Barry Blake of the Flying Fortress
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CHAPTER TWO
TWO KINDS OF RATS
The weeks that followed were more crowded than any Barry Blake hadknown. Drills, monotonous, tiring, but excellent for physical “tone,”occupied the first few days. On Monday of the second week the regulartraining schedule began.
Mornings were devoted to Ground School. Barry and Chick put their bestinto it, knowing that study was vital to passing later tests. Therewere five subjects: Airplane and Engine Operation, Weather, MilitaryLaw, Navigation, and Radio Code. Of them all, Barry Blake preferred thefirst. His hobby had been flying model planes since he was in shortpants.
The classroom in Hangar V with its blueprints, charts, takedown andworking models made him feel at home. Here he “ate up” every lecture onFuel Systems, Motors, Electric Systems, Engine Instruments, Wheels, andBrakes. The floor of the great hangar itself Barry found still morefascinating. Here were displayed the real planes and their parts, withcutaway and breakdown views. They gave him his first intimate contactwith the powerful, fighting ships that he hoped soon to fly.
Flight instruction, in the BT-9 and BT-14 training planes, was always amixture of anxieties and thrills. There was much to learn, and littletime to learn it. In these ships, twice as big as the primary school“kites,” the speeds were higher, the controls more quickly responsive.The gadgets on the instrument panels were just double in number. Andthe instructors—!
“Lieutenant Baird has it in for me, Barry,” Chick Enders confided, asthey headed down the concrete apron toward their ships. “No matter whatI do, he just sits back and sulks. All the encouragement I’ve had fromhim is a grunt or a glare—ever since the day I taxied into the wrongstall with my flaps down.”
A step or two behind him, Barry glanced down at Chick’s short legstwinkling below the bobbing bustle of his ’chute. In spite of himselfBarry chuckled. The idea that anybody could “have it in for” a fellowas homely and likeable as Chick was just too funny.
“Perhaps Lieutenant Baird has other troubles,” he suggested. “Remember,when your flight period begins he has already spent an hour with a hotpilot by the name of Glenn Crayle. That lad is enough to curdle themilk of human kindness in any instructor. I wouldn’t worry about it,Chick. You passed your twenty-hour test all right, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” Chick admitted. “Maybe it is Crayle, more than I, who’sresponsible for the lieutenant’s sour puss. Crayle’s a born show-offand a sorehead as well. Even the processors couldn’t prick his bubble,and they tried—oh-oh! G-gosh! I—er—hello, Crayle! I—uh—didn’t seeyou coming.”
Walking fast, Cadet Crayle passed the two friends with a glare. Theyturned and watched him disappear into the Operations Office. ChickEnders let out his breath in a long whistle.
“He must have heard all we said about him before he zoomed past us,”Barry said, with a dry smile. “Oh, well! It’s the truth, and it _may_do him good when he thinks it over.”
Practicing his _chandelles_ that afternoon, Chick gave less thought tohis instructor’s sour mood. As a result he did better than usual. BarryBlake, for his part, forgot the incident completely. It was not untilspecial room inspection, the following Saturday morning, that herecalled Crayle’s ugly look.
Barry Blake was room orderly that week. This meant that he alone wasresponsible for the general neatness of the quarters he shared withChick and Hap Newton. For ordinary morning and evening inspection thepreparations were simple. Beds must be made, the room must be swept anddusted, and everything had to be in its proper place.
On Saturday, however, all three roommates pitched into the work.Everything must be in perfect, regulation order—each blanket edge laidjust so, each speck of dust wiped up. Shoes, clothing, equipment mustbe spotless, or demerits would fall like rain.
To make sure that Barry had overlooked nothing in his dusting, Chickand Hap went over the furniture with their fingers, searching for asmear of dust. They found none, until Hap tried the bottom of the wastebasket.
“Two ‘gigs’ for you, Mister Blake—if the inspecting officer had foundthat,” he remarked, with a wink at Chick.
“You’re dead right, Hap,” Chick spoke up, wiping his finger over thesame spot. “The inspecting officer will do it with white gloves, youknow. And if he gets a smear—”
“Aw, drive it in the hangar, fellows!” Barry protested with a grin.“Give me that waste basket and a rag. And then go wash your own hands.”
“Okay—but not in the washbowl _I’ve_ just finished cleaning!” retortedHap. “It’s too near inspection time. I’m going down the hall....Coming, Chick?”
Barry polished the bottom of the waste basket as if it were brass. Ashe put the cleaning rag away, he glanced about him.
“If this room were to be any cleaner, it would have to be sterilized,”he declared. “Bring on your white gloves, and let’s see what they canfind now. Guess I’ll have just time to join Chick and Hap down the halland get back before inspection.”
The three roommates had figured almost too close. They were juststarting back to their room when call to quarters sounded. As theyhurried into the hall, a uniformed figure darted across the farther end.
“Say!” hissed Chick Enders. “Didn’t that mister come from _our room_?”
“I thought so,” muttered Barry. “He _looked_ like Glenn Crayle! Iwonder....”
There was no time for more speculation then. Official footsteps wereapproaching. The three cadets were just able to reach their room andstiffen at attention by their beds before the inspecting party came inview.
The officer in charge was Captain Branch, whose piercing black eyes hadnever been known to miss a spot of dirt. Square-jawed, quick-moving, heentered the room accompanied by a cadet officer with notebook andpencil. His thin, sensitive nostrils sniffed the air.
“Who,” he asked sharply, “has been smoking here within the last fewminutes? The room smells foul!”
A tense, five-second silence followed. Barry Blake broke it.
“I don’t know, sir,” he managed to say. “It was none of us three. Wedon’t use tobacco.”
The muscles of the captain’s jaw bulged. The thin line of his lipshardened.
“What is your idea in leaving rolls of dust under your bed atinspection?” he demanded bitterly. “And dirty soap on your washbowl?And that can of foot powder on the desk? And that drawer—”
He broke off, to stride across the room. From the crack of a drawer inBarry’s desk drifted a tiny feather of smoke. Captain Branch jerked itopen. There, on a charred paper, lay a smouldering cigar.
With his face like a marble mask, the officer tossed the cigar into thewashbowl.
“Gentlemen,” he said heavily. “This is an idiotic defiance ofauthority. Unless you can clear yourselves immediately in a writtenreport, appropriate punishment must follow. That is all.”
Not until the captain was out of hearing did the roommates dare to lookabout. Then, with a sigh that told more than words, Barry stooped andpicked up two big, fuzzy “rats” of dust. Wordless, Chick Enders tookthe can of foot powder from the desk and wiped up what had been spilled.
Hap Newton groaned.
“It was Crayle, all right,” he declared. “I recognized him by the wayhe carries his head.... But _why_? Why should he want to sabotage _us_?”
“I think I know,” said Barry. “Two days ago he overheard Chick and metalking about him. What we said was true enough, as this frame-upproves—that Crayle is a sorehead, with an inflated ego.”
“Inflated and inflamed, both!” Chick Enders exclaimed. “He’s alwaystrying to tell what a hot pilot he is. He hates anybody who shows himup.”
A hard grin stretched Hap’s wide, good-natured mouth.
_Smoke Drifted Through a Crack in the Drawer_]
“We’ll show him up for a sneaking rat,” he said. “Nose up to the desk,fellows, and we’ll get busy on that written report....”
“Pull out of it, Hap!” Barry Blake interrupted. “We’ll only do a groundloop that way. Ou
r best maneuver is to say nothing about Crayle andtake our medicine. We can’t prove a thing against him, anyhow.”
Hap Newton’s jaw dropped. He sat down hard on his chair.
“You-you’re crazy, Blake!” he gasped. “We’re likely to be dismissedfrom Randolph for what’s happened this morning. Why should we sacrificeour wings, our reputation—everything we value here—to protect ayellow snake-in-the-grass like Crayle? That’s what it will mean!”
“We’ve circumstantial evidence that Crayle did it,” Chick Enders putin. “He had no business in our quarters. And it _would_ have beenidiotic for us to stand inspection in a room as raunchy as this, if wecould help it. That ought to be plain to anybody. Get your pen andpaper out, Barry.”
Seated at the desk, Barry Blake shook his head.
“We won’t make anything plain by accusing Glenn Crayle, fellows,” hestated. “That mister may be a fool in some ways, but he’s covered histracks. Remember, we only _thought_ that he came from our room. And,from the captain’s viewpoint, it would be natural for us to accusesomeone else if we were guilty.”
Barry let those points sink into his roommates’ minds for a full minute.
“On the other hand,” he went on, “suppose we face the music. That iswhat Captain Branch would expect us to do if we were innocent and hadno proof. We’ll pay a stiff penalty, of course, but I don’t think we’llbe dismissed from the Field.”
Hap Newton rose and stared out of the window. Chick Enders passednervous fingers through his short, tow-colored hair.
“You’re right as always, Barry,” the homely cadet said finally.“There’s a paragraph in ‘Compass Headings’ that says: ‘_Flying Cadetsdo not make excuses._’ I have a hunch we’ll be doing punishment toursfor the rest of our course, but I’m ready to suffer in silence.”
Hap Newton grumbled and fumed, but he, too, gave in.
“I’ll get even with Crayle,” he added vengefully. “I’ll fix him—”
“No you won’t, Hap,” Barry cut in, “unless you’re willing to fly at hislevel. The ceiling’s zero down there. Come out of the clouds, fella!And help us clean this room for the second time today.”
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