Five Thousand Miles Underground Part 16

"I always found it a good plan to eat as much and as often as you can," the hunter remarked. "This is a mighty uncertain world."

"You started to tell us a little while ago, Professor," said Mark, "about a plan you had for saving out lives if worst came to worst, and there was a chance to put it into operation. What is it?"

"I will tell you," the aged inventor said. "It is something about which I have kept silent, as I did not want to frighten any of you. It was my latest invention, and I had only perfected it when we started off on this voyage. Consequently I had no chance to try it. The machine works in theory, but whether it does in practice is another question. That is why I say there is a risk. But we may have to take this risk. I have placed aboard this ship a----"

The professor was interrupted in what he was about to say by a curious tremor that made the whole ship shiver as though it had struck some obstruction. Yet there was no sudden jolt or jar such as would have been occasioned by that.

At the same time Washington, who was out in the kitchen, came running into the dining room, crying:

"We're droppin' into a ragin' fire, Perfesser!"

"What do you mean?" asked Mr. Henderson.

"I jest took a look down through th' hole in th' bottom of the ship!"

cried Washington. "It's all flames an' smoke below us!"

"I wonder if it is the end," the professor muttered in a low voice.

Followed by the boys, the inventor hastened to the floor-window. The lights were turned off to enable a better view to be had of what was below them.

Leaning over the gla.s.s protected aperture the boys and the professor saw, far, far down, a bright light shining. It was as if they were miles above a whole town of blast furnaces, the stacks of which were belching forth flames and smoke. The rolling clouds of vapor were illuminated by a peculiar greenish light, which, at times, turned to red, blue, purple and yellowish hues.

The effect was weird and beautiful though it was full of terror for the travelers. It seemed as if they were falling into some terrible pit of fire, for the reflection of what they feared were flames, could plainly be seen.

"I wish I'd never come on this terrible voyage!" wailed Washington.

"I'd rather freeze to death than be burned up."

"Washington, be quiet!" commanded the professor sternly. "This is no time for foolishness. We must work hard to save our lives, for we are in dire peril.

"Mark, you and Washington, with Jack, start the engines. Turn on every bit of power you can. Fill the gas holder as full as it will hold, and use extra heavy pressure. I will see if I can not work the negative gravity apparatus to better advantage than we did before. We must escape if possible!"

The boys, as was also Washington, were only too glad to have something to do to take their mind off their troubles. All three were much frightened, but Mark and Jack tried not to show it. As for Washington he was almost crying.

Soon the whirr and hum of the machinery in the Mermaid was heard. The craft, which was rushing in some direction, either downward, ahead or backwards within the unknown depths, shivered from the speed of the dynamos and other apparatus. Soon the boys could hear the professor starting the negative gravity engine, and then began a struggle between the forces of nature and those of mankind.

Once more the adventurers anxiously watched the gages and indicators.

For a while the ship seemed to be holding out against the terrible influence that was sucking her down. She appeared to hesitate. Then, as the downward force triumphed over the mechanical energy in the craft, she began to settle again, and soon was descending, if that was the direction, as fast as before.

"It is of no use," said the professor with a groan. "I must try our last resort!"

He started from the engine room where Mark and Jack had gone. As he did so, he glanced at a thermometer hanging on the wall near the door.

"Has any one turned on the heat?" he asked.

"It's shut off," replied Mark, looking at the electric stove.

"Then what makes it so hot?" asked the scientist.

He pointed to the little silvery column in the tiny tube of the instrument. It registered close to one hundred degrees, though a few minutes before it had been but sixty. And the starting of the machinery could not account for the rise in temperature, since most of the apparatus was run by electricity and developed little heat save in the immediate proximity. The thermometer was fully ten feet away from any machine.

"It's the fiery furnace that's doing it!" cried Washington. "We're falling into th' terrible pit an' we're goin' t' be roasted alive!"

"It certainly is getting warmer," observed Mark, as he took off his coat. Soon he had to shed his vest, and Jack and the professor followed his example. The others too, also found all superfluous garments a burden, and, in a little while they were going about in scanty attire.

Still the heat increased, until it was almost torture to remain in the engine room. Nor was it much cooler elsewhere. In vain did the professor set a score of big electric fans to whirring. He even placed cakes of ice, from the small ice machine that was carried, in front of the revolving blades, to cool off the air. But the ice was melted almost as soon as it was taken from the apparatus.

"Them flames is gittin' worser!" Washington cried a little later.

"We's comin' nearer!"

From the bottom window the professor and the boys looked down. True enough the curious, changing, vari-colored lights seemed brighter.

They could almost see the tongues of flame shooting upward in antic.i.p.ation of what they were soon to devour.

The heat was increasing every minute. The sides of the ship were hot.

The heads of the travelers were getting dizzy. They could hardly talk or move about.

"I must save our lives! I must trust to the----" The professor, who was muttering to himself started toward the storeroom. As in a dream Mark watched him. He remembered afterward that he had speculated on what might be the outcome of the mystery the professor threw about the place. "I will have to use it," he heard the scientist say softly.

Just as Mr. Henderson was about to open the door there came a fiercer blast of heat than any that had preceded. At the same instant the conditions in the Mermaid became so fearful that each of the travelers felt himself fainting away.

"Go to--storeroom--get cylinder--get in----" the professor murmured, and then he fell forward in a faint.

CHAPTER XVI

THE NEW LAND

"WHAT is it? Tell us!" exclaimed Jack, almost in his last breath, for, a few seconds later he too toppled over senseless. Then Washington went down, while Andy, Bill and Tom succ.u.mbed to the terrible heat.

Mark felt his head swimming. His eyes were almost bulging from their sockets. He dimly remembered trying to force himself to go to the storeroom and see what was there. He started toward it with that intention, but fell half way to it.

As he did so he saw something which impressed itself on his mind, half unconscious as he was.

The door of the storeroom suddenly opened, and from it came a giant shape, that seemed to expand until it filled the whole of the apartment where the stricken ones lay. It was like the form of some monster, half human, half beast. Mark shuddered, and then, closing his eyes, he felt himself sinking down into some terrible deep and black pit. A second later the whole ship was jarred as though it had hit something.

How long he and the others remained unconscious Mark did not know. He was the first to revive, and his first sensation was one as though he had slept hard and long, and did not want to get up. He felt very comfortable, although he was lying flat on the floor, with his head jammed against the side of a locker. It was so dark that he could not distinguish his hand held close to his face.

"I wonder if I'm dead, and if all the others are dead too," he thought to himself. "What has happened? Let's see, the last I remember was some horrible shape rushing from the storeroom. I wonder what it could have been? Surely that was not the secret the professor referred to."

Mark shuddered as he recalled the monster that seemed to have grown more terrible as each second pa.s.sed. Then the boy raised himself up from his prostrate position.

"Well, at any rate, some one has turned off the heat," he murmured.

"It's very comfortable in here now. I wish I could strike a light."

He listened intently, to learn if any of the others were moving about.

He could hear them breathing, but so faintly as to indicate they were insensible. Mark stretched out his hand and felt that some one was lying close to him, but who of the adventurers it was he could not determine.