HARMLESS AS A RATTLESNAKE.
"I beg your pardon, sir, but could I speak to you a moment?"
"Certainly; come in, Chance," rejoined Lieutenant De Frees, who was
sitting in his quarters on the aviation testing ground the morning
after the events narrated in our last chapter.
"It's--it's about Strong and Taylor, sir, that I wished to speak," said
Chance, twisting his cap in his hands. His crafty face looked more
fox-like and mean than ever. His manner was almost cringing.
Lieutenant De Frees jumped to his feet.
"You've got news of them?" he exclaimed. "Out with it, my lad. They are
not the boys to be absent without good reasons, although I fear that
if they have overstayed their leave without just cause they must be
disciplined."
"That's just it, sir," said Chance. "I--I don't want to make trouble,
sir, but I'm afraid that Strong and Taylor are not all that you think
them, sir. I would have spoken at roll-call this morning when they were
reported absent without leave, but I thought that maybe they would turn
up."
"Well, what do you know about them? Come, out with it," urged the
officer sharply.
He had never liked Chance, and the seaman's furtive manner irritated
him.
"Why, you see, sir, Merritt and I happened to be in town last night,
sir, and we saw Strong and Taylor associating with some disreputable
characters, sir. We warned them, but they laughed at us, sir. We
continued to urge them to come with us, however, but they only swore at
us."
"What!" exclaimed the officer, startled out of his official calm, "you
saw Strong and Taylor in undesirable surroundings and with disreputable
characters, and you mean to say that that is the reason for their
non-appearance this morning?"
"That's just it, sir," rejoined Chance. "The last we saw of them was as
they were turning into a drinking resort. I fear that some harm must
have come to them, sir."
"Why--why--confound it all, I'd almost rather cut off my right hand
than hear such a report, Chance. You are certain that you are correct
in your report?"
"Absolutely certain, sir," was the response; "there could be no
mistake. I hope I am not doing wrong in reporting this, sir?"
"No, no, my man, you have done perfectly right," was the answer,
although the officer's face was troubled. The news that his most
trusted pupils should have misconducted themselves had shaken him a
good deal.
"Good heavens, can one place no trust in human nature?" he thought.
"I'd have staked my commission that those boys were absolutely
clean-lived and upright."
"Is--is there anything else you'd like to know, sir?" Chance edged
toward the door as he spoke.
"No, no. That's all, my man. You may go."
"Thank you, sir."
And Chance, his despicable errand performed, slid through the door in
the same furtive way in which he had entered.
"If they haven't returned by eight bells, and there is no news of them
in the meantime, I'll have to send out a picket to bring them in,"
mused the officer when Chance had departed. "Then disgrace and 'the
brig' will follow, and two promising careers will be blasted. Strong
and Taylor, of all people. I can't understand it. And yet there can be
no other explanation of their absence."
Dismissing the matter from his mind for the time being, Lieutenant
De Frees continued his official work. Outside on the field his
subordinates attended to the morning practice of the flying squad. Half
an hour must have passed thus, when a sudden knock at the door caused
him to look up.
"Come in!" he said, in a sharper voice than usual. The news that his
favorites had so fallen from grace had distressed him more than even he
cared to own to himself.
In response to his words, the door swung open, and there, framed in the
doorway, stood the two very individuals whose absence had so worried
him.
Ned and Herc clicked their heels together sharply and gave the salute
in a precise manner.
"We've reported on duty, sir," said Ned in a steady voice.
The officer looked at them blankly. Their clothes were torn, although
an effort had seemingly been made to mend them and clean them of traces
of mud and dirt. A bruise appeared on Ned's face, while Herc's hair was
rumpled and standing up wildly. Their appearance bore out the story the
officer had heard. Two more disreputable-looking beings it would have
been hard to picture.
"So this is the way you men repay my trust in you?" said the officer
in sharp, harsh tones, very unlike his usual ones. "You will both
consider yourselves under arrest, pending an inquiry. Remain standing
till I summon a guard."
The lads' absolutely dumfounded looks at this reception did not escape
the officer's attention.
"Well, have you any explanation to offer?" he demanded. "Mind, don't
attempt to lie to me. I know all of your proceedings, dating from the
hour that you, Strong, left my quarters."
"You mean that you have heard we have been engaged in some
discreditable prank, sir?" asked Ned firmly, but respectfully, and
still standing--as did Herc--stiffly at attention.
"I mean just that," was the response. "Since when has it been the
custom in the United States navy for men to disgrace the service and go
unpunished?"
"And yet," said Ned, in the same well-disciplined tones, "it hasn't
been the custom to condemn men unheard, sir."
"I have heard quite enough, already," was the sharp answer. "If you
have anything to add to what Chance has told me, you may. But I warn
you that any explanation you may offer will be investigated thoroughly,
and if it is found you have been lying, it will go harder with you than
otherwise."
"I think you will find it is Chance who has been lying, sir," said Ned
calmly. "May I tell you our side of the story, dating from the hour you
mentioned?"
"You may, but make it brief. My time is fully occupied," was the cold
response.
But, as Ned struck into his story, telling it in a calm, even tone,
the officer's expression changed from one of hard incredulity to blank
astonishment, passing rapidly to deep indignation.
"We were startled soon after gaining our freedom," related Ned, going
on with his narrative from the point where we left the lads, "by the
sound of a voice calling on us to halt. A few minutes later we found
that the man who had given the order was the local constable, Ezra
Timmons. He is a farmer on the outskirts of the town, and had been
driving home late from selling some produce, when he noticed lights in
the old asylum. He decided to investigate, and did so. He found the
door open, and, penetrating the place, soon encountered us. He took us
home with him, and helped us clean up a bit, and then we hastened over
here to report."
"And that's true, by gum, every dinged word uv it!" came a voice
outside the open door. Farmer--and Constable--Timmons stepped into the
room, dramatically throwing back his coat and exposing a big tin star,
just as he had seen constables in rural dramas do.
"But they ain't told it all," he rushed on. "These two lads here saved
my wife frum some ruffians what wanted ter rob her the t'other day.
They sailed by in their sky-buggy jus' in time ter save ther spoons
thet Gran'ma Timmons willed me on her dyin' bed, by heck!---- and it's
my idee that this same gang of roustabouts was consarned in thet, frum
what I kin judge."
The officer pressed a button. An orderly responded, coming smartly to
attention.
"Send for Merritt and Chance at once," he ordered.
The orderly saluted and turned like an automaton.
Constable Timmons gazed at him in amazement.
"Is thet feller real or jes' one uv them clockwork dummies yer read
about?" he asked.
"He's real, constable," smiled Lieutenant De Frees, with some
amusement. He then began questioning the boys concerning every detail
of their experiences. Nor did he forget to acknowledge that he had
wronged them on the word of a rascal.
"It must have been their intention to keep you there until they had
made up their minds what to do with you," he said. "But they shall not
go unpunished. If a summary court martial can deal with their cases
it shall do so, and at once. Well?" he added interrogatively, as the
orderly entered the room once more.
He saluted as before, to Constable Timmons' undisguised wonder, and
then said in precise tones:
"There is no trace of the men you sent for, sir."
"What!" demanded the officer.
"They were last seen leaving the grounds in an automobile, sir."
"Good heavens! This is confirmation, indeed, of their guilt," said the
officer. "Were they alone?"
"No, sir. The car was driven by a person some of the men recognized as
a wandering photographer who has been around the grounds for some days,
sir."
"Herr Muller!" exclaimed Ned, forgetting all discipline. "I know now
why the third man seemed so familiar. I--I beg your pardon, sir,
but----"
"That's all right, Strong," said the officer. "Constable, you can rely
on the department cooperating with you in every way to capture these
men. I can't conceive how the photographer Muller fits into the matter,
but if they can be arrested we shall soon find out."
But, despite the officer's hopes of capturing the gang that had made
so much trouble for Ned and Herc, they managed to conceal their traces
cleverly enough to avoid arrest. The automobile in which they had
taken flight--and which had been hired from a local garage--was found
abandoned near a small wayside station, where they might have boarded
a train for some distant point. As for the presence of the automobile,
it was assumed that Herr Muller had visited the abandoned asylum early
that day and discovered that the prisoners had escaped. Realizing that
he must act quickly, he had evidently set out at once to warn Chance
and Merritt. Incidentally, it was found out that Muller, on account of
his anarchistic tendencies, had once been confined in the abandoned
asylum, before its condemnation, which accounted for his familiarity
with it. He had been discharged as "harmless" some time before.
"Humph! He's about as harmless as a rattlesnake!" grunted Herc, when he
heard of this.