Latest / The H. G. Wells Library / The War in the Air Chapter 10 Parts 1 & 2

Transcript

The War in the Air Chapter 10 Parts 1 & 2 · The H. G. Wells Library

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Chapter ten, Parts one and two of War in the Air.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by William tom Coe. War
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: in the Air by H. G. Wells, Chapter ten, Parts
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: one and two. Chapter ten The World under the War,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Part one. Bert spent two more days upon Goat Island
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: and finished all its provisions except the cigarettes and mineral water,
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: before he brought himself to try the Asiatic flying machine.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: Even at last he did not so much go off
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: upon it as get carried off. It had taken only
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: an hour or so to substitute wing stays from the
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: second flying machine and to replace the nuts he had
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: himself removed. The engine was in working order and differed
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: only very simply and obviously from that of a contemporary
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: motor bicycle. The rest of the time was taken up
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: by a vast musing and delaying and hesitation. Chiefly he
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: saw himself splashing into the rapids and whirling down them
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: to the fall, clutching and drowning. But also he had
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: a vision of being hopelessly in the air, going fast
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: and unable to ground. His mind was too concentrated upon
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: the business of flying for him to think very much
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: of what might happen to an indefinite, spirited cockney without
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: credential who arrived on an Asiatic flying machine amidst the
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: war infuriated population beyond. He still had a lingering solicitude
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: for the bird faced officer. He had a haunting fancy
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: he might be lying disabled or badly smashed in some way,
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: in some nook or cranny of the island. And it
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: was only after a most exhaustive search that he abandoned
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: that distressing idea. If I found him, he reasoned the while,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: what could I do with him? You can't blow a
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: chap's brains out when he's down, and I don't see
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: how else I can help him. Then the kitten bothered
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: his highly developed sense of social responsibility. If I leave her,
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: she'll starve. Ought to catch mice for herself. Are there
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: mice birds? She's too young, She's like me, she's a
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: bit too civilized. Finally, he stuck her in his side pocket,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: and she became greatly interested in the memories of corn
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: beef she found there. With her in his pocket, he
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: seated himself in the saddle of the flying machine. Big
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: clumsy thing it was, and not a bit like a bicycle. Still,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: the working of it was fairly plain. You set the
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: engine going, so, kick yourself up until the wheel was vertical,
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: so engaged the gyroscope so, and then then you just
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: pulled up this lever. Rather stiff it was, but suddenly
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: it came over. The big curved wings on either side,
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: flapped disconcertingly, flapped again. Click clock, click clock, clitter clock stop.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: The thing was heading for the water. Its wheel was
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: in the water. Bert groaned from his heart and struggled
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: to restore the lever to his first position. Click clock,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: clitter clock. He was rising, The machine was lifting its
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: dripping wheel out of the eddies, and he was going up.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: There was no stopping now, no good in stopping now.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: In another moment, Bert, clutching and convulsive and rigid, with
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: staring eyes and a face pale as death, was flapping
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: up above the rapids, jerking to every jerk of the wings,
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: and rising rising. There was no comparison in dignity and
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: comfort between a flying machine and a balloon, except in
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: its moments of descent. The balloon was a vehicle of
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: faultless urbanity. This was a buck jumping mule, a mule
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: that jumped up and never came down again. Click clock,
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: click clock. With each beat of the strangely shaped wings,
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: it jumped Burt upward and caught him neatly again half
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: a second later on the saddle. And while in ballooning
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: there is no wind, says, the balloon is part of
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: the wind, flying as a wild, perpetual creation of and
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: plunging into wind. It was a wind that, above all things,
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: sought to blind him, to force him to close his eyes.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: It occurred to him presently to twist his knees and
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: legs inward and grip with them, or surely he would
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: have been bumped into two clumsy halves. And he was
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: going up a hundred yards high, two hundred three hundred,
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: over the streaming, frothing wilderness of water below. Up, up, up,
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: That was all right. But how presently would one go horizontally?
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: He tried to think. If these things did go horizontally, No,
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: they flapped up, and then they soared down. For a
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: time he would keep on flapping up. Tears streamed from
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: his eyes. He wiped them with one temporariously disengaged hand.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: Was it better to risk a fall over land or
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: over water such water? He was flapping up above the
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: upper rapids towards Buffalo. It was at any rate a
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: comfort that the falls and the wild swirl of waters
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: below them were behind him. He was flying up straight
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: that he could see how did one turn? He was
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: presently almost cool, and his eyes got more used to
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: the rush of air. But he was getting very high,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: very high. He tilted his head forwards and surveyed the
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: country blinking. He could see all over Buffalo, a place
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: with three great blackened scars of ruin, and hills and
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: stretches beyond. He wondered if he was half a mile
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: high or more. There were some people among some houses
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: near a railway station between Niagara and Buffalo, and then
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: more people. They went like ants, busily in and out
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: of the houses. He saw two motor cars gliding along
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: the road towards Niagara City. Then far away in the
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: south he saw a great Asiatic airship going eastward. Oh, Gord,
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: he said, and became earnestness ineffectual attempts to alter his direction,
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: But that airship took no notice of him, and He
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: continued to ascend convulsively. The world got more and more
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: extensive and map like click clock clitter clock. Above him,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: and very near to him now was a hazy stratum
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: of cloud. He determined to disengage the wing clutch. He
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: did so, The lever resisted his strength for a time.
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: Then over it came, and instantly the tail of the
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: machine cat and the wings became rigidly spread. Instantly everything
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: was swift and smooth and silent. He was gliding rapidly
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: down the air against a wild gale of wind, his
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: eyes three quarters shut. A little lever that had hitherto
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: been obdurate, now confessed itself mobile. He turned it over
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: gently to the right, and where roo the left wing had,
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: in some mysterious way given at its edge, and he
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: was sweeping round and downward in an immense right handed spiral.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: For some moments he experienced all the helpless sensations of catastrophe.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: He restored the lever to its middle position with some difficulty,
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: and the wings were equalized again. He turned it to
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: the left and had a sensation of being spun round
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: backwards too much. He gasped. He discovered that he was
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: rushing down at a headlong pace towards a railway line
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: and some factory buildings. They appeared to be terror up
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: to him to devour him. He must have dropped all
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: that height. For a moment he had the ineffectual sensations
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: of one whose bicycle bolts down hill. The ground had
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: almost taken him by surprise. Ere he cried, And then
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: with a violent effort of all his being, he got
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: the beating engine at work again and set the wings flapping.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: He swooped down and up and resumed his quivering and
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: pulsating ascent of the air. He went high again until
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: he had a wide view of the pleasant Upland country
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: of western New York State, and then made a long
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: coast down and so up again, and then a coast. Then,
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: as he came swooping a quarter of a mile above
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: a village, he saw people running about, running away, evidently
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: in relation to his hawk like passage. He got an
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: idea that he had been shot at. Up, he said,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: and attacked that lever again. It came over with remarkable docility,
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: and suddenly the wing seemed to give way in the middle,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: but the engine was still. It had stopped. He flung
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: the liver back, rather by instinct than design what to do.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: Much happened in a few seconds, but also his mind
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: was quick. He thought very quickly. He couldn't get up again.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: He was gliding down the air. He would have to
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: hit something. He was traveling at the rate of perhaps
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: thirty miles an hour. Down down that plantation of larches
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: looked the softest thing. Mossy almost could he get it.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: He gave himself to the steering round to the right
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: left swear roough crackle. He was gliding over the tops
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: of the trees, plowing through them, tumbling into a cloud
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: of green, sharp leaves and black twigs. There was a
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: sudden snapping, and he fell off the saddle forward, a
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: thud and a crashing of branches. Some twigs hit him
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: smartly in the face. He was between a tree stem
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: and the saddle, with his leg over the steering lever,
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: and so far as he could realize, not hurt. He
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: tried to alter his position and free his leg, and
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: found himself slipping and dropping through branches, with everything giving
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: way beneath him. He clutched and found himself in the
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: lower branches of a tree beneath the flying machine. The
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: air was full of a pleasant, resinous smell. He stared
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: for a moment motionless, and then very carefully clambered down
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: branch by branch to the soft needle covered ground below.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: Good business, he said, looking up at the bent and
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: tilted kite wings above. I dropped soft. He rubbed his
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: chin with his hand and meditated, bloat. If I don't
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: think I'm a rather lucky fellow, he said, surveying the
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: pleasant sun bespattered ground under the trees. Then he became
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: aware of a violent tumult at his side. Lord, he said,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: you must be off smothered, and extracted the kitten from
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: his pocket, handkerchief and pocket. She was twisted and crumpled,
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: and extremely glad to see the light again. Her little
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: tongue peeped between her teeth. He put her down, and
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: she ran a dozen paces and shook herself and stretched
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: and sat up and began to wash. Next, he said,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: looking about him, and then, with a gesture of vexation,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: dash it. I ought to have brought that gun. He
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: had rested it against a tree when he had seated
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: himself in the flying machine saddle. He was puzzled for
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: a time by the immense peacefulness in the quality of
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: the world. And then he perceived that the roar of
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: the cataract was no longer in his ears. Part two.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: He had no very clear idea of what sort of
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: people he might come upon in this country. It was
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: he knew America. Americans, he had always understood, were the
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: citizens of a great and powerful nation, dry and humorous
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: in their manner, addicted to the use of the bowie
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: knife and revolver, and in the habit of talking through
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: the nose like Norfolkshire, and saying allao and reckon and calculate,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: after the manner of the people who live on the
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: new forest side of Hampshire. Also, they were very rich,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: had rocking chairs and put their feet at unusual altitudes,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: and they chewed tobacco, gum and other substances with untiring industry.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: Commingled with them were cowboys, red Indians, and comic respectful Niggers.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: This he had learned from the fiction in his public library.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: Beyond that he had learnt very little. He was not surprised. Therefore,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: when he met armed men he decided to abandon the
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: shattered flying machine. He wandered through the trees for some time,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: and then struck a road that seemed to his urban
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: English eyes to be remarkably wide, but not properly made,
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: neither hedge nor ditch nor curbed. Distinctive footpath separated it
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: from the woods, and it went in that long, easy
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: curve which distinguishes the tracks of an open continent. Ahead
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: he saw a man carrying a gun under his arm,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: A man in a soft black hat, a blue blouse
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: and black trousers, and with a broad, round, fat face,
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: quite innocent of goateee. This person regarded him askance, and
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: heard him speak with a start. Can you tell me whereabouts?
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: I am at all? Asked Bert. The man regarded him,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: and more particularly his rubber boots, with sinister suspicion. Then
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: he replied in a strange, outlandish tongue that was as
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: a matter of fact check. He ended suddenly at the
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: sight of Bert's blank face, with don't spik English, Oh,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: said Bert. He reflected gravely for a moment, and then
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: went his way, Thanks, he said, as an afterthought. The
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: man regarded his back for a moment, was struck with
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: an idea, began an abortive gesture, sighed, gave it up,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: and went on also with a depressed countenance. Presently, Bert
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: came to a big wooden house standing casually among the trees.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: It looked a bleak, bare box of a house to him.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: No creeper grew on it, No hedge, nor wall nor
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: fence parted it off from the woods about it, he
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: stopped before the steps that led up to the door,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: perhaps thirty yards away. The place seemed deserted. He would
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: have gone up to the door and rapped, but suddenly
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: a big black dog appeared at the side and regarded him.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: It was a huge, heavy jawed dog of some unfamiliar breed,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: and it wore a spike studded collar. It did not
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: bark nor reproach him. It just bristled quietly and emitted
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: a single sound, like a short, deep cough. Bert has
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: a and went on. He stopped thirty paces away and
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: stood peering about him among the trees. If I haven't
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: been and left that kiddy, he said, A cute sorrow
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: wrenched him for a time. The black dog came through
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: the trees to get a better look at him, and
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: coughed that well bred cough again. Bert resumed the road.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: She'll do all right, he said, she'll catch things. She'll
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: do all right, he said presently, without conviction. But if
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: it had not been for the black dog, he would
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: have gone back. When he was out of sight of
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: the house and the black dog, he went into the
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: woods on the other side of the way, and emerged
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: after an interval trimming a very tolerable cudgel with his
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: pocket knife. Presently, he saw an attractive looking rock by
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: the track and picked it up and put it in
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: his pocket. Then he came to three or four houses,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: wooden like the last, each with an ill painted white
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: verandah that was his name for it, and all standing
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: in the same casual way upon the ground. Behind. Through
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: the woods he saw pigsties and a rooting black sow
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: leading a brisk adventurous family. A wild looking woman with
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: slow black eyes and disheveled black hair sat upon the
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: steps of one of the houses nursing a baby. But
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: at the sight of Bert, she got up and went inside,
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: and he heard her bolting the door. Then a boy
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: appeared among the pig sties, but he would not understand
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Bert's hail. I suppose it is America, said Bert. The
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: houses became more frequent down the road, and he passed
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: two other extremely wild and dirty looking men without addressing them.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: One carried a gun and the other a hatchet, and
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: they scrutinized him and his cudgel scornfully. Then he struck
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: a cross road with a mono rail at its side,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: and there was a notice board at the corner with
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: wait here for the cars. That's all right, anyhow, said Bert,
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: wonder how long I should have to wait? It occurred
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: to him that in the present disturbed state of the country,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: the service might be interrupted. And as there seemed more
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: houses to the right than the left, he turned to
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: the right. He passed an old negro. Hallo, said Bert.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: Good morning, Good day, SA, said the old negro in
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: a voice of almost incredible richness. What's the name of
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: this place, asked Bert tarnuda, SA, said the negro. Thanks,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: said Bert, Thank you, saw, said the negro. Overwhelmingly. Bert
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: came to houses of the same detached, unwalled wooden type,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: but adorned now with enameled advertisements, partly in English and
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: partly in Esperanto. Then he came to what he concluded
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: was a grocer's shop. It was the first house that
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: professed the hospitality of an open door, and from within
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: came a strangely familiar sound. Gaw, he said, searching in
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: his pockets. Why I haven't wanted money for three weeks?
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: I wonder if I grubbed at most of it. Ah.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: He produced a handful of coins and regarded it threepennies,
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: sixpence and a shilling. That's all right, he said, for
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: getting a very obvious consideration. He approached the door, and
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: as he did so, a compactly built, gray faced man
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: in shirt sleeves appeared in it and scrutinized him at
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: his cudgel. Mornin, said Bert, can I get anything to
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: eat or drink in the shop? The man in the
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: door replied, thanked heaven in clear good American, This, sir,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: is not a shop. It is a store, oh, said Bert.
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: And then well, can I get anything to eat? You can,
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: said the American in a tone of confident encouragement, and
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: led the way inside. The shop seemed to him, by
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: his bun Hill standards, extremely roomy, well lit, and unencumbered.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: There was a long counter to the left of him,
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: with drawers and miscellaneous commodities ranged behind it, a number
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: of chairs, several tables, and two spittoons to the right,
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: various barrels, cheeses and bacon. Up the vista, and beyond
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: a large archway leading to more space, A little group
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: of men was assembled round one of the tables, and
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: a woman of perhaps five and thirty lenked with her
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: elbows on the counter. All the men were armed with rifles,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: and the barrel of a gun peeped above the counter.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: They were all listening idly, inattentively to a cheap, metallic
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: toned gramophone that occupied a table near at hand. From
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: its brazen throat came words that gave Bert a qualm
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: of homesickness that brought back in his memory. A sunlit beech,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: a group of children, red painted bicycles, grub, and an
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: approaching balloon, tingaling a tingaling a tingaling a tang. What
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: price hair pins? Now? A heavy necked man in a
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: straw hat who was chewing something stopped the machine with
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: a touch, and they all turned their eyes on Bert,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: and all their eyes were tired eyes. Can we give
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: the gentleman anything to eat? Mother? Or can we not?
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Said the proprietor. He can have what he likes, said
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: the woman at the counter, without moving right up from
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: a cracker to a square meal. She struggled with a
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: yawn after the banner of one who has been up
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: all night. I want a meal, said Bert. But I
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: haven't very much money. I don't want to give mor'n
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: a shillin. Morn a what, said the proprietor. Sharply, mor'n
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: a shillin, said Bert, with a sudden, disagreeable realization coming
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: into his mind. Yes, said the proprietor, startled for a
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: moment from his courtly bearing. But what in hell is
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: a shilling? He means a quarter, said a wise looking,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: lank young man in riding gaiters. Bert, trying to conceal
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: his consternation, produced a coin. That's a shilling, he said.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: He calls a store a shop, said the proprietor, and
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: he wants a meal for a shilling. May I ask you, sir,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: what part of America you hail from. Bert replaced the
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: shilling in his pocket as he spoke Niagara, he said,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: and when did you leave Niagara? About an hour ago? Well,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: said the proprietor, and turned with a puzzled smile to
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: the others. Well. They asked various questions simultaneously. Bert selected
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: one or two for reply. You see, he said, I've
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: been with a German air fleet. I got caught up
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: by them sort of by accident, and brought over here
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: from England. Yes, from England, way of Germany. I was
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: in a great battle with them asiatics, and I got
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: left on a little island between the falls, Goat Island.
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: I don't know what it was called, but anyhow I
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: found a flying machine and made a sort of fly
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: with it and got here. Two men stood up with
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: incredulous eyes on him. Where's the flying machine? They asked? Outside.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: It's back in the woods here, about half a mile away.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: Is it good? Said a thick lipped man with a scar.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: I come down rather a smash. Everybody got up and
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: stood about him and talked confusingly. They wanted him to
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: take them to the flying machine at once. Look here,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: said Bert, I'll show you only. I haven't had anything
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to eat since yesterday except mineral water. A gaunt soldierly
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: looking young man with long lean legs, eggs and riding gaiters,
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: and a bandolier who had hitherto not spoken, intervened now
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: on his behalf in a note of confident authority. That's
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: all right, he said, give him a feed, mister logan
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: from me. I want to hear more of that story
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: of his. We'll see his machine afterwards. If you ask me,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: I should say it's a remarkably interesting accident had dropped
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: this gentleman here. I guess we requisition that flying machine
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: if we find it, for local defense. End of Chapter ten,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Parts one and two. Recording by William tom Cooe