Eagles of the Sky: or, With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes

“Seems like it’s the only time I’ve weltered in my own gore for a coon’s age,” Perk was saying as he looked at the stains on his faithful if faded rag that had been his close companion on many a long flight through fog and storm, wintry cold and summer heat. “But then I got a notion Oscar must a’been nipped, too, mebbe a whole lot worse’n me. Honors are ’bout even, I guess, and if ever I do run across that lad again I’m meanin’ to shake hands with him, jest out o’ consideration for the fox an’ geese game us air pilots used to play in the big ruction over there.”

By chance Perk turned his gaze in another direction for he no longer found any interest in keeping tabs on his late antagonist whose ship was now growing dim in the distance, having entered among a bunch of fleecy clouds.

Hardly had Perk turned his head than he gave utterance to a low cry.

“What do I see but another crate humping along this way, an’ outen the no’th in the bargain?” he observed, with ill concealed eagerness in his tones. “Could it be Oscar, an’ the other skunks got ’em a hull fleet o’ airships to carry on their trade o’ smugglin’ in licker, diamonds an’ Chinks that want to get in this country more’n they do the yeller man’s Paradise? Oh! rats, what’m I thinkin’ about–wake up, Gabe Perkiser, an’ use your noodle like it was given to you to handle. To be sure that second plane is our own bus, with my pal handlin’ the stick. An’ I guess Oscar must a glimpsed him headin’ this way, which made him reckon this wasn’t the healthiest place in the country for a feller o’ his size, so he skipped out pronto. Yep, that’s my pal for a cookey, I’d know his way o’ handlin’ a ship in a dozen an’ as far as I could lamp the boat.”

On the whole he was extremely glad to see Jack returning, although also pleased to know he had had his little frolic in a miniature battle that for the brief period of its life had been able to give him a most delicious thrill.

He watched the oncoming ship grow in size and noted the significant fact that its approach was so lacking in all the customary racket that deafens the human ear.

Then presently a hand waved to him, Jack swung around and dropped with a little splash upon the water–just where Oscar had so recently left it–to taxi along and pull up close to the camouflaged sloop.

CHAPTER XIV

THE COAST GUARD MEN

Perk made a discovery just then that afforded him more or less satisfaction. This was the fact that apparently Jack’s mission to Tampa had not been in vain for he could see several heads in the cabin of the amphibian beside that of his best chum.

“Huh! ’pears like Jack fetched through okay, an’ has ferried some guys back with him to take this stuff off’n our hands,” Perk was muttering, even as Jack started to clamber aboard the sloop, being closely followed by a couple of determined looking young men.

“Back again, brother,” Jack observed, as he clasped the extended hand of his partner, then, gave a queer grimace upon taking note of the splintered coaming of the sloop as well as the badly pockmarked barricade of mahogany logs. “Say, what’s all this mean, I want to know–looks like you might have been mixed up in some sort of rumpus while I was away!”

Perk grinned and nodded his head cheerfully.

“Had a heap o’ fun, old boss, an’ got loads o’ thrills out o’ it. Mebbe now you noticed some sort o’ crate just vanishing among them clouds off toward the east as you breezed along?”

“Thought I did,” came the immediate reply, “but the visibility was getting poor, and I couldn’t be sure it wasn’t a buzzard, or even an eagle ducking in and out. What’s it mean, Perk–was he kicking up a mess around here?”

“You said it, partner, an’ his name was sure Oscar–Oscar Gleeb, ’cause he got mad as hops when I asked him, an’ told me that wasn’t any o’ my business. But we sure did have a nice hot spell, Oscar’n me.”

“Yes, and I reckon now you got your old right ear touched up again, Perk, for I can see streaks of half-dried blood running down your cheek.”

“Yeah, he nicked me okay, an’ if this keeps on much further I’ll soon be taken for the Manassa Mauler, ’cause it’ll gimme a cauliflower ear. Who are these two lads, Jack–look like they might belong to the Coast Guard.”

“Just what they are–meet Tom Cairns and Red McGrath, who have been sent along with me to take charge of this contraband and hand it over to Mr. Philip Ridgeway, temporarily in charge of the Treasury Department interests along the West Coast here, with headquarters in Tampa–this is the fine pal you heard me speaking about a few times, boys–Gabe Perkiser, commonly known simply as Perk, a veteran of the big scrap over in France where he flew one of those sausage observation blimps, and was later on considered something of an ace in our flying corps.”

So Perk gladly shook the hands extended to him, grinned in his genial fashion, and from that moment on they were as brothers all.

“While we’re stretching our legs, after being cooped up in that cramped cabin for some hours,” suggested Jack, whose curiosity had naturally been aroused by the multitude of signs all around indicative of a warm session, “suppose you sketch your little adventure for us, Perk. And I want to say that Oscar was pretty much of a fool if he reckoned on snatching this boat away from an old fighter like you, when you had a nice new machine-gun to back up your claims.”

“Shucks! he showed the right stuff for a scrapper,” expostulated the honest Perk, anxious to give credit where credit was due. “We stopped the barrage at one point to have a little chin, but unable to agree, we jest started all over again. An’ I kinder guess I must’ve notched the critter some, for he hauled off an’ skinned the cat by kickin’ out. I was jest tellin’ myself it sure turned out to be a good thing he didn’t have any Chinks aboard at the time, ’cause they might’ve lost the number o’ their mess in the racket–I’m willin’ to stop the yeller boys from crashin’ Unc’ Sam’s gates, but I don’t crave the job o’ sendin’ the poor dicks along to their worshipped ancestors, not me.”

“Well, get a move on you, Perk, and let’s have the story of your fight–did he drop down, and have it out with you on the water; or was he circling above your head all the while?”

“If you’ll take another squint at these bullet marks, old hoss,” said Perk, reproachfully, “you’ll see they passed along on the level. Yeah, he was a square shooter I want to say and some day I’m hopin’ me’n Oscar c’n shake hands, since the war’s long past an’ German is being taught again in our public schools.”

Then he launched forth in a graphic, if terse, description of the remarkable battle that had so recently taken place. The others listened with intense interest, for if Perk did have a way of cutting his sentences short and never going into lengthy descriptions, nevertheless he made his points tell, and kept his audience of three breathing fast with the thrill they received.

“Now let’s get a move on,” Jack was saying after Perk had finished the exciting description of his adventure, “and go over all this mess of cases, so these boys can give us a little document to say how we turned over that number of boxes to their charge, together with the sloop. McGrath here used to run the engine of a tug in New York harbor and is well able to manage this rusty cub here–we found it capable of doing a day’s work, you know Perk, on the way here.”

Jack’s word was law, since he was in command. Accordingly they started a systematic check of every case of bottled goods to be found aboard the confiscated vessel, above and below decks.

“Just an even two hundred and twenty-six,” announced Jack, after they had gone over the entire lot twice with the same result. “I reckon a few got away aboard that speedboat but they didn’t have much time to work the racket before the hijacker mob swarmed aboard and kicked up that riot–then along came Perk, with his armful of tear-bombs and broke up the Boston tea party in great shape. I’ll make out a paper for both of you to sign, after which you can kick-off when you please.”

All this was satisfactory to McGrath and his comrade and the paper having been duly signed, they set about examining the engine so as to learn whether it could have been injured in any way from the storm of missiles that came aboard during the hostilities so lately ended.

“The bally old thing seems to be in fairly decent shape for running,” was McGrath’s verdict after the checking had been completed, “and since we’ve got some distance to cover before we make Tampa Bay, p’raps we’d better be shoving off.”

“No such big hurry as that, boys,” observed Jack. “I’m a bit hungry myself and reckon you both must be in the same boat. We’ve got plenty of grub, and to spare, also Perk here knows a few wrinkles along the cooking line. Suppose we have some sort of spread to celebrate Perk’s victory.”

“Huh! pleases me okay, brother,” announced the expectant chef. “I’ve run across a little rusty kerosene burnin’ stove here in what I’d call the cook’s galley, an’ we might as well have some hot coffee with the eats.”

As there were no dissenting votes the motion was carried unanimously; whereupon Perk bustled around and soon had his coffee pot over an apology for a flame which would, however, answer their purpose.

It was only a simple supper, but with good appetites to back them, every one of the quartette declared it was great and would long be remembered.

Then the mess of saw palmetto leaves and other stuff utilized for camouflage purposes was cast overboard after which McGrath “fiddled” with the engine and soon had it running, limp and all, for its misses were plentiful, although the engineer allowed there did not seem to be anything fundamentally wrong.

“If we have fair luck,” he announced, confidently, “we ought to fetch our Tampa dock, where all prizes are tied-up, before morning comes along. On the other hand, if we break down we’ll either hang on to the sloop, or if luck runs against us, sink her, after smashing every bottle aboard.”

“Good enough, Red,” Jack told him as they shook hands for the last time. “I hope we run across you boys again some day, and please keep your lip buttoned about our being down here with an amphibian to knock some of these smugglers of Chinks and rum galley-west.”

“You can depend on us to keep mum, Jack,” the red-headed ex-harbor tug engineer assured him.

So the last line was cast off, Jack and Perk retired to their own ship, and with many a wheeze and complaint the sloop started to pass out to the open gulf, and commence the night journey to Tampa Bay.

CHAPTER XV

WITH THE COMING OF THE MOON

“Wall,” Perk was remarking as the sloop passed beyond range of their vision amidst the gathering shades of night, already drawing her sable curtains close, “I hopes they get through without runnin’ smack against a bunch o’ the racketeers.”

“With fair luck they ought to manage to slip along,” Jack went on to observe, confidently. “You heard me warn them to keep a watchful eye out for smugglers and hijackers by land and sea and air? Anyway we’ve finished our part of the job and this paper proves that our find was all I cracked it up to be when I talked with Mr. Ridgeway.”

“Course, you knocked up against the gent then, eh Jack?”

“Sure, or I shouldn’t have been able to fetch those lads back with me to take over the sloop and contraband cargo,” the other told him. “But I was in a tail spin at first when I learned that Mr. Ridgeway had gone down to St. Pete to interview some people who had reasons for not wanting to be seen going into his Government offices in Tampa. But I got his address and jumped my boat, slipped down Tampa Bay, and pulled in at the long municipal pier at St. Petersburg.”

“I first hired a dependable man to keep watch over my ship while I was off hunting my superior officer but I found him after a bit and he was sure glad to see me, shook hands like a good sport, and asked me a bunch of questions before starting to tell me what important fresh news he had picked up through his agents working the spy game for all it was worth.”

“Was he tickled to learn how we managed to run off with that slick little sloop that carried so neat a pack o’ cases marked with foreign stamps?”

“Seemed to be,” came the ready answer. “He isn’t a man of many words, you know, Perk, but what he says he means. He told me they were banking on the pair of us to bring the high-hat chaps at the head of this smuggler league to the bar, with plenty of evidence that would convict them, no matter how many big lawyers they employed to beat the case.”

“That sounds all to the good with me, old hoss,” snapped the pleased Perk. “’Taint often we get half the praise that’s comin’ to us–not that I care a whiff ’bout that, though–satisfied to do my duty by Unc’ Sam, an’ let them high-ups have the main credit. But I guess we’ll get some kick out o’ the game just the same an’ that’s worth all it costs us. Tell me, did this Mr. Ridgeway fork over any news worth knowin’?”

“He did,” the other assured him. “I showed him those papers I found hidden in the cabin of the sloop, with a fine list of names, such as would cover customers who’d ordered the stuff they had aboard and he reckoned that several of them might point to the heads of the combine swinging the big smuggling deal.”