TIMBADO KEY AND CAPTAIN MONCKTON BASSETT
From the moment Andy dropped his message to Ba, he had no time for
thought of those he had left behind. For three or four miles he shot
straight down the river at a height of about four hundred feet. In that
time his first nervousness lessened. He made ready to begin his flight
over the water.
The compass course he had laid was almost S.E. by S. His first alarming
discovery was that his compass would be of almost no use. The vibration
of the frame and the constant alteration of his level in ascending and
descending so agitated the needle that it was always in motion.
“That ain’t goin’ to stop me,” he said at once. “There’s land
everywhere over there to the southeast. I’ll hit something somewhere
sometime.”
Laying a general course by the sun, he veered to the southeast. The
moment he passed out over the ocean, the air changed. The movement of
it was less regular, and Andy knew it was due to the counter-current
of cooler water sent southward by the northward-flowing gulf stream.
Steadying the car, he began to ascend. At a thousand feet, the lower
eddies disappeared, and he felt the steady southwest breeze reasserting
itself.
Taking advantage of this, as a ship tacks, he steadied the car again.
Up to that moment every second had been one of activity; both hands
had been busy, and every sense was alert. As the aeroplane now fell
into a long, almost motionless glide――with nothing to mark its progress
but the whistling wind――for the water beneath gave him no measure of
flight――the boy discovered that his muscles were already partly numb
from the strain.
As best he could, he relaxed his tension――exercised his feet, legs,
fingers, and arms. But the attempt to relax his arms brought his
second big discovery――when soaring on an even keel at high speed, the
slightest movement of the rudder may instantly cost many minutes of
hard climbing upward.
Attempting to steady the control lever with his left hand, there was a
slight pull to the left and back. As the responsive ship answered her
double helm and veered to the left and down, Andy thrust the lever
back, changed hands, and his benumbed fingers for a moment refused to
act.
Shaking itself, under the conflicting movements, the _Pelican_ wavered
and then leaped to the right and down. Aghast, the nervous boy saw the
sea――the shore already out of sight――apparently rising to meet and
grasp him. Paralyzed for a moment, Andy gave instant proof that he was
a born aviator.
Withdrawing his eyes from the sea and bringing all his will power to
stamp out his sudden panic, he did two things with hardly the operation
of thinking. Setting his teeth and forcing his eyes on the stanchion at
his side to get his line, with both hands――and as carefully as if he
had minutes for the work――he brought the control lever to a vertical
position, and at right angles with the beam to which it was attached.
His intuition told him he could do no more. And it was enough. With
a long, gliding, downward sweep the car sped on and at last began to
move forward on an even keel. His eyes yet fixed on the lever only, he
gradually drew it vertically toward him, and, when the check in the
forward speed told him he was ascending again, looked below. He was
not over three hundred feet from the almost waveless sea, and he had
dashed downward seven hundred feet.
“I understand now what they mean when they kick about long flights,”
said the boy to himself. “It ain’t the nerves――it’s the muscles. You’ve
just kind o’ got to hold this thing on its course――anyway she ain’t
goin’ to run herself.”
When he figured himself to be about a thousand feet in the air, once
more Andy looked at his watch. It was 1:30 o’clock. He had been gone
twenty-two minutes. He almost groaned. Osborne had estimated the
maximum speed of the _Pelican_ at forty-two miles an hour. He was
surely going at his best; he was already tired, and since he had not
covered quite fifteen miles, he had the hardest part of his voyage
before him.
Since there was no relief, he must stand it, and he did. He now kept
the aeroplane at the thousand-foot level, as nearly as he could
estimate it. The engine never wavered, and finally he was able to
ignore it. The boy’s eyes grew hot and began to pain him, and he was
no longer conscious of power to move his right hand, when――and the
slowly-creeping minutes seemed endless――at 2:51 o’clock he caught sight
of a thin white line on the horizon.
The boy knew at once that this must be land. Whether or not it was
the land he had started for――the Grande Banks――made no difference.
Confidence returned with the knowledge that he had a goal to aim for,
and in that assurance he took his first moments to reason. He had done
a foolhardy thing, and now he meant to bring his perilous flight to an
end as soon as possible.
What the place might be he neither knew nor cared; his wind-swept eyes
burning and his spent muscles rigid, he was conscious only of the line
of white. As it rose and widened, he hardly knew how or when he altered
the course of the plane. But at last, with an effort that he was
fearful he could not make――when the white rolled out beneath him――he
shut off the engine. At 3:35 P.M., the rubber landing wheels were
bounding over the glaring white of a shell-strewn beach.
The exhausted boy still sat in his seat, motionless, his head on his
breast and his fingers yet grasping the idle lever. He had carried out
his great idea, reached the Bahamas in an aeroplane, but with nothing
to spare.
Until Andy was able to get the numbness out of his limbs, he gave
no thought to his surroundings. At last, creeping stiffly from the
machine, he found that he had achieved his ambition: the smooth, wide
beach, chalk-white from minute shells, the softly surging sea shaded
into all colors of blue by shallow bars and outlying keys, the distant
ridge of green through which, here and there, palms rose and spread
their umbrella-like foliage, all told him that he was at last in the
tropics. But where?
When he could, he made his way to the water’s edge. A star-fish lay at
his feet. He grasped it as another boy might have caught up a nugget
of gold. Then another object rolled in on the swell. At the first
sight of it, the boy smiled. Then the smile disappeared, and he sprang
forward and secured the floating object. It was an opened tin that had
contained English orange marmalade.
“From some passing steamer,” thought Andy. Then he saw that the label
on the can was not yet loosened by the water. “It hasn’t been floatin’
long, though,” he added. “Looks as if some Englishman isn’t far away.”
Ahead of him the beach curved into what seemed to be a bay. The
_Pelican_ was high above the water, and there was no living thing
in sight that might molest it. Glad of an opportunity to get some
exercise, Andy began trotting along the beach. Far to the south, beyond
a belt of reefs and smaller keys, he could just make out other lines of
white,――other islands, no doubt, but nowhere was there a sail in sight.
“But I guess there’s someone nearby, and an Englishman at that,”
speculated Andy. “Since he isn’t in sight, he must be in the cove
behind the point.”
When the boy reached the turn in the shore, he was astounded to see
just the opposite of the solitude in which he had alighted. At the
bottom of the bay, where a group of cocoa palms hung almost over the
water, the sight of a thatched hut met his eye. In front of it, and
anchored several hundred yards out in the cove, was a trim schooner,
her sails furled and a white awning covering her deck. Here and there
over the wide bay were small boats, in each of which he could see two
and sometimes three black men, naked to the waist.
“They’re divin’ for sponges or tongin’ ’em,” said Andy to himself as
the old geography pictures came into his mind. Before he could feast
his eyes further with the picture-like scene, he was startled to hear a
voice. At the same moment a white man, in white duck and a Panama hat,
stepped from the shade of the palms lining the beach.
“How’d do?” exclaimed the man in a decided English accent. “Did you
just alight in an aeroplane?”
“You saw me?” exclaimed Andy.
“I was on my schooner and watched you for a long time with the glass.
Come across from Florida?”
“Yes,” answered the boy. “What place is this?”
“One of the Grande Banks,” replied the stranger, “generally speaking.
To be precise, you have your choice of several local names. Mine, for
this, is Palm Tree Cove, I believe.”
“My name is Leighton――Andrew Leighton. I thought I’d try it to see if
I could. Now, I’ve got to get word to my folks that I’m all right, and
get back.”
Meanwhile the Englishman had shaken Andy’s hand.
“That’s not so easy,” he answered, laughing. “The place is uninhabited;
it’s off the steamer route. I don’t belong here; we’re prospecting the
pearl and sponge bottoms. I’m from Andros. We’ll be leaving in a day
or so. You can go with us. I’ll send you to Nassau, or send word for
you――you can cable.”
“You live on Andros Island?”
“I have fruit lands there and sisal.”
“I’m sure I’m obliged,” began Andy. “It’s good of you. I haven’t any
money.”
The man laughed.
“I shall be delighted to have you as my guest,” he said, still smiling.
“And if you are in a hurry, I’ll take you over to-night.”
“I’m not in a hurry to leave this,” began Andy, sweeping his arm about
to include the cameo-like bay. “But you can understand: I hadn’t
permission to come, and, if I had, I suppose my parents would be
worrying until they heard from me.”
“Not unlikely,” said the man in white. “I think you ought to go at
once, or send word. Any little excitement of this kind is enjoyable. If
you don’t mind, I’d like to have a look at your flying machine――I’ve
never seen one, as you can imagine. I rarely go even to Nassau――lived
on Andros twenty years.”
Glad to act as showman, Andy led his new friend back along the beach
to the _Pelican_. In the short trip he related how he came to be in
possession of the aeroplane, how it was made, and finally he told of
his parents, his late uncle, and of Captain Anderson. Reaching the car
he explained it in detail, and then while the Englishman stood back as
if to feast his eyes on the wonder, Andy said:
“If you don’t mind, I’ll have a bite of lunch and a drink.”
As if embarrassed, the stranger raised his hand.
“Excuse me, my boy――I might have known. Can’t you postpone your
refreshment until we can reach my schooner?”
Andy thought a moment.
“I don’t like to leave the machine here――I think I’ll make a little
flight and take it around in the cove.”
“Excellent,” agreed the man. “I’ll be proud,” he went on, with a smile
and bowing, “to be host to both the aeroplane and the aviator. And I’ll
watch――”
A mischievous look came into Andy’s eyes. Some distance ahead of him
the hard beach reached back over a gentle incline that made its way
like a wide road between the fence-like cocoas.
“I’ll have to get the car up there,” he said, “to get up momentum. Do
you mind giving me a hand?”
“Delighted, I’m sure,” answered the fruit grower. “It will probably be
my first and last experience with such a vehicle.”
Andy’s twinkle spread into a smile. When the _Pelican_ had been pushed
to the top of the slope and was ready for a new flight, he crawled
to his seat. The white-costumed man was backing away, watching every
detail. As soon as he was seated, Andy loosened the cords holding the
tin of gasoline on the extra seat and asked his affable host if he
would put it aside where he might get it later.
“I’d think you’d carry it with you,” suggested the stranger, as he
obligingly complied.
“I would,” answered Andy, “but I want the seat. Jump in.”
“Me?” exclaimed the man. “On that?”
“I just crossed the gulf stream, a thousand feet up,” answered the boy.
“I――I didn’t know it would carry two,” began the man, who seemed more
surprised than alarmed.
“It has,” answered the boy. “Come on.”
The surprise of the man turned instantly into open delight. He crawled
into the seat, and almost before he was settled, the proud and now
confident Andy had shot his pride and joy seaward, skimmed one low
roller, and was mounting skyward as if the machine were elated over its
extra burden.
It was not over a mile to the head of the cove and the cabin beneath
the palms, but the conditions made a direct flight thither impossible.
Assured of his ability to control the powerful machine, Andy sent her
mounting up and up in a long spiral.
“Delightful!” said the man at his side at last. “I’m charmed.”
To the boy’s surprise, there was no trace of nervousness nor fear in
his passenger’s voice.
“I think we’re nearly one thousand two hundred feet high now,” said
Andy.
“I think so, or more,” was the passenger’s answer. “Can you look about?
The view is superb.” The aeroplane, which had risen in circles above
the cove, now commanded a wide view of white-margined islands, reefs,
and channels. “Far over there to the left,” went on the Englishman,
“although you can scarcely see it, is a bit of rock with a strange
history. It is known as Timbado Key.”
[Illustration: “JUMP IN,” SAID ANDY.]
There was a slight lurch of the car, and the passenger started.
“Anything wrong?” he exclaimed.
“Nothing,” answered Andy. “I was trying to look. But this Timbado?”
“It’s a story,” answered his companion――“one that has never been
written. I’ll tell it you this evening.”
Instantly, and for the first time since he had landed, the tragic tale
of Ba, the colored man, rushed into Andy’s thoughts. Startled by his
unexpected proximity to the scene of Ba’s horrible experience, his hand
had moved and the machine had wavered. Then, as the fragmentary story
came back to him, he recalled this important detail of it――the man who
had sent the simple, half savage Ba to steal the great pink pearl was
“an English captain who lived on Andros Island.”
“Thank you,” answered the boy at last. “I’ll be glad to hear it, Mr.――”
“Pardon me,” said the man instantly; “didn’t I mention my name? I am
Captain Monckton Bassett.”