“Looks like one of their fiendishly clever jobs,” admitted the colonel, “and it’s just about time for them to start something.”
Half an hour later they were at the Vinton airport, warming up the motor of the Good News. The sun was just turning the eastern sky into a warm, rosy dawn when Tim gave the motor a heavy throttle and sent the Good News winging off the field.
He swung the plane over Vinton, picked up the twin tracks of the Southwestern and headed back toward Atkinson. His hands, sore and bruised from handling the heavy scoop, ached as he held the controls of the plane. Unconsciously he compared the massive, brute power of the locomotive with the graceful, birdlike machine he was flying. Riding the cab of the mail had been an experience he would never forget but he was happy to be back in the clouds on the trail of what promised to be another sensational story.
The rails twisted and turned through the foothills and Tim marveled as he thought of the speed they had made with the mail, wondered how they had ever stayed on the steel at the dizzying pace with which they had split the night.
The hills broadened out, wider valleys appeared and it was in one of these that they found the smouldering patch of timber which had been an inferno of flame and smoke only a few hours before.
Railroad section men had already gathered at the scene and Tim could see other gasoline handcars speeding down the rails. Ties would have to be replaced, new ballast put in and the rails tested to make sure that the heat had not warped them. Traffic on the system must not be held up a minute longer than necessary and the railroad men were rallying to the emergency.
Tim found a small meadow which was large enough for a landing. He fish-tailed the Good News into the field and set the plane down lightly. They lashed it with spare ropes which Tim carried in his own cockpit and then started for the railroad, a quarter of a mile away.
Blackened stumps of trees reared their heads into the gay sunlight of the spring morning, grim reminders of the near tragedy. Perhaps they were the only headstones Harry Benson would ever have, thought Tim, as he wondered if they would find any trace of the fireman.
A husky section boss told them to get out and stay out but Colonel Searle displayed his badge, which gave them access to anything they wanted to see.
The entire timber lot was not more than four or five acres in extent. It had been covered with a heavy growth of underbrush and with the drought of the year before it had been tender for any careless or intentional match.