Chapter IX

Setting the flash so it would not go out, Bill laid it down on the floor, cried "Oh, you robber!" and beginning to laugh continued until he had to lie on the floor and roll around. Frank, laughing, too, carefully shoved back the bed. The intruder sat up, rubbing his eyes.

"I guess the joke is on me," he said.

It was Horace Jardin!

"This beats everything in my young life," said Bill as soon as he could speak. "What are you doing here anyhow, scaring the life out of two poor little boys on their very first night in boarding-school? Don't you know you are making us break rules the first shot?"

Horace laughed sheepishly.

"I was going to give you a good old scare," he said, "but I was so tired and it took you so long to get here that I went to sleep. But I bet you are surprised to see me here."

"Here at this school, or under our beds?" quizzed Bill.

"Both," said Horace.

"How did it happen?" asked Frank.

"It was the airplane," explained Horace. "This is the only school in the country where they let you fool with this air stuff, and so I told dad that it was no use bribing me with an airplane to stay in school all the year if I couldn't go where I could use it. I have learned to fly, by the way. Dad paid a dollar a minute to have me taught. I tell you I am a whiz! It cost him five hundred dollars for my tuition, and two thousand more to mend a plane I broke, but he was so pleased at the way I learned that he didn't mind the bills at all. So here I am, and when I heard you were coming--well, I was certainly tickled! So I sneaked in here as soon as the bell rang for lights out, and first I knew I was asleep."

"From the way you were snoring, I should say first thing you knew you were awake," laughed Frank.

"Guess I will beat it now," said Horace. "There is no school to-morrow--just the organization of classes, and we can go down to the hangars and see my plane. You ought to see those dinky little hangars! Not much like the big government ones. There are only three planes. Mine and one belonging to the school, and one that belongs to a fellow from Toronto. It is a peach, and he thinks he can beat me in a race. We are going to try it out some day if we can ever get up without an instructor. They are awful strict here. I will have a deuce of a time if they catch me in here."

"I should think you had better fade away then," said Frank uneasily. "We don't any of us want to get in wrong."

"Well, I am glad you have come, fellows," whispered Jardin, tiptoeing to the door. "Put out that flash, Bill! You don't want to tell everybody what we are doing. See you in the morning. Goodnight!".

He slipped out, and the boys silently crept back into their beds.

"That beats all!" exclaimed Bill after a long pause when he decided by Frank's breathing that he was still awake. "I surely thought we were quit of that chap."

"You always have it in for him, haven't you?" said Frank. "You are a funny one. Always cracking up that Indian orderly of yours as such a peach and a straight fellow, and forever knocking a first-class good sport like Jardin."

"I didn't mean to knock Horace," said Bill, "but he does seem--well, I don't know just what!"

"I guess that's about it," sneered Frank. "Just about it! You don't know _why_ you knock him or what about, because you have just made up your mind to do it. Well, suit yourself! I like Jardin and he is good enough for me, and that's all I have to say about it. You can do as you please; don't mind me."

"Don't get so sore," said Bill. "I told you back home that I was going to treat him decently, and I am."

He turned on his pillow and was silent, and both boys were asleep in about a minute. They were very tired.

Early in the morning Jardin introduced the Toronto boy, and they found him a very quiet, pleasant chap who made no pretensions of any sort. Together they walked down to the hangars.

"How do you learn to fly in the civilian schools?" asked Bill of the Toronto boy, whose name was Ernest Breeze.

"It is about the same as the government schools," said the boy. "You know something about flying, don't you?"

"A little," replied Bill modestly. "I can control the machine on the field, but I have never been up. There are reasons that keep me from flying but I hope to some day."

"Well, we learned on an old style Bright," said Ernest. "With a dual control, you know. You take the same seat you will always occupy, you follow every movement of the instructor beside you, and you sort of feel that you are managing the levers all alone, until you sense the tricks of the machine and learn a few things like rising from the field, manoeuvering and landing. It is a good deal easier than it is to drive an automobile."

"That's the way you start at the aviation schools in the Army," said Frank. "But there you don't have to pay any of this dollar-a-minute business."

"No," said Ernest, "but in exchange for your tuition you have to join the Aviation Corps. And now that the war is over, I would rather do postal work, or ferry or excursion lines instead of hanging around an Army aviation camp. My aim is to be as perfect a flier as I possibly can, and then if there is ever any need of another Army Aviation Corps, why, I will enlist right off. You see your final test qualifies you for government service if you make good."

"What do you think is the quality a birdman should have most of?" asked Bill.

"Our instructor used to say a pilot should have courage, skill, knowledge, aptitude and confidence; but he always went on to say that all these together amounted to very little unless you have a bushel of common sense. I think he was right. I had to earn part of my tuition in the Aviation school because I didn't want to ask my father to pay all that out for me and get me an airplane beside. That is why I am just entering school. As long as the war lasted, I thought I ought to be learning something that would help a bit if they needed me, but it ended before I got a chance to offer myself, and now I have got to work mighty hard to make up for the time I spent in the air. That's why I am here. I want to keep in practice and fly whenever I am not busy with school work."

He looked critically at the sky.

"It is going to be a wonderful day up there," he said. "Don't you want to come up, one of you?"

"Frank is going with me," said Jardin.

"Come on then," invited Ernest, smiling at Bill.

"I am sorry, but I can't go up," said Bill, flushing.

"Bill likes to stay on the ground pretty well," sneered Jardin, pushing open the door of the hangar. He disappeared within, followed by Frank.

"Well, that's all right," said Ernest, smiling pleasantly. "I don't see as it is anyone's business what you like to do. I think if you feel a bit uneasy you are very wise to stay right on the ground."

"It is not that at all," said Bill, acting on a sudden impulse to tell this pleasant young stranger the reason for his refusal. "It is not that, and the reason probably won't interest you. Frank and Horace are always kidding me about it, but I can't help it. You see, I promised my mother that I wouldn't go up. She has a bad heart, and a shock like my getting hurt would certainly kill her. I can't risk that, can I? And when you come down to it, it is just as you say. I don't see as it is anybody's business what I do."

"I rather think not," said Ernest, clapping Bill on the shoulder. "I guess if you were in _my_ boat, with no mother to do things for, you would be glad enough to give up a thing like that. What do you care _what_ they say?"

"I don't," declared Bill, "only they always give people the impression that I am afraid. And I am not."

"Of course you are not!" exclaimed Ernest. "That bores me awf'ly! Let's get my little boat out. You don't mind skating around the field, do you?"

"Tickled to death!" said Bill eagerly, and hastened into a place in the trim, beautiful little plane.

The moment they were set in motion he saw that the plane was a wonder. It answered to the slightest touch of the wheel or levers and rode the humps on the field with a motion that told Bill, experienced as he was in that part of the sport, that it was made of the finest possible materials.

His admiration finally burst into speech.

"What a beauty this is!" he roared over the blast of the throbbing engine.

The young pilot turned a lever, and the racket subsided into a soft, steady humming.

Bill repeated his remark. Ernest stopped the plane and, getting out, commenced to adjust the engine.

"I see she needs a little tuning up this morning," he said, pulling off his gauntlets and fishing a screwdriver out of one of the many pockets in his aviator's coat. Bill joined him.

"It _is_ a good machine," admitted Ernest. "I am certainly proud to own it. It is too good a machine for me but I am as careful of it as I know how to be. I think so much of it that I never try any fool stunts with it. Dad says it was worth all he put into it just on that account. He says that perhaps I would forget to take care of my own safety, but he is sure I will never fail to look after this little pet. For instance, when I was learning to fly three years ago (and I don't consider that I really know how to do it yet) they tried to din it into me that I must always keep the tail of my machine a little higher than the nose, in case the engine should go dead when I wasn't expecting it."

"What would happen then?" asked Bill, deeply interested.

"Well, if the aeroplane is correctly balanced with the tail a little higher than the nose it will be ready for a glide if the engine goes dead, and on the other hand it is apt to lose headway, and go down tail first. And that, you know," added Ernest, laughing, "is often very uncomfortable for the occupants of the car."

"I should say so!" agreed Bill.

"Chaps make such a mistake trying to build their own cars," said Ernest. "More accidents come from that than people realize. While the war was going on, no one had time to tinker at building, but now half the chaps I know are studying up and attempting to make aeroplanes for themselves.

"It just can't be done. For instance, every piece of wood used in a machine must be tested with the greatest care. A chap can't do that himself. Every piece of wire used has got to be stretched in a machine specially invented for the purpose. For instance, to find the breaking strain of a piece of wire, a piece fifteen inches long is placed between the jaws of a standard testing machine, so that a length of ten inches of the wire is clear between the two ends. What they call the 'load' is then put on by means of a handle at the rate of speed of about one inch a minute. You can't do this yourself, and by the time you have sent your wire, or have taken it where the test can be applied, and have also had the test made on the twist of your wire, and all the woodwork, you will have a machine that will cost more than one made by skilled workmen. There is another test too that is very necessary. That is for your wing fabric. It ought all to be soaked in salt water. If the fabric has been varnished, the salt will soften it. Then dry the sample in the sun and if it neither stretches nor shrinks, you will know that it is all right, and you will feel safe about using it."

"I took in all I could learn, without actually going up, at the Aviation field at Sill," said Bill. "I will get my chance some day. I wrote mother this morning, telling her about our trip and all, and I asked her if she thought she would sometime feel like letting me fly. I didn't _ask_ her to let me, you know, but I have a hunch that something might happen sometime and I might almost have to fly. So I told her just how I felt about it. Whatever she says goes."

"That's a good sport!" said Ernest, smiling. "It seems to me that I would be willing to give up anything in the world if I could have my mother alive to make sacrifices for. Of course I have dad, and he is a corking pal and just an all-round dear, but a chap's mother is different, somehow. I think you were wise to write that letter, for you never know what might come up. If your mother is what I should think she is, she will understand that you are not trying to fix a loophole for yourself or tying a string to your word of honor."

"No, she won't think that," said Bill positively. "Mother and I understand each other. I can trust her and she knows she can trust me. It makes things nice all around. She will be _crazy_ about this machine of yours. Perhaps she will take a little glide with you, if she doesn't feel like actually going up. She has promised to come on and spend the Thanksgiving vacation with me."

"Good work! That makes me feel glad that I can't go home. I am going to stay right through the whole year and put in some extra work during the vacations."

"Mom will like you too," said Bill. "She will want to know all about the plane, and when she gets through listening she will know 'most as much as you do. There is one thing I am afraid of, if I should fly, and that is spinning. Now if you begin to side-slip, either outward or inward, you are apt to commence to spin, and--well, there is usually a speedy and more or less painless end to you and your hopes."

"I think, Bill, that you will have no trouble in learning to control a machine when your mother feels like releasing you from your promise. I knew of a fellow once who made a long and successful flight with no preparation at all other than what he had learned from books and observation."

"I don't believe I would want to try anything like that," laughed Bill, "but I am stowing away all I can gather here and there."

"The thing for you to do," said Ernest, "is to roll around the fields every chance you get. I will be glad to take you with me any day or every day that you feel like going. Of course you won't have very much time after to-day except on Saturdays. To-morrow classes will be in full swing. Get in now and take my seat."

Ernest tucked his screwdriver deep in his pocket, pulled his goggles over his eyes and, seating himself behind Bill, directed his actions. A thrilling two hours followed for Bill.

When at last they returned to the vicinity of the hangar from which they had started, they found an excited and angry group around Horace Jardin's aeroplane. Something was wrong with it and the two mechanics working over it were unable to find out why the machine refused to fly. It refused, indeed, to rise from the ground and the engine worked with a peculiar jolt. The sound of the bugle from the high ground in front of the mess hall called them to lunch and they went off, leaving the men still at work. Horace was in a very bad humor, and as usual indulged himself in a number of foolish threats, the least of which was to scrap the whole machine.

"I will do it sure as shooting!" he blustered. "If that machine isn't going to come up to the maker's guarantee, I will make my dad get me one that will. I won't tinker round with any one-horse bunch of junk like this looks to be."

"Give it a chance," suggested Bill soothingly.

"Not a darned chance!" declared Jardin. "I tell you my father promised me an aeroplane, and he has got to come across with a good machine! He will do it, too. He's too stuck on me to risk my being hurt. And he knows it is not my fault. I can fly all right."

"Don't junk it, anyhow," said Frank anxiously.

"Want to buy it?" asked Bill.

"I might," said Frank, "provided Horace doesn't charge too much."

"If she won't fly, I will sell her to you for five hundred dollars," declared Horace. "You can tie a string to her, and Bill here can have her to lead around the lot."

"That's a go," said Frank. Everyone laughed, but a look of cunning suddenly flamed in Frank's eyes. He commenced to lay a train for Jardin's anger to burn upon, a sort of fuse leading up to the explosion Frank wished. He cast a quick glance at the others. It was evident that they took the whole conversation as a joke. But Frank, with an arm over Jardin's hunched shoulders, commenced pouring into his willing ears a stream of abuse directed at the makers of Horace's beautiful plane, and an account, invented on the spot, of divers people who had thrown over their planes for just the reason which had so angered Horace. Frank, with his real working knowledge of flying learned at the greatest of schools, was able to talk in a most convincing manner. Horace, sunk in a sullen silence, listened closely.