a glass slide and on it placed a drop from each of the tubes containing
the bullet and the glass. That done, he placed the bent, larger end of
the capillary tubes in turn on each of the drops on the slide. The
liquid ascended the tubes by capillary attraction and siphoned over the
curve, running as he turned the tubes up to the finely pointed ends.
Next in a watch glass he placed some caustic soda and in another some
pyrogallic acid, from each of which he took just a drop, as he had done
before, inclining the tubes to let the fluid gravitate to the throttle
end. Finally in the flame he sealed both the tip and butt of the tubes.
"There's a bubble of air in there," he remarked. "The acid and the soda
will absorb the oxygen from it. Then I can tell whether I'm right. By
the way, we'll have to hurry if we're to be on time to meet Marlowe in
the yard," he announced, glancing at his watch as he placed the tubes
in his little electric incubator.
We were a little late as the chauffeur pulled in at the executive
offices at the gate of the shipyard, and Marlowe was waiting
impatiently for us. Evidently he wanted action, but Kennedy said
nothing yet of what he suspected and appeared now to be interested only
in the yard.
It was indeed something to interest any one. Everywhere were tokens of
feverish activity, in office, shop, and slip. As we picked our way
across, little narrow and big wide gauge engines and trains whistled
and steamed about. We passed rolling-mills, forging-machines, and giant
shearing-machines, furnaces for heating the frames or ribs, stone
floors on which they could be pegged out and bent to shape, places for
rolling and trimming the plates, everything needed from the keel plates
to the deck.
In the towering superstructure of the building slip we at last came to
the huge steel monster itself, the Usona. As we approached, above us
rose her bow, higher than a house, with poppets both there and at the
stern, as well as bracing to support her. All had been done up to the
launching, the stem and stern posts set in place, her sides framed and
plated up, decks laid, bulkheads and casings completed, even much of
her internal fitting done.
Overhead and all about the huge monster was a fairy network of steel,
the vast permanent construction of columns and overhead girders.
Suspended beneath was a series of tracks carrying traveling and
revolving cranes capable of handling the heaviest pieces. We climbed to
the top and looked down at the vast stretch of hundreds of feet of
deck. It was so vast that it seemed rather the work of a superman than
of the puny little humans working on her.
As I looked down the slip where the Usona stood inclined about half an
inch to the foot, I appreciated as never before what a task it was
merely to get her into the water.
Below again, Marlowe explained to us how the launching ways were
composed of the ground ways, fastened to the ground as the name
implied, and the sliding ways that were to move over them. The sliding
ways, he said, were composed of a lower course and an upper course, on
which rested the "cradle," fitting closely the side of the ship.
To launch her, she must be lifted slightly by the sliding ways and
cradle from the keel blocks and bilge blocks, and this was done by oak
wedges, hundreds of which we could see jammed between the upper and
lower courses of sliding ways. Next he pointed out the rib-bands which
were to keep the sliding ways on the ground ways, and at the bow the
points on either side where the sliding and ground ways were bolted
together by two huge timbers known as sole pieces.
"You see," he concluded, "it is a gigantic task to lift thousands of
tons of steel and literally carry it a quarter of a mile to forty feet
of water in less than a minute. Everything has to be calculated to a
nicety. It's a matter of mathematics--the moment of weight, the moment
of buoyancy, and all that. This launching apparatus is strong, but
compared to the weight it has to carry it is really delicate. Why, even
a stray bolt in the ways would be a serious matter. That's why we have
to have this eternal vigilance."
As he spoke with a significant look at Kennedy, I felt that it was no
wonder that Marlowe was alarmed for the safety of the ship. Millions
were at stake for just that minute of launching.
It was all very interesting and we talked with men whom it was a
pleasure to see handling great problems so capably. But none could shed
any light on the problem which it was Kennedy's to solve. And yet I
felt sure, as I watched Craig, that unsatisfactory as it appeared to
Marlowe and to myself, he was slowly forming some kind of theory, or at
least plan of action, in his head.
"You'll find me either here or at the hotel--I imagine," returned
Marlowe to Kennedy's inquiry as we parted from him. "I've instructed
all the men to keep their eyes open. I hope some of us have something
to report soon."
Whether or not the remark was intended as a hint to Kennedy, it was
unnecessary. He was working as fast and as surely as he could, going
over in hours what others had failed to fathom in weeks.
Late in the afternoon we got back to the laboratory and Craig began
immediately by taking from the little electric incubator the two
crooked tubes he had left there. Breaking off the ends with tweezers,
he began examining on slides the two drops that exuded, using his most
powerful microscope. I was forced to curb my impatience as he proceeded
carefully, but I knew that Craig was making sure of his ground at each
step.
"I suppose you're bursting with curiosity," he remarked at last,
looking up from his examination of one of the slides. "Well, here is a
drop that shows what was in the grooves of that bullet. Just take a
look."
I applied my eye to the microscope. All I could see was some dots and
rods, sometimes something that looked like chains of dots and rods, the
rods straight with square ends, sometimes isolated, but more usually
joined end to end in long strings.
"What is it?" I asked, not much enlightened by what he had permitted me
to see. "Anaerobic bacilli and spores," he replied, excitedly. "The
things that produce the well-known 'gas gangrene' of the trenches, the
gas phlegmon bacilli--all sorts, the bacillus aerogenes capsulatus,
bacillus proteus, pyogenic cocci, and others, actively gas-forming
microbes that can't live in air. The method I took to develop and
discover them was that of Col. Sir Almroth Wright of the British army
medical corps."
"And that is what was on the bullet?" I queried.
"The spores or seeds," he replied. "In the tubes, by excluding the air,
I have developed the bacilli. Why, Walter," he went on, seriously,
"those are among the microbes most dreaded in the infection of wounds.
The spores live in the earth, it has been discovered, especially in
cultivated soil, and they are extraordinarily long-lived, lying dormant
for years, waiting for a chance to develop. These rods you saw are only
from five to fifteen thousandths of a millimeter long and not more than
one-thousandth of a millimeter broad.
"You can't see them move here, because the air has paralyzed them. But
these vibrios move among the corpuscles of the blood just as a snake
moves through the grass, to quote Pasteur. If I colored them you would
see that each is covered with fine vibrating hairs three or four times
as long as itself. At certain times an oval mass forms in them. That is
the spore which lives so long and is so hard to kill. It was the spores
that were on the bullet. They resist any temperature except
comparatively high and prolonged, and even resist antiseptics for a
long time. On the surface of a wound they aren't so bad; but deep in
they distil minute gas bubbles, puff up the surrounding tissues, and
are almost impossible to combat."
As he explained what he had found, I could only stare at him while the
diabolical nature of the attack impressed itself on my mind. Some one
had tried to murder Marlowe in this most hideous way. No need to be an
accurate marksman when a mere scratch from such a bullet meant ultimate
death anyhow.
Why had it been done and where had the cultures come from? I asked
myself. I realized fully the difficulty of trying to trace them. Any
one could purchase germs, I knew. There was no law governing the sale.
Craig was at work again over his microscope. Again he looked up at me.
"Here on this other film I find the same sort of wisp-like anaerobes,"
he announced. "There was the same thing on those pieces of glass that I
got."
In my horror at the discovery, I had forgotten the broken package that
had come to the hotel desk while we stood there.
"Then it was Gavira who was receiving spores and cultures of the
anaerobes!" I exclaimed, excitedly.
"But that doesn't prove that it was he who used them," cautioned Craig,
adding, "not yet, at least."
Important as the discoveries were which he had made, I was not much
farther along in fixing the guilt of anybody in particular in the case.
Kennedy, however, did not seem to be perturbed, though I wondered what
theory he could have worked out.
"I think the best thing for us to do will be to run over to the
Belleclaire," he decided as he doffed his laboratory coat and carefully
cleansed his hands in an antiseptic almost boiling hot. "I should like
to see Marlowe again, and, besides, there we can watch some of these
people around him."
Whom he meant other than Gavira I had no idea, but I felt sure that
with the launching now only a matter of hours something was bound to
happen soon.
Marlowe was out when we arrived; in fact, had not yet returned from the
yard. Nor had many of the guests remained at the hotel during the day.
Most of them had been out sightseeing, though now they were returning,
and as they began to gather in the hotel parlor Marjorie was again
called on to put them at their ease.
Fitzhugh had returned and had wasted no time dressing and getting
down-stairs again to be near Marjorie. Gavira also appeared, having
been out on a case.
"I wish you would call up the shipyard, Walter," asked Kennedy, as we
stood in the lobby, where we could see best what was going on. "Tell
him I would like to see him very urgently."
I found the number and entered a booth, but, as often happens, the
telephone central was overwhelmed by the rush of early-evening calls,
and after waiting some time the only satisfaction I got was that the
line was busy.
Meanwhile I decided to stick about the booth so that I could get the
yard as soon as possible. From where I stood I could see that Kennedy
was closely watching the little manicure, Rae Melzer. A moment later I
saw Alma Hillman come out of the manicure shop, and before any one else
could get in to monopolize the fascinating little manicure I saw Craig
saunter over and enter.
I was so interested in what he was doing that for the moment I forgot
about my call and found myself unconsciously moving over in that
direction, too. As I looked in I saw that he was seated at the little
white table, in much the same position as Marlowe had been, deeply in
conversation with the girl, though of course I could not make out what
they were talking about.
Once she turned to reach something on a shelf back of her. Quick as a
flash Kennedy abstracted a couple of the nearest implements, one being
a nail file and the other, I think, a brush. A moment later she resumed
her work, Kennedy still talking and joking with her, though furtively
observing.
"Where is my nail file--and brush?" I could imagine her saying, as she
hunted for them in pretty confusion, aided by Kennedy who, when he
wanted to, could act the Fitzhugh and Gavira as well as they. The
implements were not to be found and from a drawer she took another set.
Just then Gavira passed on his way to his office in the front of the
building, saw me, and smiled. "Kennedy's cut you out," he laughed,
catching a glimpse through the door. "Never mind. I used to think I had
some influence there myself--till the captain came along. I tell you
these oldsters can give us points."
I laughed, too, and joined him down the hall, not because I cared what
he thought, but because his presence had reminded me of my original
mission to call up Marlowe. However, I decided to postpone calling
another moment and take advantage of the chance to talk to the house
physician.
"Yes," I agreed, as long as he had opened the subject. "I fancy the
captain likes young people. He seems to enjoy being with them--Miss
Hillman, for instance."
Gavira shot a sidelong glance at me. "The Belleclaire's a dangerous
place for a wealthy widower," he returned. "I had some hopes in that
direction myself--in spite of Fitzhugh--but the captain seems to leave
us all at the post. Still, I suppose I may still be a brother to
her--and physician. So, I should worry."
The impression I got of Gavira was that he enjoyed his freedom too much
ever to fall in love, though an intimacy now and then with a clever
girl like Alma Hillman was a welcome diversion.
"I'm sorry I sha'n't be able to be with you until late to-night," he
said, as he paused at his office door. "I'm in the medical corps of the
Guard and I promised to lecture to-night on gunshot wounds. Some of my
material got smashed up, but I have my lantern slides, anyhow. I'll try
to see you all later, though."
Was that a clever attempt at confession and avoidance on his part? I
wondered. But, then, I reflected he could not possibly know that we
knew he had anaerobic microbes and spores in his possession. I had
cleared up nothing and I hastened to call up the shipyard, sure that
the line could not be busy still.
Whatever it was that was the matter, central seemed unable to get me my
number. Instead, I found myself cut right into a conversation that did
not concern me, evidently the fault of the hotel switchboard operator.
I was about to protest when the words I heard stopped me in surprise. A
man and a woman were talking, though I could not recognize the voices
and no names were used.
"I tell you I won't be a party to that launching scheme," I heard the
man's voice. "I wash my hands of it. I told you that all along."
"Then you're going to desert us?" came back the woman's voice, rather
tartly. "It's for that girl. Well, you'll regret it. I'll turn the
whole organization on you--I will--you--you--" The voices trailed off,
and, try as I could to get the operator to find out who it was, I could
not.
Who was it? What did it mean?
Kennedy had finished with the manicure some time before and was waiting
for me impatiently.
"I haven't been able to get Marlowe," I hastened, "but I've had an
earful." He listened keenly as I told him what I had heard, adding also
the account of my encounter with Gavira.
"It's just as I thought--I'll wager," he muttered, excitedly, under his
breath, taking a hurried turn down the corridor, his face deeply
wrinkled.
"Well! Anything new? I expected to hear from you, but haven't," boomed
the deep voice of Marlowe, who had just come in from an entrance in
another direction from that which we were pacing. "No clue yet to my
crank?"
Without a word, Kennedy drew Marlowe aside into a little deserted
alcove. Marlowe followed, puzzled at the air of mystery.
Alone, Craig leaned over toward him. "It's no crank," he whispered, in
a low tone. "Marlowe, I am convinced that there is a concerted effort
to destroy your plans for American commerce building. There isn't the
slightest doubt in my mind that it is more serious than you
think--perhaps a powerful group of European steamship men opposed to
you. It is economic war! You know they have threatened it at meetings
reported in the press all along. Well, it's here!"
Half doubting, half convinced, Marlowe drew back. One after another he
shot a rapid fire of questions. Who, then, was their agent who had
fired the shot? Who was it who had deserted, as I had heard over the
wire? Above all, what was it they had planned for the launching? The
deeper he got the more the beads of perspiration came out on his
sunburnt forehead. The launching was only eighteen hours off, too, and
ten of them were darkness. What could be done?
Kennedy's mind was working rapidly in the crisis as Marlowe appealed to
him, almost helplessly.
"May I have your car to-night?" asked Craig, pausing.
"Have it? I'll give it to you if it'll do any good."
"I'll need it only a few hours. I think I have a scheme that will work
perfectly--if you are sure you can guard the inside of the yard
to-morrow."
"I'm sure of that. We spent hours to-day selecting picked men for the
launching, going over everything."
Late as it was to start out of town, Craig drove across the bridge and
out on Long Island, never stopping until we came to a small lake,
around the shores of which he skirted, at last pausing before a huge
barn-like structure.
As the door swung open to his honking the horn, the light which
streamed forth shone on a sign above, "Sprague Aviation School." Inside
I could make out enough to be sure that it was an aeroplane hangar.
"Hello, Sprague!" called Kennedy, as a man appeared in the light.
The man came closer. "Why, hello, Kennedy! What brings you out here at
such an hour?"
Craig had jumped from the car, and together the two went into the
hangar, while I followed. They talked in low tones, but as nearly as I
could make out Kennedy was hiring a hydro-aeroplane for to-morrow with
as much nonchalance as if it had been a taxicab.
As Kennedy and his acquaintance, Sprague, came to terms, my eye fell on
a peculiar gun set up in a corner. It had a tremendous cylinder about
the barrel, as though it contained some device to cool it. It was not a
machine-gun of the type I had seen, however, yet cartridges seemed to
be fed to it from a disk on which they were arranged radially rather
than from a band. Kennedy had risen to go and looked about at me.
"Oh, a Lewis gun!" he exclaimed, seeing what I was looking at. "That's
an idea. Sprague, can you mount that on the plane?"
Sprague nodded. "That's what I have it here for," he returned. "I've
been testing it. Why, do you want it?"
"Indeed I do! I'll be out here early in the morning, Sprague."
"I'll be ready for you, sir," promised the aviator.
Speeding back to the city, Kennedy laid out an extensive program for me
to follow on the morrow. Together we arranged an elaborate series of
signals, and that night, late as it was, Craig returned to the
laboratory, where he continued his studies with the microscope, though
what more he expected to discover I did not know.
In spite of his late hours, it was Craig who wakened me in the morning,
already prepared to motor out to the aviation school to meet Sprague.
Hastily he rehearsed our signals, which consisted mostly of dots and
dashes in the Morse code which Craig was to convey with a flag and I to
receive with the aid of a powerful glass.
I must admit that I felt somewhat lost when, later in the morning, I
took my place alone on the platform that had been built for the favored
few of the launching party at the bow of the huge Usona, without Craig.
Already, however, he had communicated at least a part of his plan to
Marlowe, and the captain and Marjorie were among the first to arrive.
Marjorie never looked prettier in her life than she did now, on the day
when she was to christen the great liner, nor, I imagine, had the
captain ever been more proud of her.
They had scarcely greeted me when we heard a shout from the men down at
the end of the slip that commanded a freer view of the river. We craned
our necks and in a moment saw what it was. They had sighted the
air-boat coming down the river.
I turned the glass on the mechanical bird as it soared closer. Already
Kennedy had made us on the platform and had begun to signal as a test.
At least a part of the suspense was over for me when I discovered that
I could read what he sent.
So fixed had my attention been that I had not noticed that slowly the
members of the elect launching party had arrived, while other thousands
of the less favored crowded into the spaces set apart for them. On the
stand now with us were Fitzhugh and Miss Hillman, while, between
glances at Kennedy, I noticed little Rae Melzer over at the right, and
Doctor Gavira, quite in his element, circulating about from one group
to another.
Every one seemed to feel that thrill that comes with a launching, the
appreciation that there is a maximum of risk in a minimum of time.
Down the slip the men were driving home the last of the huge oak wedges
which lifted the great Usona from the blocks and transferred her weight
to the launching ways as a new support. All along the stationary, or
ground, ways and those which were to glide into the water with the
cradle and the ship, trusted men were making the final examination to
be as sure as human care can be that all was well.
As the clock neared noon, which was high water, approximately, all the
preparatory work was done. Only the sole pieces before us held the ship
in place. It was as though all bridges had been burned.
High overhead now floated the hydro-aeroplane, on which I kept my eye
fixed almost hypnotically. There was still no signal from Kennedy,
however. What was it he was after? Did he expect to see the fast
express cruiser, lurking like a corsair about the islands of the river?
If so, he gave no sign.
Men were quitting now the work of giving the last touches to the
preparations. Some were placing immense jack-screws which were to give
an initial impulse if it were needed to start the ship down the ways.
Others were smearing the last heavy dabs of tallow, lard oil, and soft
soap on the ways, and graphite where the ways stretched two hundred
feet or so out into the water, for the ship was to travel some hundreds
of feet on the land and in the water, and perhaps an equal distance out
beyond the end of the ways.
Late comers still crowded in. Men now reported that everything was
ready. Steadily the time of high water approached.
"Saw the sole pieces!" finally rang out the order.
That was a thing that must be done by two gangs, one on each side, and
evenly, too. If one gang got ahead of the other, they must stop and let
the second catch up.
"Zip--zip--zip," came the shrill singing tone of the saws.
Was everything all right? Kennedy and Sprague were still circling
overhead, at various altitudes. I redoubled my attention at the glass.
Suddenly I saw Craig's flag waving frantically. A muffled exclamation
came from my lips involuntarily. Marlowe, who had been watching me,
leaned closer.
"What is it--for God's sake?" he whispered, hoarsely.
"Stop them!" I shouted as I caught Kennedy's signal. At a hurried order
from Marlowe the gangs quit. A hush fell over the crowd.
Kennedy was circling down now until at last the air-boat rested on the
water and skimmed along toward the ways.
Out on the ways, as far as they were not yet submerged, some men ran,
as if to meet him, but Kennedy began signaling frantically again.
Though I had not been expecting it, I made it out.
"He wants them to keep back," I called, and the word was passed down
the length of the ship.
Instead of coming to rest before the slip, the plane turned and went
away, making a complete circle, then coming to rest. To the surprise of
every one, the rapid staccato bark of the Lewis gun broke the silence.
Kennedy was evidently firing, but at what? There was nothing in sight.
Suddenly there came a tremendous detonation, which made even the
launching-slip tremble, and a huge column of water, like a geyser, rose
in the air about eight hundred feet out in the river, directly in front
of us.
The truth flashed over us in an instant. There, ten feet or so in the
dark water out in the river, Craig had seen a huge circular object,
visible only against a sandy bottom from the hydro-aeroplane above, as
the sun-rays were reflected through the water. It was a contact
submarine mine.
Marlowe looked at me, his face almost pale. The moment the great hulk
of the Usona in its wild flight to the sea would have hit that mine,
tilting it, she would have sunk in a blast of flame.
The air-boat now headed for the shore, and a few moments later, as
Craig climbed into our stand, Marlowe seized him in congratulation too
deep for words.
"Is it all right?" sang out one of the men in the gangs, less
impressionable than the rest.
"If there is still water enough," nodded Craig.
Again the order to saw away the sole pieces was given, and the gangs
resumed. "Zip--zip," again went the two saws.
There were perhaps two inches more left, when the hull quivered. There
was a crashing and rending as the timbers broke away.
Marjorie Marlowe, alert, swung the bottle of champagne in its silken
net on a silken cord and it crashed on the bow as she cried, gleefully,
"I christen thee Usona!"