The Ghost of Mystery Airport

by Van Powell

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  THE STORY OF A MAP

  Turning away, the red-skinned pilot helped his father to the runway.

  The old medicine man was stiff from the cramped position, and somewhatshaken by his "stunting" trip through the air lanes.

  Chick, belligerent and impulsive, followed John.

  "What did you mean by throwing that smoke flare in on us?" he demanded."You might have suffocated us!"

  "I did not throw anything!" the young Indian retorted, cool and quiet,as he steadied his father. "We watched, that is all. Some one else isto blame, not I. And--when I find him!----"

  Garry, seeing his face, felt glad that he was not the target of anemotion that contorted the copper-colored face into the mask of averitable fury.

  "Let's go to the hangar," Don suggested. "Maybe we can talk this out."

  "Come!" agreed Ti-O-Ga, moving away.

  Doc Morgan, Toby Tew and some of the handlers who had stayed arounddiscussing the exciting night's events, looked disappointed.

  "I think I'd like to come, too," observed Toby. "In the name ofall-possessed! This is a queer business."

  "It certainly is," Doc agreed, and without invitation he ranged himselfalongside of the theatre manager as the latter went with the party.

  Mr. McLeod and the control chief joined them in the designing room.

  Chairs and benches were brought. Everybody found a seat.

  Chick, before he sat down, hurried to the developing room, as Donsupposed, to estimate the damage done. Chick went in, did something,came out. Water was heard in the washing tanks.

  "What did you mean by saying you thought we were the ones who hadstolen a map?" demanded Garry, as Chick took his place again.

  Readily enough, the Indian began to explain.

  "My father has met a good many strange people, because he is sowell-known for his cures," he began. "A good many years ago he nursedan old sailor, and when he found he couldn't cure him, Father told himthe truth. The man was grateful, though, because he knew Father haddone his best. He knew he couldn't live, and he turned over to us amap."

  The map, he explained, was old and tattered. It showed, the sailor hadclaimed, a place in the Long Island swamps where, during a bad gale,many years before that, a pirate brig had been blown at high tideinland so far that it had become caught in the mud, and that ship, thusheld prisoner, had been sucked down in a spot even then known as theDevil's Sinkhole.

  "And, as the man told us," John continued, "the ship had some chests ofjewels and gold and silver aboard." He had been given a map, and thestory, by his father. Coming down from generation to generation, thetale and the chart had yielded nothing to searchers.

  "Jewels--gold--silver!" Chick spoke in awed tones. "A treasure ship!"

  "Yes," the young Indian nodded. "I was a schoolboy then. I went toCarlisle, and then enlisted in a cadet training school for navalpilots, but several years ago, when I was about to be graduated, thehard times struck the world and the navy decided not to take on anymore flyers, and I was too young to become a commercial pilot, so Igave up my course and went to work at whatever I could get."

  "Many an army and navy cadet has been disappointed by learning hecouldn't keep on, after his enlistment term," commented Mr. McLeod.

  Garry, who had always felt a respect for the older man, now began tofeel a strong liking for the straight-forward Indian, his son.

  "I went to work at a Long Island moving picture studio as an extra,"John went on. "There I saw a chance to write and sell a story--and wemade quite a good amount of money by playing in it."

  "We enjoyed your acting in 'Red Blood and Blue,'" Don commented.

  "But what about the map?" Chick broke in. "While we were working atLong Island City," John informed him, "I used my spare time to studythe swamps, and discovered that there was a spot, near this airport,known as Devil's Sink. I was in the swamp a great deal, but if therehad ever been a ship, the mud had covered every trace of it. We gaveup, Father and I. But--and this is why I've told you all this--becauseI took an interest in aviation, I was around the seaplane base that washere before the airport was begun. I met some of the flyers. I supposethey wondered about our investigations, but of course we kept closemouths."

  "Any of us would!" agreed Garry.

  "Father went back to the Catskills, to continue his doctoring," Johncompleted his astonishing revelation, "I went 'on tour' with the firstof our films, making 'personal appearances.' That was before we had thesmoke-trick scene thought out.

  "When I came home Father told me about several of the airport folks,who had been visiting him. One was a pilot who said he was in the mailand commercial end of it----"

  "A mail flyer!" cried Chick. "Well--that's interesting!"

  "You mean--Smith?" Don inquired, eagerly.

  "That's just the trouble," John stated. "He came while Father was offdoctoring a man in the back country. He called himself that. My motherisn't very quick with her old eyes. He had his flying togs on, too, andshe couldn't describe him closely except that he was tall, and thin."

  "And so was the mail flyer who came in tonight," Chick cried. "The onewe scared, so that he turned on us and tried to force the helicopterout of control. We're getting close to something--I think!"

  The man they discussed, apparently loitering outside the door, came in.

  "Is that so?" he said sharply, defiantly. "I can tell you that you willbe getting close to trouble if you start accusing me----"

  "What's all the excitement this time?" Scott, limping down the hall,dropped gratefully into a chair that Don vacated. "I see you got theIndians----"

  "They got us, you mean!" explained Garry.

  "Well--any way you want it. Did you recover--the film?"

  "No!"

  "Didn't they have it!"

  "No!" John turned to answer courteously, "we had no film."

  "You're interrupting a thrilling treasure story," warned Don.

  He and Garry, with interruptions from Chick, quickly put the pilot wholiked spooks in possession of most of the important points.

  "Well! It's wonderful!" Scott commented. "We'll soon have thatgibbering spook in the open. I'll keep still, though. Go ahead, Mr. Ti."

  "There isn't much more," the young Indian stated. "A mail flyer came toour place, while my father was away, and wasn't very easy to describe,because of his flying togs. But one thing Mother did tell us--"

  "What?" Chick was on the edge of his seat. "He had a little vest-pocketcamera!"

  "He took pictures," commented Garry. "I wonder what for?"

  "If you want my guess," Don spoke up, "he wanted to get the localityclear in his mind, to study out how to go back--and--get the map."

  "Worse than that!" the young Indian told them. "Father thought littleof the camera side of his visit until, first Doc Morgan, and then Mr.Toby Tew, and then Mr. Scott, came up, doctoring or for some reasonthat was covered by that excuse. He began to wonder, and wrote me. Icancelled my picture house engagements and went home--just before youtwo young chaps came along with the injured pilot." Don and Garrynodded.

  Their arrival, and the story he gathered about the swamp, and the oddapparition haunting the air, had made the old, wise medicine manwonder, John added. He had deduced, sagely enough, the real motive forthe apparition. It was, as the Indians believed, no ghost-scare devisedto ruin the airport owner and his venture.

  "We decided," John stated, "the ghost was being made to create a bigscare among pilots and to keep them away from the swamp!"

  "I think you are right!" Garry exclaimed. "I see it, now! If the flyerwanted to study that swamp--he'd do it from the air. He wouldn't wantother pilots coming along to catch him flying to and fro--but, atthat--how would he know what to look for--and where?"

  "The camera!" the Indian said. "Father went to his cupboard, where themap was stored, and found that while it had not been stolen, actually,it had been displaced. He had it under some oth
er papers----"

  "Was he sure he remembered just how it had been left?" asked Don.

  "I got memory--never forget!" the old medicine man remarked briefly.

  "Yes," John agreed, "Father knew just how it had been--and it was notthe same. It had been found--the look showed scratches where it hadbeen picked, and then re-locked. That pilot had taken a picture of thechart!"

  "That accounts for the tracing on thin paper!" Chick saw a clue. "Hehad to enlarge it, to study it, if he made the picture with avest-pocket camera. That film isn't much larger than the film in amotion picture camera--he enlarged it, and from the enlargements ontracing paper, he copied it--and then camouflaged the map on thetracing by adding the wings and struts and frames. And--then he slippedin the hangars and removed the tracing from Mr. Vance's drawer, andtook the blue-print I had made--so we haven't got far, after all."

  "No," Garry agreed, and turned once more to John.

  "What did you do about it?"

  "Came here, kept quiet, watched. I kept sending Father word, andtonight, early, somebody told me that mail pilot who had been up at ourplace once was flying the mail! I lost my self-control. I was in arage, I hated that fellow. He had cheated, falsified his errand,imposed on my mother's good nature----"

  "Just a minute," Scott broke in, "who told you he was coming in?"

  "I got the call at the theatre--just before the 'presentation' was onthe stage," John stated. "He called me up--told me the flyer who hadbeen at our place--and he knew I was looking for the man, he said--wasflying in the mail."

  "Did he say who was calling?" Don was excited.

  The eyes of the young Indian turned, covered the group.

  They rested on Doc Morgan.

  "You're crazy!" The-man-of-all-work leaped from his chair. "I won'tstand for that, I won't. You shan't accuse me. I never called--I didnot!"

  "You did--I think I recognize the voice!" cried John.

  "And was it you who flew over in the helicopter, out of the swamp, andtried to drive us out of control with rockets?" demanded Garry.

  "Yes. My father was in the moving picture theatre, in the room with theprojectors, and he wheeled the spot lamp across to a window, and usedit to light up and blind you! But I thought you were the man who hadtaken our property."

  "So that's how the queer searchlight came into our eyes!" snappedChick. "You know what sort of crime that is? Endangering flyers!"

  "We thought you were the mail 'plane," John said regretfully. "Just asI thought you were the culprit trying to get away just now when I usedthe Dart to drive you down. But--I'm sorry."

  "You'd better be sorry you've accused me, too!" stormed Doc Morgan.

  "Yes," Scott agreed, "I'm not sure that isn't all made up! What wereyou doing at the airport, just before the film was stolen from ouryoung friends? I saw you--running!"

  Chick sprang up.

  "It doesn't matter!" he cried. "Let's stop accusing--and find out! Thepieces we saved are about washed by now. Come on--Don-Garry!"