“Eighteen months’ provisions,” he chuckled. “The Argenta could withstand a siege.” The boat was sailing beautifully, ten thousand feet up; it was a glorious day, cloudless and fine.
“Now for the chef d’œuvre,” said Sir John. “Why, where is Masters? This is his work.” He telephoned through: “All going well?” he asked.
“Splendidly, Sir John.”
“What speed?”
“About three hundred an hour. We’ve just sighted Plymouth.”
“Plymouth,” said Mavis in amazement. “Why, we have only just left Scotland.”
“Come along to us, Masters. I want you to demonstrate the working of the atmospheric shutters.”
“Will you come into the compressed air room?” said Masters as soon as he arrived.
They found it was quite a small room which held no furnishings of any kind. Levers and switches and strange electrical contrivances were everywhere, and on one side of the room were twelve levers, very like those in a signal box on the railways.
“My idea was this,” began Masters. “We have ten engines on board, of which we use only one at a time; the others are reserve stock, as it were, or would be useful if we came up against very nasty weather and needed a stronger power to use against the elements. At the time I worked out my theory, Sir John had no interest in life. You two young gentlemen we believed were dead, and I have neither kith nor kin. It struck us, that one day we might try and reach the outside of the earth’s atmosphere for experimental purposes. I needn’t go into exact figures now, it would not interest Mrs. Forsyth, but you all know after a certain distance up life becomes impossible. Should we ever reach that height, we should have recourse to these levers,” and as he spoke he pulled them down one after the other. “Now we will put the electric light on, and I would be glad if you would step out on to the upper deck.”