CHAPTER IX--THE ESCAPADE OF ENRICO JAURES
"What are those blighters doing?" soliloquised Kenyon for the twentiethtime. "Are they buying the place, or are they poodle-faking? They oughtto have been back hours ago."
It was well after sunset. The "Golden Hind" had taken in stores andprovisions, and had replenished her fuel and oil tanks. An anchor watchhad been set, and having "gone the rounds" in order to satisfy himselfthat everything was in order Kenneth Kenyon had gone to his cabin towrite letters that would be sent ashore when the picket-boat brought offthe skipper and Bramsdean.
A shrill blast of the voice-tube whistle made Kenyon hasten across thelong narrow cabin. There was something insistent about the summons. Itwas not the discreet apologetic trill that the look-out man gave when hewished to report some trivial incident to the officer of the watch.
"Hello!" replied Kenyon.
"We're adrift, sir," announced the man, excitedly.
Telling the look-out to call the duty-watch, Kenyon replaced the whistlein the mouth of the voice-tube, struggled into his leather, fur-linedcoat, and hurried to the navigation-room. As he passed the variousmotor-rooms he noticed that the air-mechanics of the duty-watch werealready at their posts awaiting the order to get the engines running.
Throwing open one of the windows, Kenyon looked out into the night.There was no staggering, biting wind. Drifting with the breeze, theairship was apparently motionless save for a gently-undulating movement,but the merest glance served to corroborate the look-out man's words.Already the "Golden Hind," having risen to 6000 feet and still climbing,was well to the south'ard of Europa Point. He could see the lighthouseon the south-western point of the peninsula of Gibraltar steadilyreceding as the airship approached the African coast.
Kenyon was on the point of telegraphing for half-speed ahead when hebethought him of the cable. More than likely, he decided, the wire ropehad parted half-way between the nose of the fuselage and the buoy.There was danger in the comparatively light, springy wire getting foulof the for'ard propellers. Stranded wire is apt to play hanky-pankytricks.
"Get the cable inboard," he ordered. "Don't use the winch or you won'tget the wire to lie evenly on the reel. Haul it in by hand."
Two of the crew descended to the bow compartment, which, besides forminga living-room for the men, contained the cable winch.
"'Get it in by 'and,' 'e said," remarked one of the men to hiscompanion. "Blimey! There ain't 'arf a strain on the blessed thing.Bear a 'and, chum."
Presently one of the men returned to the navigation-room.
"Pardon, sir," he said, saluting, "but we can't haul the wire in. It'sfoul of something. Shall we bring it to the winch, sir?"
"Foul of something, eh?" echoed Kenyon. "Does that mean we've hiked upthe blessed mooring-buoy? Switch on the bow searchlight, Jackson."
The order was promptly obeyed, and the rays of the 10,000 candle-powerlamp were directed vertically downwards.
Leaning well out of the open window, Kenyon peered along the glisteninglength of tautened cable until parting from the converging rays of thesearchlight it vanished into space.
"Two degrees left," ordered Kenneth. "Good--at that. By Jove! What'sthat? A man!"
Filled with a haunting suspicion that the suspended body might be thatof his chum Peter, Kenyon felt his heart jump into his throat; but asecond glance, as the motionless figure slowly revolved at the end ofthe cable, relieved Kenneth's mind on that, score. Still, it was ahuman being in dire peril.
"Heave away handsomely," continued Kenyon. "Stand by to avast heaving,"he added.
The orders were communicated to the hands at the cable-winch. Steadilythe winch-motor clanked away until the word was passed to "'vastheaving." The luckless individual at the end of the wire was nowdangling thirty feet below the bows of the fuselage.
It would have been useless to have hauled him up to the hawse-pipe,because there would be no means of getting him on board. The onlypractical way to reach him was by lowering a rope from a trap-door onthe underside of the chassis midway between the two hawse-pipes in thebows.
Meanwhile Kenyon was deftly making "bowlines on the bight" at theextremities of two three-inch manilla ropes.
"Jackson," he said, addressing the leading hand of the duty-watch, "I'mgoing after that chap. Tell off a couple of men to attend to each ofthe ropes. If I make a mess of things and don't get back, keep the shiphead to wind till daylight, and then make for our former mooring.There'll be plenty of help available."
Adjusting one of the loops under his arms and another round his legsabove his knees, Kenneth slipped through the narrow trap-hatch, takingthe second rope with him. It was a weird sensation dangling in spacewith about 8000 feet of empty air between him and land or sea, for bythis time the "Golden Hind" was probably over the African coast. Butsoon the eerie feeling passed and Kenneth, courageous, cool-headed andaccustomed to dizzy heights, had no thought but for the work in hand.
"At that!" he shouted, when he found himself on the same level with theman he hoped to rescue. "Take a turn."
Ten feet from him was the unconscious Enrico Jaures. The question nowwas, how was that intervening space to be bridged?
Kenyon began to sway his legs after the manner of a child on a swing.
"If the rope parts, then it's a case of 'going west' with a vengeance,"he soliloquised grimly. "Christopher! Isn't it beastly cold?"
Momentarily the pendulum-like movement increased until Kenneth was ableto grip the arm of the unconscious man. As he did so Enrico's belt,that had hitherto prevented him from dropping into space, parted likepack-thread.
With a jerk that nearly wrenched the rescuer's arms from their sockets,the deadweight of the Scorp almost capsized Kenyon out of the bow-line.As it was, he was hanging with his head lower than his feet, holding onwith a grip of iron to Jaures' arms. Thus hampered, he realised that itwas manifestly impossible to make use of the second bow-line.
"Haul up!" he shouted breathlessly.
"Heavens!" he added. "Can I do it? Can I hold on long enough?"
It was a question that required some answering. The strain on hismuscles, coupled with the effect of the unexpected jerk, the numbingcold, and, lastly, his own position, as he hung practically headdownwards, all told against him. Even in those moments of peril hefound himself thinking he must present a ludicrous sight to the watchersin the airship in the dazzling glare of the searchlight.
"Stick it another half a minute, sir," shouted a voice. "I'll be withyou in a brace of shakes."
Of what happened during the next thirty long drawn out seconds Kenyonhad only a hazy recollection. He was conscious of someone bawling inhis ear, "Let go, sir; I've got him all right."
Kenneth obeyed mechanically. In any case he was on the point ofrelaxing his grip through sheer inability on the part of his muscles torespond to his will. The sudden release of the man he had rescuedresulted in Kenyon regaining a normal position, and dizzy and utterlyexhausted he was hauled into safety.
Someone gave him brandy. The strong spirit revived him considerably.
"Where's the fellow?" he asked.
"Safe, sir," replied Jackson. "Shall I carry on?"
"Yes, please," said Kenneth, faintly, and with the clang of thetelegraph indicator bells and the rhythmic purr of the motors borne tohis ears he became unconscious.
Meanwhile Enrico Jaures, to all outward appearances a corpse, had beenhauled on board. One of the crew, observing Kenneth's plight, haddescended by means of another rope, and had deftly hitched the end roundthe Scorp's body, climbing back hand over hand as unconcernedly as if hehad been walking upstairs in his cottage in far-off Aberdeen.
"Like handling frozen mutton," commented one of the crew as theyattended to the rescued Jaures. "Fine specimen, ain't he? An' what'she doing with that there marline-spike, I should like to know. 'Tain'tall jonnick, if you ask me."