The Man Who Ended War. Godfrey Hollis

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СКАЧАТЬ disappearance of His Britannic Majesty’s battleship Dreadnought Number 8 sent the world wild. Two great nations had suffered severe blows, and lay in quivering expectation of the future. The chief of my paper smiled at me more amicably than ever before, as I entered the office the third day after the British battleship disappeared utterly in the channel.

      “You’d better run that prophecy of yours about the French battleship to-day,” he said, “and then keep out of the office. I don’t want you to be in evidence. We’ve got too good a thing to take any chances. Work as hard as you want to on the assignment, but don’t appear publicly.”

      I nodded acquiescence.

      “By the way,” he went on, “just how many people outside our own staff know of the second letter?”

      “Seven,” I answered. “The President, the Secretary of War, the two Haldanes and their cousin Mrs. Hartnell, Richard Regnier and John King. The former Secretary of the Navy did know, but he’s dead. They are all pledged to secrecy, and all have kept the story wholly to themselves.”

      “That’s all,” said the chief, and I left.

      That night I sent in a prediction that a French battleship would sink within a week, and then spent the next few days going over the naval registers of the nations, and in correlating the mass of data concerning the navies of the world, which had been collected at the office by my request. I wanted to get all the information concerning the subject in hand that I could possibly obtain.

      Immersed in masses of data, struggling with theory after theory that arose only to be rejected, I passed the week. Weary from my labors, one afternoon I left my work to go to the Haldanes to report progress. Tom and Dorothy were both immersed in a research Tom was carrying on, but they always had time to discuss the great question.

      “I had a letter from Dick Regnier yesterday,” said Dorothy, the first words over. “He says he is doing some work he has long wanted to do. He speaks of seeing John King at Cowes. John had his new yacht down there.”

      I followed every word intently. “Nothing at all about the loss of the Alaska or the Dreadnought Number 8?” I asked significantly.

      “No,” answered Dorothy.

      “When was the letter mailed?” I asked.

      “Two days after the British ship went down,” she answered. “But – ” She stopped as Tom came in. I continued the conversation no farther.

      As I left, Tom called after me. “I’ve been fooling with some phosphorescent paint,” he said, “and I’ve run down a few interesting results. Don’t you want to come up to the laboratory to-morrow morning about three o’clock? We’re going to run some tests between twelve midnight, and five in the morning, so as to have the least current and vibration that the city can give.”

      “I’ll be glad to come,” I answered instantly. No chance to be near Dorothy was ever to be refused.

      The last revellers were just passing from the great white way, as I rode up town in a late surface car, which held, beside myself, only a few dull and sleepy workers. I was ahead of time and, as I came up near Riverside Drive, I jumped off the car and walked down towards the Drive and up by the river. Below me, in the full moonlight, lay an American fleet. The white sides and lofty turrets of the ships stood sharply outlined against the other bank. They seemed to personify the might of the nation resting there in huge impassive stolidity, fearful of nothing, ready for all. Yet as I remembered Joslinn’s words, “vanished like a breaking soap bubble,” spoken of the Alaska, I shuddered at the helplessness of those floating forts, massive as they were. I looked at my watch in the moonlight. Quarter of three. I turned and made my way to the gray stone building on the height, which held the research laboratory.

      I found Tom and Dorothy bending over a series of instruments under a big incandescent light. I watched them for a moment silently, then, as they rose from their task, I greeted them. Never had Dorothy looked more charming than in this setting of bare walls and severe tables, hooded instruments and wires, glass cases and shelves. Most girls whom I had seen at three o’clock in the morning, as they left a ballroom, were sorry spectacles, worn and dishevelled. Dorothy, in her trim working clothes, was as fresh as a summer’s morn. Her first greeting over, she turned to her work again, adjusting a micrometer levelling screw.

      “What are you doing?” I asked idly.

      “Adjusting a reflectoscope to detect the presence of radio-active waves. Tom is just going to have his assistant test the radium he is to use to-night, and has half a dozen reflectoscopes here,” and she waved her hand at the bench before her, where half a dozen similar instruments were placed.

      “They are a good deal like the old electroscopes, only infinitely more sensitive. You see that gold leaf,” she pointed to two tiny ribbons of gold that hung limply together, “when a wave from a radio-active source, such as radium, comes along, those ribbons fly apart. All our reflectoscopes are discharged now, but they’ll be charged later.”

      As we spoke, Tom joined us. “I’ve sent Jones down-stairs for the radium in the safe, Dorothy,” he said, and we three stood looking silently at the instruments before us. Through the open windows a fresh breeze fluttered in, and the soft night gave back but the slightest hum, a minimum of that sound that never ceases in the quietest hours of the great city. A church tower rang out – One, Two, Three, Four. Tom glanced at the chronometer. “Just right,” he said, and looked back. A strange hush filled the air. Again a terrific force seemed to be pulling me towards Dorothy, but my eyes never turned from the reflectoscopes. Suddenly, as I gazed, the golden ribbons sprang to life, parted and stood stiffly separate.

      “Good heavens!” cried Tom. “What did that? They were perfectly insulated. What did that, Dorothy? It must be Jones bringing the radium.”

      Dorothy’s eyes glowed with excited interest. “I don’t think it was Jones,” she said eagerly. “I believe I know what it was, but anyway, let’s go first and see where Jones is. There’s absolutely nothing else in the laboratory that could have charged them, insulated as they were.”

      Down the stairs, flight after flight, four in all, we trooped, and found Jones in an office on the first floor, seated in a chair before the safe, and looking disconsolately at its closed door. At Tom’s voice, he rose.

      “Professor, I’ve forgotten the combination again. I was sitting here trying to bring it to mind.”

      “Then you haven’t taken the radium from the safe at all?” shouted Tom, in wild excitement.

      “No,” answered Jones, staring in amazement.

      “Then how in blazes did those reflectoscopes get charged?”

      Jones showed a sudden interest, “Have they got charged again?”

      “Yes, have they been charged before?”

      “Twice before, and I meant to speak to you about it, but it slipped my mind.”

      “When did it happen?” Dorothy broke in.

      “I’ve got full particulars noted down, up-stairs,” said Jones. “But how about the combination?”

      “Never mind that,” cried Tom. “Let me see your data.”

      Rapidly we ascended, the slower Jones following some way behind. In the laboratory the assistant turned to a littered desk and fumbled among a mass of papers. I could see that Dorothy was burning with impatience which I could not understand. СКАЧАТЬ