Flying the Coast Skyways. Jack Ralston's Swift Patrol

CHAPTER XV
The Trial Spin

Perk had closely examined a number of things about the amphibian in which they anticipated carrying out the gigantic task committed to their hands by the Chief at Headquarters; and whom they looked up to as worthy of their utmost respect as an organizer able to consider the utmost details. Most of his scrutiny, however, did not have any connection with new gadgets affixed to the black dashboard fronting the pilot’s seat; but lay in the direction of the combination of wheels for landing on solid ground, also pontoons for use when seeking to drop down on the water of river, lagoon, or even the sea itself.

He spent considerable time in examining the working of this contrivance, which he had reason to fully appreciate – if only it proved all that was claimed for it, which was soon to be settled.

Then the new-fangled muffler for the engine exhaust was a source of vast attention on Perk’s part; Jack could see him shaking his head incredulously; and from this suspected Perk of doubting its efficiency; but then Perk happened to be something of a skeptic, and even though he did not come from Missouri he usually had to be shown before yielding his doubts.

“Let’s get out of here, and aloft,” suggested Jack, when he found it was about an hour before noon time.

The field just then presented a rather animated appearance, as ships were coming in, and going out; with several taking up parties who were eager to try a first air swing. This just suited Jack, for it would keep many curious eyes off their movements; and just then the less notice they drew the better he would be pleased.

They picked up a couple of field workers to lend a hand, and hence their rather seedy looking water and air craft was wheeled into position, after it had been serviced while yet in the hangar, a very nice undertaking for one who disliked publicity.

“Here, Wally,” Jack went on to say, when everything seemed in readiness for their initial jump, “suppose you take hold, seeing you’re more accustomed to this type of boat than I am. However I’ll soon get acquainted, and then it’ll be okay. Step in, and grab the stick, partner; nothing to keep us on ground that I know of; and I’m anxious to have a look-in at the waterways where we’re hoping for a run of luck with the ducks and geese.”

Much of this of course was for the benefit of the two men in dungarees, for how were Jack and his pard to know but that one of them might turn out to be a clever spy in the pay of the never sleeping Combine, jealous of their hitherto unsurpassed success in beating the customs, and in a way daring the Secret Service branch of the Federal Government to “do its level best to down them”?

Perk was not in the least averse to taking the place of honor when the amphibian would start its initial flight in their hands. He proved the absolute truth of what he had said about being fairly at home with the ship that belonged to both the land and water contingent; for they made only a short run when contact with the ground was cut off, and like a bird broken away from its brass cage and soaring upward, they started to spiral in the effort to gain altitude.

When he had a ceiling of say about five hundred feet or more, Perk commenced a wide swing, wishing to circle the city on the seashore, to view it from a different angle than their former experience had given them.

“Now point her blunt nose into the north, buddy – we’re off!” Jack bawled in the ear of the pilot, the ear-phones not having as yet been adjusted – all those things came under the line of Perk’s duty, and would be attended to in due time.

They speedily left the good city of Charleston behind them, and were passing over the Navy-yard; which place Perk meant to examine more closely with his glasses on another occasion, when matters would be easier for him.

“How does she go?” shouted Jack, later on, when they could no longer catch even a fugitive glimpse of the city, saving the cloud of smoke that almost always hung over the high buildings and steeples.

“Bang up, boss; works like a charm!” yelled Perk, happily, as though he was not “caring a Continental” just how long Jack allowed him to hold the post of honor. “Whoever looked after the job o’ gettin’ this classic old-timer in great shape for this work, he shore knew his onions, I’ll say. It’s a snap to run this boat, if yeou want to know my ’pinion.”

“I think I’ll take a whirl at the controls, partner!” cried Jack; “stay just where you are for a while at least; I can play the game as a back-seat driver. Here goes, then.”

He was pleased to find it no trouble whatever to handle the amphibian as though he knew everything about such craft; after all airships are run pretty much alike; and it depends on the adaptability of the pilot as to whether he can work the same as with his own familiar type of craft – there are some people who are able to master any and all models of automobiles, even though handling them for the first time, especially men mechanically inclined by Nature, – and Jack happened to belong to that class.

“You can go about your duties, Wally; I’ll work over into the front seat okay, for its an easy job, I reckon. When we make up our minds to dip down and wet the pontoons in some body of water, fresh or salt, I’ll let you handle the boat again; though I imagine I could do the thing without much splash if I was put to it. I’ll soon get the hang of the trick, you can well believe.”

“Huh! yeou would, Mister – it aint much that’d faize yeou, take it from me as knows.”

After that conversation was such a tremendous effort that it languished until a better opportunity opened up – this would come when Jack found it expedient to make a test of the muffler system, with which their boat had been supplied, and which Perk was eager to see tried out.

To the delight of both fliers the device worked to a charm, most of the deafening racket being abated, even when they going at the fastest speed of which the “has-been” Curtiss-Falcon was capable of exhibiting – much more than a hundred miles an hour, Perk figured.

“Huh! mebbe naow they call this ship a relic o’ the past,” he grunted, when the success of the experiment was assured; “but I wanter say right naow there aint amany up-to-the-minute ships as kin run circles ’raound this tub, as some wise guy pilot’d call her. See, yeou kin hear ev’ry word I’m asayin’ an’ yet I aint ahollerin’ any to notice. It’s a bully invention, an’ shows where we’re agettin’ in this science o’ aviation. From what I hears, them ships as is acarryin’ smuggled stuff ’long the seaboard aint great at speed, ’cause they don’t need to be, their job bein’ to carry hefty loads each trip, an’ be steady goers. If the chanct ever comes to try this Falcon aout agin one o’ that dirty bunch, I’m wagerin’ we’ll overhaul the same hands down, an’ no takers.”

“I hope your prediction proves a true one, brother,” Jack told him; “for, come to think of it, there’s a pretty good chance we may yet be up against a hot chase, either the pursued, or better still, the pursuer; in either case having the speediest craft would be an advantage worth while. Yes, that seems to be okay, and a big improvement over all that row we’re accustomed to carrying along with us wherever we go.”

They had been heading up the coast, keeping within sight of the Atlantic most of the time; but paying constant attention to inland pictures.

Of course Perk had before then brought his faithful and much beloved glasses out of their nook, and was making frequent use of the same, staring this way and that, sometimes making a noise with his mouth as though grunting his surprise to discover what a clear atmosphere attended their trial flight, and how close up the powerful binocular lens brought far distant objects.

“It shore is a big treat jest to be squattin’ hyah, suh, an’ observin’ so much all ’raound us. Looks like a mighty tough region daown there, I got to admit; an’ if them slick guys air ahidin’ their landin’ place where them awful swampy tracts lie, we’re agoin’ to have aour hands right full alocatin’ the same, an’ gettin’ what we come after in the bargain.”

“Don’t worry, partner,” Jack told him, in as smooth a voice as though he could see nothing whatever to cause undue anxiety. “Rome, you may remember, wasn’t built in a day; there’ll be heaps of time to get our little work in; and we were told to take as long as we thought wise – that there was no need of trying to wind things up in a hurry.”

“That’s correct, boss,” admitted the easily convinced Perk; and then deftly turning the talk in another quarter he went on to add, pointing as he made the remark: “Looky yondah, suh, see that neat lit’ bayou jest anestlin’ there like a private pond. Wouldn’t it be fine if we could on’y drop daown, an’ try aour pontoons on that sheet o’ water. Doant seem to be a livin’ thing araoun’ neither, less it might be a ’gator, stickin’ his nose up to see if the coast it be clear.”

Jack turned the craft to a severe dip, at which the pleased Perk grinned horribly, as if he considered he had made a real “wise-crack.”

“Goin’ daown, folks – main floor next – ev’rybody aout then what aint agwine to the basement!” he went on to remark, quaintly; and Jack could see how his best pal was earnestly trying to acquire the genuine Southern manner of speech, tinctured with a touch of negro dialect.

“I’m going to try to make contact myself, brother,” announced the confident pilot, as, after several circling movements he headed up against the sea breeze that was blowing from the southeast just then.

Perk did not appear to feel any concern, such confidence did he have in the other’s ability to make landings so soft that an egg would hardly have been crushed by any jumpy motion.

Jack watched his contact with the water – the big boat dipped, sprang up, came in touch again, and then settled down to making headway, the little wavelets curling away from the bows of the pontoons with a murmurous sound very similar to the gurgling of a running mountain brook.

“Splendid work, buddy, better’n I could a done it myself, with all the sperience I done had long ago. An’ she does work to a charm, sure as yeou’re born. We’re in bully great luck, all right, to have ’em pick aout sech a dandy ole boat like this, that does her makers credit. I’ll tell the world.”

Jack was not planning to stay in that lonely bayou for any length of time; what they were out to pay particular attention to on this their initial trip was the lay of the land; also to familiarize themselves with the working of the amphibian; so presently he again left the water, and arose like a lark.

CHAPTER XVI
All in a Day’s Work

“And I gotter to admit,” Perk was saying, shortly after they had gained the altitude that gave him a chance to sweep the horizon with his glasses, “even the ole weather sharp stands in aour favor. Look at that sky, buddy; did yeou ever in all yeour life set eyes on a clearer stretch – nary a single cloud pokin’ its nose in sight; an’ to think o’ the measly days an’ nights I uster spend in the mail-carrier business, asloggin’ ’long with a capacity load, and mebbe ice formin’ on my wings to beat the band. Yeah! this lay o’ aourn aint so bad – some o’ the time.”

They swung over much of the territory for fifty miles north of Charleston, with Jack noting the lay of the land as cleverly as any topography expert charting a region, could display. In that wonderful brain of his he undoubtedly must have been engaged in making a mental chart of the ground; the sinuosities of the streams that ran with such eccentricity toward the nearby ocean; the numerous more or less possible landing-places where both boats from salt water, and those dropping down from the clouds, might find a resting place; where their contraband cargoes could be taken aboard waiting trucks, and be transported to safe havens, despite the utmost vigilance of the customs officers and coast patrol forces to apprehend them.

This initial survey of the vast territory open to the expert smugglers, most of it absolutely familiar to those engaged in the illegal traffic, undoubtedly must have impressed the Secret Service man with the immensity of the task so recently placed upon his shoulders.

Just the same, the only visible result of this realization lay in a tightening of Jack’s firm lips, and a fresh gleam in his steady eyes, as though he might be once again dedicating all his energies, his life itself, to the undertaking as yet so young, so untried.

“So much for the territory close to Charleston,” he told his mate, as he turned the nose of his airship once more toward the city; “I’ve got that down pretty pat for a beginning. The next time we come out it will be to take up the survey about where we left off today, and head further north.”

“Judgin’ from what yeou say, partner, I kinder gu – reckons as haow yeou kim to the conclusion they gets their business in further away from dear ole Charleston – haow ’bout that, suh?”

“Possibly so, Wally, but from what I’ve picked up from many sources, I’m already half convinced we’ll be apt to rim across the whole works within fifty miles or so of the city, it may be where that swift and crooked Yamasaw River skirts the coastways, dodging this way and that, even running backwards sometimes, so when you’ve been going with the current two hours you find yourself within a biscuit toss of a tree you passed long ago.”

So in due time they dropped down again on the landing-field close to Charleston.

One thing Perk felt absolutely certain about, which was that his chief was not going to start real operations until he had accomplished the most exacting examination of the entire ground; and felt able to picture in his mind just how the Government baiters carried out their extensive smuggling game by sea and air; but when he did strike it would be in a way to start strangling the hitherto successful campaign of the giant Combine.

They both carried on in a perfectly natural fashion, much of their talk when in the company of any third party being along the line of their intended sport – how they had been able to discover a number of promising secluded ponds and bayous where already thus early in the ducking season a considerable gathering of the feathered game had been noted.

Perk fell into the humor of the trick, and even boasted of what a vacancy he meant to create in the flocks of ducks and geese before the termination of Mr. Warrington’s vacation caused him to start north once more to his regular “business” of attending Board meetings in a bunch of companies where he chanced to be a heavy stockholder, and a director as well.

Really to Perk, who liked a joke as well as the next one, this thing promised no end of fun; every hour of the day found him more deeply interested than before, and eager to push ahead.

That night in the sanctity of their room, (speaking even there in low voices as if they more than half believed the very walls might have ears) Perk took occasion to mention the remarkable gift his companion had with regard to a retentive memory.

“I jest doant see haow yeou kin ’member things like yeou do, ole hoss,” he was saying, evidently fishing for light on a subject that had often confounded his intellect. “Onct yeou hears a long-winded talk, an’ I’ll be hanged if yeou can’t spin her off word fur word, an’ never a single slip-up. Haow kin yeou do it, suh, I’d shore like to know?”

“It just can’t be explained, brother, and that’s a fact,” Jack told him in his smiling way. “All you know is that Nature’s been kind in giving you such a faculty, and let it go at that. I may seem remarkable to you, in that I’ve got such a good memory; but there have been others beside whom I’m a regular piker. Did you ever hear of Blind Tom, brother?”

“Huh! ’pears to me I did – he was some sorter black man, wa’nt he, suh, what could play extra good on the pianner?”

“Extra good – why, that doesn’t mean a tenth of what he could do – one of the greatest natural phenomena ever known in America, or anywhere – he was black as the ace of spades, and unusually homely, so they hated to watch him when he was playing; yet he had the most astounding memory ever heard of – didn’t know one note of music from another – just depended on his ears, and that amazing talent that Nature had implanted in his, strange uncouth soul.”

“What could he do, partner, as was so wonderful?” demanded Perk, seemingly more or less interested.

“Of course I never saw or listened to him play, for he was dead long before my time,” Jack continued; “but I’ve heard people who had, and I’ve also read accounts of it in magazine articles, so I’m pretty well posted myself. If you turned your head away, they say you’d have sworn some famous composer was hitting the ivories of the piano, and bringing out the most divine strains ever heard. He could listen just once to some classical and difficult sonata played by an eminent performer, (something Blind Tom had never heard before in all his life) and then sitting down he would reproduce the whole selection exactly as the famous artist had played it, with never a chord missing. People used to be awed, as though realizing they were in the presence of a miracle!”

“Gee whiz! it must a been somethin’ fierce, Boss,” was Perk’s only comment.

“You know they say the Chinese and Japanese are wonderful imitators, and can reproduce any pattern to the minutest detail that is placed before them; but the best of them would be ten classes below that negro genius. So don’t think I’m anything but a tyro, brother, with my poor memory.

“Hot-diggetty-dig! but yeou’re good enough to make a poor bucko like me take a seat way back; that’s the honest truth, er Mr. Warrington, suh.”

As the following day broke with a promise of more clear weather Jack decided to waste no time. Accordingly they were off again, and speeding toward the north at a pace well over a hundred miles an hour.

“Gosh-a-mighty! I never’d have reckoned this here ole boat could hit it up so pretty,” Perk at one time called out, when they had muffled the engine exhaust so effectually that they were well able to converse without raising their voices to a shout. “She muster been built outen A Number One stuff to hold together like she’s done. If we got through this here job alive, partner, it’s gwine to be up to us-uns to write a sweet letter to the company what constructed this here amphibian, an’ tell ’em jest haow much we thinks o’ aour boat.”

“Possibly we may, partner,” the other told him; “but even that might break the Secret Service rule of keeping identities well covered up, lest you lose some of your effectiveness by getting too familiar. Besides, I’ve got an idea this boat’s been reconstructed – that as originally built she wasn’t in the amphibian class at all – some gent who owned her must have been fond of the model, and feeling the necessity for having a ship that could land on water, had her altered to suit his wants.”

“That may well be, suh,” Perk went on to assert, with one of his nods; “but jest the same they made a mighty good job o’ it, I’m asayin’, suh. Huh! to tell the truth right naow I wouldn’t cry much if I never did see aour ole bus, the big Fokker, agin; I’ve fell so turrible hard fo’ this hyah ship, built to imitate a duck, what kin swim on the water, rise from the same when yeou wants to git agoin’, an’ cut ahead at more’n a hundred clean an hour. Huh!”

When they had reason to believe, (from landmarks taken notice of on the preceding day by Perk, as they turned for home) they were covering a fresh stretch of land and water, their vigilance was once more centered upon the task of closely observing every detail, and making more mental notes.

During this cruise they discovered next to nothing incriminating – as a rule they found themselves gazing down on a tangled mass of forest growth, with silver threads of water running crisscross here and there; or it might be muddy looking rivers and creeks meandering along in their long march to the sea, covering at least ten miles where a crow would fly the same distance in one mile or possibly less.

Jack had noted a number of places where the conditions seemed more or less favorable for such secret work as the successful landing of illicit cargoes necessitated; but while the spot seemed everything that could be wished, there was never a sign of its being used for such purposes – no sheds, or even a well-used road leading into the pine woods, such as must be required if heavy truck loads of goods were to be carried off.

“It looks as if we’ll have to go over that first fifty or sixty miles again, with a fine tooth comb,” Jack told his comrade, as the afternoon caught them still speeding gaily along, not over three thousand feet above the checkered landscape below.

“What we agoin’ to do ’baout hit, then, suh?” demanded the puzzled Perk. “We shore caint keep startin’ aout from Charleston every mawnin’ like we’re adoin’ right naow, covering hundreds o’ miles, an’ hope to git back by daylight.”

“Oh! that needn’t trouble us anything to speak of, matey,” the other hastened to assure him. “If necessary we’ll drop down, and make camp for the night, pick things up in the morning, and take chances of getting back to Charleston any old time later on.”

“Say, less do that same tonight, suh,” suggested the artful Perk, with his most engaging smile; but Jack shook his head in the negative.

“Possibly we may tomorrow; but I’ve agreed to see Mr. Herriott tonight, partner.”