CHAPTER XVMORE SPEED
Cowering beside David, he got out the miserable confession at last. Bare facts that clothed themselves with sordid details in the minds of the listeners. Not a man spoke. Not a man could look at him. Searching each face, Walter Cram saw only the reflection of his own disgrace. He turned and bolted to the sanctuary of his cabin.
David, the precious envelope in his hand, turned to go; but in a moment the passengers surrounded him, shaking his hand, patting him on the back, congratulating him wholeheartedly.
One of the last to reach David was the youngest reporter. “Gosh, we are glad, captain! It sure was a rotten deal for you, and not so nice for the rest of us. Say, it is going to make a swell story!”
“Round up the other press men, will you, please?” David asked.
When they came, he said, “Boys, I know you will give me a square deal. I am going to ask a big favor of you. I don’t want you to write a word about what has just happened. Not a single word.”
“Aw, have a heart, captain! It’s too good to kill,” cried the star reporter.
“But you are going to kill it just the same,” said David, smiling at the speaker. “I think you fellows are all good friends of mine. I think you will kill the story for my sake. And if you won’t, why, please kill it for the sake of the Moonbeam. It’s her maiden flight, you know, and it would be a crime to smear her all up with such a dirty scandal.”
One of the men laughed. “Hear him! You’d think the ship was a girl. Well, Captain Ellison, it’s all right as far as I go. I’ll respect the unblemished reputation of your husky lady-love. How about it, boys?”
There was some grumbling, but finally David won their promise. The affair of the stolen plans would never get into print.
Cram did not appear nor would he eat, sending back untouched the tray the chef sent in. About ten o’clock Mr. Hammond went to Cram’s room. It was two hours before he came out and called David.
“Well, David, I guess this unfortunate affair is nearly finished. I wish I could forget it. I made Cram talk to me. He acknowledged that he had it in for you, but his reasons were so vague that I couldn’t make anything out of them. However, it’s done. I am sorry for him, but he’s got to be wiped off our slate. So I’ve bought him out; taken over his shares in the Moonbeam. I gave him a check, and made him sign receipts for everything. He is going to leave us at Los Angeles.”
“Thank Heaven for that!” said David devoutly. “I simply can’t bear to see him. I want a chance to forget, too.”
The remainder of that night was stormy, and David made it an excuse for remaining at the wheel or around the control room most of the time. With the first glimpse of the California coast line the next morning, as they came down toward San Francisco, the weather changed into a sparkle and dazzle of sunshine and balmy breezes. They were flying low past the city, its hundreds of slips and piers stretching out into the bay like a fringe. The usual civic greeting met them. Flags broke out, whistles tooted, sirens moaned, and bells rang. Numbers of planes buzzed about them like flies, their engines roaring out the general spirit of welcome.
David sent for Red.
“After we have landed at Los Angeles, I want you to go with me to see if we can’t get the accelerators made up. I know they can be done, but we may have to oversee the job pretty closely.”
“Sure, we will do that. It won’t take long. There is nothing that would require a mould or special machinery.”
“If we get them made,” said David, “we will adjust them to the engines without telling anyone but the engineers. There can be no harm in trying them. We are only two hours ahead of the time of the G. Z., and a run of bad weather would make us lose every bit of that.”
“We won’t lose that, if we have to get out and push,” declared Red.
When Los Angeles opened her arms to them at twelve-twenty, noon, many things happened. The first one off the ship was Walter Cram. He swung himself down almost before the steps were adjusted and, like a shadow, slipped into the cheering crowd. Only Dulcie saw him go. From her window she watched the slim figure hurrying away like a fugitive.
“Good-bye, Wally,” she whispered.
It was his only farewell.
As soon as official greetings had been extended to Commander Hammond and the officers, David and Red taxied into the city, the precious plans in David’s pocket.
Red unfolded a telegraph blank.
“See what they handed me back there. It’s a night letter from the Padre. Whatever do you suppose he is up to? He says, ‘Am meeting you at landing field Lakehurst stop most important business stop arrange to spend a day with me stop mother is fine.’ Thank God he added that! I’d have thought he had bad news. Here’s what I’ll answer. ‘Can’t promise as present plan is to take ship back to Ayre immediately. Radio nature of important business.’ That ought to get something out of him.”
Red sent his message from the first Western Union office they passed. Then in the delightful excitement of machine shops that smelled of oil and steel he forgot all about it.
At one-thirty the officers and passengers were hurried off to a civic luncheon, and thence to a meeting of the Pioneer Daughters of California. But David side-stepped the Daughters, and dashed off to see how the accelerators were coming along under the eagle eye of Red Ryan.
He had only time to give a few words of advice, then rushed away to a reception at the Aviation Club. He begged off from the Board of Commerce meeting which came next, and went to the machine shop again. Red had not left since the work started, and David made him go out for a sandwich. At five the shop closed, and David and Red drove back to their hotel, where they put the envelope in the safe.
David dressed for the dinner given by the mayor and council. Four hundred sat down; and for the honor guests, the favors were fountain pens, with cases of California gold. Later they had boxes at a popular show. Still later, when David finally reached his room, he found Red sprawled out in a big chair.
“My dog, boy, do you know what time it is?” demanded David.
“That and more,” said Red, yawning. “I just got in. What’s on for tomorrow?”
“Nothing much but the accelerators. I simply can’t trail around with Mr. Hammond all day tomorrow. Here’s a list of activities: The poor man is going to speak before the Board of Trade, the Elks, the Rotary Club, the K. of C., Kiwanis, Masons, and the United Churches of Los Angeles. Also there is a luncheon given by the Sons of the Forty-niners, and a dinner.”
“All I can say is, Miss Dulcie is headed toward an orphans’ home. The Big Fella can’t stand it.”
“Neither can we, if we don’t sleep. Go to bed, you loafer, if you want to go to the machine shop with me at eight o’clock, sharp!”
On Thursday morning, local committees discovered that the eminent professors, Doctors Trigg and Sims, had by some dastardly stroke of fate never seen Los Angeles! As soon as Dulcie appeared, they were all three bundled into a big limousine, with an enthusiastic native Californian whom Doctor Sims caustically referred to afterwards as “our barker”.
Mr. Hammond worked his way grimly through speeches and interviews, and the others accomplished great feats of sightseeing. But at last the day ended and as soon as they could escape from their hosts, they retired.
When Mr. Hammond, after a restless night, reached the hangar Friday morning, he found David and Red there before him, looking fresh and crisp. Both were in overalls.
Mr. Hammond frankly acknowledged to the boys his disappointment in the performance of the ship during the trip over Siberia and the Pacific. “I was sure we’d pick up speed, but those head winds have made us lose our chance to make the record I wanted,” he said gloomily. “She just can’t do it.”
“We could gain a little by setting a straight course, instead of flying over so many cities,” David suggested.
“It’s not good policy,” said Mr. Hammond. “Those big cities want to see the ship, and really it is their right to do so. No, we will make as good time as we can on our predetermined course.” He walked aft.
“Gee, the Big Fella’s low!” said Red, looking after him. “But only a few hours more, and we will be ready for him. They promised to deliver those screws by nine-thirty. It won’t take half an hour then to finish installing them. Look here, don’t you mean to tell the chief at all?”
“Not until we hang over Lakehurst; and not then, if it’s a flop.”
“Come and get a sody while we wait,” suggested Red. “You are nervous.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” demanded David.
The passengers commenced to wander back; the crew gathered, and went to their places; the usual dense crowd blackened the landing field. Dulcie, still tired, had the peaceful sensation of returning home. Her father, for the first time since the ship started from Lakehurst, showed a strain. It hurt him to lose the distinction of making a record, but he had definitely given up the hope of doing so. David’s seeming unconcern hurt him a little, but he supposed David was too young to take such things much to heart.
The ship took off without accident, the ground crew working with the smooth accuracy of a machine. It was eleven twenty-five of Friday, July second. They started eastward through the crystalline, clean air of California—air which always carries its own celestial aroma; a perfume, vague and delicate, made of millions of flowers, seas of fruit, leagues of pines, all washed with the faint breath of the sea.
“In point of fact,” said Doctor Sims, judicially, “the enthusiasm of the Californian seems perfectly justifiable. I was rather annoyed at first by what I thought was the bombastic attitude of our barker. But the young man, while enthusiastic, was really quite moderate in his statements.”
“Decidedly,” agreed Doctor Trigg. “I was recently offered a chair at Leland Stanford University. I hesitated to accept it, but I believe it would be a fine place for an old man to finish his career.”
“Gr-r-r-r-r-uh!” said Doctor Sims in his worst growl. “Wild goose chase, I’d call it! Perfect nonsense! At your age, crazy! New climate, new type of students. How do you know how it would affect your lumbago? Silly, plain silly!”
“Possibly! Possibly!” Doctor Trigg agreed.
Dulcie was looking out of the window. “Aren’t we going rather fast?” she queried, as a couple of the reporters came up.
“We are,” said the younger. “We just looked at the indicator thing, and we are buzzing along at a great rate.”
“I must go and see,” said Dulcie, hurrying into the control room, where David held the wheel.
“What are we making, Davie?”
David beamed. “Ninety miles an hour!”
“Why, David!” Dulcie studied him curiously. “Isn’t that pretty fast for us?”
“Pretty good clip,” said David carelessly.
“Does daddy know?”
“I don’t believe so,” said David. “He hasn’t been around for quite a while.”
“Well, he ought to know,” declared daddy’s own child.
She went off, and almost immediately Mr. Hammond appeared. He said nothing, but went to the indicator and studied it. “What’s wrong with this indicator?” he asked finally. “We never make that speed.”
“It has held that, according to the chart, ever since we left Los Angeles,” said David. There was a tremor in his voice, that he could scarcely control. “If it only works, if it only works!” his heart kept whispering.
“If it only works!” he said when Red came forward to look at the indicator.
Red gave him a look of disgust.
“If it works! Why, it is working, you dumb-bell! Ninety! Has the commander seen it? Well, when are you going to tell him?”
“When we reach Lakehurst,” said David. “I want to work it out. It is only fair to me to do that.”
“It’s your funeral,” sighed Red, “and I’ll not say a word, but my, wouldn’t I enjoy it just to break the glad news to him!”
From then on the dial gradually grew to be the center of a group of amazed and delighted officers. It climbed to ninety-one, wavered, went to ninety-three, ninety-four and steadied at ninety-five miles an hour.
David called down to the five eggs by telephone, and the engineers declared that the engines were working as usual, with no extra expenditure of gas.
Before Saturday dawned they were rushing over Texas. Soon El Paso was beneath them, then she faded away. At twelve-thirty, Kansas City, secure on the border line of two states, greeted them with bells, whistles and bombs. Then the yelling crowds, standing on roofs and blocking thoroughfares, and the inevitable escort of flitting planes, were behind them. At seven that evening, going ninety-eight miles an hour, they passed Chicago, the city roaring back at their roaring engines.
At eleven Detroit appeared, her forests of chimneys belching flames of greeting, while hundreds of brazen factory whistles screeched their welcome.
No one on the ship thought of bed. The passengers, crowded into the salon, watched the calm starlit night, listened to the thunder of the engines, and talked. At twelve the myriad lights of Cleveland appeared, crossed and recrossed below them, like chains of diamonds and fire opals. Searchlights caught and held them, a dozen airplanes darted up and played about them. Then the calm and the darkness again.
“Beautiful! Beautiful!” said Doctor Trigg, as he watched the twinkling light-jewels disappear, and the planes turn back.
“Um!” said Doctor Sims. “Trigg, I can’t just see the advisability of this Leland Stanford affair. Is the salary larger?”
“Why, I’d forgotten it,” said Doctor Trigg. “Yes, they pay very generously.”
“So does Princeton,” said Doctor Sims, loyally.
“Of course; of course! Well, I haven’t made up my mind.”
“Well, I can’t advise for it,” repeated Doctor Sims. He cleared his throat, and said rather forlornly, “Fact is, Trigg, I’d miss you. I—I—actually can’t see it, Trigg.”
Doctor Trigg turned and regarded the gnarled and puckered old face. To him it looked a fine and open countenance, sincere and true. He patted the thin shoulder.
“Old friend,” he said, “if I go, you go. Did you think for a minute that I could leave my old friend after forty years? No, no! I couldn’t get along without you.”
Doctor Sims groped for the other’s hand, and shook it hard. A look of relief filled his face.
“Hah—gr-r-r-r-rumph!” he said.
“Exactly!” said Martin Trigg.