Hydrofoil Mystery (21 page)

I looked up from the point of the rifle, through the dust, and felt like crying out for joy. It was being held by one of our soldiers. Seeing us blaze down the road and ram the building must have scared them as much as they'd just scared me.

“Put down the rifle, man!” Mr. Bell bellowed.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Bell … we didn't know it was you,” he apologized as he withdrew his gun from the window and opened the door. Mr. Bell pushed me out the door and followed after me because his door was blocked by the barricades.

“There's no time for talk. We need you to extinguish all lights and to remove the sandbags blocking the big door and ramp!” he yelled as he strode toward the entrance to the building.

“But sir, I can't do that! I'm under orders—”

“What you are going to be is under attack in a matter of minutes or less!”

“Under attack! Then shouldn't we man the barricade, not open up a wall? We must defend our post.”

Mr. Bell pushed aside two men who were standing by the doorway. He reached into his pocket, fumbling for the key to the lock.

“You can't stop this attack, unless you have a battleship in your backpack.”

“A battleship … I don't understand …”

“Of course you don't! Soon a submarine will appear in the water directly in front of this building and its cannon will rain down fire until it reduces this building and its contents to charred splinters. Do you have any defence against such an enemy?”

“Um … no … I guess we could fire our rifles, and maybe we could—”

“Maybe nothing. If you remain here, you and your men will become part of the blackened contents of the building. Now get out of my way and all of you get to work clearing the sandbags off of the railroad tracks. Now!”

The soldier snapped to attention and saluted, and he and his men scrambled to the barrier.

“William, come in and help me with the
HD
-4,” he said as he pushed in through the door.

I followed but hesitated at the doorway. I pictured a submarine, out on the water, invisible to our eyes, readying its cannon—a shot flying through the air, landing on the boathouse, blowing us into a million tiny pieces.

“Come on, William, don't worry. We'll be given some warning. The first shot will be off target and will be used for them to correct aim for the next. There should be a gap between shots, perhaps up to thirty seconds, while they reload. It could very well take them a dozen tries to hit the building.”

Reassured, I rushed in after him and hurried to the
HD
-4. “Of course, I've heard the Germans have very accurate gunners, so perhaps they
can
hit us on the first try,” he said very matter-of-factly.

I looked over at him and could see his eyes were alive with laughter, despite the seriousness of his voice.

“Remove the blocks and then get the sliding door open, while I—”

His words were obliterated by a deafening crash of thunder and the sound of smashing glass. A shell had fallen so close to the building that it had blown out the back window. It was the same one they'd replaced after I'd smashed it with the rock.

“Hurry!” Mr. Bell yelled as he started up the ladder to the cockpit of the craft.

I threw myself under the hydrofoil and grappled with the blocks. The first two came out easily but I had to struggle with the third, which was wedged in tightly. Slowly the
HD
-4 started to move.

“The door, William! The door!”
It was going to hit the still-closed door. I rolled to the side, barely missing one of the foils, bounded to my feet and caught the door. I flung it open with all my might and it slid out of the way just as the tail of the
HD
-4 was about to hit it.

Half a dozen feet farther away, four of the soldiers were removing the last of the sandbags blocking the ramp. The two others were by the water, and their rifles sounded as they shot at the submarine. I stared out at it, barely visible off shore.

There was a flash of light from the deck of the submarine and before I could even think what it meant a tremendous explosion ripped open the night. I looked up in time to see the hydrofoil rolling down the track toward the water. I scrambled to my knees and on all fours scuttled forward and grabbed hold of one of the foils. I was dragged along the ground as it picked up speed. I wasn't going to let it get away. It splashed into the lake and water sprayed up at me, hitting me in the face like a cold slap. Using the foil as a ladder I climbed up the side, pulling myself up, step by step, until I mounted the wing and then tumbled over into the cockpit.

“William, you shouldn't be here! It's too dangerous! Get over the side!” Bell was sitting behind the wheel.

“And what are
you
going to do?”

“I'm going to drive her to safety, of course … at least as soon as I can get her started … I can't tell in the dark … is it this switch? … or perhaps …”

I leaned forward and pulled the throttle out. The engines flashed with fire as the fuel ignited and they roared to life.

“You've never even been for a ride in it, let alone driven it!” I shouted over the engines.

“There's always a first time!”

“But not now. Let me drive! Casey lets me drive all the time!” I lied. He'd let me behind the wheel for one short ride.

“You're bluffing me, aren't you, William?”

Despite everything a small laugh escaped my lips. “Of course I am, but I still have more experience driving it than you do.”

The steady barking of the soldiers' rifles was overwhelmed by an explosion and a
whoosh
and a shower of water washed over us! A shell had exploded just off the side of the ship and it rocked us wildly. Mr. Bell slid across the bench seat, freeing the space behind the wheel.

I plopped down, turned the wheel hard and gave it some throttle. The hydrofoil leaped forward and the shore disappeared as we circled out toward open water.

“Give it some more power, William! More power!” The boat burst forward as though it had been stung by a hornet, and we were thrown backwards against our seats. At the same time I turned hard to port, away from the U-boat. Spray bounced off the windscreen and a series of pinging sounds punctuated the noise of the engines. The ride became smoother as we rose up onto the foils and out of the water.

“Circle it wide to this side and then head under full throttle to Baddeck. We have to escape and telephone the military so they can bottle off both exits to the sea! We can trap them!”
I looked back, saw another flash of light come from the submarine and braced myself for the explosion. I heard the shot soar over our heads and explode into the water just yards ahead of us. A funnel of water shot into the air and rained down on us, and once again we were rocked violently to the side.

“Open it up! We have to go faster!”

“I can't!” I yelled back.

“What do you mean, you can't? I know she can move faster than this.”

“See the mark on the throttle? This is as fast as Casey has ever gone in the trials.”

Bell reached over and grabbed the throttle. “The time for trials is over,” he said, as he pulled it out and the engines roared louder and we rose farther out of the water.

“More speed!” he yelled. “Open it up all the way!”

I pulled the throttle out all the way and we rose up another notch. The ride was so smooth it was as though we'd slowed down instead of gained speed.

Another shot rang out and I braced for the impact.

“It hit well behind us,” Bell said. “We're out of range!” I reached for the throttle to slow us down, but Mr. Bell took my hand.

“Leave it wide until we hit the harbour. A few seconds might make all the difference.”

We skimmed across the water until the lights of Baddeck appeared dead ahead. I throttled back and we rattled and rolled as we settled back into the water.

“Congratulations, William,” Mr. Bell said. “Congratulations, yourself.”

“No, no, you don't understand. I took a mark on the coast and on my watch when you opened it to full throttle. We travelled one and a quarter miles in fifty-eight seconds. Our top speed was somewhere in excess of seventy miles per hour. Do you know what that means, William?”

I shrugged. “That we were travelling pretty fast, I guess.”

“Pretty fast is an understatement. We were travelling faster than any men have ever travelled across water. We just set a world record! And you were the driver!”

Chapter Twenty

“H
ERE, YOU MIGHT WANT
to see this,” Mr. Bell said, slapping down a newspaper on the workbench in front of me.

I opened up the paper and looked at the front page. There was a picture of a submarine, run aground, with a gaping hole extending along the side. Underneath was a bold headline that read:

SUB CAPTURED DUE TO BELL

AND YOUTHFUL HELPER
!

I didn't need to read the story as I'd already had it all explained to me. In trying to elude the navy ships that were pursuing it, the sub had run up onto a sandbar. The captain, rather than let his vessel be captured and investigated, ordered the crew to abandon ship and then set it on fire and set off explosives. The sub was just a gutted hulk. All twenty-three members of the crew were rescued and captured. The captain was believed to have perished in the fire and explosions, his body consumed by the flames.

“Oh, good Lord, you didn't bring him a paper, did you?” Casey called out from across the building. “It's bad
enough he took away my chance to set a speed record, but now his head is going to get so big it won't fit through the door!” He crossed over and playfully ruffled my hair.

“I don't suppose you've written your mother to tell her about your adventures,” Mr. Bell said.

“No, but I guess she'll find out about at least some of it now from the papers.”

“Aye, she will. This is the Sydney paper, but I can't imagine this isn't news across the country and across the ocean to the other side.”

“Do you want me to call her on the telephone?” “Yes, you place the call, but then I want to personally extend an invitation,” he said.

“An invitation to what?”

“For your parents and your sister to come to the estate for a visit.”

“My father probably isn't even home. He could be on a boat anywhere between Halifax and England.”

“Perhaps. If that is the case then perhaps they can come without your father. If your mother is anything like my dear mother, she'll need to lay eyes on you and throw her arms around you before she'll completely believe you're all right.”

“That would be wonderful!” I gushed. I so wanted to see my mother and my sister and … my father. I did want to see him, as much as I wanted to see the rest of my family. Maybe I had things to say to him, and things I hoped he'd say to me. I guess I'd learned that everyone has to play the cards he's dealt and do the best with what he's got. If my father wasn't the man I wanted him to be, maybe it was up to me to find out why, to drop my poker
face and let him know how I felt. I could only hope he'd meet me halfway.

“We'll prepare a room for them.”

“There are two beds in my room.”

“No, there's only one.” He paused. “You realize I don't mean your room up in the staff house, but here at the house. That is now your permanent room.”

“But I thought that was just for last night, after all the excitement and everything.”

“Certainly not! All my special guests … and my family … stay in the main house, and that's where you'll be staying. If that's all right with you?”

I just smiled in response.

Casey laughed and put an arm around my shoulder. “You and Casey have become quite a pair. And I guess you were right about things. What a sad tragedy … with Simon.”

“It is sad, Alec,” Casey agreed.

“I guess I can't always trust people to do the right thing,” Mr. Bell said, shaking his head slowly.

“But he was
trying
to do the right thing,” I disagreed. “What do you mean, William?”

“In the end, when it really mattered, he was trying to do the right thing. He gave up his life trying to do the right thing.”

Mr. Bell's eyes softened and a smile spread through his bushy beard. “You are right, William, it sounds as though he gave his life trying to do the right thing. I think it is better that his part in the sabotage never be known. Let his soul rest in peace.”

I nodded in agreement.

“But enough talk of sad things. There's much work to be done on the
HD
-4, and I'd like to finish it before our junior helper has to return to Halifax in September to continue his schooling. If all goes as planned, perhaps you can make the return journey in the company of your family.”

“I could stay if you still need my help,” I protested. “Not a possibility. Your schooling is important. An engineer needs to have a fine and formal education.”

“An engineer?”

“Aye. Didn't I tell you that's what you're going to become?” he said with a lilt in his voice and laughter in his eyes. “Far better money than playing poker, although a man still has to have his mathematics, understand probability and know when to fold or play his cards. You do want to become an engineer, don't you?”

“I was sort of thinking about it,” I answered.

“I hope you were more than ‘sort of thinking about it',”

Casey broke in. “I've already been on the phone to my old school, the University of Toronto. Two years from now, if you keep your marks up, they've reserved a spot for you.”

“But—”

“No buts,” Mr. Bell interrupted. “It's a good school, and an expensive one, too. You'll have to study hard and save all your money. I've already put aside your wages for next summer.”