Johnny Graphic and the Etheric Bomb (18 page)

So, he thought—sitting up straighter, turning up the corners of his mouth—I’d darned well better stop feeling so sorry for myself. No one gets anywhere with an attitude like that.

He took a deep breath, twisted around, and shouted, “Hey, Sparks. If you wanna read me that story, that’d be swell.”

A moment later he heard a shout from the top of the flying boat.

“I see ’em,” Uncle Louie hollered. “I see the tugboat.”

Johnny heard the
whooosh
of the flare as it shot up into the sky.

* * *

As soon as the tugboat nudged the Como Eagle into the dock in Landfall Harbor, Nina led Johnny off the flying boat. The bureau chief of the local World Press Association office was there to meet them. His name was Tangie Farhar and he had a high, squeaky voice. Johnny wished he could see him. He imagined him being short and fat, wearing a funny hat, like the movie comedian Stanley Sterling. The fellow took several pictures of the exhausted adventurers. Then they piled into a decrepit-sounding convertible and rattled off into town. Danny had stayed with the flying boat, to do an inspection and get her ready for the next leg of their journey.

“So what happened out there?” Tangie asked along the way. “Why the delay?”

As Johnny and the others told their tale to Tangie—who was, in fact, the entire staff of the WPA Bureau on Landfall Island—the automobile went faster and faster.

“I can barely wait to get Johnny’s film processed and Mel’s story out on the wire,” Tangie shouted over the brisk breeze. “But how about we take this young man to the doctor first?”

Johnny didn’t know what to expect, though he hoped the physician would have some kind of cure. Unfortunately, the sawbones echoed what Mel had said the day before. Flash blindness resolves spontaneously,
usually
. Johnny could only wait. There was nothing that medicine could do.

Their next stop was the WPA office. They trod up a set of outside stairs into a room that was cacophonous with the sound of teletypewriting relay machines rattling and banging away.

“Story first?” asked Tangie. “Or photos?”

“Photos,” said Johnny. “Absolutely.”

“Photos,” his sister agreed.

“Mel, give him the film holders,” said Johnny.

Fifteen minutes later the rotary door of the darkroom squawked loudly as it opened—Johnny recognized the sound from the
Clarion
photo department. Tangie’s feet shuffled across the room. Johnny waited with bated breath.

“Sorry, friends,” sighed Tangie. “The negatives are fogged. Blanked out. Nothing on ’em. No mushroom cloud. Zippo.”

Chapter 35

Johnny sat with Mel as she worked on the final draft of her article on the etheric bomb. She read out loud after she finished each paragraph and he told her what he thought sounded good, or how she ought to change it.

Normally, Johnny would have loved telling his sister what to do. What kid brother wouldn’t? But he was still blind and there were no pictures of the mushroom cloud. Something about the explosion—like x-rays, for example—had ruined his film. What a mess.

Still, he made sure Mel followed the “inverted pyramid” technique of news writing—putting the really important stuff at the beginning, the less important facts later on. They both interviewed Uncle Louie, Nina, and Danny about the crisis in the cockpit. It was a spine-tingling tale, worthy of any front page anywhere.

But right in the middle of Nina’s interview something very peculiar happened in Johnny’s unseeing eyes.

Ever since the bomb exploded, Johnny had, for practical purposes, been trying to see an ebony cat in an unlit coal mine at midnight. Only inky blackness. But now, sitting there carefully listening to Nina, he saw some flashes, glitters of green off to his right. Then, as he turned in that direction, a human figure took shape, also in green. A stout man in a uniform with a bushy beard. Lieutenant Finn! The colonel’s second in command, standing at ease at the other end of the room.

Johnny was dumbfounded. Was he just imagining it or could he really see the ghost soldier? And if he could, how was it that he could see someone who was dead, but no one who was alive? How could he see something ethereal, but nothing solid?

Mel’s voice cut in on his reverie. “Johnny, what is it? Are you okay?”

He fluttered his eyelids a few times, and Finn was still visible, suddenly looking at Johnny with a curious expression.

“I can see Lieutenant Finn,” he said. “Nothing else, though.”

Johnny could almost feel everyone in the room staring at him.

“Johnny, you’re sure that all you’re seeing is Finn?” asked Mel.

“Uh-huh, that’s right.”

“Lieutenant Finn, please make a gesture of some kind at Johnny.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the lieutenant answered.

Johnny stared at Finn. “He saluted us, Mel,” Johnny said, as the first grin in many a long hour broke out on his face.

Someone grabbed him and hugged him. It had to be Mel. And for once, Johnny didn’t mind.

“This is good,” said Mel. “This is very good.”

“Now he’s giving me the A-OK sign.”

“But you can’t see anything else,” said Mel.

“That’s right.”

“Hmmm…” Mel muttered. “That seems kind of strange. It could mean your regular vision’s on the way back. But I’ve never heard of anything like this happening before, when someone with etheristic sight goes blind. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

A bit after three in the afternoon, Tangie typed Mel and Johnny’s finished story into one of his teletypewriters. Mel insisted that Johnny share the byline with her. It was thrilling to know that their report would travel halfway around the globe in a matter of moments—to the headquarters of the World Press Association in Neuport. And from there it would go to hundreds of newspapers and radio stations all over the world.

An hour and a half later everyone was sitting directly under the WPA office, on benches at a plank table in Theodore’s Island Café. Dinner was Theodore’s chicken gumbo, fried seaweed, pineapple slices, and coconut cream pie. Johnny managed to eat his food without any help. It intrigued him that the flavors tasted more intense without his eyesight.

And he had to admit, it was nice to see somebody,
anybody
—even if they were just the ghosts of Lieutenant Finn and a few of the troopers.

* * *

One of the teletypewriting machines was rattling madly away upstairs, as everyone filed back into the office. The teletypewriter finally dinged, indicating that the transmission was complete. Johnny heard the rip of paper being torn out of the machine. There was a pause and Tangie announced, “Home office in Neuport didn’t make many edits in your story. Good job, you two.”

Just then, another teletypewriter clattered to life. A short time later another piece of paper was ripped out.

“A message from a Mr. Carlton Cargill?” Tangie said. He obviously didn’t know who this was.

“The editor at the
Zenith Clarion
,” said Uncle Louie. “Let me look at it.” There was a pause. ”Dogs in dishwater! More bad news.”

“What is it, Uncle Louie?” asked Johnny.

“Mr. Cargill’s gotten word that the Ministry of War knows we’re here,” Uncle Louie said. “They’ve arranged for a special team of agents to fly in tomorrow morning and grab us all.”

“You mean, like kidnap us?” Johnny asked, incredulous.

“Basically, yeah. That’s what Mr. Cargill says. Haul us back home in chains. If it’s true—and we’ve gotta assume it is—we have to make some tough choices. Do we stick around until morning, and chance getting in a dust-up with these people? Or do we make a run for it in the dark tonight?”

“Absolutely no way,” Danny said firmly. “Remember our little escapade up over the Treport River? No more of that, thanks very much. That bird’s not flying in the dark!”

“
Okay then, Dan,” Uncle Louie agreed.
“Fair enough. We can hide out here. But the problem is we can’t hide the Eagle. How do you conceal a big four-engine flying boat? They’ll take her or disable her and we’ll end up stranded on this island. It’ll all be over.”

Tangie cleared his throat. “Umm, sorry to contradict, Mr. Hofstedter, but
yes
, you can hide her. We can ferry your aircraft a few miles up the coast and anchor in my private lagoon overnight. I have spare bedrooms and a nice sofa. You can fly out at first light.”

“That’s a super idea,” Johnny exclaimed.

“Gotta admit that I like it, too,” said Uncle Louie. “How’s the gas, Dan? The food and water?”

“Clever me,” the pilot boasted. “I had her fueled up as soon as we arrived. The local market delivered food and other supplies just before I hiked over here to join you for dinner. Filled up the fresh water tank. Kinda wondered if this might happen. Half the time we seem to be making narrow escapes.”

“But what about that charming guesthouse where we’re supposed to stay?” asked Nina, sounding as if she couldn’t believe this turn of events. “The comfy beds with down pillows? Cakes and eggs and pork and delectable tropical fruits for breakfast? Sunrise over the scenic lagoon?”

“Sorry, kiddo,” Uncle Louie laughed. “We all gotta make sacrifices.”

Suddenly Johnny let out a gasp of surprise. Something was happening. Something perhaps very good. He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles.

It looked a lot to him like it did when the rising sun slowly lit up his darkened bedroom early in the morning. And it was revealing the real world, not just the ether.

“Johnny, are you all right?” Mel said.

He looked toward his sister’s voice and felt a big smile creep across his face. “You were right, Mel. Seeing Finn was the beginning. I’m starting to see some regular light, Sis. I see the light bulbs, and the bright windows, and some people shapes.”

“Great news, John!” boomed Uncle Louie.

Mel hugged her brother
again
, and Nina and his uncle slapped him on the back. Tangie ran downstairs for more root beer and something a little stronger for Danny, Uncle Louie, and himself. A toast and a celebration, he said, were most definitely in order.

* * *

Just before they left for the flying boat docks, Mel and Johnny stood with Lieutenant Finn on Landfall’s dusty, rutted Main Street.

His eyes finally working again, Johnny noticed that there wasn’t much there—a few threadbare shops, saloons, offices, a bank, a police station, and lots of palm trees.

Lieutenant Finn cleared his throat, even though a ghost shouldn’t need to. “Commander Graphic, what are your orders with regard to the colonel? No sign of him yet.”

“I can’t understand what could have delayed him,” Mel said, with a clear tone of concern. “It’s simply not like the colonel to be this late. I told him not to take any risks.” She looked down and shook her head. “Maybe he misunderstood me. Maybe he and the men went ahead to Gorton Island and he’s waiting for us there.”

“Always a possibility, ma’am,” answered Finn.

To Johnny it sounded as if both of them were trying to avoid mentioning the unmentionable. Who knows what that horrible explosion could have done. Even to a ghost.

“But let’s leave a few men here, in case they show up after our departure,” said Mel.

Johnny was uncomfortably warm, but he shivered nonetheless.

He didn’t want to think that he might never see Horace MacFarlane again.

Chapter 36

Thursday, October 31, 1935

Capital City, Plains Republic

Peter Santangelo watched Minister of Etheristics Hubert Scofield pace up and down alongside the broad oak table, twirling his gold-rimmed spectacles in his right hand. They were in a room many levels underground, in the bowels of the Ministry of War Building. This bare, windowless chamber had seen a thousand top-secret meetings since the Second Border War. It was a depressing place, especially in the middle of the night. Even more depressing than some of the places where Santangelo had recruited his ghost assassins.

Without warning the big double doors flew open and the minister of war trod into the room—red in the face, her silver hair plastered down around her head like a helmet. Mabel Patterson threw her fur stole and white kid leather gloves right onto the table. Looking slightly inebriated, she wobbled a bit. She was short and dumpy and stooped at the shoulders.

Her assistant—a brigadier Army general in full dress uniform—tried to take her elbow. But she turned on him and snapped, “Out.” He nodded sharply, backed away, and closed the doors.

“Where were you?” said Scofield. “The report about the bomb came over the news wires hours ago. Had a devil of a time locating you.”

She squinted at him, looking like a grumpy bulldog. “The opera. Tickets scarce as hens’ teeth. Giacomo Paranelli himself singing King Renaldo. Afterwards to Mrs. Pillsbury’s party. Then this news gets whispered in my ear. A splendid evening turns to ashes in my mouth. Those blasted Graphic brats!”

Scofield put on his spectacles and sat. “I am sorry.”

The minister of war regarded Santangelo with an evil eye, and he felt his stomach flip-flop. She was one of the most dangerous politicians in Capital City. Rumor had it that the reason Mabel Patterson was chosen as minister of war was because one look at that scary face of hers was enough to stop an advancing army.

“Who is this, Hubert?”

“Peter Santangelo. He’s been handling some of the, um, trickier aspects of the operation. He came here to tell us what he thinks has gone awry.”

Mabel Patterson plopped down in her chair, opposite Santangelo and Scofield. “Tell you something, Hubert. Didn’t take this affair seriously enough. Never
really
believed our so-called ‘khan’ would pull it off. I mean, a bomb made of ghosts? Really now. But the generals told me we had to have a piece of it, had to play his game in order to get the knowledge. It’s why we did this. Put our scientists in there. Funded it. Helped eliminate that ratty little bunch of etherists he was so worried about, who might be able to peddle the information elsewhere. What do you call them? The, um, Hammerschlager something or other.”