_Into the Enemy Camp_
"But Bob, I won't go back to Government House," Don whispered.
"Lord, we can't do that--get in for theories and questions and plans
to gather a police squad. Every minute counts."
"What can we do?"
"Break away from these fellows--send Uncle Arthur a
message--anything at all; and say we'll be back in half an hour. I
tell you, Jane is gone--they've got her. You saw them take her. By
now probably, they've got her off there in Paget among them. We've
got to do something drastic, and do it now. If the police
attacked--suppose Jane is in that Paget group--the first thing
they'd do when the police came at them would be to kill her. We
can't go at it that way, I tell you."
We were trudging back up Government Hill with a group of soldiers
around us. I had revived to find myself not seriously injured; a
lump was on my head and a scalp wound where something had struck me.
Don had regained consciousness a moment later and was wholly
unharmed. His experience had been different from mine. Two men had
seized him. He was aware of a sudden puff of an acrid gas in his
face, and his senses had faded. But when they returned he had his
full strength almost at once.
We realized what had happened. Half a dozen of the enemy were lying
in ambush there on the roadside. It was young white girls they were
after, and when we appeared with Jane, one of the invaders showed
himself as an apparition to stop us, and then the others, fully
materialized and hiding in the oleanders, had leaped upon us. They
had had only time to escape with Jane, ignoring Don and me where we
had fallen. They seemed also not aware of the nature of our weapons
for they had not taken our revolvers.
* * * * *
Had they gone now with Jane into the other realm of the Unknown? Or
was she with them, over in Paget now in the little enemy camp there
which was defying Bermuda? We thought very possibly it was the
latter. The giant who had called himself Tako, who had escaped us in
the Police Station, had been driven from our minds by all the
excitement which followed. Was that Tako the leader of these
invaders? Had he, for some time perhaps, been living as he said in
the Hamiltonia Hotel? Scouting around Bermuda, selecting the young
girls whom his cohorts were to abduct?
The thoughts made us shudder. He had noticed Jane. He it was,
doubtless, who as an apparition had prowled outside Jane's room the
night before last. And last night he had followed us to the Fort
Beach. And again to-night in the restaurant he had been watching
Jane. These men who had captured Jane now might very well carry her
to Paget and hand her over to their leader, this giant Tako.
A frenzy of desperation was upon Don and me at the thought.
"But what shall we do?" I whispered.
"Get away from these soldiers, Bob. We've got our revolvers. We'll
ride over there to Paget--just the two of us. It's our best chance
that way. Creep up and see what's over there. And if Jane is there,
we've got to get her, Bob--get her some way, somehow."
We could plan no further than that. But to return to Government
House, to face Jane's father with the tale of what had happened, and
then become involved in an official attempt to attack with open
hostilities the enemy in Paget--that was unthinkable.
* * * * *
At the foot of Government Hill, with a trumped-up excuse, Don got us
away from our escort. The night was far darker now; a gray-white
mass of clouds had come up to obscure the moon. We cycled through
the outskirts of Hamilton to the harbor road and followed it around
the marshy end of the bay and into Paget. There had been at first
many vehicles coming in from the beach, but when we passed the
intersection and nothing lay ahead of us but the Paget ridge we
found the road deserted.
We had had our handle-bar flash-lights turned on, but now we shut
them off, riding slowly into the darkness. Don presently dismounted.
"Better leave our wheels here."
"Yes."
We laid them on the ground in a little roadside banana patch. We
were no more than a quarter of a mile from the enemy now; the glow
of their green beams standing up into the air showed on the
ridge-top ahead of us.
"We'll take the uproad," Don whispered. "Shall we? And when we get
to the top, follow some path, instead of a road."
"All right," I agreed.
We started on foot up the steep side road which led from the bay
shore to the summit of the ridge. The houses here were all dark and
deserted, their occupants long since having fled to Hamilton. It was
enemy country here now.
We reached the summit and plunged into a cedar grove which had a
footpath through it. The green light-beams seemed very close; we
could see them in a little group standing motionless up into the
darkness of the sky.
"Can't plan," Don whispered. "But we must keep together. Get up as
close as we can and see what conditions are."
And see if Jane were here.... It echoed through my head, and I knew
it was also Don's guiding thought.
* * * * *
Another ten minutes. We were advancing with the utmost caution. The
cedar grove was almost black. Then we came to the end of it. There
was a winding road and two white houses a hundred feet or so apart.
And beyond the houses was a stretch of open field, strangely denuded
of vegetation.
"There they are, Bob!" Don sank to the ground with me beside him. We
crouched, revolvers in hand, gazing at the strange scene. The field
had been a cedar grove, but all the vegetation now was gone, leaving
only the thin layer of soil and the outcropping patches of Bermuda's
famous blue-gray rock. The houses, too, had been blasted. One was on
this side of the field, quite near us. Its walls and roof had
partially fallen; its windows and door rectangles yawned black and
empty, with the hurricane shutters and the wooden window casements
gone and the panes shattered into a litter of broken glass.
But the house held our attention only a moment. Across the
two-hundred-foot field we could plainly see the invaders--forty or
fifty men's figures dispersed in a little group. It seemed a sort of
encampment. The green light beams seemed emanating from small hand
projectors resting now on the ground. The sheen from them gave a
dull lurid-green cast to the scene. The men were sitting about in
small groups. And some were moving around, seemingly assembling
larger apparatus. We saw a projector, a cylindrical affair, which
half a dozen of them were dragging.
"Bob! Can you make out--back by the banana grove--captives? Look!"
* * * * *
The encampment was at the further corner of the naked field. A
little banana grove joined it. We could see where the enemy light
had struck, partially melting off some of the trees so that now they
stood leprous. In the grove were other figures of men, and it seemed
that among them were some girls. Was Jane there among those
captives?
"We've got to get closer," I whispered. "Don, that second house--if
we could circle around and get there. From the corner of it, we'd be
hidden."
"We'll try it."
The farther house was also in ruins. It stood near the back edge of
the naked field and was within fifty feet of the banana grove. We
circled back, and within ten minutes more were up against the broken
front veranda of the house.
"No one here," Don whispered.
"No, evidently not."
"Let's try getting around the back and see them from the back
corner."
We were close enough now to hear the voices in the banana grove. The
half-wrecked house against which we crouched was a litter of stones
and broken glass. It was black and silent inside.
"Don, look!"
Sidewise across the broken veranda the group of figures in the field
were partly visible. We saw ghostly wraiths now among them--apparitions
three or four feet above the ground. They solidified and dropped to
earth, with their comrades gathering over them. The babble of voices
in a strange tongue reached us. New arrivals materializing!
But was Jane here? And Tako, the giant? We had seen nothing of
either of them. These men seemed all undersized rather than
gigantic. We were about to start around the corner of the veranda
for a closer view of the figures in the grove, when a sound near at
hand froze us. A murmur of voices! Men within the house!
* * * * *
I pulled Don flat to the ground against the stone steps of the
porch. We heard voices; then footsteps. A little green glow of light
appeared. We could see over the porch floor into the black yawning
door rectangle. Two men were moving around in the lower front room,
and the radiation from their green lights showed them plainly. They
were small fellows in white, tight-fitting garments, with the black
helmet and the looped wires.
"Don, when they come out--" I murmured it against his ear. "If we
could strike them down without raising an alarm, and get those
suits--"
"Quiet! They're coming!"
They extinguished their light. They came down the front steps, and
as they reached the ground and turned aside Don and I rose up in the
shadows and struck at them desperately with the handles of our
revolvers. Don's man fell silently. Mine was able to ward off the
blow; he whirled and flashed on his little light. But the beam
missed me as I bent under it and seized him around the middle,
reaching up with a hand for his mouth. Then Don came at us, and
under his silent blow my antagonist wilted.
We had made only a slight noise; there seemed no alarm.
"Get them into the house," Don murmured. "Inside; someone may come
any minute."
We dragged them into the dark and littered lower room. We still had
our revolvers, and now I had the small hand-projector of the green
light-beam. It was a strangely weightless little cylinder, with a
firing mechanism which I had no idea how to operate.
In a moment we had stripped our unconscious captives of their white
woven garments. In the darkness we were hopelessly ruining the
mechanism of wires and dials. But we did not know how to operate the
mechanism in any event; and our plan was only to garb ourselves like
the enemy. Thus disguised, with the helmets on our heads, we could
get closer, creep among them and perhaps find Jane....
The woven garments which I had thought metal, stretched like rubber
and were curiously light in weight. I got the impression now that
the garments, these wires and disks, the helmet and the belt with
its dial-face--all this strange mechanism and even the green-ray
projector weapon--all of it was organic substance. And this
afterward proved to be the fact.[1]
[1] As we later learned, the scientific mechanism by which
the transition was made from the realm of the fourth
dimension to our own earthly world and back again, was only
effective to transport organic substances. The green
light-beam was of similar limitation. An organic substance
of our world upon which it struck was changed in vibration
rate and space-time co-ordinates to coincide with the
characteristics with which the light-current was endowed.
Thus the invaders used their beams as a weapon. The light
flung whatever it touched of organic material with horrible
speed of transition away into the Unknown--to the fourth,
fifth, or perhaps still other realms. In
effect--annihilation.
The mechanism of wires and dials (and small disks which were
storage batteries of the strange current) was of slower,
more controllable operation. Thus it could be used for
transportation--for space-time traveling, as Earth
scientists later came to call it. The invaders, wearing this
mechanism, materialized at will into the state of matter
existing in our world--and by a reversal of the co-ordinates
of the current, dematerialized into the more tenuous state
of their own realm.
We were soon disrobed and garbed in the white suits of our enemies.
The jacket and trunks stretched like rubber to fit us.
"Can't hope to get the wires right," Don whispered. "Got your
helmet?"
"Yes. The belt fastens behind, Don."
"I know. These accursed little disks, what are they?"
We did not know them for storage batteries as yet. They were thin
flat circles of flexible material with a cut in them so that we
could spring the edges apart and clasp them like bracelets at
intervals on our arms and legs. The wires connected them, looped up
to the helmet, and down to the broad belt where there was an
indicator-dial in the middle of the front.[2]
[2] We were soon to learn also that they were bringing into
our world weapons, food, clothing and a variety of equipment
by encasing the articles in containers operated by these
same mechanisms of wires carrying the transition current.
The transportation was possible because all the articles
they brought with them were of organic substance.
* * * * *
We worked swiftly and got the apparatus on somehow. The wires,
broken and awry, would not be noticed in the darkness.
"Ready, Don?"
"Yes. I--I guess so."
"I've got this light cylinder, but we don't know how to work it."
"Carry it openly in your hand. It adds to the disguise." There was a
note of triumph in Don's voice. "It's dark out there--only the green
glow. We'll pass for them, Bob, at a little distance anyway. Come
on."
We started out of the room. "You can hide your revolver in the
belt--there seems to be a pouch."
"Yes."
We passed noiselessly to the veranda. Over our bare feet we were
wearing a sort of woven buskin which fastened with wires to the
ankle disks.
"Keep together," Don whispered. "Take it slowly, but walk openly--no
hesitation."
My heart was pounding, seemingly in my throat, half-smothering me.
"Around the back corner of the house," I whispered. "Then into the
banana grove. Straighten."
"Yes. But not right among them. A little off to one side, passing by
as though we were on some errand."
"If they spot us?"
"Open fire. Cut and run for it. All we can do, Bob."
Side by side we walked slowly along the edge of the house. At the
back corner, the small banana grove opened before us. Twenty feet
away, under the spreading green leaves of the trees a dozen or so
men were working over apparatus. And in their center a group of
captive girls sat huddled on the ground. Men were passing back and
forth. At the edge of the trees, by the naked field, men seemed
preparing to serve a meal. There was a bustle of activity
everywhere; a babble of strange, subdued voices.
* * * * *
We were well under the trees now. Don, choosing our route, was
leading us to pass within ten or fifteen feet of where the girls
were sitting. It was dark here in the grove; the litter of rotted
leaves on the soft ground scrunched and swished under our tread.
There was light over by the girls. I stared at their huddled forms;
their white, terrified faces. Girls of Bermuda, all of them young,
all exceptionally pretty. I thought I recognized Eunice Arton. But
still it seemed that Jane was not here.... And I saw men seated
watchfully near them--men with cylinder weapons in their hands.
Don occasionally would stoop, poking at the ground as though looking
for something. He was heading us in a wide curve through the grove
so that we were skirting the seated figures. We had already been
seen, of course, but as yet no one heeded us. But every moment we
expected the alarm to come. My revolver was in the pouch of my belt
where I could quickly jerk it out. I brandished the useless light
cylinder ostentatiously.
"Don!" I gripped him. We stopped under a banana tree, half hidden in
its drooping leaves. "Don--more of them coming!"
Out in the empty field, apparitions of men were materializing. Then
we heard a tread near us, and stiffened. I thought that we were
discovered. A man passed close to us, heading in toward the girls.
He saw us; he raised a hand palm outward with a gesture of greeting
and we answered it.
* * * * *
For another two or three minutes we stood there, peering, searching
for some sign of Jane.... Men were distributing food to the girls
now.
And then we saw Jane! She was seated alone with her back against a
banana tree, a little apart from the others. And near her was a
seated man's figure, guarding her.
"Don! There she is! We can get near her! Keep on the way we were
going. We must go in a wide curve to come up behind her."
We started forward again. We were both wildly excited; Jane was at
the edge of the lighted area. We could come up behind her; shoot her
guard; seize her and dash off.... I saw that the mesh of wires,
disks and a helmet were on Jane....
Don suddenly stumbled over something on the ground. A man who had
been lying there, asleep perhaps, rose up. We went sidewise, and
passed him.
But his voice followed us. Unintelligible, angry words.
"Keep on!" I murmured. "Don't turn!"
It was a tense moment. The loud words brought attention to us. Then
there came what seemed a question from someone over by the girls. We
could not answer it. Then two or three other men shouted at us.
Don stopped, undecided.
"No!" I whispered. "Go ahead! Faster Don! It's darker ahead."
We started again. It seemed that all the camp was looking our way.
Voices were shouting. Someone called a jibe and there was a burst of
laughter. And from behind us came a man's voice, vaguely familiar,
with a sharp imperative command.
Should we run? Could we escape now, or would a darting green beam
strike us? And we were losing our chance for Jane.
Desperation was on me. "Faster, Don!"
The voice behind us grew more imperative. Then from nearby, two men
came running at us. An uproar was beginning. We were discovered!
* * * * *
Don's revolver was out. It seemed suddenly that men were all around
us. From behind a tree-trunk squarely ahead a figure appeared with
leveled cylinder. The ground leaves were swishing behind us with
swiftly advancing footsteps.
"Easy, Bob!"
Don found his wits. If he had not at that moment we would doubtless
have been annihilated in another few seconds. "Bob, we're
caught--don't shoot!"
I had flung away the cylinder and drawn my revolver; but Don shoved
down my extended hand and held up his own hand.
"We're caught!" He shouted aloud. "Don't kill us! Don't kill us!"
It seemed that everywhere we looked was a leveled cylinder. I half
turned at the running footsteps behind us. A man's voice called in
English.
"Throw down your weapons! Down!"
Don cast his revolver away, and mine followed. I was aware that Jane
had recognized Don's voice, and that she was on her feet staring in
our direction with horrified eyes.
The man from behind pounced upon us. It was the giant, Tako.
"Well, my friends of the restaurant! The American who knows New York
City so well! And the Bermudian! This is very much to my liking. You
thought your jail would imprison me, did you not?"
He stood regarding us with his sardonic smile, while our captors
surrounded us, searching our belts for other weapons. And he added,
"I was garbed like you when we last met. Now you are garbed like me.
How is that?"
* * * * *
They led us into the lighted area of the grove. "The American who
knows New York City so well," Tako added. "And the Bermudian says he
knows it also. It is what you would call an affair of luck, having
you here."
He seemed highly pleased. He gazed at us smilingly. We stood silent
while the men roughly stripped the broken wires and disks from us.
They recognized the equipment. There was a jargon of argument in
their strange guttural language. Then at Tako's command three of
them started for the house.
Jane had cried out at sight of us. Her captor had ordered her back
to her seat by the tree.
"So?" Tako commented. "You think silence is best? You are wise. I am
glad you did not make us kill you just now. I am going to New York
and you shall go with me; what you know of the city may be of help.
We are through with Bermuda. There are not many girls here. But in
the great United States I understand there are very many. You shall
help us capture them."
Don began, "The girl over there----"
"Your sister? Your wife? Perhaps she knows something of New York and
its girls also. We will keep her close with us. If you three choose
to help me, you need have no fear of harm." He waved aside the men
with imperious commands. "Come, we will join this girl of yours. She
is very pretty, is she not? And like you--not cowardly. I have not
been able to make her talk at all."
The dawn of this momentous night was at hand when, with the networks
of wires and disks properly adjusted upon us, Tako took Jane, Don
and me with him into the Fourth Dimension.
Strange transition! Strange and diabolical plot which now was
unfolded to us! Strangely fantastic, weird journey from this Bermuda
hilltop through the Unknown to the city of New York!