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Picture stuff
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Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #76115.
The opening · free to read
Illustrated by William Molt
The first of a spirited series of sky-aventure stories by a writing-man who has himself been a test pilot.
Russ Healy’s dislike for camera-men and cameras dated from those air-seconds, six months ago, during which he had fumbled for the rip-cord of his Irving seat-pack ’chute, while tumbling down from the wreckage of the DeHaviland he had been piloting. That D.H. had been airworthy until the pilot of the camera-ship had crashed her tail assembly, five thousand feet above the earth. With all the air in the sky he had banked into the D.H., just after his camera-man had shot Al Rodger’s jump from a wing of Healy’s ship. And right then the veteran had commenced to dislike camera-ship pilots. The fact that all of them had got down on ’chutes didn’t make any difference. The fact that Russ hadn’t been flying his pet Jenny, the “Old Lady,” didn’t help much. Russ was off the shoot stuff.
“No more for me!” he’d say. “The pilots these camera boys get to fly ’em are crazy. And the crank-boys are crazier. When I see a movie ship in the air--I nose down and land. Let ’em have the sky--that’s me!”
The outfit just grinned. Russ Healy is a long, lanky veteran. Two thousand air hours, with a bit of every type of flying thrown in--he knows his stuff. There had been a time when he’d almost gone “film-flying” himself. But no more. When a fellow’s ’chute opens only a hundred feet off the ground--he does some thinking.
Bob Brooks, boss of the Brooks’ Flying Circus, humored Russ. He let him handle the jump-off ship, and the upper plane in the air-transfer stuff. But he kept him away when they were cranking something. That is, he did until we hit Bakersfield. Then things went bad. They go like that in a flying outfit. Quiet for a few months--and then everything pops the wrong way.
That was what happened at Bakersfield. Sid Lunn blew a front left tire in a forced landing, and when we pulled him out of the wreckage he had a busted leg. Charlie Ryan taxied into a couple of carelessly-deposited fuel cans and the plane nosed over. He came out with head cuts that would stop his flying for a week. And to top the three-day session off, Mel Duncan went up in a Laco Special, and the engine cut out, went dead. It was a night flight, and Mel was too far from the field to glide in. He cut loose a flare which didn’t light. So Mel stepped over the side and let the plane go. The ’chute let him down hard and gave him a nasty drag. They flivvered him into the Bakersfield hospital with a couple of broken ribs and a fractured left wrist.
On the fourth day Russ and myself were sitting on a couple of empty oil cans and smoking pills. We were wondering who’d get it next, but we kept that guesswork to ourselves. It was a pretty quiet session until I happened to look up and spot Bob Brooks coming along with something decidedly nice.
“Hey!” I muttered. “Bob’s wife is gettin’ thin, Russ.”
But it wasn’t Bob’s wife. It was a knickered lady with blonde hair and a pretty face. We saw that as they got up close; and we saw, also, that she carried a helmet and goggles in her left hand.
Russ groaned. “Here comes more trouble,” he stated grimly. “Bob’s had an idea.”
They came up and we got off the oil cans. Brooks introduced the lady. Her name was Joan West, and she was better looking the closer you got to her, which isn’t the usual thing. She gave us a smile that was one hundred per cent perfect. Bob started talking about the weather, about the latest flight across the Atlantic--about everything but what he wanted to tell us. Finally he got around to it.
“Miss West,” he said cheerfully, “is going to work with us tomorrow.”
I stiffened. Russ groaned. There was a little silence.
“That’ll be great,” I managed after a few seconds. “Fine.”
“It ought to be good,” he stated quietly. “Miss West is making a plane transfer--without the usual rope ladder. Wing to wing.”
I regarded the girl with considerable admiration. There aren’t many boys or girls doing it that way. A rope ladder dangling from the plane above means clearance. Either ship can hit a bump--drop or rise--and have air. But in order to go from plane to plane without a rope ladder, that means one wing-tip must come within four or five feet of the other. It’s a tough way of shifting ships.
Russ grunted. “First time you’ve done it that way, Miss West?” he asked grimly.
The girl laughed.
“It’ll be the second,” she said slowly. “I tried it one other time, but the ships--”
“Yeah--it’ll be a good one,” Bob cut in sort of loudly, and I figured right away that he was trying to cover something up. But so did Russ Healy.
“_What_ happened the other time?” he asked.
The girl looked at Bob, then at me. She spoke in a cheerful tone.
“The ships got tangled up,” she stated. “But the pilots weren’t as expert, I’m sure, as you men.”
I grinned. Bob Brooks grinned. Russ Healy nodded his head slowly.
“Maybe not,” he agreed, but his tone wasn’t exactly convincing.
“We’ll work it this way--” Bob said slowly. “Mac, here--he’ll fly Miss West up in a D.H. She’ll do some wing work, and then you get off in the Old Lady, Russ. She’ll work off the left wing. You get your right wing just over it. We’ll rig on a wood loop-grip for her, and she’ll swing off and climb up. A few more stunts on the upper surface--then you can come down.”
“If not sooner,” Russ muttered. “Well, you’re the boss.”
Bob nodded. “Now, the camera-ship’ll be winging as close in as--”
Russ let out a roar. The girl looked startled. Bob stopped talking.
“Nothing doing!” Russ snapped grimly. “What do you mean, camera-ship?”
Bob spoke sharply. “I wouldn’t ask you to do it, Russ--only we’ve got three pilots on the injured list and--”
“And you want a couple more fixed the same way!” Russ cut in. “Nothing doing!”
The girl laughed again. Only this time her laugh wasn’t so pleasant.
“We’ll all have ’chutes,” she said icily. “I wouldn’t worry, Mr. Healy.”
Russ was getting sort of white around the lips. I could see that he was thinking back, remembering.
“Nothing doing!” he muttered for the third time. “If you keep the camera-ship out of the air, boss--”
“We’re doing it for them!” Bob cut in. “The National News people want something snappy. We’re in this business to make money--and this means we’ll make some. You’ve got to fly the high plane, Russ.”
I knew right away that Brooks had made a mistake. Russ’ eyes and his words got cold.
“There’s only one thing I’ve got to do,” he stated grimly. “And I’ll do that in a natural way if I don’t fall for this picture stuff.”
The girl had a derisive expression.
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