Osceola stood up and gave Bill a questioning glance which said plainer
than words—“Further directions, please?”
Bill motioned toward the lower wing section on Osceola’s side of the
plane, mouthed the word “jump,” and patted the pull ring on his own
parachute harness.
Osceola scrambled out of the cockpit onto the wing. For a moment he
clung to an interplane strut and beckoned Sam to follow. Sam hurried
after him, although from the expression on the negro’s face, it was
evident that he was terrified. Bill saw him crawl across the wing to the
rear edge where Osceola stood. Then as the old man got to his feet,
still clinging frantically to the strut, the Seminole, facing forward,
gave a tug on his pull ring. The seat pack parachute bellied out behind
him and he disappeared from sight.
At the same instant, Bill felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, and the
blue-black muzzle of an automatic was pushed into his face.
Instinctively he leaned forward to dodge the gun. The wheel went with
him, and bucking like a frightened cow pony, the big plane shot into a
nose dive.
This maneuver sent Bill’s antagonist sprawling onto the wooden yoke to
which both wheels were attached, forcing it forward as far as it would
go. The gangster’s head smashed into the instrument board and he lay
inert. Himself thrown forward by the amphibian’s dive, Bill caught at
the seat to save his own head. The man’s unconscious body prevented any
manipulation of elevators or ailerons. The plane was beyond his control,
and racing earthward with wide open throttle at a hair-raising rate of
speed. He must save himself if he could: within a second or so the big
aircraft would be but a twisted mass of burning wood and metal flaming
in the swamp below. Luckily, the pilot’s cockpit had no roof. Bill
dragged himself on to the back of his seat, which, now due to the
plane’s almost vertical position, had become a small, horizontal
platform. With a hand on the pull ring of his parachute pack, he dived
head first over the cockpit’s cowl into the open ether.
The approved types of parachutes are the manually operated free type. A
“free” type parachute is one that is complete in one unit, strapped to
the person of an aviator by a suitable harness, and one that has no
attachments whatever to the aircraft. A “manually operated” parachute is
one that will unpack automatically when the wearer gives a slight pull
on the ring located in a readily accessible place on the harness. The
aviator can open his parachute just when clear of the disabled airplane
or he can make a long free drop away from burning wreckage or a pursuing
enemy plane before he pulls the ring.
And this is why Bill did not pull the ring on his manually operated,
free parachute before diving out of the amphibian. Should the body or
air bag of the chute come in contact with the plane, he would naturally
crash with it.
Bill was not a trained parachute jumper. That part of an aviator’s
training is usually confined to those who specialize in lighter-than-air
craft, and Bill was a heavier-than-air pilot. The sensation of diving
into the air, several thousand feet above the earth was anything but a
pleasant one. But his nerves were steady. He kept his head.
“One,” he said to himself, as he sprang outwards and down...
“Two—” He felt his body twisting in his fall. He knew he was catapulting
earthward at a falling speed of nearly 400 miles per hour.
“Three!” He jerked on the pull ring. Would the chute open? Would it be
capable of withstanding the shock incurred by the weight of his body
falling at this terrific rate of speed? (He knew that the average time
required for an air chute to open and assume normal descent is
approximately one and three-fifths seconds after the rip cord has been
pulled). But that mere second and a fraction seemed interminable. He was
falling ... falling...
There came a sudden jerk that wrenched every muscle in his tense body.
His projectile-like speed decreased with uncomfortable suddenness, and
he was swung round and upward to find himself sitting in what amounted
to a swing, with webbing representing the ropes on either side of his
aching body. Looking up, he saw that slightly above his head and within
reach, the webbing divided into two, and that the shrouds or small cords
leading to the outer edge of the parachute were here attached to the
harness he wore, in four places. He was swaying wildly. In an effort to
prevent that, he pulled the ropes, first on one side, then on the other.
All this had happened in an inconceivably short space of time. Three,
possibly four seconds had elapsed since Bill had sprung out of the
doomed amphibian. For the moment, his mind had been intent upon his own
particular troubles, but now that he swung safely in his harness, memory
came back. He turned his eyes earthward.
Almost directly below him, a column of black smoke smudged the clear
green of the swamp grass. At the very base of the dark cloud, red
tongues of flame shot skyward. Bill turned his gaze elsewhere. His
former passengers were undoubtedly as cold-blooded, black-hearted a band
of villains as had ever lived; still, they were, or had been human
beings. And Bill had no desire to watch their cremation and the
demolition of a splendid plane.
His eyes swept the horizon. Yes, over there perhaps a mile to westward
two parachutes, one far below the other, were floating down toward
earth. Even as he looked, the farther one disappeared behind tall trees
on an island.
“Confound it all! I clean forgot to tell those two innocents anything
about landing. Hope they don’t get into trouble—it’s my fault if they
do!”
He knew that the average rate of descent is sixteen feet per second, and
unless one knows how, a broken leg or worse may be the outcome of an
inexperienced landing. But their luck had held so far, apparently.
Osceola and Sam were both sinewy, well-muscled fellows—they would
probably come out all right. For all their sakes, he hoped so. A
disabled companion in the middle of the Everglades, with no means of
transport other than one’s two legs, would prove a problem that Bill did
not care to contemplate.
Then he saw Sam disappear with his parachute in the high sawgrass. He
was coming close to earth himself. In a very few minutes, he would land,
and his gaze switched to the terrain directly below.
Osceola had landed on the firm ground of a large island. Sam had not
been so lucky, for Bill knew that the Seminole name for the Everglades
is Grassy-Water, and that sawgrass does not grow on dry land. He himself
was floating over the island, but he soon saw that the wind-drift would
carry him, too, into the grass unless he could prevent it.
Up went his hands, and getting a good grip on the parachute shrouds, he
pulled down hard on the ropes to windward. The chute immediately bellied
in and sideslipped into the wind. He dared not overdo the business, and
presently righted the chute by the simple expedient of releasing the
shrouds. In a fall of one hundred feet, Bill figured he had sideslipped
ten. He had seen men spin their parachutes in order to swing aside from
some building or other obstacle. He knew that the trick is done by
pulling down on one side, then releasing the pressure with a sort of
flipping motion. He attempted it, without success; after a few failures
gave it up in favor of the easier sideslips.
He was almost down now, and delighted to see that due to his system of
sideslipping, the parachute would land him on the island.
Down he came, swaying slightly, onto a patch of soft green turf, dotted
with wildflowers. Knowing that the body should relax in landing, he made
no effort to stand erect, and endeavored to absorb the shock of his fall
to some extent by rolling over in the direction that he was drifting.
Consequently, his tumble did him no harm; the parachute rolled into a
large cypress at the edge of the open space and came to a stop. The jump
was over.
Bill got out of his harness, repacked it, and throwing the bundle over
his shoulder, set off to find his two companions. Over to the west, a
mile or more from the island, the burning amphibian sent its tower of
thick black smoke mushrooming skyward.
Bill walked for half a mile along the edge of the sawgrass, and then he
saw two familiar figures appear from out a clump of trees.
“Osceola! Sam!” he called, and ran forward to meet them.
His friends waved to him, but did not quicken their pace. The old negro
seemed to be leaning heavily on Osceola’s arm, and as he drew nearer,
Bill saw that their clothes were dripping wet.
The young Seminole grinned as he came up. “You look as fresh as a
daisy!” His tone was cheerful, though it held a hint of weariness. “I
certainly hated to leave you up yonder in the plane with that bunch of
cutthroats. Sam did too. We’ve been talking about it. Until I saw your
parachute open up, I was darned worried, I can tell you.”
“Well,” beamed Bill, grasping their hands, “it sure is good to see you
both again, I’m okay, but I take it you made bad landings. My fault,
too,—I should have explained more about it before you jumped.”
“Dat’s all right, Marse Bill,” piped up Sam. “It’s me what brung de
trouble. Marse Osceola, he sure am a born parachuter! He done landed
fine on dis island—but dis old nigger crabbed everything. Come down in
de grass out yonder. Dem sharp-tooth edges sure cut me pretty bad. And I
ain’t no hand at dis jumpin’ business nohow. Like to drownded myself if
Marse Osceola hadn’t come in an’ drug me out. Got all tangled up in de
grass and dem ropes, wif de big umbrella down on top of me, tryin’ t’
smudder me to death. I sure is obliged to you gentlemen for gettin’ me
away from de workin’s—but I’d rather stay put there all my born days
than go through all dat again. Not _me_, suh!”
The old man sat down suddenly, and began to shake all over.
“Take it easy, Sam,” cautioned Bill. “Just don’t think about it for a
while. Everything will come out all right.”
“I hope so, Marse Bill.” Sam’s tone, though gloomy, was much less
excited. “Dis heah airplane stuff an’ parachutin’ may be all right fo’
white folks—but if I must do a loop-de-loop, let mine be roun’ some
chicken coop.” He grinned appreciatively at his own joke. “Thank
goodness I’m down here where I’s gwine to stay. I ain’t gwine to be
a-oozin’ round de sky no mo’—Dis heah nigger ain’t got too proud to
walk. Nobody ain’t gwine to ketch Sam a-flirtin’ wif de sun no mo’.
Unh—unh! Not _me!_”
Both lads burst out laughing. “You’ve got more nerve than the rest of us
put together, Sam,” declared Osceola.
“You sure have!” Bill knelt at his side. “Osceola is a warrior and a
gentleman, but he can’t bandage for a tinker’s hoop. Let me fix those
things. And how about this ankle—you were limping, uncle?”
“It ain’t no sprain, suh. I kin walk on dat foot—but she sure do hurt
po’werful bad.”
“You’ve wrenched and strained it.” Bill’s deft fingers were lightly
pressing the old man’s ankle. “We’ll bind it up tighter and keep you off
your feet for a couple of days, and you’ll be able to do your hundred
yards in ten flat!”
“Help him off with his wet clothes, Bill, while I get rid of mine,”
Osceola suggested. “They’ll soon be dry in this sun.”
“That’s a good idea. While you two are drying, I think the best we can
do is to have a meeting of the Ways and Means Committee. We’re still an
awful longways from anywhere.”
Sam nodded his head vigorously. “You done said a mouf-ful, suh. I hope I
ain’ no gloom—but we sure is in a bad fix. Dese heah Glades is a mighty
bad place to git stranded in widout a boat. I don’t know but what dem
fellers what come down in de airplane wasn’t de lucky ones!”