“Absolutely, son.” Jerry’s grin was good to see.
Three hours later Curlie found himself following the lead of that mysterious ship. Grave doubts had by this time entered his mind.
“How is this to end?” He asked this question many times. Many times, too, he told himself it was his duty to turn back, that a cargo of freight for the north awaited him, that each mile on this mad adventure was counting against him as a pilot with a blameless record; yet something still urged him on.
A hundred, two, three, four hundred miles they flew.
Then like a flash it came to him that he was being led away into a land where no man was.
“They hope I will run out of gas and be obliged to land where there is no fuel supply. And then?”
He shuddered at thought of that which might follow. Save for his bow and arrow, neither he nor Jerry was armed. “And if they did not attack us, we would be in a fair way to starve before we could beat our way back across this rocky wilderness.”
* * * * * * * *
At this same moment Johnny Thompson was enjoying adventures all his own.
With his dog team on his second journey in search of pitchblende he had traveled fifty miles, and the day was still young. That was because he had started at two o’clock in the morning. In this north country where at one time of the year there is no night at all and in another there is no day, men forget the conventions of life. Instead of three meals a day, they may eat five, or two, or only one. If a journey is to be made, they start when they are ready. Johnny had been ready at two in the morning.