"But think, Sarah," said Samuel Block, in answer to some of her
complaints, "what it would be if this were winter, and, instead
of being light all the time, it was dark, with the mercury 'way
down at the bottom of the thermometer!"

"I don't intend to think of it at all," replied Sarah, sharply.
"Do you suppose I am goin' to consent to stay here until the
everlastin' night comes on?  If that happened, I would simply
stretch myself out and die.  It's bad enough as it is; but when I
look out on the sun, and think that it is the same sun that is
shinin' on Sardis, and on the house which I hope we are goin' to
have when we get back, I feel as if there was somethin' up here
besides you, Sammy, that I'm accustomed to.  If it was not for
you and the sun, I could not get along at all; but if the sun's
gone, I don't think you will be enough.  I wish they would plant
that corner-stone buoy and let us be off."

But by far the most dissatisfied person on board was the Pole,
Rovinski.  He was chained to the floor in the hold, and could see
nothing; nor could he find out anything.  Sammy had explained his
character and probable intentions to Captain Hubbell, who had
thereupon delivered to Mr. Block a very severe lecture for not
telling him before.

"If I've got a scoundrel on board I want to know it, and I hope
this sort of thing won't happen again, Mr. Block."

"I don't see how it can," answered Sammy; "and I must admit I
ought to have told you as soon as you took command; but people
don't always do all they ought to do; and, as for tellin' Mr. Gibbs,
I would not do that, for his mind is rigged on a hair-spring
balance anyway; it wouldn't do to upset him."

"And what are we goin' to do with the feller?" said the captain.
"Now that I know what this Pole is, I wish I had let him go down
to the other pole and stay there."

"I thought so at first," said Sammy; "but I'm glad he didn't; I'd
hate to think of our glorious pole with that thing floppin' on
it."

At last all was ready to anchor the great buoy, and preparations
were in progress for this important event, when everybody was
startled by a shout from Mr. Marcy.

"Hello!" he cried.  "What's that?  A sail?"

"Where away?" shouted the captain.

"To the south," replied Mr. Marcy.  And instantly everybody was
looking in opposite directions.  But Mr. Marcy's outstretched arm
soon indicated to all the position of the cause of his outcry.
It was a black spot clearly visible upon the surface of the sea,
and apparently about two miles away.  Quickly Captain Hubbell
had his glass directed upon it, and the next moment he gave a
loud cry.

"It's a whale!" he shouted.  "There's whales in this polar sea!"

"I thought you said whales were extinct," cried Sammy.

"So I did," replied the captain.  "And so they are in all
Christian waters.  Who ever could have imagined that we would
have found 'em here?"

Sarah Block was so frightened when she found there was a whale in
the same water in which the Dipsey floated that she immediately
hurried below, with an indistinct idea of putting on her things.
In such a case as this, it was time for her to leave.  But soon
recognizing the state of affairs, she sat down in a chair, threw
a shawl over her head, and waited for the awful bump.

"Fortunately whales are soft," she said to her, self over and
over again.

No one now thought of buoys.  Every eye on deck was fixed upon
the exposed back of the whale, and everybody speedily agreed that
it was coming nearer to them.  It did come nearer and nearer, and
at one time it raised its head as if it were endeavoring to look
over the water at the strange object which had come into those
seas.  Then suddenly it tossed its tail high into the air and
sank out of sight.

"It's a right-whale!" cried Captain Hubbell.  "There's whales in
this sea!  Let's get through this buoy business and go cruisin'
after 'em."

There was a great deal of excited talk about the appearance of
the whale, but this was not allowed to interfere with the
business in hand.  A chain, not very heavy but of enormous
strength, and of sufficient length to reach the bottom and give
plenty of play, was attached to an anchor of a peculiar kind.  It
was very large and heavy, made of iron, and shaped something like
a cuttlefish, with many arms which would cling to the bottom if
any force were exerted to move the anchor.  The other end of the
chain was attached to the lower part of the buoy, and with
powerful cranes the anchor was hoisted on deck, and when
everything had been made ready the buoy, which had had the proper
date cut upon it, was lowered into the water.  Then the great
anchor was dropped into the sea, as nearly as possible over the
pole.

The sudden rush downward of the anchor and the chain caused the
buoy to dip into the sea as if it were about to sink out of
sight, but in a few moments it rose again, and the great sphere,
half-way out of the water, floated proudly upon the surface of
the polar sea.

Then came a great cheer, and Mrs. Block--who, having been assured
that the whale had entirely disappeared, had come on deck--turned
to her husband and remarked: "Now, Sammy, is there any earthly
reason why we should not turn right around and go straight home?
The pole's found, and the place is marked, and what more is there
for us to do?"

But before her husband could answer her, Captain Hubbell lifted
up his voice, which was full of spirit and enthusiasm.

"Messmates!" he cried, "we have touched at the pole, and we have
anchored the buoy, and now let us go whalin'.  It's thirty years
since I saw one of them fish, and I never expected in all my born
days I'd go a-whalin'."

The rest of the company on the Dipsey took no very great interest
in the whaling cruise, but, on consultation with Mr. Clewe and
Mrs. Raleigh at Sardis, it was decided that they ought by no
means to leave the polar sea until they had explored it as
thoroughly as circumstances would allow.  Consequently the next
day the Dipsey sailed away from the pole, leaving the buoy
brightly floating on a gently rolling sea, its high-uplifted
weather-vane glittering in the sun, with each of its ends always
pointing bravely to the south.




CHAPTER XIV

A REGION OF NOTHINGNESS


In the office of the Works at Sardis, side by side at the table
on which stood the telegraph instrument, Margaret Raleigh and
Roland Clewe, receiving the daily reports from the Dipsey, had
found themselves in such sympathy and harmony with the party they
had sent out on this expedition that they too, in fancy, had
slowly groped their way under the grim overhanging ice out into
the open polar sea.  They too had stood on the deck of the vessel
which had risen like a spectre out of the waters, and in the
cold, clear atmosphere had gazed about them at this hitherto
unknown part of the world.  They had thrilled with enthusiastic
excitement when the ring on the deck of the Dipsey was placed
over the actual location of the pole; they had been filled with
anger when they heard of the conduct of Rovinski; and their souls
had swelled with a noble love of country and pride in their own
achievements when they heard that they, by their representative,
had made the north pole a part of their native land.  They had
listened, scarcely breathing, to the stirring account of the
anchoring of the great buoy to one end of the earth's axis, and
they had exclaimed in amazement at the announcement that in the
lonely waters of the pole whales were still to be found, when
they were totally unknown in every other portion of the earth.

But now the stirring events in the arctic regions which had so
held and enthralled them day by day had, after a time, ceased.
Mr. Gibbs was engaged in making experiments, observations, and
explorations, the result of which he would embody in carefully
prepared reports, and Sammy's daily message promised to be rather
monotonous.  Roland Clewe felt the great importance of a thorough
exploration and examination of the polar sea.  The vessel he had
sent out had reached this hitherto inaccessible region, but it
was not at all certain that another voyage, even of the same
kind, would be successful.  Consequently he advised those in
charge of the expedition not to attempt to return until the
results of their work were as complete as possible.  Should the
arctic night overtake them before they left the polar sea, this
would not interfere with their return in the same manner in which
they had gone north, for in a submarine voyage artificial light
would be necessary at any season.  So, for a tune, Roland and
Margaret withdrew in a great measure their thoughts from the
vicinity of the pole, and devoted themselves to their work at
home.

When Roland Clewe had penetrated with his Artesian ray as deeply
into the earth beneath him as the photic power of his instrument
would admit, he had applied all the available force of his
establishment--the men working in relays day and night--to the
manufacture of the instruments which should give increased power
to the penetrating light, which he hoped would make visible to
him the interior structure of the earth, up to this time as
unknown to man as had been the regions of the poles.

Roland had devoted a great deal of time to the arrangement of a
system of reflectors, by which he hoped to make it possible to
look down into the cylinder of light produced by the Artesian ray
without projecting any portion of the body of the observer into
the ray.  This had been done principally to provide against the
possibility of a shock to Margaret, such as he received when he
beheld a man with the upper part of his body totally invisible,
and a section of the other portion laid bare to the eye of a
person standing in front of it.  But his success had not been
satisfactory.  It was quite different to look directly down into
that magical perforation at his feet, instead of studying the
reflection of the same, indistinctly and uncertainly revealed by
a system of mirrors.

Consequently the plan of reflectors was discarded, and Roland
determined that the right thing to do was to take Margaret into
his confidence and explain to her why he and she should not stand
together and look down the course of the Artesian ray.  She
scolded him for not telling her all this before, and a permanent
screen was erected around the spot on which the ray was intended
to work, formed of Venetian blinds with fixed slats, so that the
person inside could readily talk and consult with others outside
without being seen by them.

As might well be supposed, this work with the "photic borer," as
Clewe now called his instrument, was of absorbing interest.  For
a day or two after it was again put into operation Margaret and
Roland could scarcely tear themselves away from it long enough
for necessary sleep and meals, and several persons connected with
the Works were frequently permitted to witness its wonderful
operations.

Down, down descended that cylinder of light, until it had passed
through all the known geological strata in that part of New
Jersey, and had reached subterranean depths known to Clewe only
by comparison and theory.

The apparent excavation had extended itself down so far that the
disk at the bottom, although so brightly illuminated, was no
longer clearly visible to the naked eye, and was rapidly
decreasing in size on account of the perspective.  But the
telescopes which Clewe had provided easily overcame this
difficulty.  He was sure that it would be impossible for his
light to penetrate to a depth which could not be made clearly
visible by his telescopes.

It was a wonderful and weird sensation which came over those who
stood, glass in hand, and gazed down the track of the Artesian
ray.  Far, far below them they saw that illuminated disk which
revealed the character of the stratum which the light had
reached.  And yet they could not see the telescope which they
held in their hands; they could not see their hands; they knew
that their heads and shoulders were invisible.  All observers
except Clewe kept well back from the edge of the frightful hole
of light down which they peered; and once, when the weight of the
telescope which she held had caused Margaret to make an
involuntary step forward, she gave a fearful scream, for she was
sure she was going to fall into the bowels of the earth.  Clewe,
who stood always near by, with his hand upon the lever which
controlled the ray, instantly shut off the light; and although
Margaret was thus convinced that she stood upon commonplace
ground, she came from within the screen, and did not for some
time recover from the nervous shock occasioned by this accident
of the imagination.

Clewe himself took great pleasure in making experiments connected
with the relation of the observer to the action of the Artesian
ray.  For instance, he found that when standing and gazing down
into the great photic perforation below him, he could see into it
quite as well when he shut his eyes as when they were open; the
light passing through his head made his eyelids invisible.  He
stood in the very centre of the circle of light and looked down
through himself.

That this application of light which he had discovered would be of
the greatest possible service in surgery, Roland Clewe well knew.
By totally eliminating from view any portion of the human body so
as to expose a section of said body which it was desirable to
examine, the interior structure of a patient could be studied as
easily as the exterior, and a surgeon would be able to dissect a
living being as easily as if the subject were a corpse.  But Clewe
did not now wish to make public the extraordinary adaptations of
his discovery to the uses of the medical man and the surgeon.  He
was intent upon discovering, as far as was possible, the internal
structure of the earth on which he dwelt, and he did not wish to
interfere at present with this great and absorbing object by
distracting his mind with any other application of his Artesian
ray.

It is not intended to describe in detail the various stages of
the progress of the Artesian ray into the subterranean regions.
Sometimes it revealed strata colored red, yellow, or green by the
presence of iron ore; sometimes it showed for a short distance
a glittering disk, produced by the action of the light upon a
deep-sunken reservoir of water; then it passed on, hour by hour,
down, down into the eternal rocks.

When the Artesian ray had begun to work its way through the
rocks, Margaret became less interested in observing its progress.
Nothing new presented itself; it was one continual stony disk
which she saw when she looked down into the shaft of light
beneath her.  Observation was becoming more and more difficult
even to Roland Clewe, and at last he was obliged to set up a
large telescope on a stand, and mount a ladder in order to use
it.

Day after day the Artesian ray went downward, always revealing
rock, rock, rock.  The appliances for increased electric energy
were working well, and Clewe was entirely satisfied with the
operation of his photic borer.

One morning he came hurriedly to Margaret at her house, and
announced with glistening eyes that his ray had now gone to a
greater degree into the earth than man had ever yet reached.

"What have you found?" she asked, excitedly.  "Rock, rock, rock,"
he answered.  "This little State of ours rests upon a firm
foundation."

Although Roland Clewe found his observations rather monotonous
work, he was regular and constant at his post, and gave little
opportunity to his steadily progressing cylinder of light to
reach and pass unseen anything which might be of interest.

It was nearly a week after he had announced to Margaret that he
had seen deeper into the earth than any man before him that he
mounted his ladder to take his final observation for the night.
When he looked through his telescope his eye was dazzled by a
light which obliged him suddenly to close it and lift his head.
At first he thought that he had reached the fabulous region of
eternal fire, but this he knew to be absurd; and, besides, the
light was not that of fire or heated substances.  It was pale,
colorless; and although dazzling at first, he found, when very
cautiously he applied his eye again to the telescope, that it was
not blinding.  In fact, he could look at it as steadily as he
could upon a clear sky.

But, gaze as he would, he could see nothing--nothing but light;
subdued, soft, beautiful light.  He knew the ray was passing
steadily downward, for the mechanism was working with its
accustomed regularity, but it revealed to him nothing at all.  He
could not understand it; his brain was dazed.  He thought there
might be something the matter with his eyesight.  He got down
from the ladder and hurriedly sent for Margaret, and when she
came he begged her to look through the telescope and tell him
what she saw.  She went inside the screen, ascended the ladder,
and looked down.

"It isn't anything," she called out presently.  "It looks like
lighter air; it can't be that.  Perhaps there is something the
matter with your telescope."

Clewe had thought of that, and as soon as she came out he
examined the instrument, but the lenses were all right.  There
was nothing the matter with the telescope.

That night Roland Clewe spent in the lens-house, almost
constantly at the telescope, but nothing did he see but a disk of
soft, white light.

"The world can't be hollow!" he said to Margaret the next
morning.  "It can't be filled with air, or nothing, and my ray
would not illuminate air or nothing.  I cannot understand it.  If
you did not see what I see, I should think I was going crazy."

"Don't talk that way," exclaimed Margaret.  "This may be some
cavity which the ray will soon pass through, and then we shall
come to the good old familiar rock again."

But Clewe could not be consoled in this way.  He could see no
reason why his ray acting upon the emptiness of a cavern should
produce the effect he beheld.  Moreover, if the ray had revealed
a cavern of considerable extent he could not expect that it could
now pass through it, for the limit of its operations was almost
reached.  His electric cumulators would cease to act in a few
hours more.  The ray had now descended more than fourteen
miles--its limit was fifteen.

Margaret was greatly troubled because of the effect of this
result of the light borer upon Roland.  His disappointment was
very great, and it showed itself in his face.  His Artesian ray
had gone down to a distance greater than had been sometimes
estimated as the thickness of the earth's crust, and the result
was of no value.  Roland did not believe that the earth had a
crust.  He had no faith in the old-fashioned idea that the great
central portion was a mass of molten matter, but he could not
drive from his mind the conviction that his light had passed
through the solid portion of the earth, and had emerged into
something which was not solid, which was not liquid, which was in
fact nothing.

All his labors had come to this: he had discovered that the
various strata near the earth's surface rested upon a vast bed of
rock, and that this bed of rock rested upon nothing.  Of course
it was not impossible that the arrangement of the substances
which make up this globe was peculiar at this point, and that
there was a great cavern fourteen miles below him; but why should
such a cavern be filled with a light different from that which
would be shown by his Artesian ray when shining upon any other
substances, open air or solid matter?

He could go no deeper down--at least at present.  If he could
make an instrument of increased power, it would require many
months to do it.

"But I will do it," said he to Margaret.  "If this is a cavern,
and if it has a bottom, I will reach it.  I will go on and see
what there is beyond.  On such a discovery as I have made one can
pass no conclusion whatever.  If I cannot go farther, I need not
have gone down at all."

"No," said Margaret, "I don't want you to go on--at least at
present; you must wait.  The earth will wait, and I want you to
be in a condition to be able to wait also.  You must now stop
this work altogether.  Stop doing anything; stop thinking about
it.  After a time--say early in winter--we can recommence
operations with the Artesian ray; that is, if we think well to do
so.  You should stop this and take up something else.  You have
several enterprises which are very important and ought to be
carried on.  Take up one of them, and think no more for a few
months of the nothingness which is fourteen miles below us."

It was not difficult for Roland Clewe to convince himself that
this was very good advice.  He resolved to shut up his lens-house
entirely for a time, and think no more of the great work he had
done within it, but apply himself to something which he had long
neglected, and which would be a distraction and a recreation to
his disappointed mind.




CHAPTER XV

THE AUTOMATIC SHELL


In a large building, not far from the lens-house in which Roland
Clewe had pursued the experiments which had come to such a
disappointing conclusion, there was a piece of mechanism which
interested its inventor more than any other of his works,
excepting of course the photic borer.

This was an enormous projectile, the peculiarity of which was
that its motive power was contained within itself, very much as a
rocket contains the explosives which send it upward.  It
differed, however, from the rocket or any other similar
projectile, and many of its features were entirely original with
Roland Clewe.

This extraordinary piece of mechanism, which was called the
automatic shell, was of cylindrical form, eighteen feet in length
and four feet in diameter.  The forward end was conical and not
solid, being formed of a number of flat steel rings, decreasing
in size as they approached the point of the cone.  When not in
operation these rings did not touch one another, but they could
be forced together by pressure on the point of the cone.  This
shell might contain explosives or not, as might be considered
desirable, and it was not intended to fire it from a cannon, but
to start it on its course from a long semi-cylindrical trough,
which would be used simply to give it the desired direction.  After
it had been started by a ram worked by an engine at the rear end of
the trough, it immediately bean to propel itself by means of the
mechanism contained within it.

But the great value of this shell lay in the fact that the moment
it encountered a solid substance or obstruction of any kind its
propelling power became increased.  The rings which formed the
cone on its forward end were pressed together, the electric
motive power was increased in proportion to the pressure, and
thus the greater the resistance to this projectile the greater
became its velocity and power of progression, and its onward
course continued until its self-containing force had been
exhausted.

The power of explosives had reached, at this period, to so high a
point that it was unnecessary to devise any increase in their
enormous energy, and the only problems before the students of
artillery practice related to methods of getting their
projectiles to the points desired.  Progress in this branch of
the science had proceeded so far that an attack upon a fortified
port by armored vessels was now considered as a thing of the
past; and although there had been no naval wars of late years, it
was believed that never again would there be a combat between
vessels of iron or steel.

The recently invented magnetic shell made artillery practice
against all vessels of iron a mere mechanical process, demanding
no skill whatever.  When one of these magnetic shells was thrown
anywhere in the vicinity of an iron ship, the powerful magnetism
developed within it instantly attracted it to the vessel, which
was destroyed by the ensuing contact and explosion.  Two
ironclads meeting on the ocean need each to fire but one shell to
be both destroyed.  The inability of iron battle-ships to
withstand this improvement in artillery had already set the naval
architects of the world upon the work of constructing warships
which would not attract the magnetic shell--which was effective
even when laid on the bottoms of harbors--and Roland Clewe had
been engaged in making plans and experiments for the construction
of a paper man-of-war, which he believed would meet the
requirements of the situation.

When Clewe determined to follow Margaret Raleigh's advice and
give up for a time his work with the Artesian ray, his thoughts
naturally turned to his automatic shell.  Work upon this
invention was now almost completed, but the great difficulty
which its inventor expected to meet with was that of inducing his
government to make a trial of it.  Such a trial would be
extremely expensive, involving probably the destruction of the
shell, and he did not feel able or willing to experiment with it
without governmental aid.

The shell was intended for use on land as well as at sea, against
cities and great fortified structures, and Clewe believed that
the automatic shell might be brought within fifty miles of a
city, set up with its trough and ram, and projected in a level
line towards its object, to which it would impel itself with
irresistible power and velocity, through forests, hills, buildings,
and everything, gaining strength from every opposition which stood
in the direct line of its progress.  Attacking fortifications from
the sea, the vessel carrying this great projectile could operate at
a distance beyond the reach of the magnetic shell.

Now that the automatic shell itself was finished, and nothing
remained to be done but to complete the great steel trough in
which it would lie, Roland Clewe found himself confronted with a
business which was very hard and very distasteful to him.  He
must induce other people to do what he was not able to do
himself.  Unless his shell was put to a practical trial, it could
be of no value to the world or to himself.

In one of the many conversations on the subject; Margaret had
suggested something which rapidly grew and developed in Roland's
mind.

"It would be an admirable thing to tunnel mountains with," said
she.  "Of course I mean a large one, as thick through as a tunnel
ought to be."

In less than a day Clewe had perfected an idea which he believed
might be of practical service.  For some time there had been talk
of a new railroad in this part of the State, but one of the
difficulties in the way was the necessity of making a tunnel or a
deep cut through a small mountain.  To go round this mountain
would be objectionable for many reasons, and to go through it
would be enormously expensive.  Clewe knew the country well, and
his soul glowed within him as he thought that here perhaps was an
opportunity for him to demonstrate the value of his invention, not
only as an agent in warfare, but as a wonderful assistant in the
peaceful progress of the world.

There was no reason why such shells should not be constructed for
the express purpose of making tunnels.  Nothing could be better
adapted for an experiment of this kind than the low mountain in
question.  If the shell passed through it at the desired point,
there would be nothing beyond which could be injured, and it
would then enter the end of a small chain of mountains, and might
pass onward, as far as its motive power would carry it, without
doing any damage whatever.  Moreover, its course could be
followed and it could be recovered.

Both Roland and Margaret were very enthusiastic in favor of this
trial of the automatic shell, and they determined that if the
railroad company would pay them a fair price if they should
succeed in tunnelling the mountain, they would charge nothing
should their experiment be a failure.  Of course the tunnel the
shell would make, if everything worked properly, would not be
large enough for any practical use; but explosives might be
placed along its length, which, if desired, would blow out that
portion of the mountain which lay immediately above the tunnel,
and this great cut could readily be enlarged to any desired
dimensions.

Clewe would have gone immediately to confer with the secretary of
the railroad company, with whom he was acquainted.  but that
gentleman was at the sea-side, and the business was necessarily
postponed.

"Now," said Clewe to Margaret, "if I could do it, I'd like to
take a run up to the polar sea and see for myself what they have
discovered.  Judging from Sammy's infrequent despatches, the
party in general must be getting a little tired of Mr. Gibbs's
experiments and soundings; but I should be intensely interested
in them."

"I don't wonder," answered Margaret, "that they are getting
tired; they have found the pole, and they want to come home.
That is natural enough.  But, for my part, I am very glad we
can't run up there.  Even if we had another Dipsey I should
decidedly oppose it.  I might agree that we should go to Cape
Tariff, but I would not agree to anything more.  You may discover
poles if you want to, but you must do it by proxy."

At this moment an awful crash was heard.  It came from the
building containing the automatic shell.  Clewe and Margaret
started to their feet.  They glanced at each other, and then both
ran from the office at the top of their speed.  Other people were
running from various parts of the Works.  There was no smoke;
there was no dust.  There had been no explosion, as Clewe had
feared in his first alarm.

When they entered the building, Clewe and Margaret stood aghast.
There were workmen shouting or standing with open mouths; others
were running in.  The massive scaffolding, twenty feet in height,
on which the shell had been raised so that the steel trough might
be run under it, lay in splinters upon the ground.  The great
automatic shell itself had entirely disappeared.

For some moments no one said anything; all stood astounded,
looking at the space where the shell had been.  Then Clewe
hurried forward.  In the ground, amid the wreck of the
scaffolding, was a circular hole about four feet in diameter.
Clasping the hand of a man near him, he cautiously peered over
the edge and looked down.  It was dark and deep; he saw nothing.

Roland Clewe stepped back; he put his hands over his eyes and
thought.  Now he comprehended everything clearly.  The weight of
the shell had been too great for its supports.  The forward part,
which contained the propelling mechanism, was much heavier than
the other end, and had gone down first, so that the shell had
turned over and had fallen perpendicularly, striking the ground
with the point of the cone.  Then its tremendous propelling
energy, infinitely more powerful than any dynamic force dreamed
of in the preceding century, was instantly generated.  The
inconceivably rapid motion which forced it forward like a screw
must have then commenced, and it had bored itself down deep into
the solid earth.

"Roland, dear," said Margaret, stepping quietly up to him, tears
on her pale countenance, "don't you think it can be hoisted up
again?"

"I hope not," said he.

"Why do you say that?" she asked, astonished.

"Because," he answered, "if it has not penetrated far enough into
the earth to make it utterly out of our power to get it again,
the thing is a failure."

"More than that," thought Margaret; "if it has gone down entirely
out of our reach, the thing is a failure all the same, for I
don't believe he can ever be induced to make another."




CHAPTER XVI

THE TRACK OF THE SHELL


During the course of his inventive life Roland Clewe had become
accustomed to disappointments; he was very much afraid, indeed,
that he was beginning to expect them.  If that really happened,
there would be an end to his career.

But when he spoke in this way to Margaret, she almost scolded
him.

"How utterly absurd it is," she said, "for a man who has just
discovered the north pole to sit down in an arm-chair and talk in
that way!"

"I didn't discover it," he said; "it was Sammy and Gibbs who
found the pole.  As for me--I don't suppose I shall ever see it."

"I am not so sure of that," she said.  "We may yet invent a
telescope which shall curve its reflected rays over the rotundity
of the earth and above the highest icebergs, so that you and I
may sit here and look at the waters of the pole gently splashing
around the great buoy."

"And charge a dollar apiece to all other people who would like to
look at the pole, and so we might make much money," said he.
"But I must really go and do something; I shall go crazy if I sit
here idle."

Margaret knew that the loss of the shell was the greatest blow
that Roland had ever yet received.  His ambitions as a scientific
inventor were varied, but she was well aware that for some years
he had considered it of great importance to do something which
would bring him in money enough to go on with his investigations
and labors without depending entirely upon her for the necessary
capital.  If he could have tunnelled a mountain with this shell,
or if he had but partially succeeded in so doing, money would
have come to him.  He would have made his first pecuniary success
of any importance.

"What are you going to do, Roland?" said she, as he rose to leave
the room.

"I am going to find the depth of the hole that shell has made.
It ought to be filled up, and I must calculate how many loads of
earth and stones it will take to do it."

That afternoon he came to Mrs. Raleigh's house.

"Margaret," he exclaimed, "I have lowered a lead into that hole
with all the line attached which we have got on the place, and we
can touch no bottom.  I have telegraphed for a lot of sounding-wire,
and I must wait until it shall arrive before I do anything more."

"You must be very, very careful, Roland, when you are doing that
work," said Margaret.  "Suppose you should fall in!"

"I have provided against that," said he.  "I have laid a floor
over the hole with only a small opening in it, so there is no
danger.  And another curious thing I must tell you-our line is
not wet: we have struck no water!"

When Margaret visited the Works the next day she found Roland
Clewe and a number of workmen surrounding the flooring which had
been laid over the hole.  They were sounding with a windlass
which carried an immense reel of wire.  The wire was extremely
thin, but the weight of that portion of it which had already been
unwound was so great that four men were at the handles of the
windlass.

Roland came to meet Margaret as she entered.

"The lead has gone down six miles," he said, in a low voice, "and
we have not touched the bottom yet."

"Impossible!" she cried.  "Roland, it cannot be!  The wire must
be coiling itself up somewhere.  It is incredible!  The lead
cannot have gone down so far!"

"Leads have gone down as far as that before this," said he.
"Soundings of more than six miles have been obtained at sea."

She went with him and stood near the windlass.  For an hour she
remained by his side, and still the reel turned steadily and the
wire descended into the hole.

"Shall you surely know when it gets to the bottom?" said she.

"Yes," he answered.  "When the electric button under the lead
shall touch anything solid, or even anything fluid, this bell up
here will ring."

She stayed until she could stay no longer.  She knew it would be
of no use to urge Roland to leave the windlass.  Very early the
next morning a note was brought to her before she was up, and on
it was written:

"We have touched bottom at a depth of fourteen and an eighth
miles."


When Roland came to Mrs. Raleigh's house, about nine o'clock that
morning, his face was pale and his whole form trembled.

"Margaret," he cried, "what are we going to do about it?  It is
wonderful; I cannot appreciate it.  I have had all the men up in
the office this morning and pledged them to secrecy.  Of course
they won't keep their promises, but it was all that I could do.
I can think of no particular damage which would come to me if
this thing were known, but I cannot bear that the public should
get hold of it until I know something myself.  Margaret, I don't
know anything."

"Have you had your breakfast?" she asked.

"No," he said; "I haven't thought of it."

"Did you eat anything last night?"

"I don't remember," he answered.

"Now I want you to come into the dining-room," said she.  "I had
a light breakfast some time ago, and I am going to eat another
with you.  I want you to tell me something.  There was a man here
the other day with a patent machine for making button-holes--you
know the old-fashioned button-holes are coming in again--and if
this is a good invention it ought to sell, for nearly everybody
has forgotten how to make button-holes in the old way."

"Oh, nonsense!" said Roland.  "How can you talk of such things?
I can't take my mind--"

"I know you can't," she interrupted.  "You are all the time
thinking of that everlasting old hole in the ground.  Well, I am
tired of it; do let us talk of something else."

Margaret Raleigh was much more than tired of that phenomenal hole
in the earth which had been made by the automatic shell; she was
frightened by it.  It was something terrible to her; she had
scarcely slept that night, and she needed breakfast and change of
thought as much as Roland.

But it was not long before she found that it was impossible to
turn his thoughts from that all-absorbing subject.  All she could
do was to endeavor to guide them into quiet channels.

"What are you going to do this morning?" she asked, towards the
close of the breakfast.

"I am going to try to take the temperature of that shaft at
various points," said he.

"That will be an excellent thing," she answered; "you may make
valuable discoveries; but I should think the heat at that great
depth would be enough to melt your thermometers."

"It did not melt my lead or my sounding-wire," said he.  And as
he said these words her heart fell.

The temperature of this great perforation was taken at many
points, and when Roland brought to Margaret the statement of the
height of the mercury at the very bottom she was astounded and
shocked to find that it was only eighty-three degrees.

"This is terrible!" she ejaculated.

"What do you mean?" he asked in surprise.  "That is not hot.
Why, it is only summer weather."

But she did not think it terrible because it was so hot; the fact
that it was so cool had shocked her.  In such temperature one
could live!  A great source of trust and hope had been taken from
her.

"Roland," she said, sinking into a chair, "I don't understand
this at all.  I always thought that it became hotter and hotter
as one went down into the earth; and I once read that at twenty
miles below the surface, if the heat increased in proportion as
it increased in a mine, the temperature must be over a thousand
degrees Fahrenheit.  Your instrument could not have registered
properly; perhaps it never went all the way down; and perhaps it
is all a mistake.  It may be that the lead did not go down so far
as you think."

He smiled; he was becoming calmer now, for he was doing
something: he was obtaining results.

"Those ideas about increasing heat at increasing depths are
old-fashioned, Margaret," he said.  "Recent science has given
us better theories.  It is known that there is great heat in the
interior of the earth, and it is also known that the transmission
of this heat towards the surface depends upon the conductivity of
the rocks in particular locations.  In some places the heat comes
very near the surface, and in others it is very, very far down.
More than that, the temperature may rise as we go down into the
earth and afterwards fall again.  There may be a stratum of
close-grained rock, possibly containing metal, coming up from the
interior in an oblique direction and bringing the heat towards
the surface; then below that there may be vast regions of other
rocks which do not readily conduct heat, and which do not
originate in heated portions of the earth's interior.  When we
reach these, we must find the temperature lower, as a matter of
course.  Now I have really done this.  A little over five miles
down my thermometer registered ninety-one, and after that it
began to fall a little.  But the rocks under us are poor
conductors of heat; and, moreover, it is highly probable that
they have no near communication with the source of internal
heat."

"I thought these things were more exact and regular," said she;
"I supposed if you went down a mile in one place, you would find
it as hot as you would in another."

"Oh no," said he.  "There is nothing regular or exact in nature;
even our earth is not a perfect sphere.  Nature is never
mathematically correct.  You must always allow for variations.
In some parts of the earth its heated core, or whatever it is,
must be very, very far down."

At this moment a happy thought struck Margaret.

"How easy it would be, Roland, for you to examine this great
hole!  I can do it; anybody can do it.  It's perfectly amazing
when you think of it.  All you have to do is to take your
Artesian, ray machine into that building and set it over the
hole; then you can light the whole interior, all the way down to
the bottom, and with a telescope you can see everything that is
in it."

"Yes," said he; "but I think I can do it better than that.  It
would be very difficult to transfer the photic borer to the other
building, and I can light up the interior perfectly well by means
of electric lights.  I can even lower a camera down to the very
bottom and take photographs of the interior."

"Why, that would be perfectly glorious!" cried Margaret,
springing to her feet, an immense relief coming to her mind with
the thought that to examine this actual shaft it would not be
necessary for anybody to go down into it.

"I should go to work at that immediately," said he, "but I must
have a different sort of windlass--one that shall be moved by an
engine.  I will rig up the big telescope too, so that we can look
down when we have lighted up the bottom."

It required days to do all that Roland Clewe had planned. A
great deal of the necessary work was done in his own establishment,
and much machinery besides was sent from New York.  When all was
ready many experiments were made with the electric lights and
camera, and photographs of inexpressible value and interest were
taken at various points on the sides of this wonderful
perpendicular tunnel.

At last Clewe was prepared to photograph the lower portion of the
shaft.  With a peculiar camera and a powerful light five
photographs were taken of the very bottom of the great shaft, four
in horizontal directions and one immediately below the camera.
When these photographs were printed by the improved methods then
in vogue, Clewe seized the pictures and examined them with eager
haste.  For some moments he stood silent, his eyes fixed upon the
photographs as if there was nothing else in this world; but all he
saw on each was an irregular patch of light.  He thrust the prints
aside, and in a loud, sharp voice he gave orders to bring the great
telescope and set it up above the hole.  The light was still at the
bottom, and the instant the telescope was in position Clewe mounted
the stepladder and directed the instrument downward.  In a few
moments he gave an exclamation, and then he came down from the
ladder so rapidly that he barely missed falling.  He went into his
office and sent for Margaret.  When she came he showed her the
photographs.

"See!" he said.  "What I have found is nothing; even a camera
shows nothing, and when I look down through the glass I see
nothing.  It is just what the Artesian ray showed me; it is
nothing at all!"

"I should think," said she, speaking very slowly, "that if your
sounding-lead had gone down into nothing, it would have continued
to go down indefinitely.  What was there to stop it if there is
nothing there?"

"Margaret," said he, "I don't know anything about it.  That is
the crushing truth.  I can find out nothing at all.  When I look
down through the earth by means of the Artesian ray I reach a
certain depth and then I see a void; when I look down through a
perfectly open passage to the same depth, I still see a void."

"But, Roland," said Margaret, holding in her hand the view taken
of the bottom of the shaft, "what is this in the middle of the
proof?  It is darker than the rest, but it seems to be all
covered up with mistiness.  Have you a magnifying-glass?"

Roland found a glass, and seized the photograph.  He had
forgotten his usual courtesy.

"Margaret," he cried, "that dark thing is my automatic shell!  It
is lying on its side.  I can see the greater part of it.  It is
not in the hole it made itself; it is in a cavity.  It has turned
over, and lies horizontally; it has bored down into a cave,
Margaret--into a cave--a cave with a solid bottom--a cave made of
light!"

"Nonsense!" said Margaret.  "Caves cannot be made of light; the
light that you see comes from your electric lamp."

"Not at all!" he cried.  "If there was anything there, the light
of my lamp would show it.  During the whole depth of the shaft
the light showed everything and the camera showed everything; you
can see the very texture of the rocks; but when the camera goes
to the bottom, when it enters this space into which the shaft
plainly leads, it shows nothing at all, except what I may be said
to have put there.  I see only my great shell surrounded by
light, resting on light!"

"Roland," said Margaret, "you are crazy!  Perhaps it is water
which fills that cave, or whatever it is."

"Not at all," said Roland.  "It presents no appearance of water,
and when the camera came up it was not wet.  No; it is a cave of
light."

He sat for some minutes silently gazing out of the window.
Margaret drew her chair closer to him.  She took one of his hands
in both of hers.

"Look at me, Roland!" she said.  "What are you thinking about?"

He turned his face upon her, but said nothing.  She looked
straight into his eyes, and she needed no Artesian ray to enable
her to see through them into his innermost brain.  She saw what
was filling that brain; it was one great, overpowering desire to
go down to the bottom of that hole, to find out what it was that
he had discovered.

"Margaret, you hurt me!" he exclaimed, suddenly.  In the
intensity of the emotion excited by what she had discovered, her
finger-nails had nearly penetrated through his skin.  She had
felt as if she would hold him and hold him forever, but she
released his hand.

"We haven't talked about that button-hole machine," she said.  "I
want your opinion of it."  To her surprise, Roland began
immediately to discuss the new invention of which she had spoken,
and asked her to describe it.  He was not at all anxious now to
tell Margaret what he was thinking of in connection with the
track of the shell.




CHAPTER XVII

CAPTAIN HUBBELL DECLINES TO GO WHALING


The most impatient person on board the Dipsey was Captain Jim
Hubbell.  Sarah Block was also very anxious to go home as soon as
matters could be arranged for the return journey, and she talked
a great deal of the terrible fate which would be sure to overtake
them if they should be so unfortunate as to stay until the season
of the arctic night; but, after all, she was not as impatient as
Captain Hubbell.  She simply wanted to go home; but he not only
greatly desired to return to his wife and family, but he wanted
to do something else before he started south; he wanted to go
whaling.  He considered himself the only man in the whole world
who had a chance to go whaling, and he chafed as he thought of
the hindrances which Mr. Gibbs was continually placing in the way
of this, the grandest of all sports.

Mr. Gibbs was a mild man, and rather a quiet one; but he
thoroughly understood the importance of the investigations he was
pursuing in the polar sea, and placed full value upon the
opportunity which had come to him of examining the wonders of a
region hitherto locked up from civilized man.  Captain Hubbell
was astonished to find that Mr. Gibbs was as hard and unyielding
as an iceberg during his explorations and soundings.  It was of
no use to talk to him of whaling; he had work before him, and he
must do it.

But the time came when Mr. Gibbs relented.  The Dipsey had sailed
around the whole boundary of the polar sea; observations,
surveys, and maps had been made, and the general geography of the
region had been fairly well determined.  There still remained
some weeks of the arctic day, and it was desirable that they
should begin their return journey during that time; so Mr. Gibbs
informed Captain Jim that if he wanted to do a little whaling, he
would like him to lose no time.

Almost from the time of their arrival in the polar sea the
subject of whales had greatly interested everybody on the Dipsey.
Even Rovinski, who had been released from his confinement after a
few days, because he had really committed no actual crime except
that of indulging in overleaping ambition, had spent every
available minute of leisure in looking for whales.  It was
strange that nothing in this Northern region interested the
people on the Dipsey (with the sole exception of Mr. Gibbs) so much
as these great fish, which seemed to be the only visible
inhabitants of the polar solitudes. There were probably white bears
somewhere on the icy shores about them, but they never showed
themselves; and if birds were there, they did not fly over that
sea.

There was reason to suppose that there were a good many whales in
the polar sea.  Wherever our party sailed, lay to, or anchored
for a time, they were very sure, before long, to see a whale
curving his shining black back into the light, or sending two
beautiful jets of water up into the air.  Whenever a whale was
seen, somebody on board was sure to remark that these creatures
in this part of the world seemed to be very tame.  It was not at
all uncommon to see one disport himself at no great distance from
the vessel for an hour or more.