“Landing out of a loop,” thought Finley. “He’ll get bawled out for that, but he won’t mind.”
He could see the Kink now as he came up to the group of distinguished guests to receive congratulations. Tall and slim and smiling, the sun glinting from his red hair, he’d laughingly deprecate the compliments which he loved so well.
Finley taxied out, turned his ship and shoved both throttles ahead. He leaned against the wheel, and got the nose down as the Larkin bumped massively along the ground. As he eased it off the ground, however, it suddenly became easy to fly— the controls answered the mere hint of pressure on the wheel.
Finley’s square face was set and his eyes abstracted, as he circled the field for altitude. There was no doubt that most of the men on the field suddenly lost their wild desire to take a flight when it was Finley who invited them. Perhaps it was accidental, but—
Of course, he had had a streak of bad luck lately. Four wrecks, as a matter of fact, in a little more than a month. It was just a run of accidents, of course. On that forced landing the wheels had hit a log and the ship turned over. Another time, one of those —— reversible pitch propellers had suddenly gone into its negative position ten feet above the ground and snapped the nose down. The other crashes had been right on the field—bad air currents. When a man got into a run of luck of that kind he’d crash into an oasis with the whole Sahara desert to land on.
Perhaps that was the reason for his flying assignments, too. Like this Larkin, for instance. When the Larkin was a brand-new wonder he had been chief test pilot. In fact, he had been responsible for setting those motors on the wings themselves. They had been trussed up between upper and lower wings then. Five miles an hour more speed and greater ease of handling had been the results of that suggestion. That was the sort of stuff Kink Forell could do. He’d be even better with more experience.
Suddenly Finley’s mouth widened in a wintry grin. When he and this Larkin had taken their first flight they had been kings, with a thousand people watching admiringly. Now they were limping through the sky—a couple of has-beens.
It was starting to darken a little. The sun was down, and it was time to land. He eased the great ship down over the trees and leveled off with both motors cut to idling. It was slowing, now. Time to pull back on the wheel.
As he pulled the wheel back the ship settled. But, as it dropped, there was no contact with the earth. Finley, suddenly tense, felt the sickening rush downward. It was a full ten feet before the wheels found the earth, and there was a crash as the huge plane staggered back into the air. His hand found the throttles in a split second, and the Libertys were roaring. The ship settled again, and he fought it off the ground for a taut ten seconds. Gradually it picked up flying speed, and then he dared to look back.
A crumpled wheel marked the spot where he had hit. Doubtlessly the rest of the under-carriage was an ugly mess of splintered struts and a crushed wheel.