Kennedy also told me that they were already making plans in Washington to resist the Black Attila. 'They've got something up their sleeves which'll stop him in his tracks,' he said smugly, but he would not amplify the statement and I had the impression that he was not altogether sure what the pkn was.
Kennedy had also heard that there was a strong chance that the Washington 'army' would receive reinforcements from the Australasian-Japanese fleet which, he had it on good authority, had already anchored off Chesapeake Bay. I expressed the doubt that anything could withstand the Bkck Attila's Land Leviathan, but Kennedy was undaunted. He rubbed his nose and told me that there was 'more than one way of skinnin' a coon'.
Twice the train had to stop to take on more wood, but we were getting closer and closer to Baltimore and the city was little more than an hour away when a squadron of land ironclads appeared ahead of us, firing at the train. They flew the lion banner of Ashanti and must have gone ahead of the main army (perhaps having received intelligence that trains of white troops were on their way to Washington). I saw the long guns in their main turrets puff red fire and white smoke and a number of shells hit the ground close by. The driver was for putting on the brakes and surrendering, feeling that we did not have a chance, but Kennedy, for all that he might have been a cruel, ignorant and stupid man, was not a coward. He sent the word back along the tram to get whatever big guns they could working, then he told the engineer to give the old locomotive all the speed she could take, and drove straight towards the lumbering war machines which were now on both sides of the track, positioned on the steep banks so that they could fire down at us as we passed.
I was reminded of an old print I once saw - a poster, I think, for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show - of Red Indians attacking a train. The land ironclads were able to match our speed (for the train was carrying a huge number of cars), and their turrets could swing rapidly to shoot at us from any angle. Shell after shell began to smash into the train, but still she kept going, making for the safety of a long tunnel ahead of us, where the land 'clads could not follow.
We reached the tunnel with some relief and the engineer was for slowing down and stopping in the middle in the hope that the enemy machines would give up their chase, but Kennedy considered this a foolish scheme.
'They'll come at us from both ends, man!' he said. 'They'll burrow through from the roof - they've got those "mole" things which can bore through anything. We'll be like trapped rabbits down a hole it we stay here.' I think there was sense to what he said, though our chances in the open were scarcely any better. Still, under his orders, the train raced on, breaking through into daylight to find half-a-dozen land ironclads waiting for it, their guns aimed at the mouth of the tunnel. How the locomotive survived that fusillade I shall never know, but survive it did, with part of the roof and a funnel shot away and its tender of wood blazing from the effects of a direct hit by an incendiary shell.
The rest of the train, however, was not so lucky.
A shell cut the coupling attaching us to the main part of the train and we lurched forward at a speed which threatened to hurl us from the tracks. Without the burden of the rest of the train, we were soon able to leave the ironclads behind. I looked back to see the stranded 'army' fighting it out with the armoured battleships of the land. They were being pounded to pieces.
Then we had turned a bend and left the scene behind. Kennedy looked crestfallen for a moment, and then he shrugged. There was little that could be done.
'Ah, well,' he said. 'We'll not be stopping in Baltimore now.'
4. THE TRIUMPHANT BEAST
Washington, surprisingly, had not sustained anything like the damage done to cities like New York and London. The government and all its departments had fled the capital before the War had got into its stride and had retired to an underground retreat somewhere in the Appalachians. It had survived the explosives, but not the plagues. Having little strategic importance, therefore, Washington had most of its famous buildings and monuments still standing. These overblown mock-Graecian, mock-Georgian tributes to grandiose bad taste, could be seen in the distance as we steamed into the outskirts of the city, to be stopped by recently constructed barriers. These barriers had existed for only a week or so, but I was surprised at their solidity. They were of brick, stone and concrete, reinforced by neatly piled sand-bags, and, I gathered, protected the whole of the inner city. Kennedy's credentials were in order - he was recognized by three of the guards and welcomed as something of a hero -and we were allowed to continue through to the main railroad station, where we handed our locomotive over to the authorities. We were escorted through the wide, rather characterless streets (the famous trees had all been cut down in the making of the barriers and for fuel to power the trains) to the White House, occupied now by 'President' Penfield, a man who had once been a distinguished diplomat in the service of his country, but who had quickly profited from the hysteria following the War - he was beiieved to have been the first person to 'don the White Hood'. Penfield was fat and his red face bore all the earmarks of depravity. We were ushered into a study full of fine old 'colonial'-style furniture which gave the impression that nothing had changed since the old days. The only difference was in the smell and in the man sprawled in a large armchair at a desk near the bay window. The smell would have been regarded as offensive even in one of our own East End public houses - a mixture of alcohol, tobacco-smoke and human perspiration. Dressed in the full uniform of an American general, with the buttons straining to keep his tunic in place over his huge paunch, 'President' Penfield waved a hand holding a cigar by way of greeting, gestured with the other hand, which held a glass, for us to be seated. 'I'm gkd you could make it, Joe,' he said to Kennedy, who seemed to'be a close acquaintance. 'Have a drink. Help yourself.' He ignored me.
Kennedy went to a sideboard and poured himself a large glass of bourbon. 'I'm sorry I couldn't bring you any men,' he said. 'You heard, did you, Fred? We got hit by a big fleet of that nigger's land 'clads. We were lucky to get through at all.'
'I heard.' Penfield turned small, cold eyes on me. 'And this is the traitor, is it.'
'I had better tell you now,' I said, though suddenly I was reluctant to justify myself, 'that I joined Cicero Hood's entourage with the express purpose of trying to put a stop to his activities.'
'And how did you intend to do that, Mr Bastable?' said Penfield leaning forward and winking at Kennedy.
'My original plan was to assassinate him,' I said simply. 'But you didn't.'
'After the Land Leviathan made its appearance I saw that killing Hood would do no good. He is the only one who has any control at all over the Black Horde. To kill him would have resulted in making things worse for you and all the other Europeans.'
Penfield sniffed sceptically and sipped his ddnk, adding: 'And what proof have we got of all this? What proof is there that you're not still working for Hood, that you're not planning to kill me?
'None,' I said. 'But I want to discuss ways of stopping the Land Leviathan,' I told him. 'Those walls you're building will stop that monster no more than would paper. If we can dig some kind of deep trench - lay a trap like a gigantic animal trap - we might be able to put it out of action for a while at least…'