“Mr. Tesla, I… well, first, sir, let me shake your hand!” He stuck his hand out, remembering too late that Tesla abhorred shaking hands. But to his surprise, the man took it and shook weakly. He quickly let go. “Congratulations, sir! This is an amazing achievement! Truly amazing! My superiors will be extremely interested in this. Can you provide drawings? Specifications? We will want to build a lot of these devices.”
“My assistants are working on them now, Major,” said Tesla beaming in delight. “Of course we will need a great deal of the Martian wire to build many of these.”
“I’m sure we will get it.” Somehow…
The reporters crowded in now and bombarded Tesla, and himself, with questions. Tesla was more than willing to talk about his genius, but Andrew had to temper his responses to avoid making any sort of statement he’d come to regret later. Eventually he broke free, and he and Hornbaker headed back to the train station.
“That was really something, sir,” said the lieutenant.
“Yes, it was. And I still can barely believe it.”
“Sir?”
“Oh, I’ve been coming to see Tesla for years and he’s… well, as I’m sure you noticed, he’s a bit of a blowhard. He promises the sun, moon, and stars, but up until now hasn’t delivered much of anything. So for him to now come up with this. And he wasn’t even supposed to be working on this, mind you. It’s a surprise. A real surprise.”
“But a pleasant one, surely.”
“Yes indeed. I just hope I can get General Crozier to believe it. And use it.”
“Will that be difficult, sir? I thought the general was open to new ideas.”
“Oh he is. But I know he’s skeptical of Tesla. He’ll be cautious about committing a lot of resources.”
“Maybe we should get him up here to see this.”
“We might have to.”
They reached the train station and Andrew found a telegram waiting for him. He read it and frowned. “Trouble, sir?” asked Hornbaker.
“It’s from the Baldwin people. They’d like to put off the demonstration until tomorrow. Problems with their device apparently. I suppose we can just layover in Philadelphia…”
“Or we could go right on down to Aberdeen and see what Goddard has to show us, sir,” suggested Hornbaker. “Then back up to Philadelphia the next day.”
“Yes, yes, we could do that. Goddard is ready to go now from what his last message said. Good idea, Jerry. Check the train schedule while I send a wire to Goddard to get ready for this afternoon.”
“Yes, sir.”
The arrangements were made and soon the two of them were on a train heading south. Andrew immediately slumped down in his seat and pulled his cap over his eyes to try and catch some sleep. Hornbaker had his face pressed to the window of the car, taking in the sights. The young man was from some backwoods place in Kentucky or Tennessee and was still amazed by how built-up the east was. Andrew had seen those sights enough times not to need to do so again - although they did seem to change a bit each time he came through here.
America’s mobilization to meet the demands of the war was changing the landscape and changing the society as well. New factories and smelters were springing up everywhere. Thousands of chimneys belched smoke into the skies and heaps of slag grew into small mountains. Winter time snows stayed white only a few hours before soot turned the drifts black. Vast marshaling yards were filled with tanks and guns waiting to be shipped to the front. Training camps turned out new soldiers, a hundred thousand each month. Women and children were working in those new factories so the men could go fight. Everyone was involved - everyone. Andrew’s own wife was growing vegetables in a garden which took up nearly the entire back yard of her parent’s house at Fort Myer and organizing the wives of other officers to do the same. With the loss of the Great Plains, there was a growing food shortage. It was finally sinking in that this was a war for survival. He dozed off thinking about the house and the garden.
Late afternoon saw them at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland, north of Baltimore. The army had a large base there to test new weapons. Andrew had been here frequently over the last few years. In fact he’d been here just a month ago watching a field test on a new device which was hoped could help blast a way through the walls the Martians threw up around their fortresses. It had looked promising, although with the current state of the war, they were unlikely to need the thing for a while.
The weapon being tested today was one the army had great hopes for. The war against the Martians was unlike any ever fought by men. The enemy employed large, heavily armored war machines which were virtually invulnerable to the rifles and machine guns used by ordinary infantry. On rare occasions a damaged tripod might be taken down by some lucky fusillade of bullets, but that was exceptional. To make up for this, the infantry had been supplied with small bombs. These could wreck a tripod - indeed, Andrew and a small group of men had done exactly that a few years before - but it was difficult and incredibly dangerous. Not every infantryman had the nerve to make such an attack. And despite the tremendous output of America’s factories, not every soldier could be supplied with a tank or an artillery piece. Somehow the masses of infantry which made up any army had to be made effective again.
What was needed was a weapon powerful enough to damage a tripod from a distance, and yet small and light enough that infantry soldiers could carry them into battle. A little less than two years ago, a young engineer named Robert Goddard had accosted Andrew on the streets of Boston and insisted he had just the weapon for the job. Andrew had been skeptical at first since the army was being flooded with ‘great ideas’ for winning the war - most totally impractical. But Goddard had been accompanied by Charles Munroe, an explosives expert who Andrew already knew of from his work in the navy’s torpedo factory in Connecticut. The two of them together had proposed a shaped-charge explosive device delivered by a small rocket. Developing it had not been as simple or easy as Goddard had promised - but then few things were - but at last it looked as though the problems had been solved. Or Andrew surely hoped so.
Aberdeen was on a stretch of ground hugging Chesapeake Bay. It was mostly low, flat, and in places, swampy. Scraggly clumps of trees grew here and there and swarms of mosquitoes everywhere. The weather was clouding over, but the wind had died and Andrew found himself sweating under his wool uniform. A motor staff car met them at the railroad station and carried them along dirt roads deep into the base. From time to time loud booms shook the air as artillery and explosives were tested. The car passed a few firing ranges where artillery of many types and sizes were being fired. They finally arrived at a secluded field where a small group of people were waiting for them. He spotted Goddard right away. The man, though little older than Andrew, was almost completely bald and never seemed to wear a hat.
Goddard trotted over to greet them, smiling broadly. “Welcome, Colonel! Glad to see you. As soon as I got your wire I had things set up here. Glad you could come today, it’s supposed to rain tomorrow.”
“Your weapon isn’t affected by the rain is it?” asked Andrew.
“No, no! We’ve made it quite waterproof. We were told right from the start that whatever we came up with would have to be able to stand up to field conditions. I was just thinking that the demonstration would be a lot more pleasant if we weren’t standing in the rain.”
“Yes, I see. So, what do you have for us?”
“I hope I have the final prototype for the Anti-Tripod Rocket Launcher. We’ve been testing it almost non-stop for the last week. Over two hundred rounds fired with no serious mishaps.”
“That implies some not-so-serious mishaps, Dr. Goddard,” observed Andrew.
“Well, yes, there have been a few misfires and a few duds, but that’s to be expected. There have been no injuries and no unintended damage. And the performance has been excellent. Here, let me show you.” He led the way to where several tables had been set up. On one was sitting the launcher. This was little more than a
piece of hollow tubing about three inches in diameter and about four and a half feet long. It had a crude aiming site, a curved wooden piece that would allow the operator to rest the tube on his shoulder, a pistol grip near the middle and another near the front, and a small box that was only a few inches square near the rear. The other table held a dozen of the rockets themselves. These were a little less than two feet long with a bulbous nose, a thin central section, and four guiding fins at the rear.
“Looks like a stovepipe,” said Hornbaker.
Goddard chuckled. “Yes, that’s what the men are already calling it. I imagine that will prove a lot more popular than the ATRL.” He picked up the tube and handed it to Andrew. “About thirteen pounds, only a little more than a standard rifle, so the men should have no problem carrying them. The production model will have rings to attach a carrying sling. The rockets are a little over three pounds each, but a bit awkward for carrying. I’ve sent the specification to the Quartermaster Department, as you instructed. They are going to develop a carrying rig which will hold eight rockets and which can be worn like a back pack. I’m thinking that the weapon can be used by a two-man team. The rocketeer would operate the weapon and the other man could carry the rockets and act as the loader.”
“The exact method of deployment is still being worked out,” said Andrew. “Ideally there would be one of these for each squad, but it will be quite a while before they are available in sufficient numbers for that. For now, we’ll try to get a few to each company. But show me how this works.” He handed the tube back to Goddard and then nodded to Hornbaker, who got out his camera.
“It’s very simple to operate, Colonel; come with me,” said Goddard. He started walking out into the field, one of his assistants following with a rocket. Andrew and Hornbaker trailed along. When they were about a hundred yards from the tables, Goddard stopped and swapped the tube for the rocket. “The launcher is just a hollow tube to guide the rocket in the first moments of flight until its moving fast enough for the fins to provide stability. The loader inserts the rocket halfway into the rear of the tube.” The assistant put the tube onto his shoulder and Goddard slid the rocket in. “This is the only tricky part. First, you pull out this pin, which arms the warhead. Then you tug loose this wire and wrap it around this little coil attached to the tube.” He did so and slid the rocket the rest of the way in. A small click of metal indicated that it was somehow secured in place and wouldn’t fall out if the tube was tilted. “Okay, it’s ready to fire. If you’d move over here next to me—there’s quite a back blast and you can’t be right behind it when it fires.” All three of them moved about a dozen yards to the side of the firer. “Whenever you are ready, George.”
The man nodded and directed the tube toward a distant target about two hundred yards away. There was a moment as he adjusted his aim and then there was a loud roar and a blast of smoke from the rear of the tube. The rocket flew out the front and in a surprisingly short time crossed the distance to the target and exploded. The explosion wasn’t particularly loud or impressive, to Andrew’s disappointment. Goddard waved to the men around the table and one of them trotted forward with another rocket.
“The propellant in the rocket is very stable under normal conditions and has to be set off by an igniter,” explained Goddard as he loaded again. “The ignition is electrical. We have a standard National Carbon zinc-carbon Leclanché dry cell in this box attached to the tube. It is good for a few dozen firings. I’m thinking that we could have a new battery included with each carton of rockets.” He looked right at Andrew and pointed at the arming pin on the rocket. “However, once this pin is removed, the rocket is dangerous to handle. The firing pin is in the rear and the sudden deceleration of hitting the target will drive it into the explosive. Even simply dropping it could cause it to detonate. So the pin should only be removed just prior to firing.”
Andrew frowned. “We’ll need to hammer that into the men using it. Hornbaker, here, will be putting together the operating manual for this and he’ll need your notes and any other useful advice you can give.”
“My pleasure, Colonel.” He finished loading and George sent another rocket against the target. “Would you care to give it a try, Colonel?”
Andrew blinked in surprise. “Uh, sure, why not?” Another rocket was brought forward and Andrew put the launcher up on his shoulder the way he had seen the assistant do it. Goddard loaded and patted him on the shoulder.
“You’re ready, Colonel. Flip up the cover over the trigger and press it when you want to fire. Give us a moment to move aside.”
Andrew shifted the tube so that his eye was close to the rear sight, which was nothing more than a metal tab sticking out with a small hole in it. He lined it up with another metal bar attached to the front of the tube. He could see several marking spaced vertically on it. “How is the sight calibrated?” he called.
“Oh, sorry!” replied Goddard. “The top mark is for one hundred yards, the second for two hundred, and the last for three hundred.”
“Ah, I see. Okay, here goes.” The range to the target looked about two hundred yards to him, so he lined up the second mark on the target. He flipped up the little cover over the firing button and gingerly pressed the button underneath it. There was an instant’s delay when he heard a tiny crackling sound, then a loud whoosh, and he was engulfed in smoke. He heard the bang as the rocket detonated, but he couldn’t see a thing until the smoke dispersed. The others walked over to him, Goddard grinning. “Did I hit it?”
“A little over, sir,” said Hornbaker. “Close though.”
“It does take a little practice, Colonel,” said Goddard. “Of course a real tripod would be a much bigger target than what we have here.”
“There’s no recoil at all,” observed Andrew.
“Of course not,” said Goddard. “That’s the nature of a rocket launcher.”
“But what can it do to the target? Can it blast through the Martian armor? That’s’ the whole point after all.”
Goddard’s smile faded. “Let’s take a look at the target, shall we? It’s a piece of a Martian machine we were given for testing.”
They walked down range to the target, which Andrew saw was the curving piece of the cockpit of a Martian tripod about six feet in height and width—not unlike the target Tesla was using that morning. It was rather badly battered with cracks and holes and divots taken out of the surface. But the holes and most of the divots had red paint dabbed on them. “We only had the one target,” explained Goddard. “So after each series of tests we paint the hits so we don’t confuse new hits with old. Here these are the new hits we made just now.”
Andrew looked close and saw the newest divots in the armor. And that’s all they were, divots. “We didn’t penetrate.”
“No, Colonel,” said Goddard. “But this sample is from the most heavily armored part of a tripod. The drawings you’ve provided show that other areas are not so well protected.”
“We need a weapon which can kill these things, Doctor!”
“Sir, I must remind you that even regular artillery usually requires multiple hits to destroy an enemy machine,” said Goddard stiffly. “The rocket launcher has a similar destructive potential as a four-inch gun. To make it powerful enough to punch through the armor with a single shot would require a weapon far too large and heavy to be employed by ordinary infantry - although I would like to pursue the development of such a weapon. We were directed to create a weapon which infantry can use and this is it.”
“Well, yes,” said Andrew damping down his disappointment. “It’s certainly safer than the bombs we’ve equipped the poor sods with, and far better than nothing. Sorry, Doctor, I suppose I let my hopes get away from me. But you say that this is ready to go into production?”
“Yes, Colonel. There are several facilities which are only waiting your approval to begin work.”
“Very good. I’ll talk to General Crozier and we should have that approval in a few days.”
&nb
sp; “Excellent!” said Goddard, recapturing his good humor. “I’ll be involved for a few months getting the factories up to speed. After that, I’d like your permission to pursue a few new ideas I have concerning larger rockets and possible multiple launchers for a barrage system. Charles Munroe is already working on a larger shaped-charge warhead and…”
“I’ll pass that along, Doctor, but for right now, please concentrate your efforts on production of your stovepipes. We need to get these into the hands of our troops as quickly as we can. The Martians may be quiet for the moment, but that won’t last!”
Chapter Two
September, 1911, east of Augusta, Arkansas
“Where the hell are they?” growled Captain Frank Dolfen. “It’s been three hours since we called for them!”
“Yes, and I don’t know how much longer we can hang about here before those blighters notice us,” said Major Bridges. The two officers were lying on their bellies on a small rise in the ground that passed for a hill on the flat eastern edges of the Ozark Plateau. They were seventy miles west of Memphis and about an equal distance northeast of Little Rock, staring at a new Martian fortress. Like the one Dolfen had spent weeks looking at near Gallup, New Mexico two years earlier, it was a ring of raised earth and stone about forty feet high and three miles in diameter. At the moment, there were two Martian tripods not a mile off, apparently on patrol. Clouds of dust in the distance hinted at others. Dolfen, Bridges, and a pair of troopers had snuck to this position during the night.
They were waiting for a group of Air Corps bombers to come and attack. Not Colonel Selfridge’s planes, but a different group with much larger machines. They had attacked the place several times before, but reconnaissance from the air hadn’t been able to determine what sort of damage was being done. So the request had gone out for some reconnaissance from the ground and Dolfen’s squadron had been the lucky ones to get the job.
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