CHAPTER XVII
DISABLED
It was indeed well that the battleplane was already flying "down the wind." Locking the wings, and trimming them at the furthermost limit of the bent actuating rod, Blake made the comforting discovery that the planes were in the best possible position for a prolonged glide. Aided by the following gale, the velocity of which was not far short of seventy miles an hour, the battleplane ought to cover a distance of from fifty to sixty miles before alighting. In that case he hoped to effect a landing in the bleak and sparsely-populated district drained by the sluggish River Warthe.
Nursing the volplaning craft with the utmost care, Desmond Blake was getting every possible foot of space out of the involuntary glide. Perfectly calm and collected he bade Athol find a particular section of the map of Prussia and Posen and fix it in the celluloid holder in front of him.
Dick, having shut down the motors, since they were no longer of service, clambered into his seat, and made good use of his binoculars; while Sergeant O'Rafferty deliberately fixed a time fuse under the row of crank-cases so that in the likely event of the presence of German troops, the battleplane would never fall into their hands except as a twisted and tangled mass of metal.
Fortunately the clouds of smoke issuing from the burning buildings had prevented the Huns from observing the result of their chance shot; and now the battleplane was at frequent intervals hidden in the masses of scudding clouds.
Apart from that there was little in her favour, for it was now two hours before midday. The twilight that had afforded protection on the occasion of the raid upon the Zeppelin sheds at Olhelt was denied her.
The manometer now registered a thousand feet. No longer the clouds afforded protection. The country had the aspect of being fiat, and almost destitute of trees; nor were there any signs of human habitation. On the distant eastern horizon could be discerned the smoking chimneys of a manufacturing town. To prolong the flight much further would be literally throwing away the chances that the airmen already held.
"We'll descend here," announced Blake, turning the battleplane head to wind. "Stand by to jump for it if the wind threatens to capsize her on landing."
The warning was necessary, for, owing to the jamming of the wing mechanism, the wings could not be folded immediately upon contact with the ground. The now rigid expanse of planes would have to withstand the full force of the gale, and everything depended upon the angle of inclination—whether it was sufficiently small to enable the weight of the machine to pin it to the ground.
Down planed the mechanical bird at a tremendous rate. Although it cleft the air at nearly seventy miles an hour its progress over the ground and against the wind was practically nil. In point of fact the battleplane was dropping vertically earthwards at a rate of fifteen feet per second.
Quickly the almost uniform motion gave place to a series of erratic jerks. The falling machine was in the influence of the rebound of the wind from the irregular surface of the ground. The motion reminded the lads of a small boat encountering the "wash" of a huge steamer.
With a double bump the battleplane struck the ground, reared until her landing-wheels were three feet in the air, and bumped again. Then rocking violently she showed every inclination to capsize, until Athol and the sergeant, sliding to terra firma at the risk of life and limb, clung tenaciously to the partly-tilted wings.
"Good men!" shouted Blake encouragingly, as he depressed the aerilons to counteract as much as possible the lifting tendency of the wind upon the wings. "A spanner there, Dick: shift those two nuts as sharp as you can."
Dick swarmed over the side, and clinging with one arm and both feet to one of the vibrating trellis girders, set desperately to work on the nuts and bolts securing the bent rod to the underside of the left wing. With the removal of the metal bar the wings were folded, and for the time being all danger of the battleplane being overturned by the gale was at an end.
"No signs of our friends the enemy," said Blake, standing erect upon the deck of the fuselage and sweeping the treeless plain with his binoculars. "There's a small village about three miles away. I can see the church spire and the roofs of the houses; the place lies in a hollow. Beyond that there are no signs of human habitation."
"Don't you think, sir," asked Sergeant O'Rafferty, "that if we pushed the machine a couple of hundred yards in that direction there would be more shelter in that dip in the ground? It's not deep enough to hide the battleplane entirely, but it may help things a bit."
"Certainly, sergeant," agreed Blake. "Every little helps, and we'll be less exposed to the wind in the hollow."
It was a strenuous task pushing the machine dead in the eye of the wind, but on gaining the spot that the sergeant had pointed out, the airmen found that there was almost complete shelter from the full force of the gale, while the highest part of the crippled machine showed only a couple of feet above the high ground surrounding the natural hollow.
Heavy rain was now falling. The stranded aviators faced the discomfort with rising spirits, for they knew that should the downpour continue the ground would quickly become a quagmire, and that the rain would keep the villagers within doors. Nevertheless all precautions were taken against surprises, since it was quite possible that workers in the fields had noticed the battleplane's descent, and had set off to warn the military.
Enveloped in their weather-proof coats, Athol and Sergeant O'Rafferty mounted guard, taking care to avoid the sky-line. From their respective posts they could command a vast tract of the neighbouring countryside, so that, unless the battleplane was stalked by practical scouts the danger of a surprise was completely obviated.
Meanwhile Blake and Dick were hard at work removing the bent rod. Upon examination the metal showed no sign of fracture, but it was essential that it should be straightened before the wing-mechanism could again be operated.
"We've a tough job here, Dick," observed the inventor as he gazed upon his damaged handiwork. "Now, if we were at home or at the flying ground it would be a simple matter. A forge and a blacksmith's anvil would enable us to rectify the injury in less than an hour."
In vain they applied pressure to the bent rod. They jumped on it, battered it with the heaviest spanners they possessed. The tough metal sturdily refused to respond to the treatment. For the first time since Dick had made Desmond Blake's acquaintance the inventor showed signs of despair.
"I have an idea!" suddenly exclaimed Dick. "It may work; it may not. In either case there can't be much harm done."
"Well, what is it?" enquired Blake hopefully. He had already good cause to appreciate the intelligence of his young assistant, and a ray of hope flashed across his mind at the lad's words.
"Suppose I take the rod into the village and get them to straighten it out," began Dick.
Blake frowned. He was on the point of telling the lad not to be idiotic, when Dick, reading his thoughts, hastened to explain.
"I can speak German well," he continued. "You see, I was three years at school in Mecklenburg—jolly rotten time I had, too!" he remarked in parenthesis. "In this great coat and flying helmet I don't suppose the simple villagers would guess that I was anything but a Hun aviator. I could try the Kopenick hoax over again. You see, we are bound to be captured if we can't get the job done, so it's all the same in the long run."
"There may be soldiers quartered in the village," objected Blake.
"Hardly likely," said Dick. "It is not on a railway line, and consequently troops are not likely to be stationed there. There might be some of the Landwehr or Landsturm. If so, they are Prussians. By passing myself off as a Saxon or a Badener I think that would account for my slight difference in accent."
"I'll go with you," said Athol.
"No, you don't," objected Dick with a laugh. "This is my show. You had your time the other day. If I pull it off all right, well and good; if not, well, we'll most likely have the pleasure of one another's society in a German prison camp."
"Very well, carry on," said Blake cordially. "And jolly good luck to you."
The already torrential rain was in itself an excuse for Dick to wear his aviator's coat buttoned tightly from his neck downwards, while his padded helmet pulled down over his face left little of his features exposed. As a precautionary measure he carried his revolver in its holster conspicuously displayed outside his coat.
Shouldering the bent bar, which, although remarkably tough, weighed less than seven pounds, Dick bade his comrades "au revoir," and set off on his three-mile tramp to the village.
It was slow progress. There was no beaten path. The coarse grass-land was ankle-deep in tenacious mud. The rain blotted out everything beyond a distance of two hundred yards. Not only was there the risk of missing the little hamlet, but the more serious danger of losing touch with the stranded battleplane, which at a distance of a hundred yards was an almost inconspicuous "hump" in the midst of a monotonous terrain devoid of anything in the nature of "bearings."
Trudging with his back to the gale Dick held on doggedly. Unless the wind veered or backed he could be fairly certain of his direction. With a change of wind, coupled with the fact that the sun was completely overcast, there would be no means of finding his way.
Before he had covered a mile and a half the lad encountered the first inhabitant of that dreary district. An old peasant, his bent form enveloped in a tattered cloak, was tending swine. Dick made no effort to avoid him. This man's attitude towards him might be taken as a specimen of the reception he would be likely to receive in the village. On approaching, the peasant regarded the flying officer with the undisguised curiosity that dwellers in rural districts invariably bestow upon strangers; until, realising that the newcomer was one of the military "caste," the old fellow bared his head, standing stock still in the downpour until Dick, who curtly acknowledged the act of homage, had walked past.
A little further on the lad struck a lane, so deep in slime that it was of no use as a means of progression. Worn several feet below the surface of the adjoining ground it resembled a stagnant ditch of liquid mud. However, guessing that it must lead to the village, Dick struggled gamely on, keeping to the slightly firmer ground by the side of the primitive by-way.
In another quarter of an hour he descried the misty outlines of the little village looming up through the mirk.
With a quickening pulse the lad pressed on, and gained the outskirts of the straggling hamlet. The road, even in the village, was little better than the quagmire without. At first there were no signs of human beings. A few ducks revelled in the slush and rain. A gaunt pig wallowed in the mud, nosing amidst the garbage in search of food. Peat-reeking smoke was issuing from some of the chimneys, and, beaten down by the rain, was driving over the saturated ground in eddying wisps.
Dick hastened onwards in the direction of the church, the only building with a pretence of importance in the squalid village. At the same time he kept his eyes and ears on the alert in the hope of finding some sort of a place where he could get the important work carried out. There was almost a total absence of shops in this particular quarter. Commercial intercourse, if any, must be carried on in a very meagre fashion, he argued.
Presently the lad's quick ear distinguished the clang of a blacksmith's hammer—not the quick, merry ring that characterises the smith's activity in Merry England, but the slow, listless hammering of a toiler whose heart is not in his work.
Guided by the sounds Dick turned down a narrow street until he came to a low stone and plaster building, through the two glazeless windows of which bluish smoke was issuing. Over the open door was a sign, setting forth that Johannes Müller was a skilled worker in iron-work, especially in connection with agricultural implements.
Striding pompously to the door as well as the slippery nature of the ground permitted, Dick entered the low smithy. Within were two men, neither of whom, owing to the hiss of the bellows-fanned flames, had heard him approach. The elder of the twain was a short, thick-set man in a grey shirt open at the neck, a pair of trousers reaching but a few inches below his knees, a pair of rusty boots and a paper cap. His hairy chest and gnarled arms betokened great strength, although his lower limbs were ill-developed, and seemed scarcely able to support the weight of his body. His features were coarse and brutal, the sinister effect being heightened by his soot-stained face and yellow protruding eyes. He had just set aside a light hammer and was resting upon the heavy "striker," while his assistant coaxed a mass of iron into a state of white heat.
The second man's features were hard to judge, for the lower part of his gaunt face was hidden by a bushy, unkempt beard of a light brown colour. His clothing consisted of a ragged shirt and trousers; his toes, innocent of socks, peeped through rents in an odd pair of boots that in England would look out of place anywhere except on a rubbish heap. His movements were listless and dejected, and as, for the first time, he caught sight of Dick, he shot a glance of mingled hatred and contempt. He made no attempt to attract the smith's attention to the new-comer, and it was not until the young officer stamped imperiously upon the cobbled stone floor that the old fellow was aware of the presence of his uniformed visitor.
The conscript habits of by-gone years were still latent in the smith's mind. Dropping his hammer, he brought his heels together, drew himself up as far as his bent frame would allow, and saluted smartly in the Prussian style.
"I want this straightened out instantly, smith," said Dick, returning the salute. "It is work of imperial importance."
"Certainly, herr leutnant," replied the man, relieving Dick of his burden. "A part of one of our incomparable flying machines? An accident has taken place?"
"Yes," replied Dick, then, realising that he would have to account for the fact that an officer had to perform the menial work of bringing the rod to the smithy, he added, "and my sergeant has broken his leg—the idiot.... So I must needs fetch and carry. ...And not a single peasant did I meet to relieve me of this weight. The mud and rain, too, are vile."
"There are few men left here," said the smith. "We are even obliged to——. But how is this to go, herr leutnant? Are the two slotted ends to remain in line or across each other, so?"
He traced a rough diagram upon a board by means of a piece of chalk, at the same time signing to his assistant to get to work with the bellows.
The man, his face working with anger, merely folded his arms. Again the smith motioned to him. Dick began to think the assistant was deaf and dumb, or, perhaps, of weak intellect.
Still meeting with refusal the smith grasped a round bar of iron. The other, stepping back to the wall snatched up a formidable pair of tongs.
"Hanged if I do a stroke of work to the job!" exclaimed the man in unmistakable English. "Let the Bosche do a bit. It will do him good. Nothin' doing here, old sport."