Oil Upon the Waters

by Morgan Robertson

OIL UPON THE WATERS

By Morgan Robertson

"THE instrument is getting drunk," said the executive officer, as he joined the group on the after superstructure deck. "Trouble is coming from somewhere."

"Mr. Clarkson, I protest," said the chaplain warmly. "In my capacity of Gospel interpreter I protest against calling Finnegan an instrument of Providence. Why do you permit him to drink?"

"Captain's orders," said the officer.

"So that he may become an instrument of Providence, Mr. Parmlee," added the surgeon, slapping the chaplain good-humoredly on the back. "Think of the many times he has saved this ship and all hands by doing something when drunk that he couldn't do if sober."

"Of course, you are right. Providence seems to choose Finnegan in some mysterious manner to— But it is bewildering. I cannot understand it. How does he know what to do?"

"You forget the subjective state," said the surgeon, "into which Finnegan is thrown when drunk. You forget the clairvoyant knowledge possessed by the subliminal self—that you call the immortal soul."

"Speak English," said the chief engineer. "Where did Finnegan get a soul?"

"Go down to your engines," answered Dr. Bryce severely. "Even they have souls—even engineers have souls, though they don't know it."

"But seriously, doctor," said the engineer, "I thought clairvoyance was all humbug. What is this subliminal self?"

"The primordial brain, inherent through all organic change—of which instincts are but manifestations—that cares for drunken men and fools, that brings back the cat and the carrier pigeon, that has knowledge of all things, thoughts or conditions in heaven or earth of interest to that brain's owner."

"Does it prophesy?" asked the chaplain. "Hasn't Finnegan displayed prophetic insight?"

"Not at all—only clairvoyant knowledge of existing conditions that threaten trouble. The dumb pressure of this inward knowledge makes him uneasy, and he drinks, befuddles his objective mind, and gets in closer touch with this knowledge—in the subjective or hypnotoid state. The subliminal self is dumb—it can only impart its knowledge by affirmation."

"How? Explain this," said the puzzled engineer.

"By affirmation. When the objective mind, or brain, speculates or guesses rightly—that is, when the stream of consciousness happens to touch upon anything in connection with the hidden fact known only to the subliminal self, there will be an uprush of feeling that affirms, confirms, clinches—and we act, or merely know. When this knowledge is of facts or conditions we call it intuition, when of a thought in the mind of another we call it telepathy."

"Whew!" said the engineer, waving both hands and shaking his head. "It's too much for me." He departed in mock baste.

"Mr. Clarkson," said the surgeon to the first lieutenant, "if Finnegan is drinking, he is subject to an inward pressure. What trouble threatens this ship or her people?"

"None, that I know of," answered the executive slowly, looking around on the calm sea and blue sky. "All hands are well, this ship is invulnerable to anything but Whitehead torpedoes, and we can sink any craft carrying them before she can get near us. The forward thirteen-inch gun-mount is out of order, but we'll find the difficulty when we're out far enough. The barometer is falling, but I don't anticipate a gale, and it needs a typhoon and a cross sea to disturb this ship. No, I see no trouble—though Finnegan may. Here he is, now." They peered down over the break of the superstructure at a gray-haired, emaciated old man, with a vacant smile on his face, being pursued around the after-turret by the master-at-arms.

"Out o' this, Finnegan," said the ship's chief of police as he caught him. Then he pushed him gently forward.

"Jes' wanted to tell the cap'n 'bout it," mumbled Finnegan. "Battleships are bad gun-platforms—he wants ter know it."

The first lieutenant and surgeon exchanged glances.

"What's on his mind?" asked the former. "Battleships are the best gun-platforms afloat."

"Don't know," returned the surgeon thoughtfully. "Better watch him."

"I won't have time," said the lieutenant. "You watch him. I have troubles of my own."

"All right—I will. Don't lock him up."

The group separated, and Mr. Clarkson went to the forward thirteen-inch turret, where a damaged gun-mount demanded attention; and, this attended to, his mind was taken up with the target practice of all the gun crews for the next three hours. At the end of that time two distinct and apparently irrelevant facts were brought to his busy mind—one, by messenger from the officer of the deck, that the barometer was below 29, the other that Finnegan was still drunk, but no drunker. The latter fact was attested by the appearance of the old man himself in the turret, where the executive officer and the gun crews were perspiring over the work. Both guns had been loaded with solid shot, and were to be fired at extreme elevation.

"Good gunsh," remarked Finnegan, as the men took positions for firing. "Good gunsh—shoot a long way—but can't hit torpedo boats."

"Yes," answered Mr. Clarkson, eying him severely. "Good guns—shoot ten miles—over the horizon. Get out of here."

The harmless and useless old fellow was hustled out and into the arms of the listening surgeon, who led him away. Then the port gun was fired, and a huge pointed cylinder of solid steel weighing over a half ton went up into the air, while the great gun sagged, back on its oil cushion.

But there were other sounds in the turret than the roar of the gun; there were the crackling of breaking steel, the swishing of hot oil and the exclamations of startled men. No one was injured; but investigation disclosed that the turret flooring had given way, that the elevating gear of both guns was damaged beyond immediate repair, and that the hydraulic rammers were disabled. The charge in the other gun could not be extracted, and the condition of the gun-mount made it unwise to discharge the gun. The whole forward thirteen-inch turret was out of commission, and could not be repaired away from a dockyard; so, with one gun empty, the other loaded, and both pointing upward at an angle of fifteen degrees, they swung the turret amidships and left it.

"Sticking up like a couple of sore thumbs," grunted Mr. Clarkson, as he joined the surgeon and looked back at the guns. "What has the oracle to say about this?"

"You mean Finnegan?" answered the surgeon. "I've just left him. His rather muddled comment was to the effect that such heavy weights at an elevation made battleships rather top-heavy and that bad weather was coming.

"Well, dammit," said the officer in amazement, "he's right; but what's taken hold of him? What means this technical erudition?"

"Don't know. I've put him to sleep in the sick-bay, and he's safe—or, rather, we're safe for awhile—from prophecy."

Not altogether; Finnegan's prediction of bad weather was ratified by the still falling barometer, and before midnight the big ship was pounding into a head sea that compelled her, massive as she was, to slow down. Even at half speed the Argyll went through the seas oftener than over them. Green hills of water rose over the bow, plunged aft and shattered against the forward turret and superstructure, to rise as high as the bridge in an almost solid mass of foam. Battleships, heavy with armor and guns, are notoriously poor sea boats, and the Argyll was no better than her class; she made bad weather of it. And, as though this straight-on, regular head sea were not severe enough to the big, unwieldy and very bad sea boat, the furious wind that came out of the dark like a solid mass—pressing insistently—hauled just before daylight, and blew from a direction at right angles to the first. Then arose a cross sea—a combination of forces against which the best helmsmen often are helpless, and with her steering engine straining like an overworked giant the Argyll plunged and rolled, and lifted and sank, until, as day broke over the troubled ocean, Mr. Clarkson was forced to admit that another of Finnegan's comments was based upon truth; the elevated gun muzzles made her a little more top-heavy.

But typhoons are short-lived. By ten o'clock a rising barometer brought comfort to the distracted ship's company, and the wind hauled further and moderated. But there was little abatement of the bewildering cross sea, and there was an almost continuous succession of rain squalls bombarding the ship that kept fully a third of the horizon hidden at all times. Yet, in spite of the general discomfort, it being Sunday morning, Mr. Parmlee held services on the berth-deck.

Tired and sleepy as they were, the half thousand men, gripping the benches to keep their seats, were impressed by the chaplain's sincere words. They listened intently, joined in the hymn played by the band, and bowed their heads in prayer as the earnest young chaplain gave thanks to the God of storms for their reprieve from death. But as his voice dropped its cadence in the final amen every man there sprang to his feet, for preceding the amen by a tenth of a second there rang through the ship a thundering report and a crash that came of nothing less than the discharge of a thirteen-inch gun.

Church "let out." Away they went, an undisciplined mob, and surrounded Finnegan descending from the big forward turret, with a startled, dumfounded expression on his face and blood streaming from a wound in it inflicted by some flying fragment of the further wrecked turret-gear. The big starboard gun had been fired, and, though it now pointed higher than before, its centre of gravity was unquestionably lower; for it had broken down through the weakened flooring and hung in the wreckage, a menace to everything beneath it. They began slinging both guns in chains, and bracing them with shores—a long, hard job—while Finnegan, shocked into sobriety, but nerveless and uncertain of movement, was haled into the presence of the captain and his officers. Dr. Bryce, at his own request, was permitted to do the questioning.

"Why did you fire the gun, Finnegan?" he asked kindly.

"'Fore Gawd, sir," whimpered the old fellow, "I dunno—I felt like it—and—I dunno. I felt I oughter—that is, 'fore I did it—then I felt like a fool."

"Why did you feel that you ought to fire it? What did you think was wrong?"

"I felt—all night—yes, sir—all night I kinder dreamed o' firin' it—gettin' rid o' the weight. 'Twas on my mind when I turned out, and I jes' couldn't help it, sir."

"Had you taken a drink this morning? Speak truly—you know you are permitted to drink."

"I took three nips, sir—one 'fore breakfast."

"Then you were in normal condition. Finnegan, yesterday you said something about battleships being bad gun-platforms. What did you mean? Had your firing the gun any connection with that idea?"

Finnegan looked bewildered, but did not answer.

"You said, too," went on the surgeon, "that the big guns could shoot a long way, but could not hit torpedo boats. Do you remember what put the idea into your head?"

The old fellow looked helplessly around.

"Forgotten, I suppose," continued the surgeon. "Well, all right. Then we are to take, as your reason for firing the gun, that you considered the weight of the shot and powder a danger?"

"Yes, sir," answered Finnegan, his face clearing. "She was loggy in the seaway—she was top-heavy. I couldn't get it off my mind, sir—honest, I jes' couldn't stop thinkin'."

"Very well—that is all," said the surgeon. "Mr. Clarkson"—he turned to the executive officer—"has he improved the stability of the ship? Has he done any real good?"

"No," answered the lieutenant, eying the cringing old man severely. "He has lessened the moment of inertia but a trifle and the danger was past."

"Then it was an auto-suggestion, delivered to his subliminal self when the danger was real—and it persisted. He spoke last evening of bad gun-platforms, which is a thought connected with top-heaviness; and of guns shooting far, but being unable to hit torpedo boats—equally connected. Auto-suggestion and association of ideas, gentlemen, that is all."

"All!" said the irreverent chief engineer. "Isn't that enough? I thought he was only drunk."

"Not at all—simply the victim of persistent subliminal promptings, first delivered as an auto-suggestion to the subconscious mind by its objective fellow, and finding ready and reactive relief through a train of associated——"

"Oh, Lord, sir!" broke in the victim piteously. "I didn't do all that, sir. I only took three drinks."

But because the victim of auto-suggestion, subliminal promptings and association of ideas had disturbed church and the doubtful peace of the ship's company on that stormy Sabbath morning, he was consigned to the brig—where he went to sleep; and Dr. Bryce, having solved the problem to his satisfaction, sought his room to incorporate the result in a thesis he was preparing on the subject. But sleep and thesis were both impinged upon by a huge antithetical fact forgotten by Finnegan and unconsidered by the doctor. Finnegan awakened with a groan of disgust and the doctor arose with a sigh, for there sounded through the ship the bugle call to quarters, followed by the continuous rattle of all small and secondary guns. Going to the bridge, Dr. Bryce found those of his brother officers not at stations inspecting through the rain squalls a line of long, low, four-funneled craft about a mile ahead, the most sinister and evil-appearing of all seagoing war craft, torpedo-boat destroyers.

"Great guns!" exclaimed Mr. Clarkson, as the surgeon reached his side.

"Is it possible that Finnegan had clairvoyant knowledge that they were there and tried to hit them? He said that the big guns would shoot a long way."

"But he also said," answered the doctor, with doubt and speculation in his face, "that torpedo boats couldn't be hit. One thought, as a subliminal inspiration, would annul the other."

"Yet everything he's said or done has relevancy except one: Why did he fire that big gun?"

"Because he was drunk," growled the listening engineer, "You fellows will get the fantods if you don't look out. They're catching. I shall avoid you."

"Do so," answered the surgeon loftily. "You are only an engineer. God made you, it is true—and He made Finnegan."

Laughing as he went, the engineer left the bridge for the engine-room, where he was needed; and for similar reasons Mr. Clarkson left further immediate consideration of Finnegan to the surgeon, and devoted himself to the problem in hand, which promised to be serious. The sea was still heavy, running in two directions; and not only the big battleship, but the smaller, lighter and faster craft ahead were tossed and tumbled about in a manner to make accurate gun-fire impossible. But herein lay the difference and the problem in hand. While the Argyll had nothing but gun-fire with which to withstand those swift and elusive enemies, and was left helpless by its elimination, they, on the contrary, weakly endowed in this form of aggressiveness, dominated the situation by possession of a weapon of war unaffected by the non-stability of gun-platforms—deadly mechanical fish that, undisturbed by wave motion or deflecting obstacle, maintain the original direction given them by the tubes from which they are propelled; that seek a twenty-foot depth and keep it while they travel at a thirty-knot rate; that carry in their heads a charge of guncotton, explodable on impact, that can tear out the side of the strongest battleship afloat—Whitehead torpedoes.

There were four destroyers in sight through the smother, each a magnified torpedo boat, able to take to the sea, but carrying the usual pair of tubes and store of torpedoes. And there was strong evidence that they meant to use them. There were signals displayed from the small yards, crossed up forward, and the two rear boats circled around, taking up positions on the bow and quarter of the Argyll, while the two ahead shot across her path to reach similar positions on the other side. It was to be a simultaneous rush of boats from four directions, and perhaps from five, for farther ahead, only occasionally taking form through the driving rain and spume, seemed to be another long, low craft. Perhaps there were even others, farther along and out of sight—called by the voice of the thirteen-inch gun.

The Argyll barked and spat with her small and secondary guns, but not an enemy was hit. Not a gun could be aimed in that furious turmoil of tossing water, which hove the ship down broadside to forty-five degrees and pitched her fore and aft to twenty. Ballistic formulas were worthless; gunners could only load, and fire, at an approximate moment of swing. And soon firing was stopped because it was a sheer waste of ammunition. The officers uneasily paced the bridge.

"Battleships are bad gun-platforms," said Mr. Clarkson significantly to the surgeon, as for a moment their eyes met in passing.

"And big guns can't hit torpedo boats," answered the surgeon when they passed again. "And they really do make us top-heavy."

"But big guns shoot a long way," returned the executive, next time they passed. "What the devil did he mean?"

"Don't know. Wait—it'll work out. He meant something."

"Here they come!" called the captain suddenly. "Resume firing—every gun that will bear."

The mist in the air had thickened, blotting out the fifth craft ahead, and all but obliterating the four others which, it was dimly seen, had turned end-on to the Argyll and were coming each from its quarter-point in the circle of which the big tumbling ship was the centre. A menacing sight they appeared to these trained officers, versed in the possibilities of torpedo warfare; each a geometrical figure between two high white waves, that enlarged to the vision as does an approaching express train. And it was at express train speed that they came; a very few minutes would decide the fate of the Argyll and her seven hundred souls. If, in that heaving sea, but one shot as large as a twenty-pounder should hit a vital part of a boat, that boat would stop. But the storm of shot and shell flew wild; it hit the water at half distance; it flew in air and raised a cloud beyond the targets; it disappeared in the distant smudge: and the rushing destroyers came on, to half the distance, to a third; in a moment they would be within easy torpedo range, and the captain approached a voice tube, calling, "All hands!" and muttering the conclusion of his thought.

But before that moment arrived a shout went up from a casemate. One boat had been hit; for a cloud of steam arose, and she swung out of her course. Then more shouts were heard; two others stopped, one the centre of a radiating effulgence of red, which changed to thick, yellow smoke, and hid her few fragments from view; the other emitting steam like the first. The fourth wheeled about and fled, followed by shot and shell which went remarkably true compared with the inaccuracy of the preceding fire. The dazed and astonished officers on the bridge, and the exulting crews at the gun positions, did not, until the last of the quartet had settled beneath the surface from the deadly accuracy of the fire which ensued, realize that the sea had calmed—that, though the big ship still lifted and fell from the action of the ground-swell, there were no disturbing waves, no cross seas—no aim-destroying heave. The troubled ocean had become like plastic glass, though the wind still held its hurricane force and the air was filled with horizontal rain and spindrift.

There was no time for speculation; they had sunk but four destroyers. With guns silent and crews at stations, they steamed on through the storm, looking for that fifth long, low craft, and soon, through a break in the gray receding wall of spume into which they seemed to be rushing, they sighted her, quiet and inert but for her sluggish rolling—a two-masted craft, with gaffs aloft and the red ensign of England flying union down from her mainmast head—a merchant steamer in distress.

The battleship slowed down and lowered her boats. Before they were well clear of her side the listening officers on the bridge heard the exclamatory words of the men that manned them, telling of oil—oil upon the oars, oil upon the sea.

"Yes," said the rescued steamer skipper, as he told of his plight a little later, "she's a tank-steamer and was doomed for the bottom anyhow when those torpedo boats came up. But it wasn't them that sunk her and spread all this oil about—it was the act of God. Something came down sidewise out o' the sky—a meteor, I think—and went right through us. Curious—it left a round hole, about thirteen inches across."

"It was most certainly the act of God," said Mr. Parmlee reverentially, as they discussed it a little later.

"Finnegan's bullhead luck," commented the irreverent engineer.

"You are both right," said Dr. Bryce. "It was Finnegan's subliminal intelligence acting through the outlet of his muddled brain."

"D'you mean to say," queried the engineer, "that he had intelligent knowledge of what he was doing?"

"No, not as ordinarily understood. Nor was he the victim of false auto-suggestion, as we thought. But he had subconscious knowledge of the presence, over the horizon and in our path, of the four destroyers and the tank-steamer. He could only express his uneasiness in terms of objective consciousness—that is, when he thought of bad gun-platforms he was impelled to seek the captain. When he thought of the inefficiency of big guns against torpedo craft he was impelled to speak of it. He knew there was a possibility that at a certain moment of the ship's swing the range of the gun and the distance to the steamer would coincide, and he went to the turret. His all-night worry over the weight aloft and his firing the gun to get rid of it were only outlets for the subliminal knowledge of coming danger, and the remedy—oil upon the sea."

The surgeon had waxed fairly eloquent, but the engineer remained unconvinced.

"I can't believe that," he said, with an incredulous frown. "You're a wonder, doctor, at explanations; but it's my private opinion that Finnegan was simply and beautifully drunk."