Johnny Graphic and the Etheric Bomb (10 page)

“Here” was next to a long, low country cottage built of blue fieldstone. Down a sloping lawn Johnny could see the Treport River flowing by. A dock reached out onto the water, then made a right-angle turn downriver. Bobbing easily on the river side of the dock was a streamlined, aluminum-skinned tri-motor aircraft on large pontoons, securely moored with multiple lines.

“Boy, oh boy!” Johnny said. “That’s some gorgeous flying boat.”

Uncle Louie whistled in admiration. “A Gianelli Z-509. About the fastest passenger seaplane in the world. Not a flying boat, really, but a floatplane. Has her own pressurized cabin. We can fly her straight to Silver City, right over the mountains.”

“They brought her up this afternoon,” Mr. Cargill explained, as they all climbed out of the automobile. “After our lunch at the Angry Trout yesterday, I called my friends at Zephyr Lines. Thought we might need a Plan B, since Santangelo knew about the other aeroboat Zephyr was sending. And as long as a judge hasn’t forbidden us to go…”

“There you are,” someone shouted.

The house’s double front doors had swung open and two men stood there, silhouetted against the orange, welcoming light of the front hallway.

“Come inside,” one of them hollered. “You’ll get soaked!”

Mel broke out in a big smile when she saw Danny Kailolu, in his sharp blue uniform. So she
does
like him, Johnny thought.

“Hi there, Mel,” said the pilot, holding the door open for everyone. “Like I was telling Jock here—” He nodded toward his co-pilot. “That girl looks a lot better without the mustache.”

Mel turned a little red, but didn’t look mad—which relieved Johnny. Even though the mustache had saved her life, it couldn’t be too much fun to be reminded of it all the time.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Mel said. “But I think you’ll find that most girls look better without mustaches.”

After introductions were made, they all trooped into the living room. Johnny whispered up into Danny’s ear, “I sure hope this flight isn’t as exciting as the last one.”

“How could it possibly be any crazier?” the pilot whispered back.

Chapter 19

Monday, October 21, 1935

Treport River

The living room’s golden-stained timber walls teemed with hunting trophies—heads of elk, bighorn sheep, a water buffalo, bears, even a lion. Johnny was impressed and took a shot of everyone standing in front of the water buffalo. Mr. Cargill explained that the house belonged to Mrs. Throckmorton, owner and publisher of the
Zenith Clarion
. Her late husband had been quite the big game hunter.

Everyone fit comfortably on the two maroon-brocade sofas that faced each other across a vast redwood coffee table. Kerosene lamps burned cozily here and there.

“So, my friends,” said Mr. Cargill, sitting down between Danny and Jock, “what’re our plans?”

Danny’s co-pilot, Jock Atkinson, was a string bean of a man, with a long, thin face. He spoke in the drawl of someone who had grown up in the Old Dominion. “Simple enough. We get y’all out to Silver City. Then Danny sticks with you folks and captains your Como Eagle. Mr. Hofstedter’ll be your co-pilot. I believe that Miss Bain there’ll operate the radio.”

Johnny winked at Nina, who was beaming. His friend had practically been walking on air the last couple of days.

“Of course,” Uncle Louie hastened to add, “I’ll have a little refresher training out in Silver City and Nina will get some hours in on the Eagle’s radio setup.”

“How soon can you leave?” Mr. Cargill asked.

“Not until dawn,” Danny answered. “We can’t take off in the dark on water we don’t know. We could hit a log, catch a sandbar.”

Mel cleared her throat. Everyone looked at her. “There might be a way to get out of here sooner.”

Danny peered at her curiously and raised his eyebrows. “You can’t bring the sun up early, can you, Mel?”

“That’d be a neat trick,” she said, “but, alas, no.”

“Then what?” Mr. Cargill said.

“I can tell you in a wink if it’ll work.” Mel hopped to her feet and ran outside, through the front doors. A few moments later, a little damp from the rain, she traipsed back into the living room with someone only she and Johnny could see—Colonel MacFarlane.

Mel nonetheless introduced the ghost officer to the two pilots, even though he was invisible to them. As she had told Johnny many times, it was the polite thing to do. Because ghosts had feelings, too.

“I’ve checked this out with the colonel and he thinks it’s practicable,” Mel said. “He and his men can go on and under the river and find a stretch that’ll allow the aeroboat to get off safely. It’ll take them less than an hour to do their scouting. How long a run will you need, Danny?”

“A mile with a good headwind,” he said, sounding rather wary. “A bit more, without it. But what’s the point, if I can’t see where to make my run?”

“The colonel and I thought about that,” Mel continued. “We’ll give the troopers flashlights, if we can find enough. The lads will float above the water to mark your runway on both sides. As simple as that. A safe nighttime takeoff.”

Danny shook his head emphatically. “I’m really sorry, but I’ve gotta say no. Taking the Gianelli out on black water, in the dark, in that drizzle? Even with the help of ghosts and flashlights? Not a good idea. And anyway, a few hours’ wait shouldn’t matter, should it?”

In the next room a telephone rang. Mr. Cargill heaved himself up off the sofa and went out to answer it. When he came back he was scowling even more darkly than usual.

“It was Miss Beale, my managing editor,” he said, looking at the two pilots. “The Department of Etheristics has the police out looking for us. They’ve been to Johnny and Mel’s house already. The ghost of some old lady walloped Santangelo pretty good, with a broom. Wish I coulda seen that. Gentlemen, they know your floatplane came in and refueled at South Bay Port.”

“But they can’t find us, can they?” Johnny asked.

“I’m afraid they know exactly where we are.”

“But how could they?” Johnny was appalled.

“Miss Beale tells me one of our pilots got too talkative.”

It seemed unlikely that someone with Danny’s dusky complexion could turn pink, then red, but he did. “The dock manager at South Bay Port asked where we were headed,” the flier moaned. “I told him an estate up on the Treport River.”

“Doesn’t take much to figure out who at the
Clarion
has a big, fancy cottage on the Treport,” Mr. Cargill observed.

“So if we stay till dawn,” Johnny said, suddenly more concerned than he’d been all night, “we might not even get to go!”

Mel drew herself up. “We have to try a night takeoff. The colonel won’t let us down. You have my word.”

“I’m not sure it’s worth dyin’ for,” Jock drawled.

Danny looked at his co-pilot, then at Mel and Johnny. “Listen, I’m really sorry about blabbing my mouth back there at South Bay.
Really
sorry. But if I make the wrong decision… I’m the captain of that Gianelli out there and I’m responsible for all our lives. If you could tell me what this is all about, Mel—why do you have government officials after you? What’s so darned important that you’d risk your necks for it?”

“I know this may sound insane.” Mel shook her head. “But I think someone, somewhere is trying to create what I call an etheric bomb. If it exists, it would be the most powerful weapon in history—capable of utterly destroying a city the size of Zenith or Neuport. One single bomb!”

Danny shook his head. “All due respect, Mel, but you’ve gotta be mistaken. How could such a thing even be possible?”

Mel filled in Danny and Jock on the Gesellschaft murders, then explained her suspicions about the etheric bomb. She said that as far as she knew, the people in this room were all that stood between this horrible weapon and the lives of innocent millions.

Mel suddenly looked as if she were carrying the weight of the world on her skinny shoulders. “I actually hope, Danny, that I’m wrong. But can we take that chance?”

Danny looked grimly around at the others. “I don’t like it, not one bit. But I guess we’ve got to give it a try.”

At that, Mel gave her orders to the colonel. “Survey the river. Quick as you can. We need a mile and a half of clean water.”

Chapter 20

Aided by the caretaker and his wife, Mr. Cargill and the adventurers combed the big bluestone cottage and guest cabins, hunting for flashlights. They found seventeen that worked—exactly as many as they needed.

In less than an hour, the colonel and his troopers had finished surveying the water. Everyone gathered on the dock, the drizzle still coming down, as the colonel reported his findings to Mel and Johnny.

“We can give your flying machine a mile and a quarter of deep, open water, going downriver,” the ghost said. “There’s a light headwind from the southeast. But your climb brings you out perilously close to some tall trees down where the river bends. Your driver will need to pour on the power. Just follow me. I’ll be right in front of you with a battery-powered torch. Pull you up with my bare hands, if needs be.” The specter laughed his papery laugh and winked.

Mel told Danny and Jock precisely what the colonel had said.

“Then you’d better give your etheric friends their flashlights and we’ll be on our way,” Danny said. He and Jock stepped up into the aircraft, and a few seconds later the cabin lights came on. Uncle Louie got busy loading the luggage that Nina and Mr. Cargill were bringing from the chief’s station wagon.

Mel and Johnny walked along the shore, each with a bag of flashlights, passing them up to the dead horse soldiers, showing each man how the devices worked. Then the troopers trotted off, taking up their positions on the broad Treport River—eight on one side, eight on the other. Holding the seventeenth flashlight in his left hand, the colonel positioned himself and Buck directly in front of the Gianelli Z-509.

Jock’s head popped out of the aeroboat’s door. “Come on board, y’all,” he shouted. “We’ll be ready to go in a few minutes.”

Johnny turned to his boss and stuck out a hand. Mr. Cargill took it and pumped it. “Remember, John, that you, your sister and your uncle all have letters of credit,” the chief said. “Good for cash money at any bank. Any World Press Association office will help—”

“
Automobiles comin’, Mr. Cargill!”

They turned around to see the caretaker pointing back toward the woods. Three pairs of headlights were snaking down from the highway through pines and poplars. The police!

“Lucky I locked the driveway gate when we arrived,” Mr. Cargill chuckled. “Time for you folks to hotfoot it, I think.” He clapped Johnny on the shoulder. “Good shooting, John, old man.”

Johnny made a crisp salute from the brim of his fedora. He couldn’t have felt more pride…or responsibility. He could sense the weight of it. Well, this was what he’d always wanted. “We won’t let you down, Mr. Cargill,” he said with a determined nod.

“Now I’d better go greet our visitors,” the chief said. “But I think I’ll walk kind of slowly.” He turned on his heel and began ambling up the long driveway, his hands in his pockets.

Johnny almost managed to climb the aeroboat boarding ladder in a single bound, scampering over the last step right on Nina’s heels. As soon as Mel started up the ladder she shouted, “We have company, Danny. Time to go.”

“Louie, untie the lines,” Danny hollered out of his cockpit window.

The old aeroboat jockey quickly undid the ropes securing the port-side pontoon. He was inside the aeroboat and sealing the pressurized door in under forty seconds.

The nose engine roared to life. Then the port. Finally the starboard propeller started turning. The streamlined seaplane slowly eased away from the dock and out onto the water, the rain drizzling down. It made a slow 180-degree turn—heading northwest, upriver against the current.

* * *

The flight deck was dim and far more cramped than on the Night Goose. But it was sure exciting being up here with Danny and Jock. In fact, Johnny had never seen a takeoff from this angle.

He and Mel hunched over behind the two pilots. All they had to do was stay upright and not get knocked over. They were supposed to be seated in back with Nina and Uncle Louie, but Danny wanted them to keep their eyes on the colonel—in case he made an important signal that the pilots couldn’t see.

The two siblings stared straight out through the windshield, which the wipers swiped clean of rain every few seconds. Just beyond the blur of the nose prop, the colonel and Buck trotted along easily, as if they were on a Sunday ride in the park.

Danny steered the streamlined floatplane through another broad U-turn and aimed it downriver. Ahead, two rows of flashlights, bobbing gently, flickered down the broad center of the river. The farthest lights looked fainter through the rain. In a voice that Johnny could barely hear above the din Danny said, “Okay, people, let’s go.”

The three radial engines roared like a tornado. The Z-509 surged downriver, past the first pair of lights. The nose came up and the water spray almost disappeared.

The colonel charged along just ahead of the central propeller, clearly visible to Johnny. As the third and fourth troopers flashed by, Johnny caught a brief glimpse of automobile headlights pulling up to the dock.

All of a sudden, the vibration of the pontoons on the river fell off to almost nothing and the aircraft’s nose came down. The seaplane was skimming along on top of the water. More pairs of lights zipped by in quick succession.

“Here we go everyone,” Danny shouted, easing the yoke back. The Gianelli bulled its way off the water.

“The colonel’s pointing up,” Johnny yelled. “We’ve got to climb!”

Danny responded. The nose tilted higher. The aeroboat zoomed by the last two flashlights. Rain still pounded the windshield.

Johnny saw the colonel tip Buck up almost onto his hindquarters, as if to charge up a precipitous hill.

“Steeper yet!” Mel screamed.

“He sees something!” hollered Johnny.