Page:Stirring Science Stories, March 1942.djvu/29

 watch and sometimes help when a moving mass of machines on the belt rumbled and shook as it rolled on a bumpy part of the conveyor. Immediately they would run to it, push it back upon the belt and then go back to their position, their eyes intent again upon the older men and the older women who handled the drills and who placed the parts in positions.

The three walked along the conveyor belts, surprised that no one stopped them to ask who they were and what they were doing here. They ignored the monotonously droning voice that roared above them, seeming to come from microphones hidden in the roof.

Slowly Millet, Weaver and Johnson began to get the complete picture of the strange factory. Huge boxes were brought in from the outside, obviously from the second factory, and were unpacked. The machinery and parts were assorted and distributed. Motors were sent to one place, girders, wires, steel, plates and glass to other places. The trio followed the distribution from one end to another. By the time they reached the center of the plant they realized what was being made. At the end of the factory, ready to be rolled out, they saw it.

In the center of the huge, open, unrolled door, final finishing touches being placed upon its wings, stood a giant bomber.

"Warplanes!" Millet shouted to Weaver, trying to make himself heard above the din of the factory, "Giant warplanes!"

HY HASN'T anyone stopped us?" Weaver asked as they strolled under the wings of the bomber and out into the open air, "Nobody even looked at us while we walked through the whole plant!"

'Suppose they're too busy," Johnson grunted.

"Did you see the children?" Weaver asked again. "Even children! What a factory! It's like a tomb!"

"Efficient though, isn't it?" Millet smiled, "They're getting the bombers out fast enough. Let's see where they take them." They watched a crew of men roll the bomber out of the hangar-like opening. They pushed it half-way to the open field and then left it there. Another crew, coming from the second factory, marched to it and then rolled it on—to the second plant. The three men followed.

Once they were inside the second plant with the bomber they saw a strange sight. The finished bomber was rolled on to the center of a scaffold-like structure and the careful work of dissembling and taking apart the giant plane began. The wings were carefully taken off, each individual plate tagged and marked. Not one screw was wasted. Nothing was lost.

"I'll be damned!" Johnson said, astonished.

The three men gathered around and watched. There could be no doubt as to what was being done. The bomber, just finished, was now being taken apart. Its component parts would be packed and sent to the first factory where it would be rebuilt.

"An insane vicious circle!" Weaver said.

"They must be crazy!" Johnson said, "There's no sense in that!"

He stepped forward and seized one of the workmen by the shoulders.

"Hey you!" he shouted, "I want to talk to you! What's going on here?"

The man resisted and tried to get back to his position. When Johnson would not let go he turned quickly and struck at Johnson with his wrench. Johnson yelped a cry of surprised pain and let go. The man immediately went back to his spot by the plane as if nothing has happened.

"Dammit!" Johnson shouted to Millet and Weaver. "He struck me! He's crazy! They're all crazy!"

"In a way," Millet said soberly. "Yes. But let's get out of here first."

HEY LEFT the factory and entered one of the nearby homes where the glowing warmth of the fire-place soothed them.

"All right, Millet," Johnson said. "You'll seem to know the answers. What's wrong with the city? Everybody seems to be mad. They won't do anything. They just work—work—work! That's enough to drive anybody mad!"

"And the rhythm!" Weaver said. "That mechanical voice in each factory roaring over and over again—work—work—work! Be careful! Be careful! Be careful! What is it all?"

"It's our heritage," Millet said cryptically.

"Heritage? What heritage?"

"Do you remember your history? The story of the Second World War and even the Third?"

"Of course. Of course," Weaver said, "But this mad city—what has that to do with the wars that took place two centuries ago?"

"Two centuries!" Millet said, "That's it exactly! For more than two hundred years that factory has been building bombing planes for a war that ended two hundred years ago!"

"You're crazy yourself!"

"Crazy, eh? Not as crazy as the facts of history!" Millet said, "Do you remember the bombings of the Second World War? Wave after wave of enemy planes came, blowing up the factories and industrial centers of the enemy. Coventry, Hamburg, Detroit! All of them smashed to bits! When industrial centers were smashed by air-raids, what is the logical answer? Build factories and plants in out of the way places, far from the arm of the airplane!"

"I suppose you'll say that's how this factory was built?"