Part 20 (1/2)

From the funnels of the battles.h.i.+p belched clouds of black smoke.

CHAPTER XVIII-BIG GUNS BOOM

”What's the idea of taking after that craft, I wonder?” remarked Ned, when it became certain that the chase was on.

”Give it up,” answered Frank, ”unless the old man wants to throw a scare into those revolutionists.”

”I guess that's it,” chuckled Tom Dawson. ”We'll take their navy away from 'em, and then they can't do anything.”

”They couldn't do anything anyhow, with that d.i.n.ky little craft against the _Georgetown_,” boasted Hank Dell.

”Don't you fool yourself, son, and let that idea get away with you,”

came from an older blue-jacket. ”A little craft like that may have a torpedo tube or two concealed about her, and if she lets a Whitehead go at us, and it hits--good-night! as the boys say.”

The others knew that he spoke the truth. A single torpedo, with its 200-pound explosive charge of the terrible gun cotton, can render helpless the greatest battles.h.i.+p in the world if the hole is blown in the right place below the waterline. And this indisputable fact has caused many nations, our own included, to doubt the wisdom of building so many big, heavily-armored and expensive s.h.i.+ps. Many well-informed persons favor the development of a navy of submarines, which are becoming more and more efficient each year. They cost only a fraction as much as a battles.h.i.+p or cruiser, and can successfully cope with the larger craft.

”I wonder what a wars.h.i.+p of the Uridian revolutionists is doing out here, anyhow?” went on Ned, as he and his friends watched the other craft which was endeavoring to escape.

”Probably scouting along the coast to see if it can capture anything,”

suggested Frank. ”The treasury of the revolutionists may be at low ebb, and they may hope to replenish it.”

”That's what they've been doing, with your money and mine and Uncle Phil's,” remarked his brother in a low voice. ”I wish the _Georgetown_ would help to get some of it back for us.”

”Maybe she will,” Frank murmured. They had followed their plan of not telling their s.h.i.+pmates the peculiar situation which had led them to enlist.

Everyone who could get a vantage point, and was not obliged to be at other duties, was watching the chase. The battles.h.i.+p was running under forced draft, and Ned and Frank were very thankful that they were not coal-pa.s.sers, or firemen. For the temperature in the stokehole of a battles.h.i.+p, when forced draft is being used, is about the highest in the world.

Still everything possible is done to make the men comfortable, and they only work in short s.h.i.+fts, changing frequently, and receive the best of medical treatment and advice if they are temporarily overcome, as often happens. But word had gone into the engine room that the _Georgetown_ was really making her first race after what might be considered a hostile craft, and the coal-pa.s.sers and firemen stuck to their tasks with great grit, determined to make their craft do her best.

So through the sea plowed the great battles.h.i.+p, an immense wave piling up on either bow as she pushed her way along driven by the powerful engines deep in her interior.

”We don't seem to be catching up very fast,” observed Frank.

”No, that little craft is showing a clean pair of heels,” agreed Ned.

”We aren't built for speed, anyhow.”

This was true enough, though for her size the _Georgetown_ was one of the fastest battles.h.i.+ps afloat. Still a smaller boat which did not meet with so much resistance going through the water, could get away with comparative ease. And it looked as if this was what was going to happen.

”Why don't we fire a shot at her?” murmured Tom Dawson.

”We can't very well put one across her bows when we're dead astern,”

commented Ned. ”And if we fire any other way we're likely to hit her.”

”Which I suppose we haven't a right to do,” observed Frank. ”We aren't at war with Uridio. It's only that we aren't going to let her revolutionists do things to our citizens.”

But it was evident that something was going to be done, for there sounded, a little later, the order for clearing the s.h.i.+p for action.