The Bomb-Makers
Page 10
instant reply. "I tried towarn you a month ago, but you were not convinced. To-day you areconvinced--are you not? I am acting only for my dear dead mother'scountry, for, strictly speaking, being the daughter of a German, I am analien enemy."
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About two o'clock one morning, about a week later, the dark figure of aman in a shabby serge suit and golf-cap, treading noiselessly inrubber-shoes, crossed Hammersmith Bridge in the direction of Barnes and,passing along that wide open thoroughfare, paused for a moment outsidethe house of the Dutch pastor, Mr Drost. Then, finding himselfunobserved, he slipped into the front garden and, bending, concealedhimself in some bushes.
He had waited there for ten minutes or so, watching the dark, silenthouse, when, slowly and noiselessly, the front door opened, and nextmoment Kennedy and Ella were face to face. The latter wore a prettypale-blue dressing-gown, for she had just risen from bed, she havingspent the last two days at her father's house.
With a warning finger upon her lips, and with a small flash-lamp in herhand, she led her lover up three flights of stairs to the door of thatlocked room, which she silently opened with her duplicate key.
"Father and the man Hans Rozelaar have been at work here nearly allday," she whispered, when at last they halted before the long deal tableupon which stood Drost's chemical apparatus.
Kennedy's shrewd eyes were quick to notice what was in progress insecret.
With some curiosity he took up a tube of tin about a foot long and fourinches in diameter. On examining it he saw that through the centre wasa second tin tube of about an inch in diameter. Holding it as atelescope towards the light he could see through the inner tubes andnoticed that near one end of it a small steel catch was protruding.Further and minute examination revealed that to the catch could beattached a time-fuse already concealed between the inner and outertubes.
"This is evidently some ingenious form of hand grenade," whisperedKennedy. "It's all ready for filling. But why, I wonder, should a tuberun through the middle in this way?"
He was pondering with it in his hand, when his gaze suddenly fell uponsomething else which was lying close to the spot where he found the tintube.
It was a thin ash walking-stick. On Kennedy taking it up it presented apeculiar feature, for as he grasped it there sounded a sharp metallicclick. Then, to his surprise, he discovered that he had inadvertentlyreleased a spring in the handle, this in turn releasing four small steelpoints half-way down the stick.
"Curious!" he whispered to his well-beloved, for Drost was sleepingbelow entirely unconscious of the intruders in his secret laboratory."What connection can the stick have with the grenade--if not for thepurpose of throwing?"
He therefore placed the inner tube over the little knob of the stick,and found that it just fitted, so that with plenty of play it slid downas far as the projecting points which, after striking the little steelcatch which would be connected with the fuse, allowed it to pass overfreely and leave the stick.
"Ah! I've got it!" he whispered excitedly. "The grenade can be carriedin the pocket with perfect safety, until when required it is placed overthe handle of the stick and whirled off. As it passes the projectionson the stick the time-fuse is set for so many seconds, and the grenadeautomatically becomes a live one. A very pretty contrivance indeed!--very pretty!" he added with a grin. "This, I must admit, doesconsiderable credit to Ortmann, Drost and Company."
Ella, who had been standing by, holding the electric torch, stood inwonder at the discovery. Truly, some of her father's inventions hadbeen diabolical ones.
Kennedy saw that the ash-stick had been finished and was in workingorder. All was complete, indeed, save the filling of the deadlygrenade, the attaching of the fuse, and the painting of the bright tin.
For fully five minutes the air-pilot stood in silence, deeply pondering.
Then, as a sudden idea occurred to him, he said quickly:
"I must take this stick, Ella. I'll be back again by four o'clock, andwill leave it just outside the front door. You take it in, and replaceit exactly as we found it."
He lost no time. In five minutes he had crept from that dark house ofmystery and death, and, carrying the stick, returned across HammersmithBridge.
At ten minutes to four he was back again in Barnes and had left thesuspicious-looking ash-stick against the front door, afterwards going tohis rooms to snatch a few hours' sleep.
Next day happened to be Sunday, but at noon on Monday Mr MertonMansfield, one of the most active members of the Cabinet, as well as oneof the most popular of Cabinet Ministers, presided at the unveiling of anumber of captured German guns which had been drawn up in Hyde Park inorder that the public might be afforded an opportunity of seeing thetrophies of war in Flanders won by British pertinacity and pluck.
Accompanying Merton Mansfield, the people's idol, the man in whom GreatBritain trusted to see that all was well, and who was, at the same time,hated and feared by the Germans, were several other members of theCabinet.
The crowd outside the wire fence, within which stood the shrouded guns,was a large one, for some patriotic speeches were expected. Ella andKennedy were among the spectators eagerly watching the movements of athin-faced, well-dressed, middle-aged man, who wore an overcoat, in theleft-hand pocket of which was something rather bulky, and who carried inhis hand an ash-stick.
The man's name was Hans Rozelaar, known to his friends by the Englishname of Rose. By the fellow's movements it was plain that he was quiteunsuspicious of the presence of the daughter of his fellow-conspirator,Theodore Drost.
Gradually he had worked himself through the crowd until he stood in thefront row behind the wire which fenced off the guns with the CabinetMinisters and their friends, and within ten yards or so of where stoodMr Merton Mansfield.
Kennedy was beside Ella some distance away, watching breathlessly. Ithad been his first impulse to go to Scotland Yard and reveal what theyhad discovered, but after due consideration he saw that the bestpunishment for the conspirators was the one he had devised.
But if it failed? What if that most deadly grenade was exploded in thegroup of Great Britain's leaders--the men who were working night andday, and working with all their might and intelligence, to crush the Huneffectively, even though so slowly.
A roar of applause rose from the crowd as Merton Mansfield removed hishat preparatory to speaking. The short, stout, round-faced CabinetMinister who, in the days of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's Premiership,had been so unpopular with the working-class, yet who had now come tothe forefront as the saviour of our dear old England, smiled withpleasure at his hearty reception.
The little group of England's greatest men, Cabinet Ministers andwell-known politicians, with a sprinkling of men in khaki, clusteredround him, as he commenced to address the assembly, to descant upon theheroic efforts of "French's contemptible little Army," of their greatexploits, of their amazing achievements, and the staggering organisationof Lord Kitchener.
"Here, before you, you have some small souvenirs--some small idea of theweapons which the unscrupulous fiends who are our enemies are usingagainst our gallant troops. They, unfortunately, are not gallantsoldiers, these Huns in modern clothing--they are pirates with the skulland crossbones borne upon the helmets of their crack regiments. Yet weshall win--I tell you that we shall win, be the time long or short, bethe sacrifice great or small--we shall win because Right, Truth, andGod's justice are with us! And I will here give you a message from thePrime Minister--who would have been here, if it were not for the factthat he is at this moment having audience of His Majesty the King."
A great roar of applause greeted this announcement, when, suddenly, aloud explosion sounded, startling everyone and causing women to scream.
The lovers, who had kept their eyes upon the man in the overcoat, saw ared flash, and saw him reel and fall to earth with his face blown away.
They had seen how he had placed the grenade o
ver his ash-stick, and how,a second later, he had sharply slung it across from right to left,intending the deadly bomb to land at Mr Merton Mansfield's feet.
Instead, with its fuse set by the little points of steel protruding fromthe stick, it had, nevertheless, failed to pass from the stick, becauseof the small piece of thin wire which Seymour Kennedy had driven throughjust above the ferrule, on that night when he had afterwards left thestick at old Drost's front door. His quick intelligence had shown himthat the empty grenade had already been tried upon the stick, and thatwhen filled, and the fuse attached, it certainly would not be testedagain.
Hans Rozelaar had slung the grenade just as old Theodore Drost hadinstructed him, but it had remained fast at the end of the stick, andere he could release it, it had exploded, blowing both his hands off andhis features out of all recognition, though, very fortunately, injuringno one