by Frank Cobb
CHAPTER IV
O'Brien burst out with an exclamation of anger, "By gosh, sir, thisthing is going too far! I don't intend to stand by and see you murdered.You have had a close shave here tonight, and something has _got_ to bedone. Where is Mrs. Ridgeway?"
"She is in England visiting some relatives," said Mr. Ridgeway with atriumphant laugh. "So you won't get any backing from her. I sent herover there three months ago."
"Well, _something_ has got to be done all right, all right," said thesecret service man sullenly.
Mr. Ridgeway pressed his aching head. "I think this will end it," hesaid. "They have found no papers, and they will let well enough alone.You know as well as I do, O'Brien, that they will know that I will be onguard after this. And I _will_ be. I will set a lot of detectives aroundhere, each with a badge as big as a dinner plate. And I will sit and donothing, and you can do the work."
"All right; that is more like what I want to hear," said O'Brien,smiling at last. "You are doing enough, Mr. Ridgeway, when you financethe affair. You have had all those airplanes built, and thosedirigibles, and if you sit tight and boss, that is all we will ask for.Just you let me and Lawrence push the rest of the work."
"I will have to keep quiet for a day or two anyway," said Mr. Ridgeway."I feel sort of old tonight. I wish I had a son or two to look out forme. But you are all right, O'Brien. Do whatever you like."
"Then to bed you go, first of all," said the practical Irishman, "andwhilst I get some plainclothes men here for a guard, you can sit withhim, Lawrence, and don't you let a soul in the room."
"The servants are all in bed and there is no one else to come," said Mr.Ridgeway drowsily.
With a good deal of help he managed to get to the little automaticelevator, and they put him to bed. While Lawrence put cold compresses onthe bruised head, O'Brien telephoned for the police and placed a guardaround the house. Then he summoned Mr. Ridgeway's doctor, who examinedthe wound and assured them that there was no concussion. By the time allthis was done, it was nearly three o'clock in the morning.
"Let's to bed," yawned O'Brien. "It's coming home with you I am, Larry.I expect you'll loan me the matter of some pajammies?"
"Sure!" said Lawrence. "But I don't know how they will fit."
"Fit, fit!" said O'Brien, hailing a passing taxi. "Fit? Sure, I couldsleep this night in lead pajammies, any size whatever."
True enough, O'Brien rolled into bed and was asleep in a moment, butLawrence tossed restlessly a long time before he could quiet himself. Hewas worried about Mr. Ridgeway, and he wished O'Brien would wake up andtell him just what he feared from the spies or conspirators, or whateverthey were. And he wondered about Mr. Ridgeway, and was sorry that he hadno sons, and wished, poor Lawrence, that _he_ was Mr. Ridgeway's son.How proud he would be! But he knew that he would always be LawrencePetit, the waif, with only a pictured face for a family.
O'Brien snored on gently and endlessly, and at last, lulled by thesound, Lawrence went to sleep. When he awoke, O'Brien was in thebathroom running a bath, and singing _Sweet Rosy O'More_ in a mellowbaritone. He sounded like a man who has not a care in the world.
Lawrence jumped up. It was eight o'clock. They had overslept an hour.But when he asked O'Brien how he had happened to sleep so late, thatsongful gentleman declared that there was nothing to do but enjoythemselves and he intended to go to a movie and sit through it twice, sohe could think.
"Will you go along with me?" he asked.
"I would rather fly," said Lawrence. "I wish I could get hold of aplane. I would feel better if I could get off the earth for a while. Ican never think so well as when I am up a few hundred feet."
"Go as high as you like," said O'Brien. "Here, I will give you a bit ofa paper, and just you go out to the field and give it to the man incharge there, and all that you will have to do after that is to pickwhich plane you want. You can't use the dirigible because it is smashedup."
"I would rather have a plane to-day," said Lawrence. "I want to get usedto the country around here. I shall drive the dirigible when it is inorder, but I like to take my bearings first. It is funny, I have flownall over the United States and Europe, but this is the first time I wasever in Washington."
"Well, take one of the little sky-flivvers and have a good time, but becareful about landin'. A nose-dive or a tail-spin makes good readin' inthe Sunday papers, and you get a grand write-up all about the darin'young aviator So-and-So, but it's little interest _you_ feel in thearticle yourself."
Lawrence took a street car out as far as he could, and after a briskwalk reached the field. Everything was going smoothly. He offered hispaper to the man in charge, and that individual, after grumbling alittle at letting a kid go up with a perfectly good machine, letLawrence look the twenty planes over and choose the one he fancied.
Lawrence refused a passenger, and with a good start soared off the fieldand rose until the city of Washington lay far below him. He had not madea flight for a couple of weeks, and his heart thrilled. After a few widecircles that took in the shipping at the Navy Yard and all the outlyingparts of the city, he flew over Baltimore. The return he made low, andstudied the woods and landing places, to make himself sure of hisground.
As he neared Washington again, he saw a plane approaching from thesouth. It came straight for him, and he had an idea that it was tryingto communicate with him by means of the wireless. He glanced down andfound that, contrary to usage, his own machine was not equipped. So hepaid no attention to the stranger other than to swerve out of the way.But the plane turned and followed. Lawrence, curious to know what it wasup to, slowed down and allowed it to overtake him. His trained ear toldhim by the sound of the engine that his own plane was the faster andmore powerful but he had no intention of racing as he thought the otherpilot wanted to do.
So he slowed down, and as the other machine came alongside he saw thatthey were flashing messages with a mirror, using the Morse code, whichhad become one of the requirements in the public schools.
"Who are you?" demanded the stranger. "Who are you?" over and over.Lawrence had no mirror and for a moment was at a loss how to reply.There was something threatening about the manner of the other plane, andLawrence had no desire to get into a combat in the clouds over nothing.He had an idea, and as the other plane imperiously repeated the words hemanaged to take off the muffler, and in the roar of the engine hespelled out:
"A tourist seeing the sights. Who are you?"
"Where from?" demanded the mirror.
"Louisville. Who are you?" repeated Lawrence.
The plane evidently had the answer they wanted and, sheering off, shotaway without a reply. Lawrence set his teeth. If they could be sodiscourteous he could follow at all events, and see where the curiousplane hailed from. He wheeled his machine and, taking a higher level,sailed off in pursuit, keeping a good distance behind. An hour's flightbrought them above a small open field and here the plane suddenlydipped, and going at a breakneck angle dropped to the ground. Then asthough by magic it disappeared. There was no hangar, yet the machinewent under cover as though the earth had swallowed it.
Again and again Lawrence circled the field, and it worried him toimagine the chuckles the other pilot was indulging in at his expense.
Try as he might, he could not locate any sign of life. It struck him asa rather queer thing. He turned his nose upward again, and located thefield by some trees and other landmarks, then turned toward the homefield.
Dropping easily down, he found O'Brien surrounded by a group of men, allof whom seemed to be watching him with a good deal of interest.
"Hey, young felly," called O'Brien, "do you always make so neat alanding as that last?"
"I suppose so," answered Lawrence. "What was there about that one?"
"It was all right; that was it," said O'Brien. "If that's the way youfly, you can have all me pretty toys at once, on a string."
"One is enough," laughed Lawrence. "Don't you want to go up?"
"I wouldn't mind a short flight, just to see how you manage it," saidO'Brien, gently relieving the man next him of his helmet and goggles.
Rising once more, Lawrence waited until they had gained a good height,then as they sailed along in a steady current, he told O'Brien of hisencounter and the curious thing about the landing place of the strangecar and its sudden disappearance.
"Let's go over there," said O'Brien. "It's just the sort of thing I haveto look after. What with the country full of Reds, and all other colorsof the rainbow, we want to keep as many of the wild lunatics underobservation as possible."
They soon reached the spot where Lawrence had seen the plane land and,sure enough, there was not a sign of anything that could be taken for ahangar.
"You sure this is the place?" asked O'Brien.
"Sure!" replied Lawrence. "What do you say to landing? I can make iteasier than he did."
"Land away if ye like, and let's have a look," said O'Brien, "but don'tyou smear me all over that nice green grass, I warn you."
"I won't," promised Lawrence, and dropped to earth as lightly as a bird.
As the plane slid along the grass and came to a standstill, O'Brien gavea smothered exclamation.
"That's funny!" he said. "Look!"
Stepping out of the machine, Lawrence turned in the direction O'Brienwas looking. The hangar they were looking for was there, but coveredwith a thick-set camouflage of brush. The doors were open, as though noone would possibly find the place, and inside the hangar were threecars: one a dirigible, one the car Lawrence had encountered, while thethird was a long, rakish model mounting an aircraft gun.
One quick look, and O'Brien backed out, drawing Lawrence with him. Hemotioned him into their own plane, gave it a push and hopped into hisplace as the speedy little flyer danced along for a moment, then roseinto the air.
As they fled, O'Brien mopped his brow.
"I didn't feel that place to be so healthy for us," he said. "And a gunlooking so fit! Who said the war was over these five years? Now what inthe world of wonders does all that mean? I dunno. Do _you_?"
Lawrence shook his head.
"Don't go there again," warned O'Brien. "Whether I'm with you or no. Doyou mind? We have got to find out about it. Did you notice anythingfunny about that dirigible? No? Well, you don't know as well as I do,but that old tube is exactly like the one that got cut up last night.Down to the last seam, and even a dent in the steerin' gear that I mademeself trippin' against it with a hammer in me hand."
"How do you suppose that happens?" asked Lawrence, his eyes fixed in thedistance.
"That's what I dunno," said O'Brien. "But the joke is that I don't thinkit happens at all. There is something funny about that. Dang funny!"
"Where do you suppose the people were?" asked Lawrence.
"Off amusin' themselves, or up to some mischief," answered O'Brien."They have such a good hidin' place that they don't bother to guardtheir cars at all, at all."
They landed, O'Brien still sputtering. But Lawrence was silent. Hequizzed O'Brien about the locality and learned that it was not far fromthe railroad. Then finding that O'Brien had an engagement for theevening, he went quietly away. He first went to his rooms, took somemoney from the trunk, and put on a dark suit. Then he hurried down town,and reaching the Union station, boarded a train and was soon out of thecity. He had dinner on the train, and at about nine o'clock reached thelittle station of Linden, where he dropped off and not waiting for thetrain to pull out, slipped across the track and was swallowed up by theshadows.
For all his athletics, Lawrence hated walking, as most aviators do, andhe groaned in spirit as he trudged over the country in what he hoped wasthe direction of the mysterious aviation field. It had not occurred tohim to ask anyone how to reach it. Instinctively he knew that themysterious cars had not been heralded to the country at large.
He lost time, and several times had to turn aside and almost retrace hissteps, but at last he knew from the lay of the country that he was inthe right neighborhood. The moon had risen and was full. It cast thedensest shadows and Lawrence slipped from one patch of blackness toanother. He felt silly. He was not sure that this was not a wild goosechase. The cars might be the property of some eccentric man who wishedto keep them in seclusion, and possibly he was trespassing on privateground. He plodded on, however, urged by an impulse he could notunderstand.
At last he emerged suddenly on the very aviation field itself; and onthe other side he saw the big bulk that was the hangar. Once moreplunging into the underbrush, he skirted the field and circled it untilhe found himself at the back of the hangar. There was a small door here,half open, and from within he heard voices.
He could not hear what was being said, however, and he took the chancean older man would have thought plain suicide. Entering the door, andfairly holding his breath, he stepped slowly and carefully along theside of the building, crept close to the little plane, and finally laydown and wriggled beneath it toward the dirigible. On the other side ofthe long body four men were sitting over a game of cards. Not untilLawrence felt the cool box of the plane above him did he think ofdanger. And then it came to him clear as the tolling of a bell ...discovery meant his death!
