Through Space to Mars by Roy Rockwood (great novels to read .TXT) 📕
One day, to their horror, an earthquake dosed the shaft by whichthey had come to the center of the earth. The boys were indespair of ever getting to the surface again, but the professorhad been prepared for this emergency, and he had built a strongcylinder, into which all the travelers placed themselves. Thenit was projected into a powerful upward shooting column of water,which Professor Henderson hoped would take them to the surface ofthe earth. Nor was he mistaken. They had a terrible journey,but came safely out of it.
They opened the cylinder, to find themselves floating on the sea,and they were rescued by a passing vessel. Of course, they hadabandoned the Mermaid, leaving the craft in the center of thee
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the secret of the power that he wants to keep.”
“I wonder what he wants to go to Mars for, anyhow?”
“Well, you know what he said. That he wants to get possession of
some wonderful substance. I guess it is the same stuff that
makes the planet seem red to us.”
“What’s he going to do with it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wonder what it is?”
“I don’t know that, either. Maybe it’s some sort of a mineral,
like radium.”
“Radium would be valuable, if he could get that. Maybe that’s what
he’s going after.”
“No, I think not. If it was, he wouldn’t be particular about not
telling us. We’ll just have to wait and see.”
The following two days were busy ones, as many little adjustments
had to be made to the machine. But at last Mr. Roumann announced
that all was completed.
“We will start day after to-morrow,” he said. “All the stores
are in the projectile, I have every thing arranged, and we will
begin our trip Mars.”
“Are we going to go up like a balloon, through the roof of the
shed?” asked Jack. “If we we’ll have to take the roof off.”
“No, we’ll start out through the great doors,” said the German.
“My plan is to elevate the nose or bow, of the projectile, point
it toward the sky, at a slight angle, by means of propping it up
on blocks. Then we will get in, seal all the openings, and I
will turn on the power, and off we go. We can shoot right through the
big doors at the end of the shed, and no one will know anything
about it, for we will leave the earth so fast that before any one
is aware of our plans we will be out of sight.”
“That is a good idea,” commented Mr. Henderson. “Have you boys
put everything in the projectile that you’ll need?”
“I guess so,” replied Jack, “though it’s hard to tell what you
really will need on another planet.”
“All I want is my gun and some ammunition,” declared Andy Sudds.
“I can get along with that.”
“How about you, Washington?” asked Jack.
“‘Well, I suah would laik t’ take mah fowls along.”
“I don’t see how you can do that very well, Wash,” objected Mr.
Henderson. “We would have to carry food for them, and our space
is very limited at best. I’m afraid you’ll have to get rid of
your chickens.”
“Couldn’t I take mah Shanghai rooster?” begged the colored man.
“He’s a fine bird, an’ maybe dem folks on Mars nebber seed a
real rooster. I suah does hate to leab him behind.”
“Oh, I guess you could take him,” agreed Mr. Roumann.
“I’ll gib him some ob my rations,” promised Washington. “He eats
jest laik white folks, dat Shanghai do. Golly! I’se glad I kin
take him. I’ll go out an’ make a cage.”
“What will you I do with the rest of your fowls, Wash?” asked
Mark.
“Oh, a feller named Jim Johnson’ll keep ‘em fer me till we gits
back. Jim’s a cousin ob mine.”
The next day was spent in jacking up the prow of the projectile
so that it pointed in a slanting direction toward the sky.
“Am yo’ aimin’ it right at Mars?” asked the colored man, pausing
in the work of making cage for his rooster.
“No; that isn’t necessary,” said Mr. Roumann. “Once it starts
upward, I can steer it in any direction I choose. I can send it
directly toward Mars.”
“Hit’s jest like a boat,” observed Washington.
“That’s it.”
“Well, to-morrow we start,” spoke Jack that night, as they were
gathered in the dining-room of the professor’s house after
supper, discussing the great trip.
“And to think that in ten days we’ll be on thirty-five millions
of miles away from the earth!” added Mark.
“It’s a mighty long way,” said Andy. “Mebby we’ll never git
back.”
“Oh, I guess we will,” declared Jack “We got back all right
from—”
His words were interrupted by a breaking of glass. One of the
windows crashed in, and something came through it into the room.
It fell upon the floor—a square, black object.
“Dat’s one ob dem bombs!” cried Washington. “Look out,
everybody! It’ll go off!”
There was a scramble to get out of the room, Washington falling
down on the threshold. Jack, who was in a corner, behind some
chairs, found his way blocked. This gave him a chance to take a
little longer look at the object that had been thrown through the
window.
“That’s not a bomb!” he cried. “It’s something wrapped in black
paper.”
The professor, Mark and Mr. Roumann stopped their hurried egress.
They came back and looked at the object. As Jack had said, it
was something tied up in black paper with pink string.
“It doesn’t look like a bomb,” observed Mark.
“More like a brick,” said Jack, and started toward it.
“Maybe it’s an infernal machine,” suggested Mark.
Jack hesitated a moment, listened to detect any possible ticking
of some hidden clock mechanism, and then, as no sound came from
the object, he picked it up. Rapidly tearing off the paper, he
disclosed a harmless, red brick.
“Some one wanted to scare us,” remarked Andy.
“There’s a paper wrapped around the brick—a white paper,” said
Professor Henderson.
“So there is,” spoke Jack as he removed it. “There’s writing on
it, too.”
He held it up to the light.
“It’s a message,” he went on, “and not a very pleasant one,
either.”
“Who’s it from?” asked Mr. Roumann.
“It’s signed ‘The Crazy Machinist’, Jack, and this is what it
says:”
“Beware, I am still after you! I will yet blow you sky-high!”
“He threw that in through the window!” cried Mark. “He must be
outside here. Let’s see if we can’t catch him.”
“That’s right,” added Jack. “Andy! Washington! Come on!”
The boys, followed by the hunter and the man, hurried from the
house.
OFF FOR MARS
It was dark outside, and coming from the lighted room, the
searchers at first could discern nothing. Then, as their eyes
became accustomed to the gloom, they could make out objects with
greater distinctness.
A movement in a tree, just outside the broken window, attracted
the attention of Andy.
“Here’s something!” he cried.
He raised his gun, which he had caught up as he rushed from the
house, and fired high enough in the air, so as not to hurt
whoever was in hiding. The flash of the weapon showed a man in
the act of sliding down the trunk.
“Catch him!” cried Jack.
They all made a rush for the tree, but the flash of Andy’s gun,
while it revealed the man to them, also had the effect of
momentarily blinding the men and boys. For an instant they could
see nothing, and when the effect of the flash passed away the man
was not in sight in the semi-gloom. They could hear him running
through the underbrush outside of the garden, however, and took
after him.
But the crazy machinist, if indeed it was he, got away, and after
a vain search through the garden and about the machine shed, they
all returned to the house, Mr. Roumann and the professor having
joined in the hunt.
“What do you suppose he did it for?” asked Mark, when they were
again gathered in the dining-room, examining the strange message.
“He wanted to scare us,” suggested Jack.
“No, I really think he means to do us an injury,” said Mr.
Roumann. “He has some fancied grievance against us, or he is
being used as a tool by Zeb Forker. Perhaps the man who stole
the plates was with him, and he hoped to get some more during the
confusion. I think we had better take a look at the machine
shop.”
They acted on this suggestion, but an examination there showed
that nothing had been disturbed. No one had been in the place.
“I’m going to sleep here tonight,” said German scientist. “I’m
not going to take chances at the last moment. I’ll stay here.”
“So will I,” decided Andy, and with his gun he mounted guard
outside, while Mr. Roumann made up a bed in the projectile. They
were not disturbed, however, any more that night.
“Now for Mars!” cried Jack, as the sun rose the next morning, and
he jumped out of bed. “Hurry up, Mark! One would think you
didn’t care about going!”
“Well, I guess I do, but I don’t see what good it does to get up
so early. We aren’t going to start until ten o’clock.”
“No; but I couldn’t sleep any longer,” declared Jack. “I’m going
out to take a look at the Annihilator.”
He quickly dressed, and was on his way down stairs when there
arose quite a commotion out of the garden. Washington’s voice was
heard crying:
“Come back heah, yo’ unregenerated specimen ob a ungrateful
bipedical ornithology! What fo’ yo’ want t’ distress mah
longanimity fo’? Come back heah!”
“What’s the matter, Wash?” asked Jack.
“Oh, dat Shanghai rooster got away jest as I were shuttin’ him up
in de cage, an’ I’se been runnin’ all ober de garden after him.
‘Pears laik he doan’t want t’ go t’ Mars.”
“Wait a minute and I’ll help you,” volunteered Jack. “Come on,
Mark,” he added. “Washington’s pet has got away.”
The two boys went below, and, with their aid, the colored man
succeeded in catching the rooster, which, crowing a loud protest,
was shut up in a wooden cage and taken to the shop, ready to be
placed in the projectile.
There was little to do at the last moment. Professor Henderson
had arranged for a relative to come and live in the house during
the time of the journey to Mars, and this gentleman arrived about
nine o’clock.
Meanwhile, the last of the stores and supplies had been put in
the Annihilator, a final inspection had been given the machinery,
and all the scientific instruments were in place.
Washington carried the cage containing his rooster into the
storeroom, where there was a large quantity of provisions,
sufficient to last for a year, in case, after reaching Mars, the
travelers should find on the planet no food which they could cat.
There was a plentiful supply of water, and machinery for
distilling more out of the atmosphere. The gas that occupied the
space between what might be termed the two skins of the
projectile had already been pumped in, and nothing remained to,
do but for the adventurers to enter the great airship, as it
might be designated, seal up the ports, turn on the power and
start.
Mr. Roumann looked critically to the bracing up of the
Annihilator, to see that it was slanted just right. Then he went
carefully over every inch of the great machine, to make sure that
there were no openings which were not closed. As he reached the
port that communicated with the storeroom, he found it only
partly shut.
“Did any one of you open this?” he asked suddenly.
“I didn’t,” replied Jack. “Why do you ask?”
“Because I was sure I closed and locked it from the inside early
this morning,” was the answer. “Washington, did you open it when
you put your rooster in there?”
“No, sah. I went in de inside way. I didn’t
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