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.