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CHAPTER XV
A Clever Landing
A brief time passed, and then Perk called out excitedly:
“Say, I kinder b’lieve I kin glimpse thet same pesky hangaout – looks like some sorter mounting pass, sech as he drawed in his map, where they went in an’ kim aout; but they’s a kinder haze ahangin’ over yonder that makes it hard to be dead sure. If we get it araoun’ here it’ll hide us from bein’ seen. The wind up here’s hittin’ us in the face, too, which helps some in the bargain.”
“Never mind about the hideout – that’ll all come later on. Just now it’s that landing-field we need most of all – keep your glass on the ground just ahead, Perk.”
Ten seconds later the observer uttered a sudden exclamation.
“Get a bite?” demanded Jack, just about ready to swing around, as it seemed taking too hazardous chances to continue their advance any further.
“Kinder guess I sure have,” Perk told him; and then proceeded to direct the eyes of the pilot on a certain spot over which the ship was then passing.
“You struck it that time, buddy!” exclaimed Jack, evidently mightily relieved in his mind; for a crisis was upon them, with a change in their movements absolutely essential, unless they meant to give the whole scheme away, and wreck their plan of campaign, which was not to be considered at all.
“Yeah,” Perk went on to add, more confidently than before; “that’s it, for a certaintee– the on’y place where a ship kin drop with a ghost o’ a show to keep from bein’ smashed to flinders. Goin’ doawn, are yeou, Jack?”
There was no need for the other to make answer, since already the big Fokker tri-motored ship was dropping steadily. How fortunate for them that just at that critical moment Nature herself was working overtime in their favor – the wind veering until it came directly in their faces; while that little haze acted as a veil to conceal them from the hidden valley lookout – if indeed any such happened to be posted, to give warning should danger menace the fugitive gangsters.
Perk waited, and watched, his tense face betraying the natural anxiety he must just then be enduring. It was indeed no small danger that faced them, for only a most skillful pilot would be able to successfully land a great airship on such a precarious and scanty stretch of fairly level ground.
A very small thing that could hardly be avoided, save through a near miracle, would suffice to throw the heavy plane off balance, and bring about a wreck that must interfere greatly with their mission, if not utterly ruin every hope of success.
Yes, Perk could easily be excused for feeling a tenseness around the region of his staunch heart – a tightening of the nerves and sinews – a halt in his free breathing, all of them occurring simultaneously; for the most sanguine of watchers would have easily said the feat was beyond human capacity.
Yet there was Jack going about the job with apparently the same sang froid that it was his custom to show when coming down from the clouds, to settle upon the almost perfect landing green of the big San Diego airport.
“Say, what wouldn’t I give right naow if on’y I could ketch that confident spirit my best pal’s got mixed up in his mind an’ heart?” So Perk was telling himself as he saw the deftness of the touch shown by the hand at the controls, as well as the wonderful response the perfect mechanism aboard the Fokker displayed.
Now Jack held her head on, with the ground almost within reach – beyond, the narrow stretch extended just about a hundred feet; and in this space he must bring his charge up with a round turn; for should the ship keep on she would assuredly be wrecked beyond repair.
The tail came in contact, and bounded up again, to immediately repeat the manœuvre; the wheels gliding roughly along, with the body of the ship bouncing from side to side, after the usual custom when the landing is at all inclined to be a bit off-color.
The motors had ceased working, and the spinning propeller had in consequence commenced to whirl less violently. Perk allowed himself to suck in his first good breath in a score of seconds.
“Glory be!” he was saying to himself, lost in admiration and sheer wonder – “dang my hide if he ain’t agoin’ to make it, I do declare – did yeou ever in yeour born days see the like o’ that – bet there aint another pilot west o’ the Mississip could a done it that smart – hot-diggetty-dig! we’re astoppin’, as sure as anything we air. Wow!”
As the big plane ceased to move forward and came to a stand less than five feet from the terminus of the smooth ground, Perk, utterly overcome, lay back inert, “weak as a cat,” as he himself afterwards described his condition.
“And that’s that!” was all Jack allowed himself to comment; just as he might have said in the days when he was a barnstormer, and ’chute leaper at County Fair gatherings – after sailing down from a five-thousand foot ceiling, clinging to his decrepit parachute, and making a soft landing in some ploughed field.
They both sat there as if to recover their breath.
No longer did the roar of the exhaust break upon their hearing – all was marvelously still round about them – the rocks reared their crests high above their heads, and looking more cruel and pitiless than when seen at a distance. Perk shuddered as he noted the innumerable projections that stuck out almost like giant needles in a cushion, any one of which, had its point come in contact with the now stranded ship, must have played havoc with its structure.
“Huh! wake me up somebody, wont yeou kindly?” Perk finally broke out, as if possessed by the idea he must have been dreaming such a descent could be put through successfully. “There sure never was sech a crackin’ good drop as the one yeou jest made, Pal Jack – I hand yeou the palm for luck an’ skill combined; an’ I hopes as heow I have yeou fur my side kick as long as I’m in this here flyin’ trick!”
Jack turned a beaming face on him at hearing this fulsome compliment.
“Nice of you to say what you did, Perk, old chum;” he remarked, with a nod of his head; “but you greatly overrate the landing – all any one had to do was to pick out the safest way, and stick to it through thick and thin. Easy as falling off a log, let me tell you, buddy.”
“Oh! yeah; but yeou stuck!” Perk thrust back, as though after all that clinched the whole matter, which it undoubtedly did.
“Next thing we’ve got to do, Perk, is to check up, so as to find out whether the ship was injured any by contact with rocks.”
“Right yeou are there, partner,” the other chimed in, quickly; “but I kinder guess as haow we aint got much to worry over that-a-ways, ’cause she kim daown so easy like, it wouldn’t hardly abroken an egg.”
“The proof of the pudding is always in the eating,” wary Jack told him; “and we know one of the weakest parts of a ship lies in the undergear. Let’s get a move on, and find out what’s what.”
Accordingly they both started to look things over, backed by a host of past similar checkings. It could be only a superficial examination; but just the same the result pleased them immeasurably, for never the least damage could they hit upon.
Perk was almost delirious with joy, and wonder as well.
“I never would a b’lieved that stunt could be pulled off if I hadn’t seen the miracle carried aout with my own lamps,” he kept saying half to himself, as he finished his part of the survey. “Jest won-der-ful, I’d call it, an’ let her go at that, which doant tell half the story.”
Jack, having had the severe strain removed from his mind, now consented to finish his breakfast, the natural hunger of a healthy young chap asserting its prerogative. Accordingly, since Perk also confessed to feeling a “bit peckish” they sat down on the ground, with the coffee container between them, and a heap of the “ham-an’ sandwiches” which had come from their favorite restaurant.
“As soon as we get through this necessary business, Perk, we’ll stow some of the grub that’s left over in our pockets for an emergency. After that we’ll pick out such traps as we may need in our game, and trot along – though judging from the looks of this same ravine it’ll be only a figure of speech, because we’ll find it necessary to crawl like a couple of snails most of the way.”
“Yeah! that sounds more like it, buddy,” agreed Perk, eying the depression with a scowl, as though he hardly liked the nature of the job ahead.
CHAPTER XVI
Up Against a Silver-tip
There was some difficulty when it came to selecting such things as might prove most handy in their difficult task. Several had to be laid aside as being too bulky and cumbersome; for weight would count heavily against them in forcing a passage through the thick growth in the ravine; as well as later when they struck the mighty upheaval of rocks on the side of the mountain, below the natural pass into the Hole-in-the-Wall valley.
Those things they had selected were divided up, and made into two packages of about equal weight. When Jack did not happen to be looking Perk managed to slip several articles into his pack, evidently begrudging their lack; which he considered only right and proper, since his shoulders and back must stand for the extra strain.
“An’ if we do need ’em, which is like enough,” he told himself, as if in apology for his deceit; “they might jest prove life-savers– yeou never kin tell haow the cat’s agoin’ to jump; an’ they do say as a stitch in time saves yeour whole bacon.”
Having attached these bundles securely to their backs the pair were ready to start forth on their perilous errand – matching their wits and courage against the lawless spirits who had defied the power of Uncle Sam, believing it would take the whole U. S. army to dislodge them from such an isolated and natural fortress.
“First thing we’ve got to remember, partner,” said Jack, softly, as they began to plunge into the wild growth that filled the deep ravine from one side to the other, “is to get our bearings as we advance.”
“Gosh amighty! Jack, is that a go, when all we got to ’member is haow we kept aheadin’ ’long this ere coulie. I doant see haow anybody could go astray in sech a canyon as this same.”
“To be sure,” Jack assured him, “that’s true as long as this is the only old waterbed we’ll have to follow; which it isn’t, if you remember those directions Simeon sent in. Once we became a bit rattled as to which channel to follow, and it’d ruin all our calculations – the element of uncertainty has wrecked more clever plans than anything agoing. More than that, we must turn around and stare at the way things look from the other direction; because we’ll be heading back to our camp when we need to follow our trail. You know lots of landmarks may seem okay in going, which you’d never recognize when coming from the opposite quarter.”
“Yeah! I knowed that too, buddy,” affirmed Perk, with a grin; “read ’baout the same lots o’ times as a kid, when I used to soak in stories o’ them old days in Kentucky, that they called the Dark an’ Bloody Ground – Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton, Harrod an’ them forest rangers picked that trick up from the Shawnee Injuns they used to fight. We’ll face the other way heaps o’ times, an’ make picters o’ the scenery on aour minds; that’s okay with me, Jack.”
For some little time they had all they could do to push their way along, so matted were the vines and the underbrush, so extremely rough the footing.
Twice Perk had stumbled, and come near having an ugly fall; he even managed to skin his right knee painfully by coming in contact with a rock; but never a grunt did he emit, accustomed as he was to taking such things as part of the game.
“Mebbe naow this is what I get fur loadin’ me daown so heavy,” he told himself, under his breath; “but jest the same I aint ameanin’ to throw a single thing away; ’cause that’d sure turn aout to be jest what we needed most to save our skins.”
Later on, as they stood still and rested a bit, Perk again confided in his companion; he always did seem to suck more or less consolation out of these frequent “chinnings,” as they afforded him opportunities to see things through Jack’s eyes, an advantage Perk greatly appreciated.
“More I get thinkin’ ’baout the slick way that same Simeon took a carrier pigeon ’long with him, so he could be sure o’ gettin’ valuable information into the hands o’ his boss, the more I admire the ole gink. I knowed as haow the French used them birds over across the water, when we was afightin’ the Heinies; but say, tryin’ sech a game aout in the Secret Service was a new dodge on me.”
“Both clever, and original, Perk,” assented the other, fastening on his pack once more; “but then, as I remember Simeon Balderson he was always different from the common truck of the Force. I’ll be right sorry if anything has happened to him – wiped out by these devils up here, just because they naturally hate all Service men.”
Thus they continued to stumble along, sometimes one in the lead, and then later on the other would forge ahead, just as circumstances brought things about.
There was no attempt to make any kind of speed, since time did not count in what they were trying to accomplish – far better to spend a week, even two, than to ruin everything by some incautious move.
From time to time sounds would come to their ears, mostly ahead; but in every case these could be set down as proceeding from birds, or small animals that may have discovered their approach, and were showing signs of restlessness.
Once, however, a faint report drifted to their ears through some slant in the breeze, being possibly a mile or more distant, which both recognized as a gunshot – the only evidence of human beings that thus far they had discovered.
It acted as a spur, making them remember what they were up against; but Perk only smiled, as though he cared very little how soon they ran into the jaws of trouble, and matched their talents against those they sought.
Then they had a severe shock – it came almost without the least warning too, which made it more stunning.
A rustling in the underbrush – what sounded like a snarl or a grunt; and as they flashed a startled look in that direction, a huge shaggy figure uprose to betray the presence of a genuine Rocky Mountain grizzly of un-heard-of proportions, standing erect.
To make the matter all the more serious the frightful beast was almost directly in their way, blocking any further movement along the ravine. Besides, while they carried arms, it was highly imprudent on several accounts for them to dream of using the same.
In the first place their automatics would seem but trivial instruments when used against such a monster, said to have the nine lives of a cat; and often known to still be in fighting trim after receiving a volley of lead from powerful modern sporting rifles.
Then again if they were forced to fire, even though lucky enough to down their hairy enemy, the sound of the discharges was certain to be heard by those in hiding, and would serve to turn the entire settlement out searching for the cause of the rattling sounds.
“Hot-diggetty-dig! did yeou ever see sech a buster o’ a bar?” Perk was gasping, as he stared aghast; “an’ the tarnel beast’s startin’ to move this way, as sure as shootin’, Jack!”
“We’ve just got to clear out!” came the ultimatum from Jack.
That was easy to say, but what chance would they have against such a powerful beast, evidently with some reason to hate all two-legged bipeds, having possibly at some time in the past been severely wounded by such a creature, and holding a vendetta against all the clan. He could break through the worst tangle with ease, while they must be held up, and their progress impeded frightfully.
Jack hit a brilliant idea almost on the instant.
“Follow me, Perk!” he shrilled, tersely; “we’ve got to climb a tree! Let’s go, partner!”
“Which tree?” Perk demanded, as he kept close at the other’s heels.
“Over this way – got limbs low down – silver-tips can’t climb a tree, I’ve heard. Hurry – hurry!”
There was indeed need of haste, for they could distinctly hear the smashing advance of the big brute; also catch the growling as he pursued the fleeing pair who had dared invade his private hunting patch.
Neither of them dared cast a single look back, lest they stumble over an outcropping rock, or get entangled in some running vine, such as fairly covered the ground in certain places, to serve as traps to incautious feet.
Jack managed to arrive at the selected tree ahead of his mate, and swinging around to the further side, so as to keep out of the other’s way, commenced to lift himself into the lower branches.
This was no slight task, seeing how heavily they were both loaded down with those bundles fastened to their backs; but it is wonderful what fright can accomplish under similar conditions; and Perk was already pawing at the other side of the friendly tree, wild with eagerness to hoist himself far enough from the ground so as to avoid contact with those cruel claws of the monster, of which he had doubtless heard thrilling stories concerning their length, and sharpness.
Nearer came the crashing sounds, and the growls; but by great good luck the angry beast arrived just too late to attain his end; for while he reached up all of ten feet Perk believed, he could not more than barely touch the lower foot of the climber, which was instantly drawn beyond his reach.
For a full minute, more or less, neither of them could spare the breath to make any sort of comment over their narrow escape – it was enough for them to know they had nothing to fear immediately from the irate silver-tip, still standing erect, and emitting those hoarse growls, as if to tell them what he would do if only they ventured within his reach.
Then Perk made a slight move, and Jack feared he might be about to kick at the beast’s elevated snout, which would only irritate Bruin a great deal more.
“Keep quiet, and don’t do anything to stir him up more than he is already,” was the way Jack cautioned his running mate, knowing the impulsive nature of Perk only too well. “He may fade away when he sees he can’t touch us. Just get your breath back, Pal Perk, and wait up.”
“Okay, brother,” replied the other, as though recognizing the soundness of his comrade’s doctrine.
But somehow or other the big beast showed no signs of intending to break the siege by “fading out,” as Jack had termed it; he continued to move around the base of the tree, now on all fours, and again raising up to his full height with ferocious growls if either of them so much as made a slight move.
“Gee whiz! he sure is some wheeze, I’d say, Jack,” Perk remarked, after some little time had passed, with no change whatever taking place. “What if the ole geezer takes a notion to tent aout here at aour tree – say, that’d be the limit, bet yeour boots it would!”
Then he fell silent for a spell, as though mentally calculating the extent of such a calamity on their fortunes.
CHAPTER XVII
Perk Shows His Hand
“Let me tell yeou, partner, that same bar he’s some stickin’-plaster all right!”
A full half hour must have passed without any noticeable change in the conditions. The obstinate beast stayed close to the foot of the tree, never making any attempt at climbing the same; just as though he might be well aware of his own shortcomings.
A number of times, when one of the prisoners among the branches chanced to make some sort of movement, in order to relieve the numbness that had gripped his legs, the bear would exhibit the same ferocity he had shown all through the siege.
“The old chap certainly must have a long debt to pay toward somebody, and is taking it out on us, Perk,” ventured Jack, breaking the silence once more.
“But it doant seem so much like a joke as at first,” grumbled Perk, disconsolately. “What in thunder’d we do if he camped aout on us, mebbe fur a hull day’nd night – gorry! wouldn’t we be in a pickle, though – nawthin’ to eat’r drink it might be, an’ so sore in aour bodies we’d feel like howlin’.”
“Oh! let’s hope it doesn’t turn out so serious as all that,” Jack soothed him somewhat by saying confidently. “What bothers me most is how we’re going to do any sort of business, with that chap hanging out in this neighborhood, and likely to drop in on us any old minute.”
“Drat the luck, any way!” growled the greatly annoyed Perk, aghast at the very idea of slow starvation; with that fat old husky camped at the foot of their tree refuge, daring them to set a foot on the ground.
The morning was wearing away by degrees, with the sun already peeping down into the deep ravine, from its more lofty position in the heavens. Perk was now busily engaged cudgeling his brains in the endeavor to conjure up some species of scheme by which they might have a chance to rid themselves of their four-footed jailor.
All at once Jack saw the other start to feeling of his person eagerly as though some dazzling idea had burst upon his mind. As a rule these occasions were few and far between, and yet Perk had been actually known to originate some amazing schemes, that perhaps did not always turn out as successfully as he himself might have fancied would be the case.
“I could a sworn I fetched it along, thinkin’ there might be some pesky rattlers in this here coulie,” Jack heard him muttering; and then an exclamation of delight announced that whatever he had in mind it had eventually turned up in one of his numerous pockets.
“Hey! what’s in the wind now, I want to know?” Jack demanded, in idle curiosity, since he hardly anticipated that his chum would be able to offer any plausable plan for ridding themselves of that intolerable nuisance encamped below decks.
Perk was holding something up exultantly, and Jack could see it appeared to be a small flask– such things were very common nowadays, with prohibition in the land; but as he had never known his mate to use strong spirits Jack naturally felt more or less surprise to see such a bottle stowed away on Perk’s person. But the word “rattlers” may have given Jack a slight inkling of what it all meant.
“Fetched this here stuff ’long, Jack, in case either o’ us ran afoul o’ a pizen snake,” came the explanation; “kinder do hate to waste the same on sech a wretched beast; but seems like it might get us outen this nasty scrape.”
Jack was forced to laugh.
“Quite an original joke you’d play on Old Eph, I take it, partner – get the poor stick drunk, you mean, of course; but what makes you reckon he’d take to the bottle; for of course you couldn’t lean down far enough to pour the stuff into his open mouth – that’d be a heap too dangerous, I’d think.”
Perk gave him a reproachful look as he hastened to explain.
“Say, I aint quite that silly, I hopes, Jack ole hoss, as to give that critter half a chanct to nab me. I got another idee, it happens, such as ought to pan aout too, if I kin do what I want without spillin’ the beans, or in this case the bootleg stuff.”
“Sounds good to me, Perk,” Jack told him as if to encourage further explanations. “If you don’t expect him to swallow it what then, partner?”
“Jest yeou watch yeour Uncle Perk get busy, boy, that’s all.”
Long before this both of them had relieved their aching shoulders of the weighty packs they were carrying, attaching the same safely to certain broken limbs of the tree that came in conveniently enough. This allowed of a certain amount of freedom; and so Perk was able to wriggle down several feet, his movements as usual attracting the observation of the jealous guardian, for the great shaggy beast stood upright, with his snout elevated menacingly.
“Be careful now, and don’t give him half an opening to nab your foot, brother,” warned Jack.
“Shucks! he aint got a Chinaman’s chanct to do that same, Jack. Hey! ole boy, do yeou smell it a’ready, to be makin’ sech faces at me? Well, here goes to wet yeou daown nice an’ easy like.”
With that Perk leaned over still more – his hand holding the pocket flask was just a foot or so above the extended snout of the bear, when the first trickle of the liquor started to fall, striking the animal’s nose, and running down on the heavy hair covering his neck and back.
“Glory be! look at the scamp openin’ his mouth and puttin’ aout his red tongue to ketch some o’ the drops!” cried the excited Perk. “Hey! don’t be so het up an’ greedy, Mister; I sure aint atryin’ to get yeou soaked – seems like he’s quite took to the bottle, don’t it, Jack?”
“Like an old toper, for a fact, brother,” the other assured him, laughing as he spoke. “I’ve heard how the young black bears over in Yellowstone Park come up to tourists, and beg for some spirits, to which their taste turns; but I didn’t know a big old tramp like this had a leaning that way. I see you’re trying to keep him from swilling it down, Perk; must have some object in letting the stuff run all over his back as you’re doing?”
“Kinder think I have got sech a neat little scheme, partner; on’y yeou wait up till I put the finishin’ touch to the game – proof o’ the puddin’s in the eatin’ o’ the same, yeou know.”
“I’m waiting to be shown, buddy – you know your hand, and can play it best. Go to it then, and I’ll be the judge to say if it pans out okay or not.”
Perk was now draining the flask of the last drop; for when he made up his mind to do a thing he always went the limit.
“There, that finishes my snake-bite cure, more the pity,” he kept telling his fellow prisoner, with a vein of keen regret in his voice. “No, yeou jest caint have another drop yeou greedy rascal. Seems like yeou made things warm enuff for two ginks what never did any harm to yeou or the fambly; an’ now suh, the tables got to turn – I’m figgerin’ on makin’ the likes o’ yeou as hot as Tophet, that’s right, Old Eph.”
Still holding out the empty flask as though to keep the bear from dropping down on all-fours, Perk carefully took out a match, and held it poised between fingers and thumb. Then it was that what he really meant to do clicked in the mind of Jack; it rather staggered him in the bargain, so that he uttered an exclamation that told the other he had divined his secret.
“Kinder guess yeou’re on to my curves, buddy,” observed Perk; “well, here she goes, an’ hopin’ luck comes aour way.”
He thereupon scraped the head of the match along a certain part of the tree trunk – several times was this repeated, but all to no avail, as the friction did not appear to be brisk enough to start things going.
Then Perk went back to first principles, and gave a quick scrape down the seat of his trousers; whereupon there followed a tiny flash, and the match began to burn brightly.
Waving the bottle, and letting a drop or two ooze from its mouth Perk, watching his opportunity cast the burning match directly on top of the bear’s shaggy neck. He must have held his breath with suspense while so doing, for he felt as though he were casting the die, with everything at stake.
“Wow! it’s a go, Perk, you wonderful schemer!” burst from Jack, as he saw a blue flame start up, where the booze had fallen on the thick, rusty looking coat of the astonished animal, instantly increasing as the liquor caught.
Both of them watched with staring eyes to see what followed; but they did not have long to wait. The bear dropped down on all four feet, and twisting his head around commenced snapping viciously at the spot where he already began to feel uncomfortably warm. This caused him to burn his tongue, and from that moment it took on all the aspect of a circus to the two spectators lodged there amidst the branches of that friendly tree; although to be sure it was an altogether different kind of situation to the astonished bear.
The animal developed a surprising amount of agility, twisting and turning in a frantic endeavor to bite at the object that was giving him such a queer sensation as of pain. But all his antics had no effect on the fire in his coat, which was continually extending its circulation by streaks and bounds.
“Go to it, buddy – call aout the hull fire department an’ smother the blaze, or yeou’re sure a goner. Lookit him arollin’ on the ground to beat the band – aint that cute though, partner – jest like sensible human bein’s would do if they had their heads ’bout ’em when on fire. But it aint agoin’ to help the pore ole dick any, either. There, he’s a runnin’ off like fun, headin’ fur some sorter water-hole he knows ’bout, I kinder guess. What a sight that is, Jack ole geezer; but jest the same I’m sorry ’bout that snake pizen stuff, I sure am – didn’t canc’late to have to use it on sech game.”
“That’s all right, Perk; it’d saved the cause, and possibly our lives in the bargain. I’d call it well spent, if you asked me,” Jack told him.
“Say, look at him goin’ licketty split, like the Ole Nick was after him, blazin’, an’ with spurts o’ smoke bustin’ outen his singed hide. He sure enough played outen his class that time, I figger. Mebbe, naow, he’ll cut an’ run next time he meets gentlemen o’ aour stripe.”
The spectacle was so extremely ludicrous to Perk that he writhed and twisted about as if seized with a fit; so, too, did he threaten to burst out into loud laughter only that Jack gave him due warning of what dire consequences would be apt to follow any indiscretion along those lines, which sobered the hilarious one, and brought him back to sanity.
“Kin we climb daown outen this tree naow, partner?” asked Perk, after he could no longer discern any further sign of the badly singed king of the mountain valleys; “I’ll be tickled pink to be able to stretch my legs a bit, seein’ they’re so stiff an’ sore; but it shore was too bad ’bout losin’ my precious snake pizen cure – hopes we aint a goin’ to need it any time, that’s all.”
