A STRANGE AIRPLANE APPEARS
From the Hampton radio station to the hangar on the Temple estate where Frank and Bob kept their plane was a short jaunt, and the ground soon was covered. Then Bob unlocked the big double doors and rolled them back, and the three trundled the plane out to the skidway where Jack spun the propeller while Bob manipulated the controls. As the machine got under way, Jack ran alongside and was helped in by Frank.
Out over the sandy landing field trundled the plane rising so quickly that Bob nodded with satisfaction. The loving work he had put in on the machine had not been wasted. It was in fine flying condition.
They were not far from the coast and in a very short time were flying over the water, whereupon Bob made a sweep to the right and the plane headed westward. The Atlantic rocked gently below, serene under a smiling sun and with only the merest whisper of a breeze caressing it. On the southern horizon 13 a plume or two of smoke, only faintly discernible, marked where great liners were standing in for the distant metropolis. To the north, far away, showed a sail or two, of fishing craft or coastwise schooner.
An exclamation escaped Frank and he leaned sidewise, gripping Jack by the arm and pointing with his free hand. But Jack had a radio receiver clamped on his head and was frowning. He glanced only hastily in the direction indicated by Frank, then shut his eyes as if in an effort at concentration.
Frank continued to gaze, then bent down and unlashed a pair of binoculars from a pocket in the pit and, putting the glasses to his eyes, threw back his head and began scanning the sky. After staring long minutes, he hastily put aside the glasses, lifted the radio transmitter strapped to his chest and spoke in it to Bob:
“Bob, there’s a plane overhead. So high you can’t see it with the naked eye. But I spotted it before it rose too high, and followed it with the glasses. The fellow’s up where the sun plays tricks with your eyesight. And, Bob, I’ve got a hunch he’s watching us. There’s Starfish Cove below us now. Keep right on flying. Don’t turn inland.”
Bob nodded, and the plane continued its way westward offshore. Frank again took up the glasses and searched the sky, gradually increasing the focal 14 radius. An exclamation from Frank and a hurried request in the transmitter presently reached Bob’s ears:
“Shut her off, Bob, and let’s land on the water. Quick. I’ll explain in a minute.”
Obediently, big Bob shut off the engine, and the plane coasted on a long slant to a safe landing some hundreds of yards out from the sandy, deserted shore.
Bob and Jack snatched the headpieces off, and turned inquiringly to their chum.
“Here,” cried Frank, pressing the glasses into Bob’s hands. “Take a look. That plane is landing way back there, and I believe it is at Starfish Cove.”
Bob was too late to see if the situation was as Frank described, however. Putting up the glasses, he turned to his chum.
“Tell us about it,” he said.
“Yes,” said Jack. “I heard what you told Bob, but not having the glasses I couldn’t see. At first, when you punched me, besides, I was thinking over that business of the strange interference with our radio and wondering what it could be. So I didn’t get to see. I suppose you were trying to point out this other plane to me then?”
Frank nodded.
“Yes,” he said, “it was just a tiny speck at that 15 time, but I could see it with the naked eye. However, it disappeared immediately afterwards.”
“Well, what made you believe the other plane was watching us?” inquired Bob.
Frank laughed in half-embarrassed fashion.
“Oh, one of my hunches,” he said.
His two chums grinned understandingly at each other. It was a recognized fact among them that Frank was super-sensitive and frequently, as a result, received sharp impressions concerning people and events which were unsupported by evidence at the time, but which later proved to be correct. Frank was the slightest of the trio, of only medium height but wiry build, while Bob and Jack both were six feet tall and Bob, besides, had a broad and powerful frame.
“Seeing spooks again?” chaffed Bob.
Immediately, they became more serious as Frank, ignoring the banter, leaned forward and made his proposal:
“That plane landed, and I believe it landed at Starfish Cove. Let’s fly back and take a look. See what’s it like, at any rate.”
“Good idea,” approved Jack.
Bob had been taxying about slowly since landing, in order to keep the engine going and the propeller slowly revolving. Now he picked up speed, straightened 16 out, shifted the lifting plane, and the machine shot forward, skirled over the water and presently took the air.
For some minutes they flew in silence, at no great height, and a little distance out from the coast. Bob’s attention was devoted to the plane, but Frank and Jack scanned the shore with eager eyes. Presently they saw what they were looking for. A strange plane rode in the lazy swell offshore in Starfish Cove. There was nobody aboard. Not a soul was in sight on land. The little stretch of sandy beach, between the two horns of the cove, stretched untenanted back to the thick fringe of trees.
Bob swooped so low the plane almost skimmed the water, and all three obtained a good view of the stranger, before once more Bob soared aloft and forged ahead. Looking back, Frank trained the glasses on the scene. But nobody appeared from among the trees, and, far as they could determine, they were unobserved.
They made a quick run to their own landing field, descended and put the plane away. Not until the doors were closed and locked did they sit down on the skidway outside the hangar to discuss what they had seen. There had been remarks made by all after they had seen the strange plane at close range and on the hasty trip home, but all had been 17 too busy with their own thoughts for extended discussion.
Discovery of the plane had altered their original plans to fly over the secret radio station. They had decided not to advertise their presence as, if Frank was correct in his surmise that the other plane had been watching them, their return would create suspicion and put the mysterious strangers on guard against them.
“They may be on a perfectly legitimate enterprise, whoever they are,” Jack said, as all three took seats on the skidway.
“And we may be fools for butting in where we have no business to be,” said Bob. “That your idea?”
“Yes.”
“But look here,” said Frank. “I have the feeling that there’s something about all this business that isn’t open and aboveboard. I, for one, vote that we do our best to find out what is going on.”
Jack sat silent for several moments.
“That isn’t what concerns me at the present moment, after all,” he said. “Whether these people with their strange plane and their secret radio are on legitimate business or not, doesn’t interest me so much. What puzzles me—and I reckon it puzzles the rest of you, too—is the design of that plane.” 18
The others nodded vigorously.
“What a tiny thing,” was Frank’s comment.
“I was busy and couldn’t see much,” supplemented Bob. “But what impressed me was her short hood. Why, she looked as if she had no engine at all.”
“That’s right,” agreed Frank. “I never saw a plane like it. And I can’t recall any designs of that nature, either. It must be a foreign-built plane, one of those little one-man things the Germans and French have been building.”
Jack shook his head, puzzled.
“There’s something strange about it,” he said, “a little thing like that, with practically no engine space. Another thing that you fellows want to remember, too, is that probably it has been flying about here for some time, yet we have never heard it. Now, down here the sound of most planes would travel far, in this quiet and secluded place, where there are no competing noises.”
“Why do you say it has been flying about here for some time?” asked Bob.
“Well, the familiarity with which the aviator landed shows he’s been at Starfish Cove before. Evidently, after landing he struck inland to that secret radio station, because we saw no sign of him.”
“We haven’t been up in the air for three weeks,” said Frank. “That plane might easily have come 19 and gone in that time without our seeing it. But, surely, as Jack says, we would have heard it at some time or other. Haven’t either of you heard the sound of a plane lately?” he appealed to the others. “I know I haven’t.”
Bob and Jack both shook their heads in negation.
“No planes ever come out this way,” Bob said. “They fly south or north of us, but not out here. I haven’t heard anything.”
Jack rose and stretched.
“Well, I, for one, vote that we do not pursue our investigations into this mystery by going back and, perhaps, getting peppered with gunshot.”
“But, Jack,” protested Bob, the impetuous, “we want to know what’s going on. You can’t have a mystery dumped right in your own dooryard without digging into it.”
Frank was thoughtful.
“That’s true, Bob, old thing,” he said. “Just the same, I agree with Jack. What do you say to laying the matter before Uncle George and Mr. Hampton at dinner? Jack and his father are coming over to our house to-night, you know.”
“Good,” said Jack. “We can put it up to them, and, perhaps, they will know something about the man who owns that land around Starfish Cove, where this secret radio is located.” 20
Big Bob grumbled. Delay irked his soul.
“All right, you old grumbler,” laughed Frank. “Come on, I’ll give you some action. We have several hours of good daylight left before dinnertime. I’ll take you on at tennis. Della and I will play you and Jack, and we won’t give you time to worry about anything.”
Della was Bob’s sister, two years younger than he. Frank, whose parents were dead and who lived with the Temples, referring to Mr. Temple, his guardian, as “Uncle George,” was very fond of her. The others joshed him about Della frequently. Bob took occasion to do so now, as the three walked away from the hangar toward the Temple home and tennis courts.
“Huh,” he said, “you’ll be looking at your partner so often you won’t be able to play. Why, you won’t even be good practice for Jack and me.”