Air Wonder Stories, July 1929 — page 45: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CHAPTER I A Close Shave Sls Royce picked up the flash of the huge Al revolving beacon at Wayside he breathed ®la sigh of satisfaction, and slowed his =| motors fifty revolutions. It had been a tiresome climb to the divide all the way from Air- port Six, with gusty headwinds threatening to put him behind schedule. But now the grind of another trip was over. There remained but forty miles from the summit to Airport Seven almost under the hght, and a relief crew there would take charge to set the plane down at San Francisco long before daylight. A passenger in the saloon leaned back in his leather-covered chair and yawned. “We must be getting close to Seven. I wish I had taken a berth this trip, instead of trying to sit up most of the nigh‘. There's a hard day ahead of me in Frisco.” “Yes, we know all about the hard days you traveling men have,” a cattle buyer answered from across the big cabin. “Hopping from one city to another on these liners is a joke. Now when I hired a little dilapidated taxi-plane at Ogden one time to inspect a herd over in the Hidden Valley country, that was a ride to write home about.” “Let’s finish the rubber; I want to get out and stretch my legs at Seven,” spoke up a man at one of the card tables. ys “Here, give me the cards; is that a pun or...” “Say, just listen to those motors; I thought we were over the divide.” The score of saloon pas- sengers grasped tables or the arms of their chairs as the huge plane banked and swerved upward at an ever increasing angle. The five motors, after responding madly to wide-open throttles, now were laboring terribly under a heavy load. Bluish wing lights flashed on, reflecting upon the faces of the forward passengers peering from the long windows. Shades were being flicked up far aft of the huge wings as those in the sleeping compartments were roused by the sudden deviation. A blinding flash drove the portside pas- sengers back from the windows to their places and the motors eased to their customary monotonous undertone. “What was that?” Someone asked. “Just the big beacon light, but man, we were right on top of it!” They looked at one another in alarm, N the present story, the aerial beacon. viewpoint, Explanations “WE: McCrea _ will see you now, said the secretary. Tommy Royce, chief pilot, quickly arose nervously and weary 43 given us quite a treat. One of the most important and quite indis- pensable necessities for night flying is, of course, The aviator’s life and the safety of property, depends on such beacons. The author in the present story has woven a very clever adventure around this theme, which is as interesting as it is notable, from a scientific We are accustomed to think that light rays travel only in straight lines. This is, of course, not the case, Light rays are refracted, when, for instance, they pass through the atmosphere of the earth, Thus we see the sun rise actually before it does, due to this refraction. hand, Einstein in his theory, which has been proven, has shown us that light waves are bent when they pass the gravitational field of a star. You will find the scientific part of this story particularly interesting, from his chair in the waiting room and strode into the division traf- fic manager’s of- fice with the air of one anxious to get through an or- deal as quickly as possible. McCrea was standing at an east window, gaz- ing out in the di- tection of the beacon tower on Sentinel Hill, half a mile away. He whirled as the young man en- tered, and fixed him with a glowering look. “Well, Royce, out with it. Let’s see what excuse you have for trying to come in under the beacon last night with the west bound passenger plane. Jameston, in the watch tower last night, told me you were flying fully fifty feet below the light until you almost reached it. The field crew thought you were going to land in the houses over there, but they heard your motors, so that won’t do for an excuse,” Finally given an opportunity to speak, the pilot answered, “I don’t know what the matter was.” “You don’t? Well, why not? Were some of your motors going bad, or did you want to land on Sentinel Hill?” “No sir, I picked up the beacon at the pass, and followed it in. Relief Pilot Tillotson was “in the forward cockpit with me. You can ask him about it.” “Yes,” barked McCrea, “I most certainly can ask Tillotson about it, and I will. But first I want an explanation from you, and it had better be a good one.” HAROLD §. SYKES our versatile author has Royce stood in the center of the big room, nervously twisting the ring he wore on his left hand. “After I picked up the beacon at the pass—” “Yes, yes, I heard that, go on.” “Well, coming toward Seven here, I looked at the altimeter and it seemed to read about right, perhaps a trifle low, but I saw the light well ahead of and below me, so I knew I had plenty of altitude. I cut the motors to six- teen-fifty at the sum- On. the other comnlicloooks.com