"Then," von Herrnung was beginning impatiently, when a sallow, undersized young man, whose hollow chest and inky paper cuffs advertised his clerical employment, came up, touched a pen sticking out from behind his ear, and said as Sherbrand turned to him:
"Beg pardon, sir, but the telegraph-cabin is locked up proper, and Mr. Macrombie 'as carried orf the key."
"Out of sorts to-day, is he?" Sherbrand asked meaningly, and the telegraph-clerk answered:
"I've never seen 'im so bad before--in the middle of the month!"
As Fate would have it, Macrombie, ex-Petty Officer Telegraphist of the R.N.--from whose sleeve the golden Crown and thunderbolt had been reft by reason of his anti-teetotal habits, had received a visit that morning from a friend who had repaid a debt. Hence the licensed operator of Fanshaw's experimental and educational Wireless-station had succumbed to an attack of his intermittent complaint.
Hear Macrombie's assistant continuing the recital:
"He's left the aerial connected to the transmitter and gone out for lemon-squashes four times since one o'clock grub. 'That's the drink for men who have souls to save, ye little fag-eater!' he says to me; 'Salvation for soul and body, sucked through a straw! If thae deboshed and hopeless drunkards at the Admiralty could be induced to swear off their cursed alcohol and take to it, I wad no longer be deaved to the point of steeping my tongue in profanity, by the kind o' eediots' gibberish that is yammering at my lugs!'"
"He'd been raking a lot of Admiralty strays in?" Sherbrand queried. Von Herrnung, who had been grinding his heel into the turf and gnawing his lip with ill-concealed impatience, turned his head sharply, and listened to the colloquy with all his ears.
"Not so much X's as definites, sir," responded Macrombie's assistant. "He was upset about ten minutes before he broke out by getting an 'Urgent' without a Preparative Call. Then comes 'Important' in International Code, and 'Administration' and 'Emergency.' Then 'War Office,' and 'Documents,' and 'Enforcement of the Law.' By that time 'e was purple in the face and 'arf crazy. 'If I had my way wi' you, ye bung-nosed intemperates,' he says, groaning-like--'I wad keep ye on grits an' caller watter for a fortnicht! Oh, that men, as auld Hosea says in the inspired Screeptures'--an' I 'appen to know myself it was Shakespeare--'should pit an enemy intil their mooths to steal awa' their brains!' An' 'e snatches off the telephone 'ead-band and chucks it into the corner, and just as my own instrument starts to tick out a call, he ketches me by the neck as if I'd bin a tame rabbit, an' slings me out o' the office an' locks the door. 'Out o' this!' 'e says, puttin' the cabin key in 'is pocket. 'I will no' have your lugs, dirr-ty as they are, polluted by the unclean counsels o' the wicked. I'm awa' to cool the wrath o' the righteous wi' anither lemon squash!' An' the winder is blocked by the Morse key instrument, an' even if it wasn't, it's too small for me to get in through!" Macrombie's victim ended, with an injured sniff.
"Well, well! Better hang about the cabin a bit and possess your soul in patience. If any pupils drop along, tell them they'll have to wait! Perhaps Macrombie'll turn up sober enough to take them on by-and-by. As for the message in transmission, I daresay it will keep. Mr. Fanshaw's not expecting any particularly important communication that I know of. Oh, hang it!" Sherbrand whistled dismally. "I'd forgotten. That's just what I am!"
"Shall I go and see if I can find Rumball?" suggested Macrombie's assistant helpfully. "He's at the engine-sheds. He's been a locksmith. 'Twouldn't take him more than a sec. to open the office door!"
"Cut then!" acceded Sherbrand, and the telegraph-clerk touched his pen--discovering by a jab of the inky nib that he was wearing it--and set off at a trot in the direction of the engine-sheds.
You are to suppose that von Herrnung's sharp ears had gathered the pith of the communication. Some meaning in the isolated words the clerk had repeated had had a palpable effect upon his nerves. His face looked bluish-grey and streaky, as he said to Sherbrand, stammering in his eagerness:
"So then, it is agreed about my flying your machine?"
"I see no objection."
"_Gut!_" Von Herrnung went on, concealing a huge joy under a careless camaraderie: "Can you lend me a cap and coat and a pair of _Schulzbrille_? Goggles you call them, yes! The coat should better to be a large one"--he stumbled in his English now through sheer excitement--"I am so much a bigger man than you!"
"Certainly. We keep Flying rigs in all manner of sizes. It's in the way of business," Sherbrand said. Then his glance fell upon Davis, whose little black-avised countenance wore an expression of sulky resentment, and he uttered a slight exclamation. "I forgot, Davis! I really am very sorry!" He turned to von Herrnung and explained in a tone of finality that enraged the hearer: "This is Davis's afternoon off. I cannot ask him to repeat the climb."
"It is hellishly annoying! But see! Listen, my fellow!" He addressed himself to little grimy Davis, unhelmeted and unbuttoned, leaning against the Bird's flank with his hands in the pockets of his oily overalls, chewing a blade of grass; "You will go up with me if I tip you? A sovereign! Come then! The gold does it! You will go up with me, will you not, yes?"
Davis spat out grass and delivered himself:
"Not even for my young guv'nor--and a Bank of England finnup, do I do the soaring heagle hact again this blooming Wednesday."
Welsh Davis had come to London from a mountain farm in Merioneth, speaking nothing but his native Cymric, and had culled his Sassenach from Cockney lips. Von Herrnung bid another sovereign, and then two more, ineffectually.
"Naow!" Davis was rock. "I've done my day's stunt an' I'm nuffy. D'yer tumble? Nuffy! Yer knaows wot that means--if you're a Flying Bloke!"
"Damn you, I will gif you ten pounds!" Von Herrnung's face was wrung and streaked with passion. He breathed hard, and the brown leather satchel jumped and wobbled in his shaking hand.
"It isn't any use," said Sherbrand, "really! Money doesn't count with Davis where his off-time's concerned. Davis doesn't want to go up again, and I've not another man of his weight available. What do you turn the scale at? I should guess 16 stone or thereabouts?"
"I weigh 16 st. 8 lbs. in my ordinary clothes."
"Well, I tot 11 st. 6 lbs. in the fullest of flying-rig, and Davis only 8 st. 5 lbs. And the Bird is built to carry in addition to her engine--what with the instruments, so forth, and man-freight, a cargo of something like 22 stone. You see, even with Davis, you'd load the machine a good bit over her"--he smiled at the conceit--"her Plimsoll mark. Again, I'm sorry. It's your luck! No flying for you to-day!"
"It is damnably annoying! But"--von Herrnung's red-lashed blue eyes were busily scanning Bawne's face and figure--"but suppose I could get a boy of 6 stone to go up with me? Merely as ballast, for I do not require an assistant--the difficulty might be got over in this way? What you say, my little English fellow?" He turned on the boy with a great air of jovial patronage. "Are you plucky enough? Shall we go for a voyage together in the sky?"
"Yes--please!"
The dark blue eyes met the hard light ones bravely, though every vestige of colour had sunk out of the young face. Then back to lips and cheeks the banished colour came racing. Bawne flushed crimson, as von Herrnung held up a bright bit of gold, and sharply shook his head.
"_Was_? Will you not take the sovereign?" von Herrnung demanded. "Are you a faint-heart after all?"
The boy bit his lip and said, clenching his small fists desperately:
"It's against the rule for Scouts to take tips. So I don't want the money. But I'm ready to come with you!"
"Look here, old fellow!" Sherbrand was beginning anxiously. The boy stopped him with:
"Really and truly I'm not funky--and you said I was to have another flight."
"So I did, and so you shall," agreed Sherbrand. "But this won't be just a 'bus trip around the aerodrome. It will be climbing and spiralling and hovering, and all the rest!"
Bawne persisted:
"You could strap me in. And I'm not afraid--really!"
"And," von Herrnung interposed, "I shall not ascend higher than three thousand. Probably less will do for my purpose. The boy will be quite safe. Surely you are able to trust him with me?"
Sherbrand hesitated, then said to Bawne in a relieved tone: "Well, there's the Doctor talking to a tall lady in white with a hat that glitters. Run across to your father and ask him whether you may go?"
"I'd rather you asked him--if you must--and let me stop here!"
"_Gut! Sehr gut!_" Von Herrnung's tautened nerves would have been relieved by some hard Prussian swearing. He jangled out a laugh instead. He caught hold of the boy under the armpits and lifted him high above his head. "What is your weight? Six stone? Come now, have I not guessed nearly!" He had not relinquished his grip on the leather satchel, and as it banged against his ribs, Bawne realised that it was quite light.