Page:The Black Cat v01no07 (1896-04).pdf/10

8 of the big liner united in one last desperate effort to offset the magnetic influence of the mysterious 'pirate.' The fires were revived in the engine room, the steam pressure in all the boilers was run up to the 'blowing off' point; then, suddenly, the reversing mechanism was applied and a shudder ran through the great floating city as the twin screws began to back water.

"For a few minutes there ensued a titanic tug of war such as the beholders had never before witnessed. The water astern was lashed into a lather of foam, and for a brief moment the triumph of steam over magnetism seemed assured.

"Only for a moment, however, for the cheer that had ascended from the anxious scores on the deck of the Oklahoma when she slowly began to back had scarcely died away when with a mighty crash a vital section of the overtaxed engines gave way, followed by a hoarse yell of consternation from the excited engineers and stokers—and both screws were helpless and still.

"With this failure hope was well-nigh extinguished; and the Oklahoma, with her precious freight and her 643 human souls, abandoned all active effort to escape. With not a sail of any kind in sight, she passively rolled and plunged southward for seven days after her strange and terrible pilot, from which, to add to the horror of the situation, no human sign had yet been given. The supply of rockets was now exhausted, and food was doled out in minute portions as to members of a shipwrecked crew in order to husband supplies.

"On the afternoon of the fourteenth day, when the exhausted passengers had reached the verge of distraction, a gleam of hope appeared on the horizon in the shape of a solitary steamer, bearing down from the southwest. A glance through the telescope proved her to be a fast and formidable British cruiser, evidently en route from South America to England.

"At this news a mighty shudder, half of hope, half of fear, seized the crowd assembled upon the deck. Would the British cruiser come to their assistance, and if so, would she, too, become a victim of the magnetic craft? For a moment their fate hung in the balance; then from three hundred throats rang out a hoarse cry of joy as the mysterious craft swerved, turned sharply and shot away over the surface of the Atlantic due north.