THE SWAMP DEMON
Slow and methodical in his mental processes, Garry was rather stunned
by the situation the chums were confronting.
Don, climbing, listened for information. None came through the Gossport
tube.
Chick, alert, with an impulsive quick flash, got an inspiration.
To dive meant going in line with the flight of bomb or rocket, or--if
that strange Thing in the helicopter really was deadly in its
intent--bullets.
A side-slip would be no better for them.
Their climb did not get them away quickly enough. Perhaps the Dragonfly
had superior climbing ability, better maneuvering capacity; but no ship
could outfly those messengers of fire--the rockets!
"Garry!" Chick prodded his chum.
The older youth turned.
"Tell Don--a lot of barrel rolls!"
Garry saw the utility of the maneuver. They had already executed a
half-roll, turning from upside down to level. One after another, in
succession, a series of barrel rolls would get them, sidewise, away.
They would lose very little altitude.
Best of all, the stunt would send them off in an evolution that would
make it almost impossible to catch them, by angular direction of the
missiles, because Chick knew a variation--and gave it.
"Tell Don--barrel rolls, and reverse rolls!"
Garry realized the value of Chick's wit, relayed the idea.
Down went a wing. Up went the other.
Over and over, the Dragonfly revolved on its tail-and-nose line.
Three rolls followed one another.
At the end of the third, Don checked the ship.
Down went the nose. Short was the dive, to gain speed. Up came the nose.
With the wing that had swung upward before now down, he went into a
triple reverse roll.
On the descent of their dive the dying flare had shown them the
helicopter still climbing. Its surprised occupant evidently had the
large tube they saw at one side trained at a certain angle. To change
it took time.
Don's reverse maneuver sent them almost directly underneath the ship.
But there their wings were in danger.
Checking the ship, Don began the disconcerting, but very useful stunt
termed a "falling leaf," in which by alternately dropping one and then
the opposite wing, the ship descended in a sort of zig-zag drop, much
like the erratic course of a leaf falling from a tree.
Twelve hundred feet above the swamp, Don leveled, and with full-gun on
sent the Dragonfly unerringly down-wind and straight at the runway
approach lights a mile ahead.
They must get the mail in, he knew.
Swift, at its best, the craft sped toward its goal.
Don cut the gun, began the approach glide.
Far behind, unable to keep up, or, perhaps, giving up the chase, the
Demon in the helicopter--human or otherwise--stayed aloft.
Down to the runway in a well-calculated glide Don swung his ship.
"Hooray!" exulted Chick. "Don--Garry--we win!"
The trucks leveled with the tail. The ship lost speed. Its wheels set
their tires on the concrete and the ship, rumbling, ran forward.
Instantly Don cut the gun.
Mr. McLeod, the control room chief, and Doc Morgan ran up.
Garry tossed out the mail pouches.
"The ship-to-shore record is just tied!" cried McLeod. "Don--I owe you
a lot for this--and your friends, too!"
"All right, Uncle!" Don swung about in his cockpit. "Doc--Mr.
Vance--has anything been done about the Dart?"
"Why--ah--" Doc rubbed his chin as the older executive, with the
control room chief at his side, raced for the waiting car in which the
mail, still in its sacks, would be rushed to the New York Post Office,
"yes, Don. They got a new prop set!"
"Good enough."
"Why?" asked Garry.
Don had not loosened the chin strap of his helmet. He clambered hastily
out of his cockpit, onto a wing, to the earth.
"Who'll go with me?" he cried, as Garry and Chick came tumbling out of
their places. "Garry--Chick! Which one?"
"Where? For what?" asked Garry.
"Back to the swamp--to find that Thing and make sure that it never
molests any more pilots."
"I will!" cried Chick.
"I will!" Garry's words were shouted in the same instant.
"No! Only one can go in the two-place Dart!" said Don. "She's all
fueled up for the flight, you know, but there aren't three places."
"But--" began Chick.
"I need one of you for ground work," Don cried. "I have a plan! Two of
us go aloft, fly back to the swamp. Maybe we can get there before the
Thing has a chance to set down. Maybe we can fly around until we locate
it. But somebody has to stay here in the control tower!"
"Why?" asked Garry.
Don spoke earnestly.
"Because--the control room chief took back a tracing, claiming he owned
it--and because there was the beam of that searchlight on us
tonight--and there isn't another searchlight that I know of near!"
"Oh!" Garry saw light as Don spoke in his clipped, alert way.
"Yes!" Chick cried, "you think the control chief is working with the
one in the helicopter--they are the ones who are trying to ruin your
uncle."
"Yes!" Don was already hurrying into the wide open hangar, where he saw
several mechanicians adjusting the hub bolts on the small, swift Dart.
"But the chief of control has gone with your uncle!" Garry objected.
They were inside the hangar as Don answered, putting his words in low,
swift earnest sentences.
"Only to the car. He'll slip back here. We mustn't leave him free to
signal----"
"I'll stay!" Chick declared. "I'll stick to him as tight as his skin,
Don. I'll be a part of the Airlane Guard--and if he signals, I'll be
there--and we can get Doc----"
"No! Trust nobody!" Garry whispered. "Not even Doc! Don't forget he was
the one in the boathouse when you found the tracing."
On swift feet Don raced away to the men completing adjustments on the
propeller assembly.
"I'm taking the Dart aloft," he said quickly. "Come on, Garry--run her
out!"
In ten minutes, while Chick watched, and kept an eye on Doc and on the
control chief, who stood watching in the hangar doorway, Don revved up
the newly warmed engine, lifted the tailskid from the concrete, the
chocks were dragged from under the wheels, and up from the runway
leaped the Dart, with Garry, adjusting the Gossport, transferred from
the other craft. They would scotch the Demon of the Swamps--or do their
best to end his unexplained but menacing career.
Stars twinkled in the night sky as they roared straight for the haunt
of mysteries. And the Demon was ready for them!