“No, no, no,” replied Catozzi, who despite the fact that a crimson stain was beginning to show on his upper arm angrily added:
“I am not hurt; don’t bother me.”
He set off down the street, taking the direction followed by the detective the night before. He walked fast until he reached the beginning of the path which led to the home of the ancient weather prophet. There he turned off and his pace became almost a run. He needed no one to tell him the desperate need of haste.
He had gone only half way when he left the main path and followed a faintly marked trail,—so dimly indicated indeed that any person not keen sighted or looking for something of the kind would have missed it altogether.
Meanwhile Harvey Hamilton was attending strictly to business. Directly south of the tumble-down home of Uncle Tommy Waters, and less than an eighth of a mile away, stood a smaller and more dilapidated cabin, with no signs of cultivation about it. It seemed wedged among a mass of rocks and stones, which formed a part of the structure. One side was wholly composed of rocks. Surveying the miserable shanty, one would have concluded that it had never been used as a permanent dwelling, but might have been flung into shape by a party of hunters who, visiting that section, had aimed to provide against sudden storm and preferred to sleep there rather than at any house or in the town.
When the aeroplane was skimming over this unattractive spot, Harvey turned his head and, meeting the glance of the detective, nodded. The gesture said: “That’s the place,” and the answering nod indicated that the man understood.
What it was that had told the young aviator the startling truth was more than his companion could guess, for, search as he might, he could not detect the first sign of life below them. There was the gray pile of boards and rails, which looked as if they had been tossed among the boulders by a cyclone, but nothing else met the eye. All the same, the youth had not been mistaken.
Had not the interest of the two been centered upon what was beneath them, they would have made an interesting discovery. Less than a mile distant, a monoplane, as close to the earth as their own, was bearing down upon them. One glance would have made known to our friends that it was the well remembered Dragon of the Skies. There could be no doubt that its owner, Professor Milo Morgan, was on his way to take part in the game. But that interesting fact was not learned until a brief while later.
Having shown his companion the cabin he had sought so long, Harvey Hamilton shot beyond it, and circled about until over the clearing in front of Uncle Tommy Waters’ home, when he began descending by means of the spiral, that picturesque and graceful manœuver, always attended with peril, as was shown on the last day of the year 1910, when the daring aviator Arch Hoxsey was killed at Los Angeles and John B. Moisant met his death at New Orleans.
It will be remembered that the biplane was at an elevation of not more than five hundred feet when he began to volplane. The forenoon was clear, and radiant with sunshine. There was no breeze except that which was caused by the motion of the aeroplane. Harvey had excellent control, and was confident of coming down at the spot selected, when, without the slightest warning, he was caught in the fierce grip of an eddy, whirlpool or pocket, or whatever it might be called, and tossed about as if he were a feather. The ailerons fluttered and the machine lurched like a mortally wounded bird, frantically trying to hold its place in the air. Recalling the instructions of Professor Sperbeck, Harvey did not run away from the startling flurry, but plunged straight into it. It was another illustration of the peril to which all aviators are exposed, of being caught at any unexpected moment by the currents that must always be invisible.