Hartmann, the Anarchist; Or, The Doom of the Great City by E. Douglas Fawcett (smallest ebook reader .TXT) 📗

“THUS RETURNS HARTMANN THE ANARCHIST.”

147But this spectacle, grievous of its kind, was as nothing to the other. With eyes riveted now to the massacre, I saw frantic women trodden down by men; huge clearings made by the shells and instantly filled up; house-fronts crushing horses and vehicles as they fell; fires bursting out on all sides, to devour what they listed, and terrified police struggling wildly and helplessly in the heart of the press. The roar of the guns was continuous, and every missile found its billet. Was I in Pandemonium? I saw Burnett, black with grime, hounding his comrades on to the slaughter. I heard the roar of Schwartz’s bombs, and the roar of the burning and falling houses. Huge circles of flame raved beneath us, and shot up their feverish and scorching breath. The Attila, drunk with slaughter, was careering in continually fresh tracts, spreading havoc and desolation everywhere. 148To compare her to a wolf in a flock of helpless sheep is idle—the sheep could at least butt, the victims below could not approach, and after some time, indeed, owing to the smoke, could not even see us.

The morning passed in horror, but the story of the afternoon and evening is wilder yet. The sky, overcast with clouds and black with uprolling smoke-wreaths, lay like a strangely spotted pall over the blazing district. Around and within Westminster enmity could do no more. Shortly before two o’clock the Attila drew off. With the screws working powerfully she climbed upwards into the heavens, and buried in the cloud-masses gave London a momentary respite. Hartmann wished not to fatigue the crew, being anxious to reserve their energies for the attack on the City. His aim was to pierce the ventricle of the heart of civilization, that heart which pumps the blood of capital everywhere, through the arteries of Russia, of Australia, of India, just as through the capillaries of fur companies in North America, planting enterprises in Ecuador, and trading steamers on African rivers. “Paralyze this heart,” he has said, “and you paralyze credit and the mechanism of finance almost universally.” The result already known to history proved too well that he was right; 149but my task is not to play the historian, but simply to tell my tale as one who has trod the Attila.

The interval of respite was not long, but during the whole time we kept well veiled within the angry zone of clouds. Burnett came up to speak to me, but I received him coldly enough. Schwartz was “surprised that I had no compliment” for him when “even the captain” was pleased. He remarked that the slaughter had been prodigious, that the Houses of Parliament were wrecked, and the flames were carrying everything before them. Nero fiddling over Rome was respectable compared with this monster; but to attack him would have been fatal, as I should have at once been shot or thrown overboard. Hartmann remained invisible, he was still at his post in the conning-tower.

Towards three o’clock I noticed the men hurrying hastily to their posts. The assault was shortly to begin. Slowly we emerged from the cloud-rack, wheeling ever in great circles above the luckless quarry below. A queer accident delayed us. I was standing by the citadel when I heard a sharp crack, followed by a sensation of rapid sinking. The shaft of the main screw had broken, and we were rushing downwards like a parachute. Everything for the moment was in confusion and more than one cheek 150paled, but a master-hand was in the conning-tower. Without even handling the sand levers, Hartmann set the auxiliary screws rotating at a high speed. At once the fall was checked, and the Attila rose once more into the clouds. After an hour’s delay the shaft was temporarily repaired, and arrangements were made to replace it, if necessary, with a spare one. Luckily for the aëronef these shafts were extremely short, so that two spare ones could always be kept in hand without undue demand for stowage room. The present mishap was not at all serious, as between the repaired shaft and the spare ones there was little, if anything, to choose. The only “lucky” thing was that the snap had not taken place too close to the stern. In this case the screw-blades might have torn away the stern-plating and irretrievably damaged themselves at the same time.

The Attila now began to re-descend, working all three screws at once. We were evidently not unexpected, for I made out soldiery in the streets, and several detachments of artillery. How they expected to wing us I really do not know, for a moving aëronef hurling forcite and dynamite missiles is neither an easy nor a pleasant target. The height at which we were must also be borne in mind. I suppose I am within the mark when I say that our descent stopped 151at the half-mile limit. There was no delay this time. The first and second bombs fell on the Tower, reducing it half to ruins; they were of the largest kind, and terribly effective instruments. Meanwhile the quick-firing guns played havoc at all points of the compass. But the worst was to come. As we rode over the heart of the City—that sanctum of capital, where the Bank of England, many other banks of scarcely less brilliant fame, the Royal Exchange, Stock Exchange, with credit companies, insurance offices, and discount houses innumerable lie herded—the bombs fell in a tempest, shattering fabric after fabric, and uprooting their very foundations. There was a constant roar of explosions, and the loss of life must have been something terrible. Burnett was in his element. Handling his gun like a practised marksman, he riddled St. Paul’s and its neighbourhood, the crash of the infalling dome rising even above the explosions around it. But for him, at least, there was retribution. Hitherto, bating rifle-fire, we had escaped being hit, the motion and height of the Attila were in our favour. South London enjoyed the downfall of the shells launched against us. But, as fate would have it, a volley of grape-shot struck us. From the sides of the aëronef they rebounded, steel armour would have been more easily 152pierced, but a stray one found a billet. Burnett was gazing over the side through the smoke at the wreckage when a ball holed his throat. He fell back with a gurgle. I ran up, and saw the man was failing—the blood was spurting from his carotid like jets from a siphon. In less than a minute he was dead.

His fate was deserved, and I felt no ray of sympathy, for by this time I was dead to all feelings except those of helpless hatred for the anarchists, and horror at the hideous slaughter below. Before this horror every former sympathy with Hartmann and his crew had withered. Could I have killed Hartmann at that moment I would gladly have paid the price for it. But his day of reckoning was to come.