“Nine,” said the lieutenant.
“Does anyone here know how to fly them?”
“Nobody’s tried so far,” said the lieutenant. “I believe the plan is to talk first to these people who had them.”
“It seems to me I heard they weren’t hard to operate,” I said. “The criminals we’re looking for may have heard that, too. These planes would buy them anything they wanted, anywhere in the rest of the world, if they could successfully steal them from the Empress.”
I saw both officers looking at me oddly and wondered if I’d been laying on my image of self-importance too thickly.
“All right,” I said. “Let’s go then. Major, Lieutenant, we’ll take three planes apiece. We won’t take the Experimental on this first search. I’ll keep Doc and the Experimental with me until they’re needed. Do you have flashlights?”
“You mean hand torches?” said the lieutenant. “Yes, sir.” He went to a locker across the office and came back with flashlights for Debrow and myself. Leaving the Old Man in the office, we went out into the hangar proper and split up.
I took the three planes closest to me, forcing the two officers to take the ones further over. In the illumination of the flashlight, the first aircraft I came to seemed to glow with an inner gleam of its own. It was made of some milky, semi-translucent plastic and looked light enough to float up in the air if it was breathed on too heavily. But in spite of appearances, it was solid and firm when I pulled open the door in its curving side and stepped in. Within, possibly because of the almost egg-shaped hull, there was more room than I would have guessed. I went forward to the control panel.
It was a simple-looking affair, a single small television-like screen inset in the panel and a five-key keyboard just below it. I pushed down one of the keys at random and the lights went on; not only on the panel but all over within the aircraft.
“Ready,” said a voice.
I grinned. There had been no pattern at all to what I was looking at; and now, suddenly, there was very nearly a complete one.
“How do I take off?” I asked.
“You may pilot yourself, or instruct a takeoff and flight.”
“Thanks. Go back to sleep.” I punched the same key again and the lights went out. Experimentally, in the glow of the flashlight, I punched another of the keys.
“Ready,” said a voice, as the lights went on once more.
“Go back to sleep.”
So, that was it. The secret to flying these things. It was that there was no secret at all. I punched off again, the lights went out and I beckoned Doc to follow me. Together, we left the plane.
“All right,” I whispered to him, “get busy taking out those other planes. I’ll take my time with the two I’ve still got to look at. Meet you at the last one, the third one up straight ahead near the back of the hangar. I’ll go as slow as I can, but don’t let those two officers see you.”
“They won’t,” said Doc and he evaporated in the gloom.
I took the Old Man and went on to the next plane and let myself in, then sat down before the control panel and turned it on. I had quite a little conversation with the computer, or whatever it was, on this second aircraft; and by the time I had finished asking questions, I had as good a general knowledge of this kind of craft as if I had kept one around for some years. They were ridiculously, child-level foolproof, and operable.
After I had wasted as many minutes as I thought I reasonably could, I went on to the third craft, poked about inside for a while, and then stepped out again. Neither Doc nor the other two men were in sight. I stepped around to the far side of the plane to wait; and a finger tapped me on the shoulder.
I whirled, stepping back instinctively as I did so, and found Doc grinning at me.
“All set,” he said.
“Good. Come on then.”
We walked toward the next plane over and found the lieutenant there, conscientiously examining the craft’s undercarriage with his flashlight.
“Did you find anything, Lieutenant?”
He got to his feet.
“No sir. You, sir?”
“No luck for me, either. Maybe Major Debrow’s found something. Shall we go see?”
We all moved over and found Debrow inside his last aircraft. After a moment he came out.
“Nothing,” he said.
“I’m greatly relieved,” I said. “Now, if you don’t mind, Lieutenant, I’d like to examine the men you’ve got on guard here?”
“But why, sir? We didn’t find anything.”
“For that very reason. We want to be sure. The Empress wants us to be sure. Doesn’t she, Major?”
“Lieutenant,” said Debrow with a tight throat.
“Yes, Major. Yes, Mr. Despard. If you’ll come up to the office, I’ll bring in the men on the doors first—”
“You’ll bring them in one at a time, Lieutenant,” I said. “Is there another door to this hangar besides those in the front?”
“There’s a small service entrance in the back wall.”
“Good.” I turned to Doc. “After we examine each one, I’d like you to take him out the back way and back to his post. See he doesn’t talk to any of the others, particularly not to any who haven’t been examined yet. You go out with the lieutenant here, so you’ll know where to bring them back to. Lieutenant?”
“Mr. Despard?”
“I imagine you’ll be taking the place of each of your guards as you relieve them. If Doc should come for you without returning the man he last took—if he comes for you alone—it’ll mean we’ve found one of them. I’d like you to come back with Doc as naturally as possible, so as not to alarm any of the others we may find.”
The lieutenant opened his mouth, glanced at the Major and closed it again.
“Perhaps,” said Debrow, “it might be better if the lieutenant simply stayed here, Mr. Despard. It’s a little unusual, his filling in for one of the enlisted men on post; and—”
“If you don’t mind, Major?” I said.
“No sir,” said Debrow slowly. “I don’t mind, sir.”
“Then we’ll do it this way, I think. Lieutenant, will you take Doc out so he can get the first guard?”
They went off. I turned to Debrow.
“Major, how well do you know the lieutenant?”
“I’ve known him for several years. More than three years, I’d say.”
“But do you know him well?”
Debrow looked at me with sudden caution. After a second he answered, slowly.
“I couldn’t say... well, Mr. Despard.”
“Yes,” I said.
I left it at that. After a few minutes of silence on both our parts, Doc came back with the first guard, a chunky lance corporal five and a half feet tall and looking about the age of the lieutenant.
“Your name?” I asked.
“Lance Corporal Charles Onash, sir. Third Platoon, Fourth Company, Blue Regiment.”
“Have you ever ridden a motorcycle, Corporal Onash?”
“No sir.”
“Good. You can go. Take him back, Doc.”
The next man had never ridden a motorcycle either. No more had the three after that. The fifth man we questioned had. I had to reach for some other mysterious question.
“Ever fly a sailplane, Private Mahn?”
“As a matter of fact, yes, sir.”
“How about drive a hydroplane?”
“Yes sir.”
Debrow shifted uneasily in the seat he had taken behind one of the desks. I was beginning to feel a little trapped.
“How are you on reading Sanskrit?”
“Sir?”
“I said, can you read Sanskrit?”
“No sir.”
“All right,” I said, with inner relief, “take him back, Doc.”