Air Wonder Stories, August 1929 — page 78: what you’re looking at

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

cloudy over the British coast, and at times nothing could: be seen but heavy banks of clouds. But the craft kept to the beam and was allowed to continue its terrific speed, tearing blindly along through rolling banks of fog. “There may be.a chance of getting through this trip if the fog sticks with us until we get a good start,” Wallace remarked. “¥ doubt it sir,’ replied the operator. forced-down twice and there’s something uncanny about it. When they want the ship to drop, it drops; and, somehow or other, a fellow can’t prevent it.” “T’m positive,” said Wallace, “that they are using a cross-beam similar to our landing cross-beam. This would start the ship downward, but at any rate we will make damn sure that no one brings us down this trip, for if our automatic controls fail us we will use the manual levers.” As they sped along, the atmosphere cleared up for about a half hour, then they ran into an even foggier area, and the heavy rolling fog-banks were sent flying past the speeding craft on both sides. “I should. think we'd enjoy the trip. better if we were to drop down a little out of this clouded area,” suggested. Wallace. His pilot was evidently thinking the same thing, for he asked: “Shall we leave the beam and drop down a little?” The official readily consented, and the pilot using the manual controls dropped down out of the beam: They had not traveled far before they were below the clouds ‘with the sea far: below in -plain view ; still the critiser dropped, steadily. losing altitude as it continued to the west. The two’ men had apparently: forgot about the clouds, for they were allowing the craft to steadily drop without interruption. They were now only a thousand feet above the ocean but still they continued down, to every thousand ‘feet that they trav- eled west they dropped: a hundred, until the ship hit the crest of a wave; flew on, hit the water again and settled down onto the ocean like a monstrous sea gull. The pilot half absent-mindedly ‘stopped the ship, and turned-to Wallace: “You are supposed to- be posing-as a control tester, Mr. Riel, so -here.is a good chance to find out what is the matter with the ship.” Wallace realized that he was on board for that pur- pose, and_turning to the mass of controls on the dif- ferent panels, decided that he might as well look them over and see what he could find out about them. Neither of the two men noticed a third enter the room and stand‘looking at them witha quiet smile-on his face, He was the same person that had taken the papers from Riel on the former trip. Suddenly Wallace’s head cleared and he took in the situation, He could not recollect how the ship had been brought down, or why he should find himself crawling among the wiring behind the control panels. But things were now clear to him, and he watched the calm figure of the intruder, waiting to see what his next move would be. The pilot was none the less puzzled, and he vainly tried to grasp the situation. Here he was again floating on the surface of the sea, after he had made up his mind that he was going to get through on this trip at-all costs. “Well Riel,” the bandit addressed Wallace, “you will come along with me, the boss wants to ask you a few questions and it will be useless for you to resist, because you can do nothing.” “T’ve been. AIR WONDER STORIES “T’'m not Riel, ’m—” “We know who you are. The boss knows more about your business than you do, so-come along.” There was nothing else to do so, instructing the pilot to return to London, he walked out of the control room with the: bandit following. Entering the baggage toom, he detected, through the left door, which was open, the little white ‘plane which had-so successfully eluded all police planes. In the cabin, he was forced to swallow a small tablet which the captor handed him, and in a few minutes was lost in sleep. Meeting the Wizard HEN Wallace opened his eyes, he was lying on a bed in a small room, Rising to a sitting posi- tion he pondered over the situation. His brain was slow in clearing up, due to the effects of the sleeping tablet, but it was not long before he remembered every- j He had been kidnapped as Riel. Apparently the criminal leader desired to get the sleuth into his power,.and hearing the talk in-the offices of the I. A. L. had stopped the liner to get Riel, and had got him instead. Wallace, seeing that his disguise was not dis- turbed,. walked quietly to the door, opening it softly. The door. opened up into the side and near the end of a.large room: It was a long spacious room, fully equipped with all types of scientific apparatts. Along the. wall opposite to his door ran a bench about’ two- thirds of. the room in length or approximately twenty- five feet long. This was fully equipped with a com- plete outlay of chemical experimental and testing equip- ment. The rest of the room was filled with the great- est. display of electrical equipment that he had ever laid eyes on. Stepping into the room he found that along the wall, near which he was standing, was a second bench running about the same distance down the room as the other. This was constructed of grey slate, and covered with all sorts of electrical instru- ments. and parts, wires and partly-assembled devices, maty of which he had never-seen before. Much of the material was connected by loose wiring—probably for testing. Above the bench mounted on the wall were a row of marble panels extending the length of the bench, and fastened so that any one panel could-be taken down with little trouble. The different panels were electrically connected together bya type of spring switch that could be disconnected by a mere touch of the hand. . The mass of equipment on these panels was too complicated and too unfamiliar. for him to even make a guess as to their use. At the far end of the room, about six feet beyond the end of the work benches, was a massive instrttment-board reaching from the floor to about eight feet in height and about two- thirds the room in width or approximately twenty. feet. Every panel on the board was literally covered with dials, meters, coils and other controls. In the center of the room was a long table with chairs around. it. Many instruments, push-buttons, meters and such were sunk ‘into: the polished top of the table, leaving the surface: unobstructed. And in front of each chair around the table were squares of frosted glass about six inches square and supported vertically by an ad- justable bracket, so that it could be tilted into different positions similar to a mirror on a dresser. Frank judged that the heavy ornamental table fegs must be hollow and carried all the wiring from the table con- trols and instruments, for he could see no other outlet. In fact, if he was not somewhat familiar with such work, he would have doubted that there were any CO fr ‘ Ly michboolks.cor