The First Clue to the Incendiary
Slowly Charley and his friend made their way along the fire trail toward
the highway and safety, Charley assisting the ranger as much as possible.
The latter began to suffer great pain in his arm and the limb started to
swell. Meantime, the forester, with a physician and a helper, was racing
at top speed to reach the ranger. At a pace utterly reckless he drove his
car over the forest road, and the instant the rescue party arrived at the
point where Charley and Mr. Morton would reach the highway, they plunged
into the forest. Faster than he had ever raced to a forest fire, the
forester sped along the trail, his companions striving doggedly to keep up
with him. He was deep in the woods before he met Charley and the ranger.
With hand extended, the forester ran to his ranger. Their hands met in a
tight clasp. "How is it, Jim?" asked the forester, with anxious eyes.
"I'm all right," rejoined the ranger. "I'll pull out of this all O.K. That
snake got me right, though. If it hadn't been for Charley here, I don't
know how I would have made out. He's as good as a doctor."
By this time the doctor himself had come up, puffing too hard for words.
He nodded his head, clasped the ranger's hand, and with a single word of
greeting quickly began an examination of the injured arm. "How long ago
did this happen?" he puffed.
"More than two hours ago," said the ranger.
"You haven't kept these tight all that time, have you?" and the doctor
laid his finger on one of the cords around the ranger's arm.
"No, sir. Charley had me loosen them, one at a time, every twenty minutes
or so."
"That was quite right. What else have you done?"
When the ranger had told him in detail exactly how Charley had treated
him, the doctor grunted, "Confound it! Then what did you hustle me out
here this way for? I thought you were at the point of death."
Charley was amazed and offended at what he considered the heartlessness of
the physician. "You don't understand," he protested. "Mr. Morton was badly
bitten, sir."
Charley was still more astonished when both the ranger and the forester
burst out laughing. He looked from one to the other questioningly. It did
not occur to him that this was merely the doctor's way of saying that
Charley had handled the situation about as well as he could have done it
himself. Evidently the forester did not propose to enlighten Charley, for
all he said was, "Don't let him worry you, Charley. He's just naturally
lazy and a grouch. He doesn't like it because I made him hustle for once,
and he's disappointed not to find Jim at the point of death. These doctors
are strange animals, Charley. But with all their faults we love them
still." And he slapped the physician affectionately on the shoulder.
Charley looked puzzled. But concluding that silence was the best course,
he said no more. All this time the doctor was continuing his labors, and
Charley was amazed at the dexterous way he did things.
For a moment he listened to the beating of the ranger's heart. Then,
seemingly with a single motion of his knife, he slit the sleeve of the
ranger's shirt. Another motion laid open the undershirt sleeve, disclosing
the arm to the shoulder. The physician examined it closely. The arm was
swelling fast. The physician opened his case and gave the ranger some
medicine. "Now we'll get to bed as soon as possible," he said, "and rest
for a few days."
Assisted by a man on either side of him, the ranger started for the
waiting motor-car.
"Mr. Marlin," said Charley, after the party had gone a few rods, "this
morning Mr. Morton brought out a little wireless set that Lew made for
him, as well as my big battery. It's back where Mr. Morton was bitten. May
I get it and set it up in the ranger's house? It will be a good
opportunity for him to practice while he's at home. Mrs. Morton is
learning to operate the wireless, too. It would mean so much to both of
them and to the forest as well, if they could talk to each other by
wireless."
"How long will it take you to put it up, Charley?"
"Not very long, sir. Perhaps an hour or two."
"I don't like to leave the forest unprotected for a single minute at this
season, Charley, but I guess we'll take a chance on it. Get your stuff to
the road as quick as you can. I'll take Jim home and return for you."
The forester hastened after the ranger's party and Charley darted off into
the forest. At the fastest pace he could maintain he jogged along the fire
trail. In a very little time he was back at the instruments. He took down
the aerial, threw away the spreaders, uncoupled the amplifier which he
needed for use himself, and replaced the little outfit in the pasteboard
box. Then he hurried back to the road, where the forester was already
waiting to whirl him away to the ranger's house.
If Charley had had any doubts whatever about his liking the ranger's wife
(though he hadn't), they would have vanished the instant he came in sight
of the ranger's home. It was a small, weather-beaten cottage set in the
shoulder of a hill, with the forest all around it. About the house itself
was a clearing of a few acres, with a little orchard on the slope behind
the house. The home itself was enclosed by an unpainted picket fence.
Lovely old trees shaded it. Vines clambered riotously over its soft, gray
clapboards. Well arranged shrubs and bushes had been planted here and
there. There were flowers about the base of the house and along the
borders. The grass was trimmed as neatly as a city lawn. Even now before
plant growth had started, the yard was attractive. With pleasure Charley
noted that the ranger had set out two European larches, evidently brought
in from a forest plantation, at his gateway. One glance at the inviting
and neatly kept yard told Charley what he would find within the house
itself.
Nor was he disappointed when he entered the door and found the house as
clean as a whistle, plainly but neatly and attractively furnished, and
beautiful with a wealth of flowers and plants that, had quite evidently
received loving and intelligent care. On the wall Charley instantly noted
the telephone, and hanging on a nail beside it was the leather case with
the ranger's portable telephone instrument.
There was not the slightest doubt in Charley's mind that he was going to
like the ranger's wife. And when, a moment later, she came quietly into
the room and took his hand in hers and, with moist eyes, thanked him for
saving her husband's life, she won Charley's heart completely. She was
slight and girlish and good to look at, and made Charley think of some of
his nice girl friends at high school. Yet Mrs. Morton had been married a
good many years, for just behind her stood her daughter, Julia, a girl of
twelve, waiting her turn to thank Charley.
But girlish though the ranger's wife appeared, Charley did not need to be
told that she was not of the weeping, hysterical sort. On every hand were
evidences of efficiency and foresight. A fire was evidently burning
briskly in the stove, and kettles of water, presumably heated in case of
need, were steaming on the range, easily seen through the open kitchen
door. In the sick-room were evidences of the same sort of forethought.
Everything that the house possessed that could possibly be useful in
treating the ranger had been assembled in handy little piles. This must
have been done before the ranger reached home, for most of the piles were
untouched.
The ranger was resting comfortably in bed, though his arm was badly
swollen and his face was distorted with pain. At sight of Charley his
countenance lighted up. He reached out his left arm and wrung Charley's
hand until the lad winced.
"The doctor says I'll pull through this all right, though I'll have a
painful time of it," said the ranger, "and he told the truth, at least as
far as the pain is concerned. But the pain's nothing. The thing that
counts is the fact that I am safe at home. I owe it to you, Charley, and
you may be sure I'll never forget."
That was as much as the ranger, reticent, hating any display of emotion,
quiet like most men of the woods, could bring himself to say. But Charley
knew that it meant volumes. He tried to reply, but found himself also
suffering from a strange embarrassment. So Charley said good-bye to the
ranger, assured him that he would take good care of the forest, and set
about fixing the wireless outfit. The forester helped him. Quickly they
got up the aerial, brought the lead-in wire into the living-room, and set
up the instruments on a board table close beside the telephone instrument.
"Now everything is complete except for the battery," Charley said to the
forester when they had finished wiring up the outfit. "Half a dozen dry
cells will supply all the current needed."
"I'll send them out by the doctor in the morning," said the forester.
Charley showed Mrs. Morton how to wire the cells and couple them to the
instruments. Then he told her how to adjust her spark-gap and tune the
instrument to any given wave-length. He compared his watch with the clock
on the wall.
"At eight o'clock every night," he said, "I will call you up. Suppose you
take Mr. Morton's initials as your call signal. What are they?"
"J. V. M.," replied Mrs. Morton.
"Very well. Then at eight o'clock every night I will call J. V. M. slowly
a number of times. Then I will tick off the alphabet slowly and the
numerals one to ten. You listen in, and if the sounds are blurred or not
sharp, tune your instrument as I have shown you until you can hear
distinctly. If you make the letters with a pencil as you read them, it
may help you. I'm sure you will soon learn to read. I'll repeat the
alphabet and the numbers three times slowly. Then I'll listen in for five
or ten minutes. If you want to try to call me, give my signal and follow
it with your own, thus: 'CBC--CBC--CBC--JVM.' That means 'Charley
Russell--James Morton calling.' If I hear you, I will send the letters
'JVM--JVM--JVM--I--I--I.' That means 'James Morton--I am here.' Then you
can begin to send your message. I hope we'll be able to talk to each other
very soon."
"It won't be my fault if we don't," smiled the ranger's wife.
"Now I must be off," said Charley. "I've no doubt Mr. Marlin is getting
impatient. We'll just clean up this mess and then I'll go."
"I'll clean things up," insisted Mrs. Morton.
"No; I made the mess and I'll clean it up," protested Charley.
He began to pile the torn pieces of pasteboard together so he could thrust
them into the stove. The bottom of the pasteboard box had been built up
with several layers of pasteboard, evidently cut from other boxes. Charley
took them out one at a time, preparatory to crumpling up the box itself.
As he lifted the last layer of pasteboard he stopped in blank amazement.
Then he called excitedly for Mr. Marlin. Before him lay a piece of green
pasteboard exactly like the charred fragment taken from the ash heap in
the burned forest.