The Boy Aviators in Record Flight; Or, The Rival Aeroplane

CHAPTER I.

THE BIG PRIZE

“Phew!” exclaimed Billy Barnes as he reported for work on the New York Planet one broiling afternoon in late August, “this is a scorcher and no mistake.”

“I should think after all your marvelous adventures with the Boy Aviators that you would be so used to heat and cold and hardship that you wouldn’t kick at a little thing like a warm day.”

The remark came from a young fellow about twenty-one years old who occupied a desk beside that of the stout spectacled youth of eighteen whom our readers have already met as Billy Barnes.

“Why, hullo, Fred Reade!” said Billy, looking up with a good-natured grin from the operation of opening his typewriter desk, “I thought you were off covering aviation.”

“I was,” rejoined the other, with a near approach to a sneer, “but since we printed your story about the recovery of the treasure on the Spanish galleon I guess they think I’m not good enough to cover the subject.”

If the good-natured Billy Barnes noticed the close approach to outspoken enmity with which these words were spoken he gave no sign of it. Any reply he might have made was in fact cut short at that minute by an office boy who approached him.

“Mr. Stowe wants to see you, Mr. Barnes, at once, please,” said the lad.

“There you go, the managing editor sending for you as soon as you get back. I wish I was a pet,” sneered Reade as Billy hastened after the boy and the next minute entered a room screened off from the editorial department by a glass door bearing the words “Managing Editor.”

At a desk above which hung “This is my busy day,” and other signs not calculated to urge visitors to become conversational, sat a heavy-set, clean-shaven man with a big pair of spectacles astride his nose. He had a fat cigar in his mouth which he regarded as he spoke with far more intensity than he did Billy.

“Afternoon, Barnes,” was his greeting.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Stowe,” returned the young reporter, “you sent for me – ”

“Sit down,” said the other brusquely, indicating a chair.

Billy sat down and waited for the next words of his managing editor.

“The Planet, as you know, has made a specialty of featuring aviation,” continued Mr. Stowe, gazing fixedly at his cigar.

Billy nodded, the remark did not seem to call for a more definite reply.

“We have offered prizes for flights from time to time, and in this way have obtained a reputation as an authority on aviation and a patron of what is bound to be the vehicle of the coming ages.”

Again Billy nodded at the managing editor’s rather florid way of putting it.

“For instance, the $10,000 Albany-New York flight and the $30,000 New York-St. Louis flight. The $100,000 offer for a transatlantic flight as yet remains unchallenged for, but I have no doubt that in time some daring aviator will make the attempt.”

“It should be possible,” once more agreed Billy, wondering what was coming next.

“In the meantime,” Mr. Stowe continued, “the Despatch has declared itself our rival in this field by also devoting great attention to the subject, and offering prizes for flights in opposition to our original idea. The owner of the Planet has therefore decided to eclipse all previous offers and be the first in the field with a prize of $50,000 for a flight from New York to San Francisco, or as far in that direction as possible. The air craft that travels furthest will get the prize.”

“Across the continent?” gasped Billy.

“Exactly. We are going to publish the conditions and date of starting in our to-morrow morning’s issue. And the offer incidentally means a great chance for you.”

Billy gave a questioning glance.

“I intend to have you follow the racers in an automobile and send dispatches from the various points along the route concerning the progress of the cross-country aerial racers.”

The young reporter’s face beamed.

“That’s mighty good of you, sir,” he said earnestly.

“Not at all. It’s simply the selection of the best man for the job; that’s all. You have far more knowledge of aviation than Reade – or at least you ought to have after your long association with the Boy Aviators – and therefore we have selected you.”

“As to the conditions of the race, Mr. Stowe – how about stops, gasolene and water stations, and so on?”

“Each contestant will be expected to arrange those details for himself,” was the answer. “This newspaper simply offers the prize to the first aeroplane to arrive in San Francisco, or go furthest in that direction. Also, of course, we claim the privilege of getting exclusive accounts of the doings of the Planet aeroplanes. That’s all. Simple, isn’t it?”

“Very,” agreed Billy as he took his leave. “By the way, sir, does any one else know of your offer?”

“Nobody; not even Reade. I guess he’s pretty sore that we took him off aviation on the eve of making the prize offer, but it can’t be helped.”

“Why, I – you see, sir, I’d rather not take it, if it is blocking Reade in any way. I don’t want to take the assignment at all if it’s going to hurt Reade with the paper.”

The managing editor gave an impatient wave of his hand.

“Let me attend to Reade,” he remarked impatiently, “you go and get out a story for to-morrow about possible contestants. Of course your friends, the Chester boys, will enter?”

Billy looked dubious.

“I don’t know,” he replied. “I rather think they were planning for a rest and to continue their studies, and this cross-country flight won’t be any picnic. However, I hope they do enter,” replied Billy.

“I had no idea that there would be any doubt about it,” said Mr. Stowe impatiently, “well, do the best you can. Anyhow, get interviews with Blewitt, Sharkness and Auldwin. They will be sure to enter their machines, and let’s have a good, live story for to-morrow. By the way, not a word of this to anybody but the aviators you may see till we publish the offer. The Despatch would be quite capable of offering a similar prize to-morrow morning if they learned what was in the wind.”

Billy nodded as Mr. Stowe once more gave a sign of dismissal, and hastened from the room. So hurried was his exit, in fact, that he almost bumped into Reade as he made his way out. The editorial room was deserted, except for the dark-haired, slender young fellow with whom Billy had almost collided. The other reporters were all out on their assignments.

“Well?” were Fred Reade’s first words.

“Well,” rejoined Billy, adjusting his spectacles, which had narrowly escaped being jarred off his nose in the bump, “isn’t there room enough in the place without your getting so near that door that you almost upset my slender form?”

“Never mind that,” replied Frank Reade; “what I want to know is, how do I stand in there?”

He motioned with his head toward the managing editor’s room from which the boys were by this time several paces removed.

“I don’t understand you exactly,” was Billy’s reply. He noticed that Reade’s face bore an angry flush and he seemed excited.

“What I mean is this: Am I going to continue to do aviation for the Planet?”

“Say, Fred, old man, I’m awfully sorry – ”

“Oh, cut that out. You don’t mean it, and you know you don’t. You wanted to grab off the job for yourself, and I can see by your face that you have.”

“If you mean that I am to do aviation for the Planet in future, you are right,” replied Billy. “I am; but it was only on Mr. Stowe’s orders. You’re wrong, Fred, and you know you are, when you accuse me of trying to take your job away from you.”

“Oh, rot,” exclaimed the other angrily. “If that had been the case you’d have kept away. You don’t have to work. You made plenty of money out of your share of the Golden Galleon treasure. You have just deliberately tried to oust me from my job.”

“You talk as if you’d been fired,” said Billy. “You know that you are one of the most valued reporters on the Planet.”

“Don’t try to jolly me,” rejoined the other angrily. “And as for being fired, I don’t have to be, for I’ve got my resignation ready written out. Here copy boy!” he cried, “take this note in to Mr. Stowe.”

As the boy hurried up Reade drew from his pocket an envelope and handed it to the lad.

“Hold on there!” cried Billy, genuinely moved at Reade’s evident chagrin, “have you gone crazy, Fred? What’s the matter?”

“Take that note in,” thundered Reade to the hesitating boy, who thereupon hurried off, “it’s your fault I’ve had to quit, Billy Barnes, and I’ll not forget it, I can promise you. I’ll get even with you for this in a way you don’t suspect. No; I won’t shake hands with you. I don’t want to speak to you.”

Reade flung angrily off and put on his coat and hat. Without taking any more notice of Billy he strode out of the Planet offices and into the street.

On the sidewalk he paused for a minute. His hat shoved back off his brow and his forehead puckered in perplexity.

“I’ll do it,” he exclaimed suddenly under his breath as if he had made up his mind to something. “I’ll do it. The Despatch will jump at it, and I’ll get even on Billy Barnes and the Planet at the same time.”

CHAPTER II.

BILLY AS A DIPLOMAT

A few minutes after Fred Reade had left the Planet offices he was followed by Billy Barnes. The young reporter boarded an open Madison Avenue car, preferring it to the stuffy heat of the subway, and in due time found himself at the home of Mr. Chester, the wealthy banker, and father of Frank and Harry Chester, the Boy Aviators. The lads need no further introduction to our readers, who have doubtless formed the acquaintance of both the young air pilots in previous volumes of this series. To those who have not it may be as well – while Billy Barnes is ringing the doorbell – to say that Frank and Harry Chester were graduates of the Agassiz High School and the pioneers among schoolboy aviators. Beginning with models of air craft they had finally evolved a fine biplane which they named the Golden Eagle. The first Golden Eagle was destroyed in a tropical storm off the coast of Nicaragua, as related in The Boy Aviators in Nicaragua; or, In League with the Insurgents. To carry out an important commission affecting a stolen formula the lads then constructed a second Golden Eagle, in which they met many adventures and perils in the Everglades of Florida. These were set forth in The Boy Aviators on Secret Service; or, Working with Wireless, the second volume of the series. In the third and fourth volumes the boys had aerial adventures in Africa, and in the Sargasso Sea. What these were will be found in The Boy Aviators in Africa; or, An Aerial Ivory Trail; and The Boy Aviators’ Treasure Quest; or, The Golden Galleon.

Before the servant who answered Billy’s ring had time to announce him there was a rush of feet down the hallway and two tall lads, with crisp wavy hair and blue eyes, were wringing Billy’s hand till he laughingly shouted:

“Hey, let up! I’m not the India-rubber man with the circus.”

At this moment a door opened and a gray-haired man stepped out. It was Mr. Chester.

“Why, how do you do, Billy Barnes,” he exclaimed heartily, “glad to see you; but I hope you haven’t come to take my boys off again on some wonderful trip or other. You know their mother and I like to see them at home sometimes.”

“Well, sir,” began Billy somewhat abashed, “the fact is I – you see – I mean – well, the long and short of it is, sir, that I have an adventurous proposal to make to them.”

“Hurray!” shouted Harry. “Good for you, Billy!”

Mr. Chester, however, assumed his – what Frank called – “official face.”

“Really, I – ” he began.

“Now, father,” interjected Frank, “don’t you think it would be a good idea if we heard what Billy’s proposal, or whatever you like to call it, is before we say anything more?”

“Perhaps you are right, my boy,” said his father, “but I am busy now, and – ”

“We’ll take Billy out to the workshop and make him tell us all about it, and then we’ll submit it to you,” suggested Harry.

“That’s a good idea,” assented his father.

Five minutes later the three boys were closeted in the big room above the garage of the Chester home, which served them as a workshop, study and designing plant all rolled into one. The blue prints, aeroplane parts, chemicals, and tools scattered about or ranged in neat racks against the walls in conjunction with a shelf of books on aviation and kindred subjects, the table illumined by movable drop lights shaded by green shades, gave the room a very business-like appearance. It was clearly a place for work and not for play – as a sort of framework newly erected in one corner showed.

“What’s that?” asked Billy, indicating it.

“Oh, just an idea we were working on for a wireless adapted for auto use,” rejoined Frank, “but never mind that now. What’s this wonderful plan of yours?”

“Simply this,” replied Billy briskly, “how’d you fellows like to get $50,000?”

“Would we?” exclaimed Harry. “Lead us to it.”

“You’ll have to lead yourselves,” laughed Billy.

“Oh, come on, Billy, put us out of our suspense. What do you mean?” said Frank.

“Well, my paper, The Planet, you know,” began Billy, “has decided to offer the amount I named for a successful flight from here to San Francisco, or as near to that city as can be attained. There are no conditions – except get there first, or travel furthest.”

“Well?” said Frank.

“Well,” repeated Billy, “I’ve come here to interview you. Are you ready to announce yourselves as competitors for the Planet’s contest?”

Not so much to Billy’s surprise Frank shook his head.

“I don’t know what to say,” he rejoined. “It isn’t a thing you can make your mind up to in a minute. I’d like to do it, but it would require a lot of preparation. Then, too, there would be maps to get up and a thousand and one details to arrange. It’s a big task – bigger than you imagine, Billy.”

“Oh, I know it’s a big proposition,” said the young reporter, “that’s one reason I thought it would appeal to you,” he added subtly. “As for gasolene, why not carry a supply of it in the automobile?”

“What automobile?” asked Harry.

“Why, didn’t I tell you,” exclaimed Billy, “the auto I’m to follow you fellows in and send out accounts of your progress. Oh, Frank, please say you’ll do it – it would be bully.”

“It would be bully, no doubt of that,” rejoined Frank; “but I have a lot of experimental work on hand that I want to finish. I should have to leave that, and Harry is preparing for college. No, Billy, I’m afraid we shall have to call it off. There are lots of other aviators you can get to take part. The prize is big enough to call out the biggest of them.”

Bitter disappointment showed on Billy’s face.

“Then it’s all off?” he murmured dejectedly.

“I’m afraid so – yes,” replied Frank. “What do you say, Harry?”

“I’d like to go,” decided Harry promptly; “but, as you said, Frank, it would delay us both in our studies, and then we would have a lot of work to do on the framework of the Golden Eagle, wrecked as she was.”

“Hold on there!” cried Billy. “I was coming to that. I was going to say that maybe the reason you refused was that you couldn’t build a new ’plane in time, but did I understand you to say you had recovered the frame?”

“Of the old Golden Eagle II,” put in Frank. “You recollect that following the fight with Luther Barr’s dirigible in the Sargasso we had to abandon her.”

“After that rascal Sanborn tried to blow a hole in the pontoons that made her float and sink her.”

“I shall never forget the look on his face as that devil fish seized him and bore him to the depths of the sea,” shuddered Harry.

“Nor I,” said Frank; “but here’s your story, Billy. Having, as you know, left the Golden Eagle drifting on her pontoons we never thought we should see her again, but a few days ago a message reached us from Florida saying that the government derelict destroyer Grampus, while on the lookout for dangerous wrecks in the Caribbean Sea, encountered a strange-looking object scudding over – or rather through – the waves. They set out in chase and soon made it out as the framework of an aeroplane. You remember that I advertised the loss of our air craft pretty extensively in marine and naval journals, and offered a reward, so that when the drifting aeroplane was sighted every man on board the government vessel was eager to capture it. As the wind dropped soon after they sighted it they were enabled to get alongside the derelict and found that it was indeed the Golden Eagle. Her planes were riddled with bullets and her pontoons covered with green seaweed, but the framework was as solid and the braces as taut as the day we put her together. Moreover, the engine, beyond being badly coated with rust, was as good as the day we set it on the bed plate.”

“Say, why didn’t you tell me about this before?” demanded Billy.

“Too much of a hurry to get her back, I guess,” rejoined Frank. “But, say,” he broke off, “the frame was shipped from Florida and arrived here this morning. Want to look at it?”

“Want to look at it? You bet I do!” gasped Billy. “That’s the finest old air ship in the world.”

“So we think,” laughed Harry, as Frank led the way down a flight of steps into the garage below the room in which they had been discussing the Planet’s offer.

Frank switched on the lights and there stood revealed in the rear of the place a shadowy framework that glistened in places where the light caught it. It towered huge, and yet light and airy-looking, like the skeleton of a strange bird.

“It wasn’t shipped that way?” asked Billy.

“Not much,” was Frank’s reply. “They took it down in Florida and boxed it.”

“And a nice mess they made of it,” said Harry; “but, thank goodness, they didn’t harm the engine.”

He pointed to the motor which was out of the machine and lay in a corner.

“Doesn’t look very big for the work it’s done, does it?” laughed Frank, gazing lovingly at the eight-cylindered, hundred horse-power engine that had performed such good service since the boys installed it.

“There’s certainly a lot of cleaning to be done about the ’plane,” remarked Billy, as he handled the rusted frames and tarnished bronze parts.

“Oh, that won’t take long,” replied Frank lightly; “anyhow, we’ve got lots of time to do it.”

“Unless,” put in Billy.

“Well, unless what?” demanded Frank, though he guessed the young reporter’s meaning.

“Unless you go in for that $50,000 prize,” cried Billy skillfully evading the playful blow Frank aimed at him. “In all seriousness, Frank, won’t you?” he pleaded.

“In all seriousness, no,” was Frank’s rejoinder. “I’d like to do it. Billy,” he went on. “I’d like to do it for your sake, if it would do you any good – we both would, wouldn’t we, Harry?”

“You bet,” replied the younger brother with effective brevity.

“Well, of course, I know you fellows too well to try to urge you,” said Billy; “but I would like to be able to announce in the Planet to-morrow that the Boy Aviators announce they will compete for the paper’s big prize.”

“To tell you the truth, Billy,” laughed Frank, “we’ve had about enough newspaper notoriety lately. It’s mighty good of you to write accounts of our adventures, but I guess the papers can get along for a while without anything about us.”

“Not at all, you make good copy,” declared Billy, with such comic emphasis that the boys went off into shouts of laughter.

And so it came about that Billy said good-night without having shaken the Boy Aviators in their determination not to engage in any public flights, but all the time, though they little knew it, events were so shaping themselves that little as they dreamed it they were to take part in the record flight.

CHAPTER III.

UNDER A CLOUD

It was early the next morning. The paper had been put to bed. Billy, with the satisfied feeling that came to him with the knowledge that he had written a good introduction and account of the Planet’s great offer, was slipping into his coat preparatory to going home, when Mr. Stowe, his face purple with anger, called to him in a sharp voice from the door of the editorial sanctum.

“Come here, Barnes, I want to see you,” he said brusquely.

“Hullo, something’s up with the chief,” thought Billy to himself; but he answered cheerily: “All right, sir,” with an inward feeling that something was all wrong.

“Look here, Barnes,” exclaimed Mr. Stowe, angrily flourishing a first edition of the Planet’s rival, the Despatch, “there has been treachery somewhere. How about this?”

Billy, with an unaccountable sinking of the heart, took the paper the other flourished so furiously. It was still moist and warm as it had been run off the press. The sickly, sweet odor of printer’s ink hung about it. But these details did not attract Billy’s attention. And for an excellent reason. Staring him in the face in big black letters he read:

Below – and every letter of the article burned itself into Billy’s brain, was a long story eulogizing the enterprise of the Despatch in making the offer and giving a list of the noted aviators who would be sure – so the Despatch thought – to enter the contest.

It was a cold steal of the Planet’s idea.

Almost word for word the conditions were the same as those Mr. Stowe had detailed to Billy that afternoon.

“Well,” remarked the managing editor in a harsh tone, in which Billy recognized the steely ring that always presaged a storm from that august quarter.

“Well,” floundered Billy helplessly, “I cannot account for it.”

“You cannot,” echoed the other in a flinty tone.

“Why no,” rejoined the lad, lifting his eyes to Stowe’s, “can you?”

“Yes I can.”

“You can, sir?”

“We have been sold out.”

“Sold out?”

“Precisely. And there are only three people in the office who could have had any knowledge of the secret. One is the owner of the paper, the other myself and the third is you.”

Mr. Stowe joined his hands magisterially and looked straight at Billy, in whose mind a horrid suspicion had begun to dawn.

The managing editor was practically accusing him of selling the story.

Preposterous as the idea was, Billy realized that to a prejudiced mind, such as the managing editor’s, there would be no way of explaining matters. His thoughts were suddenly broken in on by Mr. Stowe’s harsh voice.

“Is there any one else, Barnes?”

Like a flash the recollection of his encounter with Reade at the very door of the managing editor’s room, the latter’s strange and defiant manner, and the unaccountable publishing by the Despatch of a rival offer, came into Billy’s mind. He was about to mention Reade’s name when he checked himself.

What proof had he?

Then, too, he saw that Stowe’s mind was made up. He did not wish to appear in the position of trying to throw the blame on a man whom he realized the managing editor would not believe could by any possibility have any knowledge of the Planet’s plans.

“I am waiting for your answer,” came the cold, incisive voice again.

“I can think of none, sir,” rejoined the young reporter with a feeling that he had put the rope about his neck with a vengeance now.

“Hum! In that case, by a process of elimination, we have only one person who could have done it, and that – ” He paused. “I hate to have to say it, Barnes, but it looks bad for you.”

“Great Heavens, Mr. Stowe!” gasped Billy, who, while he had seen what the managing editor was leading up to, was struck by a rude shock of surprise at the actual placing into words of the accusation, “do you mean to say you think that I would do such a thing?”

“I don’t know what to think, Barnes,” was the discouraging answer. “I am more sorry than I can say to have had to speak as I have. However, until you can clear yourself of the cloud of a suspicion that must rest on you because of this affair we shall have to part company.”

Billy went white.