On one side of the room two desks, their tops down and locked and covered with dust, bore end plates marked “Mr. Napier” and “Mr. Hope.” On the other side of the room was a flat desk. The top was a special map of the United States, Canada and Mexico covered with a sheet of beveled glass the exact size of the desk. On an adjoining small desk stood a covered typewriter. While Ned and Alan opened their desks, Bob left the room and made a tour of three rooms in the rear. In the two middle rooms a half dozen elderly and sedate men were busy on books. All showed deference to Bob above his years. But, beyond shaking hands as if he had been some days absent, there was little conversation.
In a rear room it was different. A square shouldered man was in charge. Between the windows was a breast-high, glass-encased, recording instrument ticking off the seconds of Washington Naval Observatory time. Over this, the second hand of a large clock jerked forward monotonously. At one side, on a table, reposed several compasses. On two desks were small engineering instruments, books, nautical almanacs and drawing tools.
“Well, Lieutenant,” exclaimed Bob, “how’s the ‘old calculator’?”
“Oh, the major seems to get a new idea each day,” responded the man, shaking hands. “How’s the _Flyer_?”
The details of the previous night’s test were described.
“I suppose you boys will be back now on commoner things for a while. Pretty lonesome here. I haven’t seen one of you in ten days.”
“You worked out that great circle from St. Johns, Newfoundland, to Cape Clear in Ireland, I suppose?” went on Bob throwing a leg over a desk. When the man nodded, the boy added, “Well, that’s all changed. We’re goin’ to start from Newark and head straight for London. You’ll get a request to route us on that line.”
“It won’t make much difference,” answered the calculator as he opened a portfolio and selected an outline sheet covering the Atlantic ocean. “As I remember it, a great circle course connecting Fastnet Light off Cape Clear and St. John’s harbor, if you continue it west, will pass just south of New York harbor.”
“Then St. Johns wouldn’t be much out of our way?”
“There’s a new deal on,” explained Bob. “Get busy and project the new course. And you might as well get down to all deviations; we’ll be goin’ in a few days.”