JOE MISSING
Curlie Carson was worried. As he sat on his rolled-up sleeping-bag in the
tent which had been set with the usual care for a night’s comfort, his
fingers drummed incessantly on the box which held his three-stage
amplifier, while he muttered ever now and again:
“Wish he’d come. I don’t like the looks of it. What’s keeping him? That’s
what I’d like to know.”
Joe was three hours overdue. After many days of travel they had made
their way far into the interior of Alaska, well away toward the Yukon.
Day by day they had broken trail for their dogs and day by day moved
forward. At first the trail had been hard-packed from many dog teams
passing from village to village. But as they pushed farther and farther
into the wilderness these villages had vanished. Towns that were towns
only in name greeted them now as they advanced. An Indian’s hovel here,
the shack of a long-bearded patriarch of a miner there, that was all.
Snow had fallen in abundance. They were obliged to break every foot of
trail before their dog teams.
Food was scarce. The question of feeding their dogs had become a problem.
Then, only this very afternoon an Indian had told of a cache of caribou
meat some ten miles away in the forest. If they would wait for him to
bring it, they would have fine fresh meat in abundance.
The boys had debated the question. They were eager to go forward. A
whispered message of the night before had led them to believe that their
quest was nearing its end; that the man they sought was not far before
them on the trail; yet the dogs must be fed.
It had been decided at last that Joe Marion with an all but empty sled
should await the supply of meat, while the others pressed on breaking the
trail until near nightfall, when they would make camp and await his
arrival.
Curlie and Jennings had carried out their part of the program, but when
he should have arrived Joe had not appeared, rounding the clump of spruce
trees to the south of them.
After an hour of anxious waiting, Jennings, taking his rifle, had gone
out to search for him.
“May have lost his way,” he had commented.
Curlie had remained to listen in on his radiophone. Joe carried with him,
attached to his sled, a complete sending and receiving set. In time of
trouble the first thing he would think of would be getting off a
radiophone message to his companions.
“Ought to be getting something,” Curlie mumbled. “I wonder what could
have happened? I wonder—”
He paused for reflection. Night by night as he had sat upon his
sleeping-bag, listening in, strange messages had come to him from the
sky. Now the rude interference of the unknown man who had been tearing up
the traffic of the air told Curlie that they were coming closer to one
another, and now the whisper of the girl, that ghostlike creature who
appeared to haunt the track of the lawbreaker, told Curlie of the day
fast approaching when he and the outlaw of the air must meet face to
face. At such times he had wondered if he should then meet the girl as
well as the man.
On the previous night the whisper had informed him that they were but
seventy-five miles apart.
“Coming, coming,” Curlie had whispered to himself.
The trail had been heavy. They had made but fifteen miles. What of the
stranger? How far had he come?
Curlie’s heart skipped a beat at the realization that he must be very
near at hand.
At the same time there came a disturbing question. Had this man of evil
intentions somehow stolen a march on them? Had he been in league with the
Indian who had claimed to possess a supply of caribou meat? Had this been
but a ruse to get them separated?
“Well, if it was, it’s been a complete success,” he exclaimed. “Three of
us and not one of us knows where the others are.”
Turning, he reached for a box-magazine rifle. After examining the clip in
the chamber, he slipped three other loaded ones in his pockets.
“You can never tell,” he whispered, “you sure can not.”
A great silence hovered over the forest which bounded the banks of the
Tanana River. Such silences existed in these Arctic wilds as Curlie had
never before experienced.
“Fairly spooky,” he whispered to himself. “Wish I could hear
something—wind in the treetops, even. But there’s not a breath.”
The forest lay all about him. Everywhere the ground was buried in two
feet of snow. Muffled footsteps might at this moment be approaching the
camp.
At last, unable to bear it longer, he snapped off the radiophone for a
moment to adjust a smaller set and tune it to 200, the wave length he and
Joe had agreed to use if in distress.
When this smaller set had been called into action, he tuned the larger
set to longer wave lengths. He hoped to catch some sound from the air
which might relieve the awful silence.
“Wonderful thing this radiophone,” he told himself. “Great boon to the
Arctic. Think of the trader, the trapper, the gold hunter alone in his
cabin, tired of the sound of his own voice and that of his dog. Think of
being able to tune in on his radio and bring down snatches of song, of
instrumental music and of ordinary conversation, right out of the
air—some young girl sending her lover a good-night kiss, for instance,”
he chuckled to himself. “But—”
He paused abruptly. He was getting something on the long wave lengths.
Faint, indistinct at first came the message. Yet he caught it clearly.
His nerves tingled as he listened. It was Munson, the great Arctic
explorer. He was attempting to inform the outside world, especially the
men who had financed his expedition, of his plans. He had established a
large supply station on Flaxman Island; then he had pushed fearlessly out
through the floes toward the Pole. His ship was strongly built, with an
extra covering of iron-wood on its keel. Its engines were powerful. He
would go as far as the steamer would carry him, then he would hop off in
an airplane and attempt the Pole. He was supplied with three airplanes.
In these, if his ship should be wrecked, he would be able to carry his
entire company and crew to the supply house on Flaxman Island.
This brief report was followed by a personal message to his wife, then
the air was once more clear. The old, monotonous silence settled down
upon Curlie’s little world. During all the time he had listened in, his
fingers had been flying across a sheet of paper. He had written down the
message. It was within the realm of possibility that he was the only
operator who had got it. In that case it would be his duty to relay it to
those for whom it was intended.
During all this time one question had been revolving in his mind: Why had
not the man he sought, the outlaw of the air, broken in on this message?
He had been informed that this man had taken delight in breaking up
Munson’s communications. Why then this silence? Could it be that he
himself was out scouting around, trying to ambush Joe and Jennings and in
time even Curlie himself? Or was he merely afraid of being detected at
this time?
“Possibly,” said Curlie to himself, “there was something about that
message which interested him. In that case he would want to hear to the
end.”
Suddenly his hand made a clutch at his rifle. What was that? Had he
caught the sound of a footstep or was it merely a white owl flapping his
wings? He sat there listening, scarcely breathing, awaiting he hardly
knew what. And, at this moment, on the 200 meter wave lengths a message
came to his waiting ears.