CHAPTER X
BUCK STEWART RECEIVES NEW ORDERS
“Come aboard,” called out Ned, giving the young Herald reporter a look that also included him. The managing editor paused, seemed about to open a conversation with Buck and then said nothing. The smile of the latter was a combination of assurance and of gentlemanly modesty and breeding. Added to this was the charm of a faint southern accent. Buck was not exactly superficial but his peculiar and animated face never betrayed a lack of knowledge.
“Up the ladder,” added Alan, and Major Honeywell led the way up a step-ladder to a short flight of landing steps lowered from a side gallery along the lower deck. Reaching this little metal gallery or walk, the boys led the two visitors astern to the end of the enclosed part of the airship and up a stairway that passed around the after part of the car to the second deck and from that to the top, where a protected walk or bridge extended the length of the airship car.
Bob, rushing ahead, caught up a metal jack staff from its cleats on the bridge rail and unfurled a blue flag on which were the words “Ocean Flyer.”
“I think we ought to carry another flag now with New York Herald on it. We can carry the colors aft where they belong and put the Herald burgee on the port staff.”
The editor seemed pleased. Looking from one boy to the other as if to get approval, he did not notice the look of sudden intelligence that flashed over Buck’s face. Since two o’clock that morning Buck had been trying to answer the question: “Why had the Herald killed his story?” He knew there was a reason. For the last fifteen minutes a new problem had mystified him: “Why was his managing editor so interested in the new aeroplane?” The cross examination he had undergone the night before gave him many clues. The instant Bob Russell spoke of a Herald burgee for the Ocean Flyer, Buck’s mental short circuit was repaired: “They’re goin’ to represent the Herald,” he concluded instantly—not stopping to reason,—“and this car is goin’ to cross the Atlantic. Whatever these kids meant to do, the boss has now hooked up with ’em. The biggest thing they can do is to fly to Europe. The boss stopped the story to pull off the stunt in secret. I’ve got to go with ’em.”
The car on which the inspectors were standing resembled, in front, both the bow and the stern of a yacht. Seven feet from the bottom, the curving side lines ended in a cutwater edge. Above this, for six feet, the front was rounded and pierced by heavy, glass protected ports. Four feet from the bottom of the car, a shaft extended through the cut water carrying a third or auxiliary propeller, moon shaped like the side propellers, but seven feet instead of eleven in length. This reserve propelling force was for use in case either of the other propellers became disabled, in which event both side propellers would of course have to be shut down.
The heavy glass ports marked the pilot room. Directly over this and extending forward from the top of the car like the headlight of an old-fashioned locomotive, was the air compression funnel. This dull finished aluminum adjunct resembled a fog horn, and its functions were explained by the young aviators with considerable pride.
“We’ll carry oxygen of course,” Ned said, “but we are so sure that our compressor will furnish us with enough air, that we’re counting on it if we attempt a high altitude. Whether we go above a thousand feet depends on the weather conditions. On that level we can fly one hundred and eighty miles an hour. And that’ll put us over in seventeen hours.”