Stephen Morris

by Nevil Shute

  "I see," said Morris.

  "We ought to have got a biggish contract for the fighter. It hasn't come, and it won't come for some time now, perhaps with the next budget, perhaps longer. We're going to build another torpedo carrier in place of the one they crashed— there may or may not be a contract for that later. In any case, it won't be for some months, because they crashed the other one before getting any tests done on it, so that nobody knows what its performance is. Then there's the Sesquiplane. I expect that to be out in March, or late in February. If it's a success, we'll probably get an order to build half a dozen for the summer traffic—that will be a rush job if it comes."

  He paused a little.

  "So you see the position is that we ought to be all right in three months' time—if these things come off. I think we can hang on till then, but only by cutting the staff down to a skeleton. Now I want you to stay on and fly the Sesquiplane —I want that flown by someone who knows it inside out. I don't want another repetition of that torpedo-carrier business."

  Morris smiled.

  "Well, Mr. Morris," said the designer, "it comes to this. Things are pretty bad, but I think we'll get through all right. I don't want you to go off and take another job in a hurry, thinking you're going to be sacked. You're all right till the Sesquiplane has flown. After that, or by that time, I hope we shall be in a stronger position."

  He rose from his desk. "That's all I wanted to say."

  Morris returned thoughtfully to the drawing office. There he found that Rawdon had said substantially the same to each of them—with this difference. Pocock and Nichols were to go "on holiday."'

  At the end of an hour's desultory discussion, Pocock looked up with a queer smile.

  "I've been in some odd shows in my time," he said, "but this is the first time I've ever been on a sinking ship."

  By the end of February the drawing office, once numbering over twenty, had been reduced to five members. There were Morris, Baker the chief draughtsman, James the engine draughtsman, and two others. Corresponding reductions had been made on the business side. Thus the staff became dispersed, that highly trained staff that had worked together on the design of aeroplanes since 1916, in the days or the Rat. Pocock had gone north, and was reported to be working in a steel works. Nichols, who had been in aviation for eleven years, had found a safe, well-paid job in a biscuit factory; a permanency which at his age he was unlikely ever to abandon to return to the work in which he was of value to the country. He had children to educate. Of the draughtsmen, some had found other work outside the industry, some had taken to manual labour, and some were simply out of work, pathetically visiting the firm once • week in the hope of finding some improvement in the position, some chance of being taken on again. But no improvement was in sight.

  Morris's paper on the fuselages had been published in the February number of the journal. He had searched about for other fields of activity when that was finished, and had determined to investigate the possibility of detecting eddies round an aeroplane by testing a small model in a stream of water tinged with red ink. He had spent a little time in calculation of water speeds and trough dimensions most nearly in approximate to the air low; then he fixed up a sort of trough in one corner of the works and paid the model-maker to make him a little model of the Sesquiplane. So far the results were not promising.

  As the Sesquiplane approached completion, it became evident that it was going to be a surprisingly neat little machine. It was not easy, even for the initiated, to tell exactly what a machine was going to look like from the drawings. The model had been a pretty little piece of work; the machine itself was the best proportioned aeroplane that Rawdon had ever turned out. He had chosen a high lift section for the wing, which give it a relatively small span and created the appearance of a small, handy little machine, that would have no difficulty in putting down in any reasonable field. This was important in air taxi work. The landing speed was estimated at forty-six miles an hour.

  By the end of February it was ready for flight.

  Morris did not anticipate any difficulty in flying it. True, it was of an entirely novel type; a type that neither he nor anyone else in England had had experience with before. That did not seem to matter much. The machinery of design was so perfect, the methods of calculation so accurate and clearly defined that he knew, could almost say beforehand, what the machine would feel like in the air. He felt that he knew the machine inside out; he had confidence in it; it was a really fine little machine. It would make a big sensation when it appeared at Croydon. So far its existence had been kept a secret from the technical papers.

  So when the day came for it to be flown, Morris was very fairly confident in his ability to bring off this, his first real test flight, without untoward incident. The engine had been tested the evening before; it was the middle of the morning when the machine was brought out on to the aerodrome, and Morris climbed up into his seat. In more normal times there would have been a little crowd of draughtsmen slinking about the place, ostensibly on their lawful occasions, actually waiting to see the machine go up. There was none of that now, for the whole staff were on the aerodrome, chatting together as they waited for the flight.

  Morris started the engine and ran it up. Satisfied, he waved the chocks away and taxied out on to the aerodrome. Well, she taxied nicely; that was probably due to the new undercarriage, a compression rubber and oleo affair. That, in turn, had been due to an ingenious draughtsman, who was now out of a job, and likely to remain so, unless he took to manual labour.

  Morris faced the machine into the wind and stopped, allowing the engine to tick over. He made his final preparations and wondered if the lucky pig, presented to him when he was a child and now reposing in his collar box, was still valid. With the reflection that this question would shortly be decided, he looked to the pressure in the tanks and the temperature of the radiator water.

  Then he settled himself more securely in his seat, one hand on the control stick between his knees, the other on the throttle. Gently he opened the throttle; the machine began to move; he opened it slowly, progressively. Instinctively he lifted her tail off the ground as she ran along, and steadied her in that position. The throttle was nearly full open; now she must fly herself off the ground.

  From beside the hangars the little group watched her intently- Much depended on this flight. There was no sign of any Air Force contracts yet, and it was nearly budget time. Perhaps there would be no Air Force contracts this year. In that case, the very existence of the firm depended on the decent performance of this machine.

  The Sesquiplane accelerated smoothly and ran lightly over the grass. Light appeared beneath her wheels; she sank again for an instant, then lifted clear and left the aerodrome on a long, slow slant.

  At a height of perhaps seventy feet, a curious little incident occurred. The machine, to the watchers on the ground, seemed to sway a little laterally; one wing dropped—and did not come up again. Instead the whole machine sideslipped and seemed to progress sideways for an instant. Then the nose dropped a little and she steadied on to an even keel, with a louder note from the engine than before.

  On the ground nobody spoke. They stirred a little when the machine recovered, but never took their eyes off her. They were all experienced men.

  She began to turn towards the north, and came round in a wide circle. Apparently he was going to land her at once. Again he hit a bump, and again she sidled out of it in that queer, unconventional manner, losing height terribly.

  The machine came in high above the hedge and made a very fast landing a quarter of a mile out on the aerodrome. Morris taxied her in carefully, jumped down, and ■walked with Rawdon to his office. Rawdon closed the door behind him.

  Morris threw his helmet and goggles on the table. "Well," he said, "it was most unpleasant. She's got simply no lateral control at all. One could feel it almost before she left the ground—you know. Then when we hit that first bump— really I didn't think she was going to come out
of it. I don't mind telling you, it put the wind right up me. It was only her dihedral that got her out—I hadn't anything to do with it. I could just tip her over enough to make a very wide turn, using full aileron."

  "Very lucky you managed to get her down undamaged," said Rawdon. He turned absently to a blueprint of the machine. "I don't quite see it, though . . ."

  "There was one thing I noticed," said Morris. "The lateral control seemed very unstable. At times it was almost as if there was someone out on the wing kicking the aileron, and the force was coining back to one's hand by the control."

  "Oh—ho?" said Rawdon. "Turbulence?"

  "I think so," said Morris. "She was too good in the wind tunnel. I was talking to the chaps down there. When the air's running over her so well, the least little thing upsets it, and then you get eddies and things. I don't know . . .'"

  "It may be that big fairing on the strut," said Rawdon. "That's what it's most likely to be. Perhaps if we had that off and simply streamlined it . . .'"

  The next day Morris took Rawdon down to his water apparatus in the shops.

  "Look at that," he said.

  Rawdon looked. He saw in a smooth stream of clear water, submerged beneath the surface, a small model of the Sesquiplane.

  "Hullo, where did that come from?'"

  "Jackson made it for me," said Morris. "I've been working on this stuff for some time, you know, and I'd just chucked it as being useless. Then last night I thought I'd have a look at this control business with it—it comes out rather curiously."

  He lifted the model from the water. "You see this aileron? I’ve put it down about fifteen degrees; that's extreme, I know, but it doesn't show what I want it to otherwise. And I've got the fairing on that strut in plasticine, you see."

  He put the model into the running water. Then he took a thin glass tube leading to a supply of red ink and, placing this in the water two or three feet upstream from the model, allowed a thin streak of colour to flow down and play about the body and strut. Behind the strut the colour formed itself into a great whorl, which crept outwards from the body and upwards, creeping round upstream till it formed a complete horizontal oval eddy behind the aileron, extending to half its length.

  "What on earth is that thing doing—do you know what it means?" asked the designer.

  "I haven't the least idea," said Morris cheerfully, "but it doesn't look very healthy, does it? Funny thing is that it doesn't seem to happen at all with the aileron up normally. And of course, it may not happen in the air. But now, look at this."

  He lifted the model from the water and peeled off the plasticine from the strut. He replaced the model in the water and turned on the colour again. The stream flowed comparatively smoothly over body, wing, and strut, with no sign of the previous eddy.

  "No elastic up the sleeve or anything," said Morris.

  "That's what they told you at the National Physical Laboratory, isn't it? That something of the sort might happen? "

  "That's about it," said Morris. He turned off the ink. "It only really confirms what we always knew—that we've hit a case where the body and wing suit each other so well that we've got to be jolly careful what we're doing."

  The designer mused a little. What he had deduced from fifteen years' experience had been definitely proved by Morris with the experience of one. True, it was luck that this effect had happened to show in such a tank.

  "Well," he said at last. "That's very interesting confirmation of that strut interference, Mr. Morris. Ï was going to have it stripped, anyway. Don't dismantle this apparatus; I'd like to see some more experiments done before we abandon it."

  He moved away towards his office.

  Five days later the Sesquiplane was again ready for flight. A small notice on the office door, offering seats in the machine at ten shillings apiece, was eventually attributed to Morris, whose confidence in the machine was not shared by the draughtsmen. He took her off again in much the same manner; there was no longer any sign of aileron weakness, though a nasty draught came into the cockpit and gave him a stiff neck for the rest of the day. He stayed up for half an hour or so, putting her into every position he could think of, short of actual stunts. Finally he brought her in and made a moderately slow landing, and was loud in his grumbles against the windscreen.

  Now began a curious period of inactivity, which Morris found very trying. His purpose in the firm was ended with the flight of this machine; it was unlikely that there would be any more test flying for many months. There was no news of any contract that would enable the firm to keep going; he had not cared to ask Rawdon for details of the firm's position. All the rest of the technical staff had been sacked or put on holiday, and there was very little work for him to do in the office. Indeed, nobody was doing any work; they sat about reading magazines all day and wondered what was going to happen next. The designer sat in his office or went up to London, and gave no sign.

  Morris decided that he must go and ask him what his prospects were, what he was to do. It was better to know at once rather than to sit waiting to be sacked. Besides, he was genuinely concerned for the future of the firm; it seemed incredible that it should be allowed to break up. Yet that was what seemed to be happening.

  That interview never came off. A week after the successful flight of the Sesquiplane, Morris received an official-looking letter. The notepaper was the office paper of Pilling-Henries, the armament firm, who had dropped aviation at the end of the war. He opened it curiously; it ran:

  Dear Sir,

  We are reorganizing our aviation department under Mr. G. A. Haverton, F.R.Ae.S., who has mentioned your name to us. Should you be free, Mr. Haverton would be glad to interview you with reference to an appointment any morning during the next week, at eleven o'clock at the above address.

  * It was signed by somebody he did not know.

  Morris sat staring at it for a long time, while his breakfast froze to the dish. So far as he had known, he was a complete nonentity in the industry. He had very seldom visited any of the centres of aviation, such as Croydon; on such occasions as he had, he had merely passed through. So far as he knew, his name had never appeared in any technical paper; he had counted himself as completely unknown. In any case, there it was. It looked as if his financial difficulties were solved.

  Presently it occurred to him that there was an unpleasant tone about the letter, slightly disconcerting. The writer evidently knew all about him, and was evidently counting on Rawdon's failure. It was a good deal too much like robbing the body before it was dead. Still, he would go and see them.

  Two days later he went. He presented himself at the palatial offices of the armament firm in Westminster. After a brief sojourn in a mahogany-furnished waiting room, he was shown into a large room. There was one desk in the middle of the office; a pale-faced, corpulent man was sitting at it. At first sight Morris identified him in his mind with the instigator of the letter. So this was Haverton.

  "Mr. Morris," said the page. A faint smile spread over the features of the fat man; he got up and shook hands.

  "Good morning, Mr. Morris. I am very pleased to make your acquaintance. Sit down, will you?"

  Morris sat down, a little uneasily.

  The other plunged into his business.

  "We have heard, Mr. Morris, that you may soon be free. I need not comment further on the state of Captain Rawdon's business. We do not know if you are free, or if you are going to be free. We only know that you may be free . . ."

  Morris bowed a little, but did not speak.

  "As you know, this firm is starting again in aviation, and we are forming a staff for the design of military and commercial machines. The position at present, briefly, is this. We have no pilot at the moment, and we want men of your stamp—technical men. We can offer you substantially the same appointment as you are filling now. I am right in my facts so far, am I not?"

  "That is so," said Morris.

  "I may say that you are not altogether unknown to us," said the
fat man. "We have read your paper on fuselages, and we have heard of your ability as a pilot—in the matter of the Sesquiplane."

  Morris started, and immediately cursed himself inwardly for a fool. But how the dickens had that got out so soon?

  "We propose to build metal machines almost exclusively," continued the other. "We can therefore offer you a post in our design office at Sheffield, coupled with some test flying. For that there would be the usual terms. For the office work and pilot's retaining fee combined, we are prepared to offer eleven pounds a week."

  Morris was prepared for this, and flattered himself that he did not move a muscle. It was more than he expected. Still, he did not like it much.

  "You have had experience of wind channel work, have you not, Mr. Morris?

  "A little," said Morris. He did not mention that it had only been two days, and wondered if the other knew. Anyway, there was nothing in it.

  "We are setting up a wind channel," said the other. "We should probably wish you to make a special study of that."

  There was a pause.

  "I can't say anything at all, off hand," said Morris. "I should like a day or two to think it over." He knew that Haverton knew that what he really meant was: "I'm going back to see if Rawdon will bid any higher."

  "Exactly, Mr. Morris," replied the other. Morris knew that he meant: "That's our limit, and I think you'd be a fool to refuse it." Morris was inclined to agree with him there. But he was uneasy; practically every circumstance had disturbed him. He did not care about Haverton or the way he went about his business. The work was to be on metal construction, and Morris had no faith in the future of metal aeroplanes for many years to come. Then again, he was aware that it was unlikely that he would do his best work unless he liked the conditions. Could he rely on working well on these metal machines, under a man that he would probably dislike? He felt rather in the position of the engineer who has been offered a most responsible, interesting, and remunerative job on a sewage farm. Somehow, he did not connect aviation with an industrial area. It was more an affair of wide, open spaces, clean woodwork that did not come off on one's hands, bright shavings in a sunny workshop.