Tom Swift and His Diving Seacopter (5 page)

"Yee-ow! Look at that checked shirt Chow’s sporting," Bud muttered. "Good thing we’re not in color or he’d probably blow out your picture tube." The Texan’s weakness for gaudy western apparel was legendary.

Tom panned the camera to keep the cook centered on the screen. Chow paused every few steps to sample the food from various containers. After each taste he stuck out his tongue and made a horrible face. The boys shook with laughter at the spectacle. Then Tom held the headset up to Bud’s ear, and Chow’s voice could be heard muttering a number of salty imprecations under his breath.

"It’s not Chow’s own cooking, that’s for sure," Bud commented.

"In any case, I hope the food isn’t for us," said Tom. "Chow acts as if it were poison!"

After the Texan had delivered the food to the metallurgy department next door, Tom went outside and called him into the photographic lab. Pretending to be stern, he said: "What’s the big idea of sampling food from that lunch cart, Chow? Don’t you get enough to eat in your own kitchen?"

The cook’s sun-bronzed face wrinkled in dismay and disgust. "Aw, Boss, brand my galley pans, I ’as jest checkin’ up on that new fry-cook Boris, who keeps mouthin’ off about working in the best hotels o’ New York and—"

Tom interrupted in mock impatience. "Never mind that. What’s with the vulgar language, anyway?—saying such things about a defenseless bull!"

"Now Tom, I only—" Suddenly Chow’s jaw dropped open in a look of amazed perplexity. "Say now, wait jest a minute, how’d you know I was tastin’ them vittles? Wasn’t no one else out there but me. I’m dead sure o’ that!"

Tom nodded gravely. "You really want to know?" He touched a button on the Eye-Spy camera, activating its digital replay mechanism. The entire sequence of events showed again on the monitor, complete with sound.

"More o’ your newfangled contraptions!" declared the cook with a sidewise glance, and Tom and Bud burst into raucous laughter. As Tom explained and assured Chow that he’d only been teasing, the grizzled old Westerner shook his head glumly. "This here’s like 1984 in the blame twenty-first cent’ry! From now on, a coot’ll have no privacy ’round here no-ways no-how. How’m I goin’ to cook up any fancy surprises fer you with that camera snoopin’ at me?"

Bud laughed again. "Pardner, if you’re dreaming up any more surprises like that sagebrush stew and pickled rattlesnake, I’d say Tom’s gizmo has more than proved its worth!"

The boys’ fun was suddenly cut off by a voice over the public address system. "Tom Swift, report to the master oscilloscope at once! An incoming coming signal has been detected!" It was the prim voice of Munford Trent, the Swifts’ efficient office secretary.

"The space scientists must finally be responding to the message Dad and I sent!" Tom cried excitedly. He and Bud hastily made their way to the oscilloscope room, which was in the airfield control tower building.

Mr. Swift was already present when they arrived. "Look, Tom—only two symbols this time, then nothing." He gestured at the glowing monitor screen.

"Looks like Egyptian hieroglyphics to me—by way of Chinese!" Bud exclaimed.

As was characteristic of the space writing, each pictograph was actually a cluster of smaller symbols that showed the relation of the concepts. Tom pointed to one of the sub-symbols. "I remember that one. It means something not brought to completion, unfinished."

"And this part is their sign of reversal or negation," said Damon Swift. "And this looks to me like ‘extend’ or ‘intensify,’ don’t you think?"

In minutes father and son were agreed on the translation of the message from space:

CONTINUE COURSE

"I don’t get it," Tom said, puzzled. "There must be more coming." But though they waited for fifteen minutes, there were no further transmissions.

"Try sending our own message and see if they reply this time," Mr. Swift suggested.

Borrowing the notebook of reconstructed translations, Tom sat down at the transmitter and began beaming impulses into space. Suddenly Mr. Swift, who was monitoring the signal on the oscilloscope, cried out, "Hold it, Tom! We’re getting interference!"

Instead of showing the symbols Tom was sending, the scope was acting wildly. Starbursts of light flickered back and forth across the screen.

"Someone’s jamming your signal!" Bud exclaimed.

Tom waited a few moments until the flashes died away, then tried once more to send the message. Again the scope exploded into wild flashes of light.

"No doubt about it now," the elder inventor commented grimly. "Someone is doing his best to prevent us from contacting our space friends! It’s obviously either the person who downloaded the space dictionary or someone who obtained it from the thief."

Tom snapped his fingers as an alarming idea occurred to him.

"Dad, maybe
he’s
the person who was sending that ‘continue course’ message!"

MR. SWIFT looked startled by Tom’s suggestion. "In other words, it came from right here on earth, not outer space, just like the interference signals."

"Then it’s a lucky break!" cried Bud. "You’ll be able to home in on the source of the signal."

Tom examined several instrument readings from the magnifying antenna and shook his head in discouragement. "No dice. The jamming signals are coming from multiple sources simultaneously, probably a dozen small relay transmitters mounted in vehicles that are on the move. And the message signal looks like a partial reflection from the upper ionosphere. What we received may be just a fragment of the original message, outgoing or incoming."

"I see we’ve arrived at a moment of high drama!" proclaimed a feminine voice from the doorway. Sandra Swift and Bashalli Prandit came traipsing in. "But then the drama is always high here in the Fortress of Swiftitude," Bashalli continued.

"We heard the loudspeaker announcement, so we knew where to find you," said Sandy.

"Look at their faces," said Bashalli. "They have no idea that they were to have a late lunch with us today."

With a glance at Tom, Bud admitted that he had forgotten to mention the plan. "See, Tom started showing me this new invention of his that—"

"What a pair you and Tom are!" Sandy moaned, shaking her head in mock disapproval. "All you do is eat, sleep, and work!"

"Especially work," Bash teased. "How long has it been, Sandy, since they took us out on a date?" She looked Tom’s way and added pointedly, "I
hope
I don’t need to put that concept into mathematical symbols for you."

Sandy’s blue eyes clouded mischievously. "I really can’t remember. Was it the night at TinCanz when Tom ditched us to go see that gangster?"

"No, I am quite sure it was the night Tom ditched me in the living room to chase after that Gorilla Man in the garden."

"They’ve just been too terribly busy to bother with us, I guess."

Mr. Swift, a slight twitch of a smile on his face, diplomatically excused himself.

The boys realized they were being needled. "No kidding, girls," Tom spoke up, "we
have
been busy. The plant’s working overtime on my diving seacopter, and then there’s been all this trouble about the rocket from space—"

"Oh, don’t apologize—it’s
quite
all right," Bashalli interrupted airily. "We knew in advance you’d forget the luncheon plan. We came here merely to instill guilt. Tonight we’re going out with a couple of smart engineers, anyhow."

"Meaning Tom and me?" teased Bud, thinking the girls were about to heckle them into a date.

But his smile faded fast as Sandy replied smugly, "No, two engineers who work for Munson Wickliffe.
Very
good-looking, too, and reputed to be clever conversationalists."

"You don’t know them?" Tom burst out.

"Why I
believe
we have their attentions!" commented Bashalli. The young Pakistani smiled sweetly. "How very flattering it is!"

"Betty Kenwood introduced them to us at the Thessaly Library Fund dinner, and they asked us to go out with them," Tom’s sister explained.

"And with very little prompting," added Bash.

"With
no
prompting!" Sandy corrected hastily. When both boys flushed, Sandy observed with a sparkle of mischief, "My, my! Is that my jealousy detector I hear buzzing?"

Tom cleared his throat and asked, "Have you girls made any plans yet about where to spend the evening?"

"We’ll be meeting at home, and Betty spoke about a dance at the Thessaly Tennis Club," Sandy replied. Her face grew sober. "But seriously, I guess Ferd and Kelt—
don’t
you say a word,
Budworth!
—figured having dates with us would be an easy way to pick up some inside information on Swift Enterprises. Anyhow," she added, "I’m certainly going to give a full report!"

"Won’t they be surprised to learn that Sandy and I know nothing!"

Sandy gave Bashalli a reproving look. "That’s not the best way to put it, Bashi dear."

Bud smiled blandly, but the look on Tom’s face bespoke concern. In fact, Sandy wondered later if her big brother had spoken to their mother during the afternoon, for Mrs. Swift asked them to change their plans and spend the entirety of the evening in the Swift home. "You may think I’m a silly old fuss-budget, dear," said Anne Swift, "but I’m terribly worried about that space rocket. If anything should happen, I’d like to know that all of us are near one another in Shopton. Would you mind entertaining your dates here at home just this once?" To spare her any anxiety, the girls readily agreed.

Soon after eight o’clock, Betty Kenwood and her date arrived at the door to the Swift home just as the two Wickliffe engineers, Ferdinand Acton and Kelton Price, pulled up in Acton’s car. Acton was blond, thin, and anemic-looking. He was dressed in a plaid jacket, wine-red cummerbund, and white flannel trousers, and he wore tinted glasses with thin wire rims. His friend Kelt Price made a somewhat amusing contrast, being short and pudgy with a shock of thick black hair. Both men were in their late twenties.

Sandy shot Bashalli a secret look that said,
They’re not as cute as they seemed the other night!

The group came into the living room, where the Sandy’s parents were waiting.

"This is Ferdinand Acton," Betty introduced one, "and this is Kelton Price."

"But please let’s not be formal!" Acton smiled suavely, making a little bow and offering his hand to Mrs. Swift. "Just make it Ferd and Kelt."

"We insist!" said Kelton Price.

"We az-
yoomed
the girls would feel right at home with a couple of technical chaps like us." Price beamed, staring at Bashalli with undisguised admiration.

"By the way," said Acton to Mr. Swift, "is your
brilliant
son going to join us for the evening?"

Damon Swift coolly answered, "I’m afraid Tom and his friend Bud have other things to attend to. They’re working late at the Swift Enterprises plant." He knew that they were attentively monitoring the space oscilloscope and various tracking instruments for any sign of the anticipated vessel from space.

Sandy’s parents politely excused themselves and retired upstairs. "It’s a good thing Bud isn’t here to meet those two," said Mrs. Swift softly to her husband. "I can just imagine him saying,
what a couple of creeps!"

Mr. Swift grinned back and whispered, "Maybe Sandy and Bashalli aren’t feeling so happy right now, either. From the looks of their dates, I’d say they really booby-trapped themselves for the evening!"

Meanwhile, Betty Kenwood and her date had gone off to the Thessaly Tennis Club, leaving Sandy and Phyl alone with Ferd and Kelt. The young men had seemed happy about staying at the house when Sandy had requested this.

"Remarkable chap, your brother," commented Ferd Acton as he whipped out a foreign cigarette and inserted it in a long, carved ivory holder.

"Do you really think so?" asked Sandy coolly, eyeing the cigarette.

"Yes, indeed. Really, I’m
such
a great admirer of Tom Swift—he’s produced so many amazing, er—"

"Inventions?"

"Precisely. I dare say he’s busy on some new project right now,
isn’t
he?" The inflection in his voice proclaimed that he was prying, ineptly, for secret information.

"I suppose so," Sandy smiled. "He usually is." Not discouraged by her noncommittal response, Kelt Price asked bluntly, "What’s the wonder boy working on these days?"

Sandy and Bash glanced at each other. Sandy managed to answer the question without giving a direct reply. But the two Wickliffe engineers soon resumed their probing.

Ferd Acton’s next question took Sandy by surprise. "Is Tom improving his jetmarine to do some underwater searching?"

Sandy did not reply to Acton’s question at once. Had he heard rumors about Tom’s new seacopter and his plans to join George Braun and Ham Teller in searching for buried lands beneath the ocean?

"You’ll have to ask my brother about that," she said sweetly. "I don’t keep up with all the details of his work. But I am curious as to why you asked about that particular invention."

"Oh, I don’t know." The thin, blond engineer blew out a cloud of purplish smoke that made Sandy wince. "Sometimes I get these hunches."

"He really does," said Price.

"It’s a gift," continued Acton.

"It really is," said Price.

"No doubt he’s hard at work on some labor-saving idea, hmm?" Though made in an offhanded way, the remark to Sandy probably was a new attempt to wheedle information, she realized. She was sure of it when Ferd Acton stared at her with one eyebrow raised quizzically.

But Sandy ignored the hint. Instead, she decided to do a little probing on her own—in a subtle, roundabout way. "Have you been working for Munson Wickliffe very long?" she inquired.

"About four years," Acton replied. "Charming fellow! Before that I was in Europe."

"In Europe? How interesting!"

"I received a good deal of my technical education over there, you see. I studied at the Sorbonne in Paris and got my master’s degree at the University of Gottingen in Germany."

Bashalli said, "I have heard of Gottingen, but please, what is the
sore bone?"
Sandy stifled a giggle, realizing that her friend was teasingly commenting on Acton’s poor pronunciation.