CHAPTER II
THE METAL MONSTERS
I
THE five planes rose over the sleeping city and swung south-eastward, flying in echelon. In the first ship rode Dr. Scott, Secretary Angell and his aides, King, and several Government technical experts on munitions and military engineering who had been hustled out of their beds by the Secretary and who were still sleepy and glum, hardly understanding the nature of the excursion upon which they had embarked.
“Better send these young men to bed,” said the professor, motioning toward the cabins in the fuselage. “We’ve got about twenty hours’ flying ahead of us, and I’ll have plenty of time to-morrow to explain this matter to them. In the meantime they’ll need their sleep.”
The Secretary assented. The experts, with glances of appreciation in the scientist’s direction, filed away, leaving Dr. Scott and King alone in the main cabin with their superior.
“I assume,” began the scientist abruptly, “that this metal used by the Asians is almost infinitely strong and infinitely heat-resisting, so far as we are concerned. I think that we will not be able to do anything against them in that direction, unless we find some chemical or atomic means of disintegrating it.”
The Secretary smiled.
“I am beginning to believe,” he said, “that you are a great scientist. I will be certain of it if our observations show that we really have in this hemisphere the cap of an earth-tube such as you have described. But I am sure, nevertheless, that you greatly overestimate the impregnability of this material. Remember that we have new heat rays and tremendously powerful explosives which have all been discovered and put into use since the unsuccessful Sino-Japanese war against the Asians.”
“Nonsense,” retorted Dr. Scott. “Your heat ray would be like a mosquito bite against such metal. We’ have calculated, from known data, that the heat at the center of the earth is at least several times greater than any temperature ever achieved on the surface. Enough heat escapes every year through the insulation of ten miles or so of rock, earth and water in its shell to melt the equivalent of eight hundred cubic miles of ice.
“And as for your explosives: the calculated pressure at the center of the earth is about forty-four million pounds per square inch. This tremendous pressure and that great heat are at once directed against the slender tube of metal which now reaches from Japan to South America, and yet it is resistant enough to withstand both influences. Where does your puny ray and your infinitesimal explosive stand in relation to those forces?”
“There is always the possibility,” replied the Secretary with irritating sweetness, “that your calculations might be wrong.”
Dr. Scott pounded his fist upon the table. “They have never been wrong yet!” he exclaimed. The planes flew evenly and with great speed, though there was very little sound in the cabins. Only the distant humming, like the drone of bees in clover, indicated that the eight great motors were tearing at the air ahead. The planes took the direct path for Montevideo, steering by instrument. They passed west of Bermuda, and by daybreak were well over the water between Bermuda and Porto Rico. At mid-afternoon the coast of Venezuela came into view. Darkness found them beginning to cross the broad, tangled jungles of the Amazon valley, flying high and well, still in formation.
During the day Dr. Scott and King, with the aid of charts and small models, had explained to the technical experts the true import of the trip and what they might expect to see at its end. They were visibly excited and asked many questions which Dr. Scott answered without hesitation, dealing minutely and completely with both facts and calculations. He drew many analogies for them, and described his working model of the earth to illustrate his theories.
“You will be able to see the western end of the earth-tube to-morrow, I hope,” the scientist told them. “We must make our observations carefully and thoroughly. On what we see to-morrow and how we see it may depend the fate of half the world.”
There was little sleeping that night aboard the leading plane, though every man went to bed early in order to be bright and fresh in the morning. A lookout was posted in the pilot’s cabin to report when Montevideo had been sighted. All were to be aroused in time to be dressed and ready for the inspection of the uncharted island they expected to find after a short flight out in the ocean from that city.
As nervous as any was King Henderson, who walked the floor of his cabin until late in the night, unable to settle down to sleep.
Now was Dr. Scott, and incidentally himself, to be proved infinitely wise or very foolish. The future of two men and a woman, at least, hung on the morning’s discoveries, whether the safety of the world was at stake or not.
Shortly after midnight King walked across the hall and carefully opened the scientist’s door. Dr. Scott was fast asleep and not in the least concerned.
II
The call from the lookout came before dawn. Far ahead, through the rainy air, he had caught a glimpse of the huge aerial beacons which marked the landing field at Montevideo. The technicians and scientists were up and dressed before they swept over the town.
“There is no need to land,” said Secretary Angell. “We have all the news by radio.”
The news, so far as it related to the project which by now was of absorbing interest to those aboard the plane, was of little importance. A party of airplanes had gone out from Montevideo the day before and had sailed over the “island” for several hours, but had learned little that was not already known. A long causeway of new earth and stone was already reaching out from the island toward the mainland, and was being added to rapidly. The remainder of the island appeared to have ceased to grow.
What had puzzled the observers was the nature of the “volcanic manifestations” they had viewed. Unlike an ordinary volcano, they reported, this cone appeared to have a thick shield over its top, which was not smoke, but some hard substance. There was a hole exactly in the center, it appeared, and from it there rushed a tremendous volume of air which carried neither smoke nor cinders, but which was so strong that one unwary plane, crossing it, had been carried upward at a tremendous rate for some distance and then torn to pieces by the force of the blast.
“What,” asked the Secretary, “do you gather from that report?”
“Simply that the car was coming through the earth from the Japanese side, forcing ahead of it the column of air which had filled the tube,” the scientist replied. “If the unlucky airplane had chanced to cross the spot when the car was returning to its home on the other side of the world, it would have discovered a similar blast of air, but this time directed downward toward the earth, and the plane, instead of being blown upward, would have been drawn into the tunnel and carried downward until exploded by the heat.”
He made a quick calculation. “If I am right about the frequency and speed of these trips through the earth,” he continued, “we may be there in time to see a car arrive. If not, we will probably witness the phenomena accompanying its return to Japan. Either will be worth seeing. I’m sure of that.”
A small convoy of navy planes had been waiting for them at Montevideo. When the official caravan passed overhead the smaller planes swept up to join them and flew on all sides in the old-fashioned war formation, as if to protect the group from some imaginary enemy in the skies ahead. The sun was beginning to come up as they flew out across the sea, still steering by compass for the supposed location of the island. The dawn was cloudy; the presence of the rising sun was evidenced only by a blood-red splotch on the eastern horizon, well to the north.
The sea was covered by a low cloud of vapor, which rose at times in plumes and whirls as the wind whipped it. Several times some one set up a cry that the island had been sighted, but each time closer observation proved that the alarm had been raised falsely. The wind produced many curious figures in the cloudy surfaces below.
“I am surprised that there is so much moisture in the air here,” said Dr. Scott. “This dampness and vapor is not common here at this season, is it?”
The Secretary shook his head.
“The population has been complaining of unusual rainfall and cloudiness for several weeks,” he said quietly. “I can’t see, though, how it could possibly have any connection with the object of our visit, can you?”
“Perhaps,” said the professor, cautiously. “We may see more about that when we get there.”
A signal came down from the bridge. An observer there had sighted what was unmistakably the island this time. The technicians rushed to the windows of the main cabin to look out. Professor Scott and the Secretary mounted to the bridge, where powerful glasses had been installed to give a better view.
At first there was nothing to be seen but a huge mound of gleaming metal, bright and new in appearance despite the rain and vapor which wreathed about it. In the center of this massive dome there was a dark spot, evidently the opening observers had noticed the day before. It was more than five hundred feet across, and perfectly round. The whole structure must have been nearly three miles in diameter, cast all in one piece, without visible seams or rivet-heads.
Below and at the edges of the shield they could see, when the vapors passed momentarily aside in the little wind, the new earth of the island which had risen so mysteriously from the sea. It was already more than four miles across at its shortest dimension. The beginning of the causeway to the continent, now a stumpy ribbon of land stretching north and a little west, was plainly visible, and toward this lengthening pathway the horn at the edge of the shield, noticed by the captain of the San Barleyduc before his misfortune, was directed. As the fleet passed over it an explosion of great violence occurred, accompanied by puffs of steam which eddied up on every side.
The planes were unaffected by the blast, which was clearly not aimed at them. Almost simultaneously there was a terrific splash at the end of the causeway. New earth seemed miraculously to have grown there. Dr. Scott, who had been peering intently at the prong, where the major part of the explosion had occurred, cried out in excitement.
“Steam!” he declared. “I have it now. they are using steam to build their island! They hurl the rocks and earth with terrific force from that steam-gun there,” he explained, “and send tons of them through the air to any desired location.”
The Secretary looked at him incredulously.
“And there’s the answer to your weather problem,” the scientist continued. “They are using the heat of the earth to turn vast quantities of sea water into steam. The vapor naturally condenses after it has been released into the air and returns to the sea as rain and mist.”
“But they can’t possibly build that causeway all the way to land by such crude methods,” objected the Secretary. “It’s all of seventy-five miles from this spot to the nearest point on shore.”
The professor readily agreed. “It’s likely,” he said, “that they will soon build an extension of the shield over the causeway, covering it for protection. Then the soil will be passed along underneath, probably by some rapid mechanical means, until the causeway is completed. You will find, in a few days, that the pathway from the Eastern Hemisphere to South America has been completed and fully armored from the island to the shore.
“Then will begin the steady conquest of the continents, proceeding upon the slow treads of caterpillar tanks and movable metal fortresses.”
Secretary Angell turned away. “Oh, professor,” he replied, “don’t surrender the continents so easily!”
“But I am not surrendering them,” the scientist corrected. “I am only writing the history in advance for you. The onerous duty of surrendering, I’m afraid, will fall upon your portfolio!”
The five planes, with their convoy, sailed around the edges of the metal shield, observing what they could of conditions below them. Little was to be seen which had not already been described. Dr. Scott calculated that the metal covering was resting upon supports which perched it at least half, and perhaps three-quarters of a mile in the air. Beneath it there would be room to house an army of men, in addition to the necessary gear for “landing” the inter-hemispheric car and launching it upon the return journey.
“It is likely,” Dr. Scott observed, “that the Asians have more than one of these cars. From the frequency with which the trips are made, I believe they have at least three; one at either end being loaded while a third is in the tube. The regularity of the earth-tremors caused by these flying monsters makes it fairly evident that there are no long delays at either end, such as would certainly be occasioned if it were necessary to unload and reload the one car each time between journeys. But with a loaded car waiting at either end, the schedule of about two hours per trip could be kept up indefinitely and with express-like regularity.”
The fliers, remembering the fate of the plane which had flown into the air blast on the day before, stayed well away from the center of the shield. From the behavior of the clouds it was evident that there was a tremendous stream of air rising there again, and in addition there was a curious rumbling which could be heard even above the drone of the airplane motors and the whistle of wind. It had the full-throated sound of a noise issuing from an immensely deep well, but it was also an unmistakably metallic clatter. a series o-f long, sliding, ringing sounds.
Dr. Scott listened to them closely, trying to catch the timing and the rhythm as the noise rapidly increased. Touching the sleeve of the Secretary, he called his attention also to the thunder roaring upward from the earth beneath the dome.
“If you will listen,” he remarked, “you’ll hear the earth-car coming with its load. It can’t be far away. It may arrive at any minute now!”
The scientists and technicians were visibly excited at this announcement. The planes were slowed and ordered to circle as near the center of the mushroom as was safe. The power was partly shut down, so that the rumble, now increased to the thunder of a Niagara, could be heard plainly.
The wind whistled up from the opening at a fearful rate, and all around the edge of the metallic shield there were curious puffs and eddies of steam. So great was the tumult that the earth appeared to be trembling. The sea at the edges of the island was broken into a choppy, foaming mass, thundering against the rocks with peculiar fury.
Louder and louder came the noise, rising to an overwhelming crescendo. Suddenly a great jet of steam appeared in the middle of the island. There was a loud clang, like the sound of many metal partitions jangling against one another. A long, metallic nose appeared in the opening in the shield and rose upward for perhaps a hundred feet, its gleaming surface lustrous with heat and polished surfaces. The red eye of the sun, bursting for a moment from the fetters of clouds, flashed upon it once and became muffled again. The metal nose dropped back a little way, inclined to one side, and disappeared in a violent blast of steam, which seemed in an instant to overwhelm the whole island, blotting it from sight.
Dr. Scott, when he saw the menacing billow of vapor rising underneath, was suddenly electrified.
“Full power ahead, and climb, climb!” he screamed into the control room. The engineers had seen the danger also. The motors roared, and the propellers, hurled abruptly into top speed, tore at the air, pulling the huge plane after them.
The other official planes, when they saw the scalding steam, also started away to escape. The five machines, like startled birds, darted swiftly upward as the white demon engulfed the world beneath with a tremendous whistling noise.
But several of the lighter planes found themselves unable to get away. The rolling cloud caught and smothered them. The condensing vapor as it rose turned into jets of scalding rain, which stopped the tardy motors and cooked the luckless pilots in their seats.
King and the Secretary stared with horror at the phenomenon. Thousands of tons of water, converted into steam, had been thrown into the air at them. It was like a nightmare, the race for safety from the menacing cloud. Every ounce of power in the motors was thrown on. The sturdy frames of the planes groaned and shuddered, strained to the utmost.
At an altitude of three miles the cloud was still coming viciously upward toward them, but the alarmed pilots saw with relief that it was coming more slowly than at first and that they had gained enough distance to permit them to pull off sidewise and defeat the steam. The plane which carried the scientists zoomed eastward with a sudden turn. The white arms of the demon momentarily obscured the windows and the cabin. The occupants thought for a minute that the game was up, and then, abruptly, the blue sky appeared overhead. They were saved.
Underneath the still skyward-reaching cloud behind them there was a terrific downpour of warm rain, so heavy as almost to preclude flying into it. The few small planes which had managed to escape the scalding cloud circled away off and finally turned for home to report this new manifestation and to refuel. The five official ships, which were sturdy and fully equipped for many more hours of continuous flying, headed bravely into the downpour and circled back toward the island again. On the sea, when they came close, they perceived the wreckage of several unlucky planes, but there was no sign of life about any of them.
“I take it you are convinced now that we have a powerful and ingenious people to deal with,” said Dr. Scott to the Secretary, who was visibly shaken by the ordeal through which they had just passed.
“Yes,” was the reply, “but there are many things that want explaining, it seems to me. Why, for instance, all that outburst of steam? Did it mean that they were taking that unique means of destroying us?”
“Hardly,” replied the scientist. “I am quite sure, in fact, that they do not even know we are here, unless by accident they have sighted us. The steam came from the interior of the earth, following the car, whose nose we saw as they were landing her.
“Don’t you see. to overcome gravity, friction, and the pressure of the air, and also, no doubt, to hasten the passage of the car, they have turned their tube into a huge steam engine! They have heat enough. free heat. in the center of the earth. They have water enough, in the oceans. Consequently, after the car has gone a certain distance they perhaps seal the tube at some point and turn the water in. The resulting steam blows the car out the other end like a piston in a steam engine. It is only necessary to reverse the process to send the same car, or another, back again.”
“And the tremendous clattering we heard?”
“A projectile, traveling as fast as this one does, need only touch the side walls with the slightest whisk from time to time to produce what would seem like a constant noise like that, echoed up out of the depths of so long a well. The car is nearly the same diameter as the tube, but enough smaller, probably, so as not too greatly to increase the friction and air resistance. I have no doubt that it is equipped with rollers or other friction reducing bearings along the sides, in anticipation of just such striking in the tube.”
“But why need it touch the side walls at all?” asked the Secretary. “If these fellows are the perfect engineers you say, why couldn’t they launch it straight into the tunnel and let it pass through without striking?”
“That is simply explained,” replied Dr. Scott. “Such a car will, of necessity, touch upon one side or the other of the earth-tube throughout the journey, with the exception of a brief interval at the center. This is due to the rotation of the earth, which at the surface, at the equator, moves eastward at the rate of about one thousand miles an hour.
“This speed is correspondingly less toward the poles, which do not move at all, of course. Therefore it must be somewhat more than six hundred miles an hour at the mouth of the earth-tube. As the car approaches the center of the earth the influence of rotation becomes proportionally less, and the pressure against the side of the tube decreases with it.
“Crossing the center, the car encounters the earth moving in the opposite direction, and must adjust itself to this new condition, sliding against the wall of the tube under constantly increasing pressure until the mouth is reached.”
The planes were over the island again. The rain was still falling heavily, but the air was clearer because the clouds of vapor had largely blown away. They could see the general outlines of the entire island. It was evident that already another car had been launched downward through the tube. Above the center of the shield, where the jet of upward-rushing air had formerly been, there was now a tremendous sucking, and a funnel of cloud and water was being carried directly down into the hole from the heavy layers of mist above. It looked like a slender thread being pulled from a tangled skein and wound upon an unseen bobbin underneath the earth.
“When the projectile has reached a certain point,” Dr. Scott commented, “they will probably seal the tube and turn the water in. Until then, it might as well be filling up with air, which also expands rapidly under the action of heat.”
The Secretary smiled mysteriously.
“Well,” he said, “this is all very amusing, and I have no doubt your Asians are an ingenious race, but I don’t know any reason why we should permit this invasion’ to go any farther. In fact, I believe I’ll put an end to it right now.”
Dr. Scott glanced at him questioningly. King had a sudden premonition. But it was too late. The Secretary had given a signal, which was flashed to the other planes almost at the same instant.
“What are you doing?” demanded King. Dr. Angell, without answering, waved his hand toward the four other planes of the investigating party. They had drawn off a little and were circling low over the metal shield, near the edge.
Suddenly there was a series of terrific flashes, accompanied by a continuous roar that shook the air and caused the official plane to vibrate like a cork caught upon turbulent water. A tiny wisp of smoke cleared away from the gleaming surface beneath the circling fliers, but no change was visible there.
With great agitation the Secretary stared at the shield beneath the planes through his field glasses, turning them this way and that. The four bombers had dropped enough high explosives upon the shining dome to sink a fleet of battleships, but there was not even a mark or discoloration upon the metal where the bombs had struck.
“Well,” growled Dr. Scott with great exasperation, “I suppose it was your plan to have them bomb that shield.”
The Secretary answered in a shaky voice. For the first time he appeared to be realizing the seriousness of the invasion from the other side of the world.
“I ordered them to drop the explosive,” he admitted nervously, “but it is clear, the bombs did nothing.”
“Nothing to the shield, you mean,” corrected the scientist. “But they undoubtedly warned the Asians that we have spotted them and tried to blow them out. If you had not tried this foolish trick we might have worked out some wiser means of attack and caught them unaware.
“But from now on they’ll be prepared. You’ve declared war on them, and they’ll soon give you war a-plenty. You can count on that!”
III
The Asians made their first attack on Montevideo. In a perfectly matter-of-fact way they finished their causeway, as Dr. Scott had prophesied, by passing material along it, underneath an armored covering of metal which reached out into the ocean to the earth-tube cap and joined it. They extended it to the nearest point on the coast of Uruguay,6 and repelled every attempt to interrupt their work with such blasts of steam and rock that shipping in that region was almost paralyzed. Steamers plying between Buenos Aires, Montevideo, and other southern ports and the north were forced to make a wide circuit around the island, coming into the bay from the southward.
The War Department’s first move was to mount heavy coast defense artillery at the point where the causeway was expected to strike land, and to keep up a ceaseless bombardment. Their shots only added debris to the mountains of rock which the Asians, by their own devices, were hurling there. Whenever a shell struck the overhead covering of the finished causeway it bounded off like a pea or exploded harmlessly. The work of building the land connection was neither slowed nor deflected by the artillery. The Asians did not even do the War Department the honor to return the gunfire. The work of finishing the link between the island and the shore was carried on as impersonally as if, indeed, the entire phenomenon was of volcanic and natural origin, despite the evidences of guiding intelligence manifest in the nature of the construction.
Many newspapers, at first alarmed and impressed by the pronouncements of Dr. Scott and the corroborating evidence given by the Secretary, were misled by the attitude of the invaders and soon began to laugh at the whole affair. They published long interviews with established scientists, proving that no such thing as a tube through the earth was possible. Anthropologists declared that even if it were, the strange Asians who had conquered the East were incapable of such a feat of engineering.
“The most charitable estimate of these men places them somewhere between the African native and the early American Indian,” one was quoted as saying. “That they overwhelmed the Japanese and Chinese need hardly be taken into account. They did it by sheer force of numbers, not by intelligence or new mechanical appliances. Dr. Scott, it is to be feared, read too closely the more erratic newspaper accounts of the time. He allowed his scientific imagination to run away with him.”
The newspapers made fun of the Secretary of War also, and that was something the Secretary could not stand. Hardly more than a week after the exploring flight to South America he came to Dr. Scott’s laboratory and explained that he no longer cared to be quoted as certifying to the theory of the earth-tube.
“You saw it yourself,” exclaimed Dr. Scott, tartly.
“I thought I saw it,” was the reply, “but since I have had an opportunity to think it over, I have become convinced that what we saw was only some new and unusual volcanic disturbance. You will agree with me, I am sure, that neither of us or any one in the party saw any of the Asians you have referred to. If the island and the shield were the work of men, how does it come that we did not see a single man about the place?”
Dr. Scott expressed his impatience at this reasoning by ignoring the question, to ask a more pointed one.
“Then you intend to abandon your effort to find some way of combating these people?”
“Well,” answered the Secretary hesitantly, “I’ll leave the artillery there for a while.”
“But nothing else?”
“No.”
“Mr. Secretary, you have already delayed for three weeks on this matter though the proof was in your hands. Three weeks ago we might have found them unable to protect themselves. Now they are strongly entrenched. Give them another week and they will be in Montevideo. What will you say to that?”
“Nonsense,” said the Secretary. He took his hat and walked, unaccompanied, to the door.
“Two weeks from now the papers will be calling you worse things than they are to-day,” was the scientist’s parting shot, “and it will be for better reason, too.”
The prediction proved accurate. Amid a constant downpour of warmish rain the coast defense gunners peppered away at the approaching causeway, under orders to stop its advance at any cost. It was like trying to stop a railroad train with spitballs. One morning through the mist they saw that the head of the land-link was half a mile from the shore, and the commander of the artillery company radioed frantically to the South American capital at Rio de Janeiro for re-enforcements and infantry.
Two hours later, when the first of the heavily loaded infantry transports appeared overhead, they saw through the rain that the artillery camp, the guns and ammunition, and the men who had sent too late for aid had been covered with a mountainside of earth. The causeway was complete. Already the overhead protective structure had been brought within a few rods of the shore, and before the planes had landed and the soldiers had disembarked, the defenses of the Asians were complete.
The causeway was nearly a quarter of a mile in width at water level, and the enclosed and armored passageway along its top was more than adequate to cover the movements of armies, machines and whole races of peoples. A long metal box, it stretched from the mouth of the earth-tunnel to the mainland, protected above, below and on all sides by seamless and indestructible plates. While the army of the defense was being hastily formed on the shore, the Asians finished the last of the walls and threw up a sort of circular building at the end, made of the same metallic substance as that which formed the island shield and the walls of the causeway.
Not a single man in the land forces was able to see how the building and armoring of the last of the causeway was done. The defenders did, however, catch glimpses of many men, working in regimented groups, bringing the sections into place. Hastily planted artillery fired a few shots of shrapnel into the breach, and the workers fell on all sides as the shells burst. But fresh hundreds were hurried into their places. Without hesitation the sections were rolled into their places and sealed by men who were apparently slaves and more afraid of the long whips of their overseers than the death-dealing shot of the Americans. The Asians, conquerors of two great races, had, it was clear, learned to make those conquered races useful.
By the time the flame-throwers were ready, the guns all in place, and the infantrymen aligned ready for a rush upon the enemy, it was too late. Only a blank and rounded wall faced them on the shore, and shelling it was wasted effort. Batteries of red-ray guns were mounted on concrete bases around the fortress by nightfall, and all through the hours of the dark they poured their burning energy on the metal before them. The flickering surfaces merely mocked the rays which had previously destroyed battleships and burned stone buildings to the ground. By morning the defense troops were ready to admit that they had been balked. They sat down glumly around the armored garrison to await the next move.
It came suddenly, a little over twenty-four hours later, and strangely enough, caught the defenders completely off their guard.
After surveying the bare rounded wall before them for a night and a day, they lost their fear of it, and under permission from the commander, a stocky, blunt fellow with more courage than strategy, a small group went forward to make a closer inspection. They took hammers with them to see if they could break off a piece of the metal for examination in the government laboratories, and pounded away on the structure for several hours without result.
The hammers proving useless, they sent back to the base for an electric drill, and when it had been brought attempted to bore a hole in the fortress, setting up a great clatter and shouting among themselves, like boys on a picnic.
Without warning a window suddenly opened toward the top of the wall. The squad of mechanics and the handful of uniformed men who had accompanied them stared upward in amazement, for they had pounded that very spot not an hour earlier and had found it as solid and unyielding as the rest of the structure.
The little door slid open as easily as a pantry window, and out of it came a long, movable nozzle. It was then that hesitation proved fatal to the squad and its guard. Without further warning a jet of steamy vapor, hot and scalding, poured from the nozzle on the Americans. Shouting, they dropped their tools and began to run, but it was too late. Horrified observers farther away saw the hurrying figures go down one by one, writhing and screaming in pain and terror. A moment later large portions of the metal fortress, forming a complete row of square portholes near the top of the wall, had opened, and thin nozzles were searching the whole hillside with the scalding vapor.
The commander, who had witnessed the performance from his station half a mile away, clapped his aide on the shoulder.
“So they think they can drive us out with steam, do they?” he shouted. “They must think the whole army is as dumb as that squad of mechanics!”
Searching the terrain again with his glasses, he was about to order a round of shrapnel fired into the upper portion of the fortress when he saw something that amazed him. The rounded metal surface of the causeway head was moving. slowly turning, as if on a pivot. A rift appeared at one side, where the circular wall had turned past an overlapping plate to make a gateway, and behind the opening there appeared the vanguard of an army of metallic monsters, bearing a resemblance to old-fashioned military tanks, but much larger and showing at the front certain terrifying and mysterious features. When the deliberate gate had opened sufficiently, the first of them came out, lumbering across the broken ground at the head 01" the causeway with the hum of well-made machinery. Behind it came the others, spreading out fan-wise and falling automatically into a curious staggered war formation, like teeth in a gigantic harrow.
It was the beginning of the first Asian assault. The terrible armored tanks of the invaders were at last on the continent, the vanguard of that weird and bloody brood which later laid waste to cities and forests and blackened the meadows where cattle had once fed and tortured and captured the thousands of luckless men and women who were unable to get out of their way. As if with some realization, as they gazed at the ghoulish faces of these gleaming monsters, of the horror that was to come, the officers of the pitiful garrison which had been drawn up along the shore to defend the Americas stood spellbound. The artillerymen, acting upon impulse without the orders which their commanders had been too stupefied to give, opened up a wild and undirected fire at the foremost of the approaching tanks.
The shells crashed as they struck or went zooming off to burst in mid-air harmlessly over the armored causeway. Still the tanks came on, their high turrets glistening brightly in the sun, their broad cleated treads churning the muddy earth as they climbed steadily the rising ground toward the entrenched Americans.
The ray-guns, higher than the artillery, concentrated upon the foremost of the monsters, which flickered with heat and reflected light, but did not hesitate. Thirty of the metal fortresses had issued from the causeway before the sleevelike, rounded gate, working on smooth bearings in a groove at top and bottom, closed again. With the dull clash of the closing gate, the commander regained control of himself and ordered a full retreat. The Asian tanks, in full formation and moving at a moderate pace, plowed after the frenzied army as it crawled from its entrenched position to form hastily in line for marching.
Upon the top of each tank there were three guns mounted, operating independently upon a revolving turret. The central gun, higher and longer than the other two, was shaped not unlike the nozzle-end of a common garden hose. From this weapon only did the approaching monsters shoot as they bore down upon the now defenseless artillery. They jetted from the nozzles such tremendous clouds of the vapor which had overcome the mechanics at the wall that the hillside was all but obscured; they sent it searching after the scurrying figures of the retreat with a force that carried it nearly a quarter of a mile.
As the tanks approached the gun placements in their deliberate fashion, the ineffectual shell fire ceased. The guns were swallowed up by the clouds of bluish-white vapor. There was suddenly a clatter as the artillery was overthrown and demolished by the weight of the attackers, and the Pan-American troops, thrown into a panic, broke formation and ran for safety in all directions. It was then that the tanks, for the first time, bestirred themselves to great activity, themselves breaking formation to charge with great ferocity among the helpless fighting men. Man after man came into contact with puffs of the whirling vapor. Like insects caught suddenly in the mist of certain volatile oils, the victims seemed immediately to lose muscular control, to fall grotesquely, writhing and screaming. It was not as if they had been scalded by steam, but rather as if they had been entangled in the air, snarled in invisible bonds which held them all the tighter as they struggled to be free.
As abruptly as they had begun the attack, the tanks, as if in accordance with a prescribed plan, wheeled and gave up the chase. They turned, instead, toward Montevideo, and struck off across the country in a long curved line, back some distance from the shore, but following it. Villages, farmsteads, and trees crumpled like paper before them; they were turned aside by nothing.
Overhead a single military observation plane reported their progress. In five minutes the pilot had aroused the world with his vehement messages.
“Thirty Asian tanks now bearing down on Montevideo,” he radioed. “They are about five hundred feet long and more than a hundred broad.7 They have crushed our artillery and routed the small defense force sent to guard the head of the causeway. Shell fire and ray-guns useless. Send help for Montevideo and Buenos Aires!”
The messages were relayed from the South American capital to Washington, the capital of North America and the seat of the Pan-American Government. The Secretary of War received notification of the Asian advance. All available troops were placed on fast transports and sent to give aid to the doomed cities. Montevideo’s police force and local military guard were rapidly mustered, and civilians equipped themselves with a variety of weapons for the defense of their homes.
A fleet of airplanes was sent out to bomb the approaching enemy and to send full reports of the size and strength. The air over the crawling fortresses of the Asians was soon filled with hostile craft, which kept up a steady but useless shower of explosive. The Asians made no effort to reply, but like great, dignified dogs assailed by gnats, they continued their advance upon Montevideo without checking their movement or speeding it.
“The tanks appear to be exceedingly heavy,” was the report radioed by the observation planes. “They move in formation, rolling out a broad path, deeply scored in the ground.”
The defenders demanded more accurate information as to the size of the machines, with the idea of digging a trench large enough and deep enough to trap them. But when they had been apprised that such a trench would have to be at least a tenth of a mile wide, a hundred feet deep, and long enough to entirely surround the city on the land side, they abandoned the plan. A steel wall was suggested instead. something against which it was” hoped the monsters would butt their heads in vain. But it was found that so much steel was not available.
Gradually the fine spirit of the defenders melted away. As the planes reported the enemy drawing closer and closer, great numbers of people began to leave the city, by rail and on foot, running for safety to the hills. Toward evening whole sections of Montevideo had been deserted, and part of it was on fire. A troop of disheartened gunners first sighted the approaching tanks from a point outside the city and greeted them with a fusillade of shells which had no effect. The object of explosive attack from above and on the surface, the enemy monsters approached as through a haze. They loomed up at Montevideo suddenly, like casual and horrendous creatures of the ocean floor, weird and unreal. The useless guns of the defenders were rooted off their mountings after they had fired only three or four rounds of shots. One of the tanks turned aside abruptly from its course to sweep them away with a contemptuous gesture.
Before dark the whole city was in flames, and the last of the inhabitants who had not found safety outside the city was dead or a captive of the Asians. The tanks seemed to make it a game, to hunt the last of the frightened citizens down into the holes and crannies and by-paths of the ruined and burning city and to ensnarl them there in paralyzing vapor, to be taken prisoner afterward at the pleasure of the conquerors.
So brutal, so devoid of spectacle or strategy was the conquest of this first American city that fear smote the entire hemisphere. That Buenos Aires would be next was a foregone conclusion, though the defenders there counted on a brief respite because of the water which lay between them and Montevideo. Hastily they set to work blasting a broad and deep moat around the entire city to protect it, if possible, from the tanks until some better way of combat could be devised.
IV
Dr. Scott paced his laboratory. It was late at night,8 and the noises of the city were dim and far away. In a chair by the huge earth model sat King Henderson, gazing at the clay globe with concentration, making calculations from time to time on a pad which he held in his hand.
“At every hour the problem grows more acute,” muttered the old scientist. “Angell, by his colossal blundering, has now lost the world for us, I’m afraid. He mistakes deliberateness on the part of the Asians for inactivity, slowness for fear. They will conquer South America without a struggle if he doesn’t wake up soon.”
King nodded, turning the globe slowly with his hand.
“Perhaps we’ll be able to get some action out of him at the conference to-night,” he suggested.
“That’s it. but what can we advise him to do? The calculations by which I was able to forecast this invasion give us absolutely no suggestions as to a means of combating it. What can our troops do against the armor plate? It is necessary to face the situation. We are helpless!”
There was a ring at the door.
“There they are now, King,” said the scientist, recovering himself.
King arose and went to the door, which opened into the street from a hall communicating with the laboratory. Outside stood the Secretary, and with him was a short, important-appearing man, whom King recognized from his pictures. Preceded by two armed attendants in uniform and followed by another who continually glanced around as if suspicious of every one and everything, the two men stepped briskly into the laboratory. King closed the door. When he joined the group again, the Secretary was going through the formality of introductions.
“Mr. President,” he was saying, with a grand manner, “this is Dr. Scott, and this, King Henderson. Gentlemen. the President of the Pan-Americas!”
The President broke in upon these flourishes quickly, smiling appreciatively at Dr. Scott and King. “We have come for a council of war as we explained over the telephone,” he remarked. “To-night we must decide some course of defense.”
“We are honored by this visit from you,” said Dr. Scott with evident respect. “It is not often that the President of so powerful a state comes to the humble home of a scientist to speak of war and national defense.”
“Unusual situations, such as this one certainly is, must be met by unusual measures,” replied the President, smiling again. “Besides, Dr. Angell has told me many interesting things about you and Mr. Henderson here. It is a pleasure to meet you in your own home and to see the curious laboratory you have built here.”
Dr. Scott piloted the group to easy chairs before the open fire in the library. This room and the laboratory were both on the ground floor, communicating with each other through enormous folding doors. In these two rooms, the one fitted with the most modern apparatus for physical, chemical, and other research, the other equipped with those quiet luxuries for body and mind which make association with good books doubly pleasant, Dr. Scott spent most of his waking hours. The little world in which he lived was stamped indelibly with his personality. Secluded and peaceful, separated completely in many ways from contact with the outer world, it was nevertheless a place where the affairs of that world and the universe were most closely studied and analyzed.
The President glanced about him appreciatively, smiling particularly at Anna as she came in with coffee for every one, while Dr. Scott stirred up the fire. The War Secretary arose and bowed. He remained standing until the girl had gone out of the room again.
“You have a most charming daughter,” he commented to Dr. Scott.
It was King who turned the discussion to the problem of defense.
“Is there anything new in South America?” he asked.
The Secretary shook his head.
“Not a thing,” he replied. “The fact is, I believe we have them completely bluffed. They haven’t stirred out of Montevideo, and it’s ten days now since they took the town. Aside from the defenses they’ve thrown up there and along the coast at intervals clear to the head of the causeway, they appear to have been completely inactive. Why they haven’t, by some roundabout route, marched their tanks on Buenos Aires I have not been able to figure out, but it is probable that they have learned in some way of the deep moats we have built there and know that they cannot cross with their moving forts.”
Dr. Angell put his fingertips together in a large gesture of satisfaction.
“It seems like a return to ancient methods of warfare, in a way,” he continued, “but so far it has worked.”
Dr. Scott stirred angrily.
“It’s a return to ancient methods on your part,” he declared, “but what of their methods? A resourceful people will not be stopped long by your moats and your medieval fighting equipment!”
“They have been stopped for ten days by it.”
“Perhaps. and perhaps also they have merely been playing with you.”
“Well, there’ll be no playing when they do come. I have sent eighty thousand additional troops to guard the city and more than half the big flame-throwers in South America. They will find the city garrisoned and ready for their attack.
“And as for their weapons. !” the voice of the Secretary was contemptuous. “Their attack on Montevideo showed beyond a doubt that all they have is their armor and jets of steam. Steam is all they had to shoot us with. Steam!” Dr. Angell spat vigorously into the fire.
“In the attack upon Montevideo, at least,” put in Dr. Scott mildly, “their armor and their steam seemed sufficient. At least your defenders thought so.”
The Secretary retorted hotly. “You seem to think you have to take the part of these Asians,” he declared. “You discovered them; you have to stick up for them!”
“Gentlemen,” remarked the President quietly, “we all agree that the invasion is serious, and we have come here to-night to ask Dr. Scott if there is any way, in his opinion, by which these people may be driven back to the other side of the world, where they belong.”
He looked at the scientist inquiringly, with evident sincerity and respect. Dr. Scott was silent for a moment, going over the matter carefully in his mind.
“We will come directly to the point,” he replied at length. “I could delude you with certain vague promises, but I prefer to face the truth. I know of no way to make effective resistance against this invasion.”
The Secretary sat stiffly in his chair, making no comment. The President, however, leaned forward, speaking with great intensity.
“But have you no suggestions, no theories upon which we could work? Dr. Scott, we have tried to battle with these men in our own way with methods we have worked out for ordinary wars. and we have failed. The best military heads in the country have conferred on the matter and admit themselves unable to cope with the new foe. Do you realize that Mr. Henderson and yourself are, therefore, our only hope; that on you depends the safety of the Western Hemisphere, and it may be, that of the world itself?”
Dr. Scott nodded.
“Yes,” he said, “but knowledge of the need alone will never solve the problem. The whole crux of the matter lies in that metallic substance which these people make and use, which defies alike unlimited heat and explosive force. It appears to have many of the properties of steel, in that it can be used for engines and moving cars, and yet it has none of the weaknesses of the strongest metals we know.
“If we had any idea what that substance is and how it is made, we might be saved, for not only could we make similar armor for ourselves, but we could also learn some method of destroying theirs.”
“Without an actual sample to work on, is it possible to draw any conclusions about the nature of the substance?” asked the President.
Dr. Scott considered.
“I’ve been thinking about it quite a little,” he replied, “and it seems logical to conclude certain things. It is apparent, for instance, that the substance is not a chemical element, but a compound. If it were an element and existed in such quantities, it is unlikely that it would have remained so long undiscovered in the Western Hemisphere. Further, if it were an element, and as it appears, virtually heat-proof, how could the Asians melt it and work it up into armor? They can produce no greater heat than we can; at least that statement was certainly true before they had made their boring through the earth; yet they had this armor more than five years ago, and with it conquered all the East.
“Consequently, I am more than ever convinced that the material is first mixed in some plastic state, molded into the desired form, and then hardened by some chemical or electrical action which settles the matter for all time.”
“For all time? Then the armor, once made, is indestructible?”
“I have no way of knowing that. ,We have on record, I believe, no instance wnere any permanent fortifications, once put up, have been destroyed or removed by the Asians. Of course our whole knowledge of the matter is scant. It seems more than likely that they have long ago learned some way to disintegrate their metal, once it is no longer of use. Otherwise the stuff would accumulate all over the countryside, heaps of metallic rubbish, and soon drive them off the land by sheer accumulation.”
“Whatever this material is,” the President put in, “the ingredients must be cheap and common, else they would never have been able to make and use so much of it. The supply seems to be endless; therefore the basic material must be almost as common as stone and as widely scattered over the earth’s surface.”
The scientist nodded. “That seems logical,” he agreed.
“Then we must obtain a sample for your laboratory here and let you go to work on it,” said the President. “We’ll try to get you one as soon as possible, though you know, knocking off a chip of this mate rial is next to impossible, and we have as yet been unable to capture any of the machines entire.”
“And you probably never will,” said Dr. Scott. “I am not even sure that a sample of the stuff would do us any good. It may possibly resist every reagent in the laboratory and defy analysis. But I’d be glad to try.”
“I will offer a prize,” exclaimed the Secretary of War suddenly, arousing from his lethargy, “for the first specimen of this metal brought into camp. And the man who brings it in shall receive the Distinguished Service Medal!”
V
The newspapers next day carried the story of the fall of Buenos Aires and La Plata, while the people of both continents seethed with excitement and fear. The Times ran eight pages on the attack the following morning, with complete details, pictures received by radio, and an eye-witness story by its special correspondent.
“I have seen the destruction of Buenos Aires. I have stood upon solid ground and felt it rise and disappear beneath my feet. I have gone through livid hells of fire and steam, while tortured souls writhed in agony all about and a triumphant foe, safe in battlements of steel,9 crushed the defenses of two continents and moved hideously upon the helpless in a mighty holocaust,” began the somewhat perturbed special writer. “The last days of Buenos Aires were ghastly, unbelievable; but the nature of her destruction was Beyond human comprehension.
“The city had been quiet for days. Most of the population had gone back to its daily routine since the expected attack of the Asian tanks had failed to materialize.
“Already, under the direction of a corps of trained military engineers, Buenos Aires had been transformed into an island city. A moat had been blasted around it on all sides, joining at either end with the bay. The sides of the canal were steep, and the excavation had been carried to a depth of nearly 300 feet before the water was turned in.
“Assured by the army men that the tanks of the enemy could never cross this entrenchment and heartened by the presence of several hundred thousand troops, equipped with the latest fighting equipment, the city had settled down to its business again almost as if the invasion had never existed.
“There were, of course, many obstacles to normal trade. The moat forbade rail traffic, except across a light bridge, and most of the shipping of the city had to be carried on over the water. In addition, the place was more like a military garrison than a business capital. Soldiers were continually guarding the streets, and the control was more military than civil everywhere.
“Beyond the moat there was a continual clatter of engines, and the fleets of rapid whippet tanks, equipped with flame-throwers and ray-guns, drilled in the camp of the city’s defenders. Overhead droned the endless caravan of transport planes and military scouts, reporting that the burned city of Montevideo still contained the enemy and that they appeared quiet and unready to renew their attack upon the continent.
“This atmosphere of armed peacefulness continued until late yesterday when the scouts radioed that a fleet of enemy tanks, lumbering along the northern shore of the bay, appeared to be picking their way carefully inland to seek a crossing.
“Immediately “there was consternation in the city. Thousands who had earlier professed complete confidence in the defenses of the city began to be afraid. There was a small riot late in the afternoon on the water-front, where a crowd had gathered to leave the city, but it was quickly stopped by the military guards, and the would-be deserters were sent back to their homes.
“All trade was stopped as darkness fell. The population was warned not to try to leave the city upon pain of execution. Complete martial law was established. Lights were permitted in buildings only on the lower floors, behind drawn blinds. Though there was no sign of enemy aircraft, the aerial defenders swarmed over the housetops all night long, adding more than was necessary to the growing nervousness of the citizens.
“Reports intended to be quieting were given out from time to time by the military heads, who asserted that the enemy tanks had proceeded a great way up the river and had stopped there, apparently abandoning the threatened attack upon Buenos Aires. These reports were false,10 however, for at dawn a great clatter of gun-fire was heard west of the city, and daring persons who climbed to the tops of buildings against the orders of the military police saw that the tanks11 of the enemy were already actually at the attack.
“The attackers seemed to pause at the edge of the plain, as if to allow the Americans an opportunity to draw their demoralized troops into line. Staunch as a herd of elephants they stood there, while more than a thousand airplanes: bombers, transports, and small fighting machines, darted at them from fore and aft and above, dropping bombs and naming oil. Nineteen airplanes were wrecked in collisions during this extraordinary display, but their efforts against the enemy were-utterly wasted.
“Suddenly, as if by a signal, the advance began. Deployed in a wedge formation, the enemy tanks advanced slowly and directly toward the edge of the moat, harassed from above by the fighting planes, and from the sides and rear by the fleet of whippet tanks, which charged and charged like Pomeranians attacking a bevy of St. Bernards, and with less effect. The enemy failed to reply even with its steam jets, which had done such destruction in the attack upon Montevideo.
“One unlucky tank, sent by the inspired order of some officer, ran in front of the leading enemy machine and charged it head-on as if pitting its puny strength against that of the enemy. It crumpled and went down with a sickening crunch, and the huge advancing tank, deflected neither to the right nor left, passed over it without a tremble.
“The advance did not long continue, however. While the helpless infantry hastened to points of safety beyond the path of the invaders, the enemy tanks drew up at the lip of the moat in a long, threatening line. and stopped.
“There was a thin, half-hearted cheer from the civilians who had been watching the wasted energy of the whippets with great misgivings. Many shouted across the artificial canyon at the enemy, screaming obscenities and thumbing noses. The whippets renewed their attack from the rear, as if to push the enemy into the ditch where they had refused to go of their own accord.
“There was a sudden, ominous silence. A tall, white stream of smoke went up from the middle tank, and at its head was a rocket, which curved high and gracefully over the city and burst there, with a thunderous crash.
“In a moment the citizens were scurrying for their cellars, fearing a bombardment or poison gas. But the rocket, as it turned out, was harmless enough in itself. It was only a signal. The fragments burst into flames and disappeared long before they touched the ground.
“Perceiving this, the civilians again set up a great shouting and catcalling, hooting their derision across the canal at the passive tanks. It was, for many of them, the last sound they ever uttered, for at that moment the whole terrain rose violently into the air, accompanied by such a crash that trees were mown to the ground for miles away by the explosion. It was as if a great finger had punched through the earth from underneath and had thrown the buildings and the pavements into the sea and left nothing of the city in its place. Out of the crater that was left of the artificial island came screaming demons of escaping steam, tongues of fire, and armies of Asian men, in scarlet coats.
“Civilians who were lucky enough to be thrown into the water by the first explosion escaped the flames and the steam. Every one else in the city was either killed outright by the blast or scalded by the steam, which covered the place for more than an hour. Of the thousands who went into the water, many were drowned, but hundreds who kept their heads and could swim eventually escaped scalding and reached the shore of the mainland.
“Upon the instant of the explosion the enemy tanks, instead of continuing their advance, turned swiftly and charged the ranks of the astonished infantry. What followed was too gruesome and horrible to recount. About four hours later a few hundred persons, many of them badly burned and virtually in rags, reached a little outlying station on the Trans-Andean railroad and were taken aboard a train there for Valparaiso. Among them was your correspondent.
“How many other persons were safe it was impossible to tell. Advices and stories told by refugees indicate that a large part of the infantry escaped the first onslaught of the enemy by scattering and taking to their heels, but they have not yet reached a telegraph station from which they can report their safety.
“A military officer who was among the refugees declared that the commanding officers in the American camp had been warned of the Asian tunneling operations under the city several days before the attack. A civilian had insisted that he heard the drilling of the sappers underneath his house. Instead of placing any credence in his story, however, the officers had laughed at the poor fellow for his pains, and he had been locked up later as a dangerous radical.”12