“You know what a carrier pigeon is, of course, Perk—well, one of the two agents who were sent out on this case several months ago conceived the bright idea of carrying a bird with him. Just as he feared might be the case they were eventually discovered, and brought to bay in a rocky canyon—the men wolves had them bottled up, so they must either surrender and take the consequences, or perish of hunger and thirst. He wrote this message in code on this thin tissue paper, fastened it under the wing of his bird, and tossed the pigeon up in the air. It may have been fired at, but since it showed up at its home cote in Angeles it escaped being killed, or even crippled.”
“Great work that, partner,” snapped the intensely interested Perk; “I shore takes off my hat to the lad who could think up sech a neat dodge. An’ right there clost to the tigers’ den he could set daown an’ write a ’portant message in code, so’s to send off his little birdie. That’s a new trick on me, I own up—a stunt worth while.”
Jack went on to interpret the contents of the little missive that had been carried all the way from the heart of the mountains. Perk listened as if bent on letting each and every word sink deeply into his receptive mind for future use.
“Them ere directions for locatin’ the place where they foregather, is shore valuable stuff fur aour crowd, Jack, ole hoss,” he finally remarked, after his chum had read the writing on the thin paper twice, putting due emphasis on certain words that had an apparently significant meaning.
“Particularly Perk, that part describing a splendid landing-field some miles distant, where we could drop down safely, and without getting close enough to the haunt for sharp ears to catch the noise of a ship’s exhaust.”
“Wust thing ’bout human bloodhounds huntin’ their prey in a bus—never will seem right to me ’til they fix things so’s we kin creep up on aour prey without tellin’ the hull world a airplane is somewhere ’round. Think that happy day ever will come, Jack?”
“Sure it will, Perk, and we’ll see it to—if it so happens we haven’t already crashed, and gone west. Why not, when such wonderful advances are being made in aviation circles every moon. Right now we’re doing a lot of amazing stunts with our ships that were never dreamed of five years ago. Anything is possible, now they’ve got started taking to the air.”
“Huh! it was time all right,” grunted Perk; “when yeou see haow all the highways air gettin’ glutted with autos, ’specially clost to big cities. Even San Diego folks find it hard to git ’round on Sundays an’ holidays. But this fresh happenin’ sorter gives me a hunch we’re agoin’ to make the ripple, an’ fetch home the bacon after all—things they air all workin’ thataways.”
“I had the last word from the weather man,” Jack went on to add; “and I’m sorry to say it wasn’t quite as fine as I’d like.”
“Storm agoin’ to hold us up, mebbe naow, partner?” suggested Perk, with one of his impatient frowns, as he disliked very much being balked in any plan.