LITMIR.BIZ

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This time closer at hand. They even fancied that they heard a human cry. Fawley would have stepped into his car but the staff officer by his side checked him.

      “They were flying at over two thousand feet,” he said. “No one could live till the end.”

      Fawley pointed upwards to where that faint violet light seemed to have discoloured the whole sky.

      “You see that area, General,” he pointed out. “Nothing living could exist within it. No form of explosive could be there which would not ignite. No metal that would not be disintegrated. The man who works the hellnotter has no need to aim. He has an illimitable range, a range which in theory might reach the stars, and a field of ever-increasing miles as the ray flashes. A hellnotter is the last word in horrors. It has been your own choice to sacrifice your men, but you will not find a single machine which exists except in charred fragments, or a single recognisable human being. If the squadron to-night, instead of ten aeroplanes, had consisted of a thousand, the result would have been precisely the same. There would not have been a human being alive or a wing of a machine to tell the story.”

      Fawley spoke with no elation—sorrowfully though convincingly. Berati spoke only once and his thoughts seemed far away.

      “Von Salzenburg knew. God!”

      The violet tinge in the sky seemed to lean in their direction. There was a warning shout from Fawley. In a crowd they dashed into the wide opening of the shelter, outside which the cars had stopped. Fawley called out to them.

      “Keep well away from the mouth,” he directed. “There was one about a mile up. I heard the humming.”

      His voice echoed and re-echoed down the smoothly tunnelled aperture. Bastani opened his lips to reply but for the next few moments no speech was possible. From outside came a sound like the battering of the earth by some gigantic flail, the crashing of metal striking the rocks, the roar of an explosion. An unnatural calm fell upon them all. They were in almost complete darkness, but when Berati pulled out his electric torch, their faces were like white masks in the velvety blackness. Outside in a matter of seconds the fierce rain had ceased. There was the hissing and crackling of flames, a lurid light which for the moment showed them the whole countryside. The silence, which lasted for a few seconds, was broken once more by the screaming of birds and the galloping back and forth of terrified cattle. Bastani pushed his way to the front.

      “It is my duty to see something of this in the moment of its opening.”

      The French officer in charge remonstrated violently.

      “Marshal Bastani,” he begged, “you have been placed in my care. This is all new to us. There may be another explosion. In any case, nothing will have changed if we wait.”

      Bastani pushed him gently but with force on one side.

      “It is my duty,” he repeated. “I must be the first to investigate. It is for that that I am here.”

      He disappeared into the mists outside and they saw the flash of his torch as he turned towards the ascent. The French officer shrugged his shoulders.

      “You will bear witness, gentlemen, that I did my best to stop the Marshal. We have had no experience in the after events of such a cataclysm as this.”

      They talked in desultory fashion. Berati smoked furiously. The seconds were drawn out. Conversation was spasmodic and disconnected. Then Fawley, who was nearest to the entrance, pointed out a thin pencil of light between two mountains eastward.

      “The morning comes quickly here,” he said. “In half an hour at the most we can leave.”

      Almost as he spoke, there was another explosion which shook large fragments of rock from the sides of their shelter. In one place the cement floor beneath their feet cracked. Then there was silence.

      “I wish Bastani had stayed with us,” Berati murmured.

      * * * * *

      The dawn through which they started their short ride to Colonel Dumesnil’s headquarters brought its own peculiar horrors. With every yard they found strange distorted fragments of metal—nothing recognisable. A bar of steel transposed into the likeness of a Catherine wheel. What might have been the wing of an aeroplane rolled up like a sheet of paper. At different points on the mountainside there were small fires burning. At the last bend they came suddenly upon a man, walking round in circles in the road. He wore the rags of a portion of torn uniform. One side of his face was unrecognisable. Blood was dripping from a helpless arm.

      “Count Bastani! My God!” one of the Italian staff officers cried.

      They were near enough to see him now. He looked at them with wild eyes, threw up one arm and called out. Then, as though he had tripped, he fell backwards heavily. There was plenty of help at hand but Air Marshal Bastani was dead.

      * * * * *

      In the orderly room of the French headquarters hidden amongst the hills, Colonel Dumesnil’s secretary was seated typing. Dumesnil himself, who had raced on from the pass, rose to his feet mechanically at their entrance. He handed a sheet of paper to Berati, who was the first to stagger in. The latter waved it away.

      “Read it to me,” he begged. “My eyes are blind with the horrors they have looked upon.”

      “It is my first report to headquarters,” Dumesnil confided.

      I have to report that ten apparently enemy aeroplanes endeavoured to cross the frontier to-night at varying distances. All ten machines were at once destroyed and all pilots are believed to have perished. I regret also to announce that Air Marshal Luigi Bastani, one of the observers selected by the Italian War Office, having left the shelter provided, was killed by the falling fragments of one of the planes.

       DUMESNIL,

       Colonel.

      “The Air Marshal’s body was brought in a few minutes ago,” the Colonel announced…“My orderly has prepared coffee in the mess room.”

      A soldier servant threw open the door of the next room. Somehow or other, every one staggered in that direction. The windows looked across the precipice to the mountains eastward. As they sank into their places, the first rays of the rising sun in ribald beauty moved across the snows.

      CHAPTER XXX

       Table of Contents

      Fawley reached Berlin a tired man, with the firm determination, however, to sleep for twenty-four hours. At the end of that time he came back into the world, submitted himself to the full ministrations of an adequate coiffeur and sent around a note, asking for an interview with Heinrich Behrling. There seemed to be some slight hesitation about granting his request, but in the end it was acceded to. Behrling, now established in a palace, received him a little coolly.

      “You lacked confidence in me, I fear, Major Fawley,” Behrling remarked, motioning him towards a chair but making no effort to shake hands. “Well, you see what has happened. I suppose you know? Some of the newspapers have done their best to hide their heads in the sand but the truth is all the time there.”

      “I never lacked confidence in you,” Fawley said. “I never doubted your star. You have triumphed as you deserve to triumph. I have come here to make sure that you retain all that you have won.”

      Behrling moved uneasily in his chair.

      “What do you mean—retain what I have won?” he demanded harshly. “There is no question about that.”

      “Perhaps not,” Fawley replied. “At the same time, it is necessary that you should forget the satisfaction of small triumphs. You must rise above them. Italy, if she turned towards any one, would turn towards you. Any idea of a treaty signed by any one else on behalf of Germany has been washed out. On the other hand, the treaty itself has vanished.”

      Behrling looked keenly

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