"Now, give thanks with your last real thoughts," cried Bill, hoa.r.s.ely.
"Gentlemen--this is--glorious! We"re going fast! The last--croak--is upon us! Good--bye!"
CHAPTER XIX
JACK STRIKES THE KEY TO THE MYSTERY
"Down below! Down, down, down!" croaked Bill Henderson.
He pointed below, with one forefinger, laughing wildly. The others, sure that the seaman had lost his mind under the crushing force of the catastrophe, felt pity for him, though the man"s actions and words also helped to increase their own terror.
To cap the climax Henderson got painfully to his feet and tried to dance a jig. That was carrying things too far in the then state of mind of the rest of the company.
"Henderson, confound you," cried Captain Jack, half savagely, as he rose, "keep quiet and sit down! Act like a man. You--"
To emphasize his order the young captain pushed against the seaman"s breast, intent on shoving him into a seat. Just as he did so, Captain Jack paused aghast, for an instant. Then he shouted hoa.r.s.ely:
"Friends, _I"ve found the wrench!_"
That brought them all to their feet, while Bill Henderson snarled in sudden rage.
"This man has it hidden away in the inside pocket of his coat!" cried the young captain of the "Pollard." "Help me to take it away from him while we"ve enough life left to act!"
With another snarl Bill Henderson crouched, in the att.i.tude of a football player, to meet the impending a.s.sault.
Five of them swarmed upon him, from all sides. Had not all of them been near to dying from air starvation the conflict would have been a savage one. As it was, the fight, although a relatively weak one, was as strenuous as any of the combatants could make it.
Henderson, ordinarily a powerful brute capable of fighting three or four ordinary men, still endeavored to do his very best.
Back and forth they fought, rolling over each other, and every moment burning up more and more of the air that was left to them.
Yet at last Captain Jack, aided by the others, succeeded in s.n.a.t.c.hing the wrench from the seaman"s inner pocket.
"Hold him," cried Benson, getting weakly up, tottering over to one of the compressors. "Give me a minute--and some--strength--and I"ll give us a taste--of real air."
Desperately he fitted the wrench, tried to give it a sufficient turn, and could not.
"I"ll help you," hoa.r.s.ely croaked dying Hal, reaching out and getting the weight of his hands also on the wrench. Never before had either boy struggled so desperately hard for anything. At last it yielded, ever so little. There was a hiss of escaping compressed air.
Then they got a taste of it. Oh, how nectarlike that air was! Renewed strength began to course through their arteries and to creep into their muscles. Two deep breaths apiece, and then Jack and Hal succeeded in making a good turn. A moment later they were able to make another twist, that set the pneumatic apparatus in operation to expel the bad air through sea valves.
But Bill Henderson, too, was reviving. Uttering hoa.r.s.e cries of rage that sounded wonderfully more powerful, now, he fought his three captors to get upon his feet.
There was no help for it. Captain Jack had to dart over and tap the fellow on the head with the wrench. Then Bill was quiet long enough to make it possible, for Mr. Farnum to hurry after a pair of the handcuffs that were a part of ship"s stores. These were snapped over the seaman"s wrists just before he came to.
"Now, we won"t have to hurt him," muttered Jack, compa.s.sionately. "He"s a maniac, poor chap, or he"d never have done such a thing as try to condemn us all, himself included, to death in the depths by asphyxiation."
"He"s a maniac, sure enough," commented Mr. Farnum. "But how on earth did I ever get trapped into hiring such a fellow as one of the crew?
Confound him, he seemed sane enough until after we came below the surface."
"And now, sir," nudged Captain Jack, "I think we"d all of us be thankful enough for a glimpse of the surface--for a look at the stars--a breath of real ocean breeze."
"Good enough," nodded the boat-builder. "Travel right to it!"
Though all were weak and trembly from the shock of their late experience, there was strength enough in their combined force to handle the "Pollard"
promptly.
While Messrs. Farnum and Pollard sat over the prostrate Henderson, handcuffed on the floor, Hal hurried to the engine room, while Captain Jack climbed up into the conning tower. Eph Somers stood near the two men and their captive, ready to respond to any call.
But Henderson, now that his maniacal rage had pa.s.sed, was sobbing quietly. He seemed spent, exhausted.
It was with a thrill that the young captain of the submarine touched the control for speed ahead from the electric equipment. Then he looked at his compa.s.s, finding that the boat, from a northerly heading, had veered around almost east. As the boat went ahead, softly, Benson put the course around to north. Then he called to Hal and Eph to empty the diving tanks by degrees.
"Going up on even keel!" asked young Hastings.
"Surest thing I know," replied the young captain.
Though there was not much motion, all felt the boat gradually rising.
Then Captain Jack suddenly caught the greater comparative light of the night above the water. Next, he caught sight of the blessed stars. But he did not stop the work of Hal and Eph until the boat rode well up out of the water.
"Now, come up and get the manhole open," called the young skipper.
"Let"s all have a notion again of how it feels to stand in the open air."
Messrs. Farnum and Pollard had, by this time, completed the captivity of Bill Henderson by wrapping around him and securing many and many a turn of half-inch rope.
As the manhole was opened Captain Jack stepped out, taking the deck wheel. The others, all except the prisoner, crowed out after him. Thus they ran along for a mile or two, under the slower electric power.
"That crazy fellow," uttered Jacob Farnum, "had some mania on his mind that we were all great sinners, and that he"d save the whole lot of us by killing us under water."
"It seems strange," muttered Hal, "for even a crazy man to have the nerve to destroy himself slowly in such a way."
"Humph, no; nothing new in that line," returned Mr. Farnum.
"What are we going to do with him, sir?" inquired Captain Jack.
"Well, we"re not going to turn in at any of the coast towns to give him up," replied the builder. "We"ll keep right along until we join the fleet, and then we"ll ask the advice of some naval officer."
When, at last, all had become accustomed to the world to which they had returned, Hal and Eph went below, to turn on the gasoline power a short time the "Pollard" was kicking the water at the exhilarating gait of eighteen miles an hour.
"How did it come, sir, that you made it eighteen miles, instead of knots?" asked Captain Jack, after a while.
"Why, that"s the basis on which gasoline engines are built," replied Mr. Farnum. "For that matter, captain, when we"ve had more practice with this boat we"ll tune the engine up to eighteen full knots an hour.
In the second boat we are going to try for an a.s.sured speed of twenty-two to twenty-four knots."
"It seems to me," said Jack, musingly, "that the ideal submarine torpedo boat ought to have a speed of from twenty-eight, to thirty-five knots."