HARRY BORDEN'S NAVAL MONSTER.
BY W. J. HENDERSON.
It was a bright and beautiful morning in June, 1927. The war between Venezuela and England had been in progress just three weeks, and every one was wondering why the big monarchy had not whipped the little republic off the face of the earth. But the resources of the South American country had been underestimated, and so had the immense difficulties which confronted England in her endeavor to carry on an offensive war at an almost inaccessible distance from her most trustworthy sources of supplies, and in a climate which was formidable to her men. She had succeeded in landing a small force of trained soldiers, fresh from her latest campaign against the Ameer of Afghanistan, who had set up a new boundary-line beyond Herat, and was consequently in hot water with both England and Russia.
These trained Indian curry-eaters had penetrated a vast forest in the interior and had never come out, and it was currently reported that half of them had perished in a swamp, and the other half had been destroyed by fevers and cobras. A strong fleet, under command of Vice-Admiral Sir Wallace Bruce, had been scattered by adverse winds, and two of the ships had fallen in with powerful Venezuelan armor-clads, and had been most impertinently sent to the bottom. Others had sunk three Venezuelan war-ships, but the little republic had three better ones afloat inside of a week, and experts said that they looked very French.
The war had broken out over England's high-handed occupation of an insignificant island off the Venezuelan coast. The Venezuelans had been amazed by the proceeding, but the Marquis of Wintergreen, the Foreign Secretary, had at once declared that the island had been conquered and attached to England by Sir Francis Drake in the course of his first voyage to the West Indies. As Mr. Froude and other English historians had proved that Drake was little better than a pirate, this made every one laugh, except the Venezuelans, who said they were going to fight; and they did. As soon as war was declared, President Roosevelt, of the United States, on the advice of Secretary of State George B. McClellan, Jun., called an extra session of Congress, and the legislative halls at Washington so rang with patriotic speeches about the Monroe Doctrine that the New York Sun got out extras every two hours, day and night, and had illuminated bulletins covering the entire front of the building. Congress at length declared that the United States must act as an ally of Venezuela, whereupon the Sun printed itself in red, white, and blue, and the World despatched correspondents by special balloon to South America. The President ordered the entire National Guard into the service of the United States, and the various regiments at once repaired to their camps of instruction and began field drills. It was expected that they would be fully equipped and prepared for service at the front in about two months. The naval militia was also ordered out, and immediately began a series of cruises alongshore in open boats, landing and sending signals in every direction every four hours. The officers clamored for coast-defense vessels to man, but there were only four such ships, and they were all in dry docks undergoing repairs that would take three months to complete. The Secretary of the Navy issued orders to Rear-Admiral Ward to get the North and South Atlantic squadrons to the Venezuelan coast as quickly as possible, and the Rear-Admiral answered that he would be ready to sail by the end of August.
As soon as the action of Congress had been taken, Harry Borden, of Tickle River, went by express train to Washington. In the obscure sea-coast village of Tickle River Harry was called a genius, and it was said that he had invented things which would be worth millions to the government in such an emergency as that which had now arisen. It was to lay before the Secretary of War one of these inventions that the young man had gone to the capital. He had exhibited a small working model of his contrivance to several wealthy men of his native State, and they had forthwith invested enough money in it to enable the young inventor to build a full-fledged machine, and to go to see the Secretary about its employment in the impending conflict. Harry Borden was a good talker, but he could not talk the government of the United States into prompt action.
"My dear young friend," said the Secretary, "I am sure that your invention will prove of inestimable value to the United States in time of war."
"It's the time of war now, isn't it?" said Harry.
"Yes, yes, to be sure; but this is a matter which must be laid before Congress, and a bill must be introduced regarding it. I should advise you to see the Congressman from your district about that. I will give you a letter to him saving that I heartily approve of your machine."
"But, sir, while all this is going on we are losing valuable time. My machine ought to be down there damaging the enemy."
"Really, my dear young friend, you must allow things to take their course."
"Why can't you give me permission to go ahead on my own hook?"
"Embark in private warfare? Privateering is out of date, my young friend. But, ah—um—I may say that—ah—if you should go down there and succeed in inflicting serious damage on the British fleet, I think—mind, I say only that I think—the government would ignore the irregularity of the proceeding."
"That's enough for me," said Harry, springing to his feet. "If my backers will consent, I'll be there in less than a week; and, mark my word, sir, you'll hear of my machine down there, sir."
And before the astonished Secretary could say more, Harry Borden had bounded from the room.
The British cruiser Ajax III. was steaming at a speed of ten knots through the blue waters of the Caribbean Sea. She had been carrying certain despatches of grave importance from Vice-Admiral Sir Wallace Bruce to the Governor of Jamaica, and was now returning in a leisurely manner, which told of economy in the coal department. The Ajax III. was an armored cruiser of about 6000 tons. She carried armor eight inches thick on her sides, and had a steel protective deck four inches thick. Her main battery consisted of four improved Smith-Dodge-Hopkins 8-inch rapid-firing breech-loaders, capable of discharging four of the new steel-iridium conical projectiles every minute, with a point-blank range of two miles, and an initial velocity of 3000 feet per second. Her secondary battery consisted of six 4-inch revolving guns, discharging seventy shells a minute when operated by electricity. The cruiser had the new compound quintuple engines, capable of driving her twenty-six knots an hour under forced draught. On the whole, she was regarded as a fairly efficient vessel, though some of the leading British critics declared that she belonged to a type that was fast becoming obsolete.
She was moving gently and steadily through the water. The sun was shining brightly, and his gleaming rays made sparkling light along the cruiser's polished brass-work and on the brown chases of her long slender guns. Captain Dudley Fawkes was pacing the after-bridge in conversation with his Executive Officer, Commander Bilton-Brooks, and Lieutenant Sir Edward Avon was the officer of the watch on the main bridge.
"I don't believe," said Captain Fawkes, "that the United States means seriously to take a hand in this light."
"I don't know about that," responded Commander Bilton-Brooks. "Congress has taken action, and the President has called out troops."
"True enough," rejoined the Captain, "but that does not necessarily mean anything. You know the navy must be the aggressive force, and we have yet to see an American ship afloat in these waters."
"That is quite true," said the Executive Officer; "yet, for the life of me, I can't help feeling that there is mischief of some sort in the air."
The Executive Officer's words were more nearly correct than even he suspected, for at that very instant the two lookouts in the foretop were puzzling their eyes and brains to make out a strange object which had appeared on the lee beam. While they were watching it, it dropped from the air, where it had seemed to be floating, and rested on the bosom of the sea, where it presently resolved itself into a cutter-yacht some sixty feet in length.
"It were a bloomin' mirage, Bill," said one lookout to the other, as he lifted his voice and bawled, "Sail, ho!"
"Where away?" came the quick demand from the bridge.
"On our lee beam, sir," answered the man. "Looks like a cutter-yacht, sir."
Now in the year 1927 a cutter-yacht was something of a curiosity, for electricity had supplanted sail-power for small craft, and vessels propelled by canvas were rare indeed. The cutter-yacht seen from the decks of the Ajax III. was on the port tack, close hauled and heading so as to intercept the cruiser's course, provided she had speed enough, which was wholly unlikely. She was under full canvas, and though the breeze was very light, she slipped through the smooth water at an amazing speed. This fact dawned on the minds of the Captain and his Executive Officer at the same time.
"She must have an auxiliary electric screw," said Commander Bilton-Brooks.
"I fancy so," said the Captain. "Owned by some fellow who likes to think he's sailing, but has no patience with light breezes. It's rather curious, though, that he should be cruising in these waters at a time like this, isn't it?"
"It certainly is," answered the Executive Officer. "I don't see any flag—do you, sir?"
"No. I rather fancy I shall have to overhaul this yacht, and make her skipper give an account of her. There's a mysterious air about her that I don't half like."
But it was a good deal easier to talk about overhauling the cutter than it was to do it. The yacht's sails, which were made of some extremely light material, like Chinese silk in appearance, were drawing powerfully, and her electric motor—if it really was electric—was doing astounding work. The yacht flashed through the water like some great fish, and so fine were her lines that she left hardly a bubble in her wake. The Captain of the Ajax III. gave orders to increase the speed of the cruiser, and presently the quick throbbing of her engines and the vibrations of her hull told that she was tearing across the long swells at a 25-knot speed. But still the cutter-yacht flew along, and it was evident that she would pass across the cruiser's bow if both held their courses.
"We must stop her lively skipping," said Captain Dudley Fawkes, and he gave orders to sound the call to quarters. The bugle rang out, and the hearty British tars jumped to their stations.
"Cast loose and provide!" ordered Commander Bilton-Brooks.
The ammunition hoists slipped noiselessly upward bearing the steel-iridium shells for the 8-inch guns, and the electric chains hauled up the 70-pounders for the secondary battery. In forty-five seconds the ship was ready to fight, and the order was given to train all forward guns on the cutter and stand by for orders. Then the Captain and his Executive Officer turned their glasses once more on the cutter.
"What on earth is she up to now?" exclaimed the Captain.
"Taking in sail—and spars, too!" cried Commander Bilton-Brooks.
It was true. Not only had the strange cutter let all her thin sails run down, but she seemed to have folded up her mast, boom, gaff, and bowsprit in some strange way and stowed them out of sight.
"Has she shown any flag yet?" asked the Captain.
"None that I have seen," answered the Executive Officer.
"Then I'll wager a month's pay that she's some Yankee invention," declared Captain Dudley Fawkes.
"What in the world are they doing now?" said the Executive Officer.
A strange misshapen mass was rising above the bulwarks of the cutter with surprising swiftness.
"It's a balloon!" exclaimed the Captain.
"Hadn't we better open fire on her?" asked the Executive Officer.
"Not yet. I think we'd better get close enough to hail her first," answered the Captain. "She may not be anything more than a pleasure craft, you know."
The balloon was inflated by this time, and was tugging at the heavy steel hawsers by which it was attached to the cutter's hull. A cry of surprise broke from the crew of the British cruiser.
"Look! look! She's going up!"
The great balloon, inflated with the newly discovered gas, mercurite, the lightest and most powerful of all known gases, was lifting the cutter bodily into the air. Her curiously shaped hull, modelled after a shark's body, and equipped with a fin-keel for sailing on the wind, was now fully revealed. At the same instant a United States ensign was waved over her stern by a young man.
"Mr. Cortis," called the Captain, who had not thought it necessary yet to enter the conning-tower, "give him a taste of your metal."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered the Lieutenant in command of the forward 8-inch guns.
The next instant there was a terrific concussion, and one of the big shells went screaming toward the cutter: but she was rising so fast that the projectile passed under her, and plunged foaming into the sea a mile away.
"More elevation, sir," cried the Executive Officer.
"Impossible!" answered Lieutenant Cortis: "we're too close to her, and the angle is too high."
"Look at her now!" exclaimed the Captain. "She's rushing toward us!"
"Sailing against the wind with a balloon!" cried Commander Bilton-Brooks.
The shark-bodied cutter, with her fin-keel below and her balloon above, was indeed now moving toward a position above the cruiser.
"Call away the riflemen!" cried the Captain.
The red-coated marines assembled on the superstructures, and began a rapid fire at the balloon, hoping to burst it. But their bullets simply glanced off the fine steel netting with which it was protected. Now the head of the young man once again appeared above the bulwarks of the strange machine, and he took a rapid glance at the British ship. The next instant a small port in the cutter's side opened, and from it dropped a glass globe about half the size of a football. The globe fell upon the forward deck of the cruiser. There was an appalling explosion, and the whole forecastle of the Ajax III. became a hopeless wreck. Another globe was hurled with such fatal accuracy that it fell down one of the smoke-stacks of the now helpless vessel. There was a roar as of thunder away down in her engine-room, and pale-faced men poured on deck.
"We're sinking! The ship's bottom is blown out!" they cried. There was a wild rush to lower away the boats. A few minutes later the Ajax III. sank out of sight under the fine waters of the Caribbean Sea, and Harry Borden, with his balloon stowed and his canvas spread again, was sailing away with a few survivors of the ill-fated cruiser in his strange invention in search of more British cruisers. A month later the war was over.
THE BILBERRY SCHOOL EXHIBITION.
BY SOPHIE SWETT.
Simpsy Judkins was to "speak a piece," and Viola Treddick to read an original composition; there was to be a glee sung by picked voices from the first class—it was all about the deep blue sky, and "the sky, the sky, the sky," was repeated in a very thrilling and effective manner; and Tom Burtis was to display his powers as a lightning calculator. The exhibition was to be given in the new Town-hall, and not only would all Bilberry be there, but a crowd of people from the adjacent towns as well, to say nothing of teachers and pupils from the Normal School at Cocheco; for the Bilberry Hill School exhibitions had acquired a reputation.
In the Treddick family the girls had been obliged to take the family burden upon their shoulders. When Father Treddick died, somewhat less than a month after Mother Treddick, turning his face to the wall, and saying that she had been his backbone and his underpinning and he couldn't live without her (it sometimes happens that way in spite of Mother Nature), the rocks still had the upper hands on the little farm, and Amasa, the only boy, was but eleven. Lizette, who was fifteen, went to work in the stocking factory. Every one thought it was a pity, because Lizette was fond of books and had meant to be a teacher; she was slight and delicate, too, and work in the stocking factory was hard. But Lizette believed in doing "not what ye would, but what you may," with just as good a will as if it were the former. Some people said she had taken warning by her father's example; he had always been trying to invent something in his queer little workshop that was the wood-shed chamber; that was why the rocks had not been gotten out of the farm.
It was Viola who was now spoken of as a remarkably fine scholar, just as Lizette had been before she went into the factory; she was not yet sixteen, but she hoped to get the Pine Bank School to teach in September. There were several other candidates, all older than she, but Viola was at the head of her class, and that original composition which she was to read at the exhibition was expected to make an impression upon the committee-men. The teacher had said to several people that it was really a remarkable production for a girl of Viola's age, and they thought a great deal of literary gifts in Bilberry.
Lizette was very proud of Viola, and so, indeed, was Amasa, who was fourteen now, but whose name was not on the programme at all. To tell the painful truth at once, although Amasa keenly felt the especial need there was that he should be "smart," although he tried his best to be the man of the family in a satisfactory sense, yet he was at the very foot of his class; fractions floored him, and he had a hazy idea that Timbuctoo was out West, and that Captain John Smith discovered America. When it came to chopping wood, Amasa was pretty sure to cut his toe, and if he went fishing he tumbled into the pond. And he couldn't get "jobs," like Cosy Pringle, the boy in the next house, who had money in the bank.
Cosy Pringle boasted that he always "came out top of the heap"; but some people thought he was too "smart."
When the exhibition day came, although Simpsy Judkins had been announced to "speak a piece," it was Cosy Pringle who spoke it; there was a report that he had hired Simpsy to have a sore throat. Simpsy had oratorical gifts, but he did not feel the advantages of appearing in public and having his name in the paper, as Cosy did. Cosy held the second rank in declamation, so Simpsy's sore throat gave him an opportunity to be heard. He wasn't second in his class; he came sympathizingly near to Amasa there; but he had carefully weighed opinions—which he sometimes confided to Amasa—concerning the amount of study that "paid."
Mother Nature provided one of her loveliest days, as she is apt to do for school exhibitions in June. The girls, in fleecy muslin clouds, were so much in evidence that the boys, in the background, were only a little hampered by the embarrassment of full dress. Cosy Pringle wasn't hampered at all; he wore his grandfather's large gold chain and his sister Amanda's moonstone ring, and felt that he ought to attract as much attention as the girls.
Cosy's voice was a little thin and sharp, but he recited one of Macaulay's lays with a great deal of "r-r-rolling drum" very well indeed, having been thoroughly coached by his sister Amanda and the young minister to whom Amanda was going to be married.
But beyond a little mild clapping, the recitation received no attention whatever, while Viola Treddick's composition was, as the Bilberry Beacon reported, received with the greatest enthusiasm. It was on "School-girl Friendships," and there was some real fun in it; and once in a while it was pathetic, or, at all events, the audience laughed and cried, and they couldn't really do that, as Cosy averred they did, because they liked Viola. It closed with a verse of original poetry, and Bilberry began to feel sure that a great poet was to arise in its midst.
Lizette stopped and hugged Amasa behind a juniper-tree on the way home from the exhibition. Viola had staid to a spread that was given to the pupils and their friends; Lizette had to hurry back to her work in the factory; and Amasa had felt that he did not shine in society. Amasa could not remember ever to have seen Lizette cry for joy before; she was not one of the crying kind, anyway.
"She'll have a chance! Viola will have a chance! She'll get the Pine Bank School," she said, rapturously. "I've been so afraid she would have to go into the factory."
Amasa realized suddenly how hard life was for Lizette. Her delicate hands were calloused and knobby, and her shoulders bent; she looked wistfully at the library books, and never had time to read; she knew that she wasn't strong, and she was anxious about their future—Viola's and his.
It was the very next night, as Amasa was going to bed, that Cosy Pringle came under his window and called to him. Amasa went down and unfastened the door, and Cosy followed him up stairs.
He seemed excited and nervous, and kept saying "'Sh!" though there was no one stirring in the house. But it was like Cosy to have some mysterious scheme on foot. Amasa thought that he had at last discovered how Pember Tibbetts made his musk-rat traps, or guessed the conundrum in the County Clarion, for which intellectual feat a prize of five dollars was offered. Or perhaps he had secured the job of weeding Mr. Luke Mellon's onion bed and hoeing his string-beans; last year he was paid three dollars for the job, and hired Amasa to do the work for seventy-five cents. Amasa stoutly resolved not to be the victim of Cosy's sharp business methods this year.
But Cosy's shrewd gray eyes had a twinkle that meant more than onion-weeding or any "jobs."
"That was an awful nice composition that your sister wrote," he said, in an easy, complimentary manner.
Amasa nodded, brightening; it was more like Cosy to make a fellow feel small about his sisters and all his possessions.
"Folks are saying that she'll get the Pine Bank School, if Elkanah Rice, that's school committee, does want it for his niece. A good thing, too, for Lizette is pretty well worn out taking care of you all." Cosy wagged his head with great solemnity. "Aunt Lucretia said she shouldn't be surprised if she got consumptive, like her mother, if she worked too hard."
Amasa's heart seemed to stop beating, and a choking lump came into his throat.
"But Viola'll get the school fast enough," continued Cosy, "if—if folks don't find out that she copied the composition."
"Copied the composition!" Amasa's brows came together in a fierce scowl, and he arose from the side of the bed where he was sitting, and advanced upon Cosy with a threatening gesture.
"Now just look here before you go to making a turkey-cock of yourself," said Cosy, drawing a newspaper from his pocket. "I happened to go down to Gilead this afternoon to swap roosters with Uncle Hiram—made him throw in a pullet and a watering-pot because my rooster had a bigger top-knot than his. There was a pile of newspapers in the wood-shed, and I went to get one to wrap up some things that Aunt M'lissy was sendin' to mother, and I came across this. 'School-girl Friendships' caught my eye. See! it's signed 'Lilla Carryl.' Aunt M'lissy said she believed 'twas a girl over to Gilead Ridge. That paper is two years old now, and Gilead being ten miles away, I suppose Viola thought nobody would ever find her out!"
"She never did such a thing! Don't you dare say she did!" cried Amasa, hoarsely.
But there it was in black and white; there it was word for word. Amasa knew every word of Viola's composition, he had been so proud of it. Cosy whistled softly, with his hands in his pockets, as Amasa ran his eye over "School-girl Friendships."
"There's some mistake," faltered Amasa. "Viola is the honestest girl."
Cosy's whistling ended in a sharp, expressive, little crescendo squeak. "There's no telling what girls will do," he said, sagely. "When folks know it, why, Elkanah Rice's niece will be pretty apt to get the Pine Bank School, and I'm kind of 'fraid Viola'll have to take a back seat altogether. It'll come hard on Lizette."
Cosy folded the Gilead Gleaner, and thrust it firmly and impressively into his pocket. Amasa had been acquainted with Cosy Pringle since they were both in long clothes, and he understood that that paper had its price. If he could pay the price, why, even Lizette need never know!
"I suppose it's my duty to show this paper," said Cosy, with an air of unflinching virtue, "but still, amongst old friends, and if you'll do a little good turn for me that you can do as well as not, why, I'll just chuck the paper into the fire, and agree not to tell anybody, and we'll call it square. I ain't a mean feller."
Amasa's heart thrilled with hope. What was the good turn that he would not do for Cosy on those terms? He thought of his fan-tailed pigeons, and of his dog Trip on whom Cosy had always had his eye because he could do so many tricks; it would be an awful wrench to part with Trip, but to save Viola from disgrace he would not hesitate.
"I only want to go into your wood-shed chamber for a few minutes. There's—there's something there that I want to see. If you'll let me, why, nobody shall ever know about Viola's cheating."
"It's father's old workshop; there's nothing there," Amasa said. "Nobody ever goes near it but Lizette."
Cosy hesitated a little, then he decided that it would be as well to be more frank; Amasa was so stupid. "She's up to something, Lizette is," he said, in an impressive whisper. "I've seen a light burning in that workshop half the night! She's trying to make an improvement on the knitting-machine that they use in the factory. Of course she can't do it—a girl!—but you'd better look out or it will kill her, just as it killed your father. How do I know what she's doing? She told Emily Norcross"—Emily Norcross was the daughter of the owner of the factory—"and Emily told Thad. Thad and I been trying too. We've got things fixed now so'st we expect to get a patent. What I want to see is whether she's got anything that's likely to interfere with us; of course she hasn't really, but then girls think they can."
Amasa felt desperately that this was too great a problem to suddenly confront a fellow like him whom every one knew to be stupid. It seemed a trifle, but Cosy Pringle would want nothing but a good bargain. Still, there was no other way; disgrace to Viola would mean heart-break to Lizette.
"Give me the paper," he said, gruffly, and thrusting it into his pocket, he led the way softly through the corridor to the wood-shed chamber.
Cosy was breathlessly eager over some queer bits of machinery which Amasa could not understand. He staid but a few minutes, as he had promised, but he stammered with excitement when he went away.
Amasa spent three miserable days, filling the wood-box so assiduously that Viola asked him if he thought she was going to bake for the County Conference, and hoeing the string-beans, until Lizette was tenderly sure that his back ached, and advised him to go fishing.
But a boy may have troubles of the mind which even fishing cannot cure.
"VIOLA! AMASA! HE SAYS IT MAY BE WORTH A GREAT DEAL OF MONEY!"
Lizette came home from her work with a radiant face on the third day. "Amasa, how came you to let Cosy Pringle go into the workshop?" she exclaimed. "But I can't scold you, it has turned out so beautifully! I have been trying a little invention—oh, for a long time! I never thought it could really succeed!" Lizette looked as fresh and bright as if all the work and care had been a dream. "Cosy saw it and told Thad Norcross. It seems he and Thad had been trying to do the same sort of thing—mere boys' play, of course—and Thad told his father. Mr. Norcross will help me to get a patent! Viola! Amasa! He says it may be worth a great deal of money!"
Lizette and Viola were crying for joy; but Amasa could think only of the horror of Viola's disgrace, for now, of course, Cosy Pringle would tell.
"You won't think anything now of my little triumph," said Viola, when they had calmed down a little and sat down to supper. "'School-girl Friendships' is to be published in full in the Bilberry Beacon next Saturday, with my own name signed it—not Lilla Carryl, as I signed it two years ago, when I sent it to the Gilead Gleaner. Oh, what a flutter I was in then! and I never dared to let a soul know it! The editor of the Beacon made me write a foot-note, telling all about it."
"I'm an awful jackass," said Amasa, his voice gruff with joy and shame.
"You're the dearest boy in the world," said Lizette. "But I don't want you to associate with Cosy Pringle."