Bill Bolton Flying Midshipman Part 1

Bill Bolton-Flying Mids.h.i.+pman.

by Noel Sainsbury, Jr.

CHAPTER I-THE HURRICANE

"I can't keep her in the air any longer, Dad!"

Bill Bolton shot the words into the mouthpiece of his headphone and pushed the stick gently forward. The amphibian which he was driving nosed into a long gliding arc toward the angry whitecaps of the Bay of Florida, a thousand feet below.

"Too much wind?" called back Mr. Bolton from his seat in the rear c.o.c.kpit.

With a sharp bank Bill saved the plane a side-slip as an unusually heavy gust caught her.

"Too much wind is right. Those black clouds to the southeast mean a hurricane or I'm a landlubber. We're soon going to be in for it good and plenty. It's already kicked up a heavy sea below. I should have landed sooner."

"If we crash, we'll have a long swim," was his father's sole comment.

Bill cut his gun and having brought the plane into the teeth of the wind which was increasing in violence momentarily, he shot a quick glance overside. Row after row of spume-capped combers met his eye and his face became grim with determination.

At an alt.i.tude of perhaps twenty-five feet he began to draw the stick slowly backward, breaking his glide. Careful not to stall her, with his eyes on the water just ahead he allowed the nose to come gradually up until the amphibian was in level flight. In such a wind this proved a most difficult evolution, for savage squalls lashed the plane until she acted like a wild colt on a leading rope; and a crash seemed imminent.

Struggling to keep the plane on an even keel, Bill continued to pull back his stick, raising the nose and depressing the tail. Then with a final pull he stalled her, the heel of the step made contact with the top of a whitecap and amid a cloud of spray the amphibian skimmed ahead on the water. Before her nose could play off, Bill had the sea anchor overside and a moment later the heavy boat was tugging on the line to the collapsible canvas bucket that kept her head into the wind.

Bill whipped off his headphone and goggles. Then he made the pilot's c.o.c.kpit secure by cleating down a waterproof tarpaulin over the top, flush with the deck, and climbed into the rear c.o.c.kpit which had seats for two pa.s.sengers.

Vast clouds growing out of the southeast almost covered the heavens now, concealing the sun. And as it grew darker the wind's velocity steadily increased.

"She'll ride better with me aft," he explained to his father, "and the tarpaulin will shed water like a deck. If the fore c.o.c.kpit s.h.i.+pped one of those big seas, we'd fill up and go down like a plummet."

"I admit that I'm not much of a seafaring man," said Mr. Bolton, "but why you keep the plane heading into those combers is beyond me! Why not run before the gale? Wouldn't we ride easier?"

"Possibly-but we can't get into position to do that now. I threw over the sea anchor to keep her as she is."

"Why did you do that?"

"Because if I hadn't, she'd have nosed round broadside to the waves and foundered with the weight of the water pouring down on her lower wing sections. If I tried to bring her before the wind now, she'd do exactly that as soon as her head played off."

In the white glare of a lightning flash which brightened the horizon for an instant, Mr. Bolton glimpsed his son, staring into the teeth of the storm.

"Then why didn't you land the plane with the wind instead of heading into it?" he queried in a perplexed tone.

"All landings must be made directly into the wind, Dad," Bill explained patiently. "A plane stalls when its speed through the air drops below a certain point. If there's no wind its speed over the surface will be the same as its speed through the air. But any wind at once affects its velocity over the surface, which will be the composition of the speed of the plane through the air with the speed of the air over the surface.

You see, a plane which stalls at forty miles an hour will, when landing into a fifteen-mile wind, make contact at twenty-five miles an hour. The same plane headed down-wind would land at fifty-five miles an hour. And that difference of thirty miles an hour in landing speed might easily spell the difference between a good landing and a wrecked plane."

His father smiled in the darkness.

"You talk like a textbook, Bill. But you do seem to have learned something at Annapolis during the past year."

"Learned that in flight training, before I entered the Naval Academy,"

replied his son. He ducked his head as an unusually vicious wave swept over the forward decking, deluging the two in the c.o.c.kpit with stinging spray. "This is going to be a wet vacation, by the looks of things."

"Who'd have thought we'd be in this fix when we left Key West at four this afternoon! Now we're stranded-somewhere in the Bay of Florida-and instead of dining cheerily with the Wilsons at Miami, and going on to that important business conference afterwards-"

"We're likely to make good bait for the sharks in this neighborhood!"

"I don't suppose there's anything we can do, son?"

"Not a thing-but grin and bear it until this wind blows itself out."

"And it will get worse before it gets better!"

"Sure! Cheer up, Dad-we'll weather it yet."

"Don't mind me, Bill. I'm-that is, I'm not feeling quite myself. Haven't since we came down, as a matter of fact. I've never been-seasick-before-" Mr. Bolton's voice sounded rather feeble.

"It's the motion, combined with the smell of gasoline, Dad. Every naval flyer knows that feeling, your son included, at this particular time.

You'll feel better when you're empty."

"I certainly hope so," faltered Mr. Bolton.

"Just let your mind rest on a fatty piece of pork swimming in its own hot grease, for a starter," Bill suggested, grinning to himself.

"Mmmm-" Bill's father stood up suddenly and leaned far overside.

His son followed suit almost immediately.

Presently they returned to their places, weak and empty, but considerably more comfortable.

"I wonder why the thought of fat pork always gets one going," mused Bill, handing his father the water bottle.

Mr. Bolton slaked his thirst and handed it back, whereupon Bill took a couple of long pulls.

"Feel better, Dad?"

"Yes, thanks." He paused a moment, then continued in his normal tone.

"The plane doesn't seem to be pitching so wildly-"

"No, the wind is increasing steadily, and flattening out the water."

"Isn't there something we can do now?"

"Yes. It's getting pretty wet in here. Give me a hand with this tarpaulin, please."

"What are you going to do?"

"Batten down the c.o.c.kpit cover."