Chapter 1 Tom Swift and His Sky Train by Victor Appleton
A CRACK-UP
“Well, Ned, what do you think of it?” asked Tom Swift, as he stood at the rear observation window of a powerful airplane and waved his hand at what seemed to be two closely-pursuing gliders.
“You’re moving ’em along, that’s sure,” Ned Newton answered with a half smile as he stood beside his chum. “You got ’em up off the ground and you’re moving ’em through the air, regular sky train style. But——”
“I know what you’re going to say, Ned; see if I don’t!” interrupted the young inventor with a laugh, as he clapped Ned on the back. “You think I can’t unhook one of my gliders and let it coast down to the ground; is that it?”
“That’s about it; yes, Tom.”
“Well, I’ll show you, old man. Just wait a little while and watch. I want to let Mason get up a little better speed, and sense the feeling of towing two of my new gliders. Up to this time he’s taken up only one. And I also want Porton and Northrup to get the hang of the machines they’re in. Then I’ll give the word and let Northrup, in the tail glider, cut loose and go down. After that I’ll pick him up again.”
“Pick him up off the landing field on this same trip? Why you’re crazy, Tom! You’ll have a crack-up sure as shooting. Hi! Let me get down! I’m not going to be in any foolish stunt like that!”
“Don’t get excited, Ned!” said Tom with a chuckle. “I’m not going to try the pick-up yet awhile. That’s in the future—something I’ve got to work out. But you’ll see that it will be a simple matter to uncouple the tail glider, or, for that matter, the one directly back of us, and let it float down with the pilot in it. Yes, and the same thing would happen if there were passengers aboard. But I didn’t think it wise to experiment with any passengers just yet.”
“Maybe it will be a good thing you didn’t, Tom. It’s bad enough for you and me and the men to be risking our foolish necks,” and Ned glanced, not a little apprehensively, at the two gliders which, like the coaches of a railroad train, were being pulled along beneath the sky in tow of the big airplane which served as an engine.
“Nothing will happen, Ned! You know how many times you’ve been up in this plane with me, and there’s no better pilot going than Mason.”
“I know that. It was the gliders I was thinking of. After all, Tom, you know this new sky train of yours is only an experiment.”
“Yes, but it’s an experiment that has passed the first stages and it’s going to work!” cried Tom with enthusiasm. “I don’t say I am going to pick up gliders in mid flight just yet, but that will come in time.”
“I’m willing to wait, Tom,” spoke Ned with a doubtful shrug of his shoulders. “At any rate I suppose we’re safe enough for a little while, and that nothing will happen. Eh?”
“Sure,” answered Tom Swift, but a little absently, for he was peering anxiously out of the rear observation window in the cabin of the big plane at the following gliders.
“Then there’s something I want to talk to you about, Tom.”
“Fire ahead, old man. Nobody is likely to interrupt us here.” This was true enough, for the two young men had the big airplane cabin to themselves. Save for Mason, the pilot in the cockpit forward, they were the only ones aboard, though the craft was designed to carry twenty passengers, and was one of Tom Swift’s most successful commercial type of planes. In each of the two gliders, being towed, was a single pilot, but they were too far back to have any chance to interrupt the conference between the young inventor and his business manager and boyhood chum.
“First of all, Tom, I want to say that I think these gliders will never be anything but a plaything.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Ned. They may never be as popular as airplanes, nor be as big or carry as many passengers. But they are what might be called a tool in the aviation kindergarten—they serve a useful purpose in teaching beginners in the air game.”
“Well, yes, maybe that.”
“But I hope you didn’t come up on this flight just to tell me that, Ned,” and Tom’s mind seemed to be on something else as he reached for the telephone instrument connected to both the following gliders.
“No, there’s something more important than that, Tom. It’s about money and——”
“Excuse me just a moment, Ned,” the inventor interrupted. “Hello there, Northrup!” he called into the telephone. “You’re getting out of line a bit! Keep her straight or you’ll strain the coupling!”
There was a moment of silence, during which Ned heard only the throb and hum of the powerful motors of the pulling plane. Tom was listening to what his mechanic in the rear glider was saying over the wire. And a testy tone was in Tom’s voice as he said:
“That’s all right—but you’ve got to do it, I tell you! Keep directly behind Porton’s glider or there’ll be trouble when I give you the signal to cut loose! We don’t want a crack-up on this first flight.”
“I should say not!” exclaimed Ned fervently as his friend hung the instrument back on the cabin wall hook. “If you do, I’m afraid the chances will be all up.”
“Chances all up! What do you mean?”
“I mean about getting that loan from Lester Willam, the new bank president.”
“Didn’t you negotiate that loan, Ned?” and Tom’s voice was quite anxious. For the first time since the trial flight had started, he turned his gaze away from the tilting, following gliders and looked intently at his business manager. “Didn’t you get the money?”
“No, I didn’t!” Ned’s answer showed how provoked and put out he was. “This Willam is one of the hardest-headed men Missouri ever turned out. He’s got to be shown—says he wants to have a talk with you and go over matters.”
“Well, maybe that’s reasonable,” mildly said Tom. “After all it’s money which he is, in a way, responsible for, that we want him to lend us, so I can go on perfecting my sky train. I’ll have a talk with him after I show you how my new system works.”
“Well, I hope it does work, Tom. It would be disastrous to have an accident now in more ways than one.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I mean if Willam heard of it, and he’d be sure to, it might shake his confidence in you and our company.”
“There won’t be any accident, Ned.”
“I surely hope not. But, all the same, I didn’t like the attitude this Willam took, when I went to him about the loan. It isn’t like when Mr. Placent was at the head of the bank. Then there never was any question.”
“Well, don’t form a hasty judgment,” urged Tom. “Some of these fellows that are very brusque make better bank heads than those who grant every loan that’s asked. But I sure do need money!” said Tom fervently.
“That’s another thing I can’t understand,” Ned went on. “With all the millions you have made for the Swift Construction Company, Tom, why do you need cash just now?”
“Well, yes, I have made money,” admitted Tom, again reaching for the telephone. Into it he called sharply: “You’re getting out of line again, Northrup! Can’t you keep her straight? Yes, do! It’s very necessary. I’ll have Mason open his throttle a little. It may be we aren’t going fast enough.”
“We’re going plenty fast for me!” murmured Ned. But Tom paid no heed to this little protest, as he got into communication with the pilot of the powerful pulling plane and asked for more speed. An instant later the louder throb and roar of the motors, as well as the sensations of the two passengers in the cabin was evidence that the sky train was soaring around above Shopton at greater velocity.
“What’s that you were saying, Ned?” asked Tom, hanging up the telephone instrument.
“I said I don’t see what you do with all your money, Tom, even if you are married now,” and Ned smiled.
“Certainly Mary doesn’t use much of it,” Tom said. “She’s as fine a little managing wife as a crazy inventor like myself could have. But the cash goes in experiments like this one, Ned. I have spent many hundreds of thousands of dollars getting my sky train in shape for a trial, and it will be a long time, even after it proves successful, before any cash from it will be coming in. It has been that way with a lot of my jiggers—the giant cannon, the war tank, the talking pictures, the electric locomotive and other machines. I spent millions on them and some millions came in. Then I spent more on new dinguses and so it goes. And I need a tidy sum now, Ned, to perfect this sky train, so I can pick up gliders in the air as well as release them when the towing airplane is in full flight. But I’ll do it! So if old what’s-his-name wants to know where our money goes, and where that which he is going to lend us will go, tell him in useful experiments. A lot of them fail, that’s what runs the cost up.”
“I’ll tell him, but I don’t know that I can convince him, Tom. You had better see him yourself.”
“I will—after this demonstration.”
“Then let’s hope it will be a success,” Ned murmured anxiously. “After Willam turned me down, or, rather, stood me off, I said you’d be out to see him.”
“Out to see him?” exclaimed Tom questioningly. “Why, isn’t he going to be at the bank?”
“No, he’s going to the Country Club over the week-end. He’s there now, I guess, for he was leaving this morning when I was in the bank, and I came to the flying field directly from there and you got me into this machine,” and Ned looked about the airplane cabin.
“Don’t worry! You’ll get down and out all right!” Tom said with a chuckle. “But I don’t just like Willam’s manner.”
“Neither do I. If he won’t let us have the money, Tom, what will you do?”
For a moment the young inventor did not answer. He was gazing anxiously at the two towed gliders. His hand went out for the telephone again, as Ned noticed the rear machine swerve. But as it came into line again Tom did not carry out his evident intention of giving more instructions to Northrup. The inventor turned to Ned and remarked:
“I think I can get our queer friend, Mr. Damon, to introduce me at his bank in Waterfield. They may let me have the cash I need to go on with my sky train.”
“I hope so,” came from Ned. “After Mr. Damon gets through blessing his rubber boots or his fountain pen, he may be able to get his bank to help us out. But how much longer are you going to circle the field, Tom?”
“Not much longer now. I think I can give the word for Northrup to cut loose.” Tom looked from a side window, down to the ground, as if to calculate the speed, then he glanced at some indicator instruments and was reaching for the telephone when Ned gave a sudden shout:
“Look, Tom! He’s cut loose already!”
“He has?” cried Tom. “Why I didn’t give him word!”
The young inventor swung around and gazed, with Ned, out of the rear window of the big airplane. There was only one glider in tow of it now. The second one was detached and was dropping rapidly toward the earth.
“Something has gone wrong!” cried Tom Swift. “Northrup shouldn’t have cut loose without orders!”
“He seems to be in trouble!” exclaimed Ned, for the glider was dropping rapidly to earth in a series of nerve-racking dives.
“He sure is in trouble!” Tom fairly shouted as he caught hold of the telephone instrument. “There’s going to be a bad crack-up!”