XV
WINGING INTO THE NORTHLAND
Perk was still in a high rage because of their having been subjected tothat shower of whistling lead.
"For two cents--if you 'lowed me to do it partner," he boomed with manya shake of his head, "an' swooped down once more, I'd a let loose onthem pesky jayhawkers an' rum-runners with my bully o' machine gun. It'dseem jest like ol' times come back agin an' you bet I'd a pickled a fewo' the rattlesnake bunch!"
"Remember Perk, we're not up here to pickle anybody. This is only whatyou might call a little side-show--the big round-up lies further northwhere we've been given a job to tackle--we're just on our way--that'sthe whole thing in a nutshell."
As usual Perk soon calmed down, being sensible enough to realize that noinjury had been done either their ship or themselves. They had met upwith a stirring little adventure and come out of the row with creditwhich ought to be satisfactory, on their side at least.
"What dye s'pose them yaps think 'bout us flyin' so low down over theirheads like we wanted to take a peep at the mule pack train?" hepresently asked the one at the stick.
"That's something we can only give a guess at," Jack told him. "They'rejust naturally suspicious as all lawbreakers are and I reckon right nowthey're likely comparing notes to try and get a line on our standing."
"Huh! guess now you might mean whether they had anything to fear 'boutour ship or not, eh partner?"
"That's the idea, buddy. Up in this part of the country air craft are ararity, I should say and they must be a whole lot suspicious afterhaving us dip down as we did. I don't imagine any one saw that you weretaking a snapshot of the pack train, for they had no glasses that Inoticed."
"Oh! that part worked okay ol' hoss," quickly announced Perk, "I didn'tmake any show when I snapped the gun off but we sure got 'em guessin' ifI know my beans an' I figger I do. If you don't mind mentionin' the factpartner, how do you mean to get in touch with Mister Maxwell so's to lethim know what's goin' on up here on these mountain trails?"
"I'll find a way to do that before long," came the confident answer. "Ofcourse, he may not be able to lay a trap for this particular pack-trainbut they keep on coming, and like as not the next convoy will run upagainst a snag. Mr. Maxwell I imagine, is a corker of an operator, onewho never lets the grass grow under his feet when there's need for quickaction. Some fine morning, after we get back from this trip, we'll beapt to read all about how this rum-running business with mules carryingthe stuff over the mountains, has been smashed to a powder and all thehead men put behind bars."
"Unless I'm away off my guess," further remarked the loquaciousPerk--who seemed wound up and just must keep going for so long beforecooling off--"that clippin' said somethin' 'bout a warehouse on thisside o' the line. Reckon now there's anythin' in that report, Jack?"
"You're a little off the track there, brother," he was told. "No suchthing as a warehouse was mentioned. It simply stated that it wasbelieved the pack trains all centered at a certain point where they hadbig, powerful trucks in waiting to carry the smuggled cases to certaincities where they were in cahoots with the authorities--meaning ofcourse, that the officers sworn to carry out the laws of the country andtheir own State, are taking graft and closing their eyes to what isgoing on."
"Huh! nice kettle o' fish when such things c'n go on with the jails sofull now they're turnin' the real criminals out to make room for thesepizen snakes in the grass."
"That's none of our business, Perk. We're only a part of the SecretService layout with our work mapped out for us. When we've shown up withresults, that's as far as we've got to consider--let the solons do therest."
Something in Jack's decisive manner of saying this must have warned thetalkative one the matter had been threshed out as far as was needful forthe time being and that it would be just as well if they relapsed intosilence so as to consider other matters that were really more important.
So Perk clamped on the lid and talked only to himself for a long timeafterwards, a sport that generally afforded him considerable joy andsatisfaction.
Time passed, with their ship keeping up its swift passage, now close tothe tops of outlying ridges and anon passing over valleys so far beneaththe voyagers that objects to the naked eye assumed very diminutiveproportions.
No further mule pack-trains were sighted but then Jack had consideredthis fact and had no expectation of meeting up with a second caravan.Because of the existing necessity for guarding the high-priced boozethey dealt in, so as to be prepared to resist an encounter with banditsknown in the rum racket under the name of hijackers, the expeditionscould only be sent off at stated periods and there might not be anotherfor a week or two.
It was all pretty wild country over which they swept as on the wings ofan eagle heading for the breeding places of its species far up towardthe Arctic Circle and in due time Perk began to weary of staring down atsuch monotonous pictures.
Once they passed over a railroad and he felt thrilled by the thoughtthat man's ability to invade the most inaccessible regions of the earthhad put a bit and bridle into the mouth of even so wild a horse as sucha land could be compared to in the mind of a visionary fellow like Perk.
On they went, still penetrating deeper into the mysterious northland andheading for that isolated post of the Canadian Mounted Police that wassaid to be at the extreme edge of the uninhabited stretch lying south ofthose desolate barrens touching on the Arctic regions where, accordingto Perk's way of describing things, might be found the jumping-off placethat gradually fades away into the near Polar ice-cap.
It was as Jack had learned, a great country for pelts and with signs ofgold cropping out of the soil in a myriad of places. The only livinghuman beings likely to be met with would be lone trappers running linesof traps in the dreadful winter season, occasional daring prospectorsand stray Indian villagers during the summer when they carried on theirannual hunt for meat to be cured for winter use.
Here too, might be found in secret hideouts more than a few fugitivesfrom justice--men who had fled from the long arm of the law and livedthe lives of hermits, their hand against all others and compelled bynecessity to play the part of desperadoes.
Such a dominating character as the Hawk would not be long amidst suchsurroundings before he gathered to his standard a select number of likebold spirits. These would be only too willing to follow him in his raidson the stores of isolated fur-takers, white or red, it mattered not,since all men looked alike in their eyes or making occasional moreambitious forays upon some outpost and trading center of the greatHudson Bay Company.
Even the Mounties it seemed had thus far been baffled in all theirefforts to break up this powerful and elusive corporation of evildoers,so cleverly handled were the go-getters under the Hawk that they had arare faculty for slipping out of any trap set for them, just as theIrishman's flea never was where he jabbed his finger down.
It tickled Perk's vanity considerably to think a problem that had solong been too much of a knotty one to be solved by those wonderfullysmart members of the Mounties had now, after a fashion, been transferredto the shoulders of himself and comrade--that the stern resolution onthe part of the Government at Washington to recapture the criminal whohad given the penitentiary at Leavenworth French leave had so worked outas to form a sort of partnership between the Secret Service and theconstabulary of the Great Northwest country.
Having himself served in the ranks with some of those Mounties, it waspuzzling Perk tremendously as to just how his former comrades had fallendown on the job of bringing in the Hawk. He had always believed thatthey never failed to get their man, sooner or later, being ready tofollow him to the Pole itself if necessary and to ease his worried mindof this strain he now, as usual, turned his batteries on Jack once more.