CHAPTER XVI
THE LOCKHEED-VEGA FLYING SHIP
"Moon coming up, partner!" was all Perk said.
"Then it's time we were moving," Jack told him as he started to stretchhis cramped arms and yawn. "Feel a heap better now after that little napand ready for what's coming."
They did not have much to do, since everything was in perfect conditionfor hopping-off--trust Jack for that, with his slogan of "be prepared."
"All set, Perk?" asked the pilot, presently.
"Shoot!" was the terse answer.
The bright moon would have to take the place of the customary equipmentof a landing field in the way of guidelights, markers, andsearch-lights, but there was no necessity for so much light with thechannel before him along which he could taxi unerringly, until, arrivingat the point where the great gulf stretched out toward the westernhorizon, the speed must be advanced for the take-off.
Now they were free from the mangroves and Jack accelerated the pace ofhis ship accordingly--two twin foam-crested waves rolled out from thepontoons as they sped along until, testing things, Jack found that hischarge was impatient to leave the water and leap upward into space.
Perk looked backward toward the scene of his amazing afternoonbattle--how many times in the future would the picture rise in hismemory to haunt him and bring that quizzical grin to his face.
With the newly risen moon gilding the small waves of the gulf belowthem, the picture looked most peaceful. Perk, although not much inclinedto romance, could not but admire the spectacle after his own rudefashion while Jack fairly drank it in as he continued to pay attentionto his manifold duties.
Their course was almost due north, Jack keeping out a score or more ofmiles from the coast, having reasons of his own for so doing--perhaps hefound the wind more favorable out there and this is always an importantfactor in the calculations of a pilot of experience. Just as in theearlier days of ocean steamers when they were also equipped with mastsand sails, the latter were always hoisted when the wind favored, sincethis helped them make progress and saved coal at the same time.
They had been booming along for something like half an hour whenwatchful Perk, the observer, made a discovery worth while he believed.He communicated with his companion, the useful earphones chancing to bein place--trust Perk for that.
"Somethin' doin' out there to the west, partner--look up to a higherceilin' an' you'll see it. Headin' to cross over our trail in thebargain, I guess."
"A crate, all right," commented Jack, whose quick eyesight hadimmediately picked up the moving object.
"Looks like it might a come all the way across the gulf--d'ye think fromsome Mexican port, Jack?"
"Like as not," assented the other. "These crooks make a start from anyone of a score of jumping-off places, but always with a specifiedlanding field ahead."
"Then you figger," continued Perk, "he might be one o' the gang,fetchin' Chinks across or mebbe precious stones, bought in Paris, andshipped to Mexico on the way to New York, eh, partner?"
"Chances are three to one that's what it means," Jack told him.
Perk continued to wield his important binoculars and presently, when thelofty plane was passing over, he stated his opinion.
"'Taint _him_, anyway, that's dead sure, Jack, I guess I ought toknow a Lockheed-Vega crate, no matter how far away, or by what trickymoonlight either, 'cause you see I used to run one o' that breed fornearly a year when I took a whirl at the air-mail business up north outo' Chicago till I had a bad crash an' quit cold."
"That settles it then, partner," said the pilot, still observing thespeck swinging past out of the tail of his eye. "I hadn't any idea itcould be the same chap you had your little picnic with some hours back,for you told me he'd blown off toward the east."
"Jest what he did," replied the observer. "Ginger pop! but what wouldn'tI give right now to know jest whar that galoot was meanin' to drop down,once he gets over the land. How 'bout that, old hoss?"
"It might help out considerable," admitted Jack although not as muchinterested as Perk considered he might be. "We'll sift things out ingood time, and for all we know, run across a few surprises in thebargain."
Perk studied that last part for a minute, feeling almost certain Jackhad some deep meaning back of his words, but it proved too much for hiscapacity in the line of figuring out mysteries, and so he dropped it"like a hot potato," as he told himself.
The mysterious air voyager had by now disappeared entirely, althoughthey might still have caught the throbbing of his madly working motorhad it not been for their own engine kicking up so much racket, Jack notbeing inclined to make use of the capable silencer just then.
Perk had made up his mind that the unknown aviator, even if other thanOscar Gleeb, was undoubtedly working the same profitable line ofbusiness as the pilot of the Curtiss-Robin ship. So, too, Perkconsidered it worth while to try and figure out the exact course of thehigh flyer as he was probably making directly for his intended goal andthis knowledge was likely to prove useful to them later on.
This he was able to accomplish. Working mental problems come easily toone who has played the part of a navigator aboard a modern galleon ofthe clouds.
"Huh!" grunted Perk after figuring out his problem twice and both timesreaching the same conclusion, "the guy's really striking in to mightynear the same point Jack's meanin' to make and mebee now our lines mightcross if we both kept on goin' long enough."
He studied this matter for some time, wondering if Jack also realizedthe fact and had kept silent about it for good and sufficient reasons.
It afforded the ambitious Perk considerable satisfaction to hug the ideato his heart that possibly the chance might be given Jack and himself tolocate some of these land stations where all this flagrant smugglingbusiness was going on--the prospect of their's being the force to dealthe outlaw organization a killing blow brought in its train the thrillhe loved so well.
Then came the moment when Jack banked and changed his course radically,heading directly into the east where lay the peninsula of Ponce de Leon,seeker after the Spring of Eternal Youth, and finding instead, a land offlowers.
Perk knew what this evidently meant--that Jack had flown far enough upthe west coast and was now bent on making for that inland sheet of freshwater he had mentioned to his comrade as a likely place for them to dropdown and pass the balance of the night.
The uncertainty was keeping Perk keyed up to a high tension--somethingtold him in no uncertain tones that Jack had a vastly more importantreason for attaining that lake than the mere desire to avoid attractingattention--just what it might mean he could not guess, for when heattempted to solve the enigma he found himself floundering in ashoreless sea of doubt and uncertainty that was baffling, to say theleast.
Perk was mumbling to himself as if he might be on the verge of reachingsome sort of decision. He bent forward several times as if about to makean important remark and on each occasion drew back, as though he couldhardly decide how to approach the matter he had in his mind. Then hewould chuckle, as if it might have its humorous side as well as aserious one.
Already had they reached a point where he could easily see the shoreseveral thousand feet below and now Jack was sliding down as if bent onstriking a ceiling that would be only a few hundred feet above thepalmetto fringe Perk could distinguish running along the coast.
It seemed a fitting time for him to give Jack the start he contemplatedand so, summoning his courage, Perk began to talk in as unconcerned atone as possible.
"Partner, would you mind tellin' me what about this here Oswald Kearns?"