“TARGET PRACTICE”
“Why, I say!” exclaimed the tramp with a wondering stare at Hiram, “you
don’t seem glad at all.”
“It isn’t him, you see,” responded Hiram dubiously. “Oh, yes,” he
hastened to add, noticing the injured way Borden took it, “I’m glad you
are here to draw a picture of the man who tried to blow us up, but I
was almost sure it was—well, a fellow we know, and have every reason to
fear. But it isn’t!”
“I see, I see,” murmured the tramp thoughtfully, and he ran his eye
more critically than ever over his handiwork. “Ye-es,” he continued
slowly, “it’s a pretty fair picture. He doesn’t seem familiar to you;
eh?”
“No, I don’t remember ever having seen a face like that before,”
answered Hiram, doubtfully.
“Just as well, I reckon. He’d be no advantage to anybody, that fellow
wouldn’t. Well, that’s the fellow you want to go after, provided you
intend to.”
“Dave will,” declared Hiram with vim. “There’s some mean hangers-on in
our line, and lots of jealousy, and it’s led to danger and loss for us
several times before this. The management here will take this matter
up, if we make a complaint about it. Dave’s going to. I could see that
from the look on his face when he went off just now. Thanks!” he
shouted to a young fellow on a motor cycle who flashed by, flipping an
envelope to Hiram. He had a gold braided “M” on his cap, indicating
that he was a grounds messenger acting as postboy in distributing the
mail to the various hangars. “Why,” added Hiram with increased
animation of manner, as he scanned the printed words in one corner of
the envelope, “it’s from Chicago, and the headquarters of the
International Meet Association we were talking about not an hour ago. I
wonder——”
Hiram strolled off by himself, looking out for Dave, and building all
kinds of air castles. In about five minutes his chum put in an
appearance. Hiram ran towards him, waving the envelope, and placed it
in his hands. Dave opened it. His assistant watched his face keenly,
and was gratified to note that it assumed a pleased expression.
“It’s from the people offering all those prizes we were talking about;
isn’t it, Dave?” questioned his eager assistant.
“Yes,” replied the other, “it’s from the committee of the big
International meet. They invite us to participate, Hiram.”
“Us?” repeated Hiram—“Oh, yes! You can be sure they’d ask you, though.
What you going to do about it?”
“Oh, we’ll think it over. They write that they are sending the details,
such as rules and restrictions, in a later mail. We’ll study them when
they come.”
Of course Hiram, in his impetuous way, was ready to take up any
proposition in the aviation line, no matter how important. To him Dave
was the one champion in the field able to compete with all rivals. He
had been with Dave long enough, however, to get used to his methodical
business-like ways. Hiram was eager to plunge at once into the merits
of the new proposition, but he knew that Dave had put the matter aside
until he was ready to take it up for real action.
“Oh, say, Dave,” Hiram changed the subject, “come along till I show you
the picture our tramp friend has drawn. That’s the man who tried to
blow us up,” he announced, as they reached the side of the hangar where
the sheet of manilla paper was tacked.
Dave surveyed the sketch critically. He saw at a glance that the artist
had caught some strong facial characteristics of the person whose
likeness he had attempted to draw. The young birdman shook his head
slowly.
“Don’t know him?” broke in Hiram questioningly—“neither do I. Anybody
would again, though, if that sketch looks like him. See here, Dave,”
and Hiram was very serious and impressive, “it’s just such mean tricks
as this one that have been the start of all kinds of trouble for us. We
want to nip it in the bud this time. What do they say up at the office?”
“They promise a thorough investigation. There has been quite a lot of
vandal work at the different meets, and they say they will spare no
pains, or expense, to run down the fellows who are discrediting our
exhibitions. Want to speak to me?” asked Dave in a kindly tone,
noticing the tramp hovering about near them as if he had something on
his mind.
“Why, yes,” answered Borden. “You fellows have been mighty good to me,
and I feel as if I owed you something. I’m no detective, or anything of
that sort, but if it’s a point to you to find out something about the
original of that picture——”
“I should say it was!” interrupted Hiram, strenuously.
“Then, as I’m the one who saw him closest, and who know him best, maybe
I’d be luckiest in recognizing him on sight. I’ll take a little scurry
around, if you say so, and try to run him down, or head him off, and
find out what’s back all this.”
“Vernon, our old-time enemy is back of it, or else some envious chaps
who think you may go to this new meet, and who want to keep you out of
it because they know you’ll win,” whispered Hiram to Dave.
“That is a very good idea,” said the latter to Borden. “You think you
saw this same man hanging around the grounds last evening? You might
come across him again by keeping your eyes open. Suppose you do that
now? Here’s a little change you may need,” and the young aviator
slipped some silver coins into the man’s hand. “Hiram, the management
here are talking about a bonus-flight the end of this week. I’m
interested and have promised to meet with the directors in an hour. I
suppose you want to take your regular fly with the _Scout_?”
“I’ve counted on it,” replied Hiram promptly, “but some one ought to
keep a close watch around the hangar, I suppose.”
“Oh, I don’t think we’ll be troubled in the day time,” answered Dave.
“You can arrange with the grounds watchman to look in on our property
from time to time. You won’t be gone very long, I suppose?”
“Oh, just a scurry across country, and back,” replied Hiram, with a
nonchalance manifestly affected, and Dave smiled to himself, suspecting
that his young assistant was up to something as he recalled to his mind
the mysterious bags that Hiram had been making.
Surely enough, those same bags played a part in the later proceedings
of the ardent young amateur airman. The tramp had started off on his
mission, promising to report his possible discoveries that same
evening. Dave followed him in the direction of the office of the
grounds. Hiram, left alone, bustled about in the most active enjoyment
of one of those occasions when he was given a chance to test out the
knowledge of air-sailing he had acquired under the tuition of his
gifted chum. He threw open the doors of the hangar, and, as the bright
sunlight streamed in, stood in a sort of rapt dream surveying the two
machines exposed to his view.
“The beauties!” he cried, his sparkling eyes resting first upon the
_Ariel_ and then upon the _Scout_.
The _Ariel_ was the very latest model in the aeroplane line. It
succeeded the famous _Comet_. That was the fine machine in which Dave
and his friends had made their trip around the world. The _Comet_ had
been built more for rough usage and staying power, than for fancy
sprints or stunts. It was now an honored relic in the show rooms of the
Interstate Aero Company. Only a few weeks before the present
introduction of the reader to our young hero, Mr. Brackett had
delighted his young protégé by shipping to him, at the Midlothian
grounds, the latest model in air craft.
The _Ariel_ flew as a parasol-type biplane. It gratified Dave to note
that the manufacturer had followed out many incidental suggestions he,
himself, had made from time to time, when visiting the plant which Mr.
Brackett practically owned. The main planes of the new machine enabled
easy entrance to, and exit from, the cockpit. The pilot had an
unhampered view in all directions. The craft had a maximum span of
thirty-five feet and a chord of seven feet.
The area of the main planes was two hundred and twenty-five square
feet. The over-all length of the machine was twenty-five feet, while
the weight empty, was nine hundred pounds. The motor was of radial
construction and of the six-cylinder type, having a bore and stroke of
five by six inches respectively. A speed of about eighty miles per hour
was easily attained by the machine loaded with fifty gallons of
gasoline and ten of lubricant, as an average for a three-hour flight.
“Want some help?” inquired a man from a neighboring hangar, strolling
up to the spot.
“Just a mere lift,” replied Hiram briskly. “The little _Scout_ acts
just as anxious to get up cloud-chasing as I am.”
“Ready,” announced the helper, getting into position.
“Let her go,” ordered the enthusiastic young airman in a tone like a
hurrah, his quivering fingers clutching wheel and control, and
thrilling to the tips with animation and delight.
It was a superb day. Air, sky and wind currents were propitious for an
easy flight. To Hiram there was nothing in the world equal to that
delightful sensation of skimming through the air like a bird. It was
almost rapture to realize that the turn of a wrist, or the pressure of
his foot sent the airy, graceful fabric of steel and wood far aloft,
like a pinion-poised eagle, ascending safely through space as would a
speeding swallow arrow-aimed for a long, deep dive.
Hiram struck a course due west, once aloft at a convenient level. Eyes
and mind were fixed upon a direct point in view. At the end of an hour
he was out of sight of the camp and the air craft practicing in the
vicinity of the exhibition grounds.
Between two settlements, some fifteen miles apart, Hiram began to
descend. It was where a two mile reach of level pasture land
intervened, dotted here and there with underbrush and stunted trees.
The _Scout_ landed and its young pilot alighted. Under one arm he
carried some sheets of white paper. He halted to place one of these on
the ground, holding it flat by stones weighing down its corners. He
then proceeded fully half a mile farther, again placed a sheet on the
ground, gradually, in like manner, making a circle of fully a mile and
a half. Finally he came back to the _Scout_, and got up into the air
again.
“Target practice!” chuckled Hiram, as he circled away from the spot,
made a sharp turn and volplaned full speed, as though aiming to land,
nose first, directly upon the first white sheet in his course. Hiram
made a magnificent dive. He swung over the control so that fifty feet
from the ground the machine turned the reverse arc of a circle of
nearly two hundred feet. His hand shot down beside him and grasped one
of the bags, lifted it, aimed it and practically fired it at the
“target” in view.
“Missed,” he grimly observed, but quite pleased all the same, for the
bag landed flat and did not roll, and lay not two feet away from its
intended mark.
“Hit it!” crowed the excited Hiram as, with a second swoop, he made a
direct hit of the second target with a second bag. The third was a
miss. The fourth was like the second.
“If I can make it that good, what can’t Dave Dashaway do?” soliloquized
the young aeronaut, as he gathered up the bags and replaced them in the
_Scout_. “I’ll spring the scheme on him just as soon as he makes up his
mind to go into that International contest, which he’s just _got_ to
do!”
Hiram went afloat once more, determined on a swift run west, a turn,
and then a course homeward bound.
“Hum” he chuckled. “If any of the airmen saw my maneuvers with those
bags they’d think I was practicing to go over to Europe and drop bombs.
Now what does that mean?” murmured the lad suddenly, and, with a quick
start, Hiram slackened his speed, to study out the details of a lively
scene in progress directly beneath him.
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