NAN'S BIG ADVENTURE
Nan couldn't answer for a moment, then unexpectedly, even to herself,
she threw her arms around Adair MacKenzie's neck and kissed him.
"Tut! Tut!" he straightened his necktie and adjusted the soft white
collar of his shirt after her hug. "Can't stand for this. What's the
matter? Aren't you pleased?"
"Oh, dear!" Nan's face was flushed and her eyes bright as she answered.
"There was never in all this wide world a nicer cousin than you are
being to me."
"Wait a second," Adair was immensely pleased at this outburst. "What
will these young men all think of you? Want to make them jealous of an
old codger like me? Better watch out."
Nan looked at the boys sitting around the ground and in the big
comfortable chairs and blushed furiously. She had completely forgotten,
at the announcement of her proposed journey that anyone else was present
beside the girls whom she knew so well.
But her embarrassment couldn't last long in the face of the excitement.
Nan was going for Rhoda! Nan was going by plane to get Rhoda and bring
her back. Nan was going to start the next morning and by Monday she
would be back, having flown half the length of Mexico to the border and
then from there to Rose Ranch.
It was exciting to think of, but then a thousand, a million times more
exciting in reality, for all sorts of unexpected things were to come
about as the result of that ride.
Now, Nan could scarcely contain herself as she sat in the group and
listened to the little everyday things they were talking about. The only
thing that really penetrated her consciousness was the fact that she was
leaving and that when she returned Walter and his friends would have
left.
Adair brought this fact to life. In his free open, hospitable style, he
tried to induce the youngsters to linger. He liked them, liked the
excitement they had caused, for in spite of Bess's complaint to Nan that
they were a dull lot, they kept things moving from the moment they
serenaded their hostesses until they left.
Through the days there had been hikes, parties, a visit into the
interior by auto, and an excursion to a small village where the Indians
were celebrating a native holiday. They had seen them dressed in native
dress, dancing native dances with all the abandon of a people freed from
the daily routine, and they had witnessed one of their elaborate
religious rites in which the ritual of the church and the ritual of
pagan ancestors who had worshipped the Sun God were mingled with one
another to result in a queer worship that was unlike anything any place
else in the world.
Then they all went to a moving picture show where Roberta Taylor, the
pretty little American actress whom everybody adored spoke in Spanish.
How queer that seemed! They had all seen the film--it was an old one--in
a theatre in Chicago, but how different it seemed now with all the
conversation translated into Spanish. They giggled when the heroine
looked up at her tall American hero and murmured "Senor, Senor," and
when he greeted her with "Buenos Dias" and other common Spanish phrases.
It was all very charming and amusing and everyone had a grand time.
But now Nan was going to leave and the boys were going to leave. The
evening, in spite of the excitement about Nan's proposed journey, turned
a little sad when they all gathered around Walter and his guitar to sing
as they had each night since he arrived. The songs they sang were all
sad little songs.
By next morning all this was forgotten. The girls were all thrilled
over Rhoda's coming. They had telegraphed to tell her what was happening
and she had wired back that her mother was well enough now so that she
could carry out the plans that Adair MacKenzie had made with such
enjoyment, for he did enjoy doing things for other people. He liked
being Santa Claus the year round.
So, by ten o'clock the next day a whole caravan drew up to the airport
and Walter, his friends, Bess, Laura, Grace, Amelia, Adair and Alice saw
Nan off. How exciting it was, getting the ticket, standing by while the
plane's motors were warmed up, and then, when the passengers started to
get in, taking pictures of the plane, of the people around it, and of
the crew.
Finally, she was off and Nan was soaring over the heads of all her
friends. She looked out the window and waved a big white handkerchief,
but already she seemed part of the clouds and those below, waving too,
couldn't see her.
How much fun it was climbing, climbing, climbing. Nan wasn't worried at
all. She looked out. Around her were clouds and beneath her the
mountains of Mexico were stretched out. She was higher than the
mountains! Her spirits soared with the thought and she looked around at
her fellow passengers, two men who were in earnest conversation, a woman
with a small child beside her, and another man who seemed to be alone.
None of them looked particularly interesting and Nan returned to her
watching of the landscape, so when, after they had traveled for some
time, there was a commotion up in the pilot's cabin and the one traveler
who seemed alone stood up and quietly ordered everyone to put his hands
up, Nan was taken completely by surprise.
"Hands up, there, you!" The remark was addressed to Nan when she failed
to comply with the first request. She put her hands up. The woman with
the baby screamed. The baby cried. Nan put her hands down and moved to
help the two.
"Put your hands up there!" the order came again in good American
diction. Nan did. The voice meant business.
Now the plane began to rock. It slowed down some and glided down a hill
of air to taxi across a field in a place far removed from civilization.
Now, for the first time, Nan was really frightened. Somehow, up in the
air, she hadn't been very scared. It had all happened too suddenly. Now,
with her feet on the ground, however, she felt as though she was going
to faint. She clenched her fists at her side, gritted her teeth, and
stood waiting for the next move.
It came, quickly. Everyone was ordered to surrender his pass to cross
the border, told to remove his luggage, and then together, they were
hurried over the rough ground to a cabin and locked in.
Shortly, they heard the motors of the great plane again and then the
drone as it swung around over head and went off in the direction it was
headed for before anything happened--the United States.
The passengers, they were only Nan and the woman with the baby--the men
had all been involved in the plot--looked at one another in
consternation. What had happened? Were they being kidnapped and why? How
long would they be left in this deserted spot?
They tried the doors and the windows. Someone outside yelled a warning
to them. They paced the floor and the baby cried a pathetic little cry.
They tried to help it, but still it cried, a baffled little cry.