The Radio Gunner

A SCIENTIST IN THE MAKING

1

Early in the twentieth century the annual Memorial Day parade was passing through a New England town. The sun shone hotly down till the tarvia of the road felt soft and sticky underfoot. At the head of the procession the usual brass band led the way with martial music. Every one in the town was out, the older citizens for the most part standing reverently with uncovered heads, while the children, in anything but a solemn mood, tagged along on the flanks of the band.

Jim Evans, a boy of six years, stood by the sidewalk in front of the little white house in which he lived, his mother beside him, holding him by the hand. At the rhythmic crescendo of the approaching music, his pulse throbbed, and as the band swept by his eyes sparkled with delight. Then came the aged veterans of the Civil War in their faded blue uniforms, their grizzled white beards and wrinkled features giving them a quaintness in the child’s eyes that made him want to call his mother’s attention. He tugged at her hand and looked up at her. The look in her face struck wonder to his childish soul; there were tears in her eyes. He gazed at her in amazement. Tears had always been to him the expression of childish grievance—nothing more. He had never seen them shed by a grown-up. To his inquiring mind a mystery had now presented itself. More than that, deep down within him there was an awakening of something he had never felt before. His mother looked down and saw the expression of wonder in the child’s serious face. Her only answer was a tightening of her grip on his hand and a quiver of the lip.

The sound of the beating drum died away down the street; the procession was gone. The mother and child returned to the little garden behind the house. Seating herself in a garden chair, she took him in her lap.

“Jim,” she said in a low tender voice, “my father would have been marching with those old men if he had lived. I remember so well when he said ‘good-bye.’ I was a little girl about as big as you are, and he picked me up in his arms and kissed me. Then he went away and never came back. He died fighting bravely for all of us who stayed behind.”

Thus with the vision of the parade fresh in his eyes and the sound of martial music still ringing in his ears, and with the wonder of this new meaning of his mother’s tears stirring his soul, the tradition of an heroic life and death, the most precious heritage of the mother, was handed on to Jim, the small boy. In after years he never saw a Memorial Day parade but the memory of that day rose vividly before him, and he never forgot what the day stood for.

2

Eleven years after this incident, one October afternoon, Jim Evans, now at boarding-school, had gone up into the laboratory in the top of the schoolhouse to finish an experiment with a new radio hook-up before putting on his football clothes. He had just become absorbed in his task when he heard the ringing of a bell which sounded the fire alarm. Every boy in the school had his duty in the fire brigade assigned him, and all knew that this summons took precedence over everything.

Evans dropped his tools and ran to a window overlooking the school grounds. From his high position he could see the situation at a glance. The school grounds comprised a superb grove of stately white pines, the pride of the neighborhood. Within this grove, by its western border, was a pond, and north of the pond the grove was bounded for a short distance at its northwest corner by a small swamp, choked with dense vegetation, a place frequented by a great variety of bird life. West of the grove lay a wide expanse of low meadowland overgrown with tall grass and thick bushes. After weeks of drought the ground was parched and dry. A strong northwest wind was blowing, and a brush fire burning in the meadow was sweeping rapidly toward the pine grove, imminently threatening its destruction. Evans saw the boys dash into a building and then, emerging with buckets and brooms, start on a run, led by Sam Mortimer, chief of the fire brigade, to the south side of the pond. Here lay the greater part of the boundary between the meadow and the grove, and here it was that the shore of the pond was most easily approached, for on the north it was lined with the dense swamp vegetation. Evidently the plan of campaign was to form a bucket line from the pond along the western edge of the grove to its southern extremity. Evans could see that no one was detailed to deal with the fire north of the pond; apparently it was assumed that the natural moisture there would stop the fire. Now Evans had frequently haunted this swamp in search of birds, and knew that the drought had reduced it to a highly inflammable state. After a brief survey of the situation, he ran downstairs and out toward the grove. By the time he was out on the grounds the entire school, boys and masters, had disappeared into the grove to the south of the pond. Evans ran for the swamp where the smoke told him the fire was already entering the dense growth of brush.

Into the thicket he plunged and clawed his way through the tall bushes till, half-suffocated with smoke, he reached the advancing line of the fire. Down he went on his hands and knees and began scraping away the dried leaves from the surface of the mud, now and again jumping to his feet and uprooting bushes where the density of the growth required it, then dropping again to his knees and working among the leaves like a terrier. Thus he made across the path of the fire a swath where the flames were stopped except in the strongest gusts of wind. Now and then one of these would blow a burning leaf across the swath and start the fire anew on the other side. Then Evans would jump back and stamp out the fresh blaze. Once, when a runaway blaze threatened to spread too fast to be stopped in this way, he threw himself on it and smothered it with his body.

With feverish effort he struggled against the advancing flames, fearful lest they should get beyond his control in the larger bushes and trees by the edge of the pond and thus set fire to the entire pine grove. But now he saw the water of the pond gleaming through the smoke not far ahead, and redoubled his efforts to carry his swath of bare earth to the water’s edge. Half-blinded with smoke he dug and clawed and kicked away the leaves till at last he reached the muddy shore of the pond, and with vast relief saw the last of the flames expend themselves in the dried leaves west of the line.

He turned and walked back over the swath he had made, searching carefully for embers that might start the fire anew. Only smouldering embers did he find, and, stamping these out, he returned to the edge of the pond satisfied that no more danger lay in this quarter. He then skirted the shore of the pond and came to the south side where the rest of the boys, having put out the fire in that quarter with their bucket line, were assembling.

Evans approached the others, picking the thorns out of his fingers as he came.

When Mortimer saw him he said, “Well, Jim, where in thunder have you been?”

“In the swamp,” was the answer.

“What, looking for birds? There’s no fire there, is there?”

Evans looked at him a second before answering, then said quietly, “No.”

“Didn’t you hear the fire bell?” said Mortimer.

“Yes,” said Evans.

“That’s a nice example to set the younger boys!” said Mortimer. “How can we make anything of the fire brigade if the fellows in the graduating class quit in an emergency like that? You ought to be put in the jug.”

The eyes of half a dozen boys standing near were on Evans, but he said nothing. The fire brigade was formally dismissed, and the boys repaired to the gymnasium where they dressed for football practice. As they were dressing, Evans spoke to no one, and no one spoke to him. In the line-up between the first and second teams, Evans, being one of the smallest on the squad, played quarterback on the second. Usually his game was not remarkable; he was criticized for too much deliberation in the choice of plays. To-day he seemed possessed; he was all over the field at once, picking up the ball on fumbles, darting through the line and gaining ground, till Mortimer, captain of the first eleven, coached his team to watch Evans and stop him. In spite of all he could do to rally his team, Evans made a touchdown which resulted in the defeat of the first eleven by the second, a humiliation it had hitherto been spared.

As the boys were walking back to the locker building in their reeking football clothes, the head-master drew Mortimer aside and said to him: “Didn’t you have your whole fire brigade on the south side of the pond?”

“Yes, sir,” said Mortimer.

“I suppose you thought the swamp on the north side would be too wet to burn, and the fire would stop there anyway,” said the head-master.

“Surely.”

“I should have thought so, too,” said the head-master; “there’s usually standing water all through there. Fortunately some one who knew better than you or I went in there and saved the pine grove. I’ve just been looking over the ground and found that the fire had gone right into the middle of the swamp to where some one had scraped away the leaves and stopped it. It was dry as tinder everywhere. Have you any idea who could have done it?”

Mortimer was staggered.

“Jim Evans was in the swamp,” he said. “It must have been he. And I called him down for not being on the job. Why didn’t he tell me?”

Mortimer hastened to find Evans and ascertain the truth.

“Why didn’t you tell me, you great chump?” he said.

“You seemed to take it for granted that I’d been making a fool of myself, and I suppose that made me sore. Anyway, I didn’t feel like going into explanations with those other fellows looking on.”

“Well, I’m going into explanations just as quick as I can,” said Mortimer warmly.

“That’s mighty white of you, Sam,” said Evans, “but don’t make too much fuss over it.”

Mortimer lost no time in telling all who had heard his sharp rebuke—and more too—the truth of the matter.

3

The next year Evans and Mortimer were freshmen together in college. The friendship between them was firmly established, but in the larger number of boys with whom they were thrown the divergence of their tastes caused them to see less and less of each other. Mortimer was universally liked and socially prominent. Altogether he was a distinguished figure in his class. Evans devoted himself assiduously to scientific study, and in his leisure time his strong love of outdoor life usually led him away from, rather than toward, the haunts of men. For this reason, as well as because of his reserved and retiring disposition, he was socially comparatively obscure, though respected and beloved by the few with whom he became intimate.

Few would have supposed that one so obviously a leader as Mortimer could ever want to lean for support in any exigency of life on one younger than himself. Yet there were times when he felt depressed or when his philosophy of life seemed clouded with doubts. At such times he was apt to stroll over to Evans’s room where the two friends would have a “heart-to-heart” talk, often lasting well into the night; and always the clouds of confusion or doubt would disappear.

The spring following their entrance into college came that great turning-point in history, when in April, 1917, America entered the war. Mortimer enrolled in the first Plattsburg Camp where he applied himself so well to his training for the army that, in spite of being only twenty years old, he won the commission of first lieutenant. After many months in a training camp he was promoted to captain and sent overseas. His company continued in training in France till the last two months of the war when it was sent into action in the Argonne. Mortimer served with distinction and won an enviable citation.

Evans, being a proficient radio operator, enlisted at once in the navy and was put through the intensive course for radio electricians, and then sent abroad on a destroyer.

When he left his home the parting was not easy. His mother was a widow, and he her only child; he was all she had. But in the spirit with which the Spartan mothers gave to their sons the shields they were to carry into battle, saying as they did so, “Return with it, or on it,” Jim Evans’s mother bade him Godspeed with a brave smile on her lips. He had a tradition to live up to, and she thanked God he was able to do it.

During the last months of the war the destroyer to which Evans was attached was among those basing on Queenstown and performing the arduous duty of meeting the great convoys from the States, far out at sea, and escorting them through the danger zone to safety.

The life on these slim fighting ships was a strange one indeed. As they slid silently out of the harbor past Haulbowline, three, four, or five in column, they never knew what might be in store for them. Then as they passed Daunt Rock and, forming their scouting line, plunged into the head seas that swept their narrow decks, there came the test of the sailor’s morale. To learn to live and carry on in their cramped quarters, rolling, pitching, and thrashing about till it seemed as if neither flesh and blood nor steel could stand it any longer, while the cold, gray rollers, washing over the ship from stem to stern, chilled the very soul, was a feat that seemed to call for even more than human powers of adaptation.

But it was not always rough and dreary. There were days of sparkling sunshine and calm seas, days when Evans’s spirit expanded and he rejoiced in the grandeur of the ocean. And as he became more and more accustomed to the life, his love of the sea, born at first in his childhood acquaintance with it on the New England coast, became deeper, till it was woven into every fiber of his being.

Soon after the Armistice, Evans went to London on leave. He now wore the uniform of a Chief Petty Officer, having risen through the successive grades of radio electrician to chief. In London he met Sam Mortimer, and they had a happy evening together. Mortimer told of the days and nights at the front in mud, rain, shell-fire, and gas.

“How was it on the destroyers?” he asked of Evans.

“Pretty hard to stick it at first,” was the answer. “In those early days when we first started bucking the head seas going out to seventeen degrees west to look for convoys, I’d just want to curl up in the lee of a stack where I could breathe fresh air and still not be drenched to the skin with the spray and green seas washing over the decks. I didn’t care a hang half the time if I made good or not. And I was just crazy for the sight of the green hills of Ireland and the spires of Queenstown, the snug berth at the mooring buoy and the liberty party ashore. Then I waked up to the fact that the messages I had to copy in those tedious watches in the radio room were very close to the heart of our naval strategy; handling them mechanically like an automaton, I was losing a golden opportunity to read the controlling mind. I began to notice things, and I saw a wonderful evolution going on. Sailing orders which at first required long messages were later transmitted in a few brief signals. Every month saw new growth of efficiency in handling communications and disposing the forces. We have the British chiefly to thank for that—especially Admiral Bayly.

“Toward the end I got to feel more like part of the ship; I got so I didn’t mind, no matter how rough it was, and then the real spirit of the sea got hold of me. As an old sailor said, life at sea clears the corruption of the beach right out of your system. I’ve got now so that when the old ship leaves Corkbeg Light astern and puts her nose into the Atlantic, I feel that I’m getting back into my native element.”

“I like the ocean on a nice calm day,” said Mortimer, “but I’d never feel like that.”

“What I want to do now more than anything,” said Evans, “is to go for a good long cruise in my own boat when I can go where I want, turn in when I want, and get up when I want.”

“I’ll do that with you when we get home,” said Mortimer.

“That’s a go,” echoed Evans warmly. “Don’t forget it.”

“You bet I won’t,” said Mortimer.

4

Before the end of the winter these two young men were back in college, finishing the courses they had begun. The summer vacations were for Mortimer so well occupied with house parties and travel that the promised cruise was forgotten.

After college Mortimer studied law. As a student of this profession, though of average thoroughness, he was more especially characterized by brilliance; he could take in the “headlines” of a subject quickly and well. After a short apprenticeship as a lawyer, he turned his attention to politics in which he made for himself a brilliant and successful career.

Evans took up research in physics as his life-work, and after a year in the great Cavendish Laboratory of Cambridge, England, he found a place in the physics department of one of the leading American universities. His researches dealt with the problems of atomic structure and dynamics, and in this work he was deeply absorbed, giving little time to anything else, except during his vacations when he made a point each year of taking a substantial allowance of outdoor life, usually cruising in a small sailboat along the New England coast and often as far as Nova Scotia or the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. Thus he kept the elasticity of youth, and with it an ever-increasing self-reliance, so that no problem presented to him by wind or tide or fog could catch him without adequate resource.

Three years after graduation the class of which Evans and Mortimer were members held a reunion at their Alma Mater in June. Mortimer, now as always the leader in his class, was the central figure, usually surrounded by groups of warm friends chatting about old times and war times, or discussing questions of the day. Once during the reunion he contrived to get off in a corner with Evans.

“What about that cruise we planned in London?” he said. “Six years have gone by and we don’t seem to have pulled it off yet.”

“Name your day this summer,” said Evans, “and I’ll take you on.”

“I’m scheduled for a vacation the first of August. How would that suit you?”

“That suits me fine. My boat will be in the harbor; just come to my laboratory and we’ll go aboard.”

“That’s a date,” said Mortimer; “don’t forget.”

On August first Mortimer appeared at the Physics Building and asked for Evans. A crotchety
diener
in faded overalls showed him to a room in the basement far removed from the light of day. Within, the sight which met his eye was what appeared to be a hopeless snarl of junk. There was a maze of glass tubing bent into all sorts of bizarre shapes, some of it covered with crumpled bits of sheet lead or tinfoil from the wrapping of a cake of chocolate; there were wires leading every which way with no apparent vestige of order; there were old wooden packing-boxes serving as supports, rusty nails bent upward for hooks, nondescript objects tied together with twine or stuck together with wax. Yet within this crazy jumble were instruments whose construction required the highest refinement of manual skill that can be found in all the world. The entire set-up was the culmination of years of patient planning, designing, and assembling. Crude as it appeared, it was in reality the key to some of the profoundest secrets of Nature; and no man on earth save Evans knew how to use it. In the midst of this strange assortment of matter, Evans sat on an empty packing-box, his eye glued to the eye-piece of an optical instrument.

“Well, Jim, are you coming sailing?”

Before answering, Evans scribbled some figures on a scrap of paper. Then he turned to Mortimer.

“Good Lord, Sam, is it the first of August already? I’d clean lost track of time.”

“That’s what it is; and there’s a fine sailing breeze.”

“Sailing breeze or no, I can’t knock off now. I’ve been sweating all summer to get this experiment going right, and it’s going at last to the Queen’s taste.”

“Well, where do I come in? I’ve come all the way from New York to go cruising with you.”

“I tell you what,” said Evans, after a moment’s reflection, “you go down to the harbor and find Jones’s store. Get whatever looks good in the way of fresh food; I’ve got plenty of canned goods and staple groceries on board. Get the stuff delivered at Salter’s Landing. I can finish up this experiment by midnight, and I guess after that it won’t hurt me to get it out of my system for a while. Go to the movies or anything you like, and then come here with a taxi about midnight, and we’ll get aboard as quick as we can.”

Clearly the man of science could no more be budged till his cherished experiment had yielded its golden fruit of knowledge than can the moon be diverted from her course in the skies. No exploration of new continents, no searching for hidden gold can lure the spirit on with so strong an appeal as the unknown law of Nature awaiting the crucial experiment, planned and prepared for months, and then appearing at last like the light of day when the experiment is done and the measurements construed with the power of reason.

Mortimer obeyed, and wandered off to spend the afternoon and evening on the water-front of the harbor. The next day the two friends sailed a sparkling sea together in a tiny cruising knockabout—boys once more.