The Flight of the Silver Ship: Around the World Aboard a Giant Dirgible
by Hugh McAlister · English · Gutenberg #45208 · 292,541 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Flight of the Silver Ship: Around the World Aboard a Giant Dirgible
Author: Hugh McAlister
Release date: March 25, 2014 [eBook #45208]
Most recently updated: October 24, 2024
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FLIGHT OF THE SILVER SHIP: AROUND THE WORLD ABOARD A GIANT DIRGIBLE ***
THE FLIGHT OF THE SILVER SHIP
Around the World
Aboard a Giant Dirigible
by
HUGH MCALISTER
Author of
“A VIKING OF THE SKY,” “FLAMING RIVER,”
“STEVE HOLWORTH OF THE OLDHAM WORKS,”
“CONQUEROR OF THE HIGHROAD,”
“STAND BY”
THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY
AKRON, OHIO NEW YORK
Made in U. S. A.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE FLIGHT OF THE SILVER SHIP
Copyright, MCMXXX
by The Saalfield Publishing Company
Printed in the United States of America
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
I DAVID CHOOSES
II LORD CRAM
III THE SILVER SHIP
IV ASSISTANT PILOT
V A STOWAWAY
VI THE CONTROL ROOM
VII THROUGH THE STORM
VIII THE CRADLE OF THE ZEPPELIN
IX EASTWARD
X BANZAI!
XI A STUDENT PRINCE
XII CUSTOMS AND COSTUMES
XIII AN EAVESDROPPER
XIV ON THE OBSERVER’S PLATFORM
XV MORE SPEED
XVI PARTNERS
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Flight of the Silver Ship
CHAPTER I
DAVID CHOOSES
David Ellison would never forget his last night at prep school. He had
had a hard time explaining to his three best friends that his plans for
college had failed. Lolling on the grass in the pleasant June dusk,
enjoying the comfortable relaxation after the hectic hours of
Commencement Day, he had put off the evil moment as long as he possibly
could. Finally he exploded his bomb.
“Well, fellows,” he said, “I am not going to college after all.”
There was a silence. Three pairs of eyes regarded the speaker blankly.
“The heat,” said a tall boy in a hushed tone, laying a hand on David’s
unruly hair.
“It’s that little girl he danced with four times yesterday at the tea,”
a second remarked mournfully.
“It’s because he leads the Honor Roll. He thinks he knows it all now,”
jeered the third; then, “Kidding aside, Davie,” he said, “what’s up?”
David hesitated, then took the plunge.
“Darn it!” he said. “Of course I owe it to you three fellows to give you
all the dope, but I certainly hate to drag my affairs in. Still, after
all our planning I can’t leave you without an explanation. You know I
live in Denver with my mother and two sisters. Boys, I’ve got the finest
mother, and the sweetest kid sisters. Mother works. She never gets a
vacation; couldn’t even come to my Commencement. Gosh! It made me sick.
And my older sister (she’s sixteen) has heard me tell all about you
fellows, and she was so crazy to see you, and the school, and
everything. But they couldn’t make it. Too much car fare.”
“Why, you big stiff!” cried the tall boy angrily. “Why didn’t you say
something? Mother and father came right through Denver. All your folks
could have come on with them in the car.”
“Yes,” said David, “I know, and I certainly appreciate it, but they
couldn’t very well—”
“But what about college, Dave?” asked the tall boy impatiently.
“I’ll have to start away back,” said David. “My father was an army
officer—a captain in the Air Corps. He went through the war without a
scratch until the day before the Armistice. There was a big raid,
and—well, dad crashed. Shot down. He had nothing but his pay, and only
ten thousand dollars war risk insurance. We were in Washington when it
happened. Mother took us back to Denver, where she had some relatives,
and invested the insurance money in a little business. She has a shop
where she sells things for women—a Specialty Shop, they call it. She
makes enough to keep herself and the girls and give me just a little
help once in a while. I don’t know when I haven’t worked at something to
help pay my way and, as you know, I’ve been lucky enough to meet all my
own expenses here.”
David chuckled as his memory took him back over the past four years.
What hadn’t he tackled! Band man, coach, bookkeeper, tutor, telephone
operator, handy man around the house—anything and everything. He had
made his tuition and clothes, and hadn’t cost his mother a cent. Of
course, he had worked summers too, but he had always found a job near
home so he could be near the family.
“Now as you know,” he continued, “I was all set for college, with jobs
enough cinched to get me through all right, especially as I was to share
your quarters, but I have just found out that the girls have given up
their plans for college, so that I can go! I had a letter from my little
sister, and she spilled the beans. Poor kid, she didn’t know it! I’m
going to work; going to earn real money. There’s a wholesale grocer in
Denver who will give me a job, I think.”
“But the big balloons, David; what about them?”
“They will have to fly without yours truly. Gosh! Well, I can always
read about ’em; that will be some comfort. And it takes quite a knack to
count bags of sugar.” He smiled wryly.
“Well, we are all darned sorry,” said the tall boy. “Guess you know
that, Dave, without our blubbering.”
David got up.
“Yes, I know it. But I’ve got to face hard facts. Don’t think I’m
squealing. Honest, I’m glad to do it, even if it is disappointing.” He
squared his shoulders. “Well,” he said reluctantly, “I’d better go by-by
now; my train leaves at six-thirty. I’ll stick my head in your rooms on
my way off. So long!”
An hour later, sitting by his open window, David listened to the strains
of the band over in the gymnasium and watched the stars. He had the
feeling that he was swinging in a void. Every task and duty connected
with the school was finished. He had just jumped on his trunk and locked
it. It was ready to be dragged out into the hall for the expressman to
take at dawn. Another boy was filling his place in the band. Football,
basketball, tennis—they were all dreams, never to touch reality again,
even when he should look at the team photographs cherished between stiff
cardboards in his trunk.
A small apologetic rap sounded on his door. No one ever knocked in the
natural course of events. Surprised, David opened it, snapping on the
light as he did so. The three boys stood there, leaning heavily on one
another’s shoulders.
“Hello!” said the foremost. “’Fraid you would be in bed.”
“No, just picking up loose ends,” said David. “Glad you happened along.
Take an end of this trunk, will you, and let’s heave it into the hall.”
“What’s in it, bricks?” asked one, as they placed the trunk in the
corridor. They came in, and shut the door.
“I suppose you want to go to bed,” said the tall boy, “but we have a
plan to put up to you, and we were afraid that there would be so much
confusion in the morning that you might not see it straight. And I’m
doing the talking now, so you’ll kindly shut up until I am all through.
And be reasonable! Fact is, old man, we want you to borrow the cost of
your college course from us. Now wait!” he demanded, as David shook his
head. “Try to listen, you blithering idiot! We all have plenty of money,
and we want to stake you; just as if you were our own brother, Dave.
Listen! It’s like this: take the money, and keep the jobs you have
planned on. They will float you, and you can send the cash home, and the
girls can go to college, and everything will be jake. See?”
“I can’t take it,” said David, touched and amused at the same time. “If
that is what brought you, just save your breath. You are the best
friends a fellow ever had, and it is worth giving up more than I have
given up to find it out. But I don’t want your money. I can’t take
anybody’s money. I haven’t a cent of my own beside my car fare and ten
dollars for meals, and I am going to start square with myself and the
whole world.
“Get this, fellows; I am just as grateful as I can be, and I’ll never
forget it. But I’m not going to be carried along by my friends. I won’t
be a sap, or a sucker, or a leech. I’ll work my own way up, and boy!
just watch my dust!” He shook each one by the hand and somehow, before
they knew it, they were in the hall.
Davie, ready for bed, tired with their kindly insistence, wondered if
they would come in the night, and pin large checks on his pajama coat!
“Well, I won’t borrow, and I won’t sponge on my mother,” David declared
grimly to himself. “I’ll show what I can do. I won’t be carried along.
I’ll arrive somewhere, some day, on my own two feet, and not on the
shoulders of somebody else. I’ll make those fellows darned proud of me
yet!”
Outside David’s door lay his boyhood, his flaming hopes, his fondest
memories. All his life he had meant to be an aviator. He had thought of
it, studied for it, and concentrated on it; but his skies were empty
now. No majestic forms floated grandly across his horizon. Vanished were
the dream-ships which he had meant to make real. Gone were his shining
hopes, his resolves to follow in his father’s footsteps. Not for him, in
future days, to build ships such as the world had never seen. He
determined to destroy all the careful plans and experiments he had so
neatly drawn. In the bottom of his trunk were a score of technical books
on dirigibles, past and present, bought at long intervals with
hard-earned money. For it was the dirigible toward which David’s heart
yearned. The great majestic balloons held a charm for him that the busy,
flitting airplanes were powerless to wield. But he knew that he had made
the right decision; and knowing it, slept well.
Reaching home, it took much argument on David’s part before his adoring
family was resigned to his change of plans; but he was all the more
determined when he saw how worn his mother’s still lovely face had
grown.
His friend the wholesale grocer was away. However, the manager said that
he would be back in a few days and assured David that a good job was
waiting for him. On the long, tedious trolley ride home, David had time
to think. At school, he could always hop some fellow’s car. Easy and
pleasant. He’d never given it a thought, but that was sponging in a way.
Well, never again; never! He made a wry face at a cat on a gatepost.
Lord! he was slated to be poor—filthy poor, for many a long year. It
couldn’t be too many years, though.
He must make money. His mother didn’t look right. Of course, the
wholesale groceries might give him a good break. Lots of fellows had
begun at the very bottom and had soared up.
Soared—that brought his mind to the ships again. It would always be
like that, he knew. He’d go along, almost contented, working like the
devil and getting on in groceries, but underneath he’d always be
thinking about the ships, the roar of the engines, the feel of the
rushing air. And he couldn’t do that—not if he meant to make a good
grocer. A good grocer! Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord! Something would have to be
done!
By the time he reached home the pendulum had swung again. He couldn’t
give up his ships. Why, he was kin to every dirigible, every balloon,
every little fat blimp that adventured into the upper tides! He couldn’t
give them up. As well ask a sailor to go inland and hoe turnips. As well
ask a violinist to drive rivets for a living. Well, he’d hoe turnips,
drive rivets; hoe fast and drive hard. He was no shirk.
Quite simply and trustingly, David turned to that Great Source upon whom
strong hearts are not ashamed to call. “Help me to find a way!” he
whispered.
After dinner, while turning the pages of a magazine David chanced on an
article on dirigibles. He commenced to read it. Parts of it he reread,
scarcely believing his eyes. He gave a whoop of delight.
“The very thing!” he cried. “Mother, listen to this!”
“What is it?” cried Mrs. Ellison and his older sister Lydia.
“Something big! Just listen!” David’s face glowed with excitement.
“Today I went over to Black & Black’s to see about a job. They will take
me on at fifteen bucks a week, and a chance for a raise occasionally.
But they wouldn’t sign me on today because the Mr. Black who attends to
such things is away, thank goodness!”
“Why ‘thank goodness’?” said Lydia.
“This magazine says Goodlow & Company, at Ayre, Ohio, have expanded into
the largest dirigible works in the world; and owing to the necessity of
having expert pilots and mechanics, they are about to open a school for
novices. It is a four-year course, in four departments. First year,
ground work; second year, construction and development; third year,
balloon fabrics and gases; and fourth year, intensive piloting.
“Some rich guy has already posted a big prize to be competed for by the
students, for the best invention that will add to the safety of
dirigible navigation. And there is a prize in each department given at
the close of each year, for the student who has done the best work. They
will accept only a limited number of students, and what do you know
about this? They pay ’em real money, with bigger salaries, of course, as
they go along.”
“Why, they couldn’t afford to do that, could they, David?” inquired his
mother.
“Yes, because the students are at first really laborers and then
mechanics in a small way—apprentices to the real big fellows until they
acquire skill themselves. Mother, if I can make it, it will fix
everything. The students have their quarters at the plant; dormitories,
I suppose. It is rather like being in the army. Pretty stiff discipline,
and all that. There won’t be any expenses to speak of, and I can send
home almost every cent they give me.”
“But flying, Davie!” said Mrs. Ellison, her beautiful soft eyes filled
with tears. “Flying! I have hoped so that you wouldn’t fly.”
“Mother darling,” said David gently, “I know how you must feel, but this
is not war time. It is peace that needs the dirigible. It is the
greatest invention; the greatest—Oh, I am crazy about it! Father would
tell me to go on, wouldn’t he, mother?”
“Yes, he would indeed,” Mrs. Ellison said proudly, with a tremulous
smile.
“When do you have to start, Davie?” asked his younger sister, Patty.
“Patty seems to have decided it,” laughed Mrs. Ellison.
“The examinations for enrollment are only four days from today,” said
David ruefully.
“At Ayre, Ohio!” cried Lydia. “My goodness! Dave, you will have to start
tonight. And what will you start on? Has anybody got any money?”
“I have the Liberty Bond father bought me,” said David.
Mrs. Ellison’s eyes filled, but Lydia jumped up and danced around the
room.
“The very thing!” she cried. “Oh, that’s wonderful! Father would so love
to stake you in this. Come on, mother, get out his bond, and while you
and David go out and get somebody to cash it, I will pack his things,
and see to reservations.”
She looked at her mother, and sensed something wrong.
“You approve, don’t you, mother? You will let him fly? We will be so
proud of him. Why, this is better than a dozen colleges.”
“A school for apprentices,” mused Mrs. Ellison. “That really means
greater safety for future ships, doesn’t it? It is a wonderful thing.”
“It is not a new idea,” said David. “They opened one in Friedrichshafen,
Germany, during the war. It has been a great success. Friedrichshafen is
the cradle of the dirigible. We have army and navy schools here in this
country, but this school is to fit civilians for commercial flying, and
is run on what you might call a co-operative basis. I wondered if we
would ever wake up over here to the necessity of schools like that. And
now—well, I bet in three or four years there will be a dozen schools
scattered all over the United States.”
“Dave, it’s just great!” cried Lydia.
David looked anxiously toward his mother.
“Well, what’s the good word, mother? Do I go?”
For a long moment Mrs. Ellison seemed lost in thought. This boy was her
only son. How much safer it would be to “measure coffee, and count sugar
sacks.” Her only son; but he was his father’s son as well! Brave,
intrepid Rick Ellison had a share in this boy. So she spoke for them
both, and smiled.
“Go, of course, David,” she said.
CHAPTER II
LORD CRAM
David found the trip to Ayre tedious; the hours dragged interminably.
His first night was sleepless, and he went into the dining-car for
breakfast rather late. He slipped into an empty seat at one of the small
tables for two. He found himself seated across from a thin, dark young
man a little older than himself. His pleasant good-morning was returned
by a mumbled greeting as the stranger glanced up, then hurriedly
transferred his attention to his food. He ate importantly, seeming to
put a vast amount of ceremony into the homely order of bacon and eggs
before him.
David ordered breakfast, and commenced to study his time-table. When he
laid it down, the stranger leaned across and remarked, “I meant to get a
time-table and forgot it. May I see yours?”
David handed it over with a pleasant word. The stranger, swaying to the
motion of the fast train, opened the folder. David had marked stops and
changes, and had drawn a black line around Ayre. The chap looked up, and
caught David’s eye.
“Ayre your destination?” he asked, and at David’s nod he continued,
“That’s where I am going, too. My name is Cram—Walter Cram.”
“My name is Ellison,” said David, “Glad to meet you.”
“Ellison,” said Walter Cram. “Not a very—well, I don’t know any
Ellison, myself. Never heard the name but once. I’ve got a book, ‘Great
Pilots of the World War.’ There is a pilot in that book named Ellison. A
great chap; absolutely fearless; did the most amazing things. His career
reads like a fairy story. You ought to get that book and read about him.
It would interest you on account of the coincidence of the name.”
“I expect it would,” said David.
Cram, once started, chatted on. He ran an appraising eye over David’s
neat but not new suit, his correct but worn hat, his well-kept but
muscular hands. He pulled out a watch, white gold, thin and racy-looking
in its general correctness.
“What time you got?” he asked.
David, with a smile, obligingly bit. He hauled out a large fat silver
timepiece on the turnip order, and gravely offered its moon face for
Cram’s inspection.
“Heirloom?” asked Cram compassionately.
“My grandfather’s,” replied David.
“How the old fellows loved those turnips!” said Cram. “I had an old hick
of a grandfather, a farmer out in the sticks. He had one of those, and
we couldn’t make him give it up. Same with yours, I suppose.”
“No, he wouldn’t give it up,” said David. “Used it all his life, then
gave it to me.” What use to tell Cram how that watch had been carried by
its intrepid owner into Africa, and through the jungles of South
America? It had lived in China, had skirted the steppes of Russia, had
been shipwrecked, and shot at. The dent on its fat back was the mark of
a poisoned arrow in Australia. No, his grandfather had never given it up
until, called at last to explore a far more distant and unknown country,
his dying hand had pressed it into the baby grasp of his grandson.
“Sentiment is a blamed poor thing,” Cram declared; then, as if he had
been too friendly, he rose abruptly, nodded and with a brief “See you
later,” went off, carrying the newspaper, and David’s time-table as
well.
With a sigh of relief, David tackled his bacon and eggs, and a second
man slid into the vacant seat. He looked directly at David with a pair
of keen blue eyes, around which curled thick fair lashes. His shock of
reddish-gold hair had been struggled with, but not subdued. His wide
grin disclosed dazzling white teeth, whiter by contrast with the deep
sunburn of his skin.
“Mind if I sit here, Buddy?” he asked cheerily.
“Not a bit,” said David, smiling in return.
“Name’s Ryan,” said the blond husky. “Kenneth Ryan.”
“I’m David Ellison,” said David, warming at once to the honest face and
clear gaze.
“Glad to meet you,” said Ryan, extending his hard and muscular hand. He
studied the menu card anxiously. “These here mennoos!” he groaned. “What
makes ’em have so many things to pick from? When I’m home I eat at
delicatessens, or Childs’; but this! Damfino what to choose!”
“I had oatmeal, and bacon and eggs, and cakes,” said David helpfully.
“Bully!” said Ryan. He looked up at the waiter. “The same,” he said,
waving a comprehensive hand toward David’s place. Then he settled his
elbows on the table.
“I seen you talking to Lord Cram,” he chuckled.
“For a few minutes,” said David. “You know him?”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t know me, now. I used to go to school with him when
we were kids at St. Mary’s school in Lawton, Oklahoma. His folks
couldn’t send him to public school on account of the Mex and Indians
fightin’ him so because of the way he yelled. Beat any Indian war cry
you ever heard. Then his grandfather struck oil on his worthless farm,
and, lordymighty, the Crams just soared! No, he don’t know me. I’m just
a mechanic. How far are you going, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Ayre, Ohio,” said David.
“Ayre!” said Ryan. “Why, that’s where Cram is bound. That’s funny! By
golly, I bet you are both set to try that examination at the Goodlow
Plant.”
“I am, at any rate,” said David. “I don’t know about Cram. He didn’t put
out any information.”
“Afraid you might cramp his style. That’s him all over. You might jump
off the train ahead of him, and get the first taxi, and reach the plant
first, and grab off a job as vice president.”
“Are you going there, too?” asked David.
“Yes, I am, as it happens, but not for that apprentice course, worse
luck. I haven’t enough education. I want to land a job as mechanic. I
just can’t keep away from the flying machines, Ellison, and,” he added,
thrusting out a stubborn jaw, “if I get a chance down at Goodlow’s, I’ll
bet my bottom dollar that I will make a swell mechanic. I’ve nothing at
all above the collar,” he grinned, “but I own a damn good pair of
hands.”
“You will do,” laughed David. “Here’s hoping we both get in. We’ll see
something of each other if we do. I’ve got to write a note to my mother;
see you later.”
“Sure, sure!” said Ryan, beaming. “I camp in the smoker. So long!”
He watched David leave the car.
“Well, Red, we like that bozo, don’t we?” he told himself. “True blue,
if I can read a man, and a gentleman born. As my mother says, the mark
of character shows on a man, no matter how many overcoats he wears.”
Later, in the club car, David found Cram reading a magazine. He walked
up to him.
“You forgot to return my time-table, I think,” he said.
“Time-table? Oh, yes, here it is. I did take it, didn’t I? Sorry, and
thanks.”
“That’s all right,” said David, turning.
“Wait!” Cram exclaimed. “Sit down. I’d like to talk to you. I am
wondering if you are going to Ayre.”
“I think it is marked on my time-table,” returned David.
“I noticed it. It doesn’t happen that you are going down for the
examinations at Goodlow’s, does it?”
“On account of my name being the same as an aviator?” laughed David. “As
a matter of fact, I am going for the exams.”
Cram shook his head. “That’s almost too bad,” he said. “You’ve come a
long way, but I’m afraid you won’t have the ghost of a chance, unless
you brought a lot of credentials, letters from your teachers, and
congressmen, and senators, and so on. No? Well, they tell me it is going
to take a lot of pull to get in, a darned lot of pull. You see, these
people want to interest influence and money, and they are going to give
first chance to the applicants who can do ’em the most good that way.”
“That’s too bad,” said David, without showing any particular anxiety. “I
can’t show a letter from a single senator. I had an idea that this was
strictly a personal merit proposition.”
“Personal merit hasn’t a show these days, my boy.”
“What pull have you got?” asked David.
Cram put a hand on David’s knee.
“Boy, I have a suitcase stuffed full of credentials. I have enough to
paper a room! No need to worry over my chances.”
“That’s fine,” said David heartily. “I will have to depend on school
reports, and such things.”
He nodded, and walked away. He was depressed in spite of himself. The
cocksure arrogance of Cram was funny, yet it stuck in David’s mind. He
was glad to wander into the smoker and talk to Ryan, who greeted him
joyfully. He repeated his conversation with Cram.
“Aw, he makes me sick!” scoffed Ryan. “He may make the grade, at that,
though. He got to be quite a shark at his books, and he’s had a small
plane, so he can talk smooth and easy. Yeah, he may pass. Lots of ways
he’s not so bad. My brother Mike likes him.”
“You have a brother?” asked David.
“Six,” said Ryan. “Have you any?”
“Six? Gosh! No; I have two sisters.”
“Only two? I have five. That’s quite a houseful to bring up and dress
and feed, even in Oklahoma. No wonder we boys worked. But it did us
good, at that. I don’t begrudge any of it, except I was sorry that I
never could get the hang of my lessons. Some of us is smart, though. My
oldest brother was a chaplain in the army through the war. I wanted to
enlist last year, and told him so; and he said, ‘Red Ryan, you
no-account, if you go enlistin’ in the army for thirty a month and
found, I’ll find ye and I’ll not leave one strip of skin on your back,
and the Pope and me will excommunicate you beside.’ He’s a murderin’
cuss. I’m not one to butt into your affairs, Mr. Ellison, but don’t you
give Wally one worrisome thought. You’ll pass. I like your
straight-looking eyes, and so will they.”
David laughed. “Why, you fuss me, Ryan,” he said, “but I am going to get
in. I have got to pass; and if I fail this time, I’ll get work with you,
and study nights, and try for the next class.”
“That’s the stuff, me lad!” cried the redhead. “Not climbing up on
nobody’s shoulders. And Red Ryan’s the lad that’s going to stand by and
hurray when you’ve got where you’re goin’.”
But five days later, at the Goodlow Plant in Ayre, David did pass. As
anticipated, there was a mob of applicants. Scores of them, who saw in
flying an easy way of escaping the grind of ordinary toil. These soon
faded out of the picture, when they found out a little of the
requirements and routine of the strenuous years ahead, and left a few
real enthusiasts, boys who realized that aviation is humanity’s dream
come true.
How can we guess what hours the cave man spent, after a kill and its
resultant feast, lying on some mossy bank, watching the swift and
glorious flight of great birds, and longing to be as they? Then, ages
passing, the vision persisted with the winged beasts of the Apocalypse;
the flying steeds of Zeus; Pegasus, beautiful and free, winging his
glorious way toward the dawn, outracing the Flying Carpet; eager young
Icarus, his wings of wax melting in the sun. Ever aspiring, the dreamers
passed, laughing at Darius Green as he tumbled, and watching with bated
breath as the first hot-air balloons lumbered clumsily into the air! An
age-old dream that has never grown less alluring, never less lovely, but
depends at last on man’s own knowledge and desperate endeavor.
So, in the big austere room, where the Board of Judges met, the stream
of applicants slowly divided, one part to be absorbed again into the
arteries of the cities, the other part to face the final questions and
scrutiny of men well able to judge men’s capabilities, and read their
secret ambitions.
They were questioned in small groups; and David, when dismissed with a
number of others with the welcome assurance that they would be enrolled
as student apprentices, was unaware of the good impression he had made
on the examining board. As he was about to leave the room, someone at
his elbow called his name. A tall gray-haired man stood beside him.
“Are you Rick Ellison’s son?”
“Why, yes, sir,” said David.
“I am Colonel Porter. I am very proud to have known your father. He was
an ace of aces. His death, coming at that last moment of the war, was
doubly a tragedy and a great loss to the air service. You have something
to live up to, young man.”
“I am proud, Colonel, but if you don’t mind—well, sir, would you mind
doing me a favor?”
“Name it, son!” said the Colonel. “Doing a favor for Rick Ellison’s boy
would seem like doing something for him; and God knows anyone who knew
him would jump at that chance.”
“It is only this,” said David. “If you don’t mind, I’d rather not have
it known here about father. He is too big for me. I want to see if I
can’t make good without leaning on his record. If it leaks out now that
I am Captain Ellison’s son, lots of ’em will watch me and perhaps be
kinder to me than I deserve.
“Don’t you see, sir, it is sort of like the ginks in old times, who used
to go out to kill dragons and rescue fair ladies carrying plain shields,
so nobody would know that their fathers were kings, until they had
proved that they were pretty hot themselves.”
“Absolutely; you are right!” said the Colonel. “I will not tell, but
don’t forget that I am David Ellison’s friend, for his own sake as well
as for the sake of his father.” He shook David’s hand and as the boy
went out muttered to himself, “Damned if that kid hasn’t killed his
first dragon, already; the dragon of dependence!”
Once outside, David sprinted for a telegraph office, and the glorious
news of his success ticked gaily off to his mother. Then taking his
suitcase, he returned to the Goodlow Plant, and at the barracks was
assigned his quarters.
On his way to find Ryan he saw Cram sitting outside the General Offices,
where the Board was working.
“What’s the glad news, Cram?” he cried.
Cram looked up.
“Well, there’s some hitch,” he said. “I guess they don’t know just which
class to put me in. They told me to wait until afternoon. I thought I
might as well stay right here.”
“Did they read all your dope?” asked David.
“They have it in there,” said Cram. “I’ll bet it knocks ’em cold. I told
’em all I could, but it was such a scramble. I don’t believe I touched
on the oil. Ready money, Ellison. A few family gushers to put into
improvements and all that. Yes, I ought to have mentioned the oil.”
“Well, I bet the oil will leak out sooner or later,” said David. “Good
luck!” He went on.
Two hours later as David skirted the big landing field, he saw Cram,
suitcase in hand, hurrying toward the taxi stand. David shouted, but he
did not appear to hear. Breaking into a run, David overtook him.
“What’s the decision?” he enquired.
Cram’s face was livid; his lips twitched.
“Ellison, they turned me down!” he announced. “Said I wasn’t
scholastically and technically qualified. Politics in it somehow, of
course. Or some personal grudge.” He swore roundly.
“Why, that’s too bad!” said David. The other’s bitter disappointment
roused a feeling of friendship that surprised him.
“I’ll get even somehow,” said the other. “Why, all I wanted was to make
a name for myself in something beside oil.” His eyes filled.
“Well, that’s all right. You study, and come back next year, and try
again. If you want any help or suggestions, write me. I’ll do what I
can.”
Cram did not reply at once. He smoothed his ruffled hair with a hand
that shook.
“I guess I’m like our Indians. Some grudges I never forget.”
“Be a good Indian then, Cram, and don’t tomahawk anybody until you know
just what’s what.”
Cram sneered, and with a glare over David’s shoulder walked hastily
away. David turned to see the cause of the venomous look. It was Red
Ryan, whistling lustily.
“Red, they kicked him out,” said David.
“Not Cram!”
“Yep, and gosh, he is sore! Wants to kill someone. Wants to be a bad
Indian, in fact.”
“Cram kicked out—”
“Not really kicked,” said David. He repeated Cram’s report.
“He’ll consider he’s been dynamited. Well, with my brother a priest, I’d
do better not to rejoice as I could. But if he’s gone, he’s gone, and
we’ve new jobs, and tough ones ahead of us.”
CHAPTER III
THE SILVER SHIP
For nearly four years David had been an apprentice-student at the
Lighter-than-Air School at Goodlow Field. During that time many changes
had taken place. The school, at first housed in a single building on the
Goodlow property, now had commodious brick buildings for classrooms,
laboratories and dormitories. The school was run on an original scheme,
which had proved most successful. It was co-operative. The students
received free tuition and a small salary, in return for which they gave
their labor. Any student falling below a certain grade was immediately
dismissed.
This benevolent scheme of education was made possible by the kindness of
one of America’s greatest philanthropists, Mr. John Harrison Hammond,
who added the strength of his millions to the Goodlow holdings at Ayre.
The erection of the great new hangar, or dock, was a story in itself.
Even in this day of architectural and engineering miracles, the building
was unbelievably huge. It was the largest airport factory and dock in
the world. Its floor was a vast concrete spread, the largest
uninterrupted floor area yet built. Over this rose the dock structure, a
cavernous semi-paraboloid building. From the passing airplane, it looked
like a peanut or a silkworm cocoon. It was lighted with tier after tier
of glass, in steel frames, so precisely made that a push-button
controlled whole units of windows. The enormous doors, two-thirds glass,
slid on ball-bearing wheels along tracks imbedded in the floor. These,
too, were operated by a one-man lever.
In the top of the arching roof was tackle to hold the dirigibles during
construction. Here swung the great shapes slowly evolving from ghostly
skeletons to the finished marvels ready for flight. There was space for
the construction of two ships at the same time.
The ship that hung there partly finished was the largest yet built.
Perfect in line, and carrying many new features; as yet unnamed, her
career undecided, she drew David like a magnet. She was his dream ship,
at last come true.
At the back of the dock built into the wall was a row of offices for the
executives. The central office belonged to Colonel Porter, A. C., U. S.
A. retired, Commandant of the school and chief of the dock forces.
Colonel Porter was a lifelong friend of Mr. Hammond, and his influence
had persuaded the great financier to put his personal energy and many
millions of his vast fortune into the great task of today—the
development of aviation.
One morning late in May, the two friends sat in Colonel Porter’s office.
“I hardly expected you so soon,” said Colonel Porter.
“Well, Port, I’ve decided to spend the rest of my life around the ships.
I like it. I’m not young, but my money can do the hard work. I’m
inclined to help you push this business as far as it will go.”
“Exactly what I hoped you would decide to do!” exclaimed the Colonel.
“And you have already made a wonderful start. This ship you are
financing—you would be surprised at the callers she has had; people
from all over the world, looking her over, taking snapshots of her,
writing down her dimensions. We could sell her tomorrow.”
“Have any changes been made recently?” asked Mr. Hammond.
“Not a thing,” said Colonel Porter. “Here are the original
specifications.” He hunted up a long sheet of paper.
“Never mind the figures,” said Mr. Hammond hastily. “My clipping agency
sends me about two a day, usually different, but they all agree that she
contains ten million, two hundred thousand cubic feet and is twelve
stories high amidship. You know that item seems to make a great hit with
the public. What will her lifting power be, Port?”
“Well, hydrogen gives us eighty pounds to the thousand feet, and helium
sixty pounds to the thousand. That works out to eight hundred thousand
pounds. You can depend on four hundred tons of useful lift.”
“Gosh, that sounds like a lot!”
“It’s handy to have.”
“It does seem, Port, as though we ought to make more than seventy-five
miles an hour with those five huge engines.”
“It can’t be done, Harry. Not with a ship that size.”
“Did you decide to use the new weave of linen cloth for the covering?”
“Yes, it is a great improvement. And the new style seam-lacings hold
perfectly. What are you going to name the ship, by the way?”
“I selected half a dozen names that sounded good to me,” said Mr.
Hammond. “Hammond High-flyer, Harkaway, and some others, but daughter
Dulcie objected. Made such a fuss that I said she could name it
herself.”
“What were her contributions?” asked Colonel Porter with a smile. He
knew Dulcie Hammond.
“She didn’t bother with a choice. She says the ship is named Moonbeam.”
“It is a splendid name. Harry, you don’t know how fine that ship is
going to be. She will be the most beautiful ship in the air.”
“I want her to be,” said Mr. Hammond with a dogged, grim look that
Colonel Porter knew of old. “I am planning to show that ship to the
world, Port. She has got to be perfect. What do you think of following
the course of the Graf Zeppelin, for a starter, and beating the G. Z.’s
time?”
Colonel Porter whistled.
“I think it would be all right. Her maiden flight, eh? I wonder if she
can do it.”
“Nothing like trying, is there? When will she be ready to fly?”
Colonel Porter reflected.
“She will be finished about the first of June. Then she must make some
trial flights. You can take off by the fourteenth or fifteenth. You will
go, won’t you?”
“You bet! I’m commander of that ship. And I want you to pick out a few
of the students, all grades, for staff. I think it would be a wonderful
try-out for them.”
“I’ll do it,” said Colonel Porter with enthusiasm.
“Why don’t you come along, Port? You need a rest.”
Colonel Porter groaned.
“Rest? Why, Harry, we are simply swamped with work. I couldn’t possibly
get away.”
“I wish you could,” said Mr. Hammond, and was silent a few moments.
“Those gas bags,” he continued, following the train of his thought,
“they are absolutely impervious to any kind of gas, aren’t they?”
“Absolutely, when made of the substance we call, for lack of a better
name, gold-beater’s skin. You know gold-beaters beat their gold into the
tissue-like sheets used by the trade, by putting it between layers of
the split and cleansed intestines of the ox, and pounding it. For the
gas bags, they split and clean the intestines, and lay them out with
overlapping edges. Others are laid on top, at right angles. These
congeal into a mass of fabric, which is flexible, yet perfectly
impervious.”
“It certainly beats all,” said Mr. Hammond. “By the way, Port, whom
shall I take on as captain? Got a good man?”
“The best!” said Colonel Porter heartily. “A man named Fraine. Captain
Fraine is as good a man as flies. During the war he was shot down and
badly wounded, and wears a small silver plate on his head. He has been
with us for six years. I advise Fraine.”
“All right; whatever you say goes. Just give me a good staff and a good
crew.” Mr. Hammond rose and stretched his great shoulders. “Let’s go
look at the Moonbeam.”
The following day Mr. Hammond flew down to New York, but a telegram from
Colonel Porter brought him back on the first of June. He found the
Moonbeam lowered and workmen putting the final touches on her passenger
gondola, establishing the monstrous engines in the five “eggs” that were
waiting for them, and varnishing the propellers with the hardest,
smoothest spar varnish, to reduce friction. The seam-lacings had been
tightened, and the linen cover looked as pale and smooth as aluminum.
Men were painting the window casings of the gondola, others were testing
the screws and bolts holding the ladders leading from the five eggs into
the hull.
Beneath the ship, groups of sightseers moved slowly. They came in
chatting shrilly after the manner of the Great American Tourist, but the
immensity of the dock and the sight of the vast silver ship, so
quiescent in the hands of her makers, seemed to quell them.
Mr. Hammond and Colonel Porter entered the ship through the door in the
center of the right side of the passenger gondola. From the doorway,
they walked straight ahead along a short passage to the center of the
gondola, where they turned to the right, along another passage into the
control room. This spacious room occupied the whole forward end of the
gondola. The oval front was composed entirely of windows, through which
the officer at the wheel had an unobstructed view.
Leaving the control room, the first room on the right was the chart
room, a small cubicle fitted with drawers and filing cases. Opposite
this was the navigator’s room. Directly back of this was the galley, a
small but perfect kitchen, where every inch of space was utilized by the
latest electrical cooking utensils. The very sight of the wealth of pots
and pans, the roasters, broilers, frying baskets and toasters made Mr.
Hammond rub his hands delightedly.
Colonel Porter managed to get Mr. Hammond away from the galley, and they
went directly across the passage into the radio room.
The salon came next. This room was dining-room and lounge in one. It
filled the breadth of the gondola, and had six broad windows that gave
ample space for observation. There were six extension tables, chairs, a
couple of divans, and a desk. The chair covers, window curtains and
walls were bright with French flowered chintz. It was as gay and
luxurious as a private yacht.
Back of this room, with a passage between, were the staterooms; six on
each side, with double-decked bunks. These cabins were equipped with
every luxury to be found on an ocean liner.
Behind the staterooms, one on either side of the passage, were the
wash-rooms, beautifully equipped, one for men and one for women
passengers. Everything in the passenger gondola was as near perfect as
modern appliances and human ingenuity could make it.
They walked back to the radio room, in a corner of which a steel ladder
led up into the hull. There they inspected the quarters of the officers
and crew; plainer but just as comfortable as those down below. Mr.
Hammond, notwithstanding his size, was well muscled and agile. He
followed Colonel Porter along the catwalks, among the fuel tanks, and
then up the many ladders to the observer’s platform, where they lifted
the trap and stepped out on the very top of the ship.
“This dock is certainly a big place,” said Mr. Hammond, staring about.
“Yes,” replied Colonel Porter. “It is hard to realize its size. You can
give its footage, twelve hundred feet long, three hundred and
twenty-five feet wide, and two hundred and four feet high, but that
doesn’t convey much. But pause to remember that if it was placed in
front of the national Capitol at Washington, it would hide the entire
building except a little bit of the spire. Or you could lay the
Woolworth building and Washington monument down in it, side by side, and
almost lose them. Or you could stage ten full-sized football games in it
at the same time, and still have plenty of room to spare.”
They made their way down through the hull to the gondola, where workmen
were now busy putting on electric light fixtures, and went back to
Colonel Porter’s office.
CHAPTER IV
ASSISTANT PILOT
A small and well-worn automobile was parked near the great hangar on the
Goodlow lot. On the bent and sagging running board sat its owners, David
Ellison and Red Ryan. Over three years had passed since the day David
had been enrolled as a student in the Goodlow school for apprentices;
three years of hard and often discouraging work, but the work had
developed him. He was no longer a diffident boy. Manhood sat easily on
his broad shoulders. Looking at him, Red Ryan’s honest and loyal heart
swelled with pride. He wondered if David had the least idea of his own
success. Ryan knew—knew what the other fellows were saying, knew how
the officers and pilots talked sometimes, while they stood watching his
trained fingers making magical repairs on some weak or broken part. It
never occurred to Red that his own uncanny cleverness had set him apart
as the best mechanic on the lot. His thought was all for David—David,
only twenty-two, and gosh-a-mighty, what he didn’t know about
dirigibles! What he hadn’t already done with ’em!
Right now David was gazing lovingly through the open doors of the hangar
at the vast silver shape rapidly approaching perfection and completion
under the hands of its pygmy workmen. The vastness of the place, and the
ship’s tremendous bulk seemed to deaden the noise of hammers and bolts.
She seemed to float there in the hangar. To David she seemed already
restless to be away. He imagined a ripple of light down her silver side;
a stir, as though she could no longer wait, but would break away and
slip through the great door to be off alone into the infinite troubled
tides of the sky.
Red followed David’s entranced look.
“Ain’t she the cat’s whiskers, just?” he enquired lovingly. “Say, if she
makes good on her trial flight, I’m just goin’ to lay right down there,
front of everybody, and cry, or pray, or swear, I dunno which.”
“A little of each, perhaps,” said David, snapping out of his dream.
“I’ll be right with you, bully boy.”
“You know, David, they have told you off to do a lot of important work
on that ship. I don’t believe you appreciate the fact. All the fellows
are talking about it.”
“Applesauce!” David retorted, laughing. “Everyone in the senior class
has had his share.”
Red hitched closer to David’s side.
“The other day,” he half whispered, “I was flat on me back under a
tarpaulin in the far corner of the baggage room up in the hull,
installing some wiring that’s to lead down from the observer’s seat on
the top of the ship. The other fella had to go clear over to the
storehouse for some wire. So I laid there tryin’ to think out a simpler
and safer installation. I don’t like it the way it is, Dave. Too much
danger during storms. Well, whilst I’m there, along comes Colonel Porter
and himself.”
“Who is himself?” asked David.
“That big bug; the papa of us all.”
“You don’t mean Mr. Hammond?” said David.
“You got it. That’s the bird!”
“But what the devil is he doing here now? I thought he was in New York.”
“I’m the boy to tell you,” said Red, joyfully. “My brother, the
chaplain, used to tell me, ‘Red, never eavesdrop; ’tis a mean and
unmanly trick, unworthy of a good Christian b’y; but so be you do chance
to hear anything, give it strict attention, and be sure to get the
straight of it.’ So I did. They come teeterin’ along the catwalk, and
stop opposite me. You know the Big Fella’s quick and light steppin’ as a
cat, for all his size. Ladders and catwalks are pie for him.
“‘What’s bein’ done here?’ says the Big Fella.
“‘Some wirin’,’ I heard Colonel Porter answer. Then there was some
little talk or other that I don’t just remember.”
Red wouldn’t tell what they had said at that point, but it glowed warmly
in his honest heart; payment in full for many hours of grilling toil.
Colonel Porter had explained the wiring, and had added,—
“We have the cleverest young mechanic in the school that I have ever
come across. I believe he could make every part and assemble any known
engine, after an hour’s study. Name’s Ryan.”
Mr. Hammond had grunted.
“Hang on to him. He may be useful a little later on.”
“Well, then what?” asked David, impatiently.
“Oh!” said Red. “Well then, ‘What sorta mechanics you got?’ asks the Big
Fella.
“‘So-so,’ says the Colonel.
“‘Only so-so?’ growls Big Stuff. ‘Better bounce ’em; the quicker the
better.’
“‘Well, I dunno,’ says the Colonel, lookin’ wise the way he does. ‘I
dunno. There’s one lad, now; our efficiency expert spent three days
checkin’ up on that b’y, and he figured it out that the fella had saved
the company one and seven-eighths cents in a week, on insulated wire! In
wan week, mind you; Ryan’s the name.’”
“You big liar!” exploded David, grinning.
“Me?” Red’s sea blue eyes were wide and innocent.
“Yes, you! When you lie, you always lie in a brogue. I can always tell.”
“I wonder, now, if that’s a slam on my ancestry,” said Red slowly. “If
it is, I got to fight the upstart who says it. Only, can a mechanic,
first-class, stoop to the killin’ of a mere apprentice? If you’d only
shut up, David; if you could only learn to be still, I’d tell you what I
been strugglin’ to tell this hour back.”
“Oh, go on; go on, for heaven’s sake! Spill it if you know anything. I
need something to pep me up. I’m going stale.” David sighed.
Red laid a hand on David’s arm and grew grave.
“It’s about your baby up there, the ship. The Big Fella is plannin’ no
less than a round-the-world trip, for her maiden stunt.”
“Round the world!” breathed David.
“That, and nothin’ less!” affirmed Red. “Yep, by diligent listening I
got it all. I’m afraid they thought they were alone. So they talked
free. It seems that Mr. Hammond wants an American ship that will beat
the Graf Zeppelin’s time. And he thinks here’s the ship. So do I. Well,
Mr. Hammond is financing the trip, with a couple of others who will go
along as passengers, just for the glory.”
“Oh, Lord! Red, I wish I could go with her!”
“Don’t you, just? But there’s not a chance. You couldn’t get in on that
trip if you was disguised as a tin of biscuit. There will be
millionaires that would get into overalls and carry oil cans to get to
go.”
“Of course,” said David. “But I can’t help wishing. Wouldn’t you like
it?”
“Me? Boy, I’d hang on to a rudder blade with me right hand from here to
Japan, and then merely shift to the left. Like to go? Lord love me,
David, wouldn’t I just!”
David sat staring at the silver ship. Men scrambled about her, popping
in and out of the openings.
“Listen, Davie,” said Red. “Don’t let your right ear know what I’ve
poured into your left. My brother used to tell me, ‘Whatever you hear,
me young buckaroo, keep it under your hat.’ But he wouldn’t have counted
you, David. ‘Keep it to yourself,’ says he. ‘If it is trash, don’t
clutter the highways wid it. If it is something worth while, lock it up,
Red; lock it up, like you would a dimant, till the fella that owns it
wants to use it.’”
“I won’t say anything,” promised David. “You certainly like that Padre
of yours, don’t you?”
“So-so,” said Red, chuckling. “He’s grand if you’re dyin’ I’ve been
told, but he’s sure a murderin’ cuss, so be you don’t walk straight
whilst you’re enjoyin’ your usual health. Come on, let’s go down town
and have a sody.”
David was not listening. He pulled a worn notebook from his pocket and
commenced to study its grimy pages.
“Come on, fella!” repeated Red. “Leap into the Rolls-Worse. I’m starvin’
for a sody.”
“I’m glad they used that new kind of covering, with those tricky
interwoven seams,” said David dreamily, ignoring the appeal of the
starving one. “They are going to save lots of worry, Red, and it’s
certain they won’t give. That old blimp we tried it on with rips here
and there to give the wind a chance, you remember? The seams never
budged. The new alloy duralumin I like too, and the longer, slimmer line
of the hull.”
Red sat down again.
“Those engines! Dave, they are as perfect—Lord, I love ’em! All the
time they have been in there on the blocks, stopping and starting,
stopping and starting; well, they have talked to me, David. One day a
girl came in, a sightseer; and she yelled, ‘My, what a horrid noise!
Isn’t it just awful?’ and I thought how nice it would be to tap her with
a wrench, but I didn’t. I let that engine answer. I tuned her up and you
couldn’t hear yourself think. Oh, but they are pretty, those engines! I
don’t know whether I love ’em most when they are quiet and dreamin’ of
what they can do, or when they are goin’ full speed with every part
doin’ its bit, so smooth and so true that there’s no words to describe
it.”
“You are a sentimental Irishman,” said David.
“I’m an Irishman that wants a sody,” said Red.
“They will be putting the last engine in place this afternoon, won’t
they?” asked David.
“Yes, and I’ve got to be here. Then she will be practically finished.
Just woodwork to wipe, and furniture to dust, and beds to make. Sounds
like a housewarming.”
“Did you know that they have named her?” asked David.
“No. I thought she was the Silver Ship.”
“Of course, but she has to have a sort of given name, like the
Shenandoah, poor girl, and the Dawn, and the Sun God, and the rest. I
heard Mr. Hammond’s daughter named her. She’s the Moonbeam.”
“That’s all right,” said Red approvingly. “I give the girl credit. The
Moonbeam! Faith, it grows on me, Davie. Moonbeam!”
“I like it,” said David. “Pretty, and easy to say, but not silly.”
“Well, here’s wishin’ her all the luck in the world,” said Red. “And the
same to us. They just got to let me go when she takes her first try-out.
I’d no sooner let those engines out of my sight first off than I’d use
an umbrella for a ’chute.”
“Better not let the engine crews hear you, you conceited devil! They
think they’re pretty kippy themselves.”
“Good lads, all,” admitted Red. “What they don’t know about engines
scarcely needs to be known, but it don’t matter what you do, David, you
have got to put something beside knowledge in your work. It’s like those
old fellas who used to put human blood in their cauldrons of metal when
they made their church bells. They thought it made the bells sound
sweeter. And so it did, so long as they thought so. You can’t say your
engine is a fine old piece of bits and parts. You’ve got to love it. You
remember last summer, when we flew east? I ran over to Providence to see
my brother. Well, one night I wandered into the engine room at Brown &
Sharpe’s, and the chief engineer showed me his engines. Gosh! there were
tunnels full of them. And he went along with an oil can and a bit of
waste, rubbin’ a bit here and a bit there, where God knows it didn’t
need it, pretending to oil; just loving them.” He jumped up. “Honest,
Dave, you’ve no heart! Come on! I’ve just got to have that sody—or
perhaps I didn’t mention it before?”
He took a step around the aged car, and stood staring.
“Come here!” he said. “See Mr. Hammond over there? Do you see who is
with him? Or is he, maybe, all alone?”
David looked.
“Don’t know the chap with him,” he decided.
“Look again,” begged Red. “Don’t you know that strut, and those skinny
legs, and that face? Think, man, think!”
“Never saw him,” declared David.
“Never? Well, listen here; may the Saints lead him off this lot,
immediate! If they don’t, there’s cloud banks and rain and hail ahead
for you and me. That’s Cram!”
“So it is!” said David. “Well, what of it? He has no grudge against us.”
“Hasn’t he, then? Didn’t you pass your exams, three years ago, and
didn’t he fail? Watch out, me lad! He hasn’t changed his spots in three
years. I know him, and all his breed.”
“Don’t be so suspicious,” said David, watching the trim, thin figure
slowly approaching. “Honestly, Red, why do you let that man get your
goat? You never act like that with anybody else, no matter what they
do.”
Red shrugged. “Dunno!” he said. “My brother holds that every man has his
own particular devil to torture and tantalize him. I feel shame, Davie,
but Walter Cram seems to be my own little devil. I have got to have two
sodies, now. I’m that upset.”
Cram, for it was he, glanced idly at the passing roadster but did not
recognize the occupants. The years had made little outward change in his
appearance. He was taller, still thin, and moved with nervous alertness.
He wore glasses, and they disguised the shadows under his eyes; violet
shadows, that hinted of escapades that he would not care to publish. For
Wally Cram, the man, was still as devious as Wally, the boy. Strangely
enough, the one fever that burned in his blood, his one dream, his sole
ambition, was based on an overwhelming vanity.
Without the ability to achieve the eminence he aspired to, he longed for
a foremost place in the public eye. In his thoughts all heroes wore his
own features. Lindbergh, winging his lonely way to France; Byrd,
exploring a frozen world; Andrews, forcing the Gobi desert to speak an
articulate language of past æons—Cram wanted what they had, but he had
grown into a lazy man, incapable of sustained effort.
Reading a newspaper in his New York hotel one day, Wally had seen an
article that had given him a grand idea—a magnificent idea. At once he
called his lawyers in Oklahoma City on long distance, and held a
conversation with them filled with so many millions that even the
telephone operator was impressed.
A week later he was in Ayre, and walking through the lobby of the hotel
he heard a familiar voice.
“Why, Mister Cram!” it said.
“Dulcie Hammond, by all that’s good!” ejaculated Cram. “What are you
doing here?”
“Looking after daddy, as usual,” Dulcie Hammond laughed. “He’s here in
pursuit of his hobby. Perhaps I should call it a life work. You know the
new dirigible starts on her maiden trip around the world in two weeks,
and naturally dad is going. He says I can’t go; isn’t that wet? In the
meantime I am seeing that he takes his bicarb after meals, and making
him lay off hot dogs, and pop corn and pie. Heavens, he’s an unruly
child! Between times I mostly hang around the plant and watch them put
the finishing touches to the ship. Did you know that I named her? She’s
the Moonbeam.”
“Fine! Why don’t you go along?”
“It’s to be a sort of stag party,” said Dulcie petulantly. “I can’t make
dad understand that I wouldn’t be a bother. I’ll bet Lady Drummond Hay
wasn’t a bother. I met her in New York, and she told me their trip was
just too galumptious. And I am just as good a sport as she is, and
probably tougher, because I’m younger.” She pondered. “Well, we’ll see!
But what are you doing here?”
“Just looking after some investments. I have stock in the Goodlow Plant,
and I have just invested a lot of money in the Moonbeam; enough, I hope,
to get me a berth on her round-the-world cruise. I am going out to the
drome now. Won’t you come?”
“Got to do some shopping,” said Dulcie. “Sorry. Oh, Wally, the ship is
too beautiful for words, even now, while she is still unfinished.”
Cram laughed. “Rot! The dirigible is nothing but a balloon.”
Dulcie gave him a scornful glance.
“You have a sordid soul,” she said, and walked away.
That night David and Red had orders to report at sunrise for a short
trip in the Dawn, a smaller dirigible which had been in commission for a
couple of months. They went up with the usual crew, and Mr. Hammond and
Captain Fraine and half a dozen others as passengers. David, to his
surprise, was put in full charge of the ship, Captain Fraine preferring
to wander around, inspecting. They were out for twenty-four hours,
without stops, and David returned the ship to Ayre, making a perfect
landing at the hangar.
Red took him aside.
“Something’s in the wind, fella. You didn’t get to handle that ship just
because they loved you. And there’s older chief mechanics than me who
might have gone. Watch out!”
Two days later the Moonbeam was completed. The last workmen crawled out
of the hull, while decorators reverently closed the door of the great
passenger gondola. Every bag, cord, wire, seam, every bolt and screw had
been tested and retested. She hung aloft in the vast hangar, a beautiful
and majestic thing, ready for the infinite. David gazed and gazed.
“Before I managed to ditch school,” said Red unexpectedly at his side,
“they read us about a place called Mount Olympus. Grand big women lived
there. Goddesses. Not real, you know, but I got an awful kick out of
’em. And the Moonbeam; ain’t she a goddess? Those old goddesses used to
pick up a mortal like they were nothin’ and carry them off. And here’s a
silver ship, just waiting to gather up a load of folks, like an armful
of babies, and go soarin’ out and up and away into—Oh, my gosh! the
thought makes me want to yell. I want to jump on my hat, or fight
somebody.”
David smiled. “I know. Pipe down, old son. Come on to quarters. I’m dog
tired, and the silver ship will wait.”
The following morning the ship took her maiden walk out of the hangar,
and was moored to the mast. Seeing her there, automobiles began to
gather, street-car lines disgorged curious sightseers, and for hours a
big crowd milled under the glistening shape. Toward evening the ship was
drawn down and returned to the hangar.
At supper an official-looking envelope was brought to David. He read its
contents unbelieving, then again perused the terse sentences.
Headquarters Aeronautical Board,
Goodlow-Zeppelin Company,
Ayre, Ohio.
Subject: Detail, Assistant Pilot, Moonbeam.
To: David Ellison, Pilots’ School,
Goodlow-Zeppelin Company.
You have been selected by the Aeronautical Board of the
Goodlow-Zeppelin Company to fill the position of assistant pilot
on the dirigible Moonbeam, on its first trip around the world,
leaving the hangar at Ayre, Ohio, at six A. M. on June 15th,
1930.
Your presence desired at headquarters, at nine o’clock tomorrow
morning.
George Paine Porter,
Director, Lighter-than-Air Craft,
Goodlow-Zeppelin Company.
David forgot his supper, forgot everything. It could scarcely be real!
While he struggled with his surprise and delight, hardly believing the
good fortune that he had not even dared to hope for, he heard Red’s
voice.
“Read it! Read it, fella!” he cried, and he pressed into David’s hand a
letter similar to his own, appointing Red as chief mechanic on the
round-the-world flight of the Moonbeam. For once Red had nothing to say.
The moment was too great, the news too stupendous.
David pushed back his chair; he could not eat. They went out and,
crossing the great landing field to the hangar, they sat down on a truck
and looked at the closed doors.
“She’s in there, Dave, safe and sound! And in two weeks she will carry
us away over land and sea, rough mountains and sweet valleys—round the
world, and home again. You and me, David; assistant pilot and mechanic!”
“Chief mechanic, as I read it,” said David, smiling. “Well, I must wire
my mother the good news.”
“That’s right, and I must telegraph my mother, too, and that blackguard
brother of mine, as well. I’ll just say to him, ‘Your Reverence, the
ugly duckling has become a swan. Am startin’ on a world cruise in the
Moonbeam on the fifteenth of June. What’s to be done about it?’ That
will stop him all right.”
“I can’t think of a greater thing to have happen to us,” mused David.
“Around the world, Red! Get it? Seeing all those countries, and meeting
so many people. The first American dirigible to fly around the world!”
“Yes,” said Red, “and having those blessed engines right where I can
keep an eye on them, day and night. Going full blast, and me with an ear
for every beat. I’m just crazy with joy, Dave. Let’s go and get a sody.”
They climbed into their jointly owned and jointly loved roadster, and
started it toward the nearest soda fountain, its fenders flapping, its
body squeaking and rattling as though in proud defiance of its softly
purring motor—Red’s “favorite child.”
“We have come a good way in the past four years, Red,” David bellowed
over the din. “Sometimes the work has seemed pretty stiff, but I’d work
twice as hard, if possible, for what I have gained.”
“Yeah!” said Red, nodding his bright head. “And sometimes I feel that it
just isn’t so. All this. I’ll wake up, and find myself a kid; in bed
listenin’ to a worn awning rope rattlin’, and a freight train grumblin’
on the sidin’ across the street. You know, Dave, even when I was a kid
there was something in me pushing up, and reaching out, for something I
couldn’t reach or see.” His voice grew bitter. “I knew a fella once who
smoked and caroused too much, and one day he went down and out. He’d
never taken anybody’s advice about taking care of himself. Well, after
his heart cracked on him, the poor devil just went around beggin’ the
rest of his gang to lay off, and go to bed once in a while. However, one
day his poor old engine stopped, and that was the end of him.
“I was like that about school. Everybody tellin’ me I ought to finish
high school, and me knowin’ better than the whole of ’em. I tell you,
Dave, I’d give anything for the chance, now. Now I see what I’ve thrown
away. And I need it; Lord, how I need it! It means that I’ve got to make
it up, sweating and groaning. Night schools, and correspondence schools,
and study. Because, so help me, Dave, I won’t disgrace my engines.
“And it’s a fact, Davie, I actually go around stoppin’ kids on the
street, and preachin’ school to ’em. I say, ‘Smoke if you like, and
drink if you want to be a fool; but lay off long enough to get yourself
through high school.’ And I’m like the poor fella in Lawton. I’ve a dark
suspicion that I’m wastin’ words.”
CHAPTER V
A STOWAWAY
Day whirled after day, filled with pleasant labor. Each morning the
Moonbeam was sent up for a flight which sometimes occupied but a few
hours, and sometimes stretched into the night. At first there were many
little things to do for her; adjustments, changes, the tightening of a
screw here, the tuning up of a brace there. Men watched the propeller
shafts, and listened to the smooth roar of the engines in their
throbbing “eggs.”
Captain Fraine, with his navigators at his side, tried for altitude and
depth; nosed up, swept down, turned the ship in majestic circles. She
responded perfectly. Her bulk, so much greater than that of any previous
dirigible, seemed to have no effect in the action of her great engines,
and she answered the wheel with absolute ease.
At mess one night Red strolled over to David’s table with a letter.
“From Padre Ryan,” he said.
David took the sheet. It was brief.
Dear Swan:
Your night letter enchants me. I rejoice that you’ve such a big
chance before you. And if you don’t uphold the honor of the
family I’ll lay the curse of Saint Morvin on you. He’s little
known, but most efficacious.
I’ll pray for you. As a child you had a bad way of leaning out
of upstairs windows. Have the ship screened.
Your devoted and loving brother,
John.
David laughed. “He must be a card, all right.”
“Well, he’s not so bad,” said Red. “A kindly priest, and a good son to
his mother. David, I’m all set for the take-off.”
So was David. On the morning of the fifteenth, he was the first man at
the hangar, and it was his hand that pressed the lever, putting in
motion the mechanism that slid back the great doors.
It was not yet dawn, but a vast mob packed the field. For months the
building of the great dirigible had been followed, detail by detail, by
an interested public. Her plans, charts and dimensions had appeared in
all the leading newspapers and magazines, accompanied by long articles.
Finally came the news of her completion. The announcement of the
round-the-world flight as her maiden effort was the spark which caused
the enthusiasm of the public to burst into flame. A year ago they had
watched the detailed accounts of the Graf Zeppelin, as radiograms marked
her flight.
Now a ship of their own; an American ship financed with American money
and manned, from the commander down, with Americans, was to essay the
same journey, hoping to better the time of the Graf Zeppelin. The papers
devoted pages to the anticipated adventure. Radiograms, cables, letters
of congratulation and good wishes, invitations from half the countries
of Europe asking Mr. Hammond to detour in their several directions and
stop off, were printed for the pleasure of a public which felt a
proprietary interest in the Moonbeam.
All night the field had been black with people. With fine democracy they
slept in their trucks, their flivvers, or their Packards, and at
intervals ate hot dogs and sandwiches. Hundreds of soldiers labored to
keep the field about the hangar clear for the departure of the outgoing
ship. And still they came. The first trolleys were packed with frantic
hordes that pushed and jostled to get near the ropes that had been
stretched along for hundreds of yards, and through which people
continually broke.
At last, as the crews walked the great gleaming shape out onto the
field, a deafening cheer broke like a portentous wave. Hoarse voices
cried, “Good luck, Moonbeam! Good luck!—’ray! ’ray! ’ray!—Go in and
win, Moonbeam! Beat the Zep! Beat the Zep!”
When Mr. Hammond’s car drove up, Dulcie hopped gaily out, her little
Pekinese hugged under her arm.
“Isn’t this jam perfectly terrific?” she said to Captain Fraine. “We
could scarcely get through.”
“Most of them have been here all night,” said Captain Fraine. “They’re
certainly enthusiastic. These troops the Governor sent down have had a
lively time keeping them off the field.”
“Any of the passengers here yet?” asked Dulcie.
“Most of them, although it’s early yet. They seem afraid the boat will
start without them!”
“I’m going on board,” said Dulcie. “I want to put dad’s bicarbonate
where he will see it. He always loses it, poor dear, whenever he gets
indigestion.”
“Plenty of time, Miss Hammond,” said Fraine, as he escorted her to the
steps leading up to the passenger gondola. “I wish you were going with
us.”
“So do I!” sighed Dulcie.
She went into her father’s cabin, and arranged several small bottles and
boxes on a shelf. Her father came in.
“Wish I dared take you with me, honey,” he said wistfully. “But I can’t
risk you, can I? If anything should happen—”
“It’s just as you say, daddy. I’ve teased all I have the face to. But
please don’t wave at me when you start. I might bust right out and cry.
So I’ll run right off and get lost in the crowd.”
“You behave yourself while I’m gone, Dulcie, and no running around with
that young bounder of a Greene chap back home.”
“I won’t speak to him while you are away,” Dulcie promised. “And I will
behave all the time exactly as though you had your eye on me.”
She kissed him lightly, and was gone, leaving him with a feeling of
loneliness and loss that overshadowed the pleasure of the take-off.
The engines were adding a deep roar to the human sounds. People strained
against those in front, and pushed them into the ropes. Small dogs
dodged into the open space and barked. The crew swarmed up and took
their places in the ship, with excitement written large all over them.
Two of the reporters paused for last-minute shots. Movie cameramen,
thanking their stars for the bright sun that had appeared, ground
frantically. Automobiles began to toot their horns as at length, the
last man on board, the ground crew of five hundred men walked toward the
ship from the spread-fan positions they had been holding. The twenty
thousand spectators let out a mighty roar; a sea of upturned faces
watched as the Moonbeam rose slowly, her motors drowning the noise of
the crowd.
From a window Mr. Hammond searched through his glasses for a familiar
little figure. “I thought the kid would wave me off, after all,” he said
to himself. “Wish now I had brought her along. At least I would know
where she was.”
“Couldn’t have had a better take-off, commander,” said Captain Fraine,
at his side. “Her engines simply sing.”
“Glad you are pleased, captain,” answered Mr. Hammond. “We’ll soon see
how she performs. We are out to make a record, as you know, and that
means a steady, day-after-day excellence. From Lakehurst to
Friedrichshafen is approximately forty-two hundred miles. We have got to
make up some of our time on that leg of the trip. I don’t know Russia at
all; in fact, I am a little dubious about it, although Dr. Eckener
experienced no trouble whatever.”
“Why didn’t you bring your daughter along, commander?” asked Captain
Fraine. “The Graf Zeppelin had a woman passenger.”
“I know, I know! I suppose I am just fussy over the kid. I wanted her
where I knew she would be safe. She’s going to the seashore. Hope she
won’t swim out too far.”
“Does she drive her own car?” asked Fraine, hiding a grin.
“Lord, yes, drives like the very devil.” He turned his back, and looked
down. The crowds were far away. “Buck up, buck up, you old fool!” he
told himself savagely. “She’s all right—but I’ll bring her along next
time.”
The sunlight was glorious; glittering and flashing, the ship circled
above Ayre, returned to her own field, and dipped low in a graceful
gesture of farewell, while the waiting crowds went mad. Rising, she sped
eastward toward Lakehurst, her first stop. Under her flowed the lovely
panorama of Ohio; gently rolling woodland, wide and opulent farms with
dark patches of plowed lands and the lush green of springing crops.
Towns appeared here and there, little huddles of houses at crossroads,
and large cities, where the smoke of manufactories spiraled lazily
upwards, as though pointing indolently at the passing ship.
David went into the chart room, and found Red poring over the passenger
list.
“I see we’ve got a medico with us,” he said.
“Yes, Dr. Forsythe; of course the Company would send their own doctor.”
“Here’s a big guy in his line,” said David. “Sanford Hamilton, of New
York, and a dozen other places. Has so much money he can’t count it, but
just can’t stop making more. Has the habit.”
“Wish I could get a habit like that. Well, the Ryans own the two most
worthless farms on God’s green earth, and I never can get over expectin’
to see a fine squirt of oil come leapin’ out of them, although the
experts say they are as dry as dust. Who’s next on the list?”
“Dr. Martin Trigg, and Dr. Nicholas Sims. They are the two old
professors from Princeton. Scientists of some sort—big bugs.”
“I helped ’em aboard,” said Red, chuckling. “One of ’em said ‘Thank you,
my boy, thank you,’ just as pretty, but the other looked at me till I
felt like a bug on a pin.”
“The next four I haven’t seen,” said David.
“Skip ’em,” counseled Red. “Reporters. Wild-eyed, sort of. You can
always tell ’em. Always huntin’ a scoop for the next edition, regardless
of time or place.”
“These two are men Commander Hammond is trying to interest in
dirigibles.”
“Uh huh,” said Red. “Be polite.”
“Emil Hausen—he’s a German. We leave him at Friedrichshafen.”
“I must practice my German on him,” said Red. “I know four fine
upstandin’ words: _Ach du lieber Augustin_. Would you think they’d sound
homelike to the poor wanderer, Davie?”
“Try ’em!” laughed Davie; “I’ll pick up the pieces.” He wandered off,
stopping to admire the salon. In one corner, at a small but perfectly
appointed desk, Mr. Hamilton already sat dictating rapidly to his
secretary. The great king of Wall Street was preparing to radio his
orders, keeping a tight rein on his active money.
At a window the two old scientists, Doctors Trigg and Sims, quarreled in
low, tense tones over something referred to in such lengthily technical
terms that David did not know whether they had disagreed about
dinosaurs, angleworms, or air currents. As David passed, the smaller of
the two men looked up and nodded.
“Well, son,” he chirruped in a pleasant crisp voice, “making fair
progress, I should say. This your first trip? Great experience;
illuminating, developing. Make the most of it—you are young. Perhaps
you will like it so well that before we have entirely circumnavigated
the globe, you will have sprouted mental wings and will accept the ether
for your habitat. I hope so—I hope so! Aerial navigation needs young
blood, young enthusiasms.”
“Bosh!” retorted the second sage, Doctor Sims himself. “Bosh! There is
no young enthusiasm; it’s grown old, money loving, comfort seeking; its
bones creak. Don’t I know? Don’t I teach about a hundred and fifty
youngsters every day of the week? Bah!”
“Sims, you are as dry as a dinosaur egg,” Doctor Trigg exploded. “As an
instructor in grades equaling yours, I am also in a position to collect
data and observe reactions. The world is moved by youthful enthusiasms.
It is, thank God, an inexhaustible force, propelling the world; a force,
Sims, which our instruments cannot gauge, which all your retorts and
chemical tests cannot resolve into its component parts. And let me tell
you, Sims, in the modern aviator there lives the spirit of the
adventurers of all time; a gallant, intrepid and invincible army that
comes marching down the gray ages to be reincarnated as the greatest of
all the cavaliers of chance.
“For centuries they have been crusaders; they have sailed uncharted
seas; they have braved killing heat and searing cold. They have fought
the dragons of every age and clime, wrestling with the earth for jewels
and gold, building glittering cities in desert places, throwing fairy
bridges from crag to crag. Now, spurning the reclaimed earth, they have
taken their indomitable courage and their boundless enthusiasm, Sims,
into the limitless sea of the air, whose currents and eddies and
tempests are more treacherous and terrible than ever beset any ocean.”
He had been tapping his words out on Doctor Sims’ bony knee. Suddenly
realizing an acute discomfort there, Doctor Sims removed the knee
abruptly, and looked up at David.
“Now you,” he remarked, ignoring his brother educator’s dissertation.
“You’re planning to be a big newspaper man, aren’t you? Eh?”
“Why, no, sir,” said David.
“Automobile tires, then—automobile tires,” Doctor Sims cut in.
He seemed about to launch on a tirade against tires, and David spoke
quickly. “I am an aviator,” he said, “and I want to thank Doctor Trigg
for what he just said. It is all true;” and looking at the doctor with a
light bow, he added, “and it is pretty fine for us youngsters to feel
that men like you understand us, and are with us.” He smiled the smile
that always won friends for him, and passed on into the little hallway.
Behind him he could hear Doctor Trigg burst into a loud cackle. He knew,
without looking, that Professor Sims was dodging a skinny finger.
“What a peachy old card!” thought David. “And can’t he just pour out the
language? He’s just right, too.”
In the hall outside the washroom he found Red. He seemed preoccupied.
“Hello,” he said. “Say, Dave, listen; do you hear a funny noise?”
David listened. “Why, yes. Sounds sort of squeakish. We are not near an
egg, and there’s nothing over us but the crew’s quarters, is there?”
“Nothing over or under; but it’s a darned queer noise. You can’t hear it
five feet away.” To prove it, he slid along with his ear pressed against
the partition. “It’s here, somewhere, right here by Mr. Hammond’s
cabin.” He went down on his knees. “Comes from low down. Now I can’t
hear it at all. Damn queer!”
David also knelt, and they listened in silence, staring at each other.
The sound was intermittent; a whiffling, wheezing squeak, and
occasionally a faint tearing sound.
“Fabric going,” said David anxiously. “It’s not a bag, because the
disturbance is low down by the floor.”
“Well, we got to find out about that,” declared Red. “It may be just a
piece of cloth rattling at a window, or something, but there mustn’t be
any unusual noises on a boat like this, where everything means
something. I’d hate to have to turn back now.”
They stood up as Mr. Hammond entered the passageway. David explained
their trouble.
“Under or over my room, eh?” he said, unlatching his door.
A small brown streak shot into the hall, recognized the paternal
trousers, whirled and fell at Mr. Hammond’s feet in an ecstasy of
delight.
“What the devil—why, you damned little runt, how do you happen to be
here? It’s Dulcie’s pup, Koko.” He picked up the little fellow and
petted him. “Dulcie must have shut him in my room while she was on
board, and then the poor kid was so upset when she left that she must
have forgotten the little beggar. Well, Koko, we can’t drop you offside,
can we? We will just send a ’gram to your missie, and take you with us.”
“There’s our funny noise, Red,” laughed David.
“Gee, you had me scared, you little scoundrel!” remarked Red, with a
sigh of relief.
“He hates to be shut up; I’ll bet he was chewing something up,” Mr.
Hammond chuckled. “Well, I’m glad he’s here. I wish I’d brought Dulcie,
too. She’d be just about as safe up here as she will be swimming and
canoeing and dancing, and racing all over creation in that damned car of
hers.” He looked at the boys, and saw that their eyes, staring over his
shoulder into the little cabin beyond, were filled with amazement,
amusement, and concern.
Red broke unexpectedly into a hearty laugh. “Well, Mr. Hammond—excuse
us, sir! Beat it, Dave!”
They bolted into the salon, and Mr. Hammond turned to his room. What he
saw there made his old heart leap. He dropped the dog.
“Dulcie!” he cried, and Dulcie ran into his open arms.
“You are a bad, bad girl!” he whispered presently. “You are a stowaway;
and you have made a fool of your poor old father. Who put you up to
this?”
“No one, daddy,” said Dulcie, rubbing her eyes which were full of tears
and her nose which bore a nice imprint of rough tweed. “I knew you
really wanted me, and you know my judgment is much better than yours in
such things, so I just stayed quietly in here. I knew you would come in
later, but Koko nearly spoiled it all. And you really do want me? I
heard what you said. It’s a lesson to you, too; your child is going
along wherever you go, and it only makes unnecessary scenes when you try
to stop her.”
Mr. Hammond blew his nose loudly.
“Well, darling, I am glad you are here. Yes, I’m delighted; but don’t
get it into your head that you have established a precedent. No, ma’am!”
“All right, precious. Now comb your hair; it looks all rat-taily. And
take your bicarb; it is long past time for breakfast. I’m starved. That
small suitcase is mine. I took your things out of it and put them all in
your other one. You are a rotten packer, daddy. Please move the man in
the next stateroom out when you get round to it. I’ll take it.”
“Do you mean,” said Mr. Hammond, grimly wagging a finger at the
suitcase, “that you had this all cooked up yesterday?”
“Oh, for weeks, daddy darling. Did you honestly think I would consider
letting you come alone? I’m surprised. I’m starved, too. What an
appetite this nice high air gives one!”
“Come on to breakfast then,” Mr. Hammond groaned. “Let’s get it over
with!”
“I don’t see any reason for you to be embarrassed, if I am not,” said
Dulcie, doing a little careful work with a lipstick. “It was frightfully
embarrassing for me to be left at home like a little girl.”
“Too bad!” growled Mr. Hammond, a twinkle in his eye that belied the
tone. “Too bad! Well, gimme that infernal soda, and let’s go.”
“What’s in there?” said Dulcie, pointing to a large box on a chair.
“Koko seems to think it’s something to eat. He nearly tore the paper.”
“He’s a smart little beggar,” said Mr. Hammond, in an offhand manner.
“Oh, yes, that’s yours, that box. Candy—thought you might like to have
it.”
“Daddy!” cried Dulcie, casting herself at him. “Daddy, you precious
adorable old lamb-pie! You knew I would come!”
“Well, I confess I did have hopes you would pull it off,” said the
adorable lamb-pie sheepishly.
CHAPTER VI
THE CONTROL ROOM
Mr. Hammond had no occasion to worry over Dulcie’s welcome. After a
hearty laugh all round at her father’s expense, she became, as Doctor
Trigg said, “the child of the regiment.” Her sunny presence raised the
morale of the whole ship. Only Red groaned.
“We’ve got to keep topside-upside now, whatever happens,” he said.
Doctor Trigg took her under his special care, muttering to Doctor Sims,
“More youthful enthusiasm, my boy; more youthful enthusiasm! She wants
to fly, too, you see.”
“G-r-r-r-r bah!” replied Doctor Sims briefly.
Those of the passengers who were flying for the first time watched the
distant earth with fascinated and slightly worried eyes. They seemed
disinclined to leave the windows, and ate their excellent luncheon
without interest. By the time afternoon tea was served, however, they
apparently decided that the globe would not disappear if they failed to
keep a restraining gaze upon it, and talked gaily over the hot toast and
marmalade.
Radiograms had been sent ahead to Lakehurst, and answers received. They
were eagerly expected, but Mr. Hammond decided that their stop there
should be a very brief one.
Lakehurst, they found, when the ship slid into view above the field, was
at least ready with a noisy welcome. Whistles, horns and sirens tooted,
screeched and moaned. The landing crew ran out to secure the ropes, as
Captain Fraine eased her gracefully down. The steps were adjusted, and
the door of the passenger gondola was opened. The passengers, warned
that they must be on board again at eleven o’clock, stepped down, not
sorry to find terra firma actually under their feet again. A group of
officials and leading citizens welcomed Mr. Hammond and his officers,
and the ship was rapidly propelled into the big hangar, where the local
force of mechanics and engineers assisted the Moonbeam’s own crew in a
microscopic examination of every part. An extra amount of fuel and gas
was taken on, being stored in the place of ballast. An extra quantity of
dry ice was shipped, and all commissary stores checked up.
Time passed rapidly, and the passengers commenced to return, hurrying in
taxis and on foot. Mr. Hamilton’s secretary rushed ahead with a bundle
of telegrams; Doctors Trigg and Sims came with their arms full of papers
and magazines; a car whirled up, and the driver hurriedly approached
Dulcie just as she was about to mount into the gondola and handed her a
great box from the officers of the field. Long rose stems stuck
intriguingly out at one end.
“What has happened to Captain Fraine?” inquired David of Mr. Hammond as
they stood near the steps.
Looking very white, Captain Fraine approached. A couple of young
officers accompanied him. He held a bloodstained handkerchief to his
head but managed to laugh as he saw them.
“Not so bad as it looks, commander,” he said lightly.
“What happened?” demanded Mr. Hammond.
“They are doing some construction work back in the hangar,” one of the
strangers explained, “and something had loosened the supports of a
platform where some boards were lying. A two-by-four slipped off, and
came down and hit the captain here, right on the head. It might have
been pretty serious. It’s too bad.”
“It will be all right as soon as Dr. Forsythe puts a bit of plaster on
it. Don’t think of it.”
“We’ll get on board, and see the doctor at once,” advised Mr. Hammond.
“Go with him, David.”
Dr. Forsythe proceeded to examine the bump. It was a bad one, but the
skin was only slightly broken. He stopped the bleeding, and plastered it
up. Captain Fraine declared that he felt as good as new, and went
directly into the control room, while David returned to Mr. Hammond.
“Weren’t we to pick up Walter Cram here at Lakehurst?” he inquired.
“We were,” Mr. Hammond replied. “He has just five more minutes to get
here.”
“Well, looks like he’d made it, at that,” said David, as a taxi raced
up, stopped at the gate with a jolt, and an agitated figure leaped out
and hurried across the field, a suitcase in each hand. A minute later,
Cram stood smiling beside them, breathless but still self-assured.
“Hope I didn’t keep you waiting long, commander,” he said
ingratiatingly.
On the stroke of twelve, with Lakehurst making all the noise it could,
the Moonbeam took off, and soon after the passengers retired, leaving
only the officers in charge to watch while she started over the high
sea.
Wednesday morning found everyone refreshed and enthusiastic. Dulcie’s
Lakehurst roses gave the salon a gala appearance. Below them the
Atlantic lay as smooth as a floor, the bright sun glistening on its
surface.
They had been flying very low. Two liners passed beneath them, and
saluted with puffs of fleecy smoke. In return the ship majestically
inclined her silver nose in a triple dip.
Later they gained altitude smoothly, and reached fifteen hundred feet.
Now little fleecy clouds met them and broke like foam on the prow. The
air was clear, the sun blinding. The passengers accepted the new
environment with ease. They read, slept, or wrote letters filled with
detailed descriptions.
David found it hard to absent himself from the control room for more
than a few minutes at a time, although with Captain Fraine in command
and Lieutenant Florsheim as second pilot, David had actually no more to
do than an observer, except for his turn at the wheel. Mr. Hammond came
in often, too. On one of his visits his eyes were attracted to Captain
Fraine as the young man pressed his palm to the top of his bandaged
temple.
“Is that troubling you, Fraine?” he inquired.
“It’s really all right,” replied Captain Fraine. “Just sore, and tender.
The plank hit me squarely on my old wound. The place has always been a
little troublesome. Worse in stormy weather, I notice. There’s a silver
plate in there, and I think it doesn’t fit very well. I mean to have it
looked after, sometime.”
“Better not neglect it,” advised Mr. Hammond.
“It really has never troubled me enough to speak of, but that board
would have given a good crack to a harder head than mine.”
“Well, don’t try to stand all the watches. Make these youngsters take
that wheel. Come back with me, and take it easy.”
“Thank you, sir, I will presently,” said the captain. He lifted a hand
toward his head again, but hastily withdrew it. David, watching him,
knew how he felt.
Back in the lounge, Dulcie was being entertained by Walter Cram. He was
telling her far too much, but he didn’t know it. His egotism, his silly
pride, his preposterous vanity ran over his narrative like an ugly
stain, and through it all a slimy envy of David that puzzled Dulcie. As
soon as she could, she left him and wandered around until she found Red
Ryan, busy with his eternal testing.
“Do you ever stop?” she asked.
“I don’t want to, Miss Hammond. I love it. Every time I try a screw or
test a wire, I think, ‘Here, you beauty, you can just depend on Red, who
loves you like a sweetheart, to keep you trim and true.’ And all my
fellas feel the same. We just love the Moonbeam, and what you feel love
for, turns toil into pleasure.”
“What a man you are!” said Dulcie warmly. “Tell me, do you always tell
the truth?”
“I try to,” said Red, looking puzzled.
Dulcie made the plunge.
“Well then, why does Mr. Cram hate David so?”
“My God!” exclaimed Red, dropping a wrench, “how did you discover that?”
“He’s been talking to me, about himself mostly, and he didn’t say a word
about David that you could pin to, but he hates him poisonously.”
“Honest, Miss Hammond,” said Red admiringly, “you are one smart girl.”
“Well, you know it, too.”
“I do so,” said Red, “but David doesn’t. Not he! He’s got more brains
and better, than anyone I know, but no common sense when it comes to
side-steppin’ a rattler.”
“But why? What’s the answer?” demanded Dulcie.
“How long have you known him?” hedged Red.
“Cram? Oh, two or three years. I used to go down to Princeton for dances
and whatnot. That’s where I first heard of David. The three men who
dragged me around to rabbles were friends of his at prep school.”
“Yeah, Butter Brown, and Len, and Smithy?”
“Right first time,” said Dulcie. “David has told you. Well, Wally tried
to give me a rush. Gee, he was a wet smack! And he wouldn’t take hints.
I was bored to tears, and the boys all offered to take him off and kill
him. But all that doesn’t explain why he has it in for David.”
“Visibility increasin’,” commented Red. “David doesn’t just shun you,
Miss Hammond. That wouldn’t just please Wally. But that’s only part of
it.”
Speaking in a low tone, he told her how, almost four years ago, David
had passed his entrance exams to the pilots’ school, while Cram had
failed. He told her a great deal about Wally, as man and boy.
“He’s not as bad as I make out, perhaps,” he finished, “but even as a
boy Wally always magnified every slight or injury to Mr. Walter Cram,
and retaliated on a big scale.”
“I think it’s a shame!” cried Dulcie. “It makes me have a horrid
feeling.”
“Well, we’ll just keep an eye out, and see what we see,” said Red as he
went off in search of a possible loose screw.
Dulcie liked Red. She liked his bright smile, and the twinkle in his
blue eyes. She didn’t care who he was, or whence he came. He was so
true, so merry, and so unassuming that he could be any man’s friend.
Yes, she liked Red, and she liked David. She certainly did like David.
During the lunch hour the Moonbeam sped smoothly along at an altitude of
one thousand feet. Dulcie declared that it was like being on an ocean
liner, only nicer. She proved a joy unspeakable to the young reporters,
the professors regarded her with apparent curiosity, and even Mr.
Hamilton induced her to talk to him a while. Tea-time was one of the
pleasantest hours of the day. No one suffered but Koko, the little dog,
who stuffed on cakes, and groaned for hours afterwards.
That night the company dispersed very early. The altitude, the crisp
untainted air and the novelty combined to make everyone sleepy. Mr.
Hammond was in the best of spirits. Tail winds had helped them on, they
had used all the engines, and were already three hours ahead of the
schedule of the Graf Zeppelin.
Thursday morning, the seventeenth of June, found the ship sailing
serenely along over a floor of heavy clouds. The sun shone brightly, and
the air was even, but there was a low humming in the wires that
disturbed David. He found Red in his cubicle, and told him that he
looked for a storm.
“Well, I’ve a prickling in my thumbs, too,” said Red. “And when it
comes, it’s going to be a wow. I think I’ll take a look over the old
boat and see that everything is ship-shape.”
He commenced to put on the smooth buttonless overalls which, with felt
shoes, were always worn by anyone moving about in the hull. They were
designed to prevent any scratching or tearing of the fabric of the gas
bags and air bags.
“God help the man at the head of a gang; he’s every man’s slave. My crew
is made up of fine efficient fellas, but this trip has gone to their
heads. As soon as they saw themselves crossin’ big water, they all took
out little notebooks from their kits, and commenced jottin’ down
‘experiences’.
“An’ when I said, ‘You blamed lunatics, what for is that?’ they told me
they were ‘writing it up for the papers at home’! Tryin’ to be a bunch
of Lindys, and Byrds, and Strassers. I simply said, ‘And have I
novelists, or have I mechanics, then?’”
David laughed and asked, “Got another ’all?”
He slipped into the garment Red threw him, and together they went up
into the hull.
That afternoon the motion of the ship became a little jerky; and David
and Red, on another inspection trip, had some trouble in making their
way over the bags, along the catwalk, and among the taut wires and
spanners. Occasionally they stood listening to the talk of the ship,
with its multitude of little mechanical noises which, to the educated
ear, was harmonious as an orchestra.
“Singin’ pretty, isn’t she?” Red said finally. “Hey, there, don’t that
wire just in front of us sag a bit?” He wormed his way over to the winch
and pulled up the offending brace, testing it until it sang softly.
“Now for the eggs full of engines,” he said, as he started back, David
following.
“Honestly, Red, all this isn’t your job,” protested David.
Red turned and stared deep into David’s eyes. For the first time David
saw pin points of flame in the blue depths. He spoke, and his voice
carried a new note.
“Any job’s my job, so be it’s for the Moonbeam. There’s going to be a
blow, Dave. We’re coming into wind. I have seen too many ‘northers’ in
Oklahoma to make any mistake. What I want to know is, why don’t they
radio the nearest station and see what weather’s scheduled ahead.”
“The receiver’s gone on the blink,” said David briefly. “That’s why they
didn’t get any messages through.”
“Saints keep us, that’s that!” muttered Red. “Well, let’s shove along. I
want to see what the engines are doing.”
They climbed down into the eggs, one by one, and Red’s keen eyes took
note of every part of the enormous throbbing engines, each controlled by
two earnest and keen-eyed engineers. A third man sat on a small stool,
always ready to stand by in case of trouble.
Later, as they entered the observation room, after removing their
overalls, Red grunted. “Everything looks okay,” he said, “but I wish
Miss Hammond was at home in her own house, instead of bummin’ along up
here a mile or so from anything more solid and endurin’ than a stiff
breeze.”
“You’re right,” said David. “Honest, Red, she is the nicest kid, and
such a good sport.”
“I think so,” said Red. “Gosh, did you feel the car shake then? We
struck a crack in the wind. Yep, Miss Hammond is the real thing, all
right. She is so nice to everybody. Why, she treats me just as good as
she does you, Dave.”
“Better!” assented David, bitterly. “Gosh, there’s another crack! Feel
her bounce!” He was flung against the nearest chair, where he clung for
support for a moment, until the ship again rode on an even keel. A
little tremor ran through the Moonbeam; she rolled a little. Several of
the passengers who were in the salon hurried to their cabins to rescue
small articles which might be broken in the event of rougher weather.
Others crowded close to the windows, watching the scudding clouds with
anxious faces.
Fifteen minutes passed, then the ship raised her nose, reared in a long
curve, and swooped downward. From the galley came the sound of breaking
dishes, followed by a yell of anguish from the cook. Flung into each
other’s arms, David and Red executed a clumsy dance about the room
before they could get their balance, as the ship righted and
straightened out again.
“Whew!” said Red, rubbing the back of his head where it had bumped
against a hook.
“Well, I don’t like that so well,” said David.
“I am going to take a squint at that weather chart, and then look at the
rear engine again,” said Red. “Coming?”
“Go on,” said David. “I’ll join you as soon as I put on another sweater.
I’m cold.” He turned and went into his cabin as Red hurried forward.
David had to unpack the sweater, but he didn’t hurry. He knew that
Fraine was on duty. He slipped on the heavy garment, then sauntered
toward the control room. As he approached it a yell broke through the
monotonous sounds of the gondola. A hoarse scream, another, and a
jabbering laugh. He ran into the control room, and for an instant stood
frozen by the sight that met his eyes.
The wheel was deserted but, caught by its stabilizing device, held the
ship on her course. On the floor, apparently dead, lay Lieutenant
Florsheim. Just beyond him lay Van Arden, a crumpled heap face down.
Captain Fraine, his face contorted in an expression of insane frenzy,
held Red Ryan by the throat against the wall with one hand, while he
poised a heavy wrench for a murderous blow with the other.
At David’s shout, the madman hesitated. As the iron came crashing down,
David caught the wrist and deflected the blow which would have cracked
Red’s head like an eggshell. Then ensued an actual life-and-death
struggle. David tried desperately to get a subduing grasp on the crazed
captain, while Red, rallying his strength, struggled for a throat hold.
The inhuman strength of madness filled Fraine. David and Red were both
tall and splendidly muscled, yet in his frenzy he swung them about like
children. He centered his attention on Red, who gurgled as Fraine’s
sinewy hands closed for the second time on his windpipe. Lights flashed
before his eyes. He choked, sagged, and then all at once it was over.
David had put every ounce of the strength of his trained muscles into a
lightning uppercut. It landed neatly on the captain’s chin. He crashed
to the floor beside Florsheim, unconscious.
At the door faces appeared: Mr. Hammond, Mr. Hamilton, a dozen others,
among them Dr. Forsythe. Van Arden was trying to sit up. Captain Fraine
groaned. Florsheim lay like dead, blood from a gaping wound on his head
spreading on the floor. Red nursed his swollen neck, and David leaned
panting against the instrument shelf.
“Fraine has gone crazy, doctor,” said Red hoarsely. “When I got here
Florsheim was out, and he was trying to kill Van Arden.”
“Get all three to their bunks,” the doctor ordered.
A swift examination showed that Van Arden was suffering from merely a
heavy blow on the jaw. All he wanted was peace and silence, and a chance
for his head to stop whirling. Florsheim was badly hurt, with a long
scalp cut, and the doctor feared concussion.
Captain Fraine, on the first approach to consciousness, evinced such
symptoms of acute delirium that Dr. Forsythe immediately gave him an
opiate.
Mr. Hammond came back to the control room and took the wheel from the
still shaky David. “I will take the first watch,” he said. “Dulcie has
some tea for you and Red in the salon.”
Nothing loath, they walked back and sat down, as Dulcie, followed by the
sputtering chef, brought in steaming tea and crackers.
Dulcie’s little hands trembled as she set the cups before them. “Drink
it,” she said. “It will fix your throat, Red, and set you up, David. Oh,
wasn’t it awful?” she quavered. “What did happen?”
“I don’t know what started it,” said Red. “When I got there, Fraine had
done for Florsheim entirely, and Van Arden was out. When he saw me, he
quit kicking Van Arden and grabbed me. David was a welcome sight. Fact
is,” he suddenly sobered, “he would have done for me, Davie. I never saw
anything like his strength. You’d have thought I was a baby. Why, he was
choking me and trying to tap me with the wrench, all at the same time.”
“Have more tea,” Dulcie shuddered. “And you, too, David.”
“Thanks, no. I’m all bucked up,” said David, and left them to go
forward.
“Take the wheel, David, while I see how Fraine is,” Mr. Hammond said, as
David came again into the control room. He patted the boy reassuringly
on the shoulder as he went back toward the cabins.
David stared out into the deepening gloom. The afternoon was nearly
gone. A strange darkness was beginning to surround them. The ship was
again running with the wind, not smoothly but very swiftly. They were
making nearly ninety miles an hour. He hoped the wind would hold behind
them, but he felt little cross currents already. As he watched, he saw
far ahead a swirl of black tossing clouds rise from the cloud floor
below, as though picked up in giant fragments which wove and blended
into a thick tossing barrier.
Mr. Hammond returned.
“Well, David,” he said, “it looks as if it was up to you, now. Things
are pretty bad in there. Doc says there must be a piece of bone pressing
on that head wound of the captain’s or a tiny splinter working around
inside, and that blow he got at Lakehurst about finished him. Doc has
given him a shot of morphine, and he is asleep. He says an operation
will fix him up.
“Poor Florsheim has a cracked skull, and needs hospital care as soon as
we can make Friedrichshafen. Van Arden is still groggy. He will be all
right again in a couple of days. You will have to take charge of the
ship, David. It’s a chance for you to show your mettle. Show what the
school at Ayre can do. I’m back of you, but while I command the ship,
you steer; understand?”
David’s eyes remained on the black curtain ahead.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “And if those are your orders, sir, I am going to
cut down now to a lower altitude, and find better weather. There’s a bad
blow ahead. See the lightning?”
“Pretty bad, way ahead there,” said Mr. Hammond, “but you must not try
going down. Heavens, no! Don’t you know that Captain Fraine was all
against that? Go up, if you must, but not down.”
“It will be safer below.”
“I can’t allow it, David. We have got to go by precedent, and not
experiment, now.”
“It is not experiment with me,” David argued, forgetting in his anxiety
that Mr. Hammond was his commander. “I have done it on trial flights,
and it worked perfectly.” He watched the approaching cloud bank. “I have
got to do it.”
Mr. Hammond’s face hardened. “I forbid it,” he said. “Understand?” and
without waiting for a reply walked away, leaving David to stare at the
ominous clouds, now shot with countless little veins of flame.
“And I am captain and two navigators, all in one, and in full charge!”
said David to himself, bitterly adding, “Like Mike, I am!”
CHAPTER VII
THROUGH THE STORM
Dinner that night was a rather somber occasion. The ship pitched badly,
and there was a good deal of difficulty in keeping the dishes on the
table. When the waiters opened the door going into the galley, the chef
could be heard calling down curses on the day he had left home. Mr.
Hamilton was silent but stoical, while his secretary was near collapse.
Wally’s verbosity was turned off like a spigot. He was green with fear.
The reporters were suspiciously jovial. One of them was constructing a
little model parachute with a few bits of wood, cloth and string.
Questioned, he said smilingly that he was going to send down a bottle
with a message in it.
Doctor Sims remarked gloatingly, “Last message, I take it, if we are _in
extremis_. Very interesting indeed.”
“Don’t be morbid, Sims,” said Doctor Trigg calmly. “Look out for your
coffee, and try some of that souffle. What mortal could possibly
anticipate disaster when the cook can concoct such a delectable morsel?”
“Gr-r-r-r!” from Doctor Sims, lunging for the saltcellar as it skated
away. “Your mental attitude, Martin, always inclines to the flippant and
dicacious. Personally, I find the present exuberant actions of the ship
most distasteful.”
“There goes your water,” Doctor Trigg retorted rather unnecessarily, as
he held his own glass in one hand and speared souffle with the other.
“Grr-r-r-r-ruh,” said Doctor Sims, rising unsteadily. He went to his
cabin to get dry clothes, clinging desperately to wall and chairs.
“Isn’t he sweet?” said Dulcie.
Doctor Trigg studied her. “My dear, you have given me a new thought,” he
said seriously. “A perfectly new thought. Sims—sweet—well, well!”
The waiters hurriedly cleared the tables. With growing apprehension, the
passengers clustered at the windows to watch the void beyond. Intervals
of calm, as they passed the space between two storms, raised false
hopes, for they were soon plunged into a roaring madness of elements.
Then, all at once, they were in a maelstrom of elemental fury. Above,
below, around them, a gale whined and shrieked. Solid sheets of water
buffeted the ship, while flashes of lightning were continuous and so
vivid that the control room was bathed in an intense, livid glare. Here,
there, and everywhere storms gathered, moved upon the ship, and beat her
mercilessly. As the gusts beset her from all sides, she pitched madly.
They were now flying about a mile above the surface of the sea. Mr.
Hammond came staggering into the control room and stood near David, but
neither spoke.
Ahead of them, mountainous clouds, looking as solid as a wall, rose up
as though to block their path. Rain continued to fall in torrents, with
hail and snow. The thunder roared, bellowed, and reverberated.
In the salon, the passengers huddled in groups with the stoic acceptance
of any situation that is characteristic of the American people. Doctor
Sims calmly watched the unbelievable panorama, jotting down an
occasional note by the intense glare of the lightning. Dulcie clung
close to Doctor Trigg, who, also calm, strove to quiet the girl’s
natural apprehension with little jokes and whimsical stories.
The majority of the crew were in the hull. The engineers of course were
at their posts. Red, sure-footed as a cat, seemed to be everywhere at
once. The ship quivered under the lashing of the storm like a live
thing. At times she was lifted more than three hundred feet above her
course, then plunged in a delirious drop of nearly a thousand feet
toward the sea, before she could be steadied. She seemed wrapped in
solid sheets of lightning. The duralumin framework was fully charged
with electricity, and tongues of electricity were being sprayed away
from all edges, points and corners. The cables were glowing with violet
light.
David watched anxiously for an opening or “hole” through the sheets of
lightning, through which he might contrive to drop down to the possible
safety of a lower level. He was determined to make the attempt. Each
time that they had been tossed upward, he had found that a worse
condition, if possible, existed in the upper altitudes. They were still
about a mile above the sea. The din was so great that speech had become
impossible. Mr. Hammond, at his elbow, continually indicated a rise; but
David had reached the place where, as long as he held the wheel, he
would have to follow his own judgment. So he crept on, watching with
strained eyes for a hole in the floor.
Wally, on hands and knees, had managed to reach his cabin, where he
cowered, utterly undone. He buckled on a parachute and decided to jump
as soon as the ship turned nose down. Suddenly he felt a forward
inclination; the ship was certainly tipping. Wally slid and scrambled
into the salon.
“Jump! Jump! She’s gone!” he croaked hoarsely and, reaching the window,
struggled to open it. Like a cat Doctor Sims was upon him, circling him
with thin wiry arms and legs. Together they rolled on the floor, and
Doctor Sims slapped him smartly on the face. It brought the nearly
crazed man back to his senses. They sat up, Wally making no move to
escape.
“Why, you amorphous protoplasm!” screamed Doctor Sims. “You congenital
moronic microbe! You—you unspeakable NUT!”
It was too much. As Wally slumped, Dulcie hid her face in Doctor Trigg’s
coat. In the din, a wild burst of laughter became nothing but a series
of open mouths and contorted faces. But the tension of terror had
snapped.
They had run the gamut of emotions, from the first cold prick of fear to
the abandon of terror, and then to the ridiculous explosion.
It was then that David saw a black spot which might be a “hole.”
Cautiously he turned the trembling ship, and managed to approach it. He
found that it was the haven which might save them, and carefully
maneuvered her down into the whirling pit. The storm-tossed craft
steadied, and with a great sigh of relief David lowered the Moonbeam
down and down, into an area of miraculous calm.
Below, the sea had been beaten into a flat surface by the driving rain.
Above, the terrible floor of storm-tossed clouds had become a roof, from
which hung wisps and threads of mist. A cold, clean, steady wind drove
them toward the east. Once more David could hear the beloved, everyday
noises of the ship.
They were safe.
Doctor Trigg patted Dulcie, and looked at his watch. “Only four
o’clock,” he said cheerily.
“Four days!” groaned a reporter.
“That indicates the inadequacy of time as we divide it,” said Doctor
Trigg, “Eh, Sims?”
“Get up!” growled Doctor Sims, glaring at Wally. “And go to your room!”
Wally, scrambling up, obeyed.
“Twenty lines of Latin is indicated, too, Sims,” said Doctor Trigg,
chuckling, “but don’t be too hard on the poor boy. His reaction is
entirely a matter of temperament.”
Doctor Sims rose. “Gr-r-r-r-r!” he retorted, and dusted his knees.
In the control room, David could scarcely realize that the danger was
really past. He felt weak and shaken.
“Give me the wheel,” said Van Arden’s voice, at his side.
“Can you make it?” David asked.
“Surest thing you know!” Van Arden smiled. “I really am all right again,
but you must be all in, Ellison. Go along. I’ll carry on.”
Mr. Hammond took David’s arm. “Black coffee is what you need,” he said,
and led him into the salon.
David rubbed his hands. The fingers were stiffly crooked. He could
hardly flex them, they had gripped the wheel so long. Dulcie, calm and
collected, appeared from the galley, and sat down opposite him. She took
the cup of coffee from the pallid chef, and served it.
“An egg, and some marmalade and toast, I think, Cookie,” she said,
smiling up into the plump, worried face. “Now, hero, don’t talk. Just
relax, and get something to eat. Then you are to go to sleep for a week
or so. Dad says so.”
“Why, I’m all right, Dulcie,” declared David. “A little stiff, but that
will disappear as soon as I move around.”
“Anyway, you are to go to bed. Gee, wasn’t that storm a whiz-bang? I was
never so thrilled in my life.”
“Where were you?” asked David.
“Right close to Doctor Trigg,” replied Dulcie. “He was calm as calm!”
“You are a nervy kid,” said David, admiringly. “I’m proud of you.”
“Well, we are all proud of you,” she replied. “Dad says even Captain
Fraine could not have done better. To tell you the truth, David, dad
feels pretty glum about the way he butted in and ordered you to make
altitude. He says that he had put you in charge, and that it was up to
him to go by your judgment. And he says that it was lucky for us you
dropped to a lower altitude when you did. It probably saved the ship.
“And he says, as long as you did bring us through, he doesn’t regret
meeting the storm one bit. It only proved the stability and strength of
the dirigible. My! By the time those reporters get through writing it
up, dirigibles are going to be the whole thing.”
“Well, I’m glad the commander isn’t sore at me for using my own
judgment,” said David, a relieved look on his face. “I just had to do
it, Dulcie.”
“He isn’t; and of course you had to, and he’s going to tell you so,”
said Dulcie. “Oh, there comes the sun! Wonderful, isn’t it?”
David turned to the window. Above, the leaden clouds were breaking up
and turning to fleece—innocent, pretty masses that looked as though
they had been assembled for purely decorative purposes. The first rays
of the sun turned them faintly pink, and changed the leaden sea to
silver.
Just below them, a big liner, looking like a toy, nosed westward, and as
Van Arden gently dropped the ship to a still lower level, the steamer
sent three puffs of smoke from her funnels in greeting. No other craft
was in sight. As the sun rose, the sparkle and brilliance increased.
Already a dull smudge on the horizon revealed itself plainly as the
eastern continent. They sped along at an altitude of one thousand feet.
Someone opened a window, and the sweet clean air rushed through the
salon. Dulcie buttoned her sweater, and sniffed the air appreciatively
as she gazed.
“Doesn’t it look happy?” she said.
David, firmly but kindly escorted to his room by Mr. Hammond, slept for
two blissful hours. Then he was awakened by his newly-acquired sense of
responsibility, a sense ingrained in the minds of masters of all crafts,
either of sea or air. He leaped up, perfectly refreshed, and ready for
anything.
Mr. Hammond was sitting by the window.
“I wanted to see you as soon as you waked up, Ellison, so I came back
here to get a little rest and quiet, myself. You can’t hear yourself
think out there in the salon. All the passengers are telling their
various experiences during the storm!
“I have arranged to leave Captain Fraine and Lieutenant Florsheim at
Friedrichshafen for hospital treatment. They are pretty sick men, Dr.
Forsythe says. I had planned to take on someone there to fill Captain
Fraine’s place but, David, I am convinced that you can do it. After your
performance last night, I am positive that you are capable of handling
any situation.” He rose, his kindly face beaming. “I congratulate you,
Captain Ellison. It is a big job, but you will swing it!” He shook
hands, and was gone.
David stood staring into limitless space.
“Dad!” he whispered; “are you glad?”
The radio was again in working order, and the operators had sent
messages back to Ayre, and long radiograms were sent to the news
syndicates of New York, Berlin, Petrograd, and Tokio by the reporters,
each eager to turn in the best story of the storm.
David did not see London. They had passed the ancient city at about six
o’clock, while he slept.
“I’m sorry I missed seeing London,” David remarked to Dulcie, who
wandered into the control room about nine.
“I was asleep, too,” said she. “I wanted awfully to see it. I’ve been
reading a book about the Zeppelin during the war. The English used to
make London pitch black every night on account of German air raids. They
were able to make the city practically invisible, but they could not
hide the river Thames. That always gave them away, because the bombers
had plans of every important place in the city—churches, public
buildings, stations, tanks, magazines, and freight depots—and they
could locate them by the river. Then down would come a few tons of
bombs.”
“Pretty ghastly,” said David. He thought of the price he had paid for
the war, a price paid by millions, and set his mouth hard. Dulcie
studied his face.
“David, did you lose anyone?” she asked. Her voice was so sympathetic,
so tender, that he opened his heart. He could almost feel himself flying
with his young and gallant father, as he told her about him, his work,
and his death. It was not a long story as David told it. When he
finished Dulcie’s eyes were misty.
“Oh, David!” she sighed, and impulsively patted his arm. “Your poor,
poor mother! But how proud you must be!”
She hadn’t pitied him. She had understood.
“I am proud; too proud to broadcast that I’m his son until I can do
something worth while, myself.”
“As if you hadn’t done so, already, you nice modest David! But I won’t
tell. Not even daddy!”
“Heavens, _no_!” cried David, giving the wheel a twist. “Oh Lord!
Dulcie—”
“Oh, shush, silly, as if I would tell! No one is to know. Just you and
me—and Red Ryan. Why Ryan, Davie?”
“He guessed it, the darned fox. Nothing I said. He just picked it out of
the air. His Irish shrewdness, I suppose. Anyway, he asked me
point-blank.”
“You like him, don’t you, David?”
“I’ll say I do!” said David warmly. “He may be rough on the outside, but
he’s nobody’s fool, and smart as a whip, and as loyal as they make ’em.
By the way, where is Cram all this time?”
Dulcie chuckled. “Poor Wally! He’s in his stateroom, a very sick man.”
“Honestly?” demanded David.
“No, just all in.” She leaned close and whispered, “Scared to death, Dr.
Forsythe told daddy. I heard him, and daddy shooed me away. So don’t
breathe it. And see what he says when he comes out.”
“You never turned a hair, did you?” admiringly.
Dulcie shrugged. “Why should I? I have no mother, and daddy was here, so
what was the difference?”
“What about your other friends?” asked David, with a wide blank gaze.
“What other friends?” she inquired innocently.
“Me,” said David, ungrammatically but concisely.
Dulcie blushed; then she chuckled, and pinched David’s finger. “Well,
Funnyface, you were here too, weren’t you?”
“That’s more like it,” said David, and they both laughed. But somehow a
new and closer friendship commenced then.
Mr. Hammond, appearing in the doorway, assumed a scowl.
“Go away, Dulcie,” he said, “and let the captain sail the ship. I’d put
you in chains where stowaways belong, if only I could find any.”
They had passed France; they were over Germany. Radiograms were flying
between the ship and Friedrichshafen. All was in readiness there for the
welcome of the Moonbeam, and at eleven thirty-five that morning
Friedrichshafen lay below them.
Slowly the ship settled over the field. The ground crew of five hundred
men seized the ropes and, spreading fanwise, brought the ship down. Mr.
Hammond had expected to be moored to the mast, but he saw that
preparations had been made to house the ship in the hangar.
As the ground crew, resplendent in their natty blues, drew the Moonbeam
down to earth, the watchers saw a large group of magnificently uniformed
officers waiting to receive them. Great crowds, held back in orderly
masses by soldiers, roared the deep German salute, “_Hoch, Hoch_,” and
mingling with it they could hear a goodly volume of American hurrahs,
while all over the vast field waved a scattering of small American
flags.
Mr. Hammond was enthusiastically received by the burgomaster and a group
of the city fathers, as well as by representative officers from the
German army and navy, air service, and government. He found himself
shaking hands with his old friend, the American ambassador to Germany.
Smiles wreathed every face.
The joyous uproar continued as all the passengers came down the steps
from the gondola, but later a sympathetic silence fell as the waiting
ambulance backed up and its white-clad attendants disappeared into the
ship. Expert hands bore out two stretchers with their swathed forms.
Florsheim, sensing the sympathy, got his arm from under the blanket and
waved it with a pale grin, while a cheer burst out again, this time not
for the ship but for the two injured men being given over to the care of
the skilful surgeons for whom Germany is justly noted. When the
ambulance had gone, the crowd surged toward the ship.
The best of German mechanics waited to assist the crew of the Moonbeam
in grooming her. David, standing at Mr. Hammond’s side, felt the good
fellowship and sportsmanship which permeated the welcome. The Moonbeam
was trying to surpass the record of their own Graf Zeppelin, but there
was no resentment.
One ferocious-looking and red-faced general in the Air Corps stared hard
at David as he walked away, then exploded, “And where iss your captain?”
“There is our captain and pilot, general,” said Mr. Hammond, bowing.
“Gott in Himmel, he iss a poy, chust a poy! Do you Americans set
children, then, to sail your ships?”
“Not quite, general,” answered Mr. Hammond, smiling, “but Captain
Ellison is one in a million; a genius in his chosen field. We lost the
services of our captain and first pilot on the way over. The captain
went—well, he became very ill from the effects of an old wound, and the
pilot sustained an injury. We are leaving them both here in the
hospital.
“A terrific storm was approaching at the time, and I was obliged to put
young Ellison in charge. He handled the ship like a veteran. I am
convinced that his cleverness and good judgment saved it, in fact, and I
have made him captain for the entire flight. I have absolute confidence
in him.”
“Fine, fine!” exploded the general heartily. “I congratulate you. Good
bilots are born, and nod mate. You are luggy.”
CHAPTER VIII
THE CRADLE OF THE ZEPPELIN
He watched the retreating back of the young captain under discussion
with the wise eyes of a man who can read men.
“Yess, he looks goot,” he added.
They were driven to a hotel, and escorted to luxurious rooms.
The lobby was full of young officers, strutting and clanking around. Mr.
Hammond and David looked distinguished in their plain, close-fitting
blue with black braid and small gold insignia which had been chosen as
the ship’s uniform. They were both very tall men, well over six feet,
the muscles of the younger man making up for the middle-age weight of
the older. The Germans regarded them with interest and respect.
Certainly they were not to be looked down on, at least! Dulcie, watching
them, thought with fury of her own fairylike proportions. How she pined
to be a Brunhilde, stalking firmly among all these arrogant-looking
young men!
Having changed her frock, Dulcie went to find her father. She found him
in his room struggling with a tie, while at the same time he regarded a
long, official-looking document on the chiffonier.
“Just look at this, Dulcie.” He handed her the paper. “A state luncheon
at one-thirty, for a starter, and from then on not a minute that isn’t
taken up. It’s a little better for you, but I bet every last one of
these officials has a nice husky wife who will look after you.”
“I’ll let ’em look for a while, but sometime I am going to play truant.
I want to see Friedrichshafen my own way. Isn’t it beautiful? And it was
here that Count Zeppelin lived, and worked out his plans. I want to
learn all about him.”
“Yes, you ought to learn all you can about him, Dulcie. Of course,
Santos-Dumont was the first one seriously to struggle with the problem
of the rigid dirigible, but Count Zeppelin went far ahead of him. Come
in!” he added in a roar, as a knock sounded at the door. A bell boy,
apple-cheeked and rosy, presented a large tray piled with envelopes.
Mr. Hammond groaned.
“Look ’em over, will you, Dulcie; we only have fifteen minutes, but you
are all ready.”
Dulcie gave a little laugh. “Why, a lot of them are for me,” she cried,
beginning to tear them open. “You were right; they are from the wives.
And oh, such high-sounding titles!” She shuffled her notes into a pile.
“I’ll read them later.”
The troublesome tie finally in place, Mr. Hammond put on his coat,
smacked down his thick white hair, and they descended to the lounge,
where a delegation awaited them.
The burgomaster met them with a long address of welcome, to which all
the Germans present listened attentively, as though to show that they
approved thoroughly. Dulcie studied their heavy, intelligent faces.
Across the weatherbeaten cheeks of a number of the older men ran jagged
scars. Newer, livid seams puckered the faces of a couple of the younger
officers, brands from Heidelberg duels. Young and old alike stood
straight, feet firmly planted, heads proudly poised on their thick
necks.
“They are glad they are men, and Germans, and want everybody to know
it,” thought Dulcie.
The luncheon was a heavy meal, punctuated by heavy speeches and encored
by heavy voices barking “_Hoch, hoch!_” appreciatively. Mr. Hammond
enjoyed every moment of it. The utterances of those clear, keen, lucid
minds were well worth listening to, especially as he spoke German
fluently. Dulcie, also easily conversant with the language, was greatly
interested; but David was lost. His French was fairly good, although of
the prep-school type, but the guttural polysyllables of the Germans left
him gasping.
After the luncheon came a drive, which was in reality a parade designed
to show the visitors to the inhabitants of the city. Hundreds of people
had come from Berlin and elsewhere to see the great American dirigible,
her officers, her crew and her passengers. Every hotel and boarding
house was filled to capacity. To the German mind their advent was an
educational opportunity which must be followed up.
The procession wound up at the landing field where the visitors were
shown all the latest improvements on the German dirigibles. New
materials for frame construction, covering, and so forth, all under
severe tests of every possible sort.
This airport was the home of the first Zeppelin. It was here that Count
Zeppelin spent his time and energy; a wonderful old man, who defied age
and went gallantly on, working, planning and constructing, until at last
he had the great happiness of tasting success.
They were taken to Count Zeppelin’s office, left as he had used it. The
walls were covered with pictures of dirigibles and photographs of
engines. Otherwise the room was bare and severe, the room of a man whose
whole heart was so entirely in his great work that he found no space for
non-essentials. His name is justly revered and honored by every German,
and never while a dirigible flies will any country fail to pay homage to
his illustrious memory.
That night, after a formal dinner given at the airport in a great
banqueting hall, they listened to the Friedrichshafen Choral Society.
Next morning, Dulcie slipped away and explored the city. She was a
tireless walker, and her pleasant wanderings took her over miles of
clean and charming streets. The business part of the town was lavishly
decorated with flags and bunting in their honor. Everyone seemed to move
with a snap. There were no loiterers. Robust people did robust work, as
though they enjoyed it.
In the outlying parts, an exquisite neatness prevailed. Small, even
humble homes, had their patches of lawn and tiny vegetable plots that
were as lovely as rose gardens, so beautifully were they laid out and
cared for. Every building seemed fresh with paint.
“Even the skies look awfully blue,” Dulcie told herself. “Just like the
babies’ eyes.”
Her wanderings were delightful; the people were so friendly. They seemed
to know, down to the least little toddler, that the pretty fraulein had
come in the beautiful airship, for there were pleasant greetings for her
wherever she went. A cheery “_Guten Morgen, Fraulein_,” and as likely as
not a posy offered over a fence. When they found that she spoke their
own tongue, they would scarcely let her go.
She reached the hotel just in time to prepare for a luncheon given for
her by the Friedrichshafen Association of Housewives. She found numbers
of stiff and crackly ladies, from bright-eyed old grandmothers proudly
wearing the fashions of forty years ago, to demure brides with soft eyes
and pleasant voices that almost made the German gutturals pleasing.
Dulcie had a good time, and when she took leave of her cordial hostesses
was presented with a souvenir. She thought it was a small feather bed,
but it was an eiderdown quilt! It was a lusty quilt, fully six inches
thick, and covered with intricate patchwork, the handiwork of the
energetic grandmothers. Dulcie was completely overcome.
All that afternoon Mr. Hammond and his staff spent at the landing field,
where the Moonbeam was being looked over, inch by inch, by her own crew
and the German experts as well.
To the surprise of all, two small holes, not larger than lead pencils,
were found piercing the very tip of her nose. Inside, the metal was
fused! She had been struck by lightning during the storm. The injury was
soon repaired. Oil and gas were shipped, every bag looked over, and
every instrument tested for the long flight over the Siberian wastes.
David thrilled at the thought of this part of the flight. It was largely
unknown territory, where there was no aid to be had in case of accident.
With Red, he himself went over and over the ship, until they knew that
she was tuned up to concert pitch.
At five, the party started for Berlin. The city is only forty miles from
Friedrichshafen. After a fine dinner with the city officials and a
number of officers, they went to the opera, where boxes were reserved
for them. David stood in the back of the commander’s box, admiring
Dulcie from afar. She was completely surrounded by a group of dashing
young lieutenants, who were utterly captivated by her beauty and charm.
It was twelve o’clock before the last strains of Wagner’s immortal theme
died away, and they were escorted to a supper, after which they drove
back to Friedrichshafen, Mr. Hammond and the older of the German
officers sleeping quite openly.
Friday was their last day in Friedrichshafen, and Mr. Hammond was
himself host at a luncheon. There was great good fellowship, and a loud
chorus of German songs. The crew of the Moonbeam had gone to the landing
field, where they were eating much food as the guests of the German
crews. Directly after Mr. Hammond’s luncheon had come to an end, he
found a chance to speak to David.
“How much gas did you put on?” he asked.
“Ten thousand feet,” said David promptly.
“Did they varnish the propellers?”
“Yes, sir. Everything is in order. We could start in ten minutes if
necessary.”
“I think we will go shortly after ten. Most of these people whom we
know, with a million or so more, want to meet us at the field and say
_Auf Wiedersehen_, so we must not go ahead of time.”
“We have had a great reception, haven’t we?” said David. “To a shy
little country boy like me, it has been rather overwhelming.”
“Huh!” said Mr. Hammond, “I’m reeling in my tracks. By the way, when
have you seen Florsheim?”
“I was up at the hospital early this morning, and once yesterday. I will
go say good-bye before I leave for the field. What rotten luck that was,
wasn’t it?”
“A mean break,” agreed Mr. Hammond.
“I think poor Florsheim feels pretty low over it. He is enough better
now to think a little.”
“Have you seen Fraine?” asked the commander. “They just let me look in
on him after the operation.”
“No, I haven’t seen him, but it really doesn’t matter, because it will
be days before he knows anyone. Poor old Fraine! I certainly hope the
next time I am captain, there won’t have to be a war staged to get me
the job.”
“I’m sorry about Fraine, and Florsheim, too,” said Mr. Hammond, “but it
was an accident that might have occurred wherever Fraine had happened to
be. And as far as you go, David, well, boy, I am well satisfied with
you.” He patted David’s shoulder in a way that added value to his brief
praise.
“Wonder where Dulcie and the professors are,” he continued. “I hope they
haven’t gone off on some jaunt of their own. I clean forgot to tell them
that we are going out in a powerboat to see the lagoons and the coast
line. See if you can find them, will you?”
David ran the quarry to earth in the lounge. Doctor Sims had just heard
of another very old graveyard some distance from the city, but the
others succeeded in persuading him to postpone indefinitely his
contemplated pilgrimage thereto, for the lesser pleasure of an afternoon
on the water.
The launch was a gorgeous thing, with mahogany planking and silver
fittings. It was a calm day, and the water was scarcely broken by a
ripple. The launch shot through the water at furious speed, and the
young naval officer, whose guest they were, asked Mr. Hammond if he
cared to go faster.
“No, I don’t think so, thanks. I am rather timid, you see.”
A general laugh went up.
“How cruelly the commander must suffer, six thousand feet in the air,”
laughed the host.
“That’s different,” said Mr. Hammond, laughing at himself. “There is
something so upsetting about this.”
They went slower after that, and were able to see the beauties of the
sea and shore line.
“This actually makes me want to be a poet,” mused Doctor Trigg.
“You are one, dang it!” said Doctor Sims, violently.
“Me? Why, I never wrote a line of poetry in my life!”
“You do worse; you think it. I can feel it stewing around inside of you.
If it wasn’t for me, Martin, you would just be another nuisance to
humanity. But I choke you off—I choke you off!”
“Now that’s kind of you, Nicholas, but this scene ought to be excuse
enough for anyone. Even you, Nicholas. How does it make you feel? Be
honest!”
Doctor Sims reflected.
“Like a normal human being,” he said. “Nice day, nice boat, nice
scenery, much obliged to our host. Doesn’t that cover everything?”
Doctor Trigg laughed heartily. “Sims,” he said, “you are a ‘gem of
purest ray serene’.”
“There—you—go!” said Doctor Sims.
“Well,” said Dulcie, “it seems to me that you each say the right thing,
always.”
“Thank you, my dear,” said Doctor Trigg.
“Har!” said Doctor Sims.
Long shadows spent themselves across the lagoon as they returned to
Friedrichshafen. Mr. Hammond and David, accompanied by their host of the
afternoon, were driven at once to the hospital, where Mr. Hammond gave
last instructions for the care of his two officers. Back to the hotel,
then, and at seven dinner was served.
The many bells in the city had struck nine before the company rose.
Dulcie and David wandered out into the lobby.
“Gold lace,” remarked Dulcie, glancing about. “Did you ever see so much
of it?”
“Someone told me that there is much less than in the days of the
Empire,” said David.
“Well, it must have been sewed all over them,” sighed Dulcie. “It must
be heavy stuff to wear.”
“What do those huskies care for a little weight more or less?” demanded
David. “Gosh, they are big fellows!”
“They are no larger than you,” said Dulcie. “And very little larger than
Red, and daddy is taller than a lot of them, but not so thick. Only
Wally looks small.” She giggled wickedly. “Really, doesn’t he look
funny? The way he scowls, and stares up at them! But then,” she went on
gloomily, “look at me! I’m shorter than Wally. See how I have to look up
at ’em.”
“Yeah; they love it. But at that Wally isn’t so short; he’s just about a
scant average. The rest of us are all so big. Why, when I was a kid, I
used to worry for fear I would be too big to fly.”
“Children are funny, aren’t they?” agreed Dulcie. “Here’s our car; let’s
go out to the field. I’ll tell daddy we have gone.”
She leaned back in the car, with a sigh of relaxation.
“It has been wonderful, hasn’t it? Surely they won’t be half as glad to
see us in Tokio. Here, of course, they feel a great interest on account
of the Graf Zeppelin. And of course she did blaze the way; we are just
beating her time.”
“If we can,” hedged David. “We mustn’t crow. We are three hours behind
her time, now.”
“We will make it up,” said Dulcie, easily. “Oh, David, I have so many
cares. I have shipped home all the lovely presents people here have
given me, but I can’t express the live stock.”
“Koko?” asked David.
“Koko! Heavens, no! I wish it was Koko. David, I have two love birds,
four German Roller canaries, a kitten, and a marmoset.”
“A marmoset!” repeated David. “Why, that’s a monkey, isn’t it?”
“A very little bit of a one,” said Dulcie, groaning. “One of those
aviators gave it to me. He brought it over from Africa one day.”
David howled. He laughed so hard that people looked around at _der
grosse Amerikaner_, who was making so much noise.
“Oh, won’t it be fun when your father sees that menagerie? The air will
be just full of love birds, and monkeys, and rolly-canaries, and
kittens.”
“You are showing a cloven foot,” she said. “Don’t you like pets?”
David sobered down.
“Truly, I do, and I could be happy forever if I could have a couple of
love birds, and some canaries, and a kitten, and you—your marmoset,” he
added quickly, warned by Dulcie’s prim mouth.
“That’s better, big boy, and when we get home perhaps I will give you
some of them. The marmoset, and maybe my best love—bird! But now,” she
added, all too briskly, “we’ll soon be back on the Moonbeam. I’ve a lot
to do, and there will no doubt be thousands of _tüchtiger_ officers,
waiting to say _Auf Wiedersehen_.”
CHAPTER IX
EASTWARD
Returning to the effulgence of the landing field, they found that
preparations were well under way for their departure. David went at once
to headquarters, where he was to join Mr. Hammond and the other
officers. Dulcie, dodging her _tüchtiger_ officers, found Red, and had
an earnest talk with him. When they parted, Red was shaking with
laughter, and Dulcie, looking as though she was the kitten and had just
eaten one of the canaries, went back to find the bereft Germans, all of
whom hastened to assure her that they were coming to America
immediately.
At last everything was ready, and at one forty-five the ship was walked
out of the hangar. Good-byes were said, thanks exchanged, passengers
counted and they rose, accompanied by cheers, waving handkerchiefs, and
the furious blasts of a brass band. As the Moonbeam gained altitude she
was followed by a giant spotlight that held her in a dazzling arc of
radiance, up, and up, and up until the ray grew dim and was left behind.
Beautiful, bright Friedrichshafen was a memory, and Sunday, the
twentieth of June, was over. David found Dulcie writing in the salon,
and whispered, “Has he seen ’em yet?”
“Seen what?” asked Dulcie.
“The menagerie, of course.”
“Oh, it’s gone,” said Dulcie, calmly.
“Gone! Gone where?”
“Well, I hated to bother daddy, it’s so bad for his digestion;
especially after all those German dinners. So I just farmed every one of
’em out. The crew has the marmoset, the reporters have the canaries, Red
is taking care of the kitten, and best of all, Doctor Trigg has got the
love birds. So it’s all fixed. Pretty clever of me, don’t you think?”
“Yes, Dulcie,” said David as soon as he could stop laughing. “And I’ll
tell the world I’m learning about women from you.”
“Well,” said Dulcie reflectively, “I’m not so bad, at that.”
All conditions were perfect for flight, and the Moonbeam sailed gently
along through the still clear night. David, standing the first watch,
was alone but not lonely. Guiding his ship, planning his future, the
“thoughts of youth” were “long, long thoughts,” and happy ones.
When Van Arden came to take the wheel, David gave it over reluctantly.
He could not sleep. The greatness of their enterprise was growing on him
with every hour; all the marvel of it. Behind and over him were human
beings; the passengers, officers, and crew, all sleeping serenely and
confidently in this immensity of space. Europe was slipping by beneath
them. Somehow David discovered that its civilization and its eager
interest in their progress was a comfort, a spiritual safeguard. Now,
indeed, they were about to fare into a wild and savage country, where
there were no hangars, and no materials for repairs. No landing crews
would swarm over the Siberian wastes to seize the ropes and ease the
stranger to the earth, should she desire to come. Ahead was Russia! The
fierce recluse of the world, with her ragged mountains and her endless
barren plains.
Long before dawn, David went again to the control room, where he found
Mr. Hammond reading the log.
“We passed over Berlin at three-thirty, David,” he remarked. “If air
conditions remain good, and we continue making seventy-five miles an
hour, I think we can make up some of our lost time today.”
“I’m sure of it,” replied David, “especially if the wind stays with us.”
Monday dawned. It was a glorious soul-shaking dawn that appeared from
nowhere, and without warning drowned the ship in splendor. As David
watched, Dulcie came quietly to his side.
“Look, Davie!” she said. “See all those banners of gorgeous color. Don’t
they look like endless lengths of silk, waving and billowing? And there
are little silver ribbons, and all those chiffon clouds. See over there
that deep orange and lavender, shading into rose and blue.”
“I’ll drop down,” said David. “Perhaps the earth is all dressed up,
too.”
Slowly the Moonbeam lost altitude, sinking gently through the riot of
color.
“Very dressy indeed,” Dulcie commented, as they gazed down at the
ordered luxuriance.
“Funny everything over here looks like it had a clean white collar on.
Even the woods. And see those farms. See the people waving. I suppose
they are shouting, too.”
“Look, there’s one little speck running for the house,” cried Dulcie.
“I’ll bet they have a telephone, and he’s gone to tell the neighbors in
the next village about us. See, there is a group of houses away ahead.”
“Quite a little settlement. By George, you are right! Look in the
square. See them come? I am going down a bit closer.”
They watched, and Dulcie waved madly. Below, the little toy people waved
their arms and hats. Even aprons were torn off and brandished. A fat old
man bowled about, waving and bowing with an air of authority easily
discernible to the amused watchers above. As the ship passed on,
children and dogs followed in a losing race.
“Wasn’t that fun?” said Dulcie. “You are nice, Davie. It is so
understanding of you to know how they feel. That is the thrill that
comes once in a lifetime for a lot of those people. And they wanted us
to know how glad they were to see us.”
“Of course they did, and now they are telephoning ahead to other
villages, and getting no end of a kick out of us. I will sail as low as
I can, so they can see us plainly. They’ll be watching for us all along
the way. Do you know, miss, that it is time for breakfast? Where do you
suppose the commander is?”
“I’ll get him,” said Dulcie, “and then we’ll eat.”
She ran off as Van Arden, giving intangible signs of just having eaten a
good meal, came in to take his turn at the wheel.
Mr. Hammond was already eating a substantial breakfast, arguing hotly
the while about politics with Wally, who displayed a positive genius for
saying infuriating things in an innocent and courteous manner. Mr.
Hamilton and his secretary sat by a window, where Mr. Hamilton drank
black coffee and ate unbuttered toast while he gazed spellbound at the
shifting panorama below. Doctor Sims, at a table by himself, drank
strong tea and read a treatise filled with unwholesome looking charts
and figures. At a table with Dr. Forsythe and the correspondents, Doctor
Trigg sat listening to the rapid fire of wit and slang and mild
profanity which flashed from one to the other. They were full of
anecdotes of their stay in Friedrichshafen, and the tales did not lose
in the telling. But all stopped talking to greet David as he came in.
“’Morning, captain!”
“Hi, captain, what’s our next thrill?”
“David, how are you?”
Dulcie smiled. David was liked by everyone. No one could resist his
brilliant smile, his thick rumpled hair that never would stay flat, his
tall muscular body with its reassuring look of power. And David’s eyes,
with their little laugh creases at the corners, were straight and very
true.
He came in, greeting everyone at once with a manner which made each one
feel that the pleasant word was especially his. It was characteristic
that he noticed Doctor Sims sitting alone, and took a place at his
table.
The doctor responded to David’s pleasant good-morning with a growl which
was almost cheerful. Doctor Trigg and the star reporter, a keen-looking,
gray-haired man, soon joined them. Doctor Sims closed his book with a
baffled air. He never got enough time for research work, and he laid
most of his interruptions to Doctor Trigg. Drat the man; he was always
close by, ready to chat. Chat—who wanted to chat? What if they had been
classmates in the long ago, and co-educators ever since? Why, by all the
test tubes in the world, should a man as learned and profound as was
Doctor Trigg in his chosen sphere, why should he want to chat?
Doctor Sims did not wait. He leaped upon his quarry.
“Yar-r-r-r-r-r,” he quoth forcibly. “Yar-r-r, Martin! What is your
latest discovery this morning? More enthusiasm? More youthful prodigies,
or more astonishing propensities? Let’s hear ’em, and get it over with.”
“Why, no, Sims, I can’t say that I have anything profound or of specific
value to offer for your consideration today.”
“How did you like Friedrichshafen, Doctor Sims?” asked the star
reporter. He was a friendly man.
“Wonderful, wonderful!” said Doctor Sims. “I ransacked the city and
miles of its environs. I found rich returns for my labor.”
“He’s a collector,” explained Doctor Trigg to the reporter.
“Epitaphs,” added Doctor Sims proudly.
“Ep—” said the reporter, and stopped.
“Precisely,” said Doctor Trigg. “Ep-itaphs. On monuments, you know:
‘Here lieth the body of Israel Jones,
Till Judgment Day shall uncover his bones’.”
“A very poor imitative effort on your part,” said Doctor Sims
caustically.
“It was just a sort of sample,” Doctor Trigg defended his effort. “I
will be willing to wager one of these excellent doughnuts that these
young men, collectively, have never read six epitaphs in their lives.”
“I haven’t,” confessed David, his sunny smile full on Doctor Sims’
gloomy countenance. “I bet they are interesting. You could sure get a
kick out of some of them. Like collecting stamps.”
“Much more enthralling, much more appealing.” Doctor Sims pushed back
his teacup and book. “It’s like this: Paleontologists have found that
from the most remote antiquity—”
Doctor Trigg interrupted. “Nicholas,” he said, “it is a pity to embark
on a subject of such widespread interest at so inauspicious a moment,
when you will certainly be obliged to discontinue your discourse before
you have voiced a tenth of your thesis. Let me advise you to reserve
your dissertation for a time when these young men will have finished
their duties and be free to assure you a couple of hours of
uninterrupted attention.”
He looked solemnly at the reporter, who looked solemnly back.
“That would be better, doctor, if you don’t mind. I’d hate to miss it,
and I’ve got to dash off pretty soon, and make out my reports.”
Doctor Sims looked almost pleased. “All right, all right, and I will get
my recent additions transcribed and cataloged, and the snapshots
developed.”
“Just where are we, captain?” asked Doctor Trigg, hastily taking up a
new subject.
David explained. “We must be approaching the border of Russia, now,” he
added. They crowded to the window.
“What wonderful scenery!” exclaimed the star reporter. “It is growing
much wilder and more rugged. Even those plains over there look harsh,
and cold.”
They watched a gradual change take place and about ten o’clock they saw
ahead a city which they knew must be Tilsit, East Prussia. They dipped
low, and went slowly over it, while the populace surged out of buildings
in black masses. They had been heralded by telegram and radio, and
cheers went up, and flags were waved. When they hung over the public
square, they dropped a bundle of postcards. Dulcie, hoping some child
would pick it up, dropped a handkerchief with an American quarter tied
in the corner.
Winds continued favorable, even and strong, and due east. They were now
going seventy-five miles an hour, and were gradually making up some of
the time lost in the storm over the Atlantic. All conditions seemed so
kindly that David actually felt nervous. He watched the instruments, and
tested the feel of the wheel every few minutes.
Luncheon came and went.
At about two o’clock, when the passengers were enjoying the passing
view, someone exclaimed, “City ahead!”
“It is Dvinsk,” said Mr. Hammond. “Friends, we are now crossing the
Soviet frontier.” He stood watching until the city, some miles to the
right, had disappeared.
“We are in Russia,” he continued. “Leningrad and Moscow are ahead, but
our course lies between them. Viatka is directly in our line of flight,
about six hundred miles east of Moscow.”
David, still impressed by the size and loneliness of the country they
were entering, slipped on an overall, and went up the ladder leading
into the hull. He gained the catwalk, and made his cautious way along
the narrow foothold that ran the entire length of the hull.
Reaching the end of the walk, David looked over the intakes of the fuel
and water lines, which entered there. Everything was in perfect shape.
He went back, and looked into the baggage room and then into the storage
rooms for the cartridge-like cases of fuel gas.
Then he went down to Red’s cabin. Red was writing postcards, aided and
abetted by the kitten.
“Hello, fella!” he cried. “Come up to see me cat? Ain’t he a beaut? You
can tell he’s a cat at first glance, small as he is. Now a pup at that
age might turn into anything between a dachshund and a Great Dane. Those
seem to be the most popular breeds in this country. But a cat—well, a
cat’s a regular cat from its first breath. Just a soft bundle of mews,
and scratches, and devilment.
“Did Miss Hammond tell you, now, about how those little German bands
gave her a menagerie? She farmed ’em all out on us. I think she’s
partial to me, Dave, because she gave me the kitten. I suggested lettin’
Wally take care of the bit of a monkey, but she said she wouldn’t ‘trust
to his finer feelings’. She didn’t make it clear whose she meant; just
twinkled those devastatin’ eyes at me, and walked off, leavin’ me with
this bit of fur. I’ve named him Trouble. He cries in a loud voice when I
leave him, and I daren’t let him out for a second. Imagine those claws
sprinting up a gas bag. So I spend most of my idle moments here, just to
hearten him. But if you want fun, go see the crew and their share of the
menagerie.”
“Well, Mr. Hammond will inspect around here some fine day, and then we
will be in wrong,” warned David.
“Not a bit! Just the first roar, and Miss Dulcie will slip up the way
she does, and she will say, ‘Why, they are mine, daddy, and these nice
men are keeping them for me,’ and I’ll bet we will each get a medal.”
“Likely to be that way,” said David, laughing. “Do you see much of Cram
lately?”
“Not so much. He sort of keeps to himself. I cross his path every little
while. Gosh, Davie, the truth is I’m tryin’ to keep from giving him a
sock.” Red sighed. “He’s my one bad dream.”
“I don’t see why you take him so hard,” said David. “You sound as though
he had grabbed off your best girl.”
“Oh, of course he did that,” admitted Red easily. “With their first oil
well. But that’s nothing. I always manage to have a few spares. It’s
nothing like that. He did other things. Well, I won’t hit him unless he
harms you, David, really tries to do you dirt. It’s the nasty way he has
of sayin’ things that makes him dangerous. Not so much the things he
says, but the way he says ’em.” Red shrugged his shoulders as though to
rid himself of an unpleasant subject. “Say, how’s your little gadget
comin’ on these days?”
David’s face lighted.
“It’s finished, Red, as far as it can be without a working model. You
know, I feel as though I had stumbled on something darned good. Gee, I
hope it wins that school prize. Ten thousand dollars! Sounds good,
doesn’t it?”
“Good enough,” said Red, “but none too good. You know I’ve a sense for
engines, and everything that concerns them and I’m telling you, you’ve
got a great thing there.”
“I think so, Red. I’m like you; I feel pretty sure of it. I didn’t have
that feeling for any of the other things I rigged up. I didn’t seem to
have much interest in them, though they worked. You know, they are using
a couple of them back at the plant, right now. But this is different.
From the minute the principle of the thing flashed into my mind, I liked
it. And think what it would mean to dirigible transportation!”
“I’ll say! It ought to increase the average speed of a dirigible fifteen
to twenty per cent.”
“If it works,” hedged David cautiously.
“Oh, it’ll work! If we hadn’t come on this trip you could have tried it
out before this, couldn’t you?”
“It will keep, and there will be plenty of time. It could be made in
twenty-four hours, if necessary,” said David.
“Well, don’t let anything happen to the plans, and keep them under your
hat,” advised Red.
“You bet,” said David. “Do you know that we are over Russia now?”
“Yeah! We crossed the frontier while I was down in an egg looking at an
engine. One of those engineers is bugs on geography, and he spouted
enough facts about Russia to fill a book. I’ll say they have some mad
looking country, haven’t they? But not many people so far. Towns kind of
scattered.”
“Wait a day or two,” David prophesied. “I have a hunch that this is
Central Park to what’s ahead. Can you leave the cat long enough to look
things over a bit?”
Red assented, and felt exploringly under his pillow. He brought out a
small can.
“God help me, I even have to steal condensed cream for me cat!” he said.
Monday evening passed uneventfully. During the night the Moonbeam
encountered a skirmish of winds which she rode so evenly that there was
scarcely any discomfort on the ship. The instruments, however, as well
as radio reports from Irkutsk, Chita, and Chabarovsk in Siberia warned
them of thick and uncertain weather ahead.
Viatka was passed at ten minutes after ten Tuesday morning; and with
daylight appeared the grim, austere peaks of the Ural Mountains. As the
light became clearer, the mountains emerged from their enveloping fogs
and reared their bleak monstrous crests as though reaching for the
passing ship. The panorama was of surpassing grandeur. At ten-thirty
they sailed over the city of Kisel. Here they approached as low as was
safe, and dropped several sacks of mail.
Cold biting winds from the Arctic buffeted them. Overcoats, sweaters and
mufflers appeared, but the elements could not keep the awed sightseers
from the windows, where they watched the slow march of the Titans below.
Their speed was reduced for safety’s sake here, for the winds were more
and more uncertain. The mountains covered a vast space, but the general
trend of the range was northeast, the direction that the Moonbeam was
gradually following. About the base of the mountains were dark blots of
forests, but they covered little of the great areas, bald, repellent,
and threatening, that looked from the ship as though carved of solid
stone.
They passed several tiny hamlets. To their surprise, the inhabitants
observed the ship with unfeigned terror. They left their huts, looked,
and one and all took refuge in the surrounding woods. With the glasses
it was easy to see their terror as they fled, mothers carrying babies,
and small children being dragged ruthlessly away to safety by agitated
fathers.
“What fools!” said Wally to Dulcie.
“I don’t think so at all,” she replied hotly. “I suppose in their place
you would know all about us by instinct? I am just as sorry for them as
I can be.”
The squally winds over the mountains were beginning to be very apparent.
They could feel the Moonbeam struggle against the intermittent gusts.
Later the wind settled into a steady gale. The five great engines were
doing their utmost, but the ship hung in the air as though anchored.
David raised her to a higher altitude, but at three thousand feet above
the mountains the wind still tore with a velocity against which they
could make no headway. He dropped back and tried a southerly direction,
but met with heavy squalls. Resuming their first course, he held the
Moonbeam steady, her nose to the blast. Finally the wind, while keeping
its intensity, began to come in gusts. Between them, David worked the
ship north, turning nose on when the hurricane redoubled its fury.
Slowly, with infinite care and patience, he maneuvered the ship high
above the rough mountains, until he saw the plains far below.
With the stone peaks of the mountains past, he dropped down to two
thousand feet, where he found comparatively smooth sailing. Working his
way, he steered the Moonbeam at an angle which brought her into the
course she had left hours before. The wind still blew hard, but the ship
again made headway against it.
As they proceeded into lower country, plains appeared, many of them
dotted over with clusters of lakes, some vast in size, others tiny
pools. It was bitterly cold. They were well north of sixty degrees
latitude, which runs just south of Seward, Alaska. During the night they
touched the Arctic Circle.
CHAPTER X
BANZAI!
As the mountains flattened out, the ragged plains seemed to stretch in
inconceivable distances. Dense uncharted forests blanketed the land. Two
forest fires were raging in this district, about fifty miles apart.
Heavy masses of smoke hung over them, or were torn into shreds and
hurried away by the high wind. Bursts of flames reddened the smoke, and
licked greedily upward.
When Dulcie went to bed, she experienced the ever-recurring thrill to
find herself in a luxurious stateroom, far above the earth. The rarefied
clean air made her body tingle. Dulcie thought shudderingly of her
narrow escape from being left behind.
“It only goes to show,” she told herself, “that occasionally one has to
act.”
The following morning, Wednesday, after breakfast, Doctor Trigg and
Doctor Sims stood gazing at the waste below them. “Endless, arid
plains,” said Dr. Trigg. “Russia—Siberia—the steppes—”
“I wonder just where we are,” said Dulcie, suddenly bobbing up at the
window under Doctor Sims’ arm. He removed the arm.
“I believe we are about seven hundred and fifty miles west of Yakutsk,”
said Mr. Hamilton, speaking from his usual place at the desk.
“Is that a city?” asked Dulcie.
“Yakutsk,” said Doctor Trigg, “is the principal city of the Lena Gold
Fields, and lies over the Stanovoi Range, toward the western end of the
Sea of Okhotsk. In this part of Siberia lie the vast gold fields known
as the Russian Klondike. They produce, with incredible hardship and
labor, over two hundred million rubles annually. A ruble,” he added,
rolling an affectionate and whimsical eye at Dulcie, “is at present
worth—hum—let me think—”
“About fifty cents,” said Mr. Hamilton promptly.
“Yes,” continued Doctor Trigg. “This bleak and terrible country,
stretching on, desolate league after desolate league, has been
unofficially the death chamber of thousands of political and criminal
prisoners every year. Herded together, the lowest and highest, in
horrible proximity, sometimes in chains, the poor wretches are sent here
from civilization to work the mines for a ruthless State, to labor,
suffer, and die. Often the keenest, cleverest intellectual, whose only
crime was a chance word, misstated by some jealous contemporary, is
chain-mate to the vilest wretch crawling. No redress, no pardon. The
poet Shelley pictures Prometheus chained to a rock, the fox gnawing at
his vitals, and Prometheus groans,
‘No rest, no change, no hope;
Yet I endure.’”
“Yes, conditions are said to be pretty bad,” mused Mr. Hamilton. “And
this is called the storehouse of the world.”
“True,” said Doctor Trigg. “The mountains contain not only gold, copper
and iron, but ninety-five per cent of all the platinum in the world. For
you, little Dulcie, and for millions like you, for that delicate chain
on your neck, and that pretty ring.”
“Costly enough,” added Doctor Sims gloomily.
“There are jewels to hang on your platinum chains, too. Stores of
tourmalines, chrysoberyls, and lovely pale aquamarines hide in the
Urals.”
“And the endless trickle of bloodstained gold and gems seeps slowly out,
year after year and generation after generation, to trick and beautify
and amuse the world,” said Doctor Sims. “Gr-r-r-r-r!”
“History repeats itself forever,” said Mr. Hamilton.
“There are other riches, too,” Doctor Trigg went on. “North of us, as I
make out our present position, lie vast deposits of unmined oil. Whole
lakes of it have escaped from the earth, and have spread over acres of
sodden ground.”
“Hmmm,” said Wally. “Something ought to be done about that, if it’s so.”
“It is not officially substantiated,” said Doctor Trigg, “but an old
student of mine, who turned out to be a globe-trotter, told me that he
had actually seen several of those lakes of oil. He said they were a
remarkable sight. He made various tests, and reported that the oil in
Siberia seems practically limitless.”
“Well, we will need that oil some day,” said Mr. Hamilton. “Question is,
what will we have to pay for it?”
“Gr-r-r-r-r,” said Doctor Sims. “Before that time comes, the face of
civilization will have assumed some new grimace, and the question will
answer itself.”
“Well, it’s a perfectly horrid country,” declared Dulcie.
“Yes, yet lonely and savage and remote as it is, it has contrived to
paint a few garish pictures on the page of time. Look at the Gobi
Desert, far south of us. Read of Marco Polo’s journeys there; his
terrific adventures, about the year 1272, when—”
“Marco Polo,” interrupted Doctor Sims. “Why go back to Marco Polo for
interest? Think of our own Roy Chapman Andrews, and what he has
discovered there. Think of those dinosaur eggs! The Peking Man!”
“I read about those,” said Dulcie brightly. “But do you know what we
have done? We have talked and talked all morning. Here comes luncheon.
Oh, Doctor Trigg, you simply know everything!”
“Gar—yah!” said Doctor Sims, cryptically.
Doctor Trigg looked at him over his glasses.
“I should know almost everything, my dear,” he agreed. “You see, I have
been closely associated with Doctor Sims here for forty years, and
having a retentive memory, I have been able to collect and assimilate a
vast amount of information.”
“Chops,” said Doctor Sims to the waiter.
The wind was lessening, and the Moonbeam was steadily picking up speed.
At seven o’clock that evening they passed within thirty miles of
Yakutsk, lying toward the southwest. The evening went gaily. Dulcie
brought out her mandolin, and the youngest reporter confessed to a
guitar. There was singing, too, and Doctor Trigg surprised everyone with
a knowledge of the words of about every college song ever written. He
sang them, too, in a lusty, wabbly old voice, happily oblivious of
Doctor Sims’ “Ha’s,” “Humphs” and “Gr-r-r-r-rs.”
At two the next morning, Thursday, they reached the Port of Ayan, on the
Sea of Okhotsk. They had safely gained the eastern coast of Asia. At
breakfast that morning, Mr. Hammond was elated.
“We have made up all the time we lost in the storm over the Atlantic, in
spite of the winds over the Urals,” he exclaimed. “We will surely make a
lot crossing the Pacific—eight hours, at least, if we have good
weather, and another two crossing the United States will put us in
Lakehurst eight hours ahead of the flying time of the Graf Zeppelin.”
David shook his head.
“I hate to have the chief set his heart on such a record,” he said to
Red, as they later went forward to the control room. “You know we won’t
have that much luck.”
“If we do, it sure will be luck,” said Red, skeptically.
The passengers seemed rather glad to leave the trans-Siberian part of
the flight behind them, although it had been a wonderful experience.
When Dulcie succeeded in cornering her father, she declared that Davie
was growing very thin. She rebuked her parent for the amount of
responsibility he had placed on David’s shoulders. Finally he replied:
“Look here, little gadfly, if you will stop buzzing for a while, I will
explain my methods. This young David Ellison is rather better than the
average, (‘Much,’ said Dulcie.) and he has a good mind; an excellent
mind. (‘A perfectly wonderful mind,’ muttered Dulcie.) He’s a splendid
type of the young American, (‘Um,’ said Dulcie.) and I want to see if he
has the stuff in him that I think he has. If it’s there, Dulcie, I mean
to give him a helping hand.”
“Atta boy, daddy!” cried Dulcie. “He has got brains. Has he said
anything to you about the invention he is working on?”
“Not a word; what is it?”
“He doesn’t want anyone to know about it, and I’m not to breathe a word
even to you, but it is something about something to fasten on the
engines that will make them do something or other a great deal better
than they are doing it now, and all that. It is marvelously important,
and I’m not to mention it to a soul.”
“I wouldn’t. Some unscrupulous person, hearing you talk about it, might
jot the whole thing down and get a patent on it. In the meantime, to go
back, I won’t be able to find out what stuff he’s made of unless I work
him like the devil. So keep your finger out of this pie, Miss Hammond.
The young man is not your type, anyhow.”
“What is my type, then?” asked Dulcie, curiously.
“Well, there’s Cram.”
“Daddy,” cried Dulcie, stamping, “I can’t bear the sight of him!”
“Can’t bear—well, what were you doing the other night when I came in to
the salon, and found you at that corner table, holding his hand, and
Cram smirking and blinking at you like a hound pup?”
Dulcie giggled. “I was reading his palm. I told him he would have a very
distinguished career, and would probably fill some high public office. I
said I thought he would be an ambassador.”
“Ambassador, my eye!” he growled. “What do you do it for, anyway,
Dulcie, smearing it on like that?”
“They expect it. If you don’t kid ’em along they don’t know how to talk
at all.”
“Well, we will hope for the best,” said Mr. Hammond, and added, as he
left her, “Go vamp Doctor Sims. If you can get one real compliment out
of him before we reach Ayre, I’ll buy you a new roadster.”
“Darling!” cried Dulcie, making a dash for her parent. But he shut the
door hastily, and was gone.
Mr. Hammond went to the chart room, studied the maps, then joined David
in the control room.
“Well, it won’t be long now, before we are over Japan,” he remarked. “We
will probably spend two days there at the airport, for a good
overhauling.”
“There are some recent radiograms in that clip, commander. I see that
they are planning a regular blow-out for us.”
Mr. Hammond commenced looking over the pile of radiograms which David
had indicated.
“Well, well!” he exclaimed. “They have arranged for six expert engineers
to meet us and take care of the ship. Two Americans, two Germans, and
two Japanese. That is certainly doing things up right. And there is a
ground crew of five hundred Japanese sailors, specially trained. Just
what they did for the Graf Zeppelin. They want to know just when to
expect us. Here are advance greetings from all their princes, highest
ranking army and navy officers, and state officials.” He sighed. “Well,
captain, it does look like a big reception.”
There was a thrill of excitement on the ship. Everyone was conscious of
it. After the days spent crossing Siberia, the thought of disembarkation
in beautiful, alluring Japan was delightful. The reporters clicked their
little portables in a chorus which sounded like hail. There was much
joking and laughter. Doctor Trigg practiced sentences out of a
Japanese-English phrase book. Doctor Sims, who had once been in Tokio,
knew of an obscure little burial-place that he meant to visit.
At three-thirty o’clock, on Thursday afternoon, they passed over
Mororan, on the island of Kokkaiddo, Japan. They were now only five
hundred and fifty miles from Tokio.
While the Moonbeam sped toward the city, her five engines roaring out
their rhythmic chorus, there was bustle and excitement in Tokio. Another
great ship, larger by far than the Graf Zeppelin, was to be the guest of
Japan. The city was in gala dress. From the highest official, dignified
and unapproachable, down to the tiniest little Geisha girl, chattering
behind her fan, the population of Tokio united in a charming spirit of
welcome. Every hotel in the city was crowded with tourists, come to see
the ship. The veteran Commander of Communications, with Mr. Hammond’s
message of acceptance of the entertainments planned by the city
officers, proceeded with his elaborate arrangements. Special trains
waited at the Tokio station to transport the two thousand invited guests
to the naval landing field at Kasumigaura, about forty miles northwest
of the city, where an arm of the Pacific forms placid lagoons.
Every hour special weather reports were wirelessed to the ship, while
six seaplanes were ordered to meet her at sea and escort her in. The
great hangar had been cleared for the reception of the visitor, the
Japanese ships being transferred to another location.
Kasumigaura was not housing an American ship for the first time. It had
been used on a previous successful round-the-world flight of three army
planes in 1924, but the American aviators had flown in the opposite
direction, with a more southerly general course.
All Thursday morning a distinguished group of Japanese watched the five
hundred bluejackets who comprised the special ground crew as they
rehearsed for their coming task. There was the admiral, the minister of
the navy, the vice admiral, and, besides, two princes of the reigning
house. The ground crew used the largest of the Japanese dirigibles for
their maneuvers.
The weather was hot, but beautiful and clear. All nature seemed in
league to show Japan at its loveliest. At Tokio, as the morning passed,
thousands of tireless eyes searched the sky for the first sight of their
splendid visitor. Afternoon came, and dragged by, and still the masses
of people watched and listened for the siren which was to sound the
tidings of her arrival. Newsboys swarmed everywhere, with extras
containing the latest reports of the ship’s location.
Evening came. Nine o’clock; fifteen minutes past; and then—three long
blasts from the city’s sirens sent men, women and children rushing for
vantage points. Traffic came spontaneously to an end.
She had come; the silver ship, the Moonbeam! Her engines roaring, her
silver gray sides gleaming in the searchlights, she appeared suddenly as
she dropped through a floor of mist, and hung so low over the city that
it was easy to see the passengers crowded at the windows of the cabin.
The usual calm of the Japanese disappeared, and wild shouts of
“_Banzai!_” rent the air. Handkerchiefs waved madly.
The Moonbeam hung low over the city, as though waiting to receive the
homage due her. Then graciously she circled, and crossing the center of
the city, sailed across to Yokohama, where she saluted the outgoing
steamers which were awaiting her there.
Then she turned in the direction of Kasumigaura. Reaching the port, she
made a wide circle, her attendant seaplanes following, then descended.
The ground crew rushed to their places, and with perfect precision the
Moonbeam was drawn down and secured.
The crowd, composed of many nationalities, became wildly excited. The
noise continued while the passengers disembarked. Mr. Hammond and David
were immediately surrounded by a group of bemedalled and gold-laced
officials. Their luggage was put in cars which were to take them to
Tokio, where rooms were reserved for all the passengers and officers at
the Imperial Hotel. Dulcie clung close to Doctor Trigg, with Red Ryan as
a bulwark on the other side, and Cram close in the rear. Soldiers and
policemen tried to hold back the masses of people who seemed to gather
in increasing numbers. Repeatedly the laughing, chattering mobs broke
through the cordons, only to be pressed back.
A large automobile swept up to Dulcie and her escorts, and a Japanese
officer motioned that they were to enter. When they were comfortably
seated, and the door shut, the smiling Oriental bowed and the car rolled
smoothly away in the direction of Tokio.
The great yellow moon came lazily out of the sea, and lanterns twinkled
merrily as they sped along.
“Well, Lafayette, here we are!” said Dulcie, leaning back on the
luxurious cushions. “This is certainly a dandy car. Red, I feel a grand
good time coming on.”
“You betcha, Miss Hammond!”
“I don’t like these Japs,” said Wally, turning around on the front seat,
where he sat beside the chauffeur. “They are two-faced, and
undependable. Wouldn’t trust one an inch.”
“Keep still!” Dulcie cried imperiously. “That man may speak English.
Anyway, I don’t believe one word of it.”
Wally subsided into sulky silence. The little man at the wheel did not
flicker an eyelid. Dulcie decided that he had not understood.
“Did you notice the charming little incident back there when our friend
closed the door?” asked Doctor Trigg delightedly. “Knowledge is indeed
power!” He tapped the little Japanese-English phrase book in his hand.
“I had the pleasure of speaking to the young man in his native tongue. I
wish you had noticed the surprise and interest depicted on his
countenance. He seemed scarcely able to believe his ears. I am rather an
old man to attempt the mastery of a new tongue.”
“What did you say, doctor?” asked Dulcie.
He stared uncertainly at the little book.
“I would refresh my memory, but the light is so bad. Can you read it? It
is the first line on the left-hand page.”
Dulcie snapped on the dome light, and looked. She could well imagine the
amazement of the young Japanese!
“You have stolen the rice of my honorable father,” was the translation
beneath the phonetic pronunciation. She closed the book hastily.
“I think you are just too smart for words, doctor,” she said.
CHAPTER XI
A STUDENT PRINCE
The Imperial Hotel afforded the travelers every conceivable luxury,
perfect service, and cosmopolitan meals. Dulcie found her room a bower
of flowers. She had her personal maid, a demure, slant-eyed little
thing. Little Kamani did not seem to sense any handicap in the fact that
neither could speak the other’s language. Smiles made easy contact.
Very early the following morning, the lobby was filled with
important-looking Japanese, all in immaculate European clothes. Only in
their homes, or on very special state occasions, do the modern Japanese
wear the beautiful kimonas of the old regime. Many of the men present
were members of the Imperial household.
As Dulcie stood talking to Doctor Trigg, Wally joined them.
“Well, Dulcie, how do you like this crazy country? The people—aren’t
they a riot? And they take themselves so seriously, too.”
“Keep still, Wally!” said Dulcie, hotly. “I think you are perfectly
inexcusable, the way you air your views.”
“They don’t understand,” said Wally carelessly. “Sort of half-witted,
anyhow.”
At that moment a young Japanese who was standing directly behind Wally
turned to look at him. As he did so, he saw Doctor Trigg. A look of
amazement flickered across his placid countenance. He stepped quickly
around the group, and with an apologetic bow to Dulcie, hastened to the
doctor with outstretched hands.
“Doctor Trigg!” he exclaimed in fluent English. “Well, well, what do you
think of this? Fortune attends me!” He shook the doctor’s hands, and
almost embraced him. “Surely you remember me?”
“I most certainly do,” exclaimed Doctor Trigg. “Well, my dear boy, this
certainly is a delightful reunion. Of course I haven’t forgotten you!”
He turned to Dulcie. “Let me present to you one of my old and most
promising students.” He hesitated. “What’s your title over here, Hata?
Prince, I believe?”
The Prince bowed deeply to Dulcie.
“Mr. Cram, Prince Hata.”
Again the Prince bowed; but this time it was a haughty salutation, and
his black eyes regarded the smiling countenance before him curiously. He
turned abruptly to Doctor Trigg.
“You came in the Moonbeam, I take it, sir. How delightful! I have
already paid compliments of day to your distinguished young captain. Do
please consider yourself most particularly my guest during your stay;
and Miss Hammond, if she will be so gracious, must meet my honored
mother and my sisters. And you must see something of our Tokio; not this
make-believe Paris, but the old city. For it still exists, hidden away.
And I have a million questions to ask you, Doctor Trigg, about
Princeton.”
“Doctor Sims is in the party, too,” said the professor.
“Truly, this is the happy day of fulfilled desires!” exclaimed the
Prince.
Wally broke into the conversation. Here was a prince! He had heard that
the Japanese nobility were very exclusive. What an incident to tell back
home! Doc calling him “my dear boy,” too, and patting him on the back.
It was time he asserted himself.
“I’m a Princeton man, too,” he said, smiling ingratiatingly.
Prince Hata looked at him pleasantly. His face did not change, his voice
when he spoke was gentle and courteous.
“Indeed!” he said, but Wally felt as though a sizable pail of ice water
had been dumped over him.
“Where is the dear doctor?” Hata asked, turning to the older man. “Does
he still roar horribly? Such a bluff! And does he still collect—what is
it? Oh, yes, epitaphs. I will make him very happy. We have some
wonderful ones near the temple on my father’s estate. Shall we go and
find him?” He turned, and they started out. Wally pressed close to the
young nobleman, but at the door Hata faced him, and bowed.
“Good-bye,” he said distinctly. “It may be that we shall meet again.” He
turned and joined the others, who had gone forward.
Walter Cram gazed after the trim, dignified little figure. He felt the
hot flush of mortification in his face. The darned Jap! he had heard
every word he had said in the lobby. He wondered if the chauffeur of the
night before had also understood English. There was the big car waiting
at the curb. Wally’s curiosity drove him on. He crossed the sidewalk and
spoke to the driver.
“Are you detailed to look after our party today?” he asked.
“Yes, sir, for the duration of your stay,” came the instant answer in
perfect English.
Wally turned and went into the hotel. He found his way to the men’s
lounge, and to a big wing chair in a corner. There he sat and thought,
cursing himself for his breaks.
Prince Hata and the two old men talked of the days, only two or three
years back, when Hata had been at Princeton. It had not occurred to
either of them that they might see this former pupil, and here they
were, walking slowly up and down, arm in arm. But here the two who had
been teachers, and therefore in authority, were the guests, and Hata,
talking fast, was planning all sorts of wonderful entertainments for
them.
Prince Hata and his two old teachers started gaily off to look at
temples and jade and epitaphs. Hata had even remembered epitaphs! They
would have a grand time, and it was easy to see that Prince Hata was
hungry to hear all about Princeton.
Dulcie found her father and David in close consultation in the reading
room, while near the door half a dozen Japanese officers waited
patiently for the conversation to end. This was no place for Dulcie. She
went down to the lobby again and found Red, scarcely recognizable in
white suit and shoes, his coppery hair painstakingly flat, his eyes
bluer than ever.
“Well, I certainly am glad to see you!” Dulcie exclaimed, dragging him
toward two big chairs in a corner. “Such a time!” and she told him about
Wally and the Prince.
“Honestly, Miss Hammond, that lad makes me just sick with disgust, but
what can be done? There’s no chance to lock him up, and there’s no use
warnin’ him to keep a civil tongue in his head, because he just don’t
know when he’s insultin’. Gosh, what do you suppose he said and did at
Friedrichshafen, when no one was with him? I dunno, but I bet it was
awful. And he speaks good German, so he could make all his friendly
comments as clear as sea-water, and as bitter.”
“Well, I’m too ashamed for words,” said Dulcie. “Last night in the car I
know that chauffeur understood what he said. These people are so
perfectly and beautifully polite; so gentle, and self-effacing, and yet
so efficient. You must meet Prince Hata, Red. He simply oozes
aristocracy, yet Doctor Trigg hugged him and called him his dear boy,
and now he’s taken them off to find old jade and tombstones. And that
man last night who put us in the car. He never smiled when dear Doctor
Trigg spouted his Japanese at him. He was so proud of his Japanese and,
Red, he had looked at the wrong line in the book! He thought he said
‘Good-night, and thank you’, but he had said, ‘You have stolen the rice
of my father’!”
“God love him!” cried Red, after a shout of laughter. “He said that, did
he?”
“Yes, and the man just smiled politely and bowed.”
“Well, Wally is just the cross we’ll have to bear, Miss Hammond.”
“We won’t worry over him, at any rate,” Dulcie replied. “I’ve a grand
morning ahead of me. I’m going to take Kamani, my little maid, and an
interpreter, and lots of money, and we are going shopping. Imagine it!
Shopping in Tokio!”
“It looks just like New York to me,” said Red, “except for the people.”
“Not where we are going. We are going to explore. Here they come now.
Good-bye!”
“Good luck!” said Red. He went off to find David, and met him coming
down the grand staircase.
“How about a drive, Red?” he called as soon as he caught sight of him.
“I’m free for the rest of the morning, and we might see something of the
city.”
“Fine!” agreed Red. “I believe that the car that brought Miss Hammond
and the professors in last night is assigned to us.”
“Good!” cried David.
They located the car, and found the same young driver at the wheel.
“You speak English, of course?” David said, his candid eyes smiling.
“Yess, sir.”
“I thought so,” David said. “Well, how about a drive this morning? We
are crazy to see the city, and I bet you can tell us all about it.”
“It will be to me a great happiness,” the young Japanese answered.
“Come on then, Red; we’re off!” They hopped in and the car started
smoothly away.
A short distance from the hotel, their driver called to a youth who was
standing at the curb. They conversed in a chopped sibilant jargon, then
the driver asked permission to take on another driver, so that he
himself might be free to designate and explain points of interest.
“Of course,” said David. “And you had better come over in back so you
won’t have to shout.”
He came readily enough and sat on one of the little folding seats, with
many apologies for occupying a place in front of them.
Then began such a story of Japan and of Tokio that the past lived and
the present blossomed for them. The Japanese, he said, had never been a
roving people. They did not live by conquest. Japan’s rulers are well
beloved, guiding their industrious subjects with kindly wisdom, as they
forge ahead in agriculture and the arts on a high plane of civilization.
Centuries ago, while all the rest of the world was new and racked by
conflict, civil and foreign, the Japanese were taught to read and write.
They drove through miles of streets as modern as the newest of American
cities. Block after block of beautiful office buildings and shops with
great windows full of the most up-to-date gowns and Paris ties, socks,
and shirts. Snappy gloves laid over correct walking sticks that would
have been a credit to the most exclusive Fifth Avenue shop. There were
magnificent banks; and movie houses everywhere.
“How big is this place, anyhow?” Red demanded at length.
“They say it is a good bit bigger than Philadelphia,” said David. “And
Philly is some town, you know.”
It was strange indeed to see on all sides such perfect order and
co-operation in a land so crowded that it was impossible to spare room
for the domestic animals, the horses and cows so common to the rest of
the world.
Their guide dwelt upon the thousands of students, men and women, who had
gone abroad to be educated, and to absorb new and advanced ideas, until
Japan in her stupendous mental growth had supplied her people with
universities and technical schools of their own. He showed them
silkworms on their trays in warm rooms, endlessly eating the mulberry
leaves heaped about them. They saw skeins of queer raw silk, and were
given a strand for a souvenir.
Then they went down to the wharves; and saw the agile little fishermen
on their slow-moving boats.
“Those boats look nice and peaceful,” said Red, staring at a dark,
sullen ship.
“Their dreadnaughts, over at Yokohama, are not so peaceful. They have to
have ’em for protection,” said David. “All countries have to have
protective navies.”
“They sure looked as though they could protect, all right.”
“We will try to go to Yokohama,” said the guide, “but not today. Not
plenty enough time.”
Driving a little way beyond the city, they saw tiny farms, perhaps two
and a half acres in extent, all under the most intensive cultivation. On
the way back they entered the old part of the city, where they saw
temples lovely as dreams. They went through small shops, where men were
decorating exquisite pieces of porcelain, painting on silk, or carving
precious stones, ivory, and teak.
“Take me home,” moaned David at last, as he paid for just one more
purchase. “I mustn’t buy another thing.”
“But they are so cheap,” murmured Red, arranging a whole procession of
tiny elephants and regarding them with fascinated eyes. “I’ve a notion
our lad here keeps a critical eye on the price tags. These storekeepers
are always castin’ eyes at him.”
“Well, take your elephants, and let’s go. I know you are going to buy
them.”
“This has been simply great,” David told their guide when they arrived
at their hotel. “I never had a better time in my life. Thanks a lot. I
wish you would tell us your name.”
The young man hesitated. “It iss most hard to speak it, that name,” he
said, “but in your America, iss not Bill the often name of the
chauffeur?”
The boys laughed.
“Yeah, it’s American, all right,” said Red.
“All right, Bill,” said David as he shook the young man’s hand heartily.
“Whatever you say goes. Thanks a whole lot for the ride, and everything.
Gee, it’s been wonderful!”
In the lobby they found Mr. Hammond waiting, as the Moonbeam people
drifted in by twos and threes. The last to appear was Prince Hata,
piloting his two professors. Doctor Trigg was wreathed in smiles. Doctor
Sims, looking almost sprightly, clutched his precious notebook and a
small parcel.
“Well, well, here’s our pretty girl!” said Doctor Trigg, smiling at
Dulcie. “Thanks to Hata, here, we have had a wonderful
morning—wonderful. If we were obliged to leave Japan now, at once, I
should still feel repaid for the journey. Our old pupil has done so much
for us,” he patted the Prince fondly.
“It would be many times impossible for me or mine to do enough for you,
sir. I was such a stupid boy, and you both were so always patient.”
“Tut, tut, Hata, you always had a very retentive mind. Well, Miss
Dulcie, I saw a little trinket, which Hata secured for me, and I have
brought it to you. I want you to accept it with an old man’s affection.”
“Ha—grr-r-r-r-r, same here!” said Doctor Sims, dropping his parcel into
Dulcie’s lap.
She opened the quaint worn metal cases. In each nestled a jewel of
purest jade; a necklace from Doctor Trigg, and from Doctor Sims a
bracelet. Dulcie had never seen anything quite so lovely.
“Oh, you dears, you shouldn’t have done it,” she sighed, brooding
lovingly over the jewels.
“Mere trifles,” said Doctor Sims. “I think Hata, here, beat the
shopkeepers down.”
Prince Hata smiled. “They received their price,” he assured them. “Quite
most satisfactory.”
Dulcie looked at him suspiciously. She knew a little about jade. But the
dark face was bland and impassive. After all, whatever Hata had done, he
had done to give happiness to his two old friends. Dulcie rallied a
diplomacy equal to his own. “They are perfect,” she said. “And I love
you both for them. I shall keep them all my life, and remember how I
came by them, and what they mean.”
“We have a most old saying in Japan, Miss Hammond,” said Prince Hata.
“‘The jewel is never so lovely as the wearer.’ I mourn that I shall not
see you again today except in my capacity as official. There is a garden
party to stroll into this afternoon, and tonight enters a great dinner.
Afterwards an entertainment for the officers and crew. You might enjoy
to go. It is permissible. The Geisha girls will dance.
“Tomorrow, Miss Hammond, I do trust that you will graciously allow my
mother to receive you. She is unfortunately unable to leave her home. If
you would so benevolently come to her?”
“I would love to,” cried Dulcie.
“Thank you. Then I will so arrange, and send you word.” He made his
cordial, graceful farewells and departed.
“Well, Prince Hata’s mother must be a princess,” mused Dulcie.
“She is the Emperor’s aunt,” said Doctor Trigg, absently.
“Aunt!” cried Dulcie. “Aunt! Then Prince Hata is the Emperor’s cousin!”
“Quite likely,” said Doctor Trigg. “I say, Sims, those manuscripts Hata
showed us—”
“Oh, what have I let myself in for!” cried Dulcie, interrupting. “I
don’t know how to behave before emperors’ aunts.”
“Pshaw!” laughed Mr. Hammond. “Don’t forget that you yourself are the
heir of the ages.”
“Certainly!” said Doctor Trigg. “Besides, she is a very agreeable old
lady. A trifle ceremonious, but very agreeable. We dropped in this
morning.”
“To see the Princess?” demanded Dulcie.
“Yes,” said Doctor Trigg. “Unofficially, of course, unofficially. The
old lady does not give audiences to men as a rule, but we were her son’s
teachers, you see, and she seemed to have an idea that she wanted to
thank us personally for the attention we had given him during his course
at Princeton. Hata took us to the palace to see some manuscripts. She
heard we were there, so she sent word for us to drop in and see her.”
“Simple, like that,” murmured Dulcie. “They just dropped in!”
Mr. Hammond laughed.
“By the way, Dulcie, did you know that Mr. Hamilton has left us? He had
to get back to Paris by the quickest route. He’s flying to Baku, then to
Moscow, then straight over. He has to attend a big directors’ meeting of
their Paris house.”
“What a shame!” cried Dulcie. “Goodness, daddy, I’m glad you aren’t a
big business man. It’s no wonder they get ‘tired’, is it?” she added
wickedly.
CHAPTER XII
CUSTOMS AND COSTUMES
Dulcie dressed for the luncheon that was being given for her by the
Japanese Vassar Club, and was immediately driven away to their club
house by the faithful Bill. The men of the party had a luncheon at the
Aviation Club, an important function because both Mr. Hammond and David
were to be presented with decorations. Already Mr. Hammond wore two
gorgeous medals presented to him in Friedrichshafen. David glittered in
a slightly smaller way and it embarrassed him very much.
When the party from the Moonbeam entered the club, they saw that a large
number of very high ranking officials were present. Most of them being
older men, they did not speak English, so the speeches of the hosts and
the replies of the guests trickled through the medium of an interpreter.
Aside from that drawback, and the presence of glittering orderlies
standing behind the chairs of the Japanese generals and ministers, they
might have been dining at any first-class hotel at home.
The young officer on David’s right spoke only a few broken words of
English, but beamed and smiled so brightly that David wished he could
communicate with him in some common tongue. Suddenly he thought of an
almost forgotten knack of caricature which had always gone over big at
school. He brought out a pencil and on the back of the menu drew, with a
few sharp strokes, pictures of Mr. Hammond and the others, not sparing
himself.
They were very funny. He set them forth on the top of a fat and wobbly
blimp with sagging hull. Each one of them was looking through long field
glasses toward a point marked with a rising sun. The young Japanese
laughed heartily and handed him another card. On the bottom of this
David drew a small, distant glimpse of the landing field at Kasumigaura.
The eager visitors were shown dancing on the top of their unwieldy ship,
and from each mouth issued a balloon inscribed “_Banzai_.”
David was not sure that the idea would get across, but it did. The
clever sketches traveled around the great table, and with the laughter
they called forth the stiff decorum of the meal lightened into a more
free and friendly atmosphere.
Helping each other as best they could, with gestures and drawings, David
managed to tell the group of young aviators about him many things
concerning aviation in America that they were very anxious to know.
The luncheon lasted far into the afternoon. The ceremonies attending the
presentation of the medals were long and dignified. When the big,
glittering, bejeweled bauble had been pinned on Mr. Hammond’s coat, with
many suave and pleasant words from the donors, and when Mr. Hammond had
replied with thanks and prophecies for the welding of nations through
aviation, David felt his muscles tighten. Now he would get a medal
pinned on him, but he wouldn’t have to speak. He hadn’t spoken in
Friedrichshafen, so why here? When his name was spoken, he went to the
head of the table, where he stood facing the highest ranking officer of
the aviation corps in Japan. David stood very straight and stiff, his
broad shoulders squared, his head high. He was very handsome—and
exceedingly embarrassed.
The general, medal in hand, began to speak, slowly, so the interpreter
could keep pace with him. To David’s consternation, the general referred
to David’s youth and to the fact that he had taken over the ship in the
teeth of a hurricane, and had brought her to safety. He congratulated
aviation and America on possessing such a fine young pilot. David felt
his very ears growing red. Then the medal was pinned on his breast, and
behold, it was the twin of Mr. Hammond’s.
Released at last, David somehow gained his seat, and dropped into it. He
looked at Mr. Hammond. That gentleman was signaling him to get up. David
drew a long shuddering breath as he rose.
“Oh, my Lord!” he breathed, and with his voice croaking with fright he
launched into his first public speech.
“Your Excellencies, and gentlemen,” he commenced: “I don’t know how to
thank you for your kindness. I really don’t deserve it. The Moonbeam is
so staunch that she could just about take care of herself. She’s a
wonderful ship, and I hope you will soon have one like her.”
“_Banzai! Banzai!_” cried the Japanese.
“This is a wonderful experience, being here, and I hope it will not be
my last flight to Japan,” David continued. “You are all so kind. I only
hope that many of you, indeed all of you, will come to America as soon
as you can so that we may have the opportunity of returning, at least in
part, your many courtesies. We will show you our landing fields. They
are very large, most of them, but we have nothing as beautiful as
Kasumigaura.
“I thank you again for the honor you have shown me.”
Somehow he found himself safe in his chair, with applause all about him.
On his breast the medal winked and flashed. It fussed him greatly.
Someone nudged his elbow. The lieutenant in the next seat held a card
under the edge of the table. On it his new friend had tried his hand at
drawing. A huge, very Japanesque figure with wide shoulders and
something, supposedly the uniform of the Moonbeam, loosely encasing his
form, stood smiling widely. Covering his breast was a medal. At either
side a group of pigmies all ejaculated “_Banzai!_” David recognized
himself under the queer Japanese features, and shook with laughter, to
the great delight of the artist, who was so pleased with his own
cleverness that David made him a present of his gold pencil as a
souvenir.
At four o’clock they were all driven to the garden party given on the
grounds of the Emperor’s palace. David was in Mr. Hammond’s car.
“Well, David, how we do glisten!” said the commander as they took their
seats. “Don’t talk to me after our escorts come aboard, as I am afraid
it isn’t polite. I was proud of you, my boy.”
“Gosh,” said David, “I thought I’d go right plumb through the floor! I
never made a speech in my life. All dressed up like a band wagon, too.
Do I dare take this breastplate off?”
“Heavens, no! We’ve got to wear ’em on every occasion as long as we are
here. Why, David, it’s a tremen
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