OUR YOUNG AEROPLANE SCOUTS IN RUSSIA
Or
Lost On The Frozen Steppes
by
HORACE PORTER
Author of"Our Young Aeroplane Scouts In France and Belgium.""Our Young Aeroplane Scouts In Germany.""Our Young Aeroplane Scouts In Turkey."
A.L. Burt CompanyNew York
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Copyright, 1915By A. L. Burt Company
OUR YOUNG AEROPLANE SCOUTS IN RUSSIA
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OUR YOUNG AEROPLANE SCOUTS IN RUSSIA.
CHAPTER I.
THE SIGN OF THE THUMB.
"Well, my young skyscrapers, I hear that you were lost in Petrograd, butthe special messengers tell me that if anything else was lost it was nottime on the way back."
The aviation chief in Warsaw had this greeting for Our Young AeroplaneScouts, Billy Barry, U. S. A., and his chum Henri Trouville, when theyoung airmen completed an interview with Colonel Malinkoff, the officerwho had selected them as pilots for the dispatch-bearing aerial trip tothe Russian capital.
"Maybe you think we are like bad pennies--always sure to turn up,"laughed Billy. "But, believe me," continued the boy, "it was no merryjest to us when the strange streets seemed to have no end, and we knewthat we were counted upon to pull out by daylight."
"I can't figure, upon my life, why you tried to foot it alone; at night,too, in a city like that."
The aviation chief had another think coming to him, if he imagined for aminute that he was going to hear the real story of the Petrogradadventure from the youths he addressed.
"We thought the walk would do us good."
Henri had some difficulty in keeping a serious face when Billy offeredthis plea as an excuse for the performance that had almost broughtnervous prostration to Salisky and Marovitch, the dispatch bearers.
In a quiet corner later on, Henri had no desire to even smile when Billygravely reviewed the possibility of the vengeful Cossack tracing them toWarsaw.
"You know," said the boy from Bangor, "those fellows hang on like grimdeath when they have a grudge against anybody, and this wild and woollyscout is evidently anxious to stick his claws into us."
"Maybe after all," suggested Henri, "it is just because he thinks we arespies, having seen us working with or, rather, for the other side."
"Why, then, didn't he make his spring when we were within easy reach?"
"You forget, Billy," replied Henri, "that by the time he had patched uphis memory we were in Malinkoff palace, and even the tiger of the plainswould hesitate before attempting to rough it with a Russian duke."
"And there was a good reason why he did not have it out with us when weleft the palace," added Billy.
"A backway reason," concluded Henri.
The Russian secret service, reputed to be a wonderfully efficientsystem, had now advices of the activities of that eminent arch-schemer,Roque, or whatever other name by which he was known, in this section ofthe war zone.
The blowing up of the war depot in Warsaw was less a mystery since theauthorities had learned of the presence of this dreaded operator even soclose as the width of a river.
If the wily Cossack could connect our boys with the previous movementsof the aforesaid Roque, then, as Billy would say, "good night."
In Colonel Malinkoff would be vested their only hope.
That the boys were not crazy about making another journey at present toPetrograd, goes without saying. They would be insane if they did, oftheir own accord.
But, luckily, their next flying assignment was the piloting of scoutssent out daily to observe the maneuvers of the great army in gray, thenworking on a new tack to break into the coveted city of Warsaw.
The aviators operated near a battle front nearly forty miles wide, andabove a veritable hurricane of gunpowder, but in this experience Billyand Henri had grown old.
Once away from the city, and up in the air, their chief worry was behindthem--their Cossack Nemesis could go hang!
From Salisky, now acting as observer in one of the biplanes, the boyslearned of the fall of the great underground fortress of Przemysl, inand out of which they had served as aerial messengers, and where theyhad, not so long ago, bidden farewell to that gallant soldier-aviator,Stanislaws.
"I hope that 'Stanny' will be given a soft berth as a prisoner," saidBilly to his chum.
In the presence of the other airmen, however, the boys kept discreetlysilent as to their acquaintance with the Austrian fort and town nowoverrun by the Russian forces.
Now and again there were days when Billy and Henri were relieved of thestrain of constant aeroplane driving, and which was given to wanderingabout the streets of busy Warsaw.
One afternoon their steps inclined to the well remembered square withthe tall column and heroic statue of bronze. In the door of a shopbearing the symbol of a silversmith, the proprietor happened to bestanding when the boys strolled by.
This tradesman, at the time without trade, suddenly changed from sleepyattitude to one of alert anticipation after second view of thestrollers. Under a skull cap of silk gleamed a pair of keen, blue eyes,and the smooth-shaven face of the man was alight with a half-smile ofrecognition.
He lifted his right hand with a peculiar gesture, the thumb folded intothe palm.
Billy, idly glancing at the performer, remarked:
"That fellow wants to sell you a dinner set of fifty pieces, Buddy."
"That hole in the wall wouldn't hold half of it," joked Henri.
The tradesman seemed puzzled at the lack of response to his thumbsignal, but he was evidently determined to have a word with the boys.
With a low bow he stepped to the middle of the sidewalk, as ifsoliciting custom, and in English, with peculiar accent, softlymentioned a familiar term--Two Towers!
Billy started as if a torpedo had exploded underfoot.
"Where have I seen that face before?"
This thought wave was instantly merged into the sense of knowing:--
The coal heaver who had presented the soiled scrap of paper whichsummoned the young aviators to the twin towers on the day of thedestruction of the war depot!
That face, though now clean of grime, was the same that had burneditself into the lad's memory when the stirring message was delivered.
"I gave you the sign and you did not respond. Why?"
"Blest if I know what you mean," Billy told the supposed silversmith.
"But it was to you that I was sent when the hour of need was near."
"Now see here, for good and all, let me say that neither my chum normyself has any knowledge of the inside workings about which you aretrying to talk, and what's more we don't want to know anything aboutthem. Mr. Roque showed us a lot, but I guess he stopped somewhere thisside of the inner circle."
Billy did not care to assume any new responsibility which might leadHenri and himself into some maze of mystery far beyond their depth.
The man addressed appeared to be puzzled at the boy's reference to "Mr.Roque." He evidently believed that Billy was fencing with him. "Kindlystep into the store for a moment; I will not detain you long."
Though both the boys had reached the same conclusion, that it was a sortof spider and the fly game, they impulsively followed the leader intothe little shop.
Spreading a few articles of jewelry and silverware upon the top of thecounter, as a cloak for the line of talk he was pursuing, he
quicklyremarked:
"I sometimes fear that I am a suspect, and we cannot be too careful inthese times."
Billy darted a look at Henri full of apprehension--"we cannot be toocareful."
"It is no use to hide behind the bush, one from the other, my youngfriends," continued the man behind the counter; "of course, I do notblame you for being cautious, but now that we are past the limit ofassurance, let us get together and talk straight."
"You still have the advantage of us," insisted Billy, glancing uneasilytoward the door, as if contemplating a hasty move in that direction.
The keen blue eyes under the skull cap flashed a threat of growingirritation.
"Perhaps you do not appreciate, young man," and the voice of the speakersounding a harsh note, "that we sink or swim together. It is no ordinarytie that binds us, and woe to the one who breaks it."
"Say, old scout," interposed Henri, "this isn't a theater."
"Or an asylum," added Billy.
How the silversmith would have resented these strokes at his manner ofdramatic declaration was left for surmise, for at the moment his wholeexpression changed to one of bland greeting at the sight of a newcomerin the shop--a man who presented a wide front view, wearing a militarycape and fairly bristling with authority, evidenced by his manner ofpushing open the door and his heavy tread, which raised a creak from thefloor as he strode to the counter where the boys were standing.
"They have just dug something that looks like a clock out of the ruinsup there, Ricker, and as you are the nearest time tinker around here, Iwant you to come alone and see what you think of it."
The boys saw the hue of ashes in the face of the tradesman, but thewords that gave him the scare were as Greek to them.
"Certainly, sir; certainly," the silversmith was saying, as he reachedfor his hat and greatcoat, hanging on a convenient peg. Turning to theboys, he politely directed them to the door, with an excellent imitationof regret that their expected purchase must be delayed by this emergencycall.
On the sidewalk the boys watched the turn of the corner of the burlycape wearer and the silversmith, the latter walking like a weary soldieron a forced march.
"Here's a pretty howdy-de-do, Buddy," observed Henri, "getting twistedup with a fellow that evidently has a price on his head, and who thinkswe are as deep in the muddle as he is. Did you ever see such luck?"
"If I knew a single word in the outlandish language spoken by that fatpoliceman I could tell better about our chances of being bothered againby the man with the thumb sign."
It was not the first time that Billy had been stumped by the variouslingoes in the war zone.
While the boys were dreaming that night of lurid initiation into somebloody brotherhood, there came riding into Warsaw a bevy of splendidlymounted horsemen, brilliantly attired in scarlet, gold-braided caftans,white waistcoats and blue trousers--imperial Cossacks from Petrograd!