MARY'S ODD STORY
"Hello! Hello! Yes, this is Tom Swift. What's that? You've had an
accident? Great Scott, Mary! I hope you aren't hurt."
Ned overheard these words as he stood outside the temporary office,
from inside which Tom Swift was telephoning.
"There's been an accident!" thought the financial manager. "I wonder if
I can help?"
He was about to hurry in to offer his services when he heard Tom laugh,
and then he knew it was all right. He heard his chum say:
"I'll be right over and get you. Just where are you?"
Then followed a period of listening on the part of Tom, to be broken by
the words:
"All right, I'll be right with you. Lucky I have my Air Scout with me.
You aren't afraid to ride in that, are you? No, that's good! I'll be
right over. Ned is here with me, and I'll have him telephone to your
father and mother."
With that Tom hung up the receiver and joined his chum.
"Mary had a slight automobile accident about five miles from here," Tom
told his chum. "Some green driver ran into her and dished one of her
wheels. No one hurt, but she hasn't a spare wheel and can't navigate.
She called me up at the house, not wishing to alarm her father, and
Mrs. Baggert told her you and I had come down to the dock, so she
reached me here. I'll go in the small aeroplane and get her. Luckily I
left it here the last time I made a trip. Will you call up Mary's home
and let them know she's all right and that I'll soon be home with her?
They might hear an exaggerated account of the accident."
Ned promised to do this, and at once put in a call for the home of his
chum's fiancee, while Tom had one of his men run out the Air Scout.
This was an aeroplane recently perfected by the young inventor which
slipped through space with scarcely a sound. So silent was it that the
craft had been dubbed "Silent Sam," and it stood Tom in good stead as
those of you know who have read the volume just before the present
book. This sky glider Tom would now use in going to the rescue of Mary
Nestor was not, however, the same large craft that figured in the
previous story. That airship had been given to the United States
government for war purposes. But Tom had built himself a smaller one
for his own use. It had the advantage of enabling him to carry on a
conversation with his passenger when he took one aloft.
About a week before Tom and Ned had flown from Shopton to the dry dock
where the submarine was being reconstructed in this small airship.
Engine trouble had developed after they had landed, and they had gone
back by automobile, leaving the Air Scout to be repaired. This had been
done, and now Tom intended to use it in going to Mary's rescue.
Now, when the Air Scout had been run out of the hangar, Tom climbed
into it.
"Sorry I can't take you along," he called to Ned, who had finished
telephoning to Mary's home, "but, under the circumstances--"
"Two's company and three's a crowd!" laughed Ned. "I know!"
"No, I didn't mean that," Tom said. "You know Mary likes you, but this
will carry only two."
"I know!" answered his chum. "On your way!"
And with an almost noiseless throb of her engine and a whirr of her
propeller, the aeroplane rolled swiftly over the level starting ground
and took the air like a swan leaving its lake.
Tom did not rise to a great height, as he would need only a few minutes
to reach the place where Mary was stalled by the accident to her
machine. Soon he was hovering over a level field, one of several that
lined the country highways in that section. A small crowd on the
turnpike gathered about an evidently disabled automobile gave Tom the
clew he needed, and presently he made a landing. Instantly the throng
of country people who had gathered to look at the automobile crash
deserted that for a view of something more sensational--an airship.
Cautioning the boys who gathered about not to "monkey" with any of the
mechanism, Tom hastened over to where Mary was standing near her car.
"Are you sure you aren't hurt?" he asked her anxiously.
"Oh, yes, very sure," she replied, smiling at him. "It isn't much of an
accident--only one wheel smashed. We were both going slowly."
"But it was all my fault!" insisted a young fellow who had been driving
the car that crashed into Mary's. "I'm all kinds of sorry, and of
course I'll pay all damages. I wanted this young lady to let me drive
her home and then send a garage man to tow her car, but she said she
had other plans. I don't blame her for not wanting to ride in my jitney
bus when I see what kind of car you have," and he looked over toward
Tom's aeroplane.
"Thank you, just the same," murmured Mary. "I'm not quite sure that it
was all your fault. But if you will be so good as to send a man after
my machine I'll go back with Mr. Swift. Wait until I get my bag," she
added, and she extracted it from the seat in her automobile. "There'll
be room for this, won't there?" she asked. "I've been shopping."
"You must have made some large purchases," laughed Tom, looking
critically at the small bag. "Yes, there'll be room for that, all
right."
He made a brief examination of Mary's machine, ascertaining that the
dished wheel was the main damage, and then, having given the young man
who caused the accident directions for the garage attendant, Tom led
his pretty companion across the field to the waiting airship.
Of course a crowd gathered to see them start off, and this was not long
delayed, as Tom was not fond of curiosity seekers. In a few minutes he
and Mary were soaring aloft.
"Well, how are you?" he asked Mary, when they were alone well above the
earth.
"Fine and dandy," she answered, smiling at him, for they were riding
side by side and could converse with little difficulty owing to the
silent running of Tom's latest invention. "I'm sorry to have called you
away from your work," she added, "but when Mrs. Baggert told me you
were at the submarine dock I thought perhaps you could run out and get
me in your machine. I didn't expect you to fly to me."
"I'm always ready to do that!" exclaimed Tom, as he shot upward to
avoid a bank of low-lying clouds. "Were you frightened at the crash in
the machine?"
"Not greatly. I saw it coming, and knew it was unavoidable. That chap
hasn't been running autos very long, I imagine, and he lost his head in
the emergency. But I had my brakes on and he just coasted into me. I
was lucky in that it wasn't worse."
"I should say so! Do you want to get right home?"
"I think I'd better. Mother and father may be a little worried about
me. And they've had trouble enough of late."
"Trouble!" exclaimed Tom, in a questioning voice. "Anything serious?"
"No, just family financial matters. Not ours," she hastened to add, as
she saw Tom look quickly at her. "A relative. I shouldn't have
mentioned it, but father and mother are a little worried, and I don't
want to add to it."
"Of course not," agreed Tom. "If there's anything I can do?"
"Oh, I expected you to say that!" laughed Mary. "Thanks. If there is
we'll call on you. But it may all be straightened out. Father was
expecting a message from Uncle Barton today. So, though I'd like to
take a cloud-ride with you, I think I'd better get home."
"All right," agreed Tom. "I told Ned to telephone that you were all
right, so they won't worry. And now try to enjoy yourself."
"I'll try," promised Mary, but it was obvious, even from the quick
glances Tom gave her, that she was worried about something. Mary was
not her usual, spontaneous, jolly self, and Tom realized it.
"Well, here we are!" he announced a little later, as they soared above
a level field not far from her home. "Sorry I can't let you down right
on your roof, but it isn't flat enough nor big enough."
"Oh, I don't mind a little walk, especially as I didn't have to hike it
all the way in from Bailey Corners," she said, referring to the place
of the automobile accident. "I suppose the time will come when
everybody who now has an auto will have an airship and a landing place,
or a starting place, for it at his own door," she added.
"Either that, or else we'll have airships so compact that they can set
off and land in as small a space as an auto now requires," said Tom.
"The latter would be the best solution, as one great disadvantage of
airships now is the manner of starting and stopping. It's too big."
Tom left his Air Scout in a field owned by Mr. Nestor, where he had
often landed before, and walked up to the house with Mary.
"Oh, I'm glad you're back!" exclaimed Mrs. Nestor, when she saw the two
coming up the steps.
"You weren't worried, were you, after Ned telephoned?" asked Tom.
"Not exactly worried, but I thought perhaps he was making light of it.
Do tell me what happened, Mary!"
Thereupon the girl related all the circumstances of the smash, and Tom
added his share of the story.
"Did father hear anything from Uncle Barton?" asked Mary, after her
mother's curiosity had been satisfied.
"Yes," was the answer, in rather despondent tones, "he did, but the
news was not encouraging. The papers cannot be found."
"It's mother's brother we're talking about," Mary explained to Tom.
"Barton Keith in his name. Perhaps you remember him?"
"I've heard you speak of him," Tom admitted.
"Well," resumed Mary, "Uncle Barton is in a peck of trouble. He was
once very rich, and he invested heavily in oil lands, in Oklahoma, I
believe."
"No, in Texas," corrected Mrs. Nestor.
"Yes, it was Texas," agreed Mary. "Well he bought, or got, somehow,
shares in some valuable oil lands in Texas, and expected to double his
fortune. Now, instead, he's probably lost it all."
"That's too bad!" exclaimed Tom. "How did it happen?"
"In rather an odd way," went on Mary. "He really owns the lands, or at
least half of them, but he cannot prove his title because the papers he
needs were taken from him, and, he thinks, by a man he trusted. He's
been trying to get the documents back, and every day we've been
expecting to hear that he has them, but mother says there has been no
result."
"No," said Mrs. Nestor. "My brother thought sure he had a trace of the
man he believes has the papers, or who had them, but he lost track of
him. If we could only find him--"
At that moment a maid came into the room to announce that Tom Swift was
wanted at the telephone.