第11章 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE(11)

The effect of the motor-bomb was fully observed with glasses from the various fortifications of the port, and from many points of the city and harbour; and those familiar with the effects of explosives were not long in making up their minds what had happened.They felt sure that a mine hadbeen sprung beneath Fort Pilcher; and they were now equally confident that in the morning a torpedo of novel and terrible power had been exploded in the harbour.They now disbelieved in the earthquake, and treated with contempt the pretence that shots had been fired from the Syndicate's vessel.This was merely a trick of the enemy.It was not even likely that the mine or the torpedo had been operated from the ship.These were, in all probability, under the control of confederates on shore, and had been exploded at times agreed upon beforehand.All this was perfectly plain to the military authorities.But the people of the city derived no comfort from the announcement of these conclusions.For all that anybody knew the whole city might be undermined, and at any moment might ascend in a cloud of minute particles.They felt that they were in a region of hidden traitors and bombs, and in consequence of this belief thousands of citizens left their homes.That afternoon a truce-boat again went out from Repeller No.1, and rowed to the fort, where a letter to the commandant was delivered.This, like the other, demanded no answer, and the boat returned.Later in the afternoon the two repellers, accompanied by the crabs, and leaving the steel net still anchored in its place, retired a few miles seaward, where they prepared to lay to for the night.The letter brought by the truce-boat was read by the commandant, surrounded by his officers.It stated that in twenty-four hours from time of writing it, which would be at or about four o'clock on the next afternoon, a bomb would be thrown into the garrisoned fort, under the command of the officer addressed.As this would result in the entire destruction of the fortification, the commandant was earnestly counselled to evacuate the fort before the hour specified.Ordinarily the commandant of the fort was of a calm and unexcitable temperament.During the astounding events of that day and the day before he had kept his head cool; his judgment, if not correct, was the result of sober and earnest consideration.But now he lost his temper.The unparalleled effrontery and impertinence of this demand of the American Syndicate was too much for his self-possession.He stormed in anger.Here was the culmination of the knavish trickery of these conscienceless pirates who had attacked the port.A torpedo had been exploded in the harbour, an unfinished fort had been mined and blown up,and all this had been done to frighten him--a British soldier-- in command of a strong fort well garrisoned and fully supplied with all the munitions of war.In the fear that his fort would be destroyed by a mystical bomb, he was expected to march to a place of safety with all his forces.If this should be done it would not be long before these crafty fellows would occupy the fort, and with its great guns turned inland, would hold the city at their mercy.There could be no greater insult to a soldier than to suppose that he could be gulled by a trick like this.No thought of actual danger entered the mind of the commandant.It had been easy enough to sink a great torpedo in the harbour, and the unguarded bluffs of Fort Pilcher offered every opportunity to the scoundrels who may have worked at their mines through the nights of several months.But a mine under the fort which he commanded was an impossibility; its guarded outposts prevented any such method of attack.At a bomb, or a dozen, or a hundred of the Syndicate's bombs he snapped his fingers.He could throw bombs as well.Nothing would please him better than that those ark-like ships in the offing should come near enough for an artillery fight.A few tons of solid shot and shell dropped on top of them might be a very conclusive answer to their impudent demands.The letter from the Syndicate, together with his own convictions on the subject, were communicated by the commandant to the military authorities of the port, and to the War Office of the Dominion.The news of what had happened that day had already been cabled across the Atlantic back to the United States, and all over the world; and the profound impression created by it was intensified when it became known what the Syndicate proposed to do the next day.Orders and advices from the British Admiralty and War Office sped across the ocean, and that night few of the leaders in government circles in England or Canada closed their eyes.The opinions of the commandant of the fort were received with but little favour by the military and naval authorities.Great preparations were already ordered to repel and crush this most audacious attack upon the port, but in the mean time it was highly desirable that the utmost caution and prudence should be observed.Three men-of-war had already been disabled by the novel and destructive machines of the enemy, and it had been ordered that for the present nomore vessels of the British navy be allowed to approach the crabs of the Syndicate.Whether it was a mine or a bomb which had been used in the destruction of the unfinished works of Fort Pilcher, it would be impossible to determine until an official survey had been made of the ruins; but, in any event, it would be wise and humane not to expose the garrison of the fort on the south side of the harbour to the danger which had overtaken the works on the opposite shore.If, contrary to the opinion of the commandant, the garrisoned fort were really mined, the following day would probably prove the fact.Until this point should be determined it would be highly judicious to temporarily evacuate the fort.This could not be followed by occupation of the works by the enemy, for all approaches, either by troops in boats or by bodies of confederates by land, could be fully covered by the inland redoubts and fortifications.When the orders for evacuation reached the commandant of the fort, he protested hotly, and urged that his protest be considered.It was not until the command had been reiterated both from London and Ottawa, that he accepted the situation, and with bowed head prepared to leave his post.All night preparations for evacuation went on, and during the next morning the garrison left the fort, and established itself far enough away to preclude danger from the explosion of a mine, but near enough to be available in case of necessity.During this morning there arrived in the offing another Syndicate vessel.This had started from a northern part of the United States, before the repellers and the crabs, and it had been engaged in laying a private submarine cable, which should put the office of the Syndicate in New York in direct communication with its naval forces engaged with the enemy.Telegraphic connection between the cable boat and Repeller No.1 having been established, the Syndicate soon received from its Director-in- chief full and comprehensive accounts of what had been done and what it was proposed to do.Great was the satisfaction among the members of the Syndicate when these direct and official reports came in.Up to this time they had been obliged to depend upon very unsatisfactory intelligence communicated from Europe, which had been supplemented by wild statements and rumours smuggled across the Canadian border.To counteract the effect of these, a full report was immediately made by theSyndicate to the Government of the United States, and a bulletin distinctly describing what had happened was issued to the people of the country.These reports, which received a world- wide circulation in the newspapers, created a popular elation in the United States, and gave rise to serious apprehensions and concern in many other countries.But under both elation and concern there was a certain doubtfulness.So far the Syndicate had been successful; but its style of warfare was decidedly experimental, and its forces, in numerical strength at least, were weak.What would happen when the great naval power of Great Britain should be brought to bear upon the Syndicate, was a question whose probable answer was likely to cause apprehension and concern in the United States, and elation in many other countries.The commencement of active hostilities had been precipitated by this Syndicate.In England preparations were making by day an by night to send upon the coast-lines of the United States a fleet which, in numbers and power, would be greater than that of any naval expedition in the history of the world.It is no wonder that many people of sober judgment in America looked upon the affair of the crabs and the repellers as but an incident in the beginning of a great and disastrous war.On the morning of the destruction of Fort Pilcher, the Syndicate's vessels moved toward the port, and the steel net was taken up by the two crabs, and moved nearer the mouth of the harbour, at a point from which the fort, now in process of evacuation, was in full view.When this had been done, Repeller No.2 took up her position at a moderate distance behind the net, and the other vessels stationed themselves near by.The protection of the net was considered necessary, for although there could be no reasonable doubt that all the torpedoes in the harbour and river had been exploded, others might be sent out against the Syndicate's vessels; and a torpedo under a crab or a repeller was the enemy most feared by the Syndicate.About three o'clock the signals between the repellers became very frequent, and soon afterwards a truce-boat went out from Repeller No.1.This was rowed with great rapidity, but it was obliged to go much farther up the harbour than on previous occasions, in order to deliver its message to an officer of the garrison.This was to the effect that the evacuation of the fort had been observed from the Syndicate's vessels, and although ithad been apparently complete, one of the scientific corps, with a powerful glass, had discovered a man in one of the outer redoubts, whose presence there was probably unknown to the officers of the garrison.It was, therefore, earnestly urged that this man be instantly removed; and in order that this might be done, the discharge of the motor-bomb would be postponed half an hour.The officer received this message, and was disposed to look upon it as a new trick; but as no time was to be lost, he sent a corporal's guard to the fort, and there discovered an Irish sergeant by the name of Kilsey, who had sworn an oath that if every other man in the fort ran away like a lot of addle-pated sheep, he would not run with them; he would stand to his post to the last, and when the couple of ships outside had got through bombarding the stout walls of the fort, the world would see that there was at least one British soldier who was not afraid of a bomb, be it little or big.Therefore he had managed to elude observation, and to remain behind.