CHAPTER II
_A Dirty Red Freighter...._
Chet Bullard was more at home among the air-lanes of Earth than he wason solid ground. But he oriented himself in an instant; knew he was on across street in the three hundred zone; and saw ahead of him, not ahundred feet away, the green, glowing ring that marked a subwayescalator.
In the passing throng there were those who looked curiously at him. Chetchecked his first headlong flight and dropped to an unhurried walk.
About him, as he well knew, the air was filled with silent radio wavesthat were sounding the alarm in every sentry box of the great city. Theywould reach the aircraft terminals and the control room of every shipwithin a fixed radius. He had dared the wrath of one of the mostpowerful officials of Earth; no effort would be spared to run him down;his picture would be flashing within ten minutes on every televisionscreen of the Air Patrol. And Chet Bullard knew only one way to go.
Of course they would be watching for him at the airports, yet he knew hemust get away somehow; escape quickly--and find some corner of the worldwhere he could hide.
He was in the escalator, and wild plans were flashing through his mindas he watched the levels go past. "First Level; Trains North and South;Local Service. Second Level; Express Stop for North-shore Lines. ThirdLevel; Airport Loop Lines; Transatlantic Terminals--"
Chet Bullard, his hair still tangled on his hatless head, his blousetorn where a hand had ripped off the Master Pilot's emblem, stepped fromthe escalator to a platform, then to a cylindrical car that slidsilently in before him and whose flashing announcement-board proclaimed:"_Hoover Airport Express. No Intermediate Stops._"
* * * * *
Would they be watching for him at the great Hoover Terminal on the tipof Long Island? Chet assured himself silently that he would tell theworld they would be. But even a fugitive may have friends--if he hasbeen a master pilot and has a lean, likable face with a most disarminggrin.
Where would he go? He did not know; he had been bluffing a bit and theCommander had called him when his hand was weak; he had no least ideawhere he could find their ship. If only he had had a chance for a wordwith Walt Harkness: Walt had been flying it; he had left it apparentlyin a storage hangar.
But where? And what was it that Walt had called out? Chet was rackinghis brains to remember.
"The ship is yours," Walt had shouted ... and something about "storage."But why should he have laid up the ship; why should he have stored it?
Chet saw the lights of subterranean stations flashing past as the carthat held him rode silently through a tube that it touched not at all.He knew that magnetic rails made a grillwork that surrounded the car andthat drew it on at terrific speed while suspending it in air. But hewould infinitely have preferred the freedom of the high levels, and hisown hand on a ship's controls.
A ship!--any ship!--but preferably his ship and Walt's. And Walt hadsaid something of "_storage--cold storage_." The words seemed writtenbefore him in fiery lines. It was a moment before he knew what he hadrecalled. Then a slow smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, and heturned and stared through a window that showed only blackness.
"_Cold storage!_" That was good work on Walt's part. He had been forcedto shout the directions before them all, yet tell none of those othersabout him where the ship was hidden. Chet was picturing that place of"cold storage" as he smiled. The fact that it was some thousands ofmiles away troubled him not at all.
* * * * *
The great Hoover Terminal was a place where night never came. Itsdaylight tubes wove a network of light about the stupendous enclosure,their almost silent hissing merged to an unceasing rush of sound, sosoft as to be unheard through the scuffing feet and chattering voices ofthe ever-hurrying crowds.
From subways the impatient people came and went, and from highwaystations where busses and private cars drove in and away. The clock inthe squat tower swung its electrically driven hands toward the figure22; there lacked but two hours of midnight, and a steady stream ofaircraft came dropping down the shaft of green light that reached to andthrough the clouds. There would be many liners leaving on the hour;these that were coming in were private craft that spun their flashinghelicopters like giant emeralds in the green descending light, while thenoise of their beating blades filled the air with a rush of sound.
Outside the entrance to the Passenger Station, Chet Bullard withdrewhimself from the surging press of hurrying men and women and slippedinto a shadowed alcove. Two passing figures in the gray and gold of theAir Patrol scanned the crowd closely; Chet drew himself into the deepershadows and waited until they were by before he emerged and followedthe shelter of a coffee-house that extended toward another entrance tothe field, where pilots and mechanics passed in and out.
* * * * *
A bulletin board showed in changing letters of light the officialassignment of landing space. And, though every passing eye was turnedtoward it, Chet knew that each man was intent upon the board and not onthe shadowed niche in the building behind it. He watched his chance andslipped into that shadow.
Unseen, he could see them as they approached: men in the multicoloreduniforms of many lines, who paused to read, to exchange banteringshop-talk--and to pass on.
Many voices: "Storm area, over the South-shore up to Level Six. Youbirds on the local runs had better watch your step" ... "--coming downat Calcutta. Yeah, a dirty, red-bottomed freighter that rammed him. Isaw it take off two of his fans, but Shorty set the old girl down like afeather on the lift of the four fans he had left. You said it--Shorty'sa real pilot...."
Another pause; then a growling voice that proclaimed complainingly:"Lord, but I'm tired! All right, Spud; grin, you damned Irishman! But ifyou had been hauling the Commander all over Alaska to-day and then gotordered out again just as you were set for a good sleep, you'd be sore.What in thunder does he want his ship for to-night, I ask you?"
* * * * *
Chet, crouching still lower in the little retreat, stiffened toattention at the reference to the Commander. So the "big boss" hadordered out his own cruiser again! He listened still more intently tothe voice that replied.
"Sure, and it's thankful you sh'u'd be to be holdin' the controls on afine, big cruiser like that; though, betwixt you and me, 'tis myselfthat don't envy you your job. Me and my old freighter, we go wallowin'along. And to-night I'm takin' her home for repairs--back to the fact'ryin Rooshia where they made her; and the devil of a job it will be, forshe handles with all the grace of a pig in a puddle."
Chet risked a glance when the sound of heavy footsteps indicated thatone of the two speakers had gone on alone to the pilots' gate. Beforethe huge bulletin board, in pilot's uniform and with the markings of alow-level man on his sleeve, stood the sturdy figure of the man calledSpud. He started back at sight of the face peering out at him, but Chetwhispered a command, and the man moved closer to the hiding place behindthe board.
There were others coming in a laughing group up the walk; daylight tubesilluminated the approach. Chet spoke hurriedly.
"I'm in a devil of a mess, Spud. Will you lend a hand? Will you stand byfor rescue work?"
And Spud studied the bulletin board as he growled:
"Lend a hand?--yes, and the arm with it, Mr. Bullard. You stud by meonce whin I needed help; and now you ask will I stand by for rescuework. Till we crash--that's all, me bhoy!"
* * * * *
Spud's speech was tinged with the brogue of Erin; it grew perceptiblymore pronounced as his quick emotions took hold of him.
"Quiet!" said Chet. "Wait till they pass!"
The newcomers stopped for no more than a glance. Then:
"I'm demoted," Chet told the round-eyed man who stared unbelievingly atthe vacant place on Chet's blouse. "The air's hot with orders for myarrest. I've got to get out, and I've got to do it quick."
And now there was
only a trace of the brogue in Spud's voice. Chet knewthe trick of the man's speech; touch his heart and his tongue would growthick; place him face to face with an emergency and he would go cold andhard, while the good-natured phrasing of his native sod went from himand he talked fast and straight.
"The devil you say!" exclaimed Spud. "What you've done I don't know, noryet why you did it. But, whatever it was, I don't believe you let thattriple star go for less than a damned good reason. Now, let me think;let--me--think--"
A figure in gray and gold was approaching, a member of the Air Patrol.Spud's tongue was lively with good-natured raillery as he fell into stepand drew the officer with him through the pilots' gate, while Chet, fromhis shadow, saw with satisfaction the apparent desertion. He had knownSpud O'Malley of old. Spud was square--and Spud had wanted time forthinking.
There were many who passed Chet's hiding place before a cautious whispercame to him and he saw a hand that thrust a roll of clothing around theedge of the bulletin board.
"Put 'em on!" was the order of Spud. "And smear your yellah hair withthe grease! Work fast, me bhoy!"
* * * * *
The command was no less imperative for being spoken beneath Spud'sbreath, and for the first time Chet's hopes soared high within him. Ithad all been so hopeless, the prospect of actual escape from the netthat was closing about him. And now--!
He unrolled the tight package of cloth to find a small can of blackgraphite lubricant done up in a jacket and blouse. Both were stained andsmeared with grease; they were amply large. Chet did not bother to stripoff his own blouse; he pulled on the other clothes over his own, and hisface was alight with a grin of appreciation of Spud's attention todetails as he took a daub of the grease, rubbed it on his hands, thenpassed them through his hair.
"Yellah," Spud had said, but the description was no longer apt. And theman who stepped forth beside Spud O'Malley in the uniform of an engineerof a tramp freighter looked like nothing else in the world but justthat.
"Come on, now!" ordered Spud harshly, as a figure in gray and goldappeared around the corner of the coffee shop. "You're plinty late, mefine lad! Now get in there and clean up that dirty motor and get herrunnin'! Try out every fan on the old boat; then we'll be off.
"You're number CG41!" he whispered. And Chet repeated the number as hefollowed the pilot through the gate.
"O.K.," said the guard at the gate, "and I'll bet he gives you hell andto spare!"
Chet slouched his shoulders to disguise his real height and followedwhere Spud O'Malley, with every indication of righteous anger, strodeindignantly down the pavement, at the far end of which was a batteredand service-stained ship.
* * * * *
Her hull of dirty red showed mottlings of brown; she was sadly in needof a painter's gun. She would groan and squeal, Chet knew, when the fanslifted her from the hold-down clutch; and she couldn't fly at overtwenty thousand without leaking her internal pressure through a thousandcracks that made her porous as an old balloon--but to Chet's eyes theold relic of the years was a thing of sheer beauty and grace.
O'Malley was leading through an open freight hatch; Chet followed, and,at his beckoning hand, slipped into a dingy cabin.
"Lay low there," the pilot ordered, and still, as Chet observed, hisspeech showed how clearly the man was thinking, since the emergencystill existed "I've cleared some time ago, Mr. Bullard; we're ready toleave as soon as we get the dispatcher's O.K."
The minutes were long where Chet waited in the pilot's cabin. Each soundmight mean a last-minute search of departing ships, but he tried to tellhimself that the attention of the officers would be centered upon thepassenger liners.
Beyond, where he could see out into the control room, a white lightflashed. He heard the bellowing orders of the Irishman at the controls.And, as other sounds reached his ears, he had to grip his hands hardwhile he fought for control of the laughter that was almost hysterical.For, beneath him, he felt the sluggish lift of the ship, and, from everyjoint and plate of this old-timer of the air, came squawking protestsagainst the cruel fates that drove her forth again to face thebuffeting, racking gales.
But the blue light of an ascending area was about them, and SpudO'Malley was shouting from the control room:
"Sure, and we're off, Mr. Bullard. Now do ye come up here and tell meall about it--but I warn you, I'll not be believin' a word--"