The Magic Labyrinth (26 page)

“
Gascon
and enemy launch closed, sir,” the lookout said.

“I can see that, hear it, too,” Sam said, looking through his night glasses.

All motion of the
Gascon
had stopped completely except for its drift with the current. The other launch was slowing down. Now it had stopped.

“By Jesus!” Sam said. “He did it! Poor bastard!”

“Maybe he ain’t hurt,” Joe said. “He vould’ve been thtrapped in.”

The
Post No Bills
was closing in. It came within perhaps a hundred feet of its target. Then it swung sharply away. Several seconds later, the enemy boat rose in water and flames and came down in pieces.

“He torpedoed it!” Sam yelled with exultation. “Good old Anderson! He torpedoed it!”

Byron said coolly, “Good show, that.”

“NFH! Anderson! What are my orders?”

“Find out if Plunkett’s all right,” Sam said. “And if the
Gascon
is still serviceable. And pick up the men who jumped.”

“Sir, the
Rex
is an estimated fifty-two hundred feet away,” the lookout said.

“Okay, Admiral,” Sam said to Byron. “You take over the cannons.”

Byron said, “Yes, sir,” and he turned to the intercom. Sam heard him giving orders to the fore port-cannon lieutenant, but his eyes were on the launches. If the
Gascon
was operable, it could be used to harass the
Rex
with its small rockets. There wasn’t enough time to fit it with torpedoes.

Byron, standing by the intercom, was repeating the range as the gunnery lookout reported it.

“Forty-nine hundred. Forty-seven hundred. Forty-five hundred.”

“That’s going to be a hell of a shock to John,” Sam said to Joe Miller. “He doesn’t know we have cannons.”

“Fire!”

Sam counted the seconds. Then he swore. The first shell had missed.

The second struck, apparently just by the waterline near the fore. But the
Rex
continued steadily toward its enemy.

“Bring her around so we can give them a broadside from the port,” he told Detweiller.

Both cannons spoke now. Columns of smoke roiled out from the
Rex.
A large fire was burning on the flight deck. Still, the boat came on. And now it was close enough to launch its larger rockets.

“Enemy within twenty-six hundred feet,” the gunnery lookout said.

“Are the big birds ready?” Sam said to Byron.

“Yes, sir, all.”

“Tell the officers to fire as soon as the
Rex
does.”

Byron relayed the order. He had no sooner quit speaking than Sam saw a multitude of flames on the
Rex.
The coveys met about 450 feet away, headlong in the air. The explosions deafened Sam.

Joe Miller said, “Chethuth Chritht!”

Suddenly, shells struck the
Rex
. The starboard wheelhousing went up in flames, and smoke covered the pilothouse. Immediately following, gouts of flame arose along the starboard side. The shell had touched off a rocket battery, and the detonation of that had set off others in a series.

“Hot damn!” Sam said.

The smoke around the pilothouse cleared, though not so swiftly. The wind had died down, and the
Rex
had lost considerable speed.

“It’s turning its port side to us!” Sam said.

Another flight of missiles arose, this time from the opposite side. Again, the
Not For Hire
’s countermissiles struck, and the result was a blast in midair that shook the boat. But no damage was done.

By then Sam could see that the
Rex
was in serious trouble. Its decks on the starboard were blazing here and there, and it was turning away from them.

For a moment he thought that the
Rex
was fleeing. But no. It continued to turn. It was describing a small circle.

“The starboard wheel is malfunctioning or destroyed,” he said. “They can’t maneuver.”

That knowledge relaxed him somewhat. Now all he had to do was to get out of effective rocket range and blast the
Rex
out of the water with his 88-millimeter and compressed-air cannons.

He gave the orders to do so. Detweiller turned the boat to put the necessary distance between it and its victim.

“Well, we didn’t do so badly,” he said exultingly to Byron.

“Not so far, sir.”

“It’s practically over! Don’t you ever give way to human emotion, man?”

“Not on duty,” Byron said.

Joe Miller said, again, “Chethuth Chritht!”

“What’s the matter?” Sam said, grabbing Joe’s enormous arm.

The titanthrop, his eyes goggling, strangling noises coming from his open mouth, pointed up and out to the stern. Sam stepped in front of him to look, but he did not get there.

The explosion tore the bulletproof glass out of the frame of the rear window in a solid piece and slammed it against him.

The mouse had sprung the trap on the cat.

While the
Not For Hire
was still two days’ journey away, the crew of the
Rex
had removed from storage the envelope of a small airship made from the intestinal linings of dragonfish over two years ago. The hydrogen-generating equipment was set up on shore, and the envelope was inflated within the bamboo and pine hangar built two weeks ago.

The
Azazel,
as John had christened it, was a semirigid airship. The envelope depended upon the pressure of gas to fill it out, but a metal keel was attached to it. The control cabin and the two motor gondolas, salvaged from the wreck of Podebrad’s blimp, were fitted to the keel. The electrical and mechanical connections between control gondola and motor gondola and the elevators and rudder were attached. The fuel tanks were filled with methyl alcohol. The bomb and the torpedo were fitted to the release mechanisms halfway along the underpart of the ship.

The bombardier and the pilot got aboard the airship and took it up for a two-hour shakedown cruise. Everything worked well. And when the
Rex
left to do battle with the
Not For Hire,
the dirigible lifted to the desired height and began circling. Not until it became dark would it go through the high part of the strait.

As the
Rex
circled, imitating a crippled duck, the blimp was downRiver behind the enemy vessel. It had come over the strait and then had turned right, cruising alongside, but not too near to, the mountains. Its black color would keep it from being visually observed by the enemy. There was a chance that the enemy radar would detect it. It was John’s hope that it would be centered on the
Rex
. Clemens would think that the
Rex
had no more aircraft, so why make a radar sweep at a high altitude?

When the radar of the
Not For Hire
was destroyed, John was jubilant. Though his boat and crew had suffered terrible punishment, he danced with joy. Now the
Azazel
could creep up on the enemy, avoiding all but visual observation. And in this pale light, with the enemy’s eyes only for the
Rex,
the airship had a good chance to get within striking distance.

The plan had worked out. The airship had hugged the mountains to the north, coming down to an altitude below the tops of the highest hills at times. It had gone east for some distance, then had eased out over the treetops to The River. And it had sped full power then, the bottom of its control gondola only a foot or so above the surface.

All was going well, and now the
Azazel
was behind the
Not For Hire.
Its bulk was shielded by the enemy boat, undetectable by its mother vessel’s radar.

Burton, standing near John, heard him mutter, “By the Lord’s loins! Now we’ll see if the airship is swift enough to catch up with Sam’s boat! My engineers had better be right! It would be ironic if, after all this work and planning, it was too slow!”

Salvoes from the enemy struck the
Rex
along the starboard decks. Burton felt stunned as the roar deafened him, shook the deck beneath him, and blew in a starboard port. The others looked as shocked as he felt. Immediately afterwards, John was yelling at Strubewell to get the damage and casualty reports. At least, that is what his mouth must have been voicing. Strubewell understood. He spoke into the intercom, but it was difficult to hear him. Within a short time, he was able to get in some reports and to tell his captain. By then, Burton could hear well enough, though not as well as he would have liked to.

This had been the worst punishment suffered yet. There were huge holes in many places on all the decks. The explosions had not only punched these on the decks and in the hull, but corridors filled with people had been blown open. A number of rocket-launching mechanisms, loaded with missiles, had gone up, adding their explosions. Several steam machine-gun turrets were knocked off their foundations.

The starboard paddle box or wheelhousing had been almost blown off by two shells. But the paddle wheel was still operating at one-hundred-percent efficiency.

“Clemens must have seen those shells hit the paddle box,” John said. “He could be fooled into thinking that he’s crippled us. By Christ’s cup, we’ll make him think so!”

He gave the order to put the boat into a wide circle. The inner or starboard wheel was turned slowly while the outer or port wheel rotated under two-thirds power.

“He’ll come arunning like a dog panting to finish off a wounded deer!” John said. He rubbed his hands and chuckled.

“Ay, he’s bound toward us like a great beast out of Revelation!” John said. “But he doesn’t know that there’s an even more fearsome monster hot on his tail, about to vomit death and hellfire all over him! It’s the vengeance of God!”

Burton felt disgusted. Was John actually equating himself with his Creator? Had his brains become a trifle addled from the shock of shells and rockets? Or had he always secretly felt that he and God were co-partners?

“They’ll have to estimate distance with the eye, and in this light they won’t do well,” John said. “Their sonar isn’t going to do any range calculation, either!”

The enemy would be getting more than return pulses from the beam directed at the
Rex.
The sonar operators were going to be confused. They’d see pulses from four different targets on their screens. Three would be from tiny remotely controlled boats circling in the lake, each emitting sound pulses of the same frequency as those of the enemy transmitter. The little vessels also contained noise generators which simulated the pounding of giant paddle wheels against the water.

Burton could see the upper structures of the
Not For Hire
silhouetted against the blazing stars and the shimmering gas sheets on the eastern horizon.

And then he saw a dark semicircle, the upper part of the
Azazel,
against the celestial illumination just above the
Not For Hire.

“Fire your torpedo!” John said loudly. “Fire now, you fools!”

Peder Tordenskjöld, the chief gunnery officer, said, “Distances are deceiving now, sir. But the airship must’ve launched the torpedo already.”

All glanced at the panel chronometer. The torpedo, if it hit, should do so within thirty seconds. That is, it would if the dirigible were as close to the boat as it seemed to be. The
Azazel
would have dropped the missile while it was only a few feet above The River. Lightened by the release of the heavy missile, it would have risen swiftly. Its speed would be increased also by the loss of weight. So, if it were now over, or almost over, the enemy, the torpedo should be about to strike.

The
Not For Hire
should be taking evasive action by now. Though the airship may not have been seen by the eye, the torpedo would be detected by the sonars of the enemy. Its location and speed would be instantly known, its shape and size indicated. The enemy would know that a torpedo was speeding toward its stern, as John inelegantly put it, “driving right up Sam Clemens’ asshole.”

John stopped. His face was a study in fury. “By God’s teeth, how could it have missed at such close range?”

“It couldn’t have,” Strubewell said. “Maybe it malfunctioned. Didn’t go off.”

Whatever had happened, the enemy had escaped the torpedo. Behind it the semicircle of the
Azazel,
which had disappeared for a moment, rose again. The pilot and the bombardier would either have jumped out or be just about ready to jump. Their parachutes, equipped with a compressed-gas device, would unfold fully the moment they leaped clear of the gondola. Without that, they would not open before the two hit The River.

Burton estimated that the two men had to have left the semirigid by now. It would be set on automatic pilot now, and the clock in the release mechanism of the bomb would be ticking away. Another mechanism would be valving off hydrogen to lower the craft. When the bomb fell, the airship would be lightened and would rise. But not far. A few seconds afterwards, if the explosion did not ignite the gas, a fourth mechanism would detonate a smaller bomb.

Burton looked out of the port screen. The decks of the
Rex
were blazing in a dozen places from the shells and rockets. Firefighters, clad in insulation suits, were spraying the flames with water and foam. Within about two or three minutes, the fires would be extinguished.

Burton heard the captain say, “Hah!”

He turned. Everybody except the pilot was gazing out of the port screen. The sausage shape of the dirigible was directly above the
Not For Hire.
Its nose would soon touch the back of the pilothouse.

“Incredible!” Burton said.

“What?” the captain said.

“That no one on the boat has seen it yet.”

“God is with me,” John said. “Now, even if it is seen, it will be too late. It can’t be shot down without imperiling the boat.”

Tordenskjöld said, “Something happened to the torpedo release mechanism. It’s malfunctioning. But when the bomb goes off, it’ll set the torpedo off.”

John spoke to the pilot. “Get ready to bring her around. When I give the word, head directly for the enemy.”

The chief radio operator said, “The two launches are heading for us, sir.”

“Surely they can see the
Azazel
now!” John said. “No, they haven’t!”

“P’raps the
Not For Hire
’s radio is knocked out, too,” Burton said.

“Then He is indeed on our side!” John said.

Burton grimaced.

A lookout said, “Sir! The enemy launches are approaching on the port sternside.”

Radar reported that both launches were at a range of four hundred yards. They were separated from each other by one hundred and twenty feet.

“They’re planning to take us in our starboard side when we’re on the other side of our circle,” Strubewell said. “They think the motherboat should be firing on us by then.”

“I can see that,” John said somewhat testily. “You’d think by now that they’d be trying to signal the
Hire.
The radio must be out, too, but surely they could send up flares.”

“There goes one,” Strubewell said, pointing at the bright blue-white glare in the sky.

“Now they’ll see the
Azazel
!” John cried.

It was about thirty feet above the flight deck of the enemy or at least it seemed to be. It was difficult to estimate at that distance. It was not up to the pilothouse yet. That was apparent, since if it had been, it would have collided with the structure.

Something dark and small dropped through the area of bright sky between the airship and the
Not For Hire.

“There goes the bomb!” John cried.

Burton couldn’t be sure, but it seemed to him that the bomb had fallen on the stern of the flight deck, perhaps at its edge. The bombardier must have set its timed automatic-release mechanism, and then he and the pilot had jumped. But the timing had not been right. The release should have been activated when it was in the middle of the deck. Or, better, as close to the pilothouse as possible.

The explosion wreathed the flight deck in flames and silhouetted the pilothouse and the tiny figures in it.

The airship soared upwards, bending in the middle, its keel twisted by the blast. And its envelope burst into flames, the hydrogen in it one huge ball of fire.

“The torpedo!” John shouted. “The torpedo! Why didn’t it fall?”

Perhaps it had, and it couldn’t be seen from the
Rex.

But it should have been set off by now.

Now Burton could see the dirigible drift down, flaming. Its forward part fell upon the stern of the
Not For Hire
and then slid off into The River through the great hole made by the forty-pound bomb. The
Not For Hire
plowed on, leaving the blazing and spreading-out envelope behind it. The stern was aflame, too, the wooden flight deck burning furiously.

John yelled, “God tear those two to pieces in the deepest pits of Hell! They’re cowards! They should have waited a few seconds more!”

Burton thought that the pilot and the bombardier had been very brave indeed. They must have waited until what seemed to them to be the last possible second before being able to jump. Under such pressure, they couldn’t be blamed for having made such a slight miscalculation. Nor was it their fault that the torpedo had not exploded. They’d made several trial runs with a dummy torpedo, and the release mechanism had worked then. Mechanical devices frequently malfunctioned, and it was their bad luck, and the bad luck of their comrades, that it had failed now.

However, the torpedo might still go off. Unless it had slid off the stern with the wreck.

John was not so unhappy when he saw that the blast had ripped off all of the two lower decks of the pilothouse structure except for two vertical supporting metal beams and the elevator shaft. And these were bending forward slowly under the weight of the control room.

Somehow, a few people in the room had survived. They were silhouetted against the holocaust on the rear of the flight deck.

“God’s balls!” John said. “He has spared Clemens so that I may take him prisoner!”

He paused, then said, “They won’t be able to steer! We have them in our hands!”

He spoke to the pilot.

“Bring us up along the enemy’s port at pointblank range!”

The pilot looked wide-eyed at his captain, but he said, “Aye, aye, sir.”

John spoke to Strubewell and Tordenskjöld then, telling them to ready the crew for broadsides first and then for boarding.

Burton hoped that he would be ordered to join his marines. They had been sitting deep within the hurricane deck, behind locked doors, waiting. During the entire battle, they had not been informed of anything. All they knew was that the boat had rocked and shaken from time to time, and thunder had roared outside their room. Doubtless, they were all keyed up, nervous, sweating, wondering when they would see action.

The
Rex
plowed The River in a furrow angling in toward the stricken vessel. The gap between the two swiftly shortened.