Air pilots -- Fiction; Criminals -- Fiction; Short stories
“Kidwell will do all the talking because it is he who is equipped with the
long distance sending and receiving apparatus. Dexter can talk with
Kidwell and Kidwell can talk with Dexter by changing the plug at the side
of the machine, so he is directly connected with Dexter. Dexter is the
pilot in the rear seat and will drive unless something happens. If
something should happen, Kidwell can drive as they have double controls.”
“Hey, below! We are having fun up here chasing toy balloons. Those that
have been let loose on the Fair Grounds have reached this far up. There
are twenty or thirty in sight. We have run down three or four. One was
thrown back by the propeller’s draft and hit Old “Dex” on the head and
busted. He would have jumped out of his seat if he were not tied down with
a safety belt. Thought part of the machinery had hit him, I guess. We are
climbing in circles and staying over the Fair Grounds as nearly as we can.
The hand on our instrument is gradually crawling near two miles and we can
begin to tell it is getting very cold. We feel sorry for you poor land
mortals below sweating in that 100 degrees in the shade. But say, ‘you
don’t have to stay in the shade’--Ha, Ha!”
The sound of Kidwell’s laughter from two miles above roared through the
horns. It ceased and no other sound came from above for several minutes.
“Got another balloon; caught it alive this time; going to tie my pipe to
it and drop it overboard. The pipe will pull it down. Tell the kids down
there I will give five dollars to the one who gets it and I will wring
their necks if any of them busts my pipe. Here she goes--”
Cheers and laughter greeted this last announcement and many small boys
jammed in the crowd began to crowd and squirm frantically to get out into
the center field where they could watch for Kidwell’s pipe pulling a toy
balloon down.
“You below! We are going to have trouble in just a minute. Saw several
balloons above us snatched and rushed east at a speed that makes us look
like a snail. It’s one of those terrific wind currents that different
persons have discovered two or three miles up. We will be O. K. when we
get in it, but going from slow to fast air is going to give us some rough
riding. We are starting; I can feel our old machine beginning to pitch.
Here we go!-- God, we are pitching and spinning like a leaf. We are on our
tail--now we are upside down. Over we go sideways--now we are level--whew,
we just made a complete flip-flop. It’s a wonder we hold together--we are
rocking and pitching like a row boat on a stormy ocean.
“We are getting up in the main current and don’t pitch so much. It is all
I can do to hold my dinner down. I’m sea-sick--we are heading west, but I
think we are losing several miles a minute as this terrific air current
drifts us east.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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