CHAPTER IVJUST IN TIME
Tom Swifthad been in dangerous situations before with aeroplanes and other machines of his invention. He had more than once been close to death, and he knew that the only way to get out of a tight corner was to keep his head. Now he did not so much fear for himself as for Mary.
“Is there any danger?” asked the girl, who had sense enough to sit quietly in her seat and not grab Tom’s arms or interfere in any way.
“Yes, there is danger,” the aviator answered quietly, as he kept at his task of trying to straighten out the plane. “If I can’t bring her up we’re likely to crash.”
Beyond a gasp of her breath and a look of terror in her eyes, Mary showed no signs of the fear that was within her. Yet she was terribly frightened, for Tom as much as for herself.
“Come up here!” cried the young inventor, speaking to the plane as he might to a horse. He adjusted the levers, pulled back on the one that tended to raise the forward edges of the plane to tilt her nose, and he tried to get the elevation rudder up. But in the end he had to admit that he was beaten.
“She won’t come up!” he gasped.
“Then we’ll have to crash!” murmured Mary.
Tom nodded hopelessly. He reached over and began loosening the buckle of the girl’s safety belt before unfastening his own.
“The only thing to do is to jump when I give the word.”
“Is there no chance of saving the plane, Tom?”
“I don’t believe so, Mary. But I’m not worrying about the machine. I can make another. It’s you!”
Tom put his arm around her and she leaned close to him. The machine was dashing downward now at terrific speed, and on a dangerous slant that meant the nose would strike the earth first, driving the engine back upon those in the cockpit. The motor had stopped, whether having been cut off by Tom or because of some defect Mary did not inquire.
“Leap clear when I tell you to,” said Tom, as he made one more fruitless effort to straighten the plane out so he could pancake down instead of hitting on the nose. “You go out on that side, Mary, and I’ll go on this.”
“If there was only some water for us to land in,” murmured the girl. “If we were only over Lake Carlopa instead of having to jump on the hard ground, it wouldn’t be so bad, Tom!”
“I’m heading for Jamison’s cranberry bog,” the aviator answered, pointing to a marshy place just ahead. “It will be a softer place to jump on than the fields or in the woods. I hope we can make it!”
Nearer and nearer the earth the plane was descending. In a few seconds more it would be all over, and the machine would crash itself into a mass of tangled wreckage, while the bodies of Tom and Mary—it was terrible to think of.
“Shall I jump now?” the girl asked as she leaned over the edge of the cockpit and saw how perilously close the earth was.
“Just a moment,” said Tom. “Wait!”
He made one last attempt to straighten the plane out, pulling on the lever with all his force. To his joy and surprise it yielded where before it had held firm. Back it came to the last notch and, with a suddenness that was like the quick stopping of a falling elevator, the plane flattened out on a level keel just as it started over the big cranberry bog, part of which was flooded with water.
“I leveled her out!” cried the young man. “There’s a chance now that we can make a three point landing and save ourselves.”
The plane, however, had acquired terrific speed during her dive, and was going much faster than would have been the case had she been driving along under the power of the motor and on a level. In this latter case Tom could have eased the machine down gently.
As it was, they were going to strike the ground while going at terrific speed. Though in their favor was the fact that they could now hit the earth at a long slant instead of at an acute angle.
“Shall I jump?” asked Mary, who was closely watching her lover.
“No!” he cried. “Sit tight! Maybe we can do it!”
He was making some adjustments to the wings and tail rudder. The controls had jammed just when they were most needed, but they had now suddenly loosened up in as strange a manner as they had tightened, and this gave Tom Swift his chance.
He looked down, picking out the best possible spot for a landing, since he could now steer the plane somewhat. The spot he picked was where the water was deepest over the cranberry bog. The plane was not fitted with pontoons for landing on water, and doubtless the under carriage was going to be greatly damaged in the fall. But, other things being equal, a fall into water in an aeroplane is less harmful to the occupants than a landing on the hard ground.
With steady hands and clear eyes that sought for the most advantageous spot, Tom guided the almost unruly craft. It was now within a few hundred feet of the earth, and a couple of seconds more would tell the tale.
Aside from the rushing of the wind past them, causing a roaring noise in spite of the helmets they wore over their ears, there was silence in the plane, for the motor was still dead. Amid the silence Tom heard some voices shouting below him.
He wondered dimly who could be calling, but guessed it was some autoists on the highway that bordered the cranberry bog.
“They’re going to see something they didn’t count on!” thought Tom grimly.
“Stand up, Mary, when I give the word!” said Tom to her as he leaned over the edge of the cockpit and looked down. His gaze took in a small automobile racing along the highway toward that part of the bog where he hoped to land.
“Stand up! What for?” asked the girl. “Shall I have to jump after all?”
“No, but by standing, instead of sitting, the shock of landing will be less,” Tom said. “Get ready now!”
His eyes were measuring the distance. In three seconds more, he calculated, the plane would crash into the bog of mud and water. But it would crash on a nearly level keel instead of on its nose, in which case nothing, in all likelihood, could have saved the occupants from death.
“Up!” cried Tom sharply, and he and Mary rose in their seats, clinging to each other.
An instant later the plane hit the ground with terrific force, but fortunately in the middle of a soft spot of mud and water which greatly reduced the shock. As it was, the jolt knocked Tom and Mary down, stunning them as they were crushed back into their seats, so that for a few seconds after the forced landing they did not realize what was happening.
Mary was the first to recover her senses. She struggled to a position where she could look over the side of the cockpit and at once cried:
“Tom! We’re sinking! We’re almost submerged!”
By this time the young inventor had aroused and, pulling himself to the edge of the cabin space, he glanced over.
“We’re in a bad hole!” he exclaimed.
He learned later that the plane had gone down in what was virtually a quicksand in the cranberry bog—a place shunned by all who knew its dangers.
“What’s to be done, Tom?” cried Mary. “We got out of the nose dive just in time, but if we’re going to sink in this bog it will be just as bad, though not so quick!”
She saw, in fancy, a slow, terrible death by suffocation in the mud and water.
“Let’s jump out and try to wade to solid ground!” she went on.
“No! No! Don’t do that!” yelled Tom. “It would be sure death! The plane will hold us up for a time—perhaps until help comes.”
“Where will help come from?” asked Mary. “No one knows we are here, Tom.”
Before he could answer there came the sound of shouting voices and the tooting of an automobile horn from somewhere in the distance.
“Maybe that’s help now,” Tom said. “But they’ve got to hurry,” he added grimly. “We’re sinking fast!”
CHAPTER VTHE AIR MONARCH
Rapidlythe small plane settled in the mud and water. It was down almost to the edge of the cockpit, and Tom was about to advise Mary to climb out and up on the upper surface of the wings, which he, likewise was going to do, when shouts over to the left attracted the attention of the two.
A couple of men—automobile mechanics to judge by their grease-soiled garments—stood on the edge of the bog, waving their hands.
“Hold fast!” the taller one urged. “We’ll get you in a minute!”
“You can’t come out here!” Tom shouted back. “It’s a regular quicksand. You’ll get in yourselves!”
“There’s some sort of a boat here,” said the other man. “We’re coming out in that!”
“A boat! Then they’ll save us!” gasped Mary.
“Maybe,” returned Tom grimly. He did not understand how a boat could be propelled through that bog which was more like thick, slimy mud than it was water.
The two men disappeared behind a screen of bushes, and Mary cried:
“Oh, they are leaving us!”
But the reassuring shout came back:
“We’ll be there with the boat in a minute!”
By this time the thick, muddy water (quicksand in solution it was) began seeping over the edge of the cockpit. Tom was helping Mary to climb up to a dry place, back on the fuselage of the machine, when out of the underbrush the two men emerged, pushing, by means of poles, a low, broad, flat-bottomed punt, which was so broad of beam that it did not sink in the swamp.
“We’ll have you off in a minute!” called the shorter of the two men encouragingly.
By dint of hard pushing they worked the punt to the side of the stranded and bogged aeroplane, and Tom and Mary lost little time in getting into the safer, if less picturesque, craft.
“Will it float with all four of us in it?” Tom asked anxiously.
“I guess so,” the tall stranger said. “But it will be slow work poling back to solid ground.”
“Sorry we can’t save your bus, mister,” remarked the other.
“Don’t worry about the plane,” was Tom’s answer. “There are more where that came from. And I may be able to save it at that.”
“It would take a tank to yank that bus out,” said the short man.
“What do you know about tanks?” asked Tom, as he took up a pole from the bottom of the punt and helped the two rescuers push the craft toward the solid point of land whence the welcome hails had come.
“I used to manicure one on the other side when we had the Big Fuss,” was the answer, and Tom knew the man had been in one of the ponderous tank machines of the World War.
“I hate to leave that bus,” sighed the tall man, with a look back at the now almost submerged plane. “She’s pretty, but you had some trouble, didn’t you?” he asked. “Sounded to me like your motor died on you.”
“It did,” admitted Tom. “And I couldn’t straighten out.”
“She was nose diving when my buddy and me saw you as we were riding along in our machine,” went on the tall man.
“Nose diving is right,” conceded Tom. “But I got her straightened out just in time.”
“But not enough to zoom up,” went on the other, and Tom was sure the man knew whereof he spoke.
“You’ve run a bus?” asked Tom.
“In France,” was the sufficient answer.
By this time the punt had been poled through the mud, water, and quicksand of the cranberry bog far enough so that all danger was past. It was shoved against the point of land on which the two men had run out as they leaped from their auto, which they said they had left back on the highway.
“Well, I guess you’ll be all right now,” remarked the tall man as Tom and Mary got out of the punt.
“Yes, thanks to you,” said the young inventor.
“If we can drop you anywhere in our flivver,” went on the short man, “we’ll do it.”
“If you can take us to the Swift plant,” said Tom, “it will be a great accommodation.”
“We’ll do that,” said the short man, as his companion made the punt fast to a stump. “That Tom Swift is the big inventor, isn’t he! Do you know him?”
“Slightly,” was the answer, with a smile.
“This is Tom Swift!” exclaimed Mary, unable to resist the opportunity. She indicated Tom.
“You are?” gasped the short man.
“Gee!” exclaimed his tall companion.
“I happen to be,” replied Tom. “And if you will leave us at my plant and come in so that I can thank you properly for what you did——”
“Aw, forget it!” snapped out the short man. “We don’t want any thanks. You’d do the same, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course,” said Tom. “But——”
“Forget it!” said the other again.
“At least tell me who you are,” begged Tom, as the two led the way to where they had left their small touring car.
“I’m Joe Hartman,” said the tall man who had admitted he was an aviator in the World War.
“And when I hear anybody yell for Bill Brinkley then I come and get my chow!” added the short chap whimsically.
“This is my friend, Miss Mary Nestor,” introduced Tom, and the girl held out a hand each to the two mechanics.
“All oil and grease!” apologized Brinkley, putting his hand behind his back. “We work in a garage at Waterford,” he went on in explanation.
“And we’ll gum you all up if we shake hands!” added Joe Hartman bashfully.
“As if I cared!” exclaimed Mary, and she insisted on grasping their oil-begrimed palms in a warm pressure. “I want to thank you, too,” she said as she told where she lived, begging the two to call and see her father and mother.
“If you fellows work in Waterford, maybe you know Mr. Wakefield Damon?” Tom added.
“Guess not,” admitted the short man, while his companion shook his head in negation. “We haven’t worked there very long,” he went on. “Just now we had to deliver a repaired car in Shopton and we two went together. I drove this flivver,” he added with a kick at one of the tires, “so I could bring Joe back.”
“Well, it’s a good thing you happened to be where you were,” said Tom. “And I wish you’d come and see me some time,” he added as the little auto was headed for his plant.
“Maybe we will,” was all the two would promise when, a little later, they let Tom and Mary out at the office entrance and then drove on.
As the accident to the plane had happened several miles from Tom’s plant, neither his father, Mr. Damon, nor the two wagering friends, Medwell Trace and Thornton Burch, were aware of it. Not until Tom and Mary came in, somewhat spattered by mud, and told of their experience was anything known of it.
Tom sent Mary home in an automobile and dispatched some of his workmen with a big truck and long ropes to see if it was possible to get the little plane out of the swamp.
“And now,” said Tom, as he finished washing off some of the grime, “I’m going to get seriously to work and help dad win that twenty thousand dollars.”
Tom Swift had made a start on his new machine some time before. He had conceived the idea of a craft that was at once an automobile, a motor boat, and an aeroplane, and though his father had at first been doubtful and some of the mechanics who worked on it openly skeptical, Tom had persisted and now the craft was well on in the process of manufacture.
A model had been made, and though at first it would not work, Tom had kept improving it until it was perfect. The only thing that disappointed the young inventor was that it was not speedy enough, and he was looking for fast performances, not only in the air but on land and water.
“I’ve got to use a more powerful gasoline,” he decided and he was experimenting on this fluid when the explosion came. Luckily, little damage was done and three days after the fire Tom’s office had been repaired and he was hard at work again.
“What are you going to call it, Tom?” asked Ned Newton, the young former bank cashier who was a close friend of the young inventor and, of late, treasurer and one of the managing officials of the Swift Company. Ned was in Tom’s private workshop looking at the strange device.
“Well, I did think of calling itMonarch,” was the answer. “TheAir Monarchmight not be such a bad name, if it does what I think it will do.”
“When will you know?” Ned asked.
“In a few weeks. I’m going to rush work on it, now that dad has made his wagers. I’ve got to help him win that twenty thousand dollars.”
“Do you think you can?” asked Ned.
“I’m going to!” declared Tom, with conviction. “Take a look at theAir Monarch, Ned, and see what you think of her as far as I’ve gone.”
“Looks pretty good,” admitted the young treasurer. “What’s that for?” and he pointed to a small door in the rear of the machine, a door under the tail rudder.
“That’s where the propeller is concealed,” was Tom’s answer. “Look and you’ll see how it works!”
He pulled a lever, the door slid back, and in a tunnel-shaped compartment was a large, three-bladed, bronze propeller.
“That’s for use when running on the water,” the inventor explained.
“How does it run on land?” inquired Ned. “Like an automobile?”
“Not exactly,” Tom said. “The same propeller that sends the craft through the air sends it along on the ground. Just as an aeroplane taxies across the field before mounting, you know. By keeping the tail rudder depressed I prevent the machine from rising, and it moves over the ground, though of course not as fast as in the air.”
“There is no direct drive on these wheels then?” asked Ned, pointing to four strong wheels on which the machine rested and on which it would land after making a flight.
“Oh, yes, I can drive the car on the ground by gearing the motor directly to the wheels,” said Tom. “But I can’t get much speed that way, though I do get a lot of power. And in front here——”
But Tom suddenly stopped his explanations and looked toward the door of his private shop. The knob was turning in a stealthy manner.
CHAPTER VIKICKED OUT
“What’sthe matter?” asked Ned Newton, who was very much interested in Tom’s new machine. Ned had gone on air trips with his chum before and, having heard of the wager and now seeing theAir Monarch, it is not at all unlikely that Ned had visions of another strange journey. “Anything wrong?” went on Ned, as Tom did not answer, but continued to stare at the door.
“There may be—I’m not sure,” was the answer in a low voice. “Wait a minute.”
Tom tiptoed softly to the door, opened it suddenly, and then uttered an exclamation of disappointment.
“What’s the matter?” asked Ned again.
“He skipped,” answered Tom.
“Who?”
“The fellow who was outside that door trying to overhear some of my secrets and find out about theAir Monarch,” was Tom’s answer.
“Spies?” exclaimed Ned.
“That’s about it. Ever since I first started on this new idea and began work on the model and the craft itself, I’ve had a sneaking idea that I’m being spied upon. I am sure of it now. Somebody was listening at the keyhole, but they heard me coming and skipped.”
“Who is it?” asked Ned.
“That’s what I’ve got to find out. Keep quiet about this, and I’ll set a trap.” Then the two friends went to a far corner of the room, out of all possible range of the door, and talked for a long time.
The next few days were busy ones in the shop of Tom Swift. Now that his father, by his rashness, had committed his son to the attempt to circle the earth in twenty days, the older inventor was as enthusiastic over the matter as was Tom himself.
“I’ll help you get theAir Monarchfinished, Tom,” said the old man, “and then you can start. I’m not going to have Burch and Trace crowing over me!”
“They won’t crow, Dad,” said Tom, with a smile. “I’ll win that money for you!”
In order to hasten the completion of theAir Monarch, men who were in other shops controlled by Tom and his father were taken off their work and put to finishing the triple traveler. All who were admitted into the shop where the big new machine was housed were sworn to secrecy.
The new machine was like a large aeroplane, but with an enclosed cabin something like the European air linede luxeexpresses. Built like a Pullman car, only lighter, the cabin of theAir Monarchafforded sleeping berths for five. When not in use the bunks folded up against the wall, thus making an observation room. There was a combined dining room and kitchen where meals could be served.
The motor of the craft was abaft the living quarters, thus keeping the sleeping compartment free of gasoline fumes. TheAir Monarchwas of the pusher and not the tractor type of plane. Extending over the cabin, and out on either side was the big top plane. There was another plane below this, and from the lower one extended the long tail which carried the rudders, one for directing the craft up or down and the other to impart a lateral motion.
The body of the craft was something like a seaplane, staunchly built to enable it to travel the surface of the ocean if need be. And, as already explained, there were four sturdy wheels on which theAir Monarchcould roll along the ground. These wheels could be geared directly to the motor, as are the wheels of an automobile, or by using the air propeller the craft could be sent along as an aeroplane taxies across its starting field. The housed propeller for use in water has already been mentioned.
To such good advantage did Tom Swift set his men to work that four weeks after the laying of the wager theAir Monarchwas completed except for the fitting up of her cabin and the taking aboard of supplies.
“The motor’s the main thing, and that’s completed and installed,” said Tom to Ned one evening.
“Does it work?” asked the financial representative of the firm.
“It sure does!” was the enthusiastic answer. “Tried it on a brake test this afternoon and she did a little better than two thousand seven hundred R.P.M.”
“Hope that doesn’t mean ‘Rest In Peace',” chuckled Ned, who was not versed in mechanics.
“R.P.M. stands for revolutions per minute,” Tom explained. “And when I tell you my new motor did more than twenty-seven hundred it’s going some. That motor will rate better than six hundred and ninety horse power.”
“Yes?” asked Ned, politely enough.
“Yes, you big boob!” cried Tom with good-natured raillery. “Why, don’t you understand that the best performance a naval seaplane ever did was only twenty-seven hundred R.P.M., and they couldn’t get more than six hundred and eighty-five rated horse power out of their V-type motor? But at that they made two hundred and fifty-six miles an hour,” said Tom with respect.
“Who did?” asked Ned.
“The United States naval flyers,” Tom replied. “I’m ashamed of your ignorance,” he chuckled. “Think of it—two hundred and fifty-six miles an hour! If I can equal that record, and I think I can, I’ll win the twenty thousand dollars for dad with my hands down.”
“Let’s see,” said Ned musingly, and he began doing some mental arithmetic. He was good at this. “The distance around the earth, say at the fortieth parallel of latitude, is, roughly, twenty-five thousand miles. At the rate of two hundred and fifty-six miles an hour, or say two hundred and fifty to make it round numbers, it would take about a hundred hours, Tom. A hundred hours is, roughly, four days, and you’ve got twenty! Why, say——”
“Look here, you enthusiastic Indian!” yelled Tom, playfully mauling his chum’s hair. “You can’t fly one of these high-powered machines for a hundred hours straight! They’d burn up. You have to stop now and then to cool off, take on gas and oil, make adjustments, and so on.”
“I thought you were going to do continuous flying,” objected Ned.
“I’m going to do it as continuously as possible,” was Tom’s reply. “But I’ll need all of twenty days to circle the globe. There will be accidents. Storms may force us down, and you may want to stop and inquire into the financial system of the Malays.”
“Me?” queried Ned. “Am I going?”
“You sure are!” was the answer. “You’re going to be official score keeper. Dad needs that twenty thousand dollars. Yes, sir, you’re going and it’s about time we began to make serious preparations to start. You won’t back out, will you?”
“No, I guess not,” Ned said. “Who else is going? Mr. Damon?”
“Well, he wants to go,” said Tom; “but he’s afraid his wife won’t let him. Dad is too old, of course. But I’ll need three good mechanics, besides myself. With you that will make five—just enough to fill the cabin nicely. Come on out and take a look at the boat.”
“Going to take along plenty to eat?” asked Ned, as he and his chum went across the now dark shop yard toward the brick building that housed the newest creation of the young inventor.
“Oh, sure!” was the response. “But we won’t have to stock up very heavily. You see we’ll make several stops on the way.”
“Just what are your plans?” Ned wanted to know.
“Well, I thought of starting from around here, or, possibly, from the vicinity of New York,” Tom answered. “You see, there’s a possibility of a race.”
“A race to circle the earth?”
“Yes. The papers have got hold of this wager of dad’s—I think Mr. Damon, in his enthusiasm, spilled the beans—and there is some talk of a national aero club taking the matter up. A paper or two has mentioned that such a trip will greatly advance the science of flying, and there may be a big prize offered for the winner of the race—the one who makes the best actual time around the world.”
“Then you’re likely to win considerable money,” suggested Ned.
“If the plans are carried out, yes. But I’ll be satisfied to win that twenty thousand dollars for dad. It will just about make me come out with an even break.”
“An even break?”
“Yes. This machine will cost me around twenty thousand,” said Tom. “Of course, I’ll be out my expenses, but then dad got me into this thing unthinkingly and I’m going to see it through. But if some one offers a prize and I can win it, I’ll have that much velvet.”
“It’s a bigger thing than I thought,” Ned stated. “I hope you won’t be disappointed in your craft, Tom. I mean I hope it will work.”
“It will work—I’m sure of that,” said the young inventor. “Of course whether I can eat up the miles and actually get around the world in twenty days remains to be seen. But I’m going to try!”
The two were at the workshop now. It was shrouded in darkness, for the day’s labor was over.
“Stand still a minute until I turn on the lights,” Tom said, as he opened a little side door and stepped in, leaving Ned to follow. “It’s as dark as a pocket in here.”
Ned could hear Tom fumbling for the electric switch. Then, just as the light was turned on, there came, from the other side of the big shop and back of theAir Monarch, a clicking sound followed by a scream of pain.
“What’s that?” cried Ned.
“I think it’s my sneak trap!” answered Tom. “I hope I’ve caught him!”
In an instant the shop was flooded with light, and Ned followed Tom on the run around the bigAir Monarch, which occupied most of the space. A moment later Ned saw Tom spring upon a man who was caught by one leg in a curious wooden trap, the smooth jaws of which had clamped around the intruder’s ankle.
“Help! Help!” screamed the man, for such he was—a burly, ugly, lowering chap dressed in the greasy clothes of a mechanic.
“You aren’t hurt!” said Tom, pausing in front of the captive and eyeing him. “I set that trap there to catch any one who came in here unauthorized. It isn’t meant to hurt—just to hold you fast. And I’ve got you, Cal Hussy! Got you good!”
“Let me out of here!” snarled the man, trying, without success, to free his foot.
“I will in a minute. But first I’ll find out if you have taken anything,” Tom said coolly. “Here, Ned, search him!” he called to his chum.
Then, while Tom deftly caught Hussy’s hands in a loop of rope drawn tight, Ned went through the intruder’s pockets. Aside from some personal effects, the search revealed nothing.
“You let me go!” snarled the man, with an evil scowl.
“I will if I make sure you haven’t damaged my machine,” went on Tom.
A quick inspection showed nothing wrong. The motor compartment of theAir Monarchwas locked, and Tom knew the fellow had not been in it.
“Now I’ll let you go,” said the inventor to the fellow. “But I warn you the next time you step into my trap it will have teeth!”
Pulling on a lever, Tom opened the jaws of the trap and the man was free to step out. He limped slightly as he walked toward the window by which he had entered, for the spring of the trap was strong.
“Who is he?” asked Ned as the man started to crawl out. He had cut a pane of glass out of the window, sawed some of the iron protective bars, and gotten in that way. But in walking across the floor in the dark he had stepped into one of several traps Tom had set recently.
“That is Cal Hussy,” explained Tom, watching every movement of the man. “He works for the Red Arrow Aeroplane Company, one of my rivals. Evidently they have heard something of my new invention and are trying to find out its secret. But I’ve fooled them. I caught Hussy the first crack out of the box.”
“Yes, you caught me all right, Tom Swift!” snarled the man, turning when he was half way through the window. He scowled and shook his fist at the young inventor. “You caught me, but I’ll catch you next time!”
This threat seemed to enrage Tom. He rushed at the fellow just as Hussy cried again:
“It will be my turn next time!”
Tom raised his foot and planted a well directed and richly deserved kick on Hussy where it would do the most good. Like a football dropping over the crossbar, the intruder went tumbling over the window sill, to fall heavily to the ground below.
He grunted, uttered some strong language, and then, as he ran off down the road in the darkness, he called back:
“You’ll be sorry, some day, you did that, Tom Swift! You’ll be sorry!”
“I’m sorry now that I didn’t kick you twice!” cried the angry inventor.
CHAPTER VIISTRUCK DOWN
“What’sthe idea, Tom?” asked Ned when his chum had returned to the middle of the big, barnlike room where he stood in front of theAir Monarch, contemplating the powerful machine. “What’s the game?”
“A dirty game!” snapped out Tom Swift. “This Red Arrow gang has been trying to sneak around and discover some of my secrets for a long time. This is another attempt. Hussy has been here before. But I don’t think he’ll come again,” added the young inventor grimly.
“Are they trying to do you out of this new contrivance?” asked Ned.
“I don’t know that they are specifically after this,” stated Tom. “They’ll steal any new invention they can. But from the fact that Hussy was in here I judge they must have heard something about theAir Monarchand they want to get an idea of how she’s made. I suspected they might try something like this, and so I set several traps. Hussy happened to step into one,” and taking Ned to the various windows Tom showed other devices to nab intruders.
Going over the machine and making an examination of the workshop in company with Ned, convinced Tom that Hussy had been caught before he could do any damage.
“But from now on I’ll have to be doubly careful,” Tom declared. “And if I see Hussy around here again——” he did not finish, but it could easily be guessed what would happen.
From then on it became increasingly difficult for strangers to get near the Swift plant. Eradicate and Koku were kept on guard in the shop where theAir Monarchwas housed and Mr. Swift, with a smile, said they at times even looked on him with suspicion.
But the days passed and the big machine was practically completed, and then came a trial flight which was successful. The giant craft took the air like a bird, and though its speed was not quite up to Tom’s expectations, he said that with some adjustments he thought it would beat any aircraft he had ever made.
On land the progress was necessarily slower, and in the water it was slower still. But even at that theAir Monarchdid well, and it could do still better, Tom declared.
The machine was taken back to the shop for some final adjustments, and Tom was busy superintending these one day when Ned Newton burst into the building, waving a paper over his head and exclaiming:
“Look at this, Tom! Listen to this! You’ve got a chance to make a fortune!”
“I sure need it,” said the young inventor, with a smile. “This machine is costing a lot more than we’d figured on. But what’s the idea? Has some one left me a million?”
“No,” answered Ned. “But this paper, the New YorkIllustrated Star, offers a prize of one hundred thousand dollars for an international race around the world in the shortest time—actual time. Why, Tom, those are exactly the conditions under which your father wagered with Burch and Trace! Why don’t you go in for this?”
“Maybe I will,” said Tom. “Let’s have a look!”
Eagerly he read the story in the paper, setting forth the terms of the prize offer. They were simple enough.
At a date about a month off, any person who wished to contest must start from an aero field on Long Island. The first person to return to the starting point, after actually circling the globe, would be given a hundred thousand dollars.
There were no conditions except that all contestants must prove by documentary evidence, such as having signed statements from officials in various countries, that they had passed through or over them on certain dates. The world must be girdled on a circle of one of its great circumferences, that is the equator, or a parallel not too far above or below it. Or, if a contestant desired, he could circle around a longitudinal line. But as this would mean flying over the north and south poles, that was practically out of the question. It was assumed that those who took part would travel along about the fortieth parallel, as this would keep them over fairly civilized countries for the longest period.
Contestants could travel as they liked, in any sort of conveyance, motor car, steamer, train, airship, or submarine. They could change conveyances as often as they pleased. The sole requisite was that they must come back to the starting point, after traveling completely around the earth, and they must prove that they had done it.
“This suits me!” exclaimed Tom, as he read the conditions.
“Then you’ll enter for the hundred thousand dollars?” asked Ned.
“I certainly will, and I hope to win it. Now this race is going to be worth while. If I won the twenty thousand dollars for dad, I’d hardly break even. But if I win the prize—oh, boy!” and Tom patted the big machine into which his hopes were built.
Keyed up to a high pitch by the prospect, Tom hurried his mechanics and helpers to the limit. Not any too much time was left to enter theIllustrated Star’scontest, and within a few days Tom Swift’s entry had been formally sent in and acknowledged.
Each succeeding day’s issue of the paper gave Tom and Ned news of the event, and one day Tom pointed to an item in the general story.
“The Red Arrow people are going to try for the prize,” he said. “They’re going to fight me. That’s why Hussy was sneaking in here, I guess. They wanted to see if they could add anything to the aeroplane they are going to enter.”
“Are they going to try in an aeroplane?” asked Ned.
“So it says here. It doesn’t mention any boat or automobile auxiliary.”
Tom had been obliged to describe the method he proposed to follow in the world race, and of course it was publicly known now that he would try in a combined automobile, motor boat, and aeroplane. Aside from some hydroplanes, which of course can skim along on the surface of the water, as well as soar over land, Tom’s was the only machine of more than a single ability.
Many of the contestants, of which there seemed likely to be plenty, at least at the start, were going to make the attempt by special steamers or trains, for not a few wealthy globetrotters entered the contest for the big purse.
It lacked about a week of the time of the start of the international race when one morning Tom Swift received a telegram. It was signed by a name he did not at first recognize, that of Armenius Peltok, and read: