Chapter 18
The strangely shaped propellers bit the air at once, and the walls of the cavern, flooded with spectral light, slid backwards. Then, as the ship swerved round the curve towards the entrance, the daylight leapt at us. But it was touch and go during the next ten seconds.
If it had not been for Gascoigne I am sure I would never have gone through. The great ship shot out of its lair like a dart. A touch on the little steering wheel and she was banking in the terrible right-hand turn. The granite walls seemed rushing to meet and crush her, and only the quick, steady words of command from the prisoner, which like an automaton I obeyed, got her finally into the straight.
And then -- oh, then -- I opened out the marvellous engines. She seemed to shake herself for an instant like a bird poised for a long flight, and humming like a wasp she shot up and out to sea.
The needle on the speed indicator quivered round its dial, moving ever upwards. Eighty, a hundred, a hundred and fifty -- and thirty more -- we were doing nearly two hundred miles an hour, straight out over the Atlantic before I had a thought of our destination, or of anything but the supreme glory of that rush up the dawn wind.
The whole morning world was blue and gold, new-built and beautiful. Far below, the Mother of Oceans lay in an unwrinkled sheet of sapphire, "as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire." A tiny purple cloud on the horizon was the Isles of Scilly, sleeping under the sun.
Connie stole in and stood by my side, her hand on my shoulder. I knew her heart like mine was full to overflowing, as memory flared up and down in us like the flame of a lamp in a draught. It was a moment so exquisite, so full of gratitude to God, that no words of mine can do more than hint at it. For we had escaped from hell and the snare of devils, and knew it in one lightning flash of gratitude and joy.
As she stared out at the sea and sky, which glowed like the pavements of the New Jerusalem, Connie quoted some words from Milton -- the song of the released spirit in his epilogue of "Comus":
"To the Ocean now I fly,
And those happy climes which lie
Where Day never shuts his eye
Up in the broad fields of the sky."
And then, as I glanced at the compass card and made a great sweep round so that we faced the jagged coasts of Cornwall once again, she whispered, with a proud note in her voice:
"For still the Lord is Lord of Might
In deeds, in deeds, he takes delight."
Then, with a tiny pressure of my arm, she went back to the other cabin.
I had not noticed Danjuro for the last few minutes. He had led Gascoigne behind me as soon as we had made the passage. Now he reappeared.
"Danjuro!" I cried, "this ship is wonderful beyond all imagining! There isn't her equal in the whole world. She'll revolutionize flying. It's a perfect joy to pilot her!"
Danjuro nodded calmly. He was not given to enthusiasms, this man with a panther in his soul. "I have been speaking with the prisoner," he said.
"With Vargus?"
"No, though I have been to look at him, and he is quite safe with Gascoigne. Gascoigne has suggested something that has not occurred to either of us, Sir John."
"His help will all tell in his favour when it comes to the trial. What is it now?"
"Something eminently sensible and pressing. As you see, this ship is quite unmistakable. Any pilot would recognize her from the descriptions which have been circulated. We are now approaching the coast again and about to fly to Plymouth. The air must be full of armed patrol ships, and whatever our speed, if we escape being shot down en route, we will certainly be blown to pieces on approaching the sea-drome!"
I flushed up. I had been an incredible ass never to have thought of that before. It was only too true. Nobody could possibly know that we had captured the Pirate Ship.
I reduced our speed to half of what it had been. "What are we to do?" I said.
"There is a complete wireless installation on board the ship. Can you operate it, Sir John?"
"No. Even if I could leave the controls, that would be impossible. I know nothing about it, unfortunately."
"Nor I, Sir John. It is a gap in my knowledge that I propose to remedy shortly. But this Gascoigne is an operator, and offers to send any message."
"I suppose we can trust him? He certainly saved us from disaster coming out of the cavern."
I shuddered; I did not want to think of that blood-stained hole of horror any more.
"Yes, I think he can he trusted. He has everything to gain, and can do no harm that I can see. I cannot operate the keys of the apparatus, but I know the Morse code, and if I stand by him I can check each letter as he sends it out."
Then I had an inspiration too. "Good! And now I think I can make it quite sure. I can remember the private code of the Air Police. We will call up Plymouth, and all the police boats now flying, in that private code. Meanwhile, we had better run out to sea again while you're taking it down."
Again I turned the ship, and as we spiralled up and out again, I formed the message in my mind and translated it, word for word, into the letters of the code, which Danjuro took down in pencil on a sheet of his pocketbook.
The message was necessarily rather a long one that took some time. When I had finished, Danjuro marched Gascoigne away to the rear cabin where Vargus was lying. It was there, you may remember, that the wireless apparatus was installed.
We were now reaching a great height, far above any of the regular air lanes, and I felt quite secure from any attack. Land, sea, every reminder of the world below, had vanished utterly. With hardly a sound from the magic engines we floated in a haze of gold chrysophrase. It was like a happy dream, though never was dream so beautiful.
Connie stole in again. "I thought I' leave Thumbwood and Wilson alone," she said. "They've been sitting side by side and whispering to each other ever since we started. Neither of them seems to have the least curiosity as to where we are or where we're going."
"How thoughtful of you, Connie! Was that the only reason you came in here?" And I laughed gently.
The rest of the conversation is not a part of this story. It lasted a long time as we droned round great five mile circles of the upper air. And then a telephone rang at my ear.
Danjuro was speaking. The message had been received at Plymouth, and an answer had been coming through for the last ten minutes. He was writing it down, letter by letter, from Gascoigne's dictation. Shortly afterwards he brought it in to me, and as I read it off the world closed round me again and fairyland vanished.
Triumph filled my veins and reddened my blood. The message came from Muir Lockhart, who was at Plymouth again, and was one shout of wonder and congratulation. "The whole world will thank you," it concluded.
For a little time I was intoxicated by that message. I saw myself a hero, vindicated a thousand times in the eyes of all men -- the Chief of Air Police whose name would go down in history. I think there are few men of my age who would not have had their moment of vainglory; we are made so. But as I read the message to Danjuro who had brought it, I realized that I had done nothing, after all, and that everything was due to his marvellous brilliancy and courage.
Thank Heaven I realized it without a pang of envy, and I told him what I thought of him in no unstinted way.
He heard me to the end with no change of countenance. When I had done, he said: "You have been very kind, Sir John, and I greatly appreciate what you have said. If, indeed, you are indebted to me in any way for the help I have been able to give, you can repay me, if you will."
"To the half of my kingdom!" I said, with a laugh, though I was in dead earnest all the same.
"That is a promise, Sir John?" He looked down at me with magnetic eyes.
"A promise, Danjuro."
"Then, while I live, I ask you to say nothing whatever of my part in this affair. I wish it kept as secret as possible. Some little part must of necessity leak out; there will be investigations, public trials, and so forth. But much can be kept secret, an
d it rests with you and Thumbwood. And as I have your promise, my mind is at rest."
"But this is madness, Danjuro! You are owed the thanks of two continents. You...."
He interrupted me.
"I want nothing of the sort, Sir John. I have had your thanks, and that is sufficient. The work itself is enough. My usefulness to Mr. Van Adams, the endeavour of my whole life, would be destroyed if anything were known."
Reluctantly I promised. "But Mr. Van Adams, I must tell him everything!" I said.
Danjuro bowed his head. A faint flush came into his yellow face. "If you think I have done anything worth it," he replied, with a curious and touching silence.
And this was the man with the panther in his soul! For the American millionaire he had supreme love, with devotion -- worship -- and for no one and nothing else on earth above or below it.
A man with a single obsession, a man of one idea. Well, most of the great men in life have been that.
I steered for Plymouth at full speed, coming down to three thousand feet. In a flash the jagged coast, fringed with a thin line of white, came clear to view. We sped from the Atlantic, over the narrow peninsula of land which divides it from the Channel, and then turned east. The Bay, with St. Michael's Mount looking like a tiny white pebble, gave place to the long, menacing snout of the Lizard, and as a few minutes later we neared Falmouth, a flight of airships rose from the water of that mighty harbour and came up to join us like a flock of gulls, the big Klaxon electric horns blaring a welcome.
Dead Man's Rock and Gall Island, Looe, Mevagissey, Fowey -- all slipped away astern, and the bluff outlines of Rame Head, from which the Devon watchers first signalled the Armada, came rushing into view. I had been speeding far ahead, turning back, flying all round the escorting patrol boats which were doing all they knew to keep pace with us, letting them see what a wonder had come into our hands, and rejoicing more and more in the powers of the ship as I discovered them one by one. Now I slowed down, and signalled by horn to the leading vessel of the flotilla.
As we turned and entered Plymouth Sound, the others spread themselves out in a great wedge, of which I was leader, like a skein of wild geese on the wing. A salute of guns boomed out as we flew high on the Breakwater, and all the bells of Plymouth were ringing as I swooped down into the sea-drome.
And all this time, for three-quarters of an hour or more, our two prisoners had been alone together in the aft cabin, where the tools and spare parts were stored. Neither I nor Danjuro had given them a further thought, and it was the one fatal mistake we made on that morning of triumph.
Thumbwood had, however, been in to look at them once or twice, and had seen nothing disturbing. Certainly, when some of my men came to take them to the station, they were lying sullen in their bonds, and not saying a word to each other of any kind.
But by that time the mischief was doubtless done.