The Bomb-Makers

Ella reflected deeply. Then she answered:

“Perhaps both the man and woman came there for the purpose either of robbery – or – ”

“No. They were probably suspicious of your father’s manner, and came to examine the house.”

“But if they did not trust my father surely they would not be in active association with him, as you say they are,” the girl argued.

“True. But they might, nevertheless, have had their curiosity aroused.”

“And by so doing they may have seen us,” she declared apprehensively. “I hope not.”

“And even if they did, they surely would not recognise us again,” he exclaimed. “But,” he added, “no time must be lost. You must take another brief holiday from the theatre, and see what we can do.”

“Very well,” was the dancer’s reply. “I’ll see Mr Pettigrew to-morrow, and get a rest. It will give my understudy a chance.”

Over a fortnight went by.

It was half-past five o’clock on a cold January evening when a trainful of merry-faced girl munition workers stood at the Central Station at G – ready to start out to Rivertown to work on the night shift in those huge roaring factories where the big shells were being made.

Each girl wore a serviceable raincoat and close-fitting little hat, each carried a small leather attaché-case with her comb, mirror, and other little feminine toilet requisites, and each wore upon her blouse the brass triangle which denoted that she was a worker on munitions.

Peering out from the window of one of those dingy third-class compartments was a young girl in a rather faded felt hat and a cheap navy-blue coat, while upon the platform, apparently taking notice of nobody, stood a tallish young man in a brown overcoat. The munition-girl was Ella Drost, and the man her lover, Seymour Kennedy.

As the train at last moved out across the long bridge over the river, the pair exchanged glances, and then Ella, with her brass triangle on her blouse, sat back in the crowded carriage in thought, her little attaché-case upon her knees, listening to the merry chat of her fellow-workers.

Arrived at the station, she followed the crowd of workers to the huge newly-erected factory close by, a great hive of industry where, through night and day, Sunday and weekday, over eight thousand women made big shells for the guns at the front.

At the entrance-gate each girl passed singly beneath the keen eyes of door-keepers and detectives, for no intruder was allowed within, it being as difficult for strangers to gain admission there as to enter the presence of the Prime Minister at Downing Street.

The shifts were changing, and the day-workers were going off. Hence there was considerable bustle, and many of those lathes drilling and turning the great steel projectiles were, for the moment, still.

Presently the night-workers began to troop in, each in her pale-brown overall with a Dutch cap, around the edge of which was either a red or blue band denoting the status of the worker, while the forewomen were distinctive in their dark-blue overalls.

Some of the girls had exchanged their skirts for brown linen trousers. Those were the girls working the travelling cranes which, moving up and down the whole length of the factory, carried the shells from one lathe to another as they passed through the many processes between drilling and varnishing. Ella was among these latter, and certainly nobody who met her in her Dutch cap with its blue band, her linen overall jacket with its waistband, and her trousers, stained in places with oil, would have ever recognised her as the star of London revue.

Lithely she mounted the straight steep iron ladder up to her lofty perch on the crane, and, seating herself, she touched the switch and began to move along the elevated rails over the heads of the busy workers below.

The transfer of a shell from one lathe to another was accomplished with marvellous ease and swiftness. A girl below her lifted her hand as signal, whereupon Ella advanced over her, and let down a huge pair of steel grips which the lathe-worker placed upon the shell, at the same time releasing it from the lathe. Again she raised her hand, and the shell was lifted a few yards above her head and lowered to the next machine, where the worker there placed it in position, and then released it to undergo its next phase of manufacture.

Such was Ella’s work. In the fortnight she had been there she had become quite expert in the transfer of the huge shells, and, further, she had become much interested in her new life and its unusual surroundings In that great place the motive force of all was electricity. All those whirring lathes, drills, hammers, saws, cutting and polishing machines, cranes, everything in that factory, as well as the two other great factories in the near vicinity, were driven from the great electrical power-station close by.

Now and then, as the night hours passed, though within all was bright and busy as day, Ella would give a glance at the woman working the crane opposite hers, a thin-faced, dark-haired young woman, who was none other than the mysterious friend of the man Cole, and whom she held in great suspicion.

While Ella worked within the factory in order to keep a watchful eye, Seymour Kennedy watched with equal shrewdness outside.

The days went past, but nothing suspicious occurred until one night Cole, who was again living at the temperance hotel, joined the munition-workers’ train, being followed by Ella, who found that he had been engaged as an electrician in the power-house.

Next day he met the thin-faced young woman, who was known to her fellow-workers as Kate Dexter, and they spent several hours together, at lunch and afterwards at a picture-house. But, friends as they were, when they left the Central Station they took care never to travel in the same carriage. So, to their fellow-workers, they were strangers.

One afternoon, at half-past two, Kennedy, who was at the Central Hotel, called at Ella’s lodgings and explained how he had seen her father walking in the street with Cole.

“I afterwards followed them,” he added, “and eventually found that your father is at the Grand Hotel.”

“Then mischief is certainly intended,” declared the girl, her cheeks turning pale.

“No doubt. They mean to execute the plot without any further delay. That’s my opinion. It will require all our watchfulness and resource if we are to be successful.”

“Why not warn the police?” suggested the girl.

“And, by doing so, you would most certainly send your father to a long term of penal servitude,” was her lover’s reply. “No. We must prevent it, and for your own sake allow your father a loophole for escape, though he certainly deserves none.”

Ella had once travelled in the same train as the woman Dexter, but the latter had not recognised her; nevertheless, from inquiries Kennedy had made in London, it seemed that a month before the woman had been living in London, and was a close friend of Cole’s. She had only recently gone north to work on munitions, and had, like Ella, been instructed in the working of the electrical cranes.

For three days Theodore Drost remained at the Grand Hotel, where he had several interviews with the electrician Cole, and while Ella kept out of the way by day and went to the works at night, her lover very cleverly managed to maintain a strict watch.

More than once Ella had contrived to pass the door of the great power-station with its humming dynamos which gave movement to that huge mass of machinery in the three factories turning out munitions, and had seen the man Cole in his blue dungarees busily oiling the machinery.

Once she had watched him using thick machine-oil from cans exactly similar to those she had seen stored beneath the table in her father’s laboratory.

Night after night Ella, working there aloft in her crane, waited and wondered. Indeed, she never knew from hour to hour whether the carefully laid plans of the conspirators might not result in some disastrous explosion, in which she herself might be a victim.

But Kennedy reassured her that he was keeping an ever-watchful vigil, and she trusted him implicitly. As a matter of fact, one of the London detectives watching the place was a friend of his, and, without telling him the exact object of his visit, he was able to gain entrance to the works.

Naturally the detective became curious, but Kennedy, who usually wore an old tweed suit and a seedy cap, promised to reveal all to him afterwards.

About half-past one, on a wet morning, Ella had just stopped her crane when, at the entrance end of the building, she caught a glimpse of some one beckoning to her. It was her well-beloved. In a few moments she had clambered down, and, hurrying through the factory, joined him outside.

“Did you travel with that woman Dexter to-night?” he inquired eagerly in a low whisper as they stood in the darkness.

“Yes.”

“Did she carry her attaché-case?”

“Yes. She always does.”

“She did not have it when she went home yesterday morning, for she left it here – the case which your father prepared,” he said. “She brought the second of the cases with her to-night.”

“Then both are here!” exclaimed Ella in excitement.

“Both are now in the power-house. I saw her hand over the second one to Cole only a quarter of an hour ago. Let us watch.”

Then the pair crept on beneath the dark shadows through the rain to the great square building of red-brick which, constructed six months before, contained some of the finest and most up-to-date electrical plant in all the world.

At last they gained the door, which stood slightly ajar. The other mechanics were all away in the canteen having their early morning meal, and the man Cole, outwardly an honest-looking workman, remained there in charge.

Together they watched the man’s movements.

Presently he came to the door, opened it, and looked eagerly out. In the meantime, however, Kennedy and his companion had slipped round the corner, and were therefore out of view. Then, returning within, Cole went to a cupboard, and as they watched from their previous point of vantage they saw him unlock it, displaying the two little leather attaché-cases within.