The cars were loaded and raised, and a second shell for each was brought out, ready to be put on the cars as soon as they came back. “They are off,” Phil shouted excitedly, as both cars were hoisted with terrific speed up the curved steel rails; the shutters between the turret and handling room opened obediently to allow the cars to pass; a glimpse of half-naked men above them came into view, then they fell shut with a bang, shutting out the scene. A dull crash from above told those in the handling room that the first gun had been fired. An empty ammunition car came down through the shutter, was quickly supplied with its shell and powder and again disappeared upward through the magic shutter. The firing above was rapid. The empty cars appeared so frequently that the men below were hard pressed to prevent the crews above from waiting for their ammunition. “That’s the fastest firing I have ever seen,” cried one of the men in admiration, as he hurled a fifty pound powder bag accurately on to its shelf in the car; “they ain’t nothing in the fleet can touch this.” “Hold on there!” Phil saw with consternation the car start up prematurely with but one bag of powder, where four were necessary for a charge. It would have to go clear to the turret and then come down again for the other three bags, a loss of much precious time. As if he thought he might call the impatient car back, he watched it gather speed to open the shutter. He saw it disappear and the shutter close behind it with a rasping noise. Then came a crash as of a heavy falling body, from above. The din of tearing metal filled his ears. “Stand clear, men,” he had barely time to shout, when the loaded car, shutter and all, shot down into their midst, a hopeless mass of twisted metal. CHAPTER V HURRIED ORDERS The accident came so unexpectedly that it was some moments before Phil could find his voice. Then he realized there was nothing to be done. The damage was beyond his capacity to repair. The turret was useless for further service. He glanced, apprehensively, upward through the jagged rent of the shutter and his eyes fell upon the angry, excited face of his divisional officer. There was small reason to ask the trouble. The dangling end of the wire rope told the story only too plainly: the hoist rope had broken when the ammunition car was nearly at the breech of the gun, and it had then plunged downward, with its burden of nearly a ton of shell and powder, wrecking itself and the shutter. A moment later Lazar was in the handling room, viewing the effects of the unlucky accident. Stooping down he raised the car end of the wire rope. “Cut half through,” he cried in a voice full of passion, “and by a file or saw.” His disappointment was too keen to conceal. “All my work for nothing. The umpires will decide the accident against me, and only half the firing over.”