A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah! (14 page)

We accelerate and feel 2-G’s and are uncomfortable, 3-G’s and we suffer, 5-G’s, 6-G’s strange things happen, death and heart failure and blackouts, very nasty. But, suspended in a liquid medium, we have had test subjects, simians for the most part, subjected to 50-G’s and they survived in fine fettle. So that is what we are doing how. A space-going womb, ha-ha, you might call it.”

“Submerged all the way? I hope I won’t have to hold my breath?”

“That would be impossible… Oh, pulling my leg, Captain Washington?

Oh dear yes! No, indeed, quite comfortable. The water may be chill but you will be wearing a wet suit with an oxygen mask. Quite comfortable indeed.”

Comfortable was not exactly the correct word, Gus thought as helping hands slipped him into the space-going bath. He dropped below the surface and fastened the snaps to his belt as he had been instructed while he breathed slowly and carefully through the mask. It was all quite interesting though there was a moment of disquiet when the distorted faces and hands above him vanished and the nose cone slid into place with a resounding clang. The water carried all the sounds and he could hear the clanking and grinding of metal al the bolts were secured. Then silence?!

This was the worst part, the waiting in the darkness and solitude.

Alone, alone as he had never been before in his life, perched atop this column with its cargo of highly combustible fuel. Waiting. He could visualize the roof opening up above the rollers, the preflight check-off, the switches thrown. He had been told this would take a few minutes but had not realized that his time perception would be thrown off to such a degree.

Had minutes passed—or hours? Had there been a failure, an accident?

Could he escape from here or would he die in a boiling pot atop a fiery column? His imagination’s steamed along in high gear and had he been able to speak he would have shouted aloud so great was the tension at this moment.

And then a sound, a whine and al scream like the souls in the pit in eternal agony. He felt the hair on his I neck stir before he realized that it was just the high-speed pumps going! into operation, forcing the fuel into!

the combustion chamber. The flight was beginning! And at the instant he realized that there was a distant rumble and roar that grew fantastically until it beat at his ears so he had to cover them with his hand while something unseen jumped on his chest and battered him down! Blast off!

For a long and unmeasurable time the pressure continued—then suddenly ceased as the engines shut down. The rocket was coasting. In those eternity-long minutes while the engines were working they had burned their way up through the storm and penetrated the atmosphere above and the stratosphere above that until now they were beyond the last traces of airy envelope of the Earth and arcing through the vacuum of space. The Atlantic was a hundred, two hundred miles below them and ahead was England. And the waiting computer at the airport in Croydon, that sleepy little suburb of London, an electric Brabbage engine that was not as reliable as the mechanical one and he hoped that, at least this once, the enthusiastic Captain Clarke would prove to be wrong about the reliability of that machine.

Yet as they coasted his heartbeat slowed and he felt a measure of peace and even good cheer. Fail or succeed, this was a voyage that would be remembered, almost a modern version of that romantic novel by the Frenchman about a voyage around the world in eighty days using all forms of transportation. Well here he was, utilizing some forms of transportation that the redoubtable M. Verne had never dreamed existed. This game was certainly worth the candle. It was in this reposed state of mind that he felt the engine re-ignite and so composed was he that he smiled at the thought. Dropping now, over Surrey and down, steering, pointing, falling and at the last moment the crack of the released parachute. There was a sudden jar that might well have been that parachute opening and,soon after another and, what he was sure was a cessation of motion. Had he arrived?

Evidence came swiftly. There was a clank and a bump, then another one and once again the grinding of metal. In a moment the nose cone above him vanished from sight and blurred faces appeared in its place against the brilliant blue of the sky. Of course! He had flown into daylight in the swiftness of his voyage. He rose up and pushed his face above the surface of the water and tore off the mask and smelled the sweetness of the warm air. A smiling face, bad teeth in that wide grin and a spanner in the matching hand, looked down, while next to this face a sterner one below a blue official cap and a square of cardboard next to that.

“Her Majesty’s Customs, sir. You have seen this card which lists contraband and dutiable items. Do you have anything to declare?”

“Nothing. I have no baggage.” Strong hands helped him out to the top of the wheeled platform that rested against the tall rocket. A view of white concrete, green trees beyond, a waiting group of men, distant cheers. He turned to the Customs officer.

“Might I ask you the time?”

“Just gone a quarter to nine, sir.” Was there time? How far to the station in London? Ten, twelve miles at least. Pushing away the helping hands he scrambled to the ladder and half slid to the ground, stumbling at the bottom and turning to see a familiar bulky form before him.

“Fighting Jack!”

“Himself. Now hurry and you like’t‘make it yet. There are clothes in here.” He thrust a paper parcel into Gus’s hands while hurrying him forward at the same time towards an unusual vehicle that was backing towards them.

“That there driver is Lightning Luigi Lambretta who is a good driver, even though a Wog. Now get in and away with you.”

“A pleasure to meet you, signore,” the driver said as Gus dropped into the empty cockpit and felt the seat slam into his back the instant he was down. “This car the winner of the Mille Miglia, so not to worry.
Due cento
, two hundred of your horsepowers, like the wind we shall go.

Steam-powered turbine, fuelled with gasoline and using Freon as the vaporizing fluid. The
polizia
out and roads cleared all the way to Putney Bridge and beyond. A nice day for the drive.”

They roared, they raced, they dived down the road with a squeal of complaining rubber as they sideslipped and skidded broadside into the London Road at over a hundred miles an hour. Quick glimpses of bobbies holding back the crowds, flags waved, a holiday air to everything.

Squirming in the tiny seat Gi managed to slip out of the wet and the slipstream grabbed it and whisked it from sight. He was more careful as he opened the parcel drew out small-clothes, shirt, tie lounge suit and sturdy boots below all this. It was an exhausting effort to get them on, but don them he did and even knotted his tie fairly adequately.

“The time?” he shouted.

“One minute past the nine.”

“Then I have failed…”

“Not yet, signore.” Roaring at one hundred thirty-five miles an hour onto Putney Bridge. “Things are arranged, I have talked by the phone, all of England is on your side, the Queen herself. She was delayed leaving Buckingham Palace, marvelous woman, and now she proceeds most sedately by the horse and carriage to the station. All is not lost yet.”

Would he succeed? Would failure follow this heroic effort? It was now in the hands of the gods and it was to be hoped that they were smiling.

Brake, accelerate, squeal of rubber, broadside through the narrow streets, a twist of the wheel to save the life of a stray dog, around another corner and there was the station. Down the ramp towards the platform, the State Coach to one side, empty.

The train, pulling out.

“Never fear, dottore. Lightning Luigi will not fail you!”

Laughing wildly and twisting his fierce mustachios with one hand the intrepid driver hurtled his blood-red machine at the platform while the officials and bystanders scattered, raced up to the train, alongside of it, easing over until his offside wheel was only inches from the platform edge, matching his speed to that of the train and holding it steady and even close to the open door.

“If you would please to disembark, signore, the end of the platform fast approaches.”

In the instant Gus was standing on the seat, standing on the rounded top of the racing car and bracing himself with a hand on the driver’s head, reaching out for the extended hand from the train, grabbing it, leaping, looking back horrified as the driver stood on his brakes and slid and twisted and slammed into the pillars at the station’s end. But he was waving and shouting happily from the smoking wreck.

“This way, sir,” said the porter. “Your seat has been reserved.”

II. POINT 200

Green England hurtled by outside, fields and streams like speeding patchwork quilts, blue rivers that swept under their wheels, black bridges and gray stone villages nestled around church spires, also in motion, also whisking by to quickly vanish along with the waving crowds in the fields and the rearing horses and barking dogs. It seemed that the entire countryside was unrolling for the benefit of the lucky travelers in this mighty train this fortunate day, for so smooth was the ride that the passengers aboard the
Flying Cornishman
felt that they were indeed standing still and the whole of England was spinning by beneath them for their edification alone.

They were indeed a blessed few who had secured passage in this inaugural run of the tunnel train, nonstop London to Point 200, the artificial island far out in the Atlantic Ocean, west of Ireland, and over a hundred miles from the nearest shore. The Queen was aboard, and Prince Philip, while the Prince of Wales also had returned by special train from Moscow where he was on a state visit to make the trip. There was a sprinkling of the nobility and the Proper Names, but not as many as might be expected at the Derby or a fashionable opening, for this was science’s day, the triumph of technology, so that the members of the Royal Academy outnumbered those of the House of Lords. The company directors were there as well as the largest financial backers, and a well-known actress whose liaison with one of these backers explained her presence.

There was champagne, bottles of it, cases of it, oh dear—a refrigerated room full of it, courtesy of The Transatlantic Tunnel Company who had bought almost the entire stock of an excellent 1965 from a lesser known but superior chateau. This golden liquid flowed like a river of beneficence through the corridors and compartments where glasses were lifted and toasts drunk to the glory of this hour, the superiority of British engineering, the strength of the pound, the stability of the Empire, the peace of the world, the greatness of this day.

Aboard as well, in sorely diminished ranks, was the press, thinned down by the exigencies of seating space, swollen again by the need for complete world coverage for this historical event. One cameraman was filming everything for the entire world to see at the same time on their television sets, though of course B.B.C. viewers would see it first, while the world papers would have to be satisfied with what the gentleman from Reuters told them, other than the French that is, who would read what was written by a small dark gentleman, pushed to the rear by his bulkier Anglo-Saxon colleagues, who was aboard though by bribery for which at least one head would roll in Transatlantic House. Of course the gentleman from
The Times
was there, since the kind attentions of the Thunderer of Printing House Square were much sought after, and a few other leading journals including, with much reluctance and persistent insistence since this was going to be a
transatlantic
tunnel, the square-shouldered bulk of the New York
Times‘
man.

They all wanted to talk to Washington at once, because he was the most singular piece of news aboard for the readers around the world who had been following every thrilling and heart-stopping detail of his journey.

Now, on the last leg, with the finish line but a few hours away they wanted him to describe all of the earlier stages down to the smallest detail.

Between sips of champagne he answered them, relivüng the heartstopping moment aboard the helithopter and the rocket, the mad ride to London, the last moment arrival. He was in formed in turn that the driver, Lam bretta, had received only minor bruises and regretted nothing, was in fact, enthused that one of
the
more popular dailies had already purchased his personal story for a price reputed to be in five figures.

Every foot of the journey to Penzance, Gus was interviewed, and he was rescued only by the fact that the journalists had to file their stories Since they would have tied up completely the only telephone and telegraph link from the train they had been forbidden access to them, with the exception of the gentleman from
The Times
who had been permitted to file one brief report, so arrangements had been made to put off bag in Penzance. The great canvass sack, boldly labeled PRESS, was quickly filled with the reports and stories and the can of film put in on top. Other arrangements of an ingenious nature had been made as well so that the various reporters now dispersed to complete the work. Fast cars were waiting by certain fields displaying flags of particular colors, ready to pick up dropped containers, one motorcyclist on a racing machine paralleled the train briefly on a stretch of road and was seen to end up in a pond still clutching a hoop and attached package he had seized, while more than one net-armed and speedy boat waited in waters the train would cross.

Free of his interviewers for the moment, Gus found his compartment and his allotted seat, which he now saw for the first time, and accepted the congratulations and another glass of champagne from the other passengers there. At this point he escaped their attention for the train was slowing as they passed through Penzance where the waiting thousands cheered uproariously and waved their Union Jacks with such animation that they fluttered like gaudy birds. The Press bag was thrown to the platform and the attendant telegraph men, the train picked up speed again, through the city and towards the dark mouth of the tunnel, passing the sidings where the other trains waited, packed with humanity, to follow after the inaugural run. Faster and faster it went to dive with a roar into the black opening, accompanied by excited female shrieks at the sudden night.