On the morning of March 16th, Dustin and Sanders set out for the
Galapagos in the former’s swift Blettendorf super-electroplane, which
was capable of a speed of eight hundred miles an hour. They arrived
about noon and worked assiduously, with the result that the gun was
loaded and ready for the herculean task of lowering it into the
emplacement by night.
On the seventeenth it was pointed according to the calculations of the
young inventor, and on the eighteenth was braced in place by hundreds of
tons of special, fast-setting, reinforced concrete.
On the nineteenth the U.S. Aerial Battleship Hawaii arrived with a group
of trained observers, representing the Associated Governments of the
Earth. She was equipped with high power telescopes, spectroscopes, and
photographic apparatus, all to be used by or under the direction of this
assembly of picked scientists.
Busy as he was in getting his men and equipment loaded and away from the
danger zone, Dustin was compelled to hold a reception for his
distinguished visitors, show them the gun and its emplacement, and
answer a thousand questions. Sanders, however, assumed the burdens of
the executive to such good purpose that before the scientists had
boarded the Hawaii to be taken to their point of observation and there
await the zero hour, he had everything loaded and off the island.
All that night, and up until one thirty on the twentieth, the inventor
busied himself connecting the automatic firing apparatus and seeing that
it was in perfect order.
By that time, Dustin, Sanders and Bevans, the pilot, were the only
humans left in the archipelago. After a cold lunch and a final tour of
inspection, each man made ready to play his part.
It was estimated that the moon would cross the path of the earth at 6
hours, 53 minutes and 13 seconds past noon, central standard time. This
brought the firing time to 2 hours, 32 minutes and 22 seconds past noon,
or approximately 2:30 P.M.
Promptly at 2:20, Bevans started the helicopter blades and rising above
the rim of the crater headed northwest toward the point on the equator,
97½° west longitude, which it was thought would be most favorable for
observation, and to which the scientists had gone the evening before.
This was less than a forty minute run for the powerful
super-electroplane.
As they hurtled along, Ted glanced, from time to time, at the
chronometer. At 2:30 he hastily unslung his binoculars, opened the rear
window and trained them in the direction of Daphne Major.
“Can’t see the island from here, can you?”
“Hardly. It’s a good two hundred and fifty miles back and we couldn’t
possibly rise high enough to bring it to our horizon line.”
“Then what do you expect to see?”
“Some sign of the explosion, possibly. Take a look for yourself.”
While Roger trained his own binoculars rearward, Ted called up to
Bevans:
“Start the smoke trail at 2:35,” he ordered, “and watch for aerial
waves. We may be in for a good shaking up.”
“Very well, sir.”
At 2:32, Ted and Roger sat with bated breath, their binoculars directed
toward the archipelago, listening intently while the chronometer ticked
off the seconds.
The zero hour arrived and for two seconds thereafter the anxious
watchers saw nothing. Then, with amazing suddenness, a gray,
mushroom-shaped cloud spread skyward above the horizon. Just above it, a
thin pencil of smoke was barely discernible through the glasses,
pointing straight toward the zenith.
“Hurray! She’s off!” shouted Roger.
Ted did not answer. His face grew suddenly grave.
“Why, what’s the matter?” asked Roger. “Isn’t everything all right?”
“I’m afraid we’ve started something we didn’t consider in our
calculations,” he replied. “Do you see that black cloud forcing its way
upward through the gray one?”
“Yes.”
“And the band of yellow immediately beneath it?”
“Yes. What is it?”
“A volcanic eruption,” replied Ted. “Daphne Major, you will remember,
was the crater of an extinct volcano. We’ve blown off the top, and
outraged Mother Earth is doing the rest. Appears like a terrific
eruption from here, too. And look: There’s a reply from the heavens. See
those flashes in the clouds? A thunder storm has formed in the upper
regions.”
At this moment thick, black smoke began belching from the rear of the
electroplane, and their view to the rear was obscured.
“Full speed ahead, Bevans,” shouted Ted. “Give her all you’ve got. We’re
due for a heavy squall in less than five minutes.”
Shortly thereafter, signs of terrific agitation in the atmosphere were
registered in the rear of the smoke trail.
“Ascend at an angle of 45°,” ordered Ted. “We’ll ride with the gale.”
Scarcely had he spoken ere the plane received such a shock that both Ted
and Roger were thrown to the floor. It was accompanied by a continuous
roar as of a thousand thunder-claps let loose at once, echoing and
reechoing with seemingly undiminished intensity for several minutes.
Rising with difficulty, for the ship careened frightfully, Ted dragged
himself to the rear window and looked out. Their smoke trail had been
completely dissipated, and once more he had a clear view toward the
rear. Two things he noted, almost simultaneously—a mountainous,
white-crested wall of water swiftly overtaking them on the surface of
the Pacific, and just above it a swirling, tumbling mass of clouds,
black beneath and silvery white above, with vivid flashes of forked
lightning playing between them. He shouted up the speaking tube:
“Higher, Bevans. Use your helicopters, man, or we’re lost!”
There was a jerk and a roar as Bevans hastily threw the helicopters into
gear, then a rapid upward movement that glued them to the floor until
their bodies had gained momentum.
Quick though he had been in carrying out orders, the pilot was not quick
enough for the forces of Nature. As if incensed at this puny attempt of
man to conquer her, she seized the frail craft in the grasp of her
powerful winds and played with it as if it had been a feather. At the
first impact Ted saw Roger strike his head on the edge of the
refrigerator and slump to the floor. He tried to go to him, but found
this impossible. The craft dipped dizzily, spun like a top, and rolled
end over end. Gripping the doorknob, unable to help his fallen
companion, he found his feet sometimes in midair, sometimes on the wall,
and sometimes on the very ceiling. There was an unending glare of
lightning and a continuous roar of thunder. Rain, sleet, and ice pellets
alternately beat in through the unclosed rear window.
The craft steadied a bit for an instant, and Ted succeeded in seizing
Roger’s ankle. Dragging the limp form of his companion toward him, he
passed his arm beneath the slender body and held it as best he could,
meanwhile keeping a tight grip on the doorknob. Though the storm
continued outside, Bevans seemed to be getting the plane under control
once more, for it rocked less and less as time went on.
Presently, too, the lightning flashes appeared farther apart, and the
intervening darkness grew steadily lighter.
As soon as he was able to release his grip on the doorknob, Ted gently
lowered his assistant to the floor of the disordered cabin. Switching on
the light, he made a hasty examination of the gash in the pale forehead
and found, to his relief, that there was no skull fracture. After
carefully dressing it from the contents of the emergency kit, he placed
a pillow beneath the head of the still unconscious Roger, and made his
way to the rear window. At a glance, he saw that they had risen above
the electrical storm, but were still beneath a dense cloud stratum that
shut off the sunlight like a blanket. He shouted up to the pilot:
“All right, Bevans?”
“Sound as a dollar, sir.”
“Good. Keep those helicopters going and see if we can get up into the
sunlight.”
“Yes, sir.”
Roger moaned feebly, then opened his eyes as Ted bent over him.
“Wh-what happened?” he asked.
“You were knocked out. Nothing dangerous. Be all right soon. Want
anything?”
“Cigarette.”
“Sure thing. Here.”
Ted placed it between the ashen lips and fired it with his atomic
lighter.
“Lie still for a while,” he counseled. “I’m going to try to make some
observations if we can ever get above these confounded clouds.”
It was some time before the welcome flash of sunlight appeared. After
making his observations, Ted calculated that they had been driven more
than three hundred miles southwest of their course by the storm. When
the plane was once more headed toward the point where they hoped to find
the Hawaii, he descended the stairway to see what he could do for Roger.
He found him in one of the cabin chairs, curiously examining a film of
dust that had formed on the map-table.
“Where do you suppose that came from?” he asked, poking it with his
finger.
“Volcanic ash,” replied Dustin. “Sometimes travels clear around the
world, so we needn’t be surprised to find it here after that huge
upheaval. How’s the head feeling now, old man?”
“Better, thanks.”
“Good. We’ll just have time for a cold snack before we board the
Hawaii.”
As soon as they had eaten, Ted took food up to the pilot and steered the
ship while he ate.
“Nearly there, aren’t we, sir?” asked Bevans, after he had swallowed the
last morsel.
“Almost. I’ll give you the signal to descend, from the cabin. We’re
going to need our searchlight, I’m afraid.”
Once more in the cabin, Ted consulted his instruments. Presently he gave
the order to descend. In a moment they were plunged into deep gloom
which the mighty searchlights failed to penetrate for more than fifty
feet in any direction.
“We’ll never find them this way,” said Ted. “Try the radio, Roger, will
you?”
Sanders sat down in front of the powerful instrument and turned the
dials.
“She’s dead,” he announced. “That electrical storm must have burned out
something.”
“Here. You keep watch while I see what’s wrong,” replied Ted.
It only took the inventor a moment to find the trouble.
“Burned out every tube,” he said, “and I forgot to bring a spare set.
We’ll just have to keep cruising around, I guess, and hope for luck. A
nice mess we’ve gotten into.”
“For my part I’m thankful to be alive, radio or no radio,” said Roger.
“Righto, but I’ll certainly be disappointed if I can’t be aboard the
Hawaii with those official observers when the projectile strikes the
moon. We may be able to see it with our binoculars, but I doubt it.”
As they cruised about in ever widening circles, the time slipped away,
but there was no sign of the Hawaii. Presently, when the chronometer
showed 6:20 Ted gave up the search and ordered Bevans to hurry back to
the designated observation point. They barely reached it at 6:50, and
another minute was consumed in rising above the highest cloud stratum.
The sun had set and the half-illumined orb of the moon was just above
the western horizon. Both men trained their binoculars on it
simultaneously. Came 6:53 and they waited tensely for the thirteenth
second, at which instant the projectile was calculated to strike.
The thirteenth second came and went without incident. The fourteenth—and
then—directly in the center of the celestial target things happened.
Both men simultaneously saw a tiny light flash for an instant across the
dark side of the moon’s sunrise line, while a small black spot slowly
grew in size on the sunlit side of the line.
“Hurray! She hit dead center!” shouted Roger.
Ted watched the black spot in silence for a moment.
“Seems to have landed plumb in the middle of the crater, Hipparchus,”
replied Ted. “Thought I had miscalculated the time, for an instant, but
I see the reason now. We saw the flash just 1¼ seconds after it took
place because it takes light that long to travel from the moon to the
earth.”
The black spot faded perceptibly. In a minute more it had disappeared
completely.
“There goes our evidence,” said Ted. “I hope they saw it while it
lasted.”
He called up through the speaking tube:
“Back to Chicago, Bevans.”