"One of the Jap tramps is leaving here tomorrow, and there will be a couple of destroyers on the trail, to see what they unload, and where. I've got hold of a new airplane—a queer little machine called the Camel-back, that I'm taking along on board. A jewel for mountain work—you could land it on a handkerchief. I needed a partner, and the Doc told me about you. Want to go along?"
"You bet I do! I've been longing for something to turn up."
"Well, be at the landing field at nine tomorrow—this morning, rather, ready for anything. This may be interesting before we're through. Buenas Noches."
A Raid and a Mystery
The old fellow left me, and I walked on toward my apartment, thinking over what I had heard. Dr. Vernon's invention a success at last! I remembered very clearly my days with the nervous, stammering little scientist, always sure that tomorrow would bring the great secret. And I thought of Ellen—indeed, I had often done so in the two years since I had heard from her. I wondered why she and her father had left Austin so suddenly, and why their destination had been kept a secret from all their friends.
As for the matter of the red planes, I could suppose nothing but that the outs in Mexican politics were preparing a little military surprise for the ins. There have been too many military forces raised secretly in Mexico for one of them to be much of a novelty. Then I thought of the queer radio messages. They did not fit in very well. But my mind returned to Ellen again. I thought no more of the red machines. I had no thought—no one on earth had warning—of the terrible force that was rising to menace the world.
In the morning, when I came down to the lobby, I found a curious clamor going. There was a hum of conversation, and people were passing around red-paper "extras". It was five minutes before I could get one to read the screaming headlines:
RED PLANES RAID FACTORY
THREE HUNDRED DEAD
MILLION DOLLAR STOCK OF
THORIUM TAKEN
The account went on to describe the raid, at four o'clock that morning, of a fleet of red airplanes upon the Rogers Gas Mantle Factory, at St. Louis. It was stated that three hundred people had been killed, and that the entire stock of thorium nitrate on hand, worth over a million dollars, had been carried off.