THE EMERALDS ARE FOUND
Larry sent his craft into a sharp dive. Tommy, trying to prevent the
maneuver, came straight toward the spot they had occupied, but missed.
Now the clouds hid them. By use of his instruments he could keep on a
level keel, Larry knew, and with the engine throttled off, they could
not be traced by its roar.
Presently they sailed out into a clear area and Larry sighed thankfully.
He watched for a landing field beside a lake shaped like a half-moon.
That would tell him he could set down on the landing spot the
millionaire had built before going West.
Then he saw it. They began to drop swiftly, coming ever closer to the
field. And then they set down, safe and unmolested.
Before the chums were clear of the runway, Tommy set down his ship,
tumbled out and let the woman with him--the yacht stewardess--get out as
best she could. "What do you mean, double-crossing me?" screamed Tommy
at detective Whiteside. "Why have you tried to get the emeralds after
you promised me half of them?"
"The man has gone crazy," said Whiteside.
"They are all in it together, Mr. Everdail," Tommy shouted, turning
toward the millionaire.
"What are you doing with that stewardess?" demanded Larry. "She joined
you on the lawn when you came from behind the trees."
"Be still," cried Everdail. "We can thresh it out later. Right now let's
get those emeralds."
Larry produced a knife, and Mr. Everdail slashed the life preserver to
ribbons.
There was a gasp. The life preserver was empty.
Then everyone began to talk at once, as accusations flew back and forth.
"Boss, I want you to take a look at this-here stuff I brought from your
house," said Jeff, drawing a parcel from his pocket.
"Good night!" Sandy was amazed. "Jeff, that's the family history of the
Everdails, that I saw when I visited the farm boys and found out you and
Mimi were married."
"That-there is it," agreed Jeff, taking several tintypes from an
envelope. "Boss, read that history of your family and see if it makes it
plain why anybody wanted to destroy your gems."
In the light of a flare, Mr. Everdail perused the pages.
"As I live and breathe!" he exclaimed.
"Yeah," grinned Jeff. "Thanks to Sandy for leaving the book there, and
thanks to--a certain relative of yours for leaving a marker at the right
place. Now, take a look at these pictures out of your family album. They
are pictures of the man who originally got the emeralds in India, and
his son. Whose face that you know is close to being the same?"
With the scream of a madman, Mr. Whiteside leaped to the side of the
group.
"Yes!" he babbled. "Yes! I am the son of the branch of your family that
originally had the emeralds. My grandfather, for spite against my
father, willed them to your family. Those emeralds ought to be mine--and
my sister's"--here he gestured toward the stewardess.
"Yes!" cried Whiteside Everdail--as they now learned his name was--"I
grew up hating Atley Everdail's family. I enlisted in the flying corps,
got into his esquadrille, made a buddy of him, won his trust!
"I worked into his confidence, and watched every chance to get the
emeralds. My time came when his wife went to London. I had my
sister--stewardess, she was--already on the yacht.
"I beat the yacht to London. With her help--forced by threats--I got
into the hotel and destroyed the gems--I thought. But on the way back to
my room I saw Captain Parks, and began to suspect. I compelled my sister
to admit the truth. The real gems were safe.
"I came to America, made the hinged door to the hangar, rewired the
switches to get light by day to prepare the amphibian.
"I hired Tommy Larsen--he didn't know the truth at first. Then I saw
Jeff was getting suspicious, changed my plans and got a seaplane. I even
went with Atley to see my own plan carried out," he screeched.
"But everything went wrong. The life preserver hid the gems. I knew
that, and made my sister run off with the wrong preserver, that I took
from Jeff's airplane. I thought the right preserver was in the seaplane,
but Tommy was 'wise,' and refused to do any more than watch me, and when
my sister came to get the emeralds, he tried to prevent me from getting
away with it. You can piece out the rest. You'll never punish me! You'll
never--take me alive!"
Eluding them, he dashed straight down to where Jeff's amphibian, its
prop still turning, stood fifty feet from the end of the runway.
Tumbling into the cockpit, he threw the throttle wide. Down the few feet
the amphibian roared, gathering speed.
The rend and crash, the tear of metal, wood and fabric as the craft
dashed against a tree, was followed by a shrill scream from the
stewardess.
In one thing the fanatic prophesied truly. They did not take him alive.
But still they did not know where the emeralds were!
Next morning the Sky Patrol, the millionaire and others took the train
from camp to the harbor.
But although Mimi showed which she thought was the right belt--although
they ripped apart every life preserver on the yacht--no jewels appeared.
"I've thought of every possible hiding place," Sandy told his chums,
"and the only thing I can see to do is--if they were in a life preserver
at all--what do you say to trying this--"
He outlined a plan. So promising did it seem that both Dick and Larry
agreed to it.
That night an alarm of fire, red glow, yellow and red flames, and
suffocating smoke, terrified everyone.
Tracing the smoke to the galley, Mr. Everdail was astounded to find Dick
and Larry struggling with a man in pajamas--he had rushed in, had
seen--too late--the red flares, colored fire powder and smoke pots that
burned in buckets, and had been unable to disguise the fact that he had
dragged two ice trays from the refrigerator. They contained--green ice!
"As I live and breathe!" cried Mr. Everdail, inspecting a tray.
Quickly overpowered, their captive confessed. The chef had taken the
emeralds from the life preserver and frozen them in ice cubes of a deep
emerald-green dye. These he easily preserved during the short times the
trays were needed for other cubes, by putting them into one of the deep
vegetable trays used in the refrigerating system.
That was how the chums were misled the night of Sandy's birthday party.
The trays had been emptied when they looked, and because the trays had
just been used for tinted ice and were logically empty, they were
fooled.
"But I was a coward--my conscience bothered me," the chef admitted. "I
wanted to return 'em, I wanted to take 'em. So, now--I'm glad I only
kept them for you!"
"Well, Sky Patrol," said Jeff as the boys pocketed their reward checks,
"the sole of that-there right foot of mine itches. That means I'm to go
into a new business and prosper--with the help of my Sky Patrol and
Ground Crew. How about it?"
"Drop a signal flare," urged Sandy. "We'll come a-flying!"
And that was settled!
Transcriber's Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original--this e-text is public
domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and
dialect unchanged.
--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the
HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)
End of Project Gutenberg's The Haunted Hangar, by Ardon Van Buren Powell