was just
getting out of his car.
"News, most likely," said Teddy, and they waited.
The commissioner of police looked worried when he shook hands with
Teddy.
"My men have been trying to trace that package that contained the
bracelet," he told him, "and have found that it was put in a country
rural-delivery mail box after dark. The mail carrier took it when he
made his morning route. There's absolutely no way of tracing it any
farther. Any one might have passed by in an automobile and have put it
in. The farmer in whose box it was is above suspicion. Now another set
of letters has been sent in the same way from another rural-delivery
box a hundred miles from the first. One is addressed to Miss Hawkins.
I have it here. The postal authorities called me in when they saw the
envelope."
He showed a huge yellow envelope addressed to Evelyn. In one corner was
a large return card. "_The Dictatorial Residence._"
"It might be almost anything," said Davis. "Better not let Miss Hawkins
open it. I'll do it, Gerrod."
Teddy shook his head.
"We'll tell her about it, and I'll open it in the laboratory."
Evelyn and Davis waited apprehensively until Teddy emerged from that
room.
"No cold bombs, no electric shocks, and no poison gas," he said,
smiling. "Just a _billet doux_ to Evelyn. It fits in beautifully with
our plans, Davis."
Evelyn took the sheet he extended to her, and read:
THE DICTATORIAL RESIDENCE, August 29th.
His Excellency Wladislaw Varrhus, dictator of the earth, has been
much annoyed by the efforts of one Theodore Gerrod to obstruct his
plans and desires. He has been informed through the press of the
fact that Miss Evelyn Hawkins has collaborated with and encouraged
Theodore Gerrod in his rash attempts. His excellency the dictator
is pleased to require that Miss Evelyn Hawkins repair to a spot
some five miles due east from Norman's Reef, off the coast of
Maine. Miss Hawkins may bring with her a maid and such baggage as
she may require. She is to be held as security for the cessation of
Theodore Gerrod's efforts to impede the secure establishment of the
dictatorship. The Mississippi River has been closed to traffic, and
will remain closed until this order has been obeyed by Miss
Hawkins. The time set for Miss Hawkins' appearance at that spot is
daybreak of Tuesday, September the third. Given at the dictatorial
residence.
WLADISLAW VARRHUS.
Evelyn looked at the three men with a white face. The commissioner of
police looked grave. Davis was smiling, and Teddy was smiling, too, but
with a blaze of anger in his eyes.
"Gerrod," said Davis whimsically, "I am much depressed that Varrhus
didn't include me with you as making efforts to obstruct his plans and
desires."
"The government will have to be notified," said the commissioner of
police solemnly.
"Do--do you think I had better go?" asked Evelyn hesitatingly.
"No!" exploded Teddy and Davis together. Teddy went on: "Why, Evelyn,
the man is insane! And besides we've just thought of something that's
sure to get him. We'll lay in wait for him, and then he'll walk into
our parlor nicely. When he does------"
"_Finis_," said Davis cheerfully, "if I may borrow a phrase from the
French."
"And if it's a long chase," said Teddy even more cheerfully, "the dear
person set the time for dawn, and we'll have light to fight by. Let's
go and set to work on that plane of yours."
They left together in high spirits. Evelyn stood quite still after
they had gone, absently crushing the letter from Varrhus in her hand.
Presently, with a sob, she went to her room and allowed herself to cry.
They would not let her face danger, but Teddy was going out to fight,
perhaps to die--and for her.
Over at the hangar, mechanics swarmed upon the fighting plane,
dismounting the motors and disassembling them. The cylinders and
pistons were being carefully packed. A big motor truck had already
backed up at the wide door of the aëroplane shed, and as fast as the
parts were packed they were loaded on it. Davis was here, there, and
everywhere. He had asked permission for the experiment, and it has been
granted. The government was prepared to risk almost anything rather
than allow Varrhus to succeed in his huge blackmailing of the entire
human race. There was no hesitation in allowing anything that might
afford a fighting chance of downing the black flyer. The Mississippi
floods were growing in size and destructiveness. The New York cold
bomb, dropped the night Teddy and Davis had fought the black machine
over the harbor, was expected to explode at any moment. Every window
still intact in the city had been pasted with strips of paper to keep
the fragments from becoming a menace to those on the streets when the
bomb should burst them.
Davis had conferred with the commandant of the forts, and volunteers
had been asked for among the garrison. A boat was being heavily armed
with concealed guns. It would go to the point where Varrhus would
expect Evelyn to be taken. He would see the small boat, drop down
to take Evelyn on board his evil craft, and the masked batteries of
anti-aircraft guns would open on him in a blast of fire. Teddy's
discovery that flares fired into the cloud of liquified gas would cause
it to burn harmlessly in mid-air had been adapted to protect the crew.
As the guns opened on the hovering black flyer a stream of fire balls
would be made to float overhead to set flaming the stream of liquid
hydrogen Varrhus might be expected to shoot downward. At that, though,
the mission of the boat crew was hazardous in the extreme.
The telephone rang in the hangar. Teddy was on the wire. He had
commandeered the big wooden acid vats of an electro-plating plant,
and the platinum-plating solution was being mixed even then. If Davis
brought the motors over in parts, the plating might begin immediately.
The big truck rumbled off, Davis smiling confidently on the seat
beside the chauffeur. Half a dozen mechanics perched on various parts
of the load. When the truck stopped before the electro-plating plant
they leaped off and rushed the glistening cylinders inside. In twenty
minutes they were in the plating solution and an almost infinitely thin
film of platinum was slowly forming within them.
The workmen of the electro-plating plant labored far into the night
on their task. Teddy had insisted that a film of platinum ten times
the thickness of the usual precious-metal plating be used, and the
process was slow. When the cylinders had been prepared, the pistons
remained, and the exhaust ports and valves. These, too, were coated
with the hard, acid-resisting metal, and Davis' mechanics began their
task of fitting piston rings to the altered motor parts. The rings
themselves had then to be plated, and all the plating burnished and
polished. Teddy and Davis snatched a few hours' sleep while the motor
in its disassembled state was being carried back to the hangar and
re-installed in the aëroplane. They woke, and during all the following
day Davis sat in the pilot's seat, listening with a practiced ear and
aiding in the final tuning up of the changed motors, adjusting the
carburetors to their new fuel. Thirty per cent of picric acid added to
the finest, highest grade gasoline was to be used. No one had dared
use such a percentage before, even for motors that were expected to be
ruined.
Teddy, in the meantime, was familiarizing himself with the small
one-pounder automatic gun--similar to the German antitank
weapons--that was to be installed in the bow of the aëroplane. By
nightfall all was finished. Teddy ran over to New York and saw Evelyn
for the last time before making his attempt, and the next morning he
and Davis flew to Noman's Reef, where a camouflaged hangar had been
erected on telegraphed instructions from New York. Tuesday dawn found
them alert and anxiously scanning the sky for a sign of the black flyer.