CHAPTER VIII
MR FALCON ON FLIGHT
While the financier was considering whether he should leave Doctor Peters at once or wait, so as to avoid getting in contact with Warner, it occurred to him that he might stay a while and sound his adviser as to the other scheme he had been thinking about ever since Eben Croft purloined from Mr Goodall’s workroom a treatise on “Flight” by Professor Scudder.
The possession of this manuscript by Mr Falcon, induced him to decide upon utilising the suggestions therein contained, for he had not forgotten the discomfiture he met with on the Crystal Palace lake, and he longed for an opportunity of surpassing the air-ship performance of Harry Goodall, which made such a favourable impression on Miss Dove before the amateur aeronaut rescued her from a watery grave. Thus animated with entirely new notions, the financier requested Doctor Peters to listen while he explained a scheme by which he hoped further to raise himself in the estimation of Squire Dove and his daughter.
The doctor at first felt disinclined to devote any time and attention to the affairs of his visitor, and he was on the point of saying “Shut up” (as Mr Falcon had done when he whispered from the skeleton case). The doctor, however, still mindful of the financier’s liberal fees, consented to hear what he had to say, but begged that Mr Falcon would be concise, as he was not disposed to go into scientific arguments or a lengthy preamble, nor could he listen to profound calculations. “For you must not forget, Mr Falcon,” he said, “that in Surgery and Pathology we dislike complications,” and he knew that figures could be easily made to embarrass the uninitiated and to deceive scientists as well. “So do unfold your wings, tail and what not with simplicity of diction.”
“You may rely on my doing that, doctor, but first let me inform you that I have not long since visited a noted tower in which a valuable work on flying was deposited, and it was there that my servant Eben Croft dropped into the storeroom, where he picked up a rare and original manuscript on ‘Flight,’ by Professor Scudder.”
“And this, I suppose, Mr Falcon, has taken a firm hold of your mind?”
“Exactly, doctor--after I had obtained a firm hold of the book. Then I went deeply into the subject, but I had thought about the matter previously.”
“Indeed, Mr Falcon, I was not aware of that. Maybe it was after you had studied and appropriated some of Scudder’s notions?”
“Mind, Peters, what you are insinuating.”
“Quite so! I merely say and mean that you, as a man of action, felt called upon to give life, energy and force to Scudder’s proposals, having most likely modified and improved his early conceptions.”
“Well, there’s something in the way you now put it, doctor, for it is unquestionable that my own views present a more attractive programme, if I may use the term, than Scudder’s did.”
“And who the dickens is Scudder, pray?”
“Scudder himself hails from Holland.”
“Ay, he is the veritable Flying Dutchman, no doubt; but is he a man of aeronautical experience, Mr Falcon?”
“Not so much as I am, doctor.”
“Indeed! Where have you matriculated?”
“I have devoted considerable attention to the movements and acts of a clever balloonist.”
“What! you have, Mr Falcon?”
“Yes, but that is strictly confidential, and I want it to go no further, please.”
“Say no more, Mr Falcon, on that head, but at once propound your theory, for I am curious to hear why you have two strings to your bow.”
“Eh? What is that you say about my bow?”
“I was adverting to your contemplating ‘Flight,’ while you have so great an attractive power in Miss Dove. Couldn’t you remain within the sphere of her influence?”
“Of course I could; but aren’t you a bit wandering yourself, doctor? You spoke of my having two strings to my bow.”
“What I meant was, that as a financial suitor you pose well, but as a flying man you would not, I think, appear to advantage.”
“Would it surprise you to hear, doctor, that Miss Dove has a taste for aerial exploration?”
“Oh, nonsense, my dear sir. Surely I ought to know more about that than you. However, tell me more of your flying machine ideas.”
“You must know then, doctor, that the main-spring of it consists of a huge steel bow, and I thought you might have heard something of this when you alluded to my having two strings to my bow.”
“No; I have heard nothing whatever of your plans, but never mind about the two strings, Mr Falcon, so that you stick to one bow.”
“You may be sure I shall do that, for it is by this power I shall be able to ascend.”
“What do you mean, Mr Falcon?”
“To be more explicit, doctor, I shall first pass into space through the instrumentality of an enormous cross-bow.”
“Then you will be the arrow?”
“Yes, and will face the inevitable like a bird.”
“Ay, like a Falcon, you might have said.”
“Mind, doctor, what use you make of an unsullied name.”
“I shall do it no harm if you don’t yourself, sir; but say what you like, Mr Falcon, I don’t believe you will ever fly unless you have a limb of the law at your heels.”
“Your candid opinion is not very encouraging, doctor, but it will not discourage me from enlightening your darkness.”
“Yes, I want more light as to your flighty ideas, for I am no air explorer and have never even been up the City Monument, or the Crystal Palace towers. Have you, Mr Falcon?”
“Many a time and oft, doctor. Why, it was at the palace tower where I came across Scudder’s book.”
“Was it really? Do go on then, though I fear this flying fad will bewilder you before you chuck it up.”
“Hear me out, doctor.”
“By all means, for I fail to see how you are going to do it.”
“I am not going to imitate the tactics of previous sky soarers, but I do hold with Scudder as to a good dashing start.”
“You won’t dash into a horse pond, a limekiln, or a railway train, I trust.”
“No fear, doctor. With my first spring I shall be hurled clear of all such impediments.”
“You say hurled, Mr Falcon. Why, you almost take my breath away.”
“That is because you lack imagination, doctor, or you would picture to yourself my contrivance in full swing on the lawn in front of Wedwell Hall.”
“God forbid that I should witness such a scene!”
“Simply because you fail, Peters, to see in your mind’s eye the merit of the invention. Can’t you imagine an enormous cross-bow, with two large grooves in the stock for the air-ship to slide up when the bow is bent and the trigger pulled?”
“No, I don’t see it.”
“You will presently when I further explain that these grooves will be three feet apart, and that the car or sledge of the air-craft will slide up these grooves, as two half round pieces of wood will be fastened at the bottom of the sledge. Of course the wire cord of the great steel bow will be drawn down and fixed behind the air machine before the trigger is pulled.”
“And how long after this bit of trigger-nometry do you expect to be alive, man?”
“Oh, that will be all right; you will see soon how the thing will work.”
“Never, I fear.”
“Well, I’ll try to make you, anyhow; and don’t forget, doctor, that the craft or cruiser (call it which you like) will narrow at the stem.”
“What for, Mr Falcon?”
“What for? Why, to cleave the air like a thing of life, so that when the wings are opened out by touching a lever then the pace will be prodigious, though, at first, the machine will have the wings closed up like the arms of a diver before he springs, but once away I should go clean over Wedwell Park.”
“Yes, yes, provided you got over the squire and the Hall.”
“Hear me out, doctor, while I tell you that the great cross-bow stock will be raised on blocks to an angle of 25 degrees, in order that my first leap into space should shoot me clear of the housetops until my wings opened for practical work.”
“Why, man, you would go like a projectile, and, to my thinking, you would be launched into eternity.”
“Should I really. You’re wrong there, Peters; only think how divers sometimes drop from great heights and then turn up safely like corks.”
“But your turn up, Mr Falcon, according to your own account, would last for more than a few seconds, and in that time your senses (or what was left of them) would be whisked out of you in a jiffy.”
“You forget, doctor, that when I reached the park boundaries I should slow down a bit and bring into use my motive power, for without that, I should drop by the run.”
“Just like De Groof did, Mr Falcon, when he was killed at Chelsea over twenty years ago.”
“That poor man was not kept moving on. He wanted propelling, or some other force, as I shall employ.”
“You don’t mean police force, possibly?”
“No, something stronger than that, or electricity either.”
“Compressed air, perhaps?”
“You must excuse me stating my power, doctor, for to a man of your sensitive nature it might sound alarming.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Mr Falcon lifted his hand and struck the table so violently that he made a wine glass jump until it fell and was smashed on the carpet. He then said without the least apology,--
“My driving power, doctor, will be worked by an explosive!”
“An explosive! I hope it won’t blow you to atoms like the pieces of glass around us.”
“No fear, Peters; I am free, however, to admit that a succession of explosions will produce a rocket-like movement. But you will excuse me, won’t you, for not naming the chemical compound employed?”
“Don’t you worry about that, Mr Falcon. I am quite convinced as to the violent nature of it, and I won’t press you for a further exposition of your new motive power; indeed, I perceive that, at the outset, you will go up (unless you funk it) like a live military shell or rocket. Secondly, that you will have folding wings to your craft; and thirdly, that by the aid of explosive materials, you will set these in motion, so that you can flap, sail, whirl or swoop.”
“Never mind the swooping, doctor; that might be resorted to in a desperate emergency.”
“Yes, in the last scene of a closing act, I guess.”
“Don’t you be so jocular and ironical, doctor. You have done me one good turn, and I want you to do another by taking this fresh matter up warmly, and further by introducing it to the Doves.”
“Not I, Mr Falcon. For my part I shall drop it from this moment like a hot cinder, and I strongly recommend you to do the same, and to concentrate your attentions on Miss Dove simply as a financial projector rather than as a man of flight.”
“Well, I do believe, doctor, that you advise me as a true friend, and I will not attempt even a preliminary canter in the park before I have tried an experiment elsewhere.”
“Don’t try to fly, but go at once to Sydenham, Mr Falcon, and see that Eben Croft is set free from durance vile.”
“A bright idea, doctor, and a very suggestive one, too; and, for your concluding hint, I thank you very much, and I promise faithfully to turn it to account.”