Read Online Tomorrow Is Too Far by James White - Free Book Online

easier, and ‘control’ was hardly the word.
    His shirt was sticking to his back, his tie was strangling him and the cockpit felt like a Turkish bath.
    ‘.. . Try to keep in the centre of the taxiway, Mr Carson,’ said the voice in his right ear, ‘and remember that your wings project nearly fifteen feet on each side. Don’t pass too close to that fuel bowser. That’s good. You concentrate on the aircraft and I’ll handle the radio this time ...’
    Pebbles unclipped the mike, brought it to within half an inch of his lips and said something which was lost in the noise of the engines. From the back of the cabin an over-amplified voice rattled, ‘You are dear to the holding point on runway Zero Nine, Tango Zulu. Acknowledge please.’
    Pebbles’s lips moved again, then he racked the mike and said, ‘The holding point is that white line about fifty yards ahead. As you come up to it, close the throttle, brake and swing the aircraft until it is pointing downwind at an angle of forty-five degrees to the runway, then lock the brakes. You will then be in a position to see if the runway is clear and that there are no aircraft making their final approach. If there is an aircraft on finals your attitude will tell him that you are waiting for him to land ... ‘
    ‘That’s good. Now lock the brakes, Mr Carson. We perform our pre-take-off checks at this point. There is a simple mnemonic which will help you remember the sequence, but this time just do it with me. Trim, set. Throttle, set to fast tick-over and friction nut not too tight. Mixture, rich. Carburettor, cold ...’
    He can do multiplication and division , Carson thought crazily , and joined-up handwriting and ... But there was no time to think about that. He could not remember a time in his whole life when he had felt so harassed and frightened and excited. Pebbles was a blithering idiot to expect ...
    But then Pebbles was supposed to be an idiot, so simple-minded that he might very well think that six years in an aircraft factory had given Carson a greater understanding of aeroplanes than Pebbles had gained in three. It was possible that Pebbles’s mind worked like that.
    The sweat running from Carson’s pores changed from hot to cold.
    ‘Tango Zulu,’ roared the voice from the back, ‘you are clear for take-off.’ Pebbles added, ‘Release the brake, Mr Carson, open the throttle and move into the centre of the runway. Line up the nose with that clump of trees on the skyline--that’s a useful landmark during take-offs from zero nine, especially if there is a cross-wind trying to blow you off course. No, we are not quite centred, but it wasn’t bad for a first try ... ‘
    Carson blinked sweat out of his eyes and croaked something which was unintelligible even to himself.
    ‘I’ll handle the take-off if you don’t mind. But keep your feet lightly on the rudder pedals, your right hand on the control column and your left on the throttle--I want you to get the feel of things for next time. Right? I have control
    ‘The words have not been invented,’ said Carson fervently, ‘properly to express my relief.’
    Pebbles nodded seriously and opened the duplicate throttle. The engine roared and they surged forward, picking up speed by the second. Under his feet the pedals made small, almost unnoticeable movements keeping them centred on the runway, and Pebbles was talking about watching the ASI for the unstick speed. The control column moved back a fraction of an inch, the undercarriage stopped rumbling against the ground and they were airborne. The runway dropped away, the club-house and the diminutive control tower slid under the edge of the port wing. The heads of the people standing outside it were exactly the same size as the wing rivets.
    There were things he was supposed to do and remember at three hundred feet and six hundred feet and a thousand feet and Pebbles was telling him about them in detail, but Carson was watching the cars on the main road and