THE FLIGHT OF THE "SILVER COBWEB."
A week rolled slowly by. A week of suspense, during which they had one or two calls from Lieut. Bradbury, who had been busy down at the Mortlake plant. But the officer was naturally noncommittal concerning his opinion of the comparative merits of the two types of aeroplanes. Equally naturally, of course, the young Prescotts had not questioned him concerning them.
But during this week they had had a glimpse of the Mortlake machine in flight. One still, breathless morning, the air had been filled, soon after dawn, with a vibrant buzzing sound, which Peggy's trained ear had recognized as the song of an aeroplane engine.
She hastened to her brother's room and rapped upon the door. In reply to his sleepy query, the girl rapidly told him of what she had heard. Roy's window faced on the road, and a glance satisfied him that the Mortlake machine was to have its first try-out. Hastily as he dressed, however, he found that Peggy was before him on the dewy lawn, field glasses in hand.
Down the road could be seen, in front of the Mortlake plant, a small crowd of mechanics with one or two dominant figures moving among them. With the glasses, they had no difficulty in making out Mortlake's heavy-shouldered figure, and the slender, upright form of Lieut. Bradbury. All at once the group opened up a bit and they saw a silvery, glittering aeroplane, agleam with new aluminum paint, throbbing and vibrating, as if anxious to be off. Blue smoke eddied up as the motor roared and whirred. The air seemed to vibrate under the sound as if a battery of gatling guns had been discharged.
Fascinated, brother and sister watched the spectacle intently. They saw Mortlake clamber heavily into the machine, followed by Lieut. Bradbury. A mechanic started for the front of the plane and began swinging the propeller.
"At least they haven't cribbed our self-starting device," exclaimed Peggy, as she saw.
The next instant the propeller became a whirring blur, and the aeroplane, after a brief preliminary run, began to climb upward. The morning sun caught its silvered planes and turned them to gold. It was a beautiful and inspiring sight. Even with all that lay at stake, Peggy and Roy could not deny the machine a meed of praise. It was fairy-like in its delicacy of construction, and speedy as a flash.
Thundering like an express train, it dashed above the Prescott home, leaving in its wake the pungent odor of burning castor-oil—the most suitable lubricant for aeroplanes.
Then suddenly—as if a recollection of Peggy's mischievous flight of a few days previously had occurred to him—Mortlake swung the delicate silvery machine about and dashed straight down at the boy and girl standing by the garden gate. So close to their heads did he skim in his desire to show off, that he almost came too low. For one instant it looked as if the machine would be dashed to a premature end, but it recovered buoyancy like a keeled-over racing yacht, and tore upward into the sky at an increased speed.
"Let's get out the Golden Butterfly and follow the——"
"Silver Cobweb!" cried Roy, the name occurring to him in a flash of inspiration as he watched the filmy outlines of the other aeroplane melt in the distance.
"Oh, Roy, what a pretty name."
"Isn't it? But somehow, I like Golden Butterfly best. Our machine may be a bit heavier, but solidity counts in hard service."
Scarcely ten minutes later, and while Mortlake's mechanics and assistants were still craning their necks skyward, another aeroplane, a yellow adventurer of the skies, thundered upward. Not to be outdone by Mortlake, Roy, who was at the wheel, swooped above the rival crowd. They did not take it with a good grace. Remarks, of which they could not catch the wording, but only the menacing intonation, were hurled upward at them. They received them with a laugh and a wave of the hand, which did not put the Mortlake crowd into any better humor. And then, with a graceful, swinging curve, that banked the machine almost on its beam ends, they were up, off and away in pursuit of the Silver Cobweb, which, by this time, was a mere shoe-button of a dot on the horizon.
"Do you think we can overhaul her, Roy?" ventured Peggy, as they raced through the air, the fresh breath of morning coming refreshingly in their faces.
"Not a chance," admitted Roy cheerfully, "but they'll turn after a while, I guess, and then we'll try the Butterfly against the Cobweb."
But they kept on and on unrelentingly, and still there was no sign of diminution of speed on the part of the Silver Cobweb. Nor did the other aircraft give any indication that she was preparing to put about.
Below them, farms, meadows, villages and crowds of wondering country folk swam by in an ever-changing panorama. The earth beneath them looked like a big saucer divided up into brown, red and green squares, with tiny fly-like dots running and walking about.
All at once Roy gave a shout and pointed. Dead ahead, and not more than a few miles distant, lay a silvery, gleaming streak.
"The sea!"
The exclamation came simultaneously from Peggy and Roy.
They had been traveling due south across the island, and now the broad Atlantic lay stretched beyond the land, shimmering in the sunlight. Far off, they could make out the black smoke of a steamer, hovering above the ocean.
"A mail boat, making for New York," announced Roy.
So fast were they traveling that by this time they could plainly make out the ocean, which, from a silvery streak, was now changed into a dark-blue rolling expanse of salt water.
And still the Silver Cobweb kept on, and gave no sign of turning. Nor, for that matter, had her speed diminished appreciably. The rival aeroplane was now skimming above the water at a height of about a thousand feet. The Golden Butterfly maintained about the same altitude, but the gap between the two aerial craft was not closing up.
"Mortlake's taking a desperate chance to show Lieut. Bradbury what the Cobweb can do," exclaimed Roy. "With a new engine, he's risking too much."
"I guess he's seen us and means to beat us out at all hazards," conjectured Peggy.
And she was right. Mortlake, glancing back a short time before the sea appeared on the horizon, had seen the other aeroplane, and guessing at once what its appearance meant, had determined to keep on, even at the risk of plunging himself and his passenger into the sea.
That was Mortlake's character; he was a man who could brook no rivalry. Used all his life to sweep obstacles aside, he would rather have terminated his career than permit any one to pass him in the race for first place, no matter in what line that first place might lie.
"Are you going to keep on, Roy?"
The question came as a strip of white beach flashed beneath them, and Peggy, peering over the edge of the chassis, saw the big Atlantic swells rolling below them. The thunder of the surf on the beach came clearly to their ears, even at that height.
"What do you think, Sis? We've got lots of gasoline. The motor is working without a hitch. I'd hate to turn back now, particularly with that officer's eyes upon us, as in all probability they are."
"Oh, let's keep on," exclaimed Peggy, casting prudence to the winds. "I feel like you, Roy. If we turn back now, it would look as if we were afraid to trust the Butterfly above the ocean, and, after all, it is a naval contest that we hope to be elected for."
"Forward it is, then," cried Roy exultingly. The tang of the salt wind, the inspiration of the ocean, had come to him. He felt like a corsair—a very modern corsair—urging his craft above the ancient sea.
The vessel, whose smoke they had espied at a distance, was quite close to them now. A huge, black hull, with white passenger decks, rising tier on tier, four huge red funnels with black tops, and slender masts, between which hung the spider-web aerials of her wireless apparatus. Her bow was creaming up the ocean into foam, as she rushed onward at a twenty-four knot gait.
Roy, obeying a daring impulse, let the Golden Butterfly descend. Now they could see her promenade decks lined with white faces peering upward. Here and there the sun glinted on the bright metal work of cameras, all aimed at the wonderful spectacle of the soaring, buoyant Golden Butterfly.
"Oh, if only we could drop a message on her decks!" breathed Peggy eagerly. "I do wish we had a post-card or something——"
"By ginger," cried Roy suddenly, "I do believe I've got some in my coat-pocket. I bought some in the village yesterday to mail to the chaps back at school. Yes. Here they are, and here's a fountain-pen. Now write all you want."
Peggy took the cards her brother handed to her with his free hand, and, with the fountain-pen, sat down to compose some messages. After a few seconds' thought, she began to write busily. Card after card was covered with her neat penmanship. All this time Roy had kept the Golden Butterfly hovering above the liner, from time to time taking swoops and dives around it like some monstrous sea gull.
Suddenly, from the liner's whistle, a great cascade of white steam spouted.
"Wough-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h!"
It was the vessel's siren blowing a greeting to the young adventurers of the air. At the same instant a deep-throated roar, a cheer from cabin and steerage passengers alike, winged its way upward. Roy acknowledged it by a graceful wave of his cap. Then the cheering broke forth afresh.
The passengers of the newest ocean giant, the Ruritania, realized that they were seeing a spectacle that would remain in their memories all their lives. Having conquered old ocean with leviathan vessels, man was now seeking to subdue the air to his utility.