GOOD NEWS
At midnight Johnny received a long distance call from the city. Curlie
was on the wire. He and Grace Palmer, following the tip from the
mysterious note, had gone to the breakwater and there retrieved the
registered package with its seal unbroken.
“And they are all there, the jewels,” Grace Palmer broke in over his
shoulder. “The little diamond and platinum train and all the rest. And
there will be a reward, such a reward! Oh, how big! And we’ll share it,
we four, Curlie, Joyce and you and I.”
* * * * * * * *
“So it was you, Greasy Thumb, and your gang!” “The Ferret” said, after
receiving the good news. “It was you, and not the radicals, who robbed
the Air Mail! And I haven’t the least doubt that it was your money the
dead Spy gripped in his hand! Blood money for betraying my boy!
“Oh, you’ll get your due now! We’ll have you before an honest judge. And
the world will not see you again until your hair is white.”
Once more he lapsed into silence.
And so, before a great fire, they spent the night, until dawn and a
strong power boat came together to light the waters and to bear guards
and prisoners back to the city.
* * * * * * * *
Evening of that day found three people standing before the cabin that
had known love and hate, life and death. There was a gray haired man and
a boy. And between them a slim, dark-eyed girl. Johnny, Joyce and Newton
Mills.
Having recovered from his injuries, save for a scalp wound that would
soon heal, the veteran detective had told, amid laughter and tears, how
he had concealed his identity under a gray coat and whiskers so that he
might better play the part of protector to his young friend, Johnny.
The affair in the tunnel had been a high spot. He it had been who had
warned Johnny and saved him from drowning.
The affair of the glider among the clouds was merely the result of a
freak of fancy.
He had come alone to the north woods and had arrived just in time to
save the boy from the murderous assault of the Spy.
“Who,” asked Joyce as the three stood watching the sun go down over the
bay, “wrote those notes to Grace Palmer?”
“No one knows,” was Johnny’s reply. “Perhaps none of us ever will know.
Some enemy of Greasy Thumb, perhaps. Every bad man has his enemies. And
they are, more often than not, his undoing.”
For a time after that there was silence. Then, as she laid a hand gently
on a shoulder of each of her companions, the girl spoke again:
“When do we go back?”
“We don’t go back.” Johnny’s voice was husky. “We go on into the silent
north, perhaps. It may be that we shall find a land where men are just
and merciful and kind.”
“Is there such a land?” she whispered.
“Who knows, unless he goes to see?”
Did they go on? Or did they go back? If you wish to know, you will find
the answer in our next book entitled: _Riddle of the Storm_.
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public
domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard (or amusing)
spellings and dialect unchanged.
--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the
HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)