CHAPTER XIVAMAZING NEWS

Tom Swift drove theWinged Arrowto a high altitude when she left Lake Carlopa on her first long voyage. It was a windy day, but pleasant. The weather indications were favorable for the journey, but the report from out at sea was that a storm had shaken up the shipping a good deal.

“We have that matter of balance and safety when taking to the water to settle, whatever else we may do,” the inventor said to Ned Newton, who was again his companion. “The hollow sheath of the boat has proved a good thing while we are in the air; but I should hate to learn that I had planned something that turned out to be no good for the object I had in mind, even if it was useful in other ways.”

Besides the two chums aboard the flying boat there were eight in the crew and a young man named Kingston who was a wireless operator. TheWinged Arrowwas supplied with the very latest instruments for wireless and radiophoneoperation, and Kingston was well trained in his business. He was, as well, a pleasant addition to the plane’s company.

They flew so high that landmarks had to be scrutinized through the glasses to make sure of their nature. They passed over three states in reaching the coast. From their height it seemed as though the ocean were a hazy blue sheet of glass with a white or yellow line marking the shore. They scaled down nearer to it and saw great ships tossing on mighty billows and the surf viciously beating the sands of Cape Cod.

“Ho!” cried Ned. “I hope you are satisfied, Tom. It looks just as safe to land down there as though the ocean were a boiling cauldron.”

“It is exactly what we have come to experience,” declared Tom.

“Well, I hope everything is all right,” grumbled his friend. “But I want to tell you right now that I would rather be on dry land than on this plane when she hits that sea. Whew!”

If Tom Swift felt any such fear he did not express it. But his face was rather grim as he scaled down the airways and brought the huge flying boat hovering above the tossing waves. To Brannigan, in the tail of the craft, he said:

“Test out your levers. See that everything is buzzing right. We are going to subject her to a severe test. All ready?”

“Aye, aye, sir!” rejoined Brannigan through the tube. “Let her go!”

Kingston, whose little coop was directly behind the pilot room, stuck his head out of his door at that moment and shouted:

“Have a care about bumping His Majesty’s liner,Cantoria. She’s right over yonder—you can see her. I just picked up a ’gram from her operator objecting to such big planes as ours being tried out in the steamship lanes.”

“What’s the matter with that limey?” demanded Ned. “Does he think he owns the whole ocean?”

“He is complaining to the U. S. Weather Bureau about us, just the same,” declared the operator.

Tom shifted certain levers and the huge plane dived for the riotous surface of the sea. She swooped like a sea-eagle, skimmed the froth-capped waves for some distance, and then settled upon the water like a duck.

Foam and spray dashed completely over the wings and the boat’s upperworks. They could scarcely see through the side ports. The roar of the waters pouring over the half buried craft was deafening. For the next few minutes theWinged Arrowwas put through a test that surely would have wrecked a less strongly built craft.

The compressed air between the skins of the boat had to be increased considerably before shestopped rolling. The airtight pontoons at either end of the wings were not sufficient stabilizers. It seemed that Tom Swift’s ingenuity had actually overcome a drawback that had baffled inventors of similar planes.

The flying boat floated like a well ballasted sailing craft. She climbed the steep waves, pitched over their tops, and slid to the depths of the trough between them with surprising ease. When the waves broke against her wings, leaping hungrily to overwhelm them, the perfect balance of the hull brought the whole ship back to an even keel in a few seconds.

Ned Newton was delighted. Aside from feeling some little disturbance in his stomach because of the boisterousness of the waves, he considered the test a great success.

“If this was my flying boat I certainly would slap myself on the back and give three cheers,” he declared.

“You must be a remarkable contortionist to be able to do that,” rejoined Tom, chuckling. “But I really am not posing. It seems as though we had hit the right idea. Hullo! What is the matter with Kingston?”

Through the glass half of the door to the radio coop they both saw that the operator seemed excited. He had the eartabs clamped to his head and was evidently listening in on something veryimportant. With his right hand he wrote a few words quickly and then wheeled and beckoned Ned.

“Get this to the chief,” he said abruptly. “It is relayed from Block Island. There may be more of it.”

Ned wheeled about and thrust the paper into Tom’s hand. The latter read the message at a glance:

“T. Swift, com. seaplaneWinged Arrow, offshore, N. Atlantic, relay: Return immediately very important news of Damon and Nestor.—B. Swift.”

Tom stared from the message to his friend.

“What do you know about that?” he exclaimed.

“Don’t even know what it’s all about,” grumbled the treasurer of the Swift Construction Company.

“Look at it!” ejaculated Tom, and handed Ned the radio message.

“Great whales and little fishes!” gasped Ned, when he had read it. “It is from your father!”

“That’s right.”

“It can’t be any joke, then,” considered Ned. “Mr. Damon and Mary’s father must be in trouble.”

“But if they are up in Iceland and we are down here, what can I do to help them out of trouble?” cried Tom anxiously.

“That seems to be the question before the house,” replied Ned. “Guess we’ll have to go back home to find out. Your father is not very explicit, that is certain.”

“He would not send this message at such a time unless the matter was urgent. I am glad we have been able to try out theWinged Arrowas well as we have. Poor Mr. Nestor! Suppose he has died up there? Or maybe Mr. Damon is ill.”

“I hope not!” cried Ned.

“If it is anything like that, somebody will have to take passage at once for Iceland,” Tom went on, in a worried way. “Mary and her mother have nobody to look to for help but father and me. Mary’s uncle is traveling around the world, you know.”

“Then the duty devolves on you, does it?” demanded the other young fellow. “And how about business? What about the Swift Construction Company? You will have to drop this flying boat right where she is!”

“I hope not,” returned Tom, and he smiled again, though rather ruefully. “If we dropped her where she is, she would go to the bottom of a very deep part of the Atlantic, Ned.”

“Don’t joke! This is too serious,” said his chum.

“You are right. It must be serious—particularly for the Nestors. If we have to delay the exploitation of theWinged Arrow, all right. The need of Mary and her mother comes first.”

It might have been difficult to convince Ned of this; but he made no further rejoinder. It did seem too bad that, just as success seemed to have crowned Tom Swift’s efforts in the building of a wonderful flying boat, a chance like this news from Iceland happened to postpone the final speed and other trials of the new invention.

Tom did not waste time even in replying to the wireless message. As they could not communicate direct with the plant at Shopton he knew that, barring accidents, the flying boat would make her landing behind the Swift Construction Company stockade before a radiogram could be delivered to his father.

Out of the boisterous sea the great flying boat rose like some huge waterfowl taking to the air. Her compressed air compartments were gradually emptied until she gained a perfect poise in the air, some mile or more above the sea.

Tom guided her in a half circle and she headed for the shore. The seaplane flew directly over the British ship,Cantoria, the captain of whichhad complained of the danger to ordinary shipping by the nearness of the plane.

“This fact will undoubtedly make the commander of that ship write to theTimeswhen he gets back to London,” chuckled Ned.

The seaplane rose higher as she neared the shore. The yellow streak of Cape Cod was only to be dimly distinguished through the lower windows of the pilot room. Night had fallen when theWinged Arrowspiraled over Shopton and the works. Tom made a ground landing instead of sinking to the surface of Lake Carlopa. He was in a hurry to get home.

The searchlights in the yard of the shops served as lighthouses for the plane’s landing. She came down perfectly, bumping along the ground easily upon the wheels, and finally stopped not far from the highroad.

The Swift house was not far away. Aside from Koku, who had been on watch continually since the plane had flown away, there were few people to greet the crew. Tom and Ned left the mechanicians to attend to the flying boat and hurried up to the house.

Mr. Barton Swift, very much disturbed for him, was walking the library floor. He hurried to greet Tom and Ned, waving a blue cablegram in his hand.

“What is it, father?” Tom asked. “What has happened to Mr. Damon and Mary’s father?”

“I don’t know,” confessed Barton Swift. “I have been wondering and worrying all the afternoon. And now I know less about it than I did at first.”

“How is that?”

“It has crossed my mind that the message may be a fake. It may come from some schemer who wishes us ill. But on the face of it—here! Read it!”

He thrust the cablegram into Tom’s hand. The young inventor read, and read it aloud for Ned Newton’s benefit:

“Mes. Damon and Nestor lost with treasure chest on iceberg in Greenland Sea between Greenland and Iceland.Kalryea wreck and our boats separated. Believe castaways alive on giant iceberg. Cable funds for rescue, or advise—Olaf Karofsen, com.Kalrye, Reykjavik.”

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