There was a good three-quarters of an hour to spare, and the Royal Hotel was not four minutes away. After the recent excitements a cup of tea with Connie seemed just the thing. As I legged it over the Hoe, I realized that I might be very busy for some time, and, in consequence, late for dinner. I must tell my girl that something of great importance had happened, though, in any case, I was determined to see her off, come what might.
Then I remembered something. As Chief Commissioner I had absolute control over the airports of England in a time of crisis. In any case, it would be as well to, close the sea-drome in preparation for the May Flower's arrival. I should then be certain that no one could possibly get at Captain Pring before I could. And if I chose to detain even the Royal Mail for half an hour later on in the evening – under the circumstances! – no one would say me nay.
There is a telephone box in the hall of the Royal Hotel. In thirty seconds my orders were given, and not a living soul would enter or leave Plymouth sea-drome without my permission. Then I strolled into the winter gardens, where I found Connie sitting at a little table among tubs of azaleas and listening to the strains of a ladies' orchestra.
"I've half an hour and ten minutes exactly, darling," I said, putting my watch on the table and helping her to early strawberries. "Tell me when the time's up, and then I must rush away for an hour before we dine."
Straightway I forgot all about the Albatros, Captain Pring, and the mysterious armed ship in mid-Atlantic.
Knowing what I know now, I wonder how I could have taken it so lightly, even then. But grave and serious as the affair was, amazing, too, in its boldness, an elaborate and unexpected masterpiece of crime, it seemed remote and very far away, like something one reads of in a foreign newspaper, never conceiving that it can have anything to do with one's own personal life.
If only I could have peeped but a little way into the future!
CHAPTER III "COLD-BLOODED PIRACY IN THE HIGH AIR"
Pilot-commander Pring was a tall, lean, lantern-jawed officer, who, though of English nationality, had spent most of his life in America. His face was still pale and grim with passion and mortification as I closed the door of my private room at the A.P. Station on him, Mr. Van Adams, the multi-millionaire, and Mr. Rickaby, second officer of the Albatros.
"Now, gentlemen, sit down, please," I said. "And I will ask Captain Pring a few questions. Sir Joshua Johnson has given me the main facts, but I want details. I won't detain you long, but I felt I ought to see you before anyone else."
"Oh, quite!" said Mr. Van Adams, a fleshy man, with a watchful eye and a jaw like a pike.
"This is an extraordinary affair, Captain Pring," I went on. "But, thank goodness, you haven't lost your ship, or any lives. I know what you feel about the Albatros."
"She is father, mother, brother, sister, hired girl and dog under the waggon to me!" said Pring, and then he blazed up into fury. I disentangle the few words I can. The majority were too overdressed for respectable society.
"… His Majesty's Mails! First time in history of flying, and it's happened to ME! Cold-blooded piracy in the High Air! They'd have blown us to pieces as soon as look at us! When I get hold of that slime-lapping leper, the pirate skipper, I won't leave him hide or hair to cover the wart he calls his heart! …" and so on, for a good two minutes by the office chronometer.
I let him rip. It was the quickest way. It's dangerous to throttle down a man like Pring.
"The Captain is, naturally, furious," I said.
"Oh, quite!" answered Mr. Van Adams.
Then we got to business. "The strange airship, Captain Pring. Let's begin with that. She approached you flying West, I understand?"
"She did, Sir John. Does that put you wise to anything?"
"It would appear that she was coming from Europe. But that was probably a trick. She might have been waiting about for hours."
"Curious thing, then, that all the ships in the air during the last thirty hours that were within fifteen hundred miles of the American and Canadian coast never saw anything of her. The Air Police of the U.S.A. have questioned every registered boat, Transatlantic and coastal trade, and not one of them sighted her. And, as you know, Sir John, from Cape Race to Charleston in summer weather the air's as thick with craft as gnats over a pond. Ain't that so, Mr. Van Adams, sir?"
"Quite, Captain Pring."
"I see your inference. Well, we'll leave that for a moment. I understand that there were some peculiar features about this ship. What were they?"
"She's the fastest thing in the air, bar none. That I can swear to. A pilot of my experience can't well be deceived, and if that ship – she's one of the very few I've seen with four propellers – can't do two hundred and forty miles an hour, without a following wind, mind, then I'm a paretic!"
I whistled. Such speeds had been dreamed of but never known. "Nearly three times hurricane velocity!" I said.
"She'd race the dawn, Sir John! and that's my honest belief. There's never been such a flying boat before. And she don't carry a crew of more than twelve or fifteen men, in my opinion. The rest's all engines and petrol. She ain't more than twice the size of one of your patrol ships, all over."
This was talking! Each moment the affair grew more tense and interesting.
"That narrows our field of search no end," I remarked. "A boat like that can't be built anywhere in the world without leaving traces."
"It colours the cat different, sure," said Captain Pring. "Now, here's another point. Gum! I'm going to startle you some more, Sir John, but, as God sees me, I'm speaking truth. Here's Mr. Rickaby here as'll swear to all I say…"
He looked at the second officer, a good-looking, brown-faced lad. "It's all gospel, Sir John," he broke in.
"Of course," I said impatiently, "I know you couldn't be mistaken, Pring, and I won't insult you by thinking you'd pull a Chief Commissioner's leg over an affair of this importance. What's number two? Let's have it!"
"The man who runs her, or the man who built her, has solved another problem. He's produced silent engines at last! That ship's motors don't make more noise than a June bug! On a dark night she could pass within two hundred yards of you, and you'd never guess that she was near."
From that moment I saw the thing in its true proportions. From that moment the air became unsafe. A man-eating tiger let loose upon a quiet country-side was not a tithe as dangerous.
The three other men saw that I understood.
"The scoundrels who came aboard the Albatros and looted the ship. What of them?"
"They were masked so's their mothers wouldn't, have known 'em. Armed to the teeth, too. We'd have downed them quick enough, even at the cost of a life or two, but there was the pirate with a four-inch gun trained on us. And she meant business. I did right, Sir John?"
The poor fellow's voice shook, and his face was corrugated with anxiety.
"I should have done exactly the same myself under the circumstances, Pring. Your first duty was to the women and children under your care. That view, I am certain, will be accepted by the company and the Government, to say nothing of the public, when it gets out. About these men, again, did you judge them to be American or foreigners?"
"They didn't speak much, except, to give a few orders. But what they did say I heard, every word. I was with them all the time, and so was Mr. Rickaby here. I'll spring another surprise on you, Sir John, and then I've done. Those chaps were English, every one of them. And, what's more, they weren't any plug-ugly crowd neither! They were educated men of some social position, club men at some time or other,