HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times-Advocate, 1931-12-24, Page 7THE EXETER TIMES-ADVOCATE nn wH. s*. urn
“The Silver Hawk
BY ■ WILLIAM BYRON MOWERY
Nest, two hundred miles
Kansas came over one
to a dance that the Indians
having on the station
When the piidnight
creeping westward like a little bug
along an ant run, Because a car
was a rarity in that tliinly-popujat-
ed country, he throtteld down and
paid particular' attention to the au
tomobile, From dead overhead he
saw it stop, saw a man jump
face up-turned, and wave arras
hat.
Dropping down, banking on
tical wing, Kansas flew back over1—
low enough this time to recognize
the tall rangy figure of Jim Dorn,
In a duck pond a mile west he
“sat down” and waited,
came bumping along the i
hitting on two cylinders. '
where the pond curved
and Kansas
out,
and
yer
IllIlllllliillillllllllillllMlllIlllllllIlllllllln
outlines of the Silver Wings Valiant
which Dorn always kept hidden be’
peath his jacket; and he reflected
“Well, if there’s fighting to be done
she picked a man who can do it.
Jim's had a skirmish with her ene
mies already,
tar when they
He flew on,
•foothills, west
so lost in thought that he nearly hit
the
They caught a Tar-
jumpea on him/'
over the ever-rising
to-ward Eagle Nest,
“Over at Eagle Nest, helping the
mechanics put the cowling on my
plane, . a wrench slipped and
thwacked nme one/*
“And you didn’t meet anybody
suspicious or run into any trouble?
I belive you’re—you’re not telling
me the truth, Jim!”
Bprn was remembering that grim
threat, “i’ll- give you a week to live
and reflecting that those operatives
were busy establishing his identity
and might be waiting for him at TL
tan Pass; but he said firmly: “I
told you the truth, Aurore. You es
caped clean-cut and you’re safe
here.” He turned the subject away,
“I sent your telegram and brought
your outfit—
|She asked eagerly, “And the news-'
papers, Jim?”
He had fetched them ashore in
the canoe with him, so he stooped
and handed her the roll. Aurore
seized it, broke the string; and Born
observed how she glanced at the
headlines and the front page column
headings of the first paper, then
passed to the second paper, the
third and the fourth. He thought,
“She expected to find her trouble in
the headlines—a front page story!”
•.Then she glanced hastily at,the in
side sheets and drew a deep breath
when she finished and looked up at
him.
“It’s
heaven,
it.”
Dorn
mean you’rei free to
You’re going back?”
“No. Not at all. I’ll stay here.”
After a moment he asked; Does
the fact—your trouble not being in
the papers—does it have any bear
ing on the hunt for you? ‘They’ will
stop now?. . .
■No, just the opposite;
it harder than ever.”
“I’ll explain, Jim: if
had become known it
done terrible injury
people and I’d have been the cause
of it; and I’m glad I’m not guilty
'of that.”
Dorn asked, “Your telegram
won’t check the hunt at all?”
when Aurore shook her head
phatically, “Then why did you
it?”
“Because my duty was to send it.
It, was my duty to let them know
I was alone and would never breathe
a word. Now if this story becomes
known it won’t be my fault, because
I warned them and promised not to
disclose myself if they'd let me
alone.
Dorn thought: “Then you’ll be
living here. You’re not going away,
He thought: “They’ll tighten down
ONCE again we have the pleasure
of wishing all our customers and
friends the Seasons’ Greetings and
to express our appreciation of the
generous support accorded us during
the year now drawing to a close.
SYNOPSIS
James Dorn, aerial map maker> as-,
signed to a territory in the north
ern Canadian Rockies lives alone
in his camp on Titan. Island,
Kansas Eby, his friend for the
: past 'six years was stationed at
Eagle
east.
. night
were
platform
train pulled in he seen a girl
come out and glance hurriedly
around and then disappear into
‘the darkness.
.hurriedly but
trace
Dprn
Pare Bergelot, a trusty metis ar
rifed
’The
D/irn tq go to a lonely lake in
search of her father and she wish-
■ es to accompany him.
When they arrive at the cabin
. there is no sign of habitation.
The girl, Aurore McNain, asks
Dorn to take her to a lonely lake
in search of her father. When
they arrive there is no sign of
habitation but she tells Dorn she
" is going to live there alone.
Dorn goes to Edmonton for
supplies for Aurore and is inter
viewed by a private detective and lice- the police in his room. | Dorn paled. “You were going to
ask the police.” IThen he laughed
chai ilk tin, hjs Siient Way, “Some day you'll
He would have left hours ago had appreciate that joke. Don’t art
lie not been afraid Dorn might come; questions. Help get this baggage
out to the plane, Couple boat loads,
pretty bulky; that’s why I wired you
to bring the D-H crate. Jerry, here’s
a hundred dollars. Hope you get
home all right. Next Christmas I'll
remember you more substantial.”
While Dorn was fetching the sec
ond boat load, Kansas stood on a
pontoon and re-stowed the packages
in the fuselage cuibby. He would
have given a leg to know what was
in them; and when 'he saw that the
paper was already torn a bit on one,
he did not think it very, treacherous
to probe a little with his finger. He
came upon some garment of fine
blue corduroy, and probing still fur
ther he discovered it was a girl's
skirt; and with still another twist
of his finger he discovered a pair
of tiny lace-boots.
“For Lord’s sake.” He drew breath
like a cow on a frosty morning. ‘For
Lord’s sake! What’s Jim Dorn do
ing with those things?”
He recovered from the shock be
fore Dorn came back and tactfully
said nothing, but he was busy add
ing up that strange gsrl at Titan
Pass, plus this wagon-load of pack
plus Dorn’s unexplained trip
he arrived at the
first snow-capped mountain
CHAPTER XIII
of her.
about it
Kansas followed
failed to find any
He’ told his friend
and the same night
with the girl, .
girl, Aurore McNain, asks
and find no one at the place of tryst.
But the chances of Dorn coming had
dwindled almost to nothing, and the
.belief had laid hold of Kansas that
his partner was not coming, was in
trouble, needed help.
When the noon hour passed and
nothing happened, he decided it was
high time to act. Switching on ig
nition, he idled the motor' or a few
minutes, drew in the anchor, skit
tered down the inlet to warm the
engine thoroughly, gave it the gun,
bounded into the air and headed for
Edmonton.
It was his intention to inquire
mtound in the capital city;- and if he
found no trace of Dorn, to ask help
from the police.
All that lo"ng mornnig, while he
waited and worried at Lake Lob
stick, Kansas had been thinking
back over his six years of partner
ship with Jim Dorn; of their first
•barnstorming tour in a rickety old
Army ■“Jennie” which finally dem
onstrated the law of gravity against
an alkali hill at Austin, Texas; of
their season together spotting light
ning fires in Oi'egon, where they got
in much good practice at aerobatics,
and imaginary letter-writing
aerial combat manoeures; of
acres and acres of boll weevils
had murdered in Mississippi;of
time in California when Dorn delib
erately hired out to an unprincipled
air-transport company in order to
crack up their dangerous old crates,
and wag so smooth about it that he
cracked up five before the company
discharged him. Of their term in
the Foreign Legion, and their sub
sequent vagabondage up and down
the airways of- Europe in an old
war-time' Sopwith.
Looking back across the years,
Kansas several times had thought
that morning: “I owe Jim Dorn my
life a couple dozen times over. And
here I sit like a stuffed owl when
laybe he’s in trouble bad.” In his
anxiety he was practically prodded
by the memory of an incident so
fresh that it was still, a nightmare
in his mind. Just six weeks ago,
before the cartographing season be
gan, he and Dorn, the two crack
pilots of the Ferre, has been test
ing forestry planes down near Vic
toria. They were flying twin ma
chines that morning when Kansas’s
engine konked anC! diied andi h'is
plane crashed on a moutaih mesa,
pinioning hid, bruised and battered,
in the wreckage-, Roaring overhead
four hundred feet-up, Dorn made a
valiant pack?chute jump, and though
liis own machine cracked, up against
a mountain-side nine miles away,
he landed almost on top of the snarl
of -wire and wing and matchwood
timber he carried him through the
smoke and flame of the fire spread
ing over the mesa, and toted him
five miles down the mountain to the
<X P. grade, where a section gang
finally picked them up in a gasoline
go-devil*
Whirling on full throttle toward
Edmonton, Kansas fervently hoped
lie could find Dorn and give him a
hand, whatever his trouble;, and pay
hack a part of the debt incurred that
morning down in the lonely Lilloo-
ets.
As he flew east he kept watching
the brown ribbon of road beneath
him, still faintly hoping Born might
be coming;’and so it came about
that thirty miles east of Lake Lob-
•fitkk he noticed an automobile
and
the
they
that
The car
rutty road
It stopped
closest to
; paddled
A Battle Ahead
the road,
ashore.
Dorn and
individual
were pulling out a pile of packages
that completely filled the tonneau of
the ancient sedan.
“Teak a lot of patience,” Dorn
greeted, as they shook hands—“pa
tience and two good mechanics and
fourteen hours to coax this bus out
here over these wagon ruts, Kansas,
but here we are. I was afraid you’d
be gone, son. Where in the world
were you' headed for?”
“Edmonton! I figured you was in
a mix-up, Jim. If I couldn’t find
you myself I expected to ask the po-
a. sawed-off, bow-legged
named Jerry already
his swift mono-?
away into the
of
spires
and far
Furniture Dealer Funeral Director
■
, ages,
to Edmonton, ancl
conclusion:
• “It’s that girl
her somehow, Jim
here these things
house-keeping. A
like this-
the bush,
that’s ' -been lecturing mo for
years about
somewhere,
nerness . . , Lord! she was pretty
that night ...”
He had thought of the girl a hun
dred times; of her haunting, wist
ful .beauty as she stood in the light
ed vestibule, and of her wraith-like
elusiveness when he hunted for her
in the cedar shadows; and he had
almost come to believe that she was
a creature of his own imagination.
But here was proof of her actuality,
and proof that Dorn had met her
and in some way was bound up with
her and the mystery of her.
The inuivictuai called Jerry waved
his cap aS the plane took off and
headed west. A few minutes later
Kansas glanced back at the rear
seat. With pack-chute for a pillow,
Dorn had eased himself into a com
fortable position and wa.s sound
asleep.
It seemed to Kansas that his part
ner’s stern face had lost something
of its sternness and that he looked
happier than in many moons.
“That girl’s the eause of it
swore to a passing mallard, **
cure him of being melancholy,
ny he won’t tell me anything
her, Guess I’m just a partner,
be he’ll tell me if he needs
but now two is company-—”
he suddenly sobered at the thought
that here might be the beginning of
the end to partnership between Jim
Born and himself.
Then lie noticed the Hnei
Born’s eyes, the weariness
features,
knuckles:
ed:
“Jim’s
trouble! He used an automobile to
got away from Edmonton because
he didn’t dare come by train! That
girl was scared the night I saw her,
and whatever she ran away
that’s what Jim is fighting,
looked meditatively nt the
He met up With
did. He’s taking
to set her up in
whole ’ crateful
-mean’s she’s away inside
He, Jim Dorn, the fellow
six
women—-he’s got her,
in that howling wild-
the crusted blood
and ho shrewdly
!” he
iShe’ll
run
about
May
help;
And
i under
of his
on his
reason-
mixed up in some bad
from,
Ho
plain
Over the nose of
plane Dorn looked
northwest across a wilderness
evergreen valley and rocky
and beatiful white neves,
ahead sighted Goat Mesa, lit to fire
by the early morning sun, and on
farther saw a glint of blue from the
upper end of the lake, Aurore's lake
the Lake of the Dawn. Unconci-ously’
he pushed the throttle a notch wid-
er.
He had left Eagle Nest three
hours ago; and alone in the night
sky, he had nothing to do but watch
the needles of his instruments and
• try to arrange the strange happen
ings of the last five days into some
I understandable story.
Several things stood out clear to
him. Aurore was being hunted,
and there was money and power
and a relentless purpose behind the
search for her, She had fled from
the Transcontinental into this wild
erness for sanctuary; had fled out
of civilization to escape pursuit of
her. This H.C-S to whom she sent
the telegram was probably the chief
one of her enemies.. But what did
he mean in her life, and. what did he
want of her, and why was he hound
ing? What was. the particular and
great value on her head?
The storm-centre ot the puzzle
to Dorn was Aurore herself—her
personality. She was not a girl one
would expect to find in any sort of
trouble. Except that she was be-
witcliingly pretty and exceedingly
well educated, there was nothing at
all strange or unusual about her. By
a hundred little indicative things
she had disclosed that she was a
wholesome and entirely sensible
person. Remembering how she had
laughed at him for shying .at her
mushrooms and picked flowers for
theii' wilderness meal together,
Dorn wondered, “What under the
vaulted heavens could a girl like her
have done to start a hue and cry
after her and stir up- a commotion
clear across two provinces.
During this night trip he had de
liberated whether or not to tell her
about having met up with her ene
mies. If she knew they had struck
clue to her, she might give him in
formation that would help him fight
them. But as her lake unfolded, a
quiet and peaceful refuge all out of
the world of her trouble, he decided
“I’ll not mention my close -call in
the city. It’d be a crime. If she
knows they had mo cornered and
trying to establish my identity right
now, she won't have any
happiness.”
He thought she would
be still asleep, this early in
ning, but as he skinm.ed above Goat
Mesa and soared hrgh out over the
mirorry blue lake* here below him
he saw Aurore, standing on their
jutting rock, fishing foi’ breakfast
trout.
■She heard the drone of his mo
tor and looked up, and dropping ier
pole hurried to the cove where he
would come ashore. Again Dorn
caught the flutter of a tiny hander
chief, and he dived down towards
it in a tight, mile-long spiral and
taxied into the shallows. Wheir he
drove the canoe to the bank Aurore
was standing beside a great pine at
water edge, and she greeted him
with “Good-morning, Mr. Jim!” and
gave him both her hands when he
stepped out.
• Dorn took Aurore’s hands, and
their eyes met in a swift, smiling
glance. He) asked, “Everything
been all right with you here?” He
could see it had. The ravages of hei’
fear
him
tent
face
She had a
and had done up her hair in a braid
ed coil as a little
and her fingers
ed,
“Yes, Jim, but
ticed that she went suddenly pale
and that she was looking up at his
temple scar, liis solo relic of a doz
en crashes, a limb of a certain ro
wan tree in Edmonton had struck
and broken open the old weal. Aur
ore raised her hand and touched it
gently, and a fear swept across her
face like a sudden gust across the
lake. “Jim, that wound? » » she
cried. “What happened to yon?” ,
“Oli, that?” Darn Hod casually*
peace or
certainly
the mor-
and worry which had tugged at
that
wore
was
first night down in his
altogether vanished. Her
taniled a shade browner,
fillet around her forehead
bush-lop or should;
were berry stain-
you?He no-
not mentioned Jim. Thank
not a thing is known about
asked quickly; “Does that
leave here?
he no long-
of avoiding
them hunt.
they'll push
my trouble
would have
to certain
then
And
em-
send
the hunt for you, They offered me
twenty thousand dollars for mere
information/* . He had believed that
perhaps her telegram would stop
pursuit, hut now she was telling him
that the search would be prosecut
ed more relentlessly than ever. He
saw a struggle ahead, a batttle
looming between himself and those
enemies of Auore’s and
er harboured any nope
.it.
He said, “Well, Jet
You’re two hundred miles up from
the grade, with, an outfit to last till
snow flies. And I’m the only person
in the world who knows where you
are. They’ll never find you. That’s
that!” And he swept her fears aside
Aurore had not told him she
glad of his return, but Dorn
read that fact for himself in
eager running to meet him, in
warm welcome of her smile,
she had been lonely, here in
of the lovliness of uer island.
She invited him; “Jim, do
comfortably ahead of my schedule/
And while he was anout it he pav
ed his way for other visits: “In
this cartographing we're limited to
so much territory and so., many
air hours a week. A pilot can get
tired without knowing it—-especially
us, flying a machine and operating
a complex camera at the same time,
I guess the Bureau’ figures that if a
person’s nerves are jumpy he might
crack up a twenty-thousand dollar
plane. Working by myself, with no
one to< keep check on me, I’ve g<t
over the limit aud piled up a mar
gin. So whenever I want to take
time, off, I can.
(To be Continued)
was
had
her
the
And
spite
you
have to return to Work right away?”
He wanted to be back at Titan
Pass and find out whether his ene
mies had made any move there in
when he did return. If they work
ed as speedily as they had' in Ed
monton, they would be waiting for
him. “But the morning here,” he
thought, “and the afternoon down
there.”
“No, I don’t/’ he answered, “I’m
WHALEN W. M.S.
The December meeting of the
Whalen W. M. S. was held on Thurs
day afternoon at the home of Mrs.
F. Gunning. Mrs. John Hazelwood-,
president, was in the chair. The
meeting opened with the Doxology,
hymn and prayer -by Mrs. Gunning
and Mrs. Geo. Millson. "The Bible
lesson, Luke 2-1-14 was read by Mrs
Will Morley. Two interesting read
ing, “A great discovery in Korea/*-
by Miss Mary Morley and “The Call
of the -Children,” by Mrs. Harvey
Squire were given. The same offi
cers were •elected by acclamation for
the coming year. Hymn 303 and-
prayer !by Mrs. F. Gunning closed
the meeting.- Tea was seryed and ft
pleasant social time spent -by all.
Complete with Tithes
Santa Claus says
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