CHAPTER XI.
THE "METEOR."
WHITTINGHAME conducted his companion to the open air by a differentroute from that by which they had gained the subterranean workshops.It was a fairly broad way, of quite recent construction, and slopinggently for quite eighty yards and finishing, up by a steep incline.
Dacres found himself in the midst of a thick wood, an avenue thewidth of the passage terminating at the rear of a large shed. Butinstead of entering the building, Whittinghame broke away to the leftby a narrow footpath, which by a circuitous route gained the openspace where Dacres had obtained his first glimpse of the returningairship.
At first he was puzzled. There was the circular clearing with itsclosely-mown grass, but no signs of the five airship-sheds.
Pulling out a whistle Whittinghame gave two sharp blasts. This signalwas almost immediately followed by the appearance of three men cladin dungaree suits.
"Open up No I. shed, Parsons," ordered the "Meteor's" owner, thenturning to his companion he observed: "That's my chief engineer. Heis absolutely part and parcel of the 'Meteor's' machinery. What hedoesn't know about motors is hardly worth troubling about. Nowwatch."
The engineer and his two assistants disappeared behind a clump oftrees. Then, even as Dacres looked, a number of lofty pines movedbodily sideways with regimental precision, disclosing the end of oneof the sheds that he had seen overnight.
"We have to disguise our sheds as much as possible," saidWhittinghame. "Those trees are dummies set in a base that travels onwheels on a pair of rails. They would defy detection unless anyonewere warned as to their nature. The roof too, is covered withartificial tree-tops. An airman passing overhead would have no ideathat there were five sheds each two hundred and forty feet in length,forty-five feet in height and forty in breadth hidden in thiscomparatively small wood. Now, this is the bow section of the'Meteor.' A noble craft, I think you'll admit."
As soon as his eyes grew accustomed to the semi-gloom Dacres saw thatthe pointed bow was facing him, while on either side of the mainfabric was a smaller cylinder open at each end.
"Those contain the propellers," explained his guide. "The airship hasfour cylinders with two propellers in each. The foremost propellerworks at 1,200 revolutions per minute, and the backdraught is takenup by the rear propeller, which runs at twice that speed. Thecylinders form a partial silencer, so that, except through an arc ofabout eleven degrees, its centre parallel to the major axis of theairship, the whirr of the blades is practically inaudible when at aheight of two hundred or more feet above the ground. Do you noticethose plates of metal lying against the outer envelope?"
"One above and one underneath the propeller covering?"
"Yes, those are the elevating planes and rudders, 'housed' for thetime being to allow the craft to enter her shed. The motors are inthe centre of the body, the propeller shafting being chain-driven.""What do you use--petrol?" asked Dacres.
Whittinghame shook his head.
"Too dangerous," he replied. "We use cordite."
"Eh?" ejaculated Dacres incredulously.
"Yes, cordite: the ideal fuel for internal combustion engines. Youmust be perfectly aware of the properties of cordite. In the open airand not under pressure it burns slowly; but under pressure itsexplosive capabilities are enormous. Our motors are actuated byintroducing small charges of cordite into the cylinders and explodingthem by electricity. The principle is similar to that of a maxim gun,only of course we don't use cartridges on a belt. The cylinderchamber itself acts as a cartridge case. Suppose we go aboard?"
Whittinghame indicated a wire rope-ladder running from a doorwayabout twenty feet from the ground.
"The whole of the underbody of the outer envelope is watertight," heremarked. "The 'Meteor' can float on the sea if necessary. Of coursethere are observation scuttles and bomb-dropping ports, but these canbe hermetically sealed."
Agilely Dacres swarmed up the swinging ladder and passed through thedoorway. He found himself in a room twenty feet square, and ten inheight, with circular ports on one side and doors on the transversebulkheads. In the floor were two rectangular openings furnished withplate-glass, but for the time being shuttered on the outside byclosely-fitting slides.
"This is our forward bomb-dropping compartment," continuedWhittinghame as he regained his companion. "The devices for thatpurpose are behind that partition. All the ammunition is stored inthe 'midship or No. 3 section and transported along these rails asrequired. We also keep stores here, the idea being that should thevarious sections of the airship have to part company each will beself-supporting in a double sense.
"The next compartment for'ard contains the mechanism for actuatingthe vertical rudders. Above that are the motor-rooms, while rightfor'ard are the twin navigation-rooms. We'll have a look at themotor-rooms first of all. By the by, those are the cylinders forstoring the ultra-hydrogen under pressure. At the present moment thedead weight of this section is less than fifty pounds."
"But we weigh more than that," observed Dacres.
"Quite so; but the buoyancy is automatically maintained. As youcrossed the threshold of the doorway you stepped upon a plateresembling the floor of aweigh-bridge. At once a sufficient quantityof ultra-hydrogen is introduced into the ballonettes to counteractyour weight, and, in fact, the weight of any person or articlebrought on board."
"I'm afraid I'm curious," said Dacres, "but what will happen when wego 'ashore'? Will the volume of the gas in the ballonettes becorrespondingly reduced?"
"Yes, but not wholly automatically. You will have to record yourweight on an indicator, and the adjustment then takes place. Thatdial you see on the bulkhead gives the total lifting power of thewhole of the ballonettes. That instrument to the left makes thenecessary compensating adjustments to the airship according to thetemperature, altitude, and amount of moisture in the air."
In the starboard engine-room Dacres noticed that each of the twomotors had four cylinders of comparatively small bore considering thehorsepower developed.
"These are not air-cooled?" he asked pointing to the motors.
"No, water-cooled. This system serves a dual purpose, for the watercirculates throughout all the cabins of the section, and if necessarythrough Nos. 2 and 3 section as well, thus affording a warmth that isappreciated when we are flying at a great altitude. Ten to twelvethousand feet is our favourite height, for then we can command afield of vision--provided the atmosphere is clear--of anything up toone hundred and twenty miles. Now for the upper navigation-room--yourfuture post."
This compartment was situated under the commencement of the taperingportion of the envelope, its roof and walls being formed by therounded surface of the outer skin. Here there were severalobservation panes, so that a fairly extensive view could be obtained.It was impossible, however, to see immediately below, and on thisaccount the necessity of a second navigation-room was apparent.
It reminded Dacres strongly of the conning-tower of a battleship,except that the scuttles were much larger than the slits in thearmoured walls of the latter. A standard compass, chart-table,gauges, indicator, voice-tubes, and telephones left very little spaceunoccupied.
Professional habit prompted Dacres to unfasten a sextant case andcritically examine the instrument. "Can't say I altogether like thischap," he observed bluntly. "If you don't mind I'll use my ownsextant. It's with the rest of my luggage at Fenchurch StreetStation."
"We'll send for it, by all means," said Whittinghame. "I franklyadmit that I'm not much use at fixing positions, and one sextant isvery much like another to me. The difficulty of getting hold of acompetent navigator worried me considerably until you trespassed uponmy property. I'm jolly glad you did."
"And so am I," said Dacres cordially.
"Now you've seen practically everything of importance in the foremostsection," continued his companion. "The rest of the available spaceis taken up with ballonettes. No. 2 section is devoted to crew space,stores, and of course more ballonettes. No. 3 contains thewireless-roo
m, the ammunition and reserve of cordite for propellingpurposes, in No. 4 the officers are berthed, while the aftermost, orNo. 5, is practically identical with No. 1."
"But how are the various divisions kept in position?" asked Dacres.
"By means of double-cam action bolts. The 'Meteor' is of a semi-rigidtype. Her great length would be a positive danger if she wereotherwise, while she would be most awkward to manoeuvre. As it is wecan turn her in a radius equal to twice her length. In violentair-currents she 'whips' considerably; it's a weird experience untilyou get accustomed to it, but therein lies another proof of safety.It is analogous to the case of a tall chimney that sways in a gale.If it didn't it would snap like a carrot.
"The upper surface of the envelope is flattened, and we have apromenade deck exactly one thousand feet in length. Of course it isonly available when we are running at a greatly reduced speed or arebrought up. At a very high rate of speed you would be unable to keepyour feet and run a great risk of having the air forced out of yourlungs."
"A most marvellous craft!" exclaimed Dacres enthusiastically. "How Ishall enjoy a cruise in her!"
"I hope you will," added Whittinghame gravely.
"Are you making another trip before you take her to Portsmouth?"
"I think not. I do not believe in purposeless flights. Her finaltrials have been successfully passed, and now nothing remains to bedone until she is required to perform some task for the well-being ofthe British nation."
As the two men prepared to descend the ladder Whittinghame suddenlyremarked:--
"You'll meet the rest of the officers to-night, Dacres. Hambrough,our doctor, turns up at five. You'll like him, I think. He's a realgood sort, and as keen as anything on the voyage. I don't supposehe'll have much to do, for these high altitudes are so beastlyhealthy; but there's no telling. He hasn't seen the 'Meteor' yet; infact, he's only just resigned his post as medical officer to a Northof England hospital. Setchell, who will be next in seniority to you,is at present on leave. We dropped him near his home at Plymouthabout three weeks ago. He had urgent domestic affairs to demand hisattention, and our wireless man here got in touch with us as we werepassing over the Pennines. We made a rattling good run down toPlymouth--rattling good--but cut it rather fine in getting back here.I was almost afraid that we should be spotted, but luckily wedescended without being detected. Setchell will also be here at aboutthe same time. Callaghan will pick the pair of them up at HolmsleyStation. By Jove! It's close on five already. How time flies whenyou're busy. We had better get back to the house."