A NARROW ESCAPE
At Frank’s words Mr. Pauling and Mr. Henderson leaped to their feet
and Tom almost dropped the coil in his surprise. “By glory!” exclaimed
Rawlins, who had just appeared.
“Are you sure?” demanded Mr. Pauling. “Of course I’m sure,” replied
Frank. “I heard them just as plain as in New York.”
Scrambling down the ladder all gathered about the instruments, but
despite every effort no sounds came to their ears.
“Well, it did before,” insisted Frank. “I hadn’t been hearing anything
and then, suddenly, I heard the voices.”
Tom sprang up and rushed towards the ladder. “Keep listening,” he
yelled. “I’ll bet I know how ’twas.”
Hurrying up the ladder, he gained the deck and seizing the resonance
coil moved it slowly about as if pointing with a stick. Then, just as
it pointed to the southeast he heard Rawlins’ voice.
“They’ve got it again,” he shouted up the ladder. “Come down and hear
it.”
“If I do you’ll lose it,” Tom shouted back. “It’s this resonance coil.
You only get the voices when it points to the southeast. Tell them to
listen and you yell up when they lose it and get it.”
Again Tom swung the coil about and before it had moved two feet
Rawlins called up that the sounds had faded away. Once more Tom swung
the coil back to its former position and once again Rawlins notified
him that the voices could be heard.
But Tom was wild to be down below and hastily hanging the coil to the
rail by knotting his handkerchief he hurried down.
“I knew that was it,” he declared excitedly. “The coil works and
they’re southeast of here. Do you know what they’re saying?”
“No, it’s Russian or German,” replied Mr. Henderson. “Wish Ivan were
here.”
“What’s the matter with Smernoff?” suggested Rawlins.
“Of course!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson. “By Jove, what fools we are! Get
him, Rawlins.”
Rawlins dashed from the room and returned a few seconds later dragging
the big Russian with him.
“Here, Smernoff!” ordered Mr. Henderson. “Tell us what they’re saying.
And no lying, either!”
Clapping the receivers over the Russian’s ears Mr. Henderson shoved
him into the chair. For a moment the slow-witted fellow seemed dazed
and uncomprehending and then, as the words came to him and he realized
what was wanted, a strange look of mingled cunning and ferocity
crossed his features and his chest heaved with the intensity of his
efforts to catch every syllable.
Impatiently the others waited. To ask him to translate as the
conversation went on they knew would merely result in failure; his
English was too limited and his brain too slow for that.
“Might let him talk back,” suggested Rawlins in a whisper. “He could
put up a yarn about escaping and find out where they are.”
Mr. Pauling shook his head. “You don’t know the men you’re dealing
with,” he said. “They probably know all about his escape and his acts
in New York and a word from him would simply forewarn them. I had the
sending set cut off the moment I came in—I’m not risking any chance
of being heard.”
A moment later, Smernoff slowly swung his big body around and with a
savage glint in his eyes took the receivers from his ears and rose.
“They been done,” he announced. “No more talk. Me, I hear heem say he
been try keel me, me, Alexis Smernoff. Ha! Heem teenk he get me, eh?
Me, I make keel heem mos’ likely. Heem say me, I what you say—geef
double cross—Ah! heem Bolsheviki keel mine boy, mine girl, mine wife.
Ah! me, I help the gentlemen.”
“Yes, yes, we know all that, Smernoff!” cried Mr. Henderson
impatiently, “but what else did they say? Where are they?”
The Russian spread his palms and shrugged his shoulders expressively.
“Heem no say notting more,” he declared. “Me, I no know where heem be.
Heem make to talk from boat, heem talk from how you call it—boat same
like thees fellow.”
“From a submarine?” cried Mr. Pauling.
“Sure, that eet,” replied Smernoff. “Sutmavine you call heem? Ah, he
same like thees only more beeg.”
“Then they have got another sub!” exclaimed Rawlins. “I knew it! Darn
it all, why didn’t we get him here first thing? We might have got wise
to where they are.”
“Possibly,” agreed Mr. Pauling, “but I doubt it. They would not be
likely to give away any secrets.”
“Now see here, Smernoff!” cried Mr. Henderson sharply. “You want to be
free—you want to go to Russia. Well, you tell us where we’ll find
this crowd and I’ll get you a pardon, see? Now out with it! Where does
the crowd hang out—where do they stay? Not the chief—I don’t believe
you know that—but where do they keep that submarine and where did you
live?”
Smernoff listened, a perplexed frown on his low forehead.
“Me, I no know,” he replied. “Leetle islan’; Me, I no know hees name.
He near one beeg place, one place me, I hear heem say call what you
call heem Sam Dora—San Dom—me, I forget heem.”
“Santo Domingo!” shouted Rawlins. “Was that it, Smernoff?”
The Russian’s eyes lit up. “Sure!” he replied “That eet. Me I hear
those fellow say beeg islan’ San Dom—San Dom’go.”
“I’ll say that’s a tip!” cried Rawlins, his face fairly beaming.
“Hitches right onto the schooner left at the Caicos too. They’re
almost due north of Santo Domingo and I’ll bet it’s one of those cays.
Come on, let’s beat it.”
Ten minutes later the cay was a rapidly fading patch of green behind
them and at her top speed the submarine tore through the smooth sea
with her bow pointed for the Caicos Islands.
But before they reached their goal their hopes were dashed, for
through the air from an invisible destroyer lurking below the horizon
came a long cypher message from Disbrow which, when decoded, informed
those upon the submarine that the deserted schooner had
disappeared—vanished as mysteriously and completely as had her crew,
and that a careful search of the islands had failed to reveal a sign
of her or of the missing men.
“Well, that’s that,” said Rawlins, when Mr. Pauling told him of the
message, “but there’s a bunch of cays and islands down there. I’ll bet
Commander Disbrow didn’t hunt every one. I’m for getting down in there
anyway. Maybe we can get their talk again.”
There seemed no better plan and so, giving Disbrow their position and
course, they continued on their way, passing the Caicos low down on
the horizon and making for the remote, uninhabited, outlying cays. In
the hopes of again picking up the Russian conversation the resonance
coil had been fixed on the superstructure and a man was detailed to
slowly swing it back and forth through a wide arc, while below, one of
the boys was constantly at the receivers with Bancroft at the regular
equipment listening for messages from the destroyer or any other
source.
Land was in sight ahead—low-lying, surf-beaten cays on the fringe of
the Bahamas—when once more Tom heard the rough gutturals in his ears.
Instantly he summoned Smernoff and with the signal bell, which had
been arranged, notified the man at the resonance coil to hold it
steady. Mr. Pauling, Mr. Henderson and Rawlins appeared at the same
instant as the Russian and all waited breathlessly as the big fellow
seated himself at the instruments. But only a few words came to him in
the tongue of his native land and they were meaningless to him. Mere
numbers, but which, after he had repeated them several times and his
hearers were convinced he had made no mistake, caused the others to
glance at one another and to retire behind closed doors the moment the
Russian was out of sight. In the meantime Rawlins had hurried on deck
and had asked the man at the coil for the direction in which it had
pointed when the bell had sounded.
“Southeast by south one-quarter south, Sir,” he replied.
“Well, they’re not on those cays!” Rawlins announced as he joined the
others. “The coil was pointing southeast by south one-quarter south
and the cays are just about due south by east. What did you make of
those numbers?”
“Latitude and longitude, I should say,” replied Mr. Pauling. “If so,
where would they bring it?”
Rawlins left and returned a moment later with a chart. Spreading it on
the table he ran his parallel ruler over it.
“If they are latitude and longitude they’re not anywhere within five
hundred miles,” he declared, “and,” he continued, “I don’t believe
they were latitude and longitude. One was X 3568 and the other 46 B
15. Whichever way you take it that would be way outside of the West
Indies and I’ll bet my best hat to a stale doughnut that they’re some
cypher numbers. By the jumping Jupiter! I have it! That’s the way the
Hun planes used to signal their gunners to direct their fire! Those
fellows on that sub are directing some one to somewhere. Yes, sir, and
I’ll make another guess and that is they’re onto us and are breaking
for headquarters as fast as they can beat it. Likely as not those
numbers refer to us. I’ll say that’s it! We never heard a peep from
them till we began testing that radio under water. Shouldn’t wonder if
they were lying low not far off and heard us.”
“You may be right,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “But it’s all guesswork. Of
course we did not hear them before as we had not set up the
instruments and had not used the resonance coil. But tell me,
Henderson, how is it we get them on that and don’t get them on the
regular instruments?”
“Too weak for the latter,” replied the other, “you forget the boys are
using three stages of amplification and those crystals. But if that
detector is right we should be able to hear that other sub if she’s
near. Are there any cays southeast by south one-quarter south,
Rawlins?”
“Not this side of Haiti or Santo Domingo, but Smernoff said they were
talking from a sub so that don’t count.”
“H-m-m,” muttered Mr. Henderson. “Rather like searching for a needle
in a haystack. For all we know they may not be headed for their hiding
place.”
“No, they may not,” admitted Mr. Pauling, “but I think Rawlins is
right in that part of his surmise. If the submarine picked up the
schooner’s crew as we assume, then they would naturally go direct to
headquarters to report. If they continue to talk there is no reason
why we should not trail them and eventually run them down.”
“Well I’m going to pump that Smernoff,” declared Rawlins. “I’ll bet he
can tell us something. Not that I think he’s lying, but he’s just
naturally thick as mud and he doesn’t get all we say to him. He must
be able to tell something about the island if he lived there, and if
he does I may be able to recognize it from his description.”
“Well, good luck, Rawlins,” laughed Mr. Henderson as the diver hurried
aft. “Sorry you can’t talk Russian.”
But when, an hour later, Rawlins reappeared the others knew instantly
by the expression on his face that he had learned something of value.
“I’ll say he knew something!” cried Rawlins gleefully. “Had the deuce
of a job getting at it—couldn’t seem to make him understand, but got
it little by little. He says the island was about a mile long and half
a mile wide, that it was high and rocky in the middle, that one of the
landmarks was a big turtle-shaped rock standing out of water just off
a point and that the men lived in rooms or barracks which were cut in
the solid rock.”
“That’s all very interesting—if true,” said Mr. Pauling, “but how
does it help? There are probably a thousand islands of that size with
similar high rocky centers and turtle-shaped, undercut rocks off their
points. Why, the description might do just as well for New
Providence.”
“Yes, except for one thing,” replied Rawlins, “and that of course was
the last thing I got out of the old duck. Probably thought it wasn’t
worth mentioning.”
“Well, out with it! What was it?” demanded Mr. Henderson.
“Rather I should have said two things,” Rawlins answered. “The first
was the fact that there were rooms cut out of the rock and stairways
cut from the rock leading up to an old fort or wall also cut from the
solid rock. The second was that the place was inhabited by a sort of
giant rat and that the men caught and ate them.”
“Might have been China!” laughed Mr. Pauling.
“Yes,” agreed Rawlins, “but it’s not. I know the place as well as I do
my own island back in the Bahamas. There’s only one island in the West
Indies that it could be. There aren’t many with ruins of forts cut
from solid rock. I don’t know of another that has them and a
turtle-shaped rock off the point, and I can swear there’s not another
that has both those and the big rats as he calls them—the Jutias—and
that’s a little island off Santo Domingo known as Trade Wind Cay.”
“Jove!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson. “Are you sure of that?”
“I’ll stake my life on it,” replied Rawlins soberly. “I’ll bet, if we
head for Trade Wind Cay, we’ll find their hang-out. And here’s another
bet—or hunch, or whatever you want to call it. Smernoff says it never
took over a day for the sub to go to the chief’s place and return. Now
there’s no blamed bit of land within half a day’s run of that cay
except Santo Domingo and it’s dollars to brass tacks the old
High-Muck-a-Muck hangs out there. Mighty good place too—lot of it
wild and uninhabited, plenty of caves, fine hidden harbors and bush
everywhere.”
“Rawlins you should be in the Service!” declared Mr. Pauling
enthusiastically. “You’ve the imagination, the perseverance, the
energy and the logic. I believe you’re right. I’m with you for Trade
Wind Cay.”
“Well I had a sort of an idea I was in the Service, just at present,”
laughed Rawlins, “and if the old sub don’t bust or run aground or
shake herself to pieces we’ll be within sight of that cay inside of
three days.”
No further messages were heard that day and all through the night they
kept steadily on. The last bit of land had dropped from sight and far
off on the southern horizon a faint misty cloud hung which Rawlins and
Sam both insisted was the higher mountain tops of Haiti or Santo
Domingo. Then, just before noon, the man in the conning tower called
down the speaking tube to those below.
“Sail ahead!” he announced. “Looks like a schooner and about three
points off our port bow.”
Ordinarily the sighting of a schooner would have caused no interest or
excitement and would merely have called for submergence until out of
sight, but with the knowledge that the mysterious submarine was
somewhere in the surrounding waters and remembering the strange
disappearance of the schooner reported by Disbrow, those on board the
submarine hurried on deck to have a look.
“It’s a schooner all right,” declared Rawlins, after studying it
through his glasses, “and it fits the description of the one that
Disbrow lost to a ‘T.’ Shall we run over and have a look at her?”
“I suppose it would be wise,” agreed Mr. Pauling, “but how about being
seen? I think we had better submerge and watch her through the
periscope. If it’s another schooner we can get away without being
seen—I doubt if these West Indians would notice a periscope—and if
it _is_ the schooner we want, we can either run alongside and
board her or else keep watch at a safe distance and perhaps secure
valuable information as to her objective.”
A few moments later only the submarine’s periscope was visible above
the sea, and below, Rawlins, Mr. Pauling and the navigating officer
kept their eyes glued to the eye-pieces. Now the schooner was plainly
visible, even from the low elevation of the periscope, and as they
drew ever nearer Rawlins noticed something peculiar about her.
Although she had all lower sails spread they were drawing but little
in the light wind and yet she was moving at a fairly good speed.
“I’ll be hanged!” Rawlins suddenly exclaimed. “She’s being towed!”
“Being towed?” repeated Mr. Pauling. “There’s nothing towing her.”
“Nothing!” almost shouted the diver. “Nothing! By all that’s holy
she’s being towed by a submarine!”
“Yes, Sir; that’s what she is, Sir,” responded the navigator in
matter-of-fact tones. “Shall we put a shot across her bows, Sir?”
Mr. Pauling burst out laughing despite the excitement and surprise of
their discovery. “This is not wartime,” he replied. “We’d get into no
end of trouble by such methods. That schooner is flying the British
flag and for all we know to the contrary is an honest vessel in
distress being towed by one of our own submarines.”
“What the deuce is up now!” interrupted Rawlins. “Look there! She’s
stopped! Say, yes, darned if she isn’t. Jumping jiminy, the sub’s cut
loose!”
“She’s no longer moving,” admitted Mr. Henderson. “Perhaps they’re
waiting for us.”
“No, the sub’s gone!” declared Rawlins. “Don’t you think so,
Quartermaster?”
The quartermaster, a grizzled but husky old sea dog, gazed silently
for a minute.
“Yes, Sir,” he replied, “she seems to has, Sir. Sorry we couldn’t have
bumped her, Sir.”
By now the schooner was close at hand and Rawlins was on the point of
suggesting that they should run alongside and board her when Frank
shouted that there was a queer noise in the receivers.
“It sounds like a hard wind or an electric fan,” he cried. “Come on
and listen. What do you suppose it is?”
“The sub’s screw!” replied Rawlins. “I’ll bet she’s hustling. Shall we
board that schooner?”
“Better,” replied Mr. Pauling, and orders were at once given to
emerge. As the submarine, her decks awash, approached the schooner,
those upon the under-sea boat’s superstructure gazed curiously at the
craft they had overhauled. That she was the missing schooner they had
sought all were sure, for she fitted the descriptions perfectly and
the fact that she had been towed by a submarine was still further
evidence. They were now within a few hundred yards and yet not a soul
had appeared upon the schooner’s decks.
“Darned if she isn’t deserted again!” exclaimed Rawlins. “I’ll——”
At that instant the schooner’s masts seemed to spring into the air; a
burst of flames and smoke shot from her decks, there was a terrific
detonation and as the submarine rolled, pitched and rocked to the
force of the explosion those upon her clutched wildly for support
while all about fell bits of torn and shattered rigging, spars and
canvas. Scared and white-faced those upon the submarine stared at one
another, steadying themselves with their grasp of the handrails,
soaked to the waist by the great waves that had washed over the
half-submerged craft and speechless with the surprise and shock of the
explosion. Only bits of wreckage marked the schooner. She had been
blown to atoms.