by Van Powell
CHAPTER XVI
CHICK TRACES THE TRACING
Seemingly unaware that Chick dogged his steps, the control room chief,whose initials, J. V., had proved the baffling tracing to be hisproperty, went from the runways to his tower quarters.
Doc Morgan, following Chick, appeared at the door to the control room aminute after the youth had seated himself unobtrusively, in a chair ina dark corner.
"You might as well go home," the control room chief dismissed hisassistant who turned from an observation window where he had stoodscanning the sky, and taking his hat, said "Goodnight." His chief,paying no attention to Doc as the latter lounged in the doorway, walkedto the windows and glanced in several directions towards the heavens.
Chick sat quite still. Doc knew he was there, he saw; but Doc wasevidently interested in his own thoughts, and, beyond giving Chick apleasant wink, ignored his presence.
Vance, the control chief, assured himself that there was no immediateneed for his services for landing ships. He adjusted several switchesto leave the essential lighting of approaches going against Don'sreturn, and then walked over to the radio table in one corner.
Chick, watching, saw that the man's thoughts were far away from duty.
Watching unobtrusively, he saw Vance lean his head on the handsupported by an elbow on the table.
Doc, still lounging, seemed forgotten, and appeared to be satisfied.
"They are both thinking about the same thing. That's my guess," Chicktold himself. "Doc had something to do with that tracing that turned upin a boathouse in the marsh, and Mr. Vance knows it. And Doc knows heknows it, too! I'll sit tight and see what happens."
He had no long vigil.
Apparently so deep in his thoughts that he forgot the others, Vance satin a brown study for a moment: Chick, quick of eye, observed that thecontrol chief was not so oblivious as he pretended.
"He's watching Doc," he decided.
The silence was broken by Doc's amused voice.
"Well, J. V., go ahead and unlock the drawer. You want to, you do, andyou know it, you do that! Well, go on. Do it! I'd like to know whatthat sketch means, I would. Let's see it again, eh?"
With a start of surprise that Chick sensed as "acting," the otherlooked around quickly.
"Oh! Hello! What's that, Doc?"
"You heard me."
"About the tracing, it was."
"Yep."
"Rats!" The man leaned back, arms behind his head, carelessly lockinghis fingers as he pretended to laugh. "Doc, you're pretty interested inthat, aren't you? Considering where it was found----"
"Yes, considering where it was found--" Doc repeated the words with ameaning that differed from the other man's phrase. "Considering that itwas supposed to be a sketch of a new design for an airplane, and I sawour young friend, Chick, discover it when the wind yanked it out of adrawer--" he forgot his mannerism and spoke directly, crisply, "Iwonder if you go over there to work on it in secret--eh?"
The man swung around in his chair.
"As likely as that you go there to hunt sea-marsh stuff for medicine,"he snapped. "It was stolen from me, as a matter of fact!" He turned hiseyes on Doc, accusingly.
"Not by me, brother not by me, not it! No, sir! You got it back,anyhow, so what's the odds how it went? What is it--besides a sketch ofa new aircraft?"
Chick became more alert, more intent: he had to hold in check hisimpulse to hitch forward in his chair. The answer might be interesting.
The control chief laughed.
"Besides a drawing of an airplane--what could it be, I wonder?"
"Look here!" Doc left the doorsill that had supported him, and took afew steps closer to the other man.
"See here," he repeated, "do you recollect when the engineers weredraining the swamp, and found a skeleton of some poor old codger whowas supposed to be one of the old pirate band that used to hang aroundNew York, a good many dozen years ago?"
Chick started. A pirate! He recalled that the local newspapers hadprinted several lines of historical fact, hinting that the bones foundin the swamp might have been a relic of days of piracy in the harborsand bays, the sea and the Sound, in and around Long Island and New York.
Suddenly something that had never before seemed of importance to himflashed across the youth's agile mind.
Among the piratical names important in history of activity under theskull and cross-bones, none had stood out more than that of Morgan.
And before him stood a man whose name was "Doc" Morgan!
He suppressed his tendency to utter a cry of surprise at his discovery;his ears became even more intent as he held his voice and his quiveringnerves in check.
"Oh, yes, I do recall something about the skeleton and piracy," thecontrol chief remarked, carelessly.
"Well, now, you do, do you? Is that so?" Doc's tone was sarcastic. "Doyou happen to recall that pirates used to sail in brigantines, andsuch-like ships? Yes, you do! Sure, you do! And there is a story to theeffect that one time an old brigantine was throwed up onto the mud, itwas, in a gale, off the very swamp where that skeleton was found!"
"You don't say!"
"I do say!"
The control chief was obviously interested.
"How do you know?"
"Who would know better than a Morgan?"
Chick's wriggle of excitement went unobserved.
"That's so," Vance remarked. "You are named the same as one of the oldbuccaneers, at that! Say, Doc--tell you the facts:
"I was with the engineers when they discovered that skeleton."
"I knew it all the time. So was I."
"Oh, yes--I recollect, you were," Vance agreed, while Chick listenedand tried to register in his memory every look, every phrase, everyintonation of the two men. There was either a fresh mystery leaping tothe fore, or the explanation of many mysteries was about to come intothe light.
"Well--" Doc paused significantly.
Vance cried that he did not understand that hint.
"If you mean that anything was found, you know as well as I do thatnothing was," he finished.
"No," Doc argued, coming closer, but no longer sarcastic. "No,Vance, nothing was found. But the finding of that skeleton, itbrought out all that about the pirates, it did. Yes, sir, it didthat! And what's to say all the talk about the pirates didn't showsomebody--who--already--had a--map-or chart--that it meantsomething!"
"Let's see it!"
Chick, forgetting the mission he was detailed to pursue, forgetting hisformer suspicions of Doc or of Vance, and intent only on that newtopic--a mysterious, concealed map or chart, hidden among the intricatelines of a design supposed to be for an airplane, startled the two menby his exclamation.
Vance, wheeling, studied him a moment, evidently becoming satisfiedthat Chick's interest was as purely on account of the new idea as washis own or that of Doc.
"Why, sure! You've seen it, already, anyhow," the control chiefconceded. "Tell the truth, you two, I can't make any more of it thanyou did. The day that the skeleton was found, after you had all goneaway, one of the engineers took me to one side, and said he had seen aqueer thing when he was in the old boathouse trying to hire a dory, toget to the place where the skeleton had been discovered, and where allthe excitement was centered. He had seen a half open drawer in thetable there at the boathouse, and in it was a tracing paper, prettyold, and seeming to be of an airplane. It was so curious to see itthere that he mentioned it and I took him in our power launch--thecrash boat--to the scene of the excitement, and then cruised back tothe boathouse for a look at that tracing. It was just what you've seen.Well, I sat there, all alone, studying it, but I couldn't make anythingout of it."
He turned and began sorting keys on a bunch he drew from his trousersas he prepared to open the drawer of the radio table.
"At first I thought what Chick did when he first saw it. There was partof an aircraft series, stolen or mislaid and carried there by somevisitor."
"Then what did you think, afterward!" Chick asked eagerly.
"I wondered, but I didn't actually decide much of anything," Vanceanswered. "Well, you know how a fellow does when he's absentminded,studying, or something--draws marks on paper!"
"Yes! I've seen you do that when you were in a brown study," Chickagreed. "You draw--let's see--J. V."
"Exactly what I do!" Vance agreed. "Well, you two, believe it or not,while I sat there, thinking, I drew my initials on the table, and oneset got on the corner of the tracing. I didn't see how it mattered, andI meant to bring the thing here anyhow. So I let them stand."
"But you left it there," contended Doc, "left it, you did. Yet youclaimed it, you did so, as yours!"
"Yes. I dropped it in the drawer when a hail came for me to bring thecrash launch to help my boss. I wasn't control chief then, only anengineer working out angles and distances across the swamp for theairport extension," Vance declared. "I forgot all about the tracinguntil I read in the papers about the piracy and the hints about losttreasure and all that folderol. Then, when Chick so kindly brought inthe tracing, I recollected my initials--and there you are."
Chick reserved his opinion about the truth and reasonableness of theexplanation. Certainly it was a point in Vance's favor that he wasalready willingly slipping a key into the table drawer.
"Why!--look here!" Vance cried, "this drawer isn't--locked!"
He dragged it open. At once Chick knew, just as he saw that Docrealized, that the tracing was gone.
Had Vance made up all that story? Had someone picked the lock? Was thatqueerly disguised tracery of lines more than an airplane design? Whohad it?
Chick took no time to puzzle out answers.
"Never mind, for now!" he exclaimed. "I wasn't such a dummy, after all.While I had that tracing, before it got lost again I decided to make ablue-print of it. I did, too!"
"Good!" exclaimed Vance, and Doc nodded. "Get it!" he urged.
Chick ran down the tower stairs. At their lower steps he stopped,stricken by an uneasy realization that he had completely shirked theduties laid on him by Don. He was not guarding that tower, not seeingwhat Vance did, not heeding Doc.
Thirteen years--piracy--mysterious maps--hidden meanings--possiblyburied treasure--the combination had been too much for Chick.
Should he go back, or go on and get the blue-print?
"I'd better go back," he said. "I can get the blue-print when the restare here. Maybe Vance made all that up, and took advantage of what Isaid, just to get me off the scent, to stop me thinking about watchinghim. I'll go back."
He turned to ascend.
From the hangars came the crash of an overturned chair, or some suchodd sound. On the office floor it seemed to be to Chick.
Furiously racing along the corridor, he watched for opened doors, inthe faint light of the corridor bulb at the landing.
The design room door stood ajar!
There he swung in, catching the jamb with a hand to expedite his turnas he reached the opening.
Inside all was dark, still.
"Who's there?" he called, and listening, heard no sound.
His fingers found the light switch. The room sprang into brightness.
"There's a chair upset," Chick called out. "I know you're in here. Comeout!"
Silence met his demand.
With quiet feet he advanced, past an overturned wastebasket, past thefiling cabinets. They had been tampered with--he saw that as he passed.
In a corner was a wash basin, marble, on a stand, and before it was aJapanese screen to conceal those who chose to wash.
Tiptoeing, Chick advanced close to the screen.
Unexpectedly it was thrust over onto him. He had half expected themaneuver, and he leaped sidewise and backward, just escaping the edgeof the light frame and the entangling silk stretched over it.
A tall, thin, dark-haired, reddish, copper-colored youth leaped pasthim. Caught off balance, it took Chick half a second to right himself.Then he was in pursuit, screaming as he ran. The other was fleeter,longer-legged. He seemed to have prepared a plan. Chick heard feet onthe tower stairway, thudding down to his summons. They might interceptthe escaping youth--an Indian, Chick felt assured at that. He was thefaster of the pair, and Chick, for all his best effort, could not get agrip on the flying coat.
The Indian swerved, in the hall, into an office. Chick thought he hadhim cornered until the slam of intervening doors told that hisadversary of the design room screen episode was out through theintersecting office suite, and had beaten him.
Chick ran to the fire escape at a window.
Down its iron rungs he went swiftly.
A figure, running lightly, crossed the hangar apron of cement, got to acar. Chick, putting every ounce of energy into his effort, ran, after aleap from the fire escape ladder, to try and reach the car.
"This way--he's going away in a car!" Chick shouted, to guide the menfrom the control room.
Then he saved his breath, his task being to get to the car before theyouth could get in. It was a light, cheap make of sedan.
Something Garry had told him seemed to come uppermost in Chick's mind,some recollection; but he was too excited to pause and make sense of it.
The motor roared, gears ground into mesh, the car started.
Chick's clutching fingers barely missed the rear tire.
He fell, carried forward by his leap, and lay, prostrate.
Then he lifted his head as the car roared away, and when Doc Morgan andVance reached him, he sat up, smiling.
"Let's take my car!" cried Vance. "Come on, Chick. Doc, stay and takecare of the place. Get my assistant back to the control room!"
"Yes!" urged Chick, running toward the control chief's bigger, fasterroadster, "I remember something. Garry was taken to an Indian camp inthat very car, and the very fellow who's getting away with blue-printsor tracing is the Indian's son who drove Garry back. I know thelicense, too. Come on!"
