“Right here,” said the skipper, hastening down from the pilot-house.
Barton handed him a slip of paper. He looked at it; then turned quickly to his orderly.
“Tell Mr. Jones I want to see him at once. Commander Barton, come to my room and I’ll have supper for you right away. The gunners can go to the wardroom. I’ll have the plane ready for you to go on in half an hour.”
Lieutenant Jones, the executive officer, appeared, on the run, and saluted.
“Mr. Jones, have the tanks of this seaplane filled with gas and oil, have the engine carefully inspected and the best emergency crew fully equipped and ready to take her; they are going on to Trepassy Bay, and everything must be ready in half an hour. Have supper for the crew that brought her in; they’ll stay here.”
The skeptic was told that he was to take the big seaplane on the next lap of her journey;—the monotony was to break more abruptly than he had hoped. Never had the routine of this floating relay station been so violently shaken. To-day a new record for speed was made, for the slip of paper called for speed, and it bore the signature of Admiral Johnson. In arranging with Fraser for the trip, Barton had told him nothing of his confidential relations with Evans, but merely stated that since the case involved tampering with the radio gear in the flagship, which Evans had discovered, he wanted to take him along as a witness.
In half an hour, as the tired crew that had brought the giant seaplane on her flight from the Azores, refreshed by hot coffee and cigarettes, were beginning to wonder how long they were doomed to stay at this lonely spot in midocean, Barton, Evans, and Long climbed aboard the seaplane once more. Long was shackled to his seat, so that he could not by a sudden leap deprive them of his services as a witness. The skeptic took his place in the pilot’s seat; and with a deafening roar from her engines the great creature rose off the water and shot away into the twilight where she was almost instantly lost to view. Looking back ten minutes later, the pilot saw twinkling faintly astern the light on the floating hangar that guided seaplanes to this haven of rest and refuge on the lonely sea.
It was only just after two in the morning when the commanding officer of the great seaplane base at Trepassy Bay, Newfoundland, was roused from his sleep and handed a slip of paper which caused him to spring out of bed and order the best seaplane at the base to be ready at once to take passengers to Halifax.
At Halifax they stopped for breakfast while a fresh plane was being prepared to make a non-stop flight to Washington. Before nine they were on their way again, dropping the islands and promontories of the Nova Scotia coast behind them at a rate of ninety miles an hour. As they passed over the heel of Cape Cod, flying high, Evans could make out the long white line of Monomoy Island with its sandy ocean beach. The memory returned to him of the same white line when last he had seen it over the roaring breakers, showing dimly through the rain from the Petrel’s cockpit, on his adventurous sail with Mortimer.
It was toward the end of the afternoon that the strange trio arrived in Washington, quite unheralded. With the utmost care to keep Evans concealed from Rich’s possible spies, Barton found Mortimer and brought him secretly to the place where Evans was awaiting them. Mortimer told them all that had transpired in Washington and how Rich had found in Goss the real culprit. Then they in turn recited the evidence they had obtained at the Azores implicating Rich. The behavior of Long and his visible agitation on the mention of Rich’s name seemed to Mortimer suggestive, but not conclusive; so did the testimony of Elkins concerning Rich’s advice to Captain Brigham, but this, having passed through so many months, carried less weight than the other. The report of Heringham, however, made him feel that the case, indeed, looked bad for Rich. After some consultation it was decided that, unknown to Rich, Mortimer should assemble Admiral Rallston, Chief of Naval Intelligence, Barton and Evans in his office, and then send for Rich and question him. Long would be held under guard where he could easily be brought in, and Commander White could be summoned at any time from the Bureau of Engineering to repeat the significant words of Captain Brigham, if it seemed desirable.