“Of course.”
“Head that way, if you would be so kind.”
Harry glanced at the steam gauge from habit, though she already knew the Pegasus was hot. She gave two short whistles and then spoke. “Going light in five … four … three … two … one.”
She flipped the switch. There was neither a murmur nor any other sort of reaction from the military men, and just a sharp intake of breath from Mrs Hemingway.
Harry tested the wings. Their powerful response to her movements gave her strength and confidence. She ran up the speed of the propeller.
Two long whistles. “Taking off,” she shouted over the breathless pumping of the steam engines.
One stroke. Two. And they were airborne. She brought the Pegasus around and stared at the ruin of their home. It was a sharp reminder of why they were in the air and what they were planning to do.
She powered into the dawn as the sun rose across the Indian Ocean beyond Mombasa.
The station was barely a minute away. Almost immediately it was possible to see the pneumatic tube running across the landscape. The atmospheric ran from Mombasa to Nairobi, and then onwards to the north. Ultimately it was intended to link East Africa with Egypt and the Mediterranean.
Two of the military vehicles that had brought the group were parked outside the station.
“They took the atmospheric?” said Harry incredulously.
“What better way to outrun you?” said Laxton.
“To Mombasa?”
“North.”
Harry gritted her teeth. “When?”
“Mid-afternoon.”
“They have a fifteen-hour head start,” she said in despair. “They could be in Khartoum by now.”
“But not much further since that is where the atmospheric ends. The line from Cairo is not yet complete.”
Harry said nothing further. She put her hand on the power and cranked the propeller to maximum. As their airspeed increased she descended until she was only a few feet above the tunnel of the atmospheric.
Across the plains of Africa the pumping stations were two to three miles apart. They could not keep up the kind of pressure in the tube to maintain the kinds of speeds they managed in Europe, but even an African atmospheric was no slouch.
That Hauptman Gerhardt had chosen to take the train meant that his trail was easy to follow. Unless he had got off, he could only be in the tube.
As they approached the top of the tube Harry felt the change in the air around them and under the wings. The Pegasus’s velocity slid higher on the dial, as if they were gliding on oil.
“That is impressive,” said a voice in her ear. It was Lieutenant Keating. “How is it possible your vessel can make this kind of speed?”
“Ground effect,” she heard Sellie answer. “Harry says it happens when we’re close to the ground.”
Harry focused on the tube. Every few miles she had to swing out to avoid the pumping stations, though they were easy to spot as they poured smoke from their furnaces. Here in the heat of Africa they ran water in pipes down the inside of the tubes to supply the steam for the pumps.
Their speed topped out at 175. That seemed to be the maximum they could reach. Still, it was nearly three miles, or one pumping station, per minute. Harry gave up riding above the tube but stayed to the side and simply followed its line.
Time passed and the sun rose. It was about half-past eight when they reached a place called Nairobi. It was nothing more than an outcropping at the edge of a swamp but it was well placed and there was fresh water nearby.
The town was composed of a selection of buildings. Maintenance for the atmospheric, sidings, and workshops. To support the workforce there were already shops, hotels, and other establishments. Harry climbed to kill their speed and brought the Pegasus to a gentle landing next to the station.
Laxton and the two majors went to make enquiries. Mrs Hemingway, who had been silent the entire trip, went to stretch her legs, as did Khuwelsa.
Harry climbed out of her chair and stretched. Her muscles were tense and ached, not just from this short flight but from her exertions on the previous day. The only other person in the cabin was Lt Keating who diplomatically looked out of the window while she performed her exercises.
“The commander thinks I should learn how to fly your vessel, Miss Edgbaston,” he said, almost diffidently as if he had an inkling she might react badly to the suggestion.
She did not find the idea pleasant. “Why?”
“He does not wish to die.”
Harry blinked. “What? Die?”
Keating now turned to face her. His face lacked any strong emotion. “Miss Edgbaston, how long has the Royal Navy had an air corps?”
“Twenty-eight years.”
“Quite so, in fact exactly so,” he said. “Since 1868, and there were air vehicles in use for three years before that.” He took a breath. “In that time, do you suppose we learned anything about piloting Faraday craft?”
She frowned. “Well, of course, we have the most powerful vessels in the air and the Void.”
“Then perhaps it may not come as a surprise that we soon learnt that a pilot flying for more than two or three hours, particularly under stress, becomes tired and likely to make mistakes.”
Harry said nothing.
“And in a vessel such as this, that requires constant attention, travelling at a velocity far in excess of its design specifications would tire the pilot far more quickly.”
“I …” she trailed off.
“Do you dispute my authority in this matter?”
After a moment’s hesitation she shook her head.
“Then you see the value in my becoming your substitute pilot on this journey?”
“Yes.” The single word was almost whisper.
Cmdr Laxton’s voice penetrated the hull. “Prepare to go light! Immediately.”
Harry dived under the rail and swung into the pilot’s chair. Sellie entered and almost pulled Mrs Hemingway up the steps and inside.
“Going light!” shouted Harry counted one and flipped the switch. Pressure had dropped but they had enough. She could already hear Sellie shovelling coal.
Laxton and the majors tumbled inside. The last one in slammed the hatch and dogged it.
Harry ran up the propeller and, with two powerful beats, had them in the air.
“Which way?” Harry called.
“Keep following the tube.”
Harry gunned the engine, thrust them forward with powerful strokes, and brought the Pegasus around. Within seconds Nairobi was no more than a memory.
xxiii
Once they had settled into their course, Laxton related the information they had discovered. The atmospheric train had arrived on schedule the evening before. It had been due for a stop-over for the night so the passengers could, if they chose, find accommodation and food in the town.
However the flood of passengers escaping from the atmospheric once the tube doors had been opened was the first sign something was wrong. The local constabulary had investigated but were warned off by shots when they approached.
The Germans aboard kept the crew and their original prisoners as hostages, and had the train restocked and its water tanks filled—though an atmospheric was driven by air pressure, it still required its own power to drive the Faraday grid.
One passenger had been killed. He was ex-army and had tried to overpower their captors. He had expected the other passengers to assist but they were too scared, and his death confirmed their fears.
The atmospheric had spent a little over an hour at Nairobi before the train pushed on into the night.
Harry put the Pegasus to the ground and accelerated. They were soon roaring above the savannah at their maximum speed. To the north the horizon was broken by the green slopes and white top of a massive volcano.
“It’s Kiri Nyaga, ‘God’s home’,” said Khuwelsa. “Some of Bakari’s people live around here.”
“Well, it’s more interesting
than this place,” said Harry. The terrain was flat as a pancake and the atmospheric tube ran straight as a die. The grasslands were filled with animals and birds that flashed past so fast the beasts had no time to react before the vessel was already gone.
Harry yawned.
An hour later, and they were running northwest up a valley with hills to the right and plains the other side. Every now and then they would pass a smaller volcano caldera. All of them were ages dead and filled with green.
“Perhaps this would be a good time for you to show me how to fly your plane,” said Keating.
“We’ll have to slow down,” said Harry, realising that she sounded like a whiny child.
“Better than the alternative.”
Harry adjusted the angle of the wings slightly and the Pegasus soared up.
Keating immediately enquired as to what she had done. She explained as best she could.
It was only then that it occurred to her that she did not even think about flying. When she was at the controls it was as if she and the ship were one and the same.
She felt a panic. What if explaining it took away that oneness? Could analysing it make it stop?
But she went through the controls with Keating: the two sticks that controlled the wing position by pushing forward, back and to the sides, and how rotating them adjusted the feathering.
“No foot controls?” asked Keating.
Harry shook her head. “What would you use your feet for?”
“Fixed-wing craft use them for the rudder.”
“The wings do everything,” said Harry. “We don’t need a rudder.”
And then came the moment when she relinquished her position. Reluctantly she had throttled back to sixty miles per hour, which almost certainly meant they were falling behind their quarry.
She locked off the wings, after explaining what she had done and how the arched position was very stable. Finally she relinquished her position. It was not leaving the chair while in flight that bothered her. She had done that before many times; the Pegasus just hung in the air like a gull or a hawk. No, it wasn’t that.
It was that she had to stand by while someone else climbed into her chair. While that someone touched her controls, it was as if he was touching her, violating her privacy, her very person.
She pointed to the control lock. “Move that up, it’s quite stiff, and make sure you put your hand on the control quickly.”
They had climbed to three thousand feet, there would be plenty of time for her to get back in the chair even if he made a mess of it. Unless he flipped them over.
Harry tried, with only partial success, to suppress the anger that rose within her. She knew it was foolish but the fact that Keating did not mess up filled her with unjustifiable annoyance. He was cautious. He seemed to understand that the Pegasus was a delicate creature and that he had to work with her, and not try to enforce his will on her.
“May I increase velocity?” he asked.
Harry nodded but then realised he was not looking in her direction. “Yes. She will let you release the controls but only for a moment.”
“You compensate before you let go,” he said.
“I don’t know what you mean?”
“You know how the ship will react when you let go, so you adjust for it before you do.”
Harry thought about it. He was right. “Yes.”
“I’ll just try letting go,” he said. And for the next two minutes he let go, felt the ship move, and then took hold again. He tried it with the other hand and then both hands. “I see,” he said. He made a slight movement that brought the port side up, released the stick, and as the stick moved and the port dropped again he pushed the throttle forward.
Harry was grateful that he missed the stick and had to grab it.
She always knew where the sticks were. She sighed; yes, she knew, but that knowledge came with experience. He was doing very well for someone who had never flown a ’thopter before.
As he pushed the ship into a gentle dive, the airspeed increased. He moved the wings into the arched position. After glancing left and right through the portholes to check their position, he locked them off. He released the controls and sat back, rubbing his hands and arms.
“Aching,” he said.
“You haven’t done this before,” she said.
“Well, I may be able to relieve you for short periods,” he said. “But you’ll still have to the most of the work.”
“Good,” said Harry. She had not meant to say it aloud, and embarrassment swept over her.
Keating laughed. “I know this is your baby,” he said. “But we have to be practical.” He climbed out of the chair. “The helm is yours, Miss Edgbaston.”
xxiv
For the rest of the day they traced the tube north across Africa. The terrain was largely unchanging, which was good because it meant they could maintain a high velocity. Every ninety minutes Keating would relieve Harry and give her a chance to rest. They flew slower at those times, as he was not going to risk the low altitude flight Harry could manage.
Three times they were forced to stop for personal convenience. It was extremely embarrassing for the ladies but the military men were practical about the matter. Though Harry and Sellie were used to using the wilderness for such necessities, they had always been alone.
Poor Mrs Hemingway tried to deny nature for a long time until it became impossible for her.
The situation was not discussed.
As to their temporary dress, Harry was satisfied despite the roughness. She found piloting the Pegasus to be much easier without having to fight her way through layers of restrictive clothing. She would have to have some flying gear made up when she got home.
Home. Her heart felt empty. They no longer had a home. Their father, stolen away and her mother, thousands of miles distant. Harry wondered why she had come to mind now. After all, she almost never thought about the woman. What was the point? Her mother had never been part of the home that she or Sellie remembered.
By mid-afternoon the mountains of Ethiopia had emerged from the landscape to the east. The lush grasslands of the equatorial country gave way to stony ground. It was still green here, but it was more like the lower slopes of the mountain, where the green had to fight to maintain its hold.
Harry had never seen the Nile before. Although there were plenty of bigger rivers around Mombasa, none of them was the mighty river of Egypt. The atmospheric followed it now, though it cut corners wherever appropriate. It even crossed the waters more than once. A fast atmospheric did not take corners quickly so the engineers took the straightest line they could.
The fabled Nile, the life’s blood of Egypt and the river that fed the people of the Sudan.
It would not be much further to Khartoum where the two major tributaries—the Blue Nile that they were following, and the White Nile that flowed from Ethiopia—joined to become the mightiest river in the world that flowed for another thousand miles into the Mediterranean.
To Italy. Perhaps that was why Harry thought of her mother; she now lived in Italy. Of course, Mrs Hemingway had mentioned her yesterday as well.
Harry felt strange thinking about her mother. She could barely remember what she looked like. There was the photograph she had in the bedroom but that had been taken a dozen years before.
“That’s Juba,” said Keating.
They were overflying a large Arab walled town with its low white houses tight together and the thinnest lines separating them showing where the streets lay. Packing them so close meant the narrow streets were in shade almost the whole day. A train of camels headed into the city through one of its gates.
Camels. They were approaching the southernmost reaches of the Sahara. And that meant sand. Harry was not sure how well the mechanisms of Pegasus would cope.
“How long to Khartoum?” she said.
“Three hours at a guess,” he said. “We shall have to stop for the night before we reach it.”
“No!”
Keating leaned on the rail and put his head close to her ear. So close she could feel his breath.
“Harry.” It was the first time he had used her nickname. “This is a military operation, you cannot go against orders.”
“It may be a military operation for you,” she hissed, “but I am rescuing my father and every moment we delay we give them time.”
“You cannot fly at night.”
“Give me one good reason why not?”
“You won’t be able to see where you’re going,” he said without raising his voice. “You’ll crash at high speed.”
“Am I allowed to present an alternative plan to your military operation?”
“Of course.”
“You take over for an hour, so I can rest. Then I’ll take us to Khartoum, if it gets dark before we reach there I’ll reduce speed and take us up. We have a compass and we have both the Nile and the tube to guide us. We’ll be able to see them even at night.”
“If it remains clear.”
“Yes,” she said. “We will set down at Khartoum and find out if they’ve moved on. The tube stops there so they will be using the old style train, which is much slower. We can follow them in the dark perhaps even catch up or overtake them.”
Keating thought for a few moments. “Very well, I will discuss this with the commander.”
Harry calmed herself and brought the Pegasus down again. She stifled a yawn; she did not want anyone to know how tired she was.
“Getting on all right with the lieutenant?” It was Sellie’s turn to talk in her ear, but she was grateful. She missed her sister; the only reason she knew Sellie was still there was that the steam pressure stayed up. “Those army boys are handy as stokers,” Sellie said. “We should try to keep them on.”
“I thought you were still doing the stoking,” said Harry, almost offended that she had been wrong. That she, Harry, had been doing all the hard work while Sellie had been having it easy.
“Why would I shovel coal when I have a couple of strong lads to do it for me?” said Sellie. “Grateful to do it, I might add.”
“Grateful?”
Harry gets Her Wings (Iron Pegasus Book 3) Page 9