And beneath this was a name: “D’Arcy Arden.”
“D’Arcy,” he murmured. “What a strange name! Would it be a boy or a girl?”
For a long time he sat staring at that square of white, trying at the same time to patch together the rumors that had come to him regarding this mystery ship of the air.
“No use,” he told himself. “Can’t make head nor tail of it.”
The truth was that until that hour no aviator of this northern country had laid eyes on this gray phantom. They had one and all agreed that it did not exist, that it was the creation of an over-wrought imagination; that some mineral-hunting plane on a special mission had passed over here and there and had created the illusion.
“But now,” he assured himself, “I have seen it. I will vouch for it. And here,” he held the square of white up to the light, “here is the proof!
“But why is that plane here? Where is it going? Why is that person a captive? What type of outlaw rides in that cockpit? All that is the riddle of this storm, a riddle I am bound to aid in solving. But now—”
His ears caught the beat of snow on the cabin window. “Now there is nothing left but to eat, sleep a bit, and wait out the storm.
“Get a bite to eat,” he told himself. “Something hot. Fellow has to keep himself fit on a job like this, when you—”
He did not finish. A sudden thought breaking in upon him had startled him. He had believed himself safe from the peril that had threatened. But was he? What if the plane turned about and came back?