THE SIERRA MADRE CHAIN
Another thing Perk noticed—this was the fact that Jack seemed to have
changed his mind with regard to making haste for the ship was racing
along at top-notch speed, as though engaged in a race with some unseen
rival.
“Hey! what’s the big idea, Jack?” he called out, when this thing had
been going on for some time, and his burning curiosity could no longer
be held in leash. “Why doin’ the sprintin’ act, I’m awonderin’?”
“Less chance for us to run foul of that other boat if we forge well
ahead, don’t you see, partner?” exclaimed the pilot, sententiously.
“Yeah! that’s a fact,” returned the enlightened Perk. “An’ then mebbe
it’d be jest as well for us to get there ahead o’ the boss in the
bargain.”
“I’m aiming to do that,” he was told. “It happens that we can’t keep on
in the boat till we strike close to his hideout—the racket would stir
the whole bunch up like a hornet’s nest you’ve kicked when going through
the brush, with the mad critters swarming out to tackle you.”
“I get you now, Big Boss—never did think o’ that before. Then I kinder
guess we’ll have to hike some little way,” and there was a vein of
chagrin in the speaker’s voice as he mentioned this fact, since walking
and Perk never did seem to agree very well—like most flyers he had been
spoiled for all manner of pedestrianism by his ability to cover such
vast distances without moving his pedal extremities an iota.
“That’s our sure enough program,” Jack told him, doubtless thinking that
the delayed knowledge might allow his pal to make up his mind about
swallowing the bitter medicine without a single grimace.
It was not long after this little break when Jack again spoke:
“I’ve a good idea we’re across the line now, partner,” was the
information he passed along.
“Sounds good to me, okay,” commented Perk, with a tinge of solid
satisfaction visible in his voice as though having a possible
rough-house job to handle, the sooner he got busy the sooner it was
likely to be over.
“And making more than an even hundred miles to the hour in the bargain,
Perk.”
“Some punkins about comin’ in swell on the last lap, this crate sure is,
I’d say, partner. Licketty split she humps along like a reg’lar witch. I
guess now she’d make rings around that ol’ boat Slim’s got hold o’
though it answers his purpose seems like. But see here, Jack, you never
did tell me jest how you got word to that same Colonel Morales down here
in Mexico.”
“I was given my instructions, and sent a telegram to him at Hermosilla,
in care of Padre Lopez, giving him the order he was expecting—during
the last hour we were in Los Angeles.”
“Glory be! then the sojers must be in the saddle right now!” burst out
Perk, with enthusiasm.
“If the arrangement went through without a miss that’s like enough a
fact,” admitted Jack; “the way my plan’s arranged everything must go off
with the regularity of machine work, each separate part dovetailing, so
as to work in full sympathy. If anything lags, and goes amiss, it’s apt
to throw the whole scheme out of gear, you understand.”
“Yeah! I grab what you mean, partner,” said the astounded Perk; “but I
got to hand it to you when it comes to hatchin’ up big things—it’s jest
wonderful how you manage. An’ I sure do hope everything’ll slide along
like greased lightnin’, once it gets started.”
Jack had planned to drop down in some isolated spot where with the
coming of dawn, with the aid of the strong glasses they could pick up
the rocky Sierra Madre range with its canyons and valleys, where, unless
all his leads have been false clues, those whom they sought would have
their secret den and stronghold.
Perk got to thinking these matters over, and of course he was bound to
run across some things that still seemed a bit hazy in his mind.
Accordingly he sought for information at headquarters.
“Say, now, d’ye know I’m jest beginnin’ to get on to why you had the
wings an’ fuselage o’ this here ship painted the color o’ sand—took a
pattern from the way they striped the steamers on the Atlantic durin’
the big war, an’ colored batteries on the battle front, so flyers
couldn’t pick ’em out to drop their bombs down on—camouflage, ain’t
that the right word, Jack?”
“Slow to get on to my little schemes, partner; but in the end you make a
smart stab—yes, that was what I had in mind, for I knew we’d have to
park the old bus somewhere in the open; and I didn’t want any hostile
eye to glimpse her from a soaring plane, or a mountain crag—for you see
I reckoned Slim was too smart a lad not to have binoculars handy so as
to watch for trouble.”
More than ever was Perk impressed with an overwhelming admiration for
the ability of his pal to lay plans capable of covering every possible
necessity that could arise in carrying out the job they had tackled.
He asked no more questions, confident that everything was bound to move
along smoothly, when the casting of the play was in such capable hands.
“Anyway,” he told himself as he thus pondered, “we ain’t seen anything
more o’ that moon ship, which makes it certain we’ve knocked her outen
the runnin’. Wonder now if that was really an’ truly ol’ Slim, totin’ a
swell bunch o’ machine guns, so’s to bolster up the new revolution they
say is bein’ fostered an’ nursed in this corner o’ poor ol’ Mexico.
Queer what international jingles a feller c’n get mixed up in, when he
runs in harness with Uncle Sam’s revenue boys; but it’s all pie to me,
just the same, ’cause they allers did say my middle name was Scrap.”
He was now starting to make use of the binoculars, which were fitted
with lens capable of making them useful during the night-time, at least
when there was a certain amount of moonlight. In a general way Perk
could decide where to turn his attention, for it went without saying
that the mountain chain lay toward the southeast for had he not studied
the lay of the land upon the small but accurate map with which Jack had
armed himself before leaving Washington to take up this hazardous
adventure?
When he felt assured that he could make out the distant ridges he
announced his pleasing discovery to his mate and then at the other’s
request took over the controls so that Jack in turn might use the
glasses and thus make assurance doubly safe.
“Bank, and head more into the east,” Perk heard the other saying, after
a steady look.
“Then it’s the Sierra Madre okay, partner, I opine?” suggested the one
at the stick, as he obeyed orders.
“No question about it,” Jack assured him “but I knew it was time for us
to sight the ridge. I’ve pored over the map of this section, and charted
it all out in blocks, so I can tell just what the lay of the land is,
and how long it’s apt to take the colonel to get here with his galloping
company. We’re going to drop down presently, and find shelter where we
can lie low until the hour comes for making our ten strike.”
“How long might that be, boss?” asked Perk.
“It all depends on certain happenings. We can creep up close to the
place, and watch how things move figuring out how to act when you get
your first glimpse of a dust cloud away off toward where Hermosilla
lies. I give the cavalry two days to reach here, if everything moves
along smoothly.”
“Two long days—an’ say, we gotter eat all that time, don’t we,
partner?”
“We surely can’t live on air, Perk; but I’ve provided for that—even
should we run out of grub you laid in I’ve a little deposit of dried
meat, real pemmican in fact, that will keep us from famishing. Water we
can secure somewhere among the mountain trails, since never a drop would
we be apt to find on the open desert.”
“Huh! I’m leavin’ it all to you, Big Boss,” Perk told him, again lost in
wonder and near awe as he realized how Jack seemed to have thought of
everything—what a mind the boy had for grasping details, and weaving
them into the net with which they expected to enmesh the slippery one.
Now Jack slowed down their speed more or less, although of course it was
not possible to soften the clamor accompanying their flight through
space. But Perk noticed that, so far as he could tell, the night wind
was coming from ahead, and this assured him it would not be apt to carry
those telltale sounds toward the range lying in the east, and so warn
the enemy of their coming.