rushing up the slope of the world in a battle line that covered a wide sector of the southwestern horizon, steamed four german battle cruisers. they were four sea eagles dashing at a little water beetle of a tug—the hammer of thor swinging forward to crush an insect. the submarine had signaled by wireless the whole german south atlantic fleet to destroy the tug.
only in the face of this demonstration did madden realize that a great german naval stratagem hinged upon the fate of the little english boat. the slow, clumsy little vulcan would decide the fate of millions of dollars worth of english shipping. the little vessel was freighted with huge consequences.
at first glimpse of the battle line, the vulcan had sheered about, and now rushed northward, stringing her black smoke flat behind her. up from the south, the submarine followed on the surface, although she could not make as good time through the weed as did the vulcan. however, the burden of destroying the english craft had been transferred to the cruisers that came rushing forward at at least twenty-five knots an hour.
as madden stood on the bridge in the skirling wind, the little vulcan, the seaweed drifts and the cruisers reminded him of nothing so much as a rabbit flying across cotton rows in front of four greyhounds; only here there were no friendly briar patches or fence corners in which to double or hide. never had the sargasso appeared so vast, so empty, so brilliant, so hot.
"any chance?" he shouted to caradoc above the rumble of machinery and the whistling of the wind.
"there's always a chance! they might foul in these weeds!" he nodded aft.
"improbable."
"lloyds would hardly insure us," admitted the commander dryly.
at that moment, as if to lend point to the remark, came a sharp clap of thunder off their port bow. madden whirled quickly. a ball of white smoke, the size of a balloon, drifted up in the air a quarter of a mile distant.
the american stared at the smoke quite wonderstruck, then looked around at the distant ships that had not yet topped the horizon.
"did they shoot this far?"
"a request to heave to."
"are you going to do it?"
at the bursting of the shell, the men on deck came walking aft to the superstructure, with the apprehensive gait of men getting under shelter from blasting operations.
caradoc leaned over the rail of the bridge. "greer!" he shouted, "go to the flag locker, get out a union jack and show our colors on the peak!"
the men pulled up at this, and half a dozen men, two or three of them crippled, hurried to carry out the order. in a few minutes they came running back on deck with the flag. they tangled the sheets after the manner of landsmen, but finally the red pennant traveled skyward. there was a brief hoarse cheering from the cockneys.
the flag was scarcely at the peak, when above the throb and rumble of the machinery, madden's ear caught a queer droning noise, and a moment later came a deafening crash about two hundred yards to the starboard. the water beneath it was beaten to a foam, while another balloon of smoke slowly expanded and thinned in the breathless air. a long time after the bursting of the shell, leonard heard the grumble of the cannon that had fired it."
"now, lads," shouted caradoc, "go below and bring up some rockets!"
the men set off with a will, but madden viewed the situation without any thrill of patriotism to gild a death under the union jack. the cruisers were slowly coming into full view. through his glasses he could now see their turrets and the black gun ports.
"what's the idea, smith? you can't fight with rockets?"
"some english vessel may see us," answered caradoc shortly.
madden was still more astonished. "what good would that do?" he called above the wind. "she'd be captured, too."
"certainly," agreed the englishman brusquely, "but if she had a wireless, she might report the situation to the admiralty before they sank us."
madden removed his binoculars and stared at his friend. "are you staking your life on as long a chance as that?"
"my boy," said smith, in an oddly matured tone, "when the safety of one's country is at stake, one man's life doesn't amount to that!" he snapped his fingers. "if there's a point to be gained, you accept any chance automatically—or no chance at all."
the american returned no answer, but there flashed into his mind the legend of the tyrian who beached his galley in order to save the secret of cornwall. caradoc's narrative was oddly prophetic of the fate of the vulcan. and madden wondered with a quirk of grim humor if there were a foreigner aboard that tyrian's galley, and what he thought about the sacrifice.
there was another jagged report as a shell burst just aft the tug, then a missile of some thousands of pounds shrieked through the air just above the stumpy masts and filled the sky with fire and thunder a hundred yards ahead.
out of the cabin came the rocket bearers, quite over their fright by now, and acting with the nervous steadiness which acute danger brings. one of the sailors from the regular crew of the tug moved along the rail, mounting the fire signals one after the other for shooting. immediately behind him came hogan, using his one good hand to fish matches from his watch pocket and light the fuses.
the first rocket lit with a sputter, for a moment its fiery blowing filled the deck with smoke, then it darted skyward, with a tremendous swis-s-sh! up, in a long black column it went, into the very heart of the hot brazen sky, then it exploded with a faint pop, and a black head of smoke expanded at a prodigious height. in the midst of the smoke-filled deck, hogan was applying his match to another. so as the tug plowed forward, tall slender pillars of smoke, crowned with swelling palm-like heads, arose to dizzy heights out of her path.
by this time huge shells were bursting about the vulcan with crashing monotony. sometimes the dodging little vessel ran through the pungent gases of the shells that were sent to destroy her. now and then the giant missiles exploded under water and sent furious waterspouts leaping over her decks. something touched the top of her steel mainmast and snapped it off as if it were a straw. a few minutes later the crew had cleared the union jack from the wreckage and had it flaunting defiantly from the forepeak.
it was an odd defiance, a tugboat's challenge to a german battle line. the nibbling of a mouse once set a lion free. here was a mouse endeavoring to net a whole herd of lions.
the cruisers did not overhaul the little vessel as rapidly as madden had anticipated. the vulcan skurried through the seaweed fields, dodging this way and that in order to take advantage of every lane of open water, but the unwieldy battleships could not accept small advantages, and were forced to plow straight ahead, through weed or wave as it came.
thus the cruisers still fired at extreme range, and the tug escaped destruction as a gnat might jiggle between raindrops and survive a summer's shower.
amid steady crashes, madden awaited stoically for the shot that would erase the vulcan from the face of the sea. there came another splintering shock; the upper half of the foremast made a curious jump, and came down with its rigging and plunged overboard in the rushing water. the obstruction instantly choked down the tug's speed. every man in the crew seized axe, saw, anything, and rushed forward in a fury of impatience, hacking, chopping, sawing, working through the wreckage and cutting the ropes with jackknives, in an effort to clear the tug of debris. after an intolerable while, the last ratlines snapped like pistol shots, the whizzing end of a rope struck a sailor and laid him out as if clubbed, then the foremast fell away and the vulcan rushed forward again.
"look ahead, madden!" shouted caradoc in the uproar. "we've got to run among thicker fields than these!"
by this time the tug's rockets were spent and the german cruisers were rushing down a line of gigantic smoke-palms that were planted by the little vessel.
"you might as well surrender," called the american coolly. "you won't find a merchantman if you go in thicker fields—you know that."
"surrender!" bawled smith. "do you think they shall have this tug to haul their prizes? let 'em sink us, and then pick us up in boats! look ahead!"
the american turned his binoculars obediently and scanned the west and north. his eyes traversed skein after skein of the brilliant colorful patternings, but he was unable to find a very closely netted region. he was about to announce his discovery to caradoc when his lense focussed on another grim menace almost dead ahead.
he stared at it with a curious dropping of hopes that he had not suspected were in his breast.
what he saw was another fighting top. that pertinacious submarine had apparently surrounded the elusive vulcan with german fighting ships.
leonard removed his field glasses and stood for a full minute filled with a keen frustration. the splitting din about him roared on uninterruptedly, and yet somehow he had been hoping the vulcan would escape.
"what do you make of it?" bawled smith, who had been watching the submarine, which was once more drawing dangerously close.
"we can't go in this direction, smith!" shouted leonard hopelessly. "there are more ships in that direction."
"warships?" demanded caradoc swinging his spyglass around.
"yes, fighting tops!"
both lads focused in the new direction.
"those germans do everything thoroughly," shouted leonard, "even to sinking a tug!"
but instead of despairing, caradoc, after a single glance, rushed over to the speaking tube to the boilers. he blew the whistle shrilly, then folded it back and screamed down.
"malone! malone! malone!"
"very well, sir!" came back the muffled voice through the pipe.
"give her all steam possible! blow her up! speed her, man, speed her!"
"very well, sir!" returned the same voice.
"caradoc! caradoc! are you insane!" bawled leonard. "do you imagine you can outrun two squadrons of german cruisers?"
"german cruisers! that's england's line of battle, madden! england! old england! god let me get to them and tell 'em what i know, then i don't care what happens!"
