TOIL AND PURSUIT
Before midnight the storm died with a suddenness even greater than that of its onset. Like a tangible flock of evil birds or of the spirits Victor Hugo has painted in Les Djinns, the sand-storm blew itself out to sea and vanished. The black sky opened its eyes of starlight, once again; gradually calm descended on the desert, and by an hour after midnight the steady east wind had begun to blow again.
The "wolf's tail," or first gray streak of dawn along the horizon, found the Legion all astir. Lebon had long since been told of his rescue; he and his lieutenant had embraced and had given each other a long story—the enslaved man's story making Leclair's face white with rage, his heart a furnace of vengeance on all Islam.
The Sheik, dimly understanding that these devils of Feringistan had by their super-magic overwhelmed him and his tribe with sleep-magic and storm-magic of the strongest, lay bound hand and foot, sullenly brooding. No one could get a word from Abd el Rahman; not even Rrisa, who exhausted a wonderful vocabulary of imprecation on him, until the Master sternly bade him hold his peace.
A gaunt, sunken-eyed old hawk of the desert he lay there in the sand, unblinkingly defiant. Tortures and death, he felt, were to be his portion; but with the stoicism of the barbarian he made no sound. What his thoughts were, realizing the loss of tribesmen, capture, despoilment of the Great Pearl Star, who could tell?
A wondrous dawn, all mingled of scarlet, orange, and vivid yellows, with streaks of absinthe hue, burned up over the desert world. It showed Nissr about as she had been the night before; for the simoom had not thrashed up sea enough—offshore, as it had been—to break up the partial wreck.
The air-liner had, however, settled down a good deal in the sand, and had canted at a sharp angle to port. Her galleries, fuselage, and wings were heavily laden with sand that materially increased her weight; and to the casual eye she gave the impression of a bird which never again would soar on level wing.
The major voiced discouragement, but no one shared it. Spirits were still high, in spite of thirst and exhaustion, and of the losses already sustained in men and material. Lombardo and "Captain Alden" had patched up the wounded in rough, first-aid fashion; and they, in spite of pain, shared the elation of the others in the entire wiping-out of the Beni Harb.
As soon as the light permitted operations to begin again, the Legion trekked over to the Arabs' former lines. Nothing now remained to tell them of the enemy, save here or there the flutter of a bit of burnous or cherchia (head-dress), that fluttered from the white sand now all ribbed in lovely scollops like the waves of a moveless sea. In one spot a naked brown arm and hand were projecting heavenward, out of the sand-ocean, as if in mute appeal to Allah.
The Legionaries heaped sand on this grim bit of death, completely burying it, and on the fluttering cloths. And as they peered abroad across the desert, in the glory of morning, now nothing could be seen to mind them of the fighting-men who, like the host of Sennacherib, had been brushed by the death-angel's wing.
The jackals knew, though, and the skulking hyenas, already sneaking in the nullahs; and so did the rion and the yellow ukab-birds—carrion-fowl, both—which already from the farthest blue, had begun to wheel and volplane toward the coast.
Back on the beach, exultant, yet rather silent in the face of all that death, the Legion at once got itself into action under the vigorous command of the Master. Twenty-three men were still fit and active for service; and both Enemark and Lebon would in a few days be of help.
"Man-power enough," thought the Master, as he laid out his campaign. "The only troublesome factors, are, first, Nissr's condition; second, our lack of water and supplies; and third, the possibility of interference from Arabs or European forces, by land or sea. If we can overcome all these—if, did I say? We can! We will!"
First of all, three volunteers swam out to Nissr through the surf now again beating in from the open sea. Their purpose was to bring the wounded Kloof ashore. Even though Kloof's oversight of the stowaway had wrecked the expedition, and though Kloof would probably be executed in due time, common humanity dictated succoring him.
The volunteers returned, after a hard fight, with a body past any human judgments. Kloof, Daimamoto, Sheffield, and Beziers, all of whom had lost their lives in the battle with the Beni Harb, were soon buried on the beach by the hungry, thirsty, sand-penetrated Legionaries. The shallow graves were piled with driftwood—rocks there were none, even in the wady, which' was of clay and gravel—and so, protected as best might be from beasts and birds, four of the Legion entered their long homes. The only ceremony over the fallen adventurers was the firing of a volley of six pistol-shots.
Swiftly returning heat, and a plague of black flies that poisoned with every bite, warned the Legionaries not to delay. Hunger and thirst, too, scourged them on. Their first care was food and drink.
Fortune favored them. In spite of the simoom the prevailing west wind had cast up all along the shore—for two or three miles each way—perhaps a quarter or a third of the stores they had been forced to jettison. Before doing anything else, the Legion brought in these cases of provisions and established a regular camp in the wady where they would be protected from observation from the Sahara. The piling up of these stores, the building of a fire to keep off the flies, and the portioning out of what little tobacco they had with them, wonderfully stiffened their morale.
Water, however, was still lacking; and all the Legionaries, as well as the old Sheik who would have died in the flames before asking for drink, were beginning to suffer extremely. The Master detailed Simonds, L'Heureux, and Seres to construct a still, which they did in only a little more than three hours.
The apparatus was ingeniously and efficiently built, out of two large provision tins and some piping which they got—together with a few tools—by swimming out to the air-liner. The still, with a brisk fire under it, proved capable of converting sea-water into flat, tasteless fresh water at the rate of two quarts an hour. Thirsty they might all get, to desperation; but with this supply they could survive till better could be had.
While the distilling apparatus was being built, work was already under way on Nissr; work which old Abd el Rahman watched with beady eyes of hate; work in which Dr. Lombardo, fellow-partner in Kloof's guilt, was allowed to share—the condition being frankly stated to him that his punishment was merely being deferred.
Under the Master's direction, stout mooring-piles of driftwood were sunk into the dunes, block-and-tackle gear was improvised, and lines were rove to the airship. She was lightened by shoveling several tons of sand from her and by removing everything easily detachable; the men working in baths of sweat, with a kind of ardent abandon.
Enough power was still left in her storage-batteries to operate the air-pressure system through the floats. This air, with a huge boiling and seething of the white surf, loosened the floats from the cling of the sand; and a score of men at the tackles succeeded at high-tide in hauling Nissr far up on the beach.
Rough gear, broken ship, toiling men blind with sweat, blazing African sun, appalling isolation, vultures and jackals at work behind the dunes, and—back of all—ocean and Sahara, made a picture fit for any master-painter. We must throw only one glance at it, and pass on.
This much accomplished, nightfall, with the west glowing like a stupendous jewel, brought rest. They camped in the wady, with machine-guns mounted and sentinels out. Abd el Rahman, liberated from his bonds and under strict surveillance, still refused to talk. No information could be got from him; but Rrisa's eyes brightened with unholy joy at sight of the old man ceremonially tearing his burnous and sifting sand on his gray head.
"Allah smite thy face, ya kalb!" (O dog!) he murmured. "Robber of the Haram, from Jehannum is thy body!"[1]
[Footnote 1: Alluding to the Arab superstition that every man's body is drawn from the place where it will eventually be buried. Rrisa's remark, therefore, was an Oriental way of wishing the Sheik back into Hell.]
Night passed with no alarm, quietly save for the yelping and quarreling of the jackals and hyenas at work beyond the dunes. Early morning found the Legionaries again at work; and so for five days they toiled. The Legion was composed of picked men, skilled in science and deep in technical wisdom. With what tools still remained from the time when all surplus weight had been jettisoned, and with some improvised apparatus, they set vigorously to work repairing the engines, fitting new rudder-plates, patching up the floats and providing the burned propellers with metal blades.
Metal enough they had at hand, by cutting out dispensable partitions from the interior. And beavers never worked as these men worked in spite of the fierce smitings of the tropic sun. Even the wounded men helped, holding or passing tools. The Master labored with the rest, grimy, sweating, hard-jawed; and "Captain Alden" did her bit without a moment's slackening. Save for Abd el Rahman, now securely locked without any means of self-destruction in a stateroom, no man idled.
Anxiety dogged their every moment. Sudden storm might yet hopelessly break up the stranded air-liner. Other tribes might have seen the signal-fire and might descend upon the Legionaries. Arab slavers might discover them, beating along the coast in well-armed dhows. Twice, in five days, latteen-sailed craft passed south, and one of these put in to investigate; but a tray of blanks from a machine-gun, at half a mile, turned the invader's blunt nose seaward again.
The greatest peril of all was that some news of the wreck might reach Rio de Oro and be wirelessed to civilization. That would inevitably mean ruin. Either it would bring an air-squadron swooping down, or battle-ships would arrive.
The Master labored doggedly to get his neutralizing apparatus effectively operating once more; and besides this, he spent hours locked in his cabin, working on other apparatus the nature of which he communicated to no one. But the Legion knew that nothing could save them from long-range naval guns, if that kind of attack should develop. They needed no urging to put forth stern, unceasing energies. Twice smoke on the horizon raised the alarm; but nothing came of it.
With great astuteness the Master had the wireless put in shape, at once, and sent out three messages at random, on two successive days. These messages stated that Nissr had been sighted in flames and falling, in North latitude 19°, 35'; longitude 28°, 16', or about two hundred and fifty miles north-west of the Cape Verdes; that wreckage from her had been observed somewhat south of that point; and that bodies floating in vacuum-belts had been recovered by a Spanish torpedo-boat.
No answer came in from any of these messages; but there was always an excellent chance that such misinformation would drag a red herring across the trail of pursuit.
Men never slaved as the Legionaries did, especially toward the end. The last forty-eight hours, the Master instituted night work. The men paused hardly long enough to eat or sleep, but snatched a bite when they could, labored till they could do no more, and then dropped in their places and were dragged out of the way so that others could take hold. Some fell asleep with tools in hand, stricken down as if by apoplexy.
The Master had wisely kept the pace moderate, at first, but had speeded up toward the end. None grew more haggard, toil-worn, or emaciated than he. With blistered hands, sweat-blinded eyes, parched mouths and fevered souls these men fought against all the odds of destiny. Half naked they strove, oppressed by heat, sun, flies, thirst, exhaustion. Tobacco was their only stay and solace. The Master, however, only chewed khat leaves; and as for "Captain Alden," she toiled with no stimulant.
It was 7:33, on the morning of the sixth day, that Frazier—now chief engineer—came to the Master, as he was working over some complex bit of mechanism in his cabin. Frazier saluted and made announcement:
"I think we can make a try for it now, sir." Frazier looked white and wan, shaking, hollow-eyed, but a smile was on his lips. "Two engines are intact. Two will run half-speed or a little better, and one will do a little."
"One remains dead?"
"Yes, sir. But we can repair that on the way. Rudders and propellers will do. Helicopters O.K."
"And floats?"
"Both aft floats repaired, sir. One is cut down a third, and one a half, but they will serve."
"How about petrol?" the Master demanded. "We have only that one aft starboard tank, now, not over three-quarters full."
"There's a chance that will do till we can run down a caravan along the Red Sea, carrying petrol to Suakin or Port Sudan. So there's a fighting hope—if we can raise ourselves out of this sand that clings like the devil himself. It's lucky, sir, we jettisoned those stores. Wind and current brought some of them back, anyhow. If they'd stayed in the storeroom they'd have all been burned to a crisp."
"Yes, yes. You think, then, we can make a start?" The Master put his apparatus into the desk-drawer and carefully locked it. He stood up and tightened his belt a notch.
"We can try, sir," Frazier affirmed grimly. Unshaven, haggard, dirty, and streaked with sweat, he made a strange figure by contrast with the trim, military-looking chap who only a week before had started with the other Legionaries, now no less altered than he.
"Very well," said the Master decisively. "Our prospects are good. The wounded are coming on. Counting Lebon, we have twenty-five men. I will have all stores reloaded at once. Be ready in one hour, sir. Understand?"
"Yes, sir!" And Frazier, saluting again, returned to the ravaged but once more efficient engine-room.
All hands plunged into the surf, wading ashore—for it was now high-tide—and in short order reloaded the liner. In forty-five minutes stores, machine-guns, and everything had been brought aboard, the cables to the posts in the beach had been cast off and hauled in, and all the Legionaries were at their posts. The ports were closed. Everything was ready for the supreme test.
The Master was last to come aboard. Still dripping seawater, he clambered up the ladder from the lower gallery to the main corridor, and made his way into the pilot-house. Bohannan was with him, also Leclair and Captain Alden.
The engines had already been started, and the helicopters had begun to turn, flickering swiftly in their turbine-tubes. The Master settled himself in the pilot's seat. All at once a buzzer sounded close at hand.
"Well, what now?" demanded the Master into the phone communicating with the upper port gallery.
"Smoke to southward, sir. Coming up along the Coast."
"Smoke? A steamer?"
"Can't see, sir." It was the voice of Ferrara that answered. "The smoke is behind the long point to southward. But it is coming faster than a merchant vessel. I should say, sir, it was a torpedo-boat or a destroyer, under forced draft. And it's coming—it's coming at a devil of a clip, sir!"