THE WIRELESS OPERATOR The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 18, 6 May 1909, Page 683

THE WIRELESS OPERATOR

The Storyteller

At 10 o'clock that particular evening Marcus Floyd entered the operating-room of the Cape Cod station of the International Wireless Company. Gray, whom he was to relieve, came forward to meet him.

' It's thickening up outside,' remarked young Floyd, as he divested himself of his top-coat, upon which the condensed moisture from the sea fog lay in glistening globules. Gray, never a talkative man, grunted and went out, closing the door noisely behind him. Mark threw his cap into a corner, glanced at the Marconi communication chart hanging on the wall, and tightened up a wobbly binding-nut on the automatic receiver. Then he filled his pipe and drew a chair close to the stove. His spell would last until 6 o'clock in the morning, and it is not pleasant to sit around in damp boots. Yet, come to think of it, why should he be exercised over so trifling a matter as wet feet? This was Saturday, the 10th of September, and it was just four weeks ago that Lorna Gaydon had gone oiit of his life for ever; it seemed incredible that he should be thinking now of anything ; ,_,less important. ' I must be getting over it,' he concluded/ grimly. It had been a foolish misunderstanding, so utterly triSfel in its nature that for the life of him Mark could not remember its initial point of departure. Yet neither would yield, and the gap had quickly widened ; four days later Miss Gaydon had sailed for Europe, and a "steamer letter brought him back the ring and a cold word of farewell. Two weeks later he noted the names of her party among the arrivals at a London hotel, and that was all. In the briefest possible words : Marcus Floyd, bachelor, aged four-and-twenty, and a two-year-old graduate in electrical engineering. Upon the completion of his course, Mr. James Coldwell, maternal uncle and president of the International Wireless, had offered young Floyd a place in his operating department of the company. ' It's one thing to graduate at the head of a college class,' remarked Mr. Coldwell, thoughtfully, ' and they tell me down at Princeton that you're clever. But this is business; will you begin again at the bottom?' 'Try me,' Mark had answered, confidently. Now, at the end of his two years' apprenticeship he had gained sufficient practical experience to qualify as an operator, and this was his first month of really reponsible duty. Uncle James, keeping a watchful eye on his nephew's progress, was well pleased, but took care not to say so openly. ' He is clever, right enough,' decided this Spartan relative, ' and I think that he has the stuff in him. If he has, it'll show for itself; we'll wait and see.' A very business-like nan was Marcus Floyd's Uncle James. But theie are some things outside of business and even beyond it — for instance, Miss Lorna Gaydon. A man must have always some object to work for, and in the youthful imagination the ideal is almost invariably personified. Success is a beautiful flower, and the young'man desires ardently to gather it. But not for himself; it is only the stage hero who may actually venture to wear ga\lands. The real man seeks his bays in order "that he may lay them at the feet of- some divinity whose loveliness they shall fittingly adorn. This is the normal and healthy incentive to masculine effort, and Mark Floyd had drawn his inspiration from the approved fount. It had been Lorna, always and eternally Lorna.- And now the" goddess had deserted his shrine; what did anything matter after that? To work along without an object, the one object — the proposition was virtually unthinkable. The clock struck 11, and almost simultaneously the young man's trained ear told him that the instruments were at work; some one was trying to communicate -with his station. He glanced at the tape, but the signals were too faint and irregular for reproduction by the automatic apparatus. ' Long distance,' said Mark to himself, and picked up the telephone receiver. He listened intently to the slight clicking of the diaphragm and recognised the distress call of the universal code; several times it was repeated, and then a message began ; by dint of guesswork he managed to get the gist of the communication. Written out, it read as follows: ' * .;' ' S.S. Sirius — four" days out — Liverpool to New York. Port engine wrecked — explosion low-pressure cylinder and ship's hull" badly damaged. Water gaining — heavy sea running — small boats — impossible May keep afloat — daybreak ' Here the message terminated abruptly .- Mark reached for the maritime register and looked up the call letters of the Sirius, Black Ball liner. They were E.S.S. He began sending with the coil, and a vicious spark leaped crackling across the gap as he pressed the

key E.S.S. again and yet again. At last be got the response. 'This is Cape Cod,' rapped out Mark. 'Where are you?' 'Mid-Atlantic. Unable to get sights for two days, but probably to south of west-bound lane. Water close to fire-boxes. Heavy sea running and pitch dark. It has just struck three. bells.' Mark wiped his damp brow and considered. ' Sho must be close to longitude 41 degrees,' he decided, ' and possible as low in latitude as 39 degrees 50 minutes.' He picked up the entry sheet, turned over to him by Gray, and studied it attentively. Three ships had been spoken during the early part of the night — the United States cruiser Springfield, the Bennett liner Navajo, and the King Harold, Lord Esmond's yacht, coming over for the America's cup races. Of course the King Harold was the- only boat within possible striking distance of the Sirius. Floyd sent out the King Harold's code signal several times without getting any response; then he picked up the Sirius and told her operator what he was trying to do. , ' You might call King Harold yourself,' he said. ' Her signal in the international code is A.E.A.' There was silence for perhaps ten minutes, and then Floyd's receiver spoke again. * ' Can't get King Harold,' reported the Sirius man. ' Captain Ward desires to send this message to his agents. Will you take it ? ' A brief official statement of the accident to the Sirius followed, and Mark transcribed it with painstaking care. It was like taking down the last words of a dying man, and his hand trembled as it raced over the writing-pad. k Anything more ? ' he asked, and in reply the Sirius operator announced that he had a batch of private messages to forward. 'If I can only keep my nerve,' went on the man : suddenly his sending had become weak and shaky as of one suddenly stricken with a great fear. ' Steady, old chap,' returned Floyd. ' You're still to the good, and I may pick up King Harold and time. She can't be more than fifty miles east or west of you — probably nearer. But just one moment — ' Mark pushed back his chair and went to the door; the atmosphere in the little room had become close and choky and he must have air. He flung the door wide open and looked out; the fog jumped at him as though it had beeen some* gray, misshapen monster waiting for its prey; misty tentacles of vapor crept across the threshold and coiled themselves about his f-eet. But he breathed again, and the thumping at his temples had sensibly lessened. For perhaps half a minute Mark Floyd stood gazing steadfastly into the night. Somewhere behind that thick curtain of darkness a dead ship lay rolling upon the lampless waste of sea, and men and women were awaiting the moment of their last agony. Out of that infinite darkness one feeble voice had called and his ear had heard. Yes, and had understood; beyond that there was nothing save the conspicuousness of his own helplessness; the need was bitter, and he had only words, words to offer. How slender was the thread uniting these doomed men with the living world; yet a little while and it must snap, and then there would be silence again — a silence that would remain unbroken. In an hour, perhaps, or even sooner. The sting of the thought sent him back quickly to the operating table. ' Sirius,' he called, and sat shaking in his chair while he awaited the reply; then it came. ' Are you ready ? ' asked the steamer's operator, and Floyd answered yes. There were perhaps a couple of dozen messages, and all were brief and characterized by a remarkable restraint of feeling; most of them had to do with purely business interests, and Mark found himself setting down the words as unemotionally as though they were nothing more than the commonplaces of the daily routine. A great despair mercifully numbs, and Mark felt his own spirit sinking in mysterious sympathy to that lower key. ' Morituri te salutamus,' he murmured, under his breath. When he had finished he looked at the clock and saw that it was on the stroke of four. 'Is there any change ?' he asked. ' Day is breaking,' came the answer, ' but the sea is still high, and there is nothing in sight. The small boats have all disappeared, and the ship seems to be settling steadily. With the putting out of the fires the dynamos will stop, of course, and communication must cease. Go on talking as long as possible— if you don't mind.' '.In a moment — after I have tried for King Harold again,' returned Mark. He began sending out the latter's signal— A.E. A. — in monotonous iteration, and as he did fo he picked up his entry-pad to run over the messages that he had taken down. Incredible as it may seem, it was only then that he realised that one of them bore his own name and address; he read the half-dozen words it con-

' I was coining back to you.' The signature was 'L.G.

Mark bent down and felt the soles of his boots. They were quite dry again, and the assurance brought with it a distinct sense of relief. Long afterward when he recalled this trivial incident its apparent irrationality puzzled him mightily, until he reflected that Nature always seeks the nearest and handiest safety-valve at a moment of emotional overcharge. He had been bothering about the discomfort of wet feet, and the slight reaction was sufficient to balance the immediate effect of the greater shock ; he straightened up to find himself in full and cool possession of every faculty. ' Sirius,' he called, and, ' Here,' came the answer. ' I want to speak to Miss Gaydon, one of your firstclass passengers. The message she sent was addressed to me, Mark Floyd.' He spelled the name out carefully. 'Have you got that? Please repeat.' < F-i-o-y-d. Right. I remember meeting you once at the International New York Office. My name is Wood. I have sent for Miss Gaydon to come to the operatingroom.' While he was waiting Mark tried again for the King Harold— A.E.A., A.E.A., A.E.A. Presently Wood broke ' Miss Gaydon is here,' he announced. What am I to tell her ? ' Mark stopped for an instant to consider; what one word should he choose of the myriad that crowded to his lips. ' She knows who it is ?' he began. ' Yes, she knows, and — ' here the message broke off abruptly. Mark sounded the "Sirius call once, twice, thrice; then he realised that communication had ceased entirely. There was but one explanation: the water must have reached the fires, and the dynamos supply electric power to the Marconi instruments had stopped working. But there was still the King Harold. A.E.A., A.E.A. — mechanically he kept pounding oub the call on the sending-key; an unreasoning fear that his own electrical power might fail obsessed him. The mihtites dragged on, and presently he noted that it was half-past four "o'clock. His fingers had stiffened with the constant repetition of the dots and dashes making up the cod© letters of the King Harold, and he stopped for a few moments to restore the retarded circulation; going to the tap, he held his hand under the cold stream and rubbed it vigorously with a coarse towel. Then a sense of the immense futility of all his efforts overcame him. 'What is the use ?' he said, aloud. ' Science cannot work miracles, and what I want is beyond the law— beyond the law.' As he turned again to his instruments his toe caught in a hole of the shabby strip of carpet covering the floor; he plunged heavily forward and his head came in contact with the corner of the operating-table. With the final effort of consciousness he pulled himself into his chair and found the key ; A.E.A. were the letters, and he must keep on sending them — keep on The ship's cabin, as Floyd saw it, was tolerably well filled with people. For the most part they sat about quietly, and there was but -little conversation, and that only in undertones. Of confusion or distress there was not a trace. At a side table sat two men, and they were drinking champagne with a certain curiously measured deliberation. One of them happened to let his glass clink ao-ainst the bottle and looked up hastily ; an evident apology upon his lips. But to his relief no one had seemed to Presently a steward came to them with fresh glasses and a plate of biscuits. -The dark-haired man pulled a piece of money from his pocket and held it out; by some accident the coin slipped through his fingers and rolled away across the floor. -- ' • ' Thank you, sir,' said the steward softly, and weut back to his dark passageway. The coin, a bright, newminted sovereign— lay where- it had finally fallen, and a little boy, of perhaps four years, escaped from his mother s lap and ran to pick it up. As he did so a roll of the ship sent him tumbling against a stanchion. Instantly his mother had him in her arms, hushing the childish sob* ' And" remember that mother will not let anything hurt you,' she added in a whisper. Floyd turned quickly aWa A tall gray-haired man— he looked, as though he might be some hopeless invalid going home to die— paced monotonously up and down, and Mark^ ancied that the roses in the carpet were worn and faded where his rest ess feet had passed and repassed; probably he had been walking m just that fashion for hours passed A young chap hardly over four-and-twenty, with a fresh, bright face sat under the main lightway poring over^ a pocket account-book and jotting down rows of figures with methodical precision.

"Presently he finished his comparisons, shut the book wibh a snap, and smiled complacently. He drew a cigar from his waistcoat pocket and half rose as though to go on deck; then he sank back in his chair and buried his face in. his hands. A priest began reading in a low tone 'from a little black book as < he moved about from one group to another; a dark-haired girl sat rigid in a secluded corner, staring straight before her as though fearing to lose a single word.But although listening, she heard nothing — of that Mark was sure. And then he saw that she was looking at tho clock. It was quiet now in the cabin, and the motion of the ship had ceased almost entirely. One might have fancied her safely moored at her dock were it not for the sinister and steadily increasing slope of the floor. The port-holes to starboard were already under the water-line, and it was but a pale and greenish light that filtered through them. The door of state-room No. 207 stood wide open, and Floyd saw that the apartment was empty. Then he remembered that his message had summoned her to the wireless operating-room. That was on the upper deck, of course; he would go up at once. Under the gray light of a stormy morning the ship wallowed heavily in a creaming seaway. The decks were encumbered with a raffle of broken spars and tangled run-ning-gear; at the life-boat davits the empty falls swung, idly, and on the dark and broken line of the horizon to leeward the hull of a capsized cutter showed for an instant wet and glistening, like a whale's back. There was no one to bo seen either on forecastle or bridge, but through the window of his cabin Mark caught a glimpse of tho commander of the Sirius, sitting at his desk — a silent, and motionless figure. A chart of the North Atlantic had Jbeea spread open before him, but it had twisted away, like some living thing, from under his hand, and had fallen to the floor, whero it lay with its stiff, crackling edges slowly curling together. Directly abaft the bridge the door of the wireless operating-room stood ajar; Floyd went forward quickly. As he entered he noticed that the clockdial keeping New York time indicated twenty-five minutes to five. The electrics were burning brightly. How could this be, since the dynamos had stopped working? There were three people in the room — a young chap who wore the uniform of a company surgeon, the unconscious man on the lounge, and the woman who stood with her back to the door, looking down at the patient. Tho_ doctor completed his examination and straightened up. ' It's only syncope,' he said abruptly. ' A fainting fit, you know, induced by over-excitement and all-night work with his instruments. Pull out of it? Why, of course; he'll be as good as ever in an hour or two. Though I'm not so sure that he isn't better off as he is,' he added under his breath; his eyes travelled outward to the gray and broken sealine. The sick man had raised himself to a sitting posture. ' I saw- her,' he said, excitedly. The King Harold — straight over the starboard bow and just below the horizon — A.E.A., that's her call — get me to the table — ' His voice thickened and trailed away into unintelligible mutterings; he fell back on the couch. The man and the woman looked at each other. 'If I only knew something about the business,' the_ little doctor said quietly. • ' But I don't — not the first, thing.' He took the hypodermic syringe from his pocket and turned to his patient. The girl's breath came hard and quick. 'If only some one knew,' she whispered to herself. To get to the- operating-table Mark had to pass directly in front of Miss Gaydon; he could have put out his hand and touched her, but the deeper instinct restrained him. Yet she seemed to understand what it was he wanted her to do; she sat down at the instrument without any hesitation and pressed the key; the current was still on in full force, and a detonating spark followed. A.E.A. was the signal, and it was sent out twice in rapid succession. Then came a response. Mark opened his eyes slowly. The surroundings were unfamiliar; the clean, white walls, the green-shaded windows, the table covered with vials at his bedside — all these things confused and puzzled him. An attendant stepped up. 'Good! 'he said, heartily. ' You'll be coming right along now — drink, this.' Mark obeyed and slept again. When he awoke later in the day the confusion in his mind was gone. ' Hospital?' he said, inquiringly, to the man in the white duck uniform. ' You had a nasty knock on the head,' answered -the. nurse, ' and .just the barest touch of fever to supervene. Want to sit up ? Why not — no, to-day is Wednesday, the 14th.' Outside in the street a stentorian voice was calling : ' Extra ! Extra !' Then came a jumble of undistinguish-

able words, out of which two rang significant and unmistakable — King Harold and Sirius.

Later on it was decided that he might see a copy of the Evening Messenger, and one was brought in. The head-lines told the story — the rescue of the passengers and crew of the s.s. Sirius by the King Harold, Lord Esmond's yacht. A column of description followed, and then several interviews, notably one with the King Harold's sailingmaster. ' We_ carry a wireless, operator,' said Captain Law, * but he is not on duty at night — not considered necessary. Early in the morning of Sunday, the 11th, Mr. James, the operator, was awakened out of a sound sleep by hearing the international signal call of the yacht — A E A-r-twice repeated. It was then, about 20 minutes to 5, New York time. He answered, and received the following message: "S.S. Sirius foundering — steer S.W." Of course, we obeyed, and that is all I know about the affair.' 'All?' repeated Mark to himself, and Jay there wondering. ' Now, you mustn't read any more,' put. in the nurse, authoritatively. ' However, I don't mind telling you that a lady called to see just now. I told her that she could come again in the morning — any time after 10 o'clock. She gave me her card — what did I do with it?'

' Never mind,' said Mark. ' Just get some water for the violets, and pus them where I can look at them.' — Harper's Weekly.