Saturday, he spent most of the day settling his affairs and packing for
the trip.
The plan had begun. Whether it worked or not, he was going through with
it.
The gravity-control mechanism would not be turned loose on the world to
increase the tensions and fears already much too prevalent to the point
where mankind would plunge into atomic war.
But the gravity-control mechanism wouldn't be abandoned, either. They'd
develop it, secretly. They'd have it ready when the world situation
changed--for the better, Morrow hoped--and it could be given to the
world. Then, mankind would benefit from it.
That was his whole purpose--that his discovery should benefit mankind,
rather than pave the way to the destruction of civilization. Morrow
considered it a purpose worthy of all the sacrifices he had to make.
His job, his career--perhaps later, if the plan worked, he could regain
them.
But he had to try.
* * * * *
The battered, worn truck came whining out of the rutted dirt road,
clashed its gears, and rumbled into the wide sawmill yard. On the
left, a little mountain stream laughed merrily over the rocks and then
widened out, ahead, and trickled sluggishly across a brakish pond. On
the right, at the foot of the tall pine trees, were the crumbling ruins
of sheds and outbuildings, piles of rotted wood.
The truck halted before the main sawmill building across the yard. The
mill was weather-stained and decrepit-looking, with the boards fallen
off one wall and the roof sagging on one corner, but it was still
standing.
Morrow and Smith climbed down from the cab of the mud-splattered truck
and stood gazing around them. "Looks like she's been abandoned for
quite a while," Morrow remarked noncommittally.
"She has," Smitty agreed. "But it'll serve our purposes, I think. This
main building is large enough to be our hanger-workshop with a minimum
of repairs. The timbers have tightened up until they're like iron, else
the whole building would've collapsed long ago."
Morrow nodded. "Long as the timbers are sturdy, we can patch up the
holes with canvas tarpaulin if we have to."
Smitty hooked his thumb toward the stream. "I got a lab analysis of
the water--it's drinkable. But we'll have to spread some oil on that
pond to kill the mosquitoes. We don't have any neighbors to worry about
within ten miles of here; Yosemite National Park's due south of here
about fifteen miles."
"What about fire towers?"
"Forest rangers? The nearest is over on a mountainside twenty miles
away. He's not going to see anything at night unless it's a fire."
Smitty grinned reflectively. "I figure this can serve as our temporary
base until we get the ship built and flight-tested. Then we travel due
east across some of the worst desert and mountain country you'll ever
see, to the site I've picked for our permanent base. It's in a deep,
crooked canyon over on the other side of the Kawich Range, in Nevada."
"Not near any atomic project area, is it?"
"Uh-uh. Not near anything else, either. It's not near any airway
routes, and private pilots shun that area because there aren't any
fields or meadows available for emergency forced-landings."
"Sounds good!" Morrow complimented him. "Where do we camp, here?"
"I've knocked together a small cabin back in the woods. Grab your stuff
out of the truck and come on--I'll fix us some chow!"
Morrow climbed into the rear of the truck and slid his luggage back
to the tailgate. Smitty took a couple of suitcases, Morrow the third
and his equipment case, and they strode off on a narrow trail winding
through the trees.
"Now what was it you've been working on?" Smitty asked as he led the
way.
"I've been working, on?" Morrow echoed blankly, his mind filled with
sensations of clear, cool mountain breeze and the smell of tall pines
and the eternal silence of the woodland.
"Yeah!" Smitty prompted. "When we were having dinner, back in L.A.,
remember, we were talking about the event of anyone catching us at
this, that we'd be finished if they did? You said you'd been working on
something that would protect us from discovery."
"Oh, that!" Morrow grinned. "I merely figured out a means of
camouflage."
"Camouflage?"
"It's still just in its theoretical stage, but I think it'll work. I'll
show you my diagrams."
"Show me while we're eating."
* * * * *
The little shack nestled under the pines was cozy and weather-proof,
built out of rough lumber and fitted out with hand-made furniture. The
air was filled with the aroma of fried bacon, coffee, and wood smoke.
They sat at the small, wooden table and ate out of tin plates, washing
it down with tin cups of coffee, and Morrow spread his diagrams between
them and explained his idea to Smitty.
"--So it's all designed around that propulsion unit," he said. "The
gravity-control ring establishes a focus of 'false gravity' inside the
tail-pipe so that air is sucked in through the scoops on the ship's
hull. The air 'falls' into that focus of 'false gravity' and goes on
past it to shoot out the tail-pipe at an estimated sixty-mile-an-hour
gale."
"Couldn't we do just as well with a large electric fan?" Smitty asked,
half-jokingly.
"This propulsion unit will cost only a fraction of the price of a large
air-conditioning fan and motor," Morrow pointed out.
Smitty grinned at the diagrams. "Okay, but you've certainly sketched in
a fancy-looking ship, there! Aero-dynamically, I'm afraid it wouldn't
be too practical--"
"I know," Morrow admitted. "But we'll have to work that out and still
keep this fancy-looking ship."
"How come?"
"Because that's the whole idea, Smitty! Think a minute. Suppose we've
built our ship and are flight-testing it. So there's always the
possibility that someone will see it--"
"--And call the cops!"
"Right. Normally, that would bring on an investigation and we'd be
finished."
"I hope they serve good food at Leavenworth!"
"Stop interrupting, will you? Now, the idea is this: suppose whoever
sees us _thinks_ they're seeing a ship _from outer space_?"
Smitty's grin faded. He stared at Morrow for a moment, then picked up
his cup and took a healthy swig of coffee. "I see what you mean," he
said, replacing his cup carefully on the table. "They think they're
seeing a rocket ship from Mars, or something like that. So they go to
the cops and start yelling about it. And that's happened so often--"
"We won't have to worry about any thorough investigation," Morrow
concluded, smiling. "They might check the area in which our ship was
sighted--"
"Which isn't likely to be around here!"
"--But that's all. Even if it is around here, they aren't going to ask
us too many questions so long as we don't have two heads, blue skin,
and arms like an octopus!"