THE RAIDER
Half a mile or so ahead of Bill’s plane, the great sea monster, the
_Flying Fish_, leveled off at an altitude of twenty-five hundred feet,
and headed out on a northeasterly course.
Bill continued to climb his amphibian until they too reached that
height, then he spoke to Charlie again.
“Now that we’re high enough, I’ve got to make a right turn in order to
follow that ship. So I push my stick slowly forward, drop the nose to
level like this, and maintain it there throughout the turn. Next I give
her right aileron and increase right rudder considerably at the same
time.”
“And we’ve gone into a bank. I see.” Charlie unconsciously leant toward
the raised wing.
“That’s it. And now that I’ve tilted her far enough, I check the wing
with the ailerons, and at the same time ease the pressure on the rudder.
I maintain a constant bank, you see, and a constant pressure on the
rudder bar throughout the turn.
“Now we are round to where we want to go, so I resume level flight by
applying left aileron and left rudder. The wings are level once more, so
I neutralize the ailerons and give her a normal amount of right rudder.
And we’re pointed in a direct line for the _Flying Fish_!”
“Gosh, but there’s an awful lot to it,” muttered Charlie into his
transmitter. “Looks so simple and easy when you’re on the ground,
watching a plane flying. How do you ever remember it all?”
“Oh, at first it’s a bit confusing, until you get the hang of the
thing—but it soon becomes second nature to do the right trick. When you
come to fly you’ll find that there isn’t time for slow thinking in the
air. In fact, as my instructor used to say, a flyer must develop
instinctive coordination between the sensory organs and the muscles.”
“You can’t prove it by me!”
“Well, it simply means that when flying a pilot must act quicker than he
can think.”
“Humph! Like Dad does when he gets mad and gives me a walloping.”
Bill laughed heartily. “Hair brush or slipper?”
“Oh, I always get the hair brush. He can get a better grip on it. But I
get a choice at that—back or bristles.”
“I should think that bristles might be the less unpleasant.”
“So did I. Just once. Never again, though. I had to carry a pillow
around with me for a week after that session.”
“If I,” remarked Bill, “had your imagination, Charlie, I’d be worth more
than John D. Rockefeller!”
“Raspberries!”
For a time they kept silence, unbroken save for the humming drone of the
engine.
“I wonder where that hideaway is we were talking about?” Charlie said
after a while.
“Well, it isn’t located on our coast, if we’re bound there now. This
plane is pointing straight for Northern Europe.”
“Gee! Do you really think we’re going across—making a trans-Atlantic
flight?”
“Not a chance, kid, with the gas we’ve got aboard this crate. If you ask
me, the _Flying Fish_ is heading for a mother ship of some sort. This
gang will have to operate from a steamer if they have no land base. Slap
on those sea glasses you were using and take a squint dead ahead beyond
the _Fish_—Smoke on the horizon, isn’t there?”
“Sure is. Yes, I can make it out plainly now. Say, you don’t realize how
fast we’re traveling until you get a bead on something in the distance.
The ship is still hull down, but the smoke seems to be getting denser—”
“I can see it now,” said Bill, giving the amphibian more altitude in
order to gain a better view. “That’s no single-stacker, or I’m a
landsman.”
“You’re right—she isn’t! I can see—one—two—three—_four_ funnels!
Jingoes! She must be a whopper!”
“I wonder,” muttered Bill, half to himself.
“What? But I can see—”
“Oh, I’m not doubting your word, Charles.”
“What are you wondering about then?”
“Remember the _Amtonia_?”
“_Amtonia?_ Why, she’s the big British liner that was held up at sea a
couple of months ago!”
“Yes. A freighter SOS’d and when the _Amtonia_ went to offer help, the
crew of the tramp forced the liner’s crew and passengers to swap
steamers. Then they made off with the big ship.”
“Sure, I remember all about that. Harry Davis’ dad was on the _Amtonia_,
coming home from England, when it happened. It was in the papers but I
got the inside dope from Harry. His old man told him all about it.”
“Dollars to a dead stick, you’ll be able to tell Harry Davis more about
the _Amtonia_ than he ever dreamed of, one of these days.”
“You mean—that ship over there is the _Amtonia_?”
“Exactly. See—she’s hove to now—and the _Flying Fish_ is nosing over for
a landing!”
The two in the speeding amphibian saw the _Flying Fish_ descend in a
long glide to the surface of the ocean and taxi toward the great
steamer.
“She’s the _Amtonia_, all right, all right!” said Bill.
“Gosh, she’s big. What’s her tonnage?”
“Twenty-five thousand tons, I think.”
“Whew!—Say, listen, do you suppose Mother and Dad are on board her now?”
“I shouldn’t be surprised if your Mother and Father and some other boys’
papas and mammas, along with them.”
“That is, unless business in the ransom line is bad.”
“Which,” said Bill, “considering the number of passengers watching us
and the _Flying Fish_ from her decks—it isn’t. Shut up now, kid,” he
added, cutting his gun and pushing forward the stick. “We’re going down
and it sure would look rotten to nose into the drink with that gallery’s
eyes on us.”
“Humph! And what about us in that case?”
“Boston papers,” said Bill, “please copy!”
Down they soared, straight into the wind to land with hardly a splash,
went skimming over the water for fifty or sixty yards and came to rest
just behind the _Flying Fish_. Charlie, at Bill’s bidding, flung out the
sea anchor.
To port lay the _Amtonia_, now Baron von Hiemskirk’s traffic raider, and
neither lad was surprised to see that she was blatantly flying the flag
of piracy, a skull and crossed bones of white on a black field.
Bill had no difficulty in recognizing the _Amtonia_. She was one of the
largest passenger ships afloat, and consequently hard to disguise. Her
camouflaged hull and stacks, painted in broad wavy stripes of grey-green
and black made it still harder to judge her length on the waterline. He
knew, however, that she must be quite as long as two city blocks, and
her many decks rose above the amphibian to the height of a ten-story
building. Her four gigantic funnels—so huge that the greatest locomotive
could have passed through one of them lengthwise without scraping—and
her tall masts, made her easily recognizable to the young midshipman.
“Hello!” exclaimed Charlie, “there’s a gob on the _Flying Fish_
signalling the liner. Gee, I wish I understood wigwag.”
“If you did,” said Bill, standing up on the pilot’s seat and flapping
his arms like a semaphore, “you’d know he was signalling us and not the
_Amtonia_. For heaven’s sake, kid, button that lip of yours. I want to
get this message.”
Bill then snatched up the helmet he had just doffed and clapped it on
again, buckling the flaps over his ears. Charlie watched proceedings
with interest that for once was wordless. Presently the sailor aboard
the _Flying Fish_ stopped waving his two red flags. Bill answered him
with his arms, and the man rolled up his flags and went below.
Bill Bolton unbuckled the chin-strap of his helmet and turned toward the
rear cockpit.
“Snap on that safety belt and put on your helmet again,” he ordered,
“and don’t take it off this time until I tell you to. We are going
aboard.”
“Aboard what?”
“The _Amtonia_, of course.”
“But how can I go aboard that liner if I’m tied to this seat?”
“Wait and see—I’m too busy to talk now—even if you’re not!”
Bill got down, started the engine idling and commenced to haul in their
sea anchor.
Charlie stood up in the rear cockpit and called to him.
“Hey, Bill!”
“Well, what is it now?”
“How _are_ we going aboard if I’m to be tied up in this belt?”
“Great jumping snakes!” exploded Bill, with a furious glance over his
shoulder. “Have you still got that safety-belt on the brain?”
“No—around the middle!”
“For a counterfeit two-cent piece with a hole in it, I’d throw you into
the Atlantic and let you swim aboard!”
“Aw, please tell me, Bill!”
“Well, if you must know each detail, we’re going aboard by way of the
electric crane—”
“Aw, quit yer kidding—there ain’t any electric trains out here!”
“Not train, bozo—_c-r-a-n-e_—hoist!”
“Oh! an electric crane! Are they going to hoist us up?”
“That,” said Bill, as he stowed away their mooring, “is the usual
procedure when cranes are used. Sometimes up—sometimes down—and—chew on
this one thoughtfully, for this is the point of the story: Sometimes
when the tackle slips on a haul, there is a tendency to slip sideways.
And then, little chatterbox, since it is this amphibian which is to be
hauled upward, and you who will be sitting in said amphibian—the
aforementioned safety belt is likely to prove mighty useful. _Now_ do
you savez?”
“Yup. But my teacher usta tell me that a straight line is the shortest
distance between two points.”
“And when,” replied Bill with a grin, “you want to make a home run, it
is absolutely necessary to touch all three bases and the plate!”
“Oh, yeah? Well, I think it’s pretty tough when a feller can’t open his
mouth without bein’ told to pipe down every other minute!”
“Cheer up, Charles. It’s a long worm—you know. And you’ve got this one
on his back with your chatter. The Baron said that this was war, and I,
for one, believe he’s right!”
“And,” Charlie chortled, “Sherman said that war was—”
“All that _and_ more. Nothing slow about you when it comes to pickup.
Well, there’s the crane showing topside. Reckon I’d better feed the old
girl a little more gas and mosey over there.”