CHAPTER XVI
IN DOUBT
Hiram Dobbs sank down on the sand beside the wreck of the Ariel and tears came into his eyes. In a flash the truth dawned upon him. Vandal hands had destroyed the flying marvel upon which such hopes had been built. Dave had been tracked to the present spot and captured; perhaps hurt.
Bruce Beresford stood regarding his new friend, sharing his deep emotion. He rammed his hands into his pockets and clenched them, pacing about the spot to give Hiram time to regain his composure. Finally he walked up to him and touched him on the shoulder.
“Don’t take on so, Hiram,” he pleaded, “please don’t. It may not be the Ariel, you know——”
“Not the Ariel,” cried Hiram, springing to his feet, his tears becoming angry tears now. “Think I wouldn’t know the Ariel if I came across one spar, or rod of it in the desert of Sahara? The Ariel? Look there!”
The speaker pointed to a place in the blackened twisted mass near the pilot post. A silver plate there bore in script the name of the machine, date and maker. Blackened and abrased as it was Bruce was able to make out the inscription.
“It’s too bad,” he said sorrowfully. “Do you suppose something exploded and set it on fire?”
“No!” shouted Hiram wrathfully, now poking in among the debris. “I can smell kerosene. And there’s the cinders of a bunch of cotton waste. The Ariel was set on fire! And—Dave!”
The thought of his missing friend roused the young pilot of the Scout as no other idea could have done. Bruce was glad to see Hiram come back to his old rushing, go-ahead self. Hiram went back to the coat they had at first discovered. He inspected it more closely this time.
“See, it’s torn as if in a struggle, and the pockets are turned inside out,” he said. “Oh, if we had only received the warning from Mr. Borden sooner! Dave is gone. The same persons who expected him here, and watched for him, have taken him away.”
“But surely they would not dare to injure him,” argued Bruce.
“Perhaps not, but don’t you see that they have spoiled his whole future? They have put his biplane out of the way—they will keep Dave out of the way till the International meet is over.”
“The crowd you told me about—the Syndicate people?” asked Bruce.
“Who else? What will Mr. Brackett say when he hears of this? How am I going to find out where they have taken Dave? Oh!” cried the excited lad, “I’m just half crazy over these doings! Wait here and watch the Scout. They’ll be after that next,” and Hiram sped away, after a sweeping glance in every direction.
He had made out a man with a rake covering the ruts in the straggly winding road that ran across the waste space. He came up with him and asked:
“Have you been here long?”
“All day, here and hereabouts,” was the reply, as the worker rested on his rake and seemed glad to break the monotony of his task in that lonely spot by talking to some one.
“Did you notice an airship within the last hour or so?”
“I did,” answered the old man. “It was over to the north yonder. It did some fancy whirls. I watched it a bit, then I went on with my work. They’re getting common, those flyers.”
“Have you seen anybody over near that clump of poplars?” and Hiram indicated the spot where he had left Bruce and the Scout.
“Why, yes, I did,” answered the road-mender. “Thought it was sort of queer, too. It must have been nigh onto two hours since, when three men, driving a covered wagon, drove off from the road here. They cut across in the direction you say. I wondered why, for the loose sand don’t make easy going for a horse. The hummocks shut them out after a bit, and I thought no more of them until I noticed a lot of smoke near that patch of poplars. I then made up my mind they were campers, come down on a sand-crane hunt.”
“Did you see them after that?” inquired Hiram eagerly.
“I did. Next thing I knew, the horse and wagon cut across back this way. They struck the road here, and went south, the same direction they had come from.”
“Did you notice the men on the seat of the wagon?”
“They weren’t near enough for that, and I’m sort of poor sighted as I get older,” was the reply.
Hiram thanked the man, and hurried back to Bruce.
“I hope you have found out something,” said the latter anxiously.
“Not much that is any good, I fear,” replied Hiram. “We’ll get back into the Scout. It’s just as I guessed it, Bruce. I am satisfied that a covered wagon with three men in it took Dave away and that they went south.”
The country lay under them like a map as they resumed the flight. Hiram followed the road as a guide. At the end of ten miles it ran into a junction of other diverging highways. So far they had not caught sight of any vehicle answering the description of the covered wagon.
They followed the main highway for some distance. Ahead they made out a large town. It was one of half a score dotting the landscape, and the location of large iron plants. As they neared it, and passed roads filled with all kinds of vehicles, and the great industrial beehive spread out for miles, Hiram gave up in despair.
“They’ve got a start of us, and have probably run to cover by this time,” he said. “Oh, Bruce! I don’t know what to do!”
Hiram was in deep distress. He realized that he, only a boy, had on his hands a task that might well baffle the shrewdest detective. A dozen impulses and plans came to his mind, but he rejected them all, fearing to cause complications.
“Indeed, I don’t know what to do,” he said to Bruce. “If I go to the management back at the grounds, they may cancel our entrant, and then Dave may show up. They will want some evidence besides my say so, and my suspicions, before they will be willing to accuse anybody of having a hand in the affair. If I charge that Syndicate mob boldly with having a hand in the burning of the Ariel, it will put them more than ever on their guard, and they will hide Dave closer than ever. Oh, but I must do some tall thinking! Of course the very next thing is to get in touch with Mr. Brackett. We’ll get back to the grounds right away.”
An unexpected shower came up, and pilot, passenger and machine received quite a drenching. The rain had stopped by the time they reached the grounds. It made Bruce Beresford sad to watch the face of his friend. Hiram was like a rudderless boat, without Dave. The responsibilities suddenly thrust upon him seemed to stagger him. He was so harried, worried and flurried that he walked up and down before the hangar, so nervous and stirred up he could not keep still.
“It seems to me, Hiram,” suggested Bruce, “that the best thing to do is to tell the management about the whole business. Surely they will do something to help you.”
“I’m trying to think if it’s best to do that,” responded Hiram. “I’m trying to block out a way to act so I won’t make any mistake. You don’t know this game as well as I do. It isn’t the first time this kind of a thing has happened to us. Let me alone for a bit, Bruce, till I get everything straightened out in my mind.”
“Don’t you bother about the Scout, Hiram. I’ll clean up and get it into the hangar,” said Bruce.
He rubbed the metal parts dry and shining and swept up the litter in the cockpit. A good deal of sand had gotten into this. He was pulling out the seat cushions, when something caught his finger, pricking it sharply. It was a metal point of some kind, and looking closer Bruce made out that it was a stick pin.
He picked this up, and as he did so noticed a second pin lying on the seat frame, hitherto concealed by the cushion. A quick flash of intelligence came into his mind. Quite roused up, Bruce shouted to his friend:
“Hiram, come here, I think I’ve made an important discovery!”