LADY COP OF THE SKY
But we must not forget Florence. At Danby Force’s request, she had
arranged for a dance in the Community House. “Call it a waltz night,” he
suggested. “All these older people love the old-fashioned dances and the
waltz is the best of them all.”
“Yes,” she agreed, “there’s nothing quite like a waltz.”
She took great pleasure in arranging for this simple social affair. She
sent a bevy of girls into the hills to gather branches of maple and
sumac. These, all afire with colors of autumn, turned the rather drab
social hall into an elfin grotto. High in one corner she hung a
cardboard moon. Behind this was a powerful electric lamp.
“For the last waltz,” she whispered to Verna who was helping. “We will
turn off all the other lamps and waltz by the light of the golden moon.”
“That,” said the happy girl softly, “will be grand.”
Their waltz night came and with it such a crowd as the Community House
had never before known.
From the musicians of the community Florence had managed to assemble an
excellent orchestra.
To the swinging rhythm of “The Beautiful Blue Danube,” Danby Force and
Florence led the merrymakers away for the first dance.
“They’re happy,” Danby Force said as a pleased smile passed over his
face. “Truly, peacefully happy. This waltz night idea is going to be
fine. We’ll have several of them, have them all winter long.”
“Has he forgotten?” Florence asked herself. “Has the spy and my mission
here slipped from his memory so soon?” It surely seemed so, for here he
was planning her social service work for the distant future.
“Some day,” she told herself with a little shudder, “there will be a big
blow-up around here. The spy will be found. Perhaps I shall find him.
And then there will be no more social work done by little, big
Florence.”
She resolved to forget all this and, for one night at least, enjoy life
to its full.
The fourth waltz had come to a close with a glorious swing. She was
seated on the side line with Danby Force when, of a sudden, a figure
appeared on the narrow platform. A jolly-faced young man he was. His
dark eyes were sparkling, his bushy black hair tumbled about his ears.
His was a face to charm the world. From some woman’s gown he had
snatched a broad belt of red cloth. A fantastic, romantic figure he cut
indeed as he stood there waving his hands. “Well now, that was
wonderful!” he shouted. “Beautiful! Artistic! Entrancing! Marvelous!
“And now—” his face became animated like a thing glowing with inner
fire. “Now let’s have a little jazz.”
The orchestra leader beckoned. He bent low to listen. Then,
“No music? Bah! Who wants music? It goes like this!”
Like a clown in the circus, he produced a saxophone from nowhere at all,
put it to his lips and began a series of strange sounds which everyone
knew was jazz.
“Now!” He beckoned to the orchestra. His body swayed. His eyes shone.
“Now!”
Who could resist him? Whether they could or not, no one did. The
orchestra followed his lead. Dancers swarmed out upon the floor. Soon
the place was a mad house of wild, hilarious dancing. Only Florence and
Danby Force did not dance.
“Who is he?” Florence asked as a puzzled frown overspread her face.
“Hugo?” Danby Force said in a tone of surprise. “Haven’t you met him?
Well, of course you might not. He’s an inspector, works in a back room.
But in a place like this he’s what’s known as the life of the party.
“In fact,” he added, “that’s why I employed him. I thought, with his
saxophone and his high spirits he’d stir things up. We’re a bit dull in
this old town. Well—” he laughed an uneasy laugh. “He’s done it all
right. He’s stirred us up. See for yourself. He’s only been here three
months and he practically runs the town. Jolly fellow, Hugo.”
“Three months,” Florence was thinking to herself. “Then he’s one of the
newcomers. He might be—”
Her thoughts broke off suddenly. Had she caught some movement behind
her? A door stood ajar. Her keen eyes caught sight of a figure that
vanished instantly. It was the little hunchback German, Hans Schneider,
one of her suspects,—she was sure of that.
As if he had read her thoughts, Danby said: “The German people are the
cleverest dye makers in the world. While the World War was on and we
could not get their dyes, we made some very poor cloth I can tell you.
But now—”
He did not finish. She knew what he would have said: “Now if we can but
find this spy, if we can protect our interests, we shall lead the world
and our little city may become the center of a great industry.”
“You don’t dance to that sort of music?” he said, nodding his head
toward the squealing, squawking, sobbing orchestra.
“Is it music?” Florence smiled.
“I wonder!” He did not smile. He was watching the younger people in this
mad whirlpool of motion and sound. “Sometimes I wonder,” he repeated.
“I’ve been told that this jazz started in the dark heart of Africa, or
perhaps in the black Republic of Haiti. That it used to be practiced as
a wild, frenzied dance, mingled with a sort of madness, by the Voodoo
worshippers before they performed something terrible—perhaps human
sacrifice.
“Anyway—” his voice changed, “this wild revel does things to our people.
There’s sure to be things happen tomorrow, a whole batch of color
spoiled perhaps, or bolts of cloth ruined, perhaps valuable machines
wrecked. People are nervous and jumpy after just one wild night. You
can’t trust them to be themselves.
“Last time we had a revel like this,” he laughed low, “one of the girls
was working near a vat of indigo blue coloring matter. She—she tried a
new jazz step, I believe,—and—fell in! She was blue for a week after
that.” He laughed aloud. Florence joined him and felt better. Her night
of waltz music was spoiled, but here at least was amusement. “She would
have been blue for life,” Danby went on, “only the coloring material
wasn’t in its last stages.
“Well—” he rose. “I’ll be going. Got a lot of work to do. No more waltz
tonight.”
“No—no more waltz!” Florence looked up at her imitation moon. She was
disappointed and unhappy. She had pictured that last dance as something
unusual and beautiful.
“Your Hugo is attractive at any rate,” she said to Danby.
Just at that moment Hugo went whirling by. He was dancing with Ina
Piccalo, the dark-eyed girl who had carried away the dye.
“She’s wearing a purple dress,” Florence said to herself, “the very
shade that was in the ink bottle. I wonder—” she was to wonder many
times.
It was not many hours after Florence had returned to her small room in
the bird-cage cottage, when Jeanne, in quite a different part of the
country, started on her strange flight following the small silver plane.
“What can have happened?” Madame Bihari asked herself in utter
astonishment as she watched the two planes, like homing pigeons, rapidly
disappearing into the distance.
That which had happened was truly very simple. As Jeanne, after taxiing
down the field, came in sight of that silver plane, she caught sight of
a tall dark figure just entering the plane. One look was enough. Her
lips parted in sudden surprise as she hissed under her breath: “The dark
lady! The spy!”
She was about to spring from her place when the silver plane, whose
propeller had been slowly revolving, started gliding away. There was
nothing left but to follow.
Jeanne followed, not alone on the ground, but in the air. And did she
follow? Miles and miles the two planes roared on. Perhaps some early
milkman, looking up at the sky, wondered where they were going. Jeanne
wondered also, but not once did she think of turning back. In her mind’s
eye, she could see the earnest look on Danby’s face. She could picture
his happy little city and her friend Florence working there.
“I’ll catch that so terrible spy,” she told herself. “Somehow I _must_!”
We feel certain that she would have accomplished her purpose, but for
one thing. She and Madame had traveled far on the previous day. Their
supply of gas was low. Just when Jeanne fancied that the silver plane
was slowing up for a landing, her motor gave an angry sput-sput-sput,
then went quite dead.
“No gas!” she exclaimed in sudden consternation.
Wildly her eyes sought the earth beneath her. There were plowed fields
to the right and left of her, very soft and dangerous, she knew.
Directly before her were corn shocks, hundreds of them. There were wide
spaces between the shocks. Could she land between them?
With a little prayer to the god of the air, she set her plane to go
gliding in a circle and land as nearly as possible in one particular
spot.
She missed the spot and the space between the shocks completely. With a
sudden intake of breath, she saw herself headed for an endless row of
shocks.
“God take pity on one poor little gypsy girl!” she whispered.
The plane bumped softly. A brown bundle shot past her, another and
another, five, ten, twenty. The earth and sky turned brown. Then, her
plane quite buried in brown, she came to a standstill.
Realizing the danger from fire, she leaped from the plane to begin
dragging at the bundles of corn fodder that covered her motor. To her
surprise, she discovered that someone on the other side was engaged in
the same occupation. When at last the motor was quite clear, a freckled
youth, with two front teeth gone, came round the side to grin at her.
“Now you’ll have t’set ’em all up ag’in, I reckon.” He cackled a merry
cackle.
“Oh no; you set them up.” Jeanne joined him in the laugh. Then, digging
deep in her knickers pocket, she dragged forth a new five dollar bill.
“You take this and get me some gas. You can keep the rest. Just enough
gas to take me to the landing field. Where is the nearest one?”
“Thanks! Er—” the boy paused to cackle again. “Them shocks was just
husked. I husked ’em. Weren’t tied none. If they wasn’t husked you’d
might nigh cracked up, I reckon.
“I’ll get the gas,” he added hurriedly. “Sure I will. Landin’ field over
thar.” He pointed north. “Ten miles. How come you all didn’t stop thar?”
“No gas.” Jeanne smiled a happy smile. “But say! You hurry!” she put in
as he moved slowly away. “I’m a lady cop of the air. I was chasing a
spy.”
“Gee Whillikins! A spy!” The boy was away on the run.