Lost on the Moon, Roy Rockwood [best reads of all time .txt] 📗

CHAPTER XVII

TURNING TURTLE

 

Together Mark and Jack leaped for the engine room. Their faces showed

the fear they felt. Even before they reached it, they realized that, at

the awful speed at which they were travelling, and the fearful velocity

of the meteor, there might be a crash in mid-air which would destroy

the projectile and end their lives.

 

“I wonder if we can steer clear of it?” gasped Jack.

 

“If it’s possible the professor will do it,” responded his chum.

 

The next instant they were in the engine room, where Mr. Roumann was

bending over the Cardite motor.

 

“Shut off the power!” yelled Jack.

 

“We are going to hit a meteor!” gasped Mark.

 

The German looked up with a startled glance.

 

“Slow down?” he repeated. “It is impossible to slow down at once! We

are going ninety miles a second!” He pointed to the speed gauge.

 

“Then there’s going to be a fearful collision!” cried Jack, and he

blurted out the fact of the nearness of the heavenly wanderer.

 

“So!” exclaimed Professor Roumann. “Dot is bat! ferry bat!” and he

lapsed into the broken language that seldom marked his almost perfect

English. Then, murmuring something in his own tongue, he leaped away

from the motor, calling to the boys:

 

“Slow it down gradually! Keep pulling the speed lever toward you! I

will set in motion the repelling apparatus and go to help Professor

Henderson steer out of the way. It is our only chance!”

 

Mark and Jack took their places beside the Cardite motor, which was

still keeping up a fearful speed, though not so fast as at first. To

stop it suddenly would mean that the cessation of strain could not all

be diffused at once, and serious damage might result.

 

The only way was to come gradually down to the former speed, and, while

Mark kept his eyes on the indicator, Jack pulled the lever toward him,

notch by notch.

 

“She’s down to seventy-five miles a second,” whispered Mark. They were

as anxious now to reduce speed as they had been before to increase it.

 

Meanwhile Professor Roumann had set in motion a curious bit of

apparatus, designed to repel stray meteors or detached bits of comets.

As is well known, bodies floating in space, away from the attraction of

gravitation, attract or repel each other as does a magnet or an

electrically charged object.

 

Acting on this law of nature, Professor Roumann had, with the aid of

Mr. Henderson, constructed a machine which, when a negative current of

electricity was sent into it, would force away any object that was

approaching the Annihilator. In a few moments the boys at the

Cardite motor heard the hum, the throb and crackling that told them

that the repelling apparatus was at work.

 

But would it act in time? Or would the meteor prove too powerful for

it? And, if it did, would the two scientists be able to steer the

swiftly moving projectile out of the way of the big, black stone, as

the old hunter called it?

 

These were questions that showed on the faces of the two lads as they

bent over the motor.

 

“We’re only going fifty miles a second now,” whispered Jack.

 

Mark nodded his head. “Can’t you pull the lever over faster?” he asked.

 

“I don’t dare,” replied his chum. There was nothing to do but to wait

and gradually slow up the projectile as much as possible. The boys

could hear the professors in the pilothouse shifting gears, valves and

levers to change the course of the projectile. Andy Sudds and

Washington White, with fear on their faces, looked into the engine

room, waiting anxiously for the outcome.

 

“Hab—hab we hit it yet?” asked Washington, moving his hands nervously.

 

“I reckon not, or we’d know it,” said the hunter.

 

“No, not yet,” answered Jack, in a low voice. “How much are we making

now, Mark?”

 

“Only thirty a second.”

 

“Good! She’s coming down.”

 

Hardly had he spoken than there sounded a noise like thunder, or the

rushing of some mighty wind. The projectile, which was trembling

throughout her length from the force of the motor, shivered as though

she had plunged into the unknown depths of some mighty sea. The roaring

increased. Mark and Jack looked at each other. Washington White fell

upon his knees and began praying in a loud voice. Old Andy grasped his

gun, as though to say that, even though on the brink of eternity, he

was ready.

 

Then, with a scream as of some gigantic shell from a thousand-inch

rifle, something passed over the Annihilator; something that shook

the great projectile like a leaf in the wind. And then the scream died

away, and there was silence. For a moment no one spoke, and then Jack

whispered hoarsely:

 

“We’ve passed it.”

 

“Yes,” added Mark, “we’re safe now.”

 

“By golly! I knowed we would!” fairly yelled Washington, leaping to his

feet. “I knowed dat no old meteor could kerflumox us! Perfesser

Henderson he done jumped our boat ober it laik a hunter jumps his boss

ober a fence. Golly! I’se feelin’ better now!”

 

“How did you avoid it?” asked Mark of the professor.

 

“With the help of the repelling machine and by changing our course. But

we did it only just in time. It was an immense meteor, much larger than

at first appeared, and it was blazing hot. Had it struck us, there

would have been nothing left of us or the projectile either but star

dust. But we managed to pass beneath it, and now we are safe.”

 

They congratulated each other on their lucky escape, and then busied

themselves about various duties aboard the air-craft. The rest of the

day was spent in making minor adjustments to some of the machines,

oiling others, and in planning what they would do when they reached the

moon.

 

In this way three days and nights passed, mainly without incident. They

slept well on board the Annihilator, which was speeding so swiftly

through space—slept as comfortably as they had on earth. Each hour

brought them nearer the moon, and they figured on landing on the

surface of that wonderful and weird body in about three days more.

 

It was on the morning of the fourth day when, as Mark and Jack were

taking their shift in the engine room, that Jack happened to glance

from the side observation window, which was near the Cardite motor.

What he saw caused him to cry out in surprise.

 

“I say, Mark, look here! There’s the moon over there. We’re not heading

for it at all!”

 

“By Jove! You’re right!” agreed his chum. “We’re off our course!”

 

“We must tell Professor Henderson!” cried Jack. “I’ll do it. You stay

here and watch things.”

 

A few seconds later a very much alarmed youth was rapidly talking to

the two scientists, who were in the pilothouse.

 

“Some unknown force must have pulled us off our course,” Jack was

saying. “The moon is away off to one side of us.”

 

To his surprise, instead of being alarmed, Mr. Roumann only smiled.

 

“It’s true,” insisted Jack.

 

“Of course, it is,” agreed Mr. Henderson. “We can see it from here,

Jack,” and he pointed to the observation window, from which could be

noticed the moon floating in the sky at the same time the sun was

shining, a phenomenon which is often visible on the earth early in the

morning at certain of the moon’s phases.

 

“Will we ever get there?” asked Jack.

 

“Of course,” replied Mr. Roumann. “You must remember, Jack, that the

moon is moving at the same time we are. Had I headed the projectile for

Luna, and kept it on that course, she would, by the time we reached

her, been in another part of the firmament, and we would have overshot

our mark. So, instead, I aimed the Annihilator at a spot in the

heavens where I calculated the moon would be when we arrived there.

And, if I am not mistaken, we will reach there at the same time, and

drop gently down on Luna.”

 

“Oh, is that it?” asked the lad, much relieved.

 

“That’s it,” replied Mr. Henderson. “And that’s why we seem to be

headed away from the moon. Her motion will bring her into the right

position for us to land on when the time comes.”

 

“Then I’d better go tell Mark,” said the lad. “He’s quite worried.” He

soon explained matters to his chum, and together they discussed the

many things necessary to keep in mind when one navigates the heavens.

 

That day saw several thousand more miles reeled off on the journey to

the moon, and that evening (or rather what corresponded to evening, for

it was perpetual daylight) they began to make their preparations for

landing. Their wonderful journey through space was nearing an end.

 

“I guess that crazy Axtell fellow was only joking when he said we’d

never reach the moon,” ventured Jack. “Nothing has happened yet.”

 

“Only the meteor,” said Mark, “and he couldn’t know about that. I guess

he didn’t get a chance to damage any of the machinery.”

 

“No, we seem to be making good time,” went on his chum. “I think I’ll

go and–-”

 

Jack did not finish his sentence. Instead he stared at one of the

instruments hanging from the walls of the engine room. It was a sort of

barometer to tell their distance from the earth, and it swung to and

fro like a pendulum. Now the instrument was swinging out away from the

wall to which it was attached. Further and further over it inclined.

Jack felt a curious sensation. Mark put his hand to his head.

 

“I feel—feel dizzy!” he exclaimed. “What is the matter?”

 

“Something has happened,” cried Jack.

 

The instrument swung over still more. Some tools fell from a work

bench, and landed on the steel floor with a crash. The boys were

staggering about the engine room, unable to maintain their balance.

 

There came cries of fear from the galley, where Washington White was

rattling away amid his pots and pans. Andy Sudds was calling to some

one, and from the pilothouse came the excited exclamations of

Professors Henderson and Roumann.

 

“We’re turning turtle!” suddenly yelled Jack. “The projectile is

turning over in the air! Something has gone wrong! Perhaps this is the

revenge of that crazy man!” and, as he spoke, he fell over backward,

Mark following him, while the Annihilator was turned completely over

and seemed to be falling down into unfathomable depths.