FIGHTING BACK.
Hines sat at a telephone in Portland, and things began to move. He
called Boston, and long, lean, greyhound-like ships with many funnels
slipped their moorings and slid smoothly out to sea. Three cruisers
raised steam and went after them. And there was vast activity in the
Navy yard, and presently an old harbor-defense monitor went staggering
gamely after the more modern ships.
He called New York, and trains were shunted swiftly here and there, and
there were shouted orders and the rattling of accouterments and much
profanity; then flatcars with squat, ungainly-wheeled shapes upon them
rolled out of the city bound northward. They traveled at the speed of
the fastest express trains, and passenger flyers were sidetracked to
let them pass.
Hines called here and there, and everywhere there were swift and
deadly preparations for action. At Newport, two battalions of Marines
entrained with an astounding celerity. At other scattered cities other
fighting men and fighting machines made ready. Three howitzer batteries
were bumping at top speed over the rails to Maine. Two twelve-inch guns
with railroad mountings formed a racing special train with cars of
shells and their gun crews.
All the preparations were Hines's doing, and he explained his orders
as he gave them in the manner of a man who does not expect to survive
their carrying out. Metinic Island was no more than six miles from an
accessible part of the mainland. Artillery will range that distance
easily. Within two hours after Hines's return from the reconnaissance
flight in which three bombing planes were lost, artillery officers
had reached the future firing-point by plane and were marking out
gun-emplacements and swearing at the inadequacy of the local maps.
Hines's plan was to mass artillery in such quantity and with such a
supply of ammunition that Preston's headquarters could be smothered
under a rain of explosives. One field gun to ten yards of target can
keep that target under an adequate barrage fire. No man can live in the
open under such a hail of death. But in addition there would be the
warships. Four super-dreadnaughts, three cruisers, and a monitor would
pound the island. Three hours before dawn there would be over twenty
guns of twelve and fourteen-inch caliber trained upon the island, and
upward of thirty eight-inch rifles to assist. Nothing should be able
to live on the surface or beneath it, however deep the dugouts Preston
might have prepared. Hines was grimly calculating that within three
minutes of the opening of fire every square foot of earth upon the
island should have been plowed up by explosives. And Kathryn was there.
She must be.
It looked perfect, however, from the standpoint of destruction. The
resources of one regional department of the Army would be at hand
before dawn. The Navy would have its ships at hand with shotted
guns. The air would be alive with flying craft. A signal; a blast of
cannon-fire; a terrific, long-continued battering, and Metinic Island
should disappear forever.
* * * * *
It did look perfect. Too perfect, considering that Preston knew what
to expect now. Schaaf paced nervously back and forth as Hines gave his
orders.
"He has something up his sleefe, Hines," he said irritably. "He has
taken plenty from der cuffs, but he has something more."
Hines relaxed deliberately, with an effort.
"What has he got?'
"He has four-centimeter wafes," said Schaaf desperately. "They explain
nearly eferything. It was calculated a year and a half ago that der
death-ray of der imaginatif nofelists is theoretically impossible.
But if a man makes Hertzian wafes of four centimeters frequency, he
has der world by der tail. All der armies haff been trying to make
them, because it can be proofed by mathematics that in der path of a
beam of four-centimeter wafes der air will be a conductor der same as
metal. Breston has them. He has sent a beam of them straight up to der
Heaviside Layer. And his short wafes that make der air opaque, they
trafel along der four-centimeter beam until they hit der Layer. There
they spread out. So much is simple. Der bomber that was destroyed when
we went to look simply difed through a beam of four-centimeter wafes
that was carrying four thousand kilowatts of Breston's prifate short
short wafes up to der Heaviside Layer. It is no wonder it crashed!
"Der thing that destroyed der other bombers is just as simple. A beam
of der same conducting wafes, with darkness in it so they could see to
aim it, and high-frequency current shot into it at der critical moment.
A plane in a beam of those four-centimeter wafes is just like a plane
touching a power-transmission line. If der frequency is high enough,
there is no need of a ground wire to electrocute efery man on board.
Der whole plane starts sparking, it bursts into flame and der bombs
explode. That is what he has used!"
"I wonder," said Hines drearily, "if he can use it on the artillery?"
Schaaf shrugged. He resumed his impatient pacing up and down the room.
"But he has something else up der sleefe. I know he has something else
up der sleefe. It is too easy! Much too easy!"
The clocks announced seven o'clock. Eight. Nine o'clock. Reports began
to come in. Artillery units had arrived, were digging in. A battery of
field 'guns was ready to fire.
Nine thirty: Two guns of a howitzer section were ready to fire. One
naval gun on a railroad mounting was in position.
Ten: All the howitzers were ready to fire. The cruisers were in
position and the battleships were coming up. Destroyers had ventured
into the dense mass of darkness that hung about the island. The
darkness was nearly a circle, six miles across. One of the destroyers
came scuttling out with flames pouring from it. It reached the clear
air and was aflame from end to end. It floated, a lurid torch, while
its crew was taken off. It blew up and sank at eleven ten precisely.
At eleven thirty the basket-mast of a battle cruiser glowed red,
halfway up its height, and its separate steel rods bent and buckled,
and then cooled off again, leaving the fighting-top careened crazily
over at right angles and far out over the ship's side.
"Breston is trying to fight," said Schaaf shortly. "He is swinging der
beam of four-centimeter wafes around and shooting all der juice he
can supply into it. It happened to hit der fighting-mast. The beam is
infisible now. Since he cannot see what he is aiming at, he does not
want anybody else to see der beam. It is infisible death, that beam."
* * * * *
Hines smiled queerly. He picked up a telephone and spoke almost softly
into it.
"All ready for me?... Very well. It's understood that zero hour is 3
A.M. if the darkness is not cut before then. If it is cut, bolometer
readings are to be taken and action judged by their indications.
All ships and guns are to stand by in any event until the island is
occupied. Very well. Good luck!"
He stood up and held out his hand to Schaaf.
"I'm going to the island, Schaaf. Good-by."
Schaaf scowled at him.
"Of all der double-barreled, triple-distilled idiots I efer saw," he
said bitterly, "you are der worst! Hines, you are a _verdammt_ fool!
You are going to der island--"
Hines shrugged.
"It's a form of suicide," he said evenly. "I know it. But that devil
has got Kathryn there. I've arranged for him to be blown off the earth.
She'll be blown up with him. We were to have been married this morning.
So I--well, I'm going to be there, too."
Schaaf swore explosively in guttural German.
"That is not what I am talking about!" he snapped. "That is lunacy,
yes! But der magnificent imbecility is that you think I am going to let
Breston's short-wafe outfit be blown to bits without getting a look at
it! There is a place reserfed for me in der boat that is going to der
island. Try and keep me out of it!"
Hines looked steadily at Schaaf for nearly half a minute. Then he
smiled.
"You're a damned liar, Schaaf. You're going because--"
"Shut up!" snapped Schaaf again. He drew himself up to his full six
feet and something of whiskered blondness. "Hines, I am a damned liar,
yes! And you are a damned fool! So that makes two of us going out to be
fery unpleasantly bumped off, and if you try to talk silly sentiment I
will poke you in der eye. Come on!"