AT CAPE PERIL
 
 Boy Scouts of the Air Books 
 
 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 At Cape Peril
 
 The 
 
 Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 At Cape Peril 
 
 BY 
 GORDON STUART 
 
 Frontispiece by Harry W. Armstrong 
 
 The Reilly & Lee Co. 
 Chicago
 
 Copyright, 1921 
 
 By 
 The Reilly & Lee Co. 
 
 Made in V. 8. A* 
 
 The Boy Scouts of the Air at Cape Peril
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. STARTING THE ADVENTURE 9 
 
 n. JUMPING OFF AT CAPE HENRY 28 
 
 III. THE JAMBOREE 43 
 
 IV. CAPE PERIL 's JOLLY HERMIT 59 
 
 V. THE INTERRUPTED MESSAGE 77 
 
 VI. THE HAUNTS OF BUFFALO DARE 92 
 
 VII. THE BIRD HAD FLOWN 102 
 
 VHI. PLUGGING A MAN-EATER 113 
 
 IX. WARNINGS IN THE AIR 126 
 
 X. TREASURE TROVE 133 
 
 XI. HOW THE AlRBUG STARTED 148 
 
 XII. THE CAPE PERIL LIGHT Is OUT 163 
 
 XIII. RESCUE THROUGH THE STORM 171 
 
 XIV. CAP'N BUFFUM'S REVELATIONS 180 
 
 XV. CAT FINDS A KEY 189 
 
 XVI. CAT IN AMBUSH 197 
 
 XVII. HARDY STRIKES A HOT TRAIL 203 
 
 XVIII. THE NIGHT RIDERS. 215 
 
 XIX. KNITTING UP THE CLUES 222 
 
 XX. COMPARING NOTES 227 
 
 XXL THE SKIPPER FILLS THE GAPS 237 
 
 XXII. THE TRIALS OF CAP'N BUFFUM 242 
 
 XXIII. EXIT THE SEABOARD AIRLINE PATROL. .251 
 
 20;
 
 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 At Cape Peril 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 STABTINQ THE ADVENTUBE 
 
 In the second car of an electric train racket- 
 ing on its way to the seashore, sat three boys 
 in scout costume. Two sat side by side, while 
 the third, twisted around in the seat just in 
 front, was facing them and talking with an ani- 
 mation that arrested the attention and excited 
 the merriment of the non-scout passengers near 
 him. 
 
 " I say, it's a shame to make a catfish travel 
 on a motorcycle while you two landlubbers take 
 the Seaboard Airline to Cape Peril." 
 
 The speaker's fascinatingly homely face was 
 almost sliced in two by a capacious mouth, which, 
 when open, revealed snaggly teeth with gaps
 
 10 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 between, the whole effect offering a ludicrous 
 resemblance to the denizen of the deep he had 
 just mentioned. 
 
 " Well, we matched for the airplane rides, 
 didn't we? " retorted a round-eyed, smooth- 
 cheeked youngster, whose slender figure, when 
 erect, must have been at least six feet one. 
 " Take your medicine like a scout and close 
 up that Mammoth Cave of yours. " 
 
 " That's right, Legs, hand it to him good and 
 straight," approved the companion by his side, 
 dark of hair, swarthy of complexion, stocky 
 in build, and a good foot and a half shorter 
 than the other. " Nothing's ever settled with 
 Cat Miller. Might know his daddy was a 
 politician. Button up your mouth, Cat, button 
 up your mouth." 
 
 Regardless of this admonition, Cat grinned 
 like a Billikin and then came back, " That's 
 all right, Legs Hatton, you and Jimmy Todd, 
 you better take a lesson from my dad and from 
 me too. I got you fellows this trip, didn't I? " 
 
 " Doggone right you did," conceded Jimmy, 
 speedily changing his tone to one of apprecia- 
 tion, " and, Cat, old boy, you're some getter!
 
 At Cape Peril 11 
 
 A fellow doesn't get a treat like this every day. 
 Gee! It's great to go camping without having 
 to take a thing along except one little knapsack 
 full, and to be able to chase around all day 
 with nothing on but trunks! We'll be regular 
 Indians. Won't take us long to look as sweet 
 as we did when we got home from school after 
 scrapping through that Paradise Alley gang. 
 Eemember that bunch, Cat? " Jimmy grinned 
 at his friend. 
 
 " Do I? Well, I should smile. Look here, 
 see this little souvenir over my left eye one 
 of those suckers handed me with a brickbat? 
 I reckon I do remember 'em." 
 
 11 Ye-ah, and I tried to stop the blood with 
 a piece of brown paper while you were yelling 
 like murder," returned Jimmy, glowing with 
 these memories of his early youth, " and gee! 
 When I got home, Mother wanted to know why 
 in thunder I was so bloody, and I asked her 
 how she expected a fellow to keep clean when 
 he had to fight his way from school every day 
 through a gang of hoboes. Gosh! those Para- 
 dise Alleycats were lulus. A white collar and 
 a clean shirt set thse guys wild, same as a
 
 12 The Boy Scouts -of the Air 
 
 red rag does a bull. Redhot times those were, 
 you bet." 
 
 " Pretty lively times now," remarked Legs 
 soberly. " Going up in an airplane ain't so 
 slow. Say, Cat, pity about you! " 
 
 Cat winked one eye and then the other and 
 grinned knowingly as if he were possessed of 
 an important and highly amusing secret which 
 he was inwardly enjoying. 
 
 " Look here, fellows," he said finally, "I'm 
 not sore because you two drew the plane this 
 time." And then he added in a low and myste- 
 rious tone, " Know sump thin'? I've been up in 
 one already. ' ' 
 
 " Yes, you have! " returned Jimmy sarcastic- 
 ally. " Over the left! " 
 
 " Yes, I have/' affirmed Cat staunchly. "I 
 cross my heart, and I can prove it just as soon 
 as we get back to town." 
 
 Jimmy snorted derision. 
 
 " Come off, Cat," objected Legs. " You know 
 you couldn't have kept that secret five minutes." 
 
 " Believe it or not, I don't give a hang," 
 snapped Cat sourly, " but listen to this, will 
 you? "
 
 At Cape Peril 13 
 
 " Shoot! " directed Jimmy, who began to 
 be interested despite his incredulity. 
 
 Legs cocked his head on one side and screwed 
 up his eyes as if to hear a Munchausen fable. 
 
 " Know that guy that flew people over town 
 for fifteen bucks a fly? Well, every afternoon 
 I used to trot out to his field and hang around 
 watching him. After a while, I got to talking 
 planes and, when he found I wasn't any bone- 
 head on flyers, he gave me a lot of new dope. 
 I'd spent 'bout ten afternoons hanging around 
 when he said day before yesterday, * Look here, 
 young fellow, how'd you like to take a little 
 sky ride? Business seems to be slack, so I 
 might as well make you happy.' My heart 
 turned a somerset, but I looked kind of shy and 
 said, * Haven't got the price, but I'd give my 
 head to go up.' * How much have you in your 
 jeans? ' he asked me. Then I said, * Two bits 
 and a jit.' All right,' he said, * I'll take that. 
 Come along.' Course he was just fooling about 
 the dough. Then he remembered and wanted 
 to know if I could get permission from home 
 right quick. Quick as lightning, I reached down 
 in my pants and fished out a note from the
 
 14 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 old man saying I could go any old time I got 
 a chance. He laughed like the mischief, and 
 said I was some slick kid and wouldn't have to 
 have anybody to lead me 'round the world. 
 You see, fellows, I knew I was going to work it 
 sooner or later, so, to save time, I got dad the 
 first night to write me a note saying I could 
 go. Gee! You ought to have seen him grin, and 
 he said if I could get a fifteen dollar ride for 
 a little scrap of paper, I sure would make a 
 killing as a lawyer when I grew up. Well, I 
 got my fly, and great day, man! Talk about 
 fun! " 
 
 As Cat paused at this point for the applause 
 of his audience, he gave Jimmy a chance to get 
 in a word. 
 
 " Swear this is so? " 
 
 " If it's not, I hope I may be struck dead 
 right this minute. What would I want to fool 
 you for? " 
 
 " Gee, man! " was Legs's fervent exclamation. 
 
 " Well," declared Jimmy, " you sure did 
 do us a dirty trick not telling us sooner. We 
 fellows might have pulled off that stunt like 
 you did."
 
 At Cape Peril 15 
 
 " I don't see how that big mouthed buzzard 
 managed to keep it in this long, that's what 
 gets my goat," observed Legs. 
 
 Cat grinned. " You bet I'd 'a spread it all 
 over this U. S. A. if he hadn't made me promise 
 to keep it on the q. t. till he got away. Said 
 he didn't want to be pestered, and he didn't 
 expect to ride a single 'nother kid free. See? 
 Well, he's pulling out to-day just about this 
 time, so I can loosen up on it. See? " 
 
 " Golly, Cat! " exclaimed Jimmy, now fully 
 convinced and looking at the new birdman with 
 undisguised admiration. " Say, fellow, what did 
 it feel like? " 
 
 To his intensely absorbed scout audience, not 
 to mention certain grown individuals on the side 
 lines, he recounted, in his most humorous style, 
 his varied sensations and experiences during 
 the flight. 
 
 " Is Mr. Hardy just as good a pilot as that 
 one? " asked Legs eagerly, after Cat was appar- 
 ently on the point of exhausting his narrative. 
 
 " Big sight better," he asserted. 
 
 " How did your father get in with him? " 
 queried Jimmy.
 
 16 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 11 Listen! You know Father he's had air- 
 planes on the brain ever since the Wright broth- 
 ers pulled off their experiments on the North 
 Carolina coast way back yonder before we were 
 born. He's read every darn thing he could lay 
 his hands on about flying. He's been up every 
 time he could beg or buy an air ride, and, when 
 the war came on, he was crazy as a Junebug to 
 get in as a pilot, but of course he got turned 
 down because he was too old and his eyes are 
 bum. See? Well, while he was fooling and 
 fussing around trying to buck into the service, 
 he ran across Hardy and they've been buddies 
 ever since, though my dad's about twenty years 
 older. Now, my old man is some horse pulling 
 wires. See? And when he heard about that 
 N. C. Topographical Coast Survey, his pull 
 landed the job for Hardy I call him Tom 
 behind his back." 
 
 ' ' State Top what ? Whew ! ' ' whistled 
 Jimmy. " Jimmy, that's a jawbreaker." 
 
 " You can listen, but don't try to handle," 
 proclaimed Cat with mock solemnity. " Now, 
 listen some more and I'll teach you something. 
 You know surveyors used to trot all over the
 
 At Cape Peril 17 
 
 country with rods and a lot of junk and take 
 about five years to survey one measly little 
 county. Well, now an aviator and a photog- 
 rapher can go up and take views with the camera 
 upside down, and in an hour or two the job's 
 done. Get me? Well, that's the stunt Tom does 
 on the Carolina coast, and a fellow named Tur- 
 ner, who is with him, does the camera work. 
 They're bunking at Cape Peril till they finish 
 around there and then they'll move on some- 
 where else. Father hooked that job for him 
 and he thought it would tickle the old man to 
 invite me down. He sent word for me to pick 
 two good old scouts for company, so you two 
 rummies are my pickings. See! " 
 
 " Pretty good pickings, too, eh, Legs? " 
 observed Jimmy. " Sure your daddy's going 
 to stop and bring us home in his yacht? " 
 
 " That's what he promised," said Legs. 
 " He'll let us know by the wireless Cat says 
 they've got at Cape Peril. This is the eight- 
 eenth, isn't it? He ought to be leaving Tam- 
 pico right about this time, but he's going to 
 stop by Cuba for a couple of days or so." 
 
 11 Bet he's been having a swell time down
 
 18 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 there," affirmed Cat. " You're the slowest 
 rummy I ever saw. Why in the -name o' Heck 
 didn't you make him take you with him? Bet 
 your life, I'd gone if my dad had a clipper." 
 
 " Nothing doing! " returned Legs. " It's 
 something secret about oil. He couldn't take 
 any of the family only his friends. Dad sure 
 is good to his friends. He wants 'em to put a 
 lot o' money in oil lands down there." 
 
 ' * Gee ! I wish my daddy had a yacht, ' ' sighed 
 Cat comically, " then I wouldn't have to go 
 down on that blamed motorcycle with the coast 
 guard. Wish Turner had brought the hydro- 
 plane up." 
 
 " Jiminy! have they got a hydro down there, 
 too? " asked Jimmy excitedly. 
 
 " Sure they have. Didn't I tell you that? 
 An airplane rigged up in a life preserver, that's 
 what it looks like to me. They use it to survey 
 the sounds and creeks around Cape Peril. Oh 
 my, oh me, I see where I get a ride every day. 
 You fellows, too, if you don't lose your nerve 
 flying down to Seagulls' Nest." 
 
 " Bet your sweet life, here's one scout that 
 won't," asserted Jimmy valiantly.
 
 At Cape Peril 19 
 
 Legs, for the moment, was silent, thinking 
 deeply. 
 
 " And fellows, you know they used to use 
 seaplanes in the war to hunt for submarines," 
 explained Cat. 
 
 " The mischief you say! " This from Jimmy. 
 
 " Sure! The subs, even when they were 'way 
 down deep, made sort of rings on the top of 
 the water, and the flyers could spy 'em out with 
 the airplanes, and find out where to drop the 
 depth bombs and blow the stuffings out of them. ' ' 
 
 " Golly! " exclaimed Jimmy. 
 
 " I bet you can't guess what they use them 
 for now? " Cat persisted with his instruction 
 of his friends. 
 
 " Search me! " returned Jimmy. 
 
 " Use 'em to look for shoals of fish that make 
 pretty much the same sort of circles that sub- 
 marines do. When the flyer sees 'em he signals 
 to the fishermen where to net 'em. How's that? " 
 
 " Sounds fishy! " joked Jimmy. 
 
 11 Oh, mush! Is that the best you can do? " 
 came from the disgusted Cat. " I don't waste 
 any more breath on mutts like you. You'd just 
 as soon spring that rotten joke about the fish-
 
 20 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ermen and the salmon. They eat all they can, 
 and what they can't, they can.' 
 
 " Oh, no," denied Jimmy, " I canned that 
 joke along with the other stale one about the 
 lightship. Remember it! You tell a rube they 
 raise all the vegetables they eat on that boat. 
 Then the boob pops his eyes, and you explain 
 they raise 'em from the row boat onto the 
 deck." 
 
 " Bury all those chestnuts and bury 'em 
 deep," directed Cat, with a pained expression. 
 11 But, say, that reminds me " 
 
 " Just one more," interrupted Jimmy. " This 
 is a bird for Legs. Say, Legs, know how long a 
 fellow's legs ought to be? Don't know? Here's 
 the answer. Just long enough to reach from his 
 body to the ground. Hear that joke crack? " 
 
 Jimmy pounded Legs, delightedly. 
 
 " Put him out! " shouted Legs, at the same 
 time giving his chum a shove that nearly landed 
 him in the passageway. "You cribbed that joke 
 from Adam. I heard that before you were 
 born." 
 
 " Bury that, too," directed Cat, when Jimmy 
 had righted himself and was trying, in revenge
 
 At Cape Peril 21 
 
 for the upset, to flatten Legs's head against the 
 window frame. 
 
 ''And listen here," he added, as if seized by 
 a sudden inspiration. " Did you boys know that 
 Blackboard used to scout around Cape Peril? 
 Tell you what! Maybe we'll run across some 
 buried treasure down there doubloons and 
 pieces-of-eight, shiver my timbers." 
 
 " Who in thunder is Blackbeard? " asked 
 Jimmy, becoming interested at once. 
 
 " Gee! You never heard of Blackbeard? 
 He was a fe-rocious pirate whose real name was 
 Teach, from over in Accomac county on the 
 Eastern Shore. He raised Cain with the mer- 
 chant boats on the Virginia coast till the sea 
 cops got on his tracks and he had to light out 
 to Albemarle Sound. He operated down there 
 for a while, till a ship from up this way jumped 
 his boat and killed most of his men, and I bet 
 you something pretty that those who got away 
 hid their coin on the shore somewhere. Wouldn't 
 it be funny if we ran across some of it? " 
 
 1 ' You 're right it would ! Where did you see 
 that, Cat, in the newspaper? " queried Jimmy. 
 
 " Golly Moses, Jimmy. You think you're
 
 22 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 funny. You know that was about two hundred 
 years ago." 
 
 " No, I didn't," asserted Jimmy. " I didn't 
 know I was pulling a bone, swear I didn't." 
 
 Visions of adventures began to float through 
 the lads' fancies. 
 
 " Oh, ye-ah, I remember! " exclaimed Legs 
 with sudden enthusiasm. " Teach? By Jebo, 
 he's the very fellow Stevenson you know, the 
 guy who wrote Kidnapped and Treasure Island 
 tells about in The Master of . . . Oh, 
 shucks!" 
 
 " Master of Oh Shucks! " jeered Cat. 
 
 "Of Ball Ball Ball, ' ' Legs stumbled, 
 " Oh yes, I know, The. Master of Ballantre. The 
 guy supposed to be telling the yarn was cap- 
 tured by pirates who ran up the black flag and 
 made the skipper and 'most all the crew of the 
 captured ship walk the plank, all except two or 
 three. Then Teach blacked up his face and curled 
 his hair in rings and crammed his mouth full 
 of glass and chewed it to make himself spit 
 blood. Then he stuck his belt full of pistols 
 and brandished a dirk and cussed a blue streak 
 pulled off a regular bughouse parade up and
 
 At Cape Peril 23 
 
 down the deck, swearing he was Satan and that 
 his ship was called 'Hades.' He wasn't any 
 chocolate sundae pirate, he wasn't. He was a 
 genu-wine blood-and-thunder guy, he was.'* 
 
 At this violent explosion from the mild-eyed, 
 velvet-cheeked Legs, the other two scouts broke 
 into a roar. 
 
 " Oh, Legs, naughty boy, ain't you ashamed 
 of yourself? " mocked Jimmy. 
 
 " Got it all wrong, too," added Cat. " The 
 saphead didn't see the note that said it wasn't 
 the same Blackbeard who scouted in these parts. 
 Why don't you take a squint down in the cellar 
 when you are reading? Then you find what 
 they say upstairs ain't so." 
 
 "Ah, get out! Hanged if I saw it," declared 
 the muddled Legs. " Don't believe it was 
 there, either. Anyhow, I don't see why they 
 want to stick in junk like that to spoil a dandy 
 good story." 
 
 "Hello, Central!" called Cat into his fist, 
 raised to his mouth to represent a telephone. 
 " Give me Legs's top story. How's the weather 
 up there, Legs? Foggy as usual? I thought so." 
 
 " Don't cry, Legs," laughed Jimmy. "You'll
 
 24 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 forget it before you're a hundred. See here, 
 fellows, the pirate business is s^rt of on the 
 blink now, but I certainly would like to spend 
 about two years sailing around the world. That's 
 a long sight better education than what you get 
 in books. But blessed if I want to swab decks. 
 You can't look at the scenery and study the 
 customs of the natives while you are splicing 
 ropes and splashing water around all day. Won- 
 der if they'd take me on one of these pleasure 
 yachts as an entertainer. I can play the guitar 
 and do card tricks " 
 
 "That's right, Jimmy," interrupted Legs, 
 now recovering his usual good humor, " blow 
 off to hear yourself talk. But tell you what's 
 a fact. If you can speak 'steen languages, you 
 can get a fat job on 'most any old ship. Easy 
 berth, too. Father picked up a fellow in New- 
 port News who can tie Spanish up in a bow 
 knot, believe me, and, as Father can't talk any- 
 thing much but American, he is giving him all 
 sorts of money just to help him chin the 
 Greasers down there in Mexico." 
 
 " That straight? " said Jimmy. " Gee! I 
 sure will take that Spanish course in High
 
 At Cape Peril 25 
 
 School next session, and when I get up on it, 
 I'll run down and open an airplane factory in 
 Brazil." 
 
 " Come off, they don't speak Spanish in 
 Brazil, nut," corrected Legs. "They talk Por- 
 tuguese. ' ' 
 
 "All right, then. Can't phaze me. I'll go on 
 to Bonus Airs." 
 
 "Huh! Reckon you do need some Spanish! 
 Bonus Airs! " sneered Legs. , 
 
 " What is it if that ain't right! " insisted 
 Jimmy. 
 
 Legs scratched his head, but apparently with- 
 out extracting any information therefrom. 
 
 " Tell you the truth, I've forgotten, but I'm 
 dead certain you're a million miles off. I knor 
 that much." 
 
 " Huh-huh-huh-huh! " grunted Jimmy. " Bet- 
 ter find out something yourself before you try 
 to give me lessons." 
 
 " I know what it is," announced Cat, who had 
 just been in consultation with a gentleman in the 
 seat in front; " it's Bwanus I-res, and it's the 
 capital of Argentine Republic." 
 
 "You fudged, Cat," detected Jimmy, almost
 
 26 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 sticking his accusing finger in Cat's eye. " I 
 saw you get the dope. Can't put that over 
 on us." 
 
 The informer smiled over his newspaper, while 
 Cat twisted his mouth ludicrously. " Any way, I 
 did it," he protested. 
 
 " Give you a dime to do it again," Jimmy 
 baited him. 
 
 ' ' Don 't you know Shakespeare never repeats, ' ' 
 said Cat, with sham solemnity. 
 
 " But Shakespeare's cat does," retorted 
 Jimmy. "Cat, you are some fraud. Know 
 where you are going? " 
 
 "Anyway, I've got a return ticket. Say, 
 boys," he suddenly shouted, "we're there! " 
 
 Instantly six eager eyes, which had been giv- 
 ing but fleeting attention to the familiar sand 
 dunes along the seashore, were focused on two 
 landmarks just ahead, indicating the end of the 
 first leg of their journey. One was the century- 
 and-a-half-old stone lighthouse, now in disuse; 
 the other, its modern successor whose revolving 
 light at night guides a host of seacraft through 
 the great strait between Cape Charles and Cape 
 Henry.
 
 At Cape Peril 27 
 
 " Knapsacks up," yelled Jimmy. " Hurrah, 
 all off for the Cape! " 
 
 In wild excitement, each lad grabbed up the 
 slim roll of luggage lying at his feet, made for 
 the door and bounded out upon the sand. To 
 the right was the vast blue Atlantic; and to the 
 left, over the sand hills, the shores of the Bay 
 of Lynnhaven, ancient site of the Indian village 
 of the Chesapeakes, where, in the year 1607, 
 the doughty adventurers from the good ships 
 Susan Constant, Goodhope, and Discovery, made 
 their first landing before sailing on to what was 
 to be the first permanent settlement of the 
 English in the New World, the famous founda- 
 tion on the island of Jamestown.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 JUMPING OFF AT CAPE HENBY 
 
 " WeU, fellows, here I am! " 
 
 It was a hearty, ringing voice that struck the 
 boys' ears as its owner, whose every movement 
 proclaimed the perfect coordination of the mus- 
 cles beneath his aviator costume, strode along 
 the station platform to greet his young visitors. 
 A firm-set chin, brown eyes with wrinkles of 
 perpetual good humor about them, a high fore- 
 head, a wholesome, tanned skin, a boyish shock 
 of brown hair with a pronounced cowlick this 
 was Tom Hardy's outer man. At first sight, 
 Legs and Jimmy lost all awe of him. 
 
 As Cat rushed up, the airman seized the boy's 
 hand in such a viselike grasp that the victim 
 squirmed, " ouched," and yelled for mercy. 
 
 " Why not introduce me to your chums, Mutt 
 and Jeff? " demanded the host. 
 
 11 Doggone it, how can I when you're mash- 
 ing every bone in my flipper? " cried Cat, still 
 writhing. " Lenune go, will you? "
 
 At Cape Peril 29 
 
 " Just showing you how glad I am to see you. 
 There now." 
 
 Tom Hardy beamed on the three boys. 
 
 Cat, released but still nursing his crumpled 
 hand, proclaimed in the tone of a circus barker, 
 as he nodded at his lanky companion, " This 
 sawed-off fellow here is William Madison Mose- 
 ley Hatton, known for short as Legs." 
 
 " With that name, no wonder he's stunted," 
 laughed Hardy, at the same time giving Legs a 
 hearty clap on the shoulder, instead of the 
 dreaded handshake. 
 
 " And this," proceeded Cat, indicating Jimmy, 
 " the tallest specimen of scout out of captivity, 
 is named Jimmy Todd. If he ever sported a 
 middle name he's lost it, and he's shed every 
 nickname we fellows ever gave him. First, we 
 called him ' Tadpole '; then, when he shot up 
 'bout two inches, we dubbed him * Dusty,' 'cause 
 the seat of his pants is so near the ground that 
 they're always covered with dust; then, when 
 he tumbled for one of the calicks in High, we 
 nicked him i Spooney '; and when he got to 
 handing out that limerick stuff, we gave him 
 ' Kicks,' but somehow, we always get back to
 
 30 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Jimmy. I reckon it just naturally fits in better 
 with Todd." 
 
 Hardy was already shaking Jimmy's right 
 hand while the lad used his left to ball a fist at 
 the barking Cat. 
 
 " That'll do for today, Miller," said Hardy, 
 as he released Jimmy's hand. " Don't use up 
 all your words. May need a few when you grow 
 up and get in the lawyer game. Jimmy and 
 Legs, then, are these fellows' names to me and 
 I'm plain Hardy. See! Don't want anyone to 
 be mistering anybody. Not even the cook does 
 it at Seagulls' Nest. Now, let's beat it." 
 
 He directed his guests toward the resting place 
 of his famous flyer Windjammer, on a level, firm 
 plot of ground well back from the lighthouses 
 and the sand hills. 
 
 " Gee, boys, you don't know how glad I am to 
 have you," he said as they trotted along. 
 " Nothin' like fif teeners for pep, and we'll all 
 pep together. I've got a sort of holiday at 
 present. Turner's busy on some maps and 
 photos, so our operations are held up for a 
 spell. I've just got a job as lighthouse inspector 
 on the coast, but don't count on their calling on
 
 At Cape Peril 31 
 
 me just yet, or my calling on them, rather. By 
 the way, which of you kids is a shark on mathe- 
 matics? " 
 
 ' * I pass, ' ' Cat hastened to proclaim an 
 announcement that he had occasion to regret 
 later. " I flunked on tkat Pons Asinorum, and 
 I've never understood a thing about Geometry 
 since. You flunked, too, Jimmy. Old Whiskers 
 got red in the face trying to rub it into our 
 heads, didn't he? " 
 
 Whiskers, so called because of his sideburns, 
 was the lads' teacher in High School, and the 
 pupils had facetiously dubbed the rawboned 
 nag on which he solemnly took his exercise after 
 school hours, " Hypotenuse." 
 
 "I swear I b'lieve Hypo knows a lot more 
 math, than I do," conceded Jimmy, " just from 
 old Whiskers bouncing up and down on him." 
 
 This drew a laugh from all the boys, in which 
 Hardy joined after being informed of the nature 
 and constitution of Hypotenuse. 
 
 " Here's your shark," continued Jimmy, pull- 
 ing Legs forward. * ' He 's wading into Trig, and 
 eating it up. All his sense is not in his feet, 
 though you might think so."
 
 32 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 11 Just wanted to know," declared Hardy, 
 when Legs protested against Jimmy's estimate 
 of Ms knowledge. " Now I want to know, too, 
 who goes up with me and who's going to make 
 the coast guard happy. You're the unselfish 
 kid, Cat. You want to take the motor? " 
 
 " Sure I do," agreed Cat grinning, and at the 
 same time kicking Jimmy's shins when that 
 young man seemed on the point of opening his 
 mouth to contradict him. " I don't need any 
 air-rides to-day. I'm fresh from one." 
 
 And he proceeded to repeat what he had told 
 his friends on the electric train. 
 
 " Well, I'll be hanged if you ain't your 
 father's own son," was Hardy's comment when 
 the boy had finished his story. " We'll have 
 to give you a brass medal to chime in with your 
 actions. Have to get up early in the morning 
 to beat you to it, boy." 
 
 At the compliment, Cat's chest swelled pom- 
 pously and his eyes danced gleefully. 
 
 " Now, you two," observed Hardy a little 
 later, addressing Legs and Jimmy. "You two 
 who are going up will have to sit in one another's 
 laps. I mean," he laughed, " one will have to
 
 At Cape Peril 33 
 
 sit in the other's lap that's the only way to 
 stow you in. I think, judging by appearances, 
 Jimmy better be the top layer.'* 
 
 " I never thought of that beanpole having a 
 lap," declared Jimmy. " Get me a microscope, 
 Cat" 
 
 Hardy put an end to the disturbance that 
 threatened, and continued, " Now, see here, you 
 two fellows who haven't been initiated, like 
 your friend Cat, may feel a little wriggly for a 
 minute or two, but you'll soon get over it. Keep 
 this in mind: Flying is regular life insurance 
 compared to dodging autos in any big city, and 
 remember it's how a fellow shows up in a new 
 experience that proves what sort of stuff he's 
 got in him. Listen to what Service says. You 
 know Service, the war poet? 
 
 * When your legs seem made o' jelly 
 
 And you're squeamish in your belly, 
 
 And you want to turn about and do a bunk, 
 
 For Tom's sake, kid, don't show it, 
 
 Don't let your mateys know it, 
 
 You're just sufferin' from funk, funk, funk.' 
 
 Get that! I put the Tom in to suit this present
 
 34 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 occasion and audience. Grab hold o' that sen- 
 timent and swallow it. Hear? " 
 
 " Didn't need that to give me backbone," 
 affirmed Jimmy. 
 
 " Beckon I can go anywhere Jimmy can," 
 was Legs's conclusion in a feebler tone. 
 
 When the group reached the famous Wind- 
 jammer the lads raised a wild whoop and set to 
 examining her in every detail while her owner 
 held forth on her various excellencies. 
 
 " Now," said he as he finished his lecture, 
 " time to be off. Here, put those on," he 
 directed his passengers, fishing out goggles and 
 headgear. " You, Cat, will meet the coast guard 
 in front of the lighthouse about fifteen minutes 
 from now. Don't let the motorcycle jar all the 
 pep out of you. Want some left for the jam- 
 boree to-night, hear? " 
 
 "Oh, gee I" exclaimed Cat. "What's 
 doing? " 
 
 " Oh, just a little roughhouse, with extra 
 choice eats stored in my bird's gizzard there. 
 Smell a rat, do you, Cat? " added Hardy, giv- 
 ing the boy a swift kick as he attempted to peep 
 into the cockpit. " Take your nose out of there.
 
 At Cape Peril 35 
 
 Off with you. And now, Legs, old boy, your 
 time's come. Get in the electric chair and be 
 strapped. Don't look so green about the gills. 
 You'll live to tell the tale. Remember Service. 
 Crawl in! " 
 
 Legs cast his eyes into the well, and, appar- 
 ently satisfied that it had a solid bottom, 
 straddled in and took his seat. 
 
 " Keep your fingers crossed," laughed Hardy. 
 " Knock on wood, and keep your eyes open for 
 black cats, and nothing will happen to you. Come 
 along, Jimmy." 
 
 He grabbed him by the seat of his breeches and 
 speeded him in, while Cat was directed to help 
 with the straps, a duty undertaken with such 
 enthusiasm as to draw various gasps and 
 punches from his victims. 
 
 Hardy meanwhile gave Windjammer's motor 
 a final inspection, singing softly to himself, 
 
 "111 make you rumble, 
 
 Across the sky, 
 And if I don't tumble, 
 
 111 live till I die." 
 
 Then, assured that his passengers were safely 
 stowed and leathered, he fixed himself in the
 
 36 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 pilot's seat and directed Cat and another 
 bystander to start his propeller and give his 
 bird a shove. In a few moments, the crew had 
 left the cheering Cat below and were soaring 
 np the heavens. 
 
 Every drop of blood in their bodies seemed 
 to be tingling to the tips of their ears when the 
 taxying came to an end and the new flyers felt 
 the machine rising. Legs wrapped his arms 
 around Jimmy 's chest in the convulsive hug 
 of a drowning man, while the latter clutched 
 the edge of the well, an interminable 
 " Gee-e-e-e! " flowing from his lips. 
 
 " Say, Legs, the ground's sinking! " he fal- 
 tered out after some moments. 
 
 There was a tense silence on the part of the 
 boy beneath him. 
 
 " I b'lieve you're scared," persisted Jimmy 
 with a quiver in his tone. " Great Caesar's 
 ghost I Stop squeezing the life out of me." 
 
 Continued silence on the part of the under lad. 
 
 " Dizzy I " persisted the tormentor. 
 
 11 Naw! " finally returned Legs, with affected 
 composure. 
 
 " Me neither. Duck your head, Legs. Going
 
 At Cape Peril 37 
 
 to butt into the moon in a minute. Want me to 
 cut off a piece of green cheese for you? " 
 
 " Quit talking and let me look," countered the 
 unhappy Legs. 
 
 " Doesn't that motor jar! Just like one of 
 those vibrators you put to the back of your 
 neck." Jimmy babbled on, principally to keep 
 up his own nerve. " Ain't this a grand and 
 glorious feeling! Say, Legs, don't the ocean 
 look funny through these goggles! " 
 
 "I'm looking! " quavered Legs. 
 
 Another silence as the bird rose to the desired 
 altitude and the pilot, by a swift shift of his 
 levers, sent her shooting on a bee line. 
 
 "All 0. K.? " he shouted. " Not scared, are 
 you? Sit tight, boys, and don't rock the boat." 
 
 * * We 're all right, ' ' called back Jimmy as 
 spokesman for both, and then to Legs, as he 
 became composed enough to remark some physi- 
 cal discomfort. "Golly, Legs, I swear I b'lieve 
 you sharpened up your knees before we got in; 
 they're jabbing right into my meat like a couple 
 of knife blades. And stop blowing a gale on the 
 back of my neck. You're scared. I can feel the 
 way you're panting."
 
 38 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 "I'm not, either. I'm having a swell time. 
 Let me look, will you! " 
 
 The fact is, as the flyer sped on her way 
 without accident, the lads began to forget any 
 sense of uneasiness and to give their minds 
 wholly to the marvelous panorama of sea and 
 sand below and boundless sky above. 
 
 " Say, Legs," jested Jimmy, "I can see the 
 rock of Gibraltar plain as day." 
 
 " Your eyes are rum," countered Legs. " I 
 can spy the Pyramids of Egypt. ' ' 
 
 " High spy! " shot back Jimmy. 
 
 "Oh, slush!" 
 
 " Say, Legs, wouldn't our mothers be all up in 
 the air if they knew we were up here now. Gee 
 whillikins! Look at that toy steamship way 
 down yonder. Looks to me like a terrapin 
 crawling along smoking a cigarette. What does 
 it look like to you." 
 
 " Like a steamer." 
 
 " Ah, come off, you haven't got any more 
 imagination than a sand-fiddler." 
 
 "I'm mighty thankful I haven't. You need 
 to put a mustard plaster on yours. When I see 
 a rattlesnake, I don't want to take it for a
 
 At Cape Peril 39 
 
 humming bird. Now dry up and let me look 
 and enjoy myself. You are worse than the simp 
 that talks all through the movies and won't let 
 you get your mind on 'em. I'm not going to 
 answer another blamed thing." 
 
 In awed silence, the two lads, now forgetting 
 themselves in the wonder of the experience, 
 stared over at the great expanse of blue sea on 
 their left a sea of glass it appeared, with tiny 
 spots that were vessels. On the horizon, the 
 cloudless sky merged almost imperceptibly into 
 the waters below. 
 
 To the right, the sand hills were fringed by 
 splotches of dwarfed forests, and beyond these 
 lay a variegated pattern of level inland, with its 
 marshy inlets and gleaming ponds. 
 
 For a half hour the bird sped onward, and 
 then suddenly the pilot cried, " Nearly there! 
 See, there's Cape Peril and the lighthouse 
 ahead! " 
 
 The lads, thrilled to the soul, strained their 
 eyes through the goggles. They saw a great 
 bulge of seashore rather than a cape and near 
 the middle of this arc, a toylike lighthouse. It 
 seemed but a moment more before the machine
 
 40 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 began circling and the shore apparently flew up 
 to meet them. 
 
 The bird made an egg-shell landing on the 
 firm level ground covered with a layer of wind- 
 blown sand, well back from the seashore and the 
 dunes. 
 
 Hardy vaulted out and inspected his pas- 
 sengers. 
 
 " Well, boys, still alive and kicking! 'Fraid 
 I'd find two corpses lashed to the mast like the 
 skipper in the Wreck of the Hesperus." 
 
 The lads were more like two spirited colts 
 straining on their leashes. Any pallor that 
 might have blanched their faces at the begin- 
 ning of the ascent had given place to a vivid 
 flush from the stinging wind and the excitement. 
 Their eyes sparkled with the zest of a new and 
 thrilling experience. Every exclamation and 
 superlative in their vocabulary tumbled out in 
 their effort to express their feelings. 
 
 "Say, how about letting us loose?" finally 
 asked Jimmy. "I'm tired of being hitched up 
 to this flamingo." 
 
 " Don't want to stay like the Siamese twins 
 they used to exhibit in the side show, eh? "
 
 At Cape Peril 41 
 
 laughed Hardy as he helped them nnbuckle the 
 leathers. 
 
 " Not with this thing. I'd look like a wart on 
 a fishing pole." 
 
 " Sure don't want any warts like you on me," 
 growled Legs, climbing out after his short-legged 
 companion. 
 
 " Haven't got any flesh wounds from Jimmy's 
 elbows, have you? " jested Hardy. 
 
 1 1 Flesh wounds ! ' ' sneered Jimmy. ' * He 
 hasn 't meat enough to make a flesh wound ! ' ' 
 
 Hardy nipped off any disturbance that might 
 have followed by directing the pair to help him 
 shove his plane into a roughly constructed 
 hangar some fifty yards away. This duty per- 
 formed, the newcomers had a chance to take a 
 closer look at the scene around them. 
 
 The horizon, in the background, was fringed 
 with stunted pine woods rising beyond a broad 
 sterile, sandy plain. In the foreground, the 
 gleaming blue of the ocean showed here and 
 there between sand hills sparsely grown with 
 long, waving yellow sand grass. Back of the* 
 hangar and extending for about a mile parallel 
 with the beach, was a sort of lagoon, perhaps a
 
 42 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 quarter of a mile in width at its broadest point. 
 From the surface of the lake at its* nearer end 
 rose a strange looking wooden structure that 
 Hardy explained to be the hangar of the sea- 
 plane. A short distance from the farther end 
 of this unruffled body of water stood, on what 
 seemed a vast mound in comparison with the 
 sandy stretches about it, the gaunt and grim 
 lighthouse of Cape Peril. 
 
 " And here's Seagulls' Nest," announced the 
 host, as he led his guests seaward and pointed 
 to a spacious cottage, half weatherboarded and 
 half shingled, rising from an elevated plot some 
 two hundred yards in front of them.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 THE JAMBOREE 
 
 Seagulls' Nest was the property of a group of 
 city business men who used it as headquarters 
 for the fall duck hunting and fishing season. 
 Hence, it was readily leased by Hardy for the 
 summer. Leaving out the kitchen ell, the lower 
 floor formed dining-room, lounge, and library 
 in one. Above stairs, one room was appropriated 
 by Turner for developing his pictures and for 
 his drawing work; another was Hardy's work- 
 shop; the other three were available for sleep- 
 ing quarters. 
 
 The whole establishment was furnished in 
 the most rough-and-ready camping style. A long 
 table of unfinished wood, nine or ten substantial 
 chairs, a desk, a hanging set of bookshelves, and 
 an improvised cupboard constituted the fittings 
 of the living room. Its walls were adorned with 
 horse, dog, and fish pictures along with a varied 
 assortment of trophies of the chase. In the 
 bedrooms above, were cots and little more. All 
 
 43
 
 44 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 bathing facilities were abundantly supplied by 
 the ocean. 
 
 " Hello, Mother Hubbard! " called out Hardy 
 as the trio mounted the steps to the porch 
 extending the length of the building's front. 
 " Boys, there's my mascot, the only lady on 
 deck, and I'd take my oath she's a witch." 
 
 He pointed to a one-eyed coal-black cat sitting 
 near the door and blinking her remaining optic 
 in a way that showed but languid interest in the 
 visitors. 
 
 "And now, fellows," he added, as they entered 
 the door, " here's our joint abode, so to speak. 
 Make yourselves 'to hum,' as they say down 
 East. You can bounce on the French furniture, 
 shine up your knives on the damask tablecloth; 
 prop your feet on the Italian mantelpiece, and 
 do anything except monkey with Turner's junk 
 upstairs. If you do that, you might as well get 
 measured by the undertaker." 
 
 In a moment, Luke, the cook, a powerful, good- 
 natured looking mulatto, came in to greet the 
 newcomers. He was plainly delighted at the 
 arrival of company to liven up the loneliness. 
 After his enthusiastic welcome, he was directed
 
 At Cape Peril 45 
 
 by Hardy to fetch the eatables from the air- 
 plane and prepare his very best dinner with all 
 possible speed. 
 
 Then appeared Turner, a tall, sandy-haired 
 fellow of about twenty-five years, with a gaunt, 
 solemn-looking face; " slow but sure" written 
 in every line of his features. 
 
 " Hello, Turner! " cried out Hardy. " Here 
 are two of our Seaboard Airline patrol, Legs 
 Hatton and Jimmy Todd. Our old friend Miller 
 will blow in on the motorcycle about two hours 
 from now. Fellows, this is Sockless Turner, a 
 Tarheel from 
 
 ' Way down on the Pasquotank 
 
 Where the bullfrogs jump from bank to bank.' " 
 
 "And proud of it," asserted Turner as he gave 
 the boys his most cordial pumphandle shake. 
 
 " Now, Turner, while we are waiting for Cat 
 and dinner, take the fellows up and show 'em 
 your movie apparatus and make 'em forget their 
 stomachs. Cat's heard all that dope already." 
 
 Up the stairs went the three, the boys taking, 
 en route, an inquisitive glance into their new 
 dormitory. They followed the deliberate Turner
 
 46 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 into his workshop, littered with charts, maps, 
 drawing material, aerial photo equipment, and 
 many curious-looking objects, which the instruc- 
 tor began to explain in his drawling tone, warm- 
 ing up more and more as he proceeded with his 
 subject. 
 
 Having been initiated into the mysteries of 
 aerial photography, the lads were next enlight- 
 ened concerning the magic of the movies how 
 to make an auto run backwards, how to create 
 ghosts, how to make the same person appear in 
 different costumes on the same film, how a man 
 is made to seem to jump up a wall of twenty 
 feet, how the dummy is substituted for the flesh- 
 and-blood person in movie accidents such as 
 falls from a fifteenth story, how scenery is 
 worked in to give all the illusion of nature, and 
 Jnany other curious and entertaining facts, the 
 recital of which held the two lads open mouthed 
 \nd spellbound. 
 
 " Gosh! this fellow knows everything," was 
 the thought both began to entertain. 
 
 And to confirm their opinion of his boundless 
 knowledge, he wound up with a lesson in topog- 
 raphy which entertained Legs immensely, but
 
 At Cape Peril 47 
 
 threw Jimmy into an embarrassed state of per- 
 plexity, till he was glad to be relieved by a wild 
 whoop from the seashore announcing the arrival 
 of Cat. 
 
 As the other two scouts bounded down the 
 stairs, followed by Turner and joined by Hardy, 
 the newcomer burst into the premises sounding 
 like a whole menagerie of wild animals. The 
 place was not new to him, so he took no time in 
 inspection. 
 
 " Great Gee! I'm sore," he exclaimed, rub- 
 bing his person vigorously and giving a twist to 
 his spacious mouth. " I sure ought to get a scout 
 badge for what do you call it stick-to-it-ive- 
 ness, darn if I oughtn't. That ride shook the 
 wits out of me. Never again!" he added, holding 
 up his hand with mock solemnity, and then 
 changing his key, " Well, I swear, if here ain't 
 Legs and Jimmy alive and kicking. How was 
 it, fellows? " 
 
 And on the instant he insisted on having every 
 detail of the air trip, interspersed with numerous 
 comic and sarcastic comments by himself. 
 
 " Well, old scouts," he finally conceded, " I'll 
 shake hands with the Seaboard Airline patrol.
 
 48 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 We have all three been up, which is an extra 
 cinch on the aviation badge; weVe all made 
 models; we've got a good line on famous avia- 
 tors and airships; and, as soon as Hardy gives 
 us a little more dope on motors and ornithopters 
 and those other opters, we'll be able to give 
 points to the man who makes 'em, we will. And 
 1 can see that new badge right 'longside the 
 other flock on my sleeve this minute." 
 
 Cat surveyed his comrades smilingly. 
 
 Hardy and Turner watched the lads' enthu- 
 siasm with happy smiles until what Hardy called 
 the dinner "de Luke's " was announced. They 
 all fell to with voracious appetites, even Cat 
 finding himself able to sit down to it, despite his 
 repeated conflicts with the motorcycle. 
 
 After the meal, a dip in the surf was voted 
 by the boys as next in order, but the cautious 
 Hardy directed that, although they might get 
 into their trunks forthwith, on no condition were 
 they to enter the water until their dinner was 
 well on its way to digestion, and, besides, they 
 were not to go in until he got there to superin- 
 tend the job. These directions being acceded to, 
 the lads shuffled off their scout outfits, slipped on 

 
 At Cape Peril 49 
 
 their trunks, and made for the beach to kill the 
 required interval. 
 
 11 Look here, fellows, let's have a little field 
 day while we're waiting to go in," suggested 
 Cat. " Give us a back, Legs. Come on, Jimmy, 
 frog it over the skyscraper." 
 
 Legs, with apparent docility, bent his back 
 to accommodate the agile Jimmy; but when Cat 
 attempted to keep the pot boiling, the bent back 
 humped itself abruptly and shot the prospective 
 leaper into a heap on the sand. The discom- 
 forted Cat bounded up, harnessed his finger into 
 Legs's trunks and threatened to tear off that 
 flimsy garment while he mauled the offender's 
 head, until Jimmy interfered and diverted their 
 minds to a broad jump. 
 
 He lined off taw on the moist sand, leaped a 
 scant six feet as estimated by Cat's eye; then 
 the measurer followed and heeled in at six and 
 a half. 
 
 " Now, kangarooster, your turn," said Cat to 
 Legs; " take your fling. You've got it sewed up 
 already." 
 
 Legs bounded at least nine feet, landing on 
 the seat of his trunks.
 
 50 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " What shall we do with WooloomoolooT " 
 asked the grinning Cat. 
 
 " Who? " demanded Jimmy. 
 
 " Didn't hear about him? He's the new im- 
 migrant kangaroo who came in with a Noah's 
 Ark load of four thousand animals for the New 
 York Zoo. He can hop fifty-two feet pretty 
 near as good as a trained flea. Legs is his 
 first cousin. " 
 
 " Tell you how to fix Legs," suggested Jimmy. 
 " Load him up to the nozzle with buckshot, and 
 then we could make him trail us the way the 
 guy did in the Jumping Frog Mark Twain 
 wrote about. Gee whizz! Never heard of that? 
 You've got something to live for! When I read 
 that tale, I came near splitting my four sides 
 and rolling right off the chair. Here's the way if 
 goes: The yap in the story had the jumpingest 
 frog anywhere in the whole country, and he 
 cleaned up a barrel of money betting on him 
 till a funny geezer came along and allowed he 
 could lick the prize croaker with any old frog 
 the yap picked up for him. So, while the owner 
 was off hunting another frog in the swamp, the 
 slick guy grabbed up the performing frog and
 
 At Cape Peril 51 
 
 loaded him to the gills with buckshot. Well, 
 'fore long, here comes the fellow with the new 
 frog, and when the stranger takes it and sets it 
 side by side with the yap's and they give 'em 
 both a shove, blamed if the new frog didn't 
 jump about ten feet and the old prize one 
 couldn't do a darned thing but just flop up and 
 down like a limp jumping-jack. " 
 
 " That's pretty rich," approved Cat, with a 
 moderate grin. " Though it doesn't make me 
 split my sides, but I guess that's because you're 
 telling it." 
 
 Legs, standing off at some distance on the 
 spot where he had landed, showed no signs of 
 amusement. 
 
 " Laugh at the man's joke, Legs," exhorted 
 Cat. 
 
 The rest of the wait was spent in a game of 
 kitten ball, the details of which abbreviated 
 form of baseball Cat had recently acquired, and 
 much sport resulted from an effort to make three 
 individuals do the work for a whole team. 
 
 Hardy finally appeared attired for his plunge 
 and suggested going down to the culvert, for 
 diving. This construction admitted the salt
 
 52 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 water of the ocean to Lake Herring to prevent 
 the latter from becoming pestilential or furnish- 
 ing a breeding place for mosquitoes. The ocean 
 mouth of this spillway was formed of piles 
 driven deep into the sea-bed and projecting some 
 distance from the shore line. From the end of 
 it, excellent diving into sufficiently deep water 
 was offered. 
 
 With a whoop that started the echoes in the 
 woods beyond the sandhills, the boys made a 
 wild rush for the diving place. Fast and furi- 
 ous was the fun of the swimmers as they plunged 
 one after the other into the briny waters, speed- 
 ing up the ladder and repeating the performance 
 to "keep the pot boiling.*' Once Cat followed 
 too close on the gawky Legs, tripped him, and 
 sent him sprawling into the water. 
 
 "Gee! that was a buster!" he shouted. 
 " Don't be too rough on the poor ocean, Legs. 
 You might bruise it. You must have taken 
 swimming lessons in the correspondence school 
 and lost most of 'em in the mail," yelled the 
 persecutor as his victim came up sputtering and 
 vowing direst vengeance. As Cat plunged in, a 
 stingaree wrapped itself about his ankles and
 
 At Cape Peril 53 
 
 sent him yelping back up the ladder and Legs 
 was more than avenged. 
 
 Hardy kept a close eye on the swimmers, tak- 
 ing an occasional header himself, until they all 
 had their fill of fun and salt water and wended 
 their way back to Seagulls' Nest. 
 
 Seven o'clock, the time set for Hardy's prom- 
 ised jamboree, finally arrived. A royal feast 
 was the preliminary spots and hogfish, ham 
 and celery, vegetables to match, and the most 
 savory plum pudding that a boy ever ate. Even 
 after all this, the chinks had to be filled up with 
 nuts and candy. 
 
 Stuffed but happy, the party started the rough- 
 house. There was a jew's-harp performance by 
 Turner, and a guitar offering by Hardy, with a 
 breakdown chorus. Then, as soon as digestion 
 permitted, Legs and Jimmy staged a boxing bout 
 that threw the spectators into a roar. A mock 
 jujutsu exhibition by Cat, with Legs as the 
 victim, was next on the program, which ended 
 with a minstrel show in which the whole estab- 
 lishment participated. Of this last, Luke was 
 easily the star. 
 
 Finally, as the evening wore on to the end,
 
 54 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Hardy moved that the show be concluded by 
 drinking the health of Windjammer, more not- 
 able in its flights than any roc in the Arabian 
 Nights, and by all singing a composition of his 
 own, carbon copies of which were distributed. 
 
 " Which ale shall we drink it in," shouted 
 Hardy, "Adam's or ginger! " 
 
 " Ginger! " roared the lads with one accord. 
 
 The suggestion being thus noisily approved, 
 the ginger-ale was produced and drained off 
 with great gusto. Then Hardy, after a few intro- 
 ductory chords on his guitar, started to bellow 
 out his verse to a rollicking tune, while he flour- 
 ished one hand in the most approved orchestra- 
 leader fashion : 
 
 "A jolly rover of the air, 
 A seasoned bird am I. 
 There's not a venture I'd not dare, 
 When sweeping through the sky. 
 I feel my blood 
 Surge to the flood, 
 As I mount up the sky. 
 
 " Now, boys," he paused to exhort, "all join 
 in and put plenty of punch in your singing. Now :
 
 At Cape Peril 55 
 
 "Up, up she wings; the motor sings; 
 
 I guide her at my pleasure. 
 High o'er the world Windjammer swings 
 To paths no soul can measure. 
 The sphere below 
 Shrinks as we go 
 To heights no gauge can measure. 
 
 " Next spasm," shouted the leader. " Eip it 
 out! 
 
 ' ' I maul the moon around the rink ; 
 
 The stars I bowl and batter; 
 I put the sunball on the blink ; 
 The sheeplike clouds I scatter. 
 It's bully fun 
 To see them run 
 The curling clouds I shatter. 
 
 " I crumple up the hurricanes; 
 
 I flip the ticklish breezes ; 
 I smash the hail to window-panes, 
 And roll the snow in cheeses. 
 I churn the air 
 Until the Bear 
 High in the heavens sneezes. 
 
 " Either Bear you choose, boys. Ursa Major 
 or Ursa Minor. We'll go out and take a look at 
 them presently. Now, all together! "
 
 56 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Down came every fist on the table till the 
 glasses bounced and rattled an necompaniment 
 to the last stanza: 
 
 ' ' Whir- whir- whir- whir- whir- whir ; 
 Throb, throb, throbby, throbbity ; 
 And purr, purr, purr-purr, purr, purr; 
 Bob, bob, bobby, bobbity; 
 Buzz, buzz, buzz; 
 Suzz, suzz, BUZZ ; 
 Chob, chob, chobby, chobbity. 
 
 Wow! " 
 
 This rigmarole was rendered time and again, 
 each time with more tremendous clatter than the 
 time before. But even boy energy ebbs at last, 
 and the tumult began to die away. 
 
 * It's all slightly exaggerated," said Hardy, 
 " as Mark Twain declared when told of a report 
 of his own death, but it expresses my feelings, 
 and, I believe, the feelings of every flyer that 
 ever trimmed a bird." 
 
 " You bet it does," agreed the chorus. 
 
 Then the conviviality moderated into a short 
 discussion of the joys of flying. 
 
 During all this jollity several hours had hur- 
 ried by, and when the cuckoo clock announced
 
 At Cape Peril 57 
 
 eleven, and Hardy expressed the conviction that 
 it was time for hard-working lads to be abed, it 
 was with the greatest difficulty that they man- 
 aged to make a start. Finally, they got to the 
 point of making a rush for their sleeping quar- 
 ters, but, even then, the easy process of undress- 
 ing was interrupted by frequent tussles and 
 pillow fights before reaching the pa jama stage. 
 
 " I am growing old, Mother," remarked Cat 
 whimsically, donning the above-mentioned gar- 
 ment; "my pink pajamas are turning white. 
 Tough the grudge all these laundries have against 
 sporting colors." 
 
 Jimmy, meanwhile, was carefully slicking back 
 his hair before retiring a habit that he always 
 indulged in, with the explanation that he didn't 
 know whom he might meet in his sleep. 
 
 " Hully gully, ain't he cutie!" jeered Cat. 
 
 A few moments later, all three were stretched 
 out on their cots, and, after a little more jab- 
 bering, silence fell. 
 
 " What are the wild waves saying, Legs?" 
 abruptly broke forth Jimmy, who had been 
 listening to the gentle wash of the surf on the 
 shore.
 
 58 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 "Saying, close your face and let me sleep," 
 growled Legs, just feeling his first delicious 
 drowsiness. 
 
 " Got me that time, didn't youf " Jimmy 
 returned, and then he slowly composed: 
 
 1 ' There is a young fellow named Legs 
 Who . . . trots on a pair of slim pegs ; 
 
 He can . . . wiggle each ear . . . 
 
 In a way . . . that I fear . . . 
 He's kin to a a a " 
 
 But while drowsily trying to search out a 
 suitable rhyme, he, too, fell asleep.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 CAPE PERIL'S JOLLY HERMIT 
 
 When the boys woke up the next morning, or 
 rather when they were tumbled out of bed about 
 eight by Hardy and Turner, who had already 
 been up an hour and had developed a voracious 
 appetite for the breakfast waiting in the kitchen, 
 the sea proved a bitter disappointment. As the 
 three guests bounded to a front window to 
 inspect the prospects, it was disgustingly placid 
 without a sign of a whitecap. The gentle waves 
 that washed the beach seemed fearful of dis- 
 placing a single pebble. 
 
 " B'lieve that old ocean is just trying to spite 
 us," concluded Cat. " 'Fraid we won't get a 
 good man-sized wave to ride while we're down 
 here." 
 
 11 Hurry up," shouted Hardy as he left the 
 room. " If you kids don't get down to breakfast 
 in less than a pig's whisper, I'll be riding you 
 good and heavy." 
 
 A savory odor of frying fish that penetrated 
 
 59
 
 60 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 the room from the region below proved even 
 more stimulating than Hardy's threat, and after 
 dashing out for a morning dip of brief duration, 
 the lads scrambled into their scout togs and 
 a few moments later presented three smiling 
 faces and ravenous appetites at the breakfast 
 table. 
 
 " Want to go over to Cape Peril, don't you? " 
 asked the host when all were through. 
 
 An eager "You bet!" was the unanimous 
 answer. 
 
 " Well, you've got a regular picnic before 
 you," declared Hardy. 
 
 " Old Buffum's the rarest bird you ever 
 imagined. Been running the light over there 
 for the last ten years, ever since he left the 
 Merchant Marine service. What he doesn't know 
 about ships and sea lore isn't worth knowing. 
 He's got the dots on every vessel that plies up 
 and down this coast and knows where they are 
 every minute of the day or night. Has a chart 
 tacked up on the wall and a lot of pins with the 
 name of a ship tied to each one, and he shifts 
 them all the time he's got an eye open, to indi- 
 cate the boats' positions at any specified mo-
 
 At Cape Peril 61 
 
 ment. Doesn't get far off either, unless some- 
 thing very unforeseen happens. If you want to 
 complete your education in the water line, ask 
 Bill Buffum. And he's the queerest old duck. Sits 
 there all by himself most of the time, reading 
 sea yarns or watching the ocean. But he has 
 right much company. Everybody who comes 
 this way stops to see him, sometimes as many 
 as three visitors a week, not counting the man 
 who brings his ' vittles ' from the fishing settle- 
 ment over yonder. So far as I know he does his 
 own washing, for I never saw him without that 
 same blue shirt that always looks tolerable 
 clean. Beckon it must be an easy conscience. 
 Now let's go over and chat with him." 
 
 There was a noisy chorus of assent. 
 
 The lads were ready enough for the experi- 
 ence. Cape Peril had a tang of romance to its 
 very name and to meet an ex-mariner who had 
 scoured the Seven Seas was a treat not to be had 
 every day. " He doesn't mind boys asking him 
 questions, does he? " inquired Legs. 
 
 " Tickles him to death. Only trouble is to 
 stop him when he gets wound up. I'll leave you 
 fellows with him for a while, and when I come
 
 62 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 back and sit a little, I'll hop up and give the 
 signal to go." 
 
 Merrily joking and laughing, the four trudged 
 along the sea beach, over the culvert that spanned 
 the depression between the region of Seagulls' 
 Nest and the domain of Cape Peril, and up the 
 mound to the lighthouse. The lads viewed the 
 weatherbeaten exterior with intense interest as 
 Hardy recounted the services it rendered to 
 vessels seeking to shun the dangerous shoals it 
 faced. 
 
 Then the four passed through the open door 
 into a bare circular basement. Here Hardy 
 shouted for the keeper. 
 
 " I seen you ahoy," called back a hearty 
 voice. " Climb the companion way up amidships. 
 The skipper is within." 
 
 Up the ladderlike stair climbed the proces- 
 sion, emerging into a second circular room, evi- 
 dently the living quarters of the keeper. A couch 
 covered with a rusty crazy quilt, a cupboard, a 
 great stove, a table littered with a rare collection 
 of odds and ends, various chairs and boxes of 
 all sizes, shelves supporting everything imagin- 
 able from a mousetrap to a cannonball, maps,
 
 At Cape Peril 63 
 
 charts, and curios from every quarter of the 
 world adorning the curving walls of the room 
 such were the furnishings of this strange abode 
 of the veteran of the sea. 
 
 The " Cap'n," a short, broad man of some 
 sixty years, with a bushy white beard, twinkling 
 bright eyes on either side of a mighty nose, came 
 forward on his bowed legs to welcome his 
 visitors. 
 
 " So these is them," said he as Hardy pre- 
 sented the boys before taking his leave. " Glad 
 to see ye, lads'," he added, picking up the pipe he 
 had laid aside in order to shake their hands. 
 ' * If you can 't find chairs to accommodate ye, the 
 boxes is soft and springy. Buffum's my name, 
 and Buffum's my nature. You don't find no 
 style hyuh, but what I has you're welcome to it. 
 I know that suits ye, boys. You look like you've 
 got horse sense, and horse sense is what old 
 Bill Buffum swears by. And ye've got good 
 clean smooth faces I see, lads. Keep 'em smooth 
 and clean, and when your thoughts begin to 
 write wrinkles on 'em, let 'em be jolly, happy 
 wrinkles, for your thoughts write on your face so 
 everybody kin read 'em. You can't fool old
 
 64 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Mother Nature, lads, and don't try.^ Horse sense 
 and happiness, lads, them's the words." 
 
 He seated himself under six eager eyes, and 
 began to puff vigorously on his pipe. 
 
 " Tell me you used to be a sailor," began 
 Legs. 
 
 Captain Buffum refilled and relighted his pipe, 
 and putting on his most knowing look, proceeded : 
 " They told you right, lad, they told you right. 
 A sailor I was and, though my old body is tied 
 down in this hyuh lighthouse, my mind is a-sail- 
 ing the sea right this minute. I was born at sea, 
 and I reckon that first salt spray I took in when 
 I opens my mouth to tell 'em I'd come must 
 'a give me a taste I couldn't never git over. 
 Then I growed up in a seaport as nigh to the 
 water as where I'm sittin' here. I growed up 
 with the salt air in my lungs, lads." 
 
 Captain Buffum nodded his head in the direc- 
 tion of the ocean. " When I fust seed the vessels 
 in the harbor," he continued, " the sea drawed 
 me, and she kept a drawin' me till I was eighteen 
 year old, and then I says to my father, * I'm 
 a-goin' to sea,' And he says to me, ' Bill, 
 you're a danged fool! ' And says I, ' I knows
 
 At Cape Peril 65 
 
 it, but a fool is goin ' to sea. ' And I went, boys ; I 
 went. The sea had drawed me, same as the 
 magnet does the needle, ever sence I fust seen 
 it, and, when you fall in love with the sea, she's 
 the goldarnest drawin'est sweetheart a felluh 
 can have. She don't let go fer nuthin', and 
 sometimes she takes such a almighty likin' to 
 you she opens up them foamy jaws o' hers and 
 swallows you whole, and keeps you tight till 
 kingdom come in her Davy Jones's locker." 
 
 "Where's that?" inquired Legs wonder- 
 ingly. 
 
 " That's a name for the bottom of the sea," 
 explained Cap 'n Buffum, with a laugh, and added 
 with a solemn face, " where many a good sailor 
 lies a-moulderin' and many a good ship, too. In 
 the old days, that was the place where I wanted 
 to go when my time came, though I warn't in no 
 blasted hurry, just like you lads ain't. But I 
 thought the wust thing that could happen to a 
 sailorman was to flicker out on dry land, and 
 though I had to use my fists in more'n one skir- 
 mish on shore, lads, I kept my weather eye 
 open for to keep a whole skin for Davy Jones r s 
 locker when that thar sea-witch took a notion to
 
 66 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 blow her whistle fer me. Thar were one time, 
 though, lads, when I had that eye shet, and that 
 was when I fit a dooel." 
 
 " Gee! have you fought a duel? " exclaimed 
 Jimmy, popping his black eyes in wonder and 
 admiration, while the other two boys leaned 
 forward in rapt attention. " I thought every- 
 body who did that was dead long ago." 
 
 " When I say fit a dooel," pursued Cap'n 
 Buffum, blowing, out a cloud of smoke, " I ain't 
 walkin' the chalk line o' truth. I was all primed 
 to fight one day when I was circumwented, lads. 
 I was circumwented. This was the way of it: 
 There was a sailor on The Flying Jenny (she 
 flied on the ocean, lads) 'bout ten years 
 younger than me and the viles', out-cussinest, 
 out-lyines' bluejacket that ever clum a riggin'. 
 One day he said sumpin' about a gal I wouldn't 
 stand for fer nuthin,' and I give it back to him 
 hot and heavy, hot and heavy, I did. * Well, all 
 right,' says he with a string o* oaths that ought 
 to 'a burned a hole plumb through his throat, 
 ' that means a round next time we has shore 
 leave.' * That's me,' says I, ' fists or pistols? ' 
 * Pistols is a gentleman's weapon,' says he.
 
 At Cape Peril 67 
 
 * Though I don't see whar you got no such title, 
 pistols let it be,' says I. 
 
 " I hadn't never heard tell of seconds in 
 them days, so, next shore leave we has, we 
 goes together to a pawnshop and buys a gun 
 apiece, lads, and then we makes for a ole field, 
 nice and quiet, outside the town. * Now,' says he, 
 ' le's turn back to back and step off fifty paces.' 
 1 I ain't got no eyes in the back of my head,' 
 says I. * And you don't need none,' says he, 
 mild as a spring mornin'. Then, blister my boots, 
 lads, when I faces round from east to west, 
 that scoundrel he boxed the compass in his tracks 
 and comes back to whar he starts from and he 
 ups and whacks me a murderous thump on the 
 skull with the butt of his pistol, and I falls like 
 a log on the ground, jus' like a log." 
 
 The Cap'n paused at this dramatic point to 
 take another draw on his pipe. 
 
 The excited Jimmy hastened to ask, ' * How did 
 you know he hit you with a pistol if you didn't 
 see him? " 
 
 " How would you know, my mate, ef lightning 
 was to strike you? I laid thar fer two hours 
 limp an' pacified, and when I comes to and pulls
 
 68 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 my senses together and feels the back o' my 
 head, thar was the criss-cross ridges made by 
 that 'ere pistol butt, and I knowed right off 
 what that devil had done. I hed blood in 
 my eye, lads, and ef I'd 'a ketched that scoundrel 
 then, I'm a-f eared thar wouldn't 'a been no pac- 
 in'-off dooel, but jes' a plain ev'y-day murder. 
 But I scours the town, and nary a Bill Perkins 
 could I find, and I goes back to the ship and 
 he warn't thar, and the next day he didn't turn 
 up, ner the next, ner nary day till the ship 
 sailed, and then I seed he'd meant to desert fun 
 the fust." 
 
 The " Cap'n " leaned back reflectively. 
 
 " Gee! what would you do if you got him 
 now? " asked Cat. 
 
 " Listen, lads, listen," continued the old man, 
 after another puff, " I'm goin' to surprise ye. 
 You 'spect me to say I'd reach out and wring 
 his mis 'able neck fer him, don't ye? No, no, I 
 wouldn't. Fve lamed a lot since them times, and 
 the hardest lesson I ever lamed was to forgive 
 yo' enemies, but I've learned it. Hatin' don't 
 do yo' disposition no good and it plumb spiles 
 yo' complexion."
 
 At Cape Peril 69 
 
 A light came into the old mariner's eyes as at 
 the attainment of a great triumph. 
 
 " I've done fergiven ev'y critter that done me 
 any wrong on this hyuh globe. When it come 
 to that 'ere varmint, I wrastled with my soul fer 
 forty days right in this hyuh lighthouse, but I 
 done it. I fergive him, an' ef he'd step up 
 right this minute, I might screw up this old mug 
 o' mine, but, blister my boots, I'd stick out my 
 old flipper and I'd say, ' You low-down, ornery, 
 sneakin' cuss, I fergive you that dirty trick you 
 played on me thirty years ago, and, dang you, 
 hyuh's my hand on it. I'd do that, fer I'm tryin' 
 to do my bes' in this hyuh life. I'm tryin' not 
 to think of no thin ' but what's good. It's a 
 lonesome life, but I'm doin' my bes', lads. I'm 
 a-lettin' my light shine, and when I gets a little 
 down in the mouth of a night, I says to myself, 
 * Bill Buffum, you're a fool. Think how happy 
 you're a-makin' them sailormen out on the sea 
 yonder,' and I cheers up immediate. 
 
 " I might o' been married, lads, but when I 
 had that sort o' thing a workin' in my head, I 
 hed the same ailment I has now, lads. I war 
 bow-legged, and bowlegs is a powerful drawback
 
 70 The Boy Scouts of the Air , 
 
 to mat'amony. All the gals snickers at ye, lads, 
 and when a gal makes fun o' ye f ye might as 
 well reef yo' sails and drift. Ye see, when I 
 was jes' kneehigh to a hoppergrass them clapper- 
 clawed kids in school said thet when I toddled 
 along my legs makes a and then they crosses 
 sorter and makes a X, so, dang 'em, they yells 
 * Ox * after me ; * f er, ' says they, ' yo ' legs spell it 
 just as good or plainer then McGuffey's Spellin' 
 Book.' Ef you want to be happy, boys, don't let 
 none of yo' limbs take a hold on yo' mind." 
 
 At this point, Legs crossed his lower extrem- 
 ities uneasily, much to the merriment of his 
 companions. 
 
 11 What's the matter, lad? " laughed the jolly 
 seaman. " You ain't got nothin' to worry you. 
 I has to tack, but yo' props is long but straight, 
 and, as long as they're straight, you kin walk 
 away with any of 'em. That's right, lads. Don't 
 do like me. Pick yo' gal an', when you've 
 sighted her with your telescope, bear down the 
 wind with all yo' sails a-bellyin'. An', blister 
 my boots, she'll strike her colors, and she's 
 yourn to have and to hold, ferever and mo'n 
 ever. Amen."
 
 At Cape Peril 71 
 
 With great solemnity the Cap'n drew on his 
 pipe, and then gazed roguishly around upon his 
 grinning audience. 
 
 " But I did go a-co'tin* once," he conceded 
 with a sly wink. * * 'Twar when I come home after 
 I'd been at sea 'bout five year. I run across 
 one of the gals I'd knowed that knocked me 
 down the companion way the fust time I laid a 
 eye on her." 
 
 There was a look of startled surprise from 
 the boys. 
 
 " I mean," Cap'n Buffum hastened to ex- 
 plain, with a twinkle in his eye, " I mean she 
 drawed my heart out, lads. She was all cream 
 and ripe peaches. 'Twarn't no gal that weared 
 her clothes neater, an', in all my born days, I 
 never seed finer mitts than she wore." 
 
 "What!" interrupted Legs. " The things 
 ketchers wear? " 
 
 Cap'n Buffum iaughed long and loudly. 
 " Them was the gloves gals wore when I was 
 young, gloves that didn't have no finger ends to 
 'em, so the womenfolks could show off their shiny 
 rings and grab things good. In them days, they 
 didn't have to take 'em off when they ate their
 
 72 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 vittles like these hyuh slick, slippery ones the 
 gals wear nowadays." 
 
 " What you fellows keep ha-ha-ing about! " 
 demanded Legs, glaring on his two chums, who 
 were indulging in horselaughs. " She might 
 have been on a team. Didn 't you see that Ladies ' 
 aggregation that came down home last year, with 
 men along to slide bases for 'em? I never did 
 see so many balls muffed nor as many fouls 
 cracked nor nor Shut up, will you? " 
 
 The last command was evidently not intended 
 for their host, who chuckled once more and con- 
 tinued: " She was this sort of baseball player, 
 lads: she knocked me out and clean over the 
 fence when I set down to talk sweet to her. She 
 didn't say so, but I knowed it war my legs that 
 done it. But time brings changes, lads; time 
 brings almighty changes. She kept on a-knockin' 
 and a-knockin' other felluhs out because one's 
 eyes didn't set right and she didn't like another 
 lad's job. She was so notional and pernickety, 
 fust thing she knowed she was a ole maid 
 landed high and dry in No Man's Land, she was. 
 
 " I reckon it war twenty year since I done 
 lost sight of her when hyuh come a letter from
 
 At Cape Peril 73 
 
 her to me, sayin', ' Bill dear, I'm a-dyin' and I 
 can 't die easy unless I see you bef o ' I go. ' You 
 could 'a knocked me down with a gull's pin- 
 feather, lads, but 'twarn't nothin' to do but go. 
 So I rigs myself up and takes the train and finds 
 her house, an' when I rings, a solemn-lookin' ole 
 woman opens the do' and shows me upstairs as 
 sadlike as if I was goin' to a buryin', and thar 
 in that room on them pillowshams lay the bat- 
 tered hull of that pretty Mary Ann I had knowed 
 when she was a gal. Says she, sort o' dyin'- 
 calf-like, 'Law, Bill, is that you? ' And I takes 
 her hand with one of mine, and with the other 
 I draws out my red bandanna and I weeps regu- 
 lar briny tears, and then I talks ole times to 
 sorter cheer her up till I hed to go. 
 
 " But, blister my boots, boys, 'bout the time 
 I looks fer one o' them black framed envy-lopes 
 to tell me Mary Ann had slipped over the horizon 
 on her last voyage, here come a pink letter, lads. 
 1 I didn't die,' she writes, ' an' I ain't got no 
 notion o' dyin' now. Seems like that sweet face 
 o' yonrn jus' snatched me from the grave. I'm 
 up and about an', 'cept fer a leetle tech o' lum- 
 bago, I'm sound as a ole kittle. A mustard
 
 74 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 plaster and you, Bill, will make me the Mary 
 Ann I used to be, I'm shore.' Blister my boots, 
 she sends me 'bout six o' them health bulletins, 
 each one healthier than the one befo', but nary a 
 scratch has I writ. I ain't a-lookin' fer no grave- 
 yard ceremony. She wouldn't take me when I 
 was young and she don't git me when I'm old. 
 I'm spliced to the sea that don't never have no 
 lumbago, an', when she hollers and howls and 
 yells and carries on, it's jest to show the spunk 
 she's got in her. I ain't takin' on no cargo at 
 my time o' life. I'm a-sailin' light and easy till 
 I puts in my last port." 
 
 Again Cap'n Buffum drew on his pipe, proba- 
 bly to hide a tear that seemed to be forming in 
 the corner of his eye. 
 
 " Nothin' ain't goin' to down me, lads," he 
 burst out suddenly. " It's too fine a day. It's 
 a fine day, an' the sea looks like a fishpond, but 
 she's like some folks; they're a-plannin' and 
 a-plottin' their meanest when they looks the 
 mildest. Some days I've seen the sea look jus' 
 like that an', fus' thing you knows, my corns 
 begins to ache and the nex mornin' she's a-skin- 
 nin' the cat and a-cuttin' up like she done
 
 At Cape Peril 75 
 
 lost her senses; an' they're a-achin' to-day 
 sorter, an' thar ain't no tellin' what's comin* 
 tomorrow." 
 
 4 * Then maybe we '11 get some breakers to 
 ride," said Cat enthusiastically, with the secret 
 hope that the prophetic ache would continue. 
 ." But, Cap'n Buffum, tell us about some of your 
 sea experiences. You must have had some hot 
 ones." 
 
 11 When I fust knowed the sea," proceeded 
 the Cap'n without further urging, " them was 
 times, them was. But I give her up because all 
 the old windjammers was gone an' the old style 
 steamers, an* I didn't have no taste for these 
 new bilers and en-jines they run 'em with these 
 days. An' I'm glad I give it up, lads, befV them 
 submarines sneakin' round underneath the water 
 and things sailin' overhead had plumb spiled the 
 sea. These hyuh inventors has plumb sp'iled it, 
 and, as fer seamanship these days, 'tain't nothin* 
 in it no longer. 
 
 ' ' ' Twar many a year ago I read that yarn 
 Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and 
 says I to myself, says I, the Frenchman that 
 wrote that ain't safe aboveboard. Then come
 
 76 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 along a War of the Worlds, a tale about ships 
 a-flyin' in the air, and I throwed that trash 
 away, and says I, ' That's a danged sight craz- 
 ier,' but, blister my boots, these hyuh submarines 
 and them airjammers o' Hardy's, they done both 
 come true. But 111 tell you some yarns of what 
 I seen befo' that." 
 
 Whereupon, between puffs, Cap'n Buffum kept 
 the audience rigid with interest for two full 
 hours with some of his wildest experiences of 
 the deep. Then followed an excursion to the 
 turret and an explanation of the mechanism of 
 the powerful revolving light. Then back to the 
 room below they went for an inspection of his 
 museum. This done, the host was in the midst 
 of a recital of some of the most disastrous wrecks 
 on the shoals of Cape Peril when Hardy turned 
 up. With the greatest reluctance, the boys were 
 prevailed upon to go, and then only with an 
 understanding that they might come back again 
 at the earliest possible opportunity.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE INTEKKUPTED MESSAGE 
 
 The next morning Legs awoke early and, after 
 inspecting his watch, was about to settle him- 
 self for another hour's snooze when he detected 
 a sputtering sound and instantly recognized it 
 as the wireless in action. Footfalls on the flat 
 roof of the kitchen ell confirmed him in the 
 opinion that Turner was taking or sending a 
 message. Straightway, the youngster was seized 
 by an itching desire to witness the apparatus 
 in operation, and all thought of further sleep 
 vanished. 
 
 Very softly he arose, slipped on his clothes, 
 and was hurrying on his way to seek the outer 
 stairway leading to the roof of the annex when 
 he stopped short and drew back on discovering, 
 out on the porch, Hardy and Turner (the latter 
 evidently just arrived) deeply absorbed in 
 conversation. 
 
 " That's what it said," Turner was announc- 
 ing, " that's every last word I could get. 
 
 77
 
 78 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ' Lighthouse keeper at Kitty Hawk ill. Bring 
 Smith from Knott's Island this morning with- 
 out delay. You can make it if you hurry. 
 There's a terrible ', and that's all I could pick 
 up, though I listened till my ears ached." 
 
 Hardy paced up and down a few moments. 
 11 Terrible what, do you suppose? Battle, mur- 
 der, or sudden death? " 
 
 " You can search me. All you know is that 
 you've got to beat it and beat it good and quick. 
 Beckon they had too much gumption to ask 
 you to bump a hurricane." 
 
 "Confound it!" grumbled Hardy. "When 
 I took this job, I didn't count on carrying light- 
 house keepers around over all creation. Say, 
 run up there, will you, and try your wire again 
 while I get some stuff together. If I've got to 
 go, I've got to there are no two ways about it." 
 
 As the birdman rushed through the door, he 
 nearly unset Legs in his haste. 
 
 " Hello 1 Down already?" he rattled, and 
 then, as if seized by a sudden inspiration, " Look 
 here, old fellow, how would you like to go with 
 me in the plane as far as Knott's Island, about 
 twenty miles from here? I'll leave you there
 
 At Cape Peril 79 
 
 with a friend of mine and pick you up on my 
 way home this afternoon. Got to carry a light- 
 house doctor from here to Kitty Hawk about 
 forty miles further. How about it? Quick, right 
 off the bat! " 
 
 The suddenness of the invitation staggered 
 Legs and almost floored him. 
 
 " Want me to go? " Then after a second's 
 hesitation. " Sure I'll go. You bet I'd like to 
 go," said the lad, too flattered by the honor to 
 feel much nervousness over the adventure. 
 
 " That's what I call a man! Now, come on, 
 help me to throw some plunder into a bag." 
 
 11 How 'bout calling the other fellows? " sug- 
 gested the boy, on the track of the scurrying 
 birdman. 
 
 11 Hang the other fellows! We haven't got 
 time to fool with them. Chase yourself." 
 
 In high feather, yet quivering from excite- 
 ment, Legs kept at Hardy's heels as the man 
 grabbed a small satchel from a shelf, rushed to 
 the pantry and shoveled into the receptacle, 
 without a word of explanation to the petrified 
 Luke, some remains of the last evening's feast, 
 then dashed upstairs for an aviator's coat for
 
 80 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 himself and one for Legs; thrust into his belt 
 the pistol which he had official license to carry; 
 bounded from the house, and called up to Turner 
 to know if he could squeeze anything more out 
 of the wireless. 
 
 " Not a buzz," cried the man aloft. " Not a 
 sizzle." 
 
 " Then come on down and help us with the 
 plane." 
 
 As the three were jog-trotting along towards 
 the hangar, the Tarheel prudently raised some 
 sharp objections to Hardy's plan for the boy, 
 but, with the assurance that the passenger was 
 to be dropped at Knott's Island, he subsided. 
 
 Fifteen minutes later, the bird had started on 
 its journey. 
 
 " Gee! they'll be sore," thought the rising 
 Legs with great elation, as he waved down upon 
 his belated companions, who came running across 
 the sand. " This is where I score." And, snug- 
 gling in his coat, began to goggle the surround- 
 ing sky and the sea beneath with more self- 
 possession and courage than he had on his 
 initiation. 
 
 Over the lighthouse rose Windjammer and, at
 
 At Cape Peril 81 
 
 a suitable elevation, was soon speeding above a 
 sandy strip separating what appeared to be a 
 vast inland lake on the one hand and the ocean 
 on the other. To the lad's eyes, a singular 
 change had taken place in the water, due to the 
 curling whitecaps. The sky also had changed 
 its aspect of the day before. The sun shone red 
 and sinister through a weird mist, and from the 
 rim of the southern horizon great clouds were 
 surging. 
 
 Beyond the region of the landlocked waters, 
 great stretches of woodland and the farms of 
 the trucking land miles inland from the sand 
 and marsh area came in view. Soon the state 
 boundary was crossed, and immediately beneath 
 the flyer gleamed another sand ridge, the begin- 
 ning of that barrier extending, with breaks here 
 and there, almost the whole length of the Caro- 
 lina coast. For a space of ten or fifteen miles 
 the ocean stretched boundlessly on the left, and 
 on the right spread the upper waters of Curri- 
 tuck Sound. Then there came into view a 
 sparsely wooded sandy island with groups of 
 tiny houses at wide intervals. Now Hardy, 
 steering to the right, crossed a narrow inlet,
 
 82 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 hovered over a village and planed down to a 
 grassy spot not more than a stones throw from 
 the marshy shoreline. 
 
 " All out for Knott's Island," sang out the 
 pilot as he alighted under the staring eyes of a 
 group of fishermen. " Boy, you're a seasoned 
 birdman," he added patting the exultant lad on 
 the shoulder. " You're wearing your wings; 
 you're getting the bird look in your eyes. 
 But, see here, keep off the swell-head and, while 
 I chase off for Smith, keep a close watch on this 
 plane and don't let any of those oyster rubes 
 get their whiskers tangled in my propeller. I'll 
 bring Nash back with me and turn you over to 
 him to keep till I get back. Hell stuff you with 
 prunes and persimmons. He has a grocery store 
 yonder." 
 
 Hardy strode off to the shop, a few rods up 
 the shore. 
 
 "Well, I'll be switched! Hello, sky pilot," 
 hailed the grocer, bluff and hearty, red-headed 
 and red-cheeked, in shirt sleeves and corduroy 
 breeches spotted with marks of flour and other 
 reminders of his trade. " Saw you coming with 
 a tail to your kite. Looks more like chine than
 
 At Cape Peril 83 
 
 good red herring." He shot out a stubby finger 
 in the direction of Legs. 
 
 " Just a kid I brought along for company," 
 explained Hardy. " But look here, have you 
 heard 1" 
 
 "A kid! " interrupted Nash. " Now I know 
 you're a fool. Thought you were dippy enough 
 to be windjammering by yourself, let alone bring- 
 ing ballast with you. Haven't you heard of that 
 gale whipping up the coast at a hundred miles an 
 hour." 
 
 " What! What's that? " exclaimed the star- 
 tled pilot. "A gale! The deuce you say! " 
 
 " What are you givin' us? Haven't you got a 
 wire at Cape Peril? " 
 
 In hurried words, Hardy told of the broken 
 message. 
 
 " This fills the gap then," said Nash. " Tele- 
 gram came this A. M. early ! ' Put storm signals 
 out along coast. West Indian gale sweepin' 
 north. Central now off coast of Florida.' Take 
 a look at that barometer, will you? " 
 
 The pilot glanced at the instrument attached 
 to the door frame. 
 
 11 Doesn't look good a bit. But I reckon I can
 
 84 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 make Kitty Hawk. Now to get that fellow Smith 
 in a jiffy." 
 
 " You can go over and see. He was hangin' 
 around the store yestiddy, but seems like I heard 
 somebody say he pulled out to Roanoke Island 
 last night on a tugboat." 
 
 " Darn I " exploded Hardy, staring vacantly 
 about him, and then turned to rush over to 
 Smith's cottage several hundred yards away. 
 Twelve minutes later he was back, looking his 
 stormiest. 
 
 " Talk about wild-goose chases! " he fumed to 
 Nash. " That chump Smith's wife says he's gone 
 to Dareville on business, but I'll sure find him 
 there. She bristled and looked sour about the 
 Kitty Hawk proposition, but I'm going to get 
 him there if I have to make a pancake landing 
 to do it. This is the deuce! " 
 
 " Better lie low here, that's my advice," 
 warned Nash. 
 
 Hardy shook his head impatiently. 
 
 " Orders are orders. I learned that in the 
 army," declared the pilot firmly. " Now if 
 you'll keep an eye on Hatton " 
 
 " I'll keep two on him. Here comes your
 
 At Cape Peril 85 
 
 Sonny Longlegs now. Looks like he thought 
 sompin' was after trim." 
 
 He pointed to the lad sprinting toward them 
 with such speed as he might have exhibited in 
 front of a legion of tigers. 
 
 " Hardy! Hardy! " panted the boy as he 
 bounded up. " Come quick! Come quick! " 
 
 There was a note of tragic insistence in his 
 tone, but Hardy was not the sort of fellow to be 
 stampeded. 
 
 "Great guns! What's up now?" he 
 demanded. " What's got into you, boy? " 
 
 "One one one of father's lifeboats 
 with a hole in it on the shore there." 
 
 He pointed tremblingly at a line of boats on 
 the sloping bank not far from the airplane. 
 
 " Why, you're crazy. One of your father's 
 lifeboats! He's in Mexico! " 
 
 " But I know it is! I know it is! " insisted 
 the lad. " I found my initials I cut on it a long 
 time ago. You don't think the yacht's gone 
 down, do you? " 
 
 He was already dragging Hardy along, while 
 the grocer, in dumb astonishment, toddled after 
 on his fat, round legs.
 
 86 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " Keep your head, Hatton," commanded 
 Hardy; " don't talk tommyrot.' What in the 
 name of herring could one of the yacht's boats 
 be doing way up here? " 
 
 The boy slackened his pace a bit to rattle off 
 his story. When Hardy had left for the store, 
 he related, he kept an eye on the plane, but 
 moved over closer to the beach. Among several 
 boats lying there, one had instantly attracted his 
 attention on account of its being a type quite 
 different from those used by oystermen. Draw- 
 ing nearer to inspect it better, he discovered that 
 one side had been staved in as by the blows of 
 an axe. The name on either side of the prow 
 seemed to have been sandpapered out, but some 
 fragments of letters still visible convinced him 
 that the name had been The Jolly Ruffian. To 
 confirm his suspicions, he found cut in the wood 
 of the gunwale the letters W. M. M. H. This 
 piece of mischief he had perpetrated five years 
 before, and his misdeed had been deeply 
 impressed upon him by a spanking. 
 
 Partly convinced by the story, Hardy reached 
 the bont, inspected it carefully, and agreed with 
 Nash that the evidence was overwhelming. The
 
 At Cape Peril 87 
 
 boat undoubtedly belonged to the Hatton yacht. 
 
 Most of the neighboring fishermen had gath- 
 ered about the plane, but one weatherbeaten old 
 fellow sat mending a net by the waterside, stop- 
 ping every now and then to cast uneasy glances 
 at the trio pow-wowing over the lifeboat. 
 
 " Who's this smashed-in boat belong to? " 
 
 11 My boat," shouted back the old man in a 
 tone that implied, " And what business is it of 
 yours? " 
 
 " Wouldn't mind coming over and telling us 
 where you got it, would you? " urged Nash. 
 
 The fisherman arose and walked over delib- 
 erately. 
 
 " Go ahead and tell him, Mr. Hall," coaxed 
 Nash when the man arrived. " He's all right." 
 
 " Buy it? " quizzed Hardy, in a hurry to be 
 done with the business and off on his errand. 
 
 " No, I didn't," was the brusque reply. " It 
 ain't yourn, is it? What you askin' fer? " 
 
 " To come right to the point, my friend, this 
 boat here looks very much like one I've seen 
 before, and I'd just like for curiosity to know 
 how it came here." 
 
 "They're all right," encouraged Nash once
 
 88 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 more. " Tell 'em. You're a friend of mine, 
 ain't you? " 
 
 " Well, if you're a friend of Tom Nash thar," 
 he drawled, jerking his head towards the grocer, 
 11 I don't mind talkin', but I ain't much set on 
 unloadin' my own business on strangers. And 
 what's more, I say nobody ain't goin' to get their 
 hands on this boat unless they can prove it 
 b 'longs to 'em. That's whar I stand. The way 
 I come across it was this way. Less'n two weeks 
 ago I was out dredgin' my oyster beds 'bout 
 two shouts and a fling from hyuh and the tongs 
 got hold o' sumpin' that felt powerful funny. Me 
 and my son, we jerks and jerks, but couldn't 
 move it a peg. Then I gets a boy to dive down 
 and feel of it, and the boy, says he, 'It's a boat, 
 a rowboat.' Then me and my son gets a big 
 iron hook and a chain and hitches on to that boat 
 in 'bout fifteen feet o' water and hauls it over 
 to the shallow marsh and drags it asho' and 
 with that thar hole stove in it. I asked every- 
 body I seed, and nobody don't know nary a 
 thing 'bout whar it come from. Then I says, it's 
 mine till somebody can prove a claim to it, that's 
 what I says."
 
 At Cape Peril 89 
 
 " Then you have no suspicion as to who sunk 
 it or where it came from? Nobody suspicious 
 been seen around? " persisted Hardy. 
 
 " No, sir, not so far as I knows," declared the 
 witness, and then, after a few moments' hesita- 
 tion, he pointed to a lanky man in an oilskin 
 coat in the group around the airplane. " I 
 recollect Joe Turpin, that tallest man yonder, did 
 say that he give some grub to a tramp one night 
 'bout the time I found the boat. He said he came 
 from Eoanoke Island and his name was Buffalo 
 Dare or some such." 
 
 Unable to get any further information from 
 Hall, Hardy directed the excited Hatton to stay 
 where he was while he himself interviewed the 
 man in oilskin. Joe Turpin answered the ques- 
 tions after some coaxing. The stranger, he 
 asserted, was a short, stocky, smooth-faced man 
 with a rattlesnake sort of eye, but he stood out 
 of the light with a slouch hat pulled down over 
 him face, and the witness wasn't sure he could 
 recognize him if he saw him in tEe daylight. 
 
 " He wore sto* clothes," continued Turpin, 
 " and didn't look like our folks. He paid for his 
 food. Said he was an Indian traveling to Dare
 
 90 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 County and that his name was Buffalo Dare. ' ' 
 
 This source of evidence exhausted, Hardy 
 found that the other men in the group had no 
 knowledge whatever of the stranger, so he hur- 
 ried back to the oystennan for a last word. 
 
 " I don't want no other folks' belongin's," 
 insisted the old man, " but nobody ain't goin' 
 to get that boat but the lawful owner, and then 
 only when he forks out fifteen dollars fer haulin' 
 it out of the oyster bed. It was wuth every 
 cent of it, and it kilt some o' my young oysters, 
 too." 
 
 " Now, Hatton," said the pilot, turning to 
 the boy, who had followed every word of the 
 oysterman with breathless interest. " You stay 
 here with Nash and don't worry. You know 
 your father's been heard from. I s'pose one of 
 his boats got adrift when he laid over in the 
 Sound, and that's all there is to it. I've wasted 
 too much time already. Nash, take care of him 
 till I get back." 
 
 Legs, however, was in no mood to be shaken 
 off. As fast as the words could tumble out of 
 his mouth, he argued he must get to Roanoke 
 Island to find out something further; it would be
 
 At Cape Peril 91 
 
 impossible for him to stay in that lonesome spot, 
 and so on. Hardy frowned, looked fierce, posi- 
 tively refused to let him go, melted a little, 
 and then, after a short consultation with Nash 
 about the prospects of the weather for the next 
 hour, finally gave in. 
 
 " Anything to keep the peace; but if the wind 
 gets stiff er I'm going to land and leave you even 
 if it's in a wilderness twenty miles from 
 civilization. ' ' 
 
 Up went the bird, amid the wondering long- 
 shoremen, the pilot steering from Currituck 
 Sound to the mainland; he then left Currituck 
 County behind, passed over Dare County, and, 
 turning east across a narrow inlet, drove across 
 Roanoke Island in a freshening breeze, hovered 
 over a hamlet, glided down, and landed even keel 
 in the outskirts of Dareville on the seaward side 
 of the island.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE HAUNTS OF BUFFALO DARE 
 
 When the pilot had safely landed at Dareville, 
 inquiry brought out the news that Smith had 
 gone to Manteo, a settlement two miles away. 
 It was getting to be a needle hunt in a haystack 
 and, with the wind rising every moment, Hardy 
 was growing desperate. He felt very much as 
 an angry porcupine looks, and expressed himself 
 accordingly to a group of villagers. The offer of 
 an obliging citizen to go post-haste in his auto 
 for the elusive Smith was eagerly accepted. 
 
 " If this ain't the dickens! " exploded Hardy 
 to Legs. " If I ever get my hands on that son of 
 a gun, fat chance he'll have to wriggle out till 
 I drive his head into the Kitty Hawk light- 
 house. What's the use of getting hot, though! " 
 he concluded. "It's all in a lifetime. Let's go 
 over to that swell hotel there and eat while we're 
 waiting. ' ' 
 
 Legs began to press the Buffalo Dare mystery. 
 
 " Look here," argued the pilot, " my first job 
 
 02
 
 At Cape Peril 93 
 
 is to load and unload Smith. In an hour and a 
 half, at the outside, I'll be back, and it looks like 
 a dead certainty we'll be marooned here all 
 night and maybe all tomorrow and, for all I know, 
 a whole week. Oodles of time for detective 
 work. But to tell you the honest truth, Hatton, 
 I don't see why you plague yourself about that 
 boat business. Don't look so bilious. You'll 
 have some fun before you die." 
 
 Legs quieted down and Hardy was busy with 
 his own thoughts till the pair reached the Sir 
 Walter Raleigh Tavern, a dilapidated two-story 
 building just opposite the general merchandise 
 store known as " The Emporium," which latter 
 also housed the postoffice. Through this last 
 fact the loafers on the Raleigh porch had the 
 tremendous advantage of gazing on every man, 
 woman, and child in the village at some period 
 of the day. The newcomers passed some of these 
 idle gentry as they entered the doorway and 
 found themselves in a long dining room, one 
 corner of which served as the office of the land- 
 lord, the principal function of whose desk seemed 
 the support of his pair of very dirty boots. 
 
 Of the eight tables, one was occupied by a tall
 
 94 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 individual whose back was turned* to the pilot 
 and his companion. A waiter was sauntering 
 around, apparently trying to persuade himself 
 that he was busy with a mop and a bucket. Two 
 clodhoppers, one with the round, yellow face of 
 a Hallowe'en pumpkin and the other possessing 
 the sharp, startled look of a rabbit, were stand- 
 ing by a window lazily engaged with their 
 toothpicks. 
 
 Hardy, addressed as " Brother " by the land- 
 lord, was informed he could get coffee and ham 
 and eggs. 
 
 " Long sweetenin' or short in yo r coffee? " 
 inquired the negro waiter when he found time 
 for the order. 
 
 Hardy decided on " short," explaining to the 
 puzzled lad that " long " was molasses, very 
 popular in these regions a fact which had not 
 escaped the attention of the flies, as attested 
 by their swarming over everything. 
 
 For a minute or so, the two men by the win- 
 dow stared at the newcomers in solemn silence; 
 then, removing their toothpicks, they abruptly 
 launched into the following dialogue: 
 
 " Looks like we was goin' to have some
 
 At Cape Peril 95 
 
 weather, " drawled Rabbit-face, casting an eye 
 up toward the window like a duck looking for 
 thunder. " Bio win' right smart, ain't it? " 
 
 "Certain sho' is!" returned his friend, on 
 the same key. " Tain't no fittin' time fer them 
 submarines to be flyin' in, is it? " 
 
 " What you talkin' 'bout, Bill Hulfish? Sub- 
 marines don't fly; they swims and dives in the 
 ocean same as fish do. Them's airyplanes you 
 mean. I seen two o' them there things at the 
 State F'ar 'bout a mile up in the air, and a 
 fool stepped off'n one smack on t'other same as 
 you step out o' yo' kitchen back do' right spank 
 in the hawgpen." 
 
 " Git out, Jim," observed Pumpkin-face, with- 
 out showing any heat at the insinuation that he 
 lived cheek by jowl with his porkers. 
 
 " Fac'," asserted Rabbit-face. 
 
 "Well, I'll be jiggered! He was danged 
 crazy," inferred Pumpkin. 
 
 * * If fools is fools 'taint no business o ' mine or 
 yourn, is it? " queried Rabbit-face. " Ev'ybody 
 to their taste as the old woman said when she 
 up and kissed the heifer." 
 
 " I don't say contrary. All the lunytics ain't
 
 96 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 been put in the 'sylum yet, or if they has been, 
 some has bus' loose." 
 
 " Ought to be a open season fer huntin' then! 
 sort o' birds all the year roun'," decided Babbit. 
 
 Whereupon they looked at one another, laughed 
 hoarsely, and dropped into a stare at the bird- 
 man and his fledgling, showing as clearly as 
 glances can that they were the target of the last 
 remark. Hardy was not touchy, but he couldn't 
 resist twisting about and returning a challenging 
 stare. As this movement brought to view the 
 weapon at his belt, the rustics decided the season, 
 was not quite so open as they had thought, 
 hitched at their breeches, sidestepped, and scut- 
 tled out of the door, much to the amusement of 
 Legs as well as of the landlord. 
 
 During the wait for the lunch and while they 
 were eating, Hardy answered Legs' questions 
 with regard to the famous Blackbeard who met 
 his end in these regions. From this he passed 
 on to mention of the early explorers. 
 
 " Near here," he related, " were the Indian 
 villages discovered by the expeditions sent out 
 by Sir Walter Raleigh, who named this country 
 Virginia in honor of the Virgin Queen. The first
 
 At Cape Peril 97 
 
 expedition landed in July, 1584. At the north 
 end of this island, I've seen the spot where they 
 say the original village of the Indians stood 
 nine houses built of cedar and fortified with 
 stakes. 
 
 " In 1585, the next year, another expedition 
 came out, and the white men were well treated 
 by the savages. These Englishmen brought 
 with them a painter named John White, who car- 
 ried back to Queen Elizabeth water-color pictures 
 he made of the natives. One funny thing he said 
 in his account was that the savages built plat- 
 forms in their cornfields and made a squaw sit 
 on a chair up there and keep up a terrible 
 squawking and howling to scare off the beasts 
 and birds from the crops human scarecrows 
 and pretty lively ones, I'll say. 
 
 " Now the last expedition sent out is sup- 
 posed to have been cleaned out completely by 
 the Indians. The word Croatan carved on the 
 bark of a tree was the only mark left by them 
 that could be found. By the way, before this, 
 the wife of a man who rejoiced in the cheerful 
 name of Ananias Dare, kin to our friend Buffalo, 
 I dare say, gave birth to a daughter named Vir-
 
 98 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ginia Dare, and she was the first English child 
 born on American soil. Some people claim the 
 lost Englishmen married into the Indian tribes 
 and t) at descendants of theirs are still living, 
 but that's all hot air." 
 
 While Hardy, to cover his impatience, was 
 enlightening the interested lad, the individual 
 eating with his back turned had begun to show 
 more attention to the pilot's story than to his 
 own meal. He started to clear his throat, rattle 
 his knife and fork, work his shoulders and dis- 
 play other marks of bodily disturbance. But when 
 Hardy paused after his " hot air " statement, 
 the stranger, a tall gaunt man with a shock of 
 red hair, bounded up and displayed flaming eyes 
 to the pair at the other table. 
 
 "I'm hot air, am I? Hot air, hot air, hot 
 air!" 
 
 And then, without attempting any violence 
 against Hardy and Legs, who jumped up ready 
 to defend themselves, he seized his hat and, toss- 
 ing his head, rushed from the room. 
 
 Before the two guests had quite recovered 
 from their astonishment, the landlord, his sides 
 shaking with mirth, came over to explain.
 
 At Cape Peril 99 
 
 " Crazy as a Junebug, but harmless, only you 
 tread on Ms toes good and proper. His name is 
 Ketcham, but he thinks he's a descendant of that 
 Virginia Dare, so the kids around here call him 
 Buffalo Dare and run after him yelling, ' You 
 ketch him; I'll skin him.' " 
 
 " Buffalo Dare! " exclaimed Legs, popping 
 his eyes. 
 
 " Does this man ever row around in a boat? " 
 asked Hardy eagerly. " Does he ever go over to 
 Knott's Island? " 
 
 " He never rowed no thin' but a herring," 
 returned the landlord, chuckling at his own jest. 
 " Bow no thin', and I've seen him every day 
 fer years. He eats here on a meal ticket his 
 brother pays for. He's harmless, so they don't 
 put him in the bughouse. Just gets daffy when 
 the kids pester him about that Buffalo business." 
 
 " But, say, Hardy," interposed Legs, not fully 
 recovered from his start, " I bet he is the same 
 man, though." 
 
 " Couldn't be," objected Hardy. " The fellow 
 seen on the island was short and smooth-faced 
 and black; this crazy loot has red whiskers." 
 
 Legs was about to push the subject further
 
 100 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 when there was commotion in front of the inn, 
 announcing the arrival of the auto with Smith. 
 
 " Can't talk, boy," shouted the pilot, throw- 
 ing Legs some money to pay for the lunch. 
 " Here, stay here and wait for me. Good-bye, 
 I'm gone. Back in less'n two hours, sure." 
 
 Out of the door flashed the birdman, seized the 
 protesting Smith, swore the wind wouldn't hurt 
 a kitten, and dragged him off almost bodily in 
 the direction of the plane. Legs followed, but 
 in the excitement got no attention and very for- 
 lornly watched the hurried preparation of the 
 pilot and his speedy departure in the teeth of a 
 good stiff wind sweeping over the Sound. 
 
 The hours dragged heavily by, one, two, three, 
 four, still no Hardy. At the end of two hours, 
 in fact, no rational person could be expected to 
 venture anywhere in an airship. The first good, 
 strong whip of the gale was in evidence, and 
 with it came dark and threatening rain clouds. 
 Time and again, Legs hurried down to the shore 
 and gazed over the waters in the direction of 
 Kitty Hawk. Gulls were circling landward with 
 plaintive cries. Every now and then, one of 
 these marine birds, a speck in the far distance,
 
 At Cape Peril 101 
 
 would tempt him for a moment to believe the 
 plane was on its way. 
 
 Boats speeded shoreward under all the force 
 of the oars; but none of the disembarking long- 
 shoremen reported having seen the plane since 
 it sailed seaward. Indeed, they thought it an 
 idiotic question to ask. With the fourth hour of 
 Hardy's absence, the wind was blowing with such 
 velocity and driving the rain in such torrents, 
 that Legs, unable to hold out any longer, wended 
 his way back to the shelter of the hotel. 
 
 " No use to worry," consoled the landlord. 
 " You might 'a knowed he wouldn't try to get 
 back a evenin' like this. If he didn't get spilled 
 on his way over he's high and dry in the light- 
 house. I'll take care of you, and won't let Buf- 
 falo Dare get your scalp. " 
 
 Legs, irritated by the last part of this speech, 
 and alarmed by the first, gazed disconsolately 
 out of the window at the driving rain and listened 
 with sinking heart to the dismal howling of the 
 wind. What with the lifeboat mystery on his 
 mind, the appearance of the madman and his own 
 loneliness, he had never felt quite so miserable 
 before in all his days.
 
 CHAPTER VH 
 
 THE BIRD HAD FLOWN 
 
 Scarcely had Hardy, Turner, and Legs left the 
 premises that eventful morning when Jimmy 
 opened his eyes, blinked them in the sun's rays, 
 and, sitting up between the sheets, looked about 
 him. There lay Cat on his back, mouth open, 
 still far away in dreamland. Legs's cot, on the 
 other hand, displayed the narrow mould of his 
 form, but nothing more substantial. Except for 
 Miller's heavy breathing, an uncanny silence 
 pervaded the house. 
 
 " Eh, Sleeping Beauty," yelled the tormentor, 
 partly from that boy instinct for raising the 
 roost when not asleep one's self. " You blue- 
 eyed Catfish, wake up there, hear me? " 
 
 To lend force to his command he hurled his 
 pillow with deliberate aim at the sleeper. Either 
 the yell or the pillow or both had the effect. 
 Cat's eyes popped open on the instant. 
 
 11 Confound you, Jimmy Todd, what'd you 
 wake me up for when I was right that second 
 102
 
 At Cape Peril 103 
 
 digging my fingers down in one of old Black- 
 beard's chests and raking out gold by the hand- 
 ful? " he demanded as soon as he took in the 
 situation. "I'd been a millionaire in just 'bout 
 two more minutes." 
 
 " Maybe that's what that slick Legs is up to, 
 without dreaming," suggested the other. " Look! 
 He's flew the coop." 
 
 Cat surveyed Legs's vacant bunk, bounced 
 from his own bed, and rushed to take a look at 
 the ocean from the window. 
 
 " Don't see him in," announced the observer. 
 " But golly, Jimmy, Tom Hardy's sunball looks 
 red and funny, and the sea's got some nifty jell 
 to her today. I b'lieve old Buffum's barometer's 
 working. We'll get some surf today, boy, sure! " 
 
 The aid was tepid and soft, with a brisk breeze 
 blowing. The waves that the day before had 
 washed the beach languidly and rolled back just 
 as lazily, this morning were splashing away in 
 hurly-burly fashion. 
 
 " We sure will," agreed Jimmy, planting him- 
 self by his companion. " But where you s'pose 
 Legs is. Can't be more'n seven o'clock. Not 
 near breakfast time yet. Let's raise the roof."
 
 104 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 The speaker ran to the door* and yelled 
 " Legs! " at the top of his lungs. No answer. 
 
 Mystified, the two barefooted boys pattered 
 along the hall, peeping into Hardy's room and 
 into Turner's in succession. Both were empty. 
 
 " Hardy! " they both shouted together as 
 loudly as they could bawl. 
 
 Dead silence. 
 
 " Turner, ah, Turner! " they shrilled. Same 
 result. 
 
 " What you reckon 's happened? " speculated 
 Cat, inferring some pleasure jaunt of which he 
 and Jimmy were being cheated. " Come on! 
 Let's go down and see! " 
 
 Back to their rooms they darted, slipped on 
 their shoes, and adding nothing else to their 
 sleeping costume, bounded down the stairway. 
 
 " Not a soul in sight but that old one-eyed 
 witch. Scat! " cried Jimmy, gazing about and 
 then striding from one window to another. 
 
 At the commotion, Luke cropped up from the 
 pantry. 
 
 " Where in the mischief are the others? " 
 demanded Cat. 
 
 " I dunno where they gone," returned the
 
 At Cape Peril 105 
 
 mulatto. " Heard Turner buzzin' 'round with 
 that there wireless o' his'n jus' now, and then 
 he come in and got Hardy and say sumpin', and 
 then I see Hardy and Legs runnin' round like 
 chicken with their heads cut off, and then they 
 grab some cold vittles from the pantry, and bus' 
 out the do', and, last I seed of 'em, all three was 
 a-makin' tracks out to-wards that there airy- 
 plane gayraje. Look like they done gone crazy." 
 
 The information added fuel to the lads' burn- 
 ing curiosity. " Come on, come on, Jimmy, don't 
 let 'em put one like that over on us," Cat 
 exhorted, starting for the entrance. 
 
 " I'm with you," shouted Jimmy. 
 
 And the two scantily attired forms shot out 
 of the door, sprang down the steps, rounded the 
 house, and ploughed along at their best speed 
 over the sandy pathway. 
 
 From the top of one of the dunes, the sight 
 that greeted their eyes spurred them on to new 
 exertion. There in the distance stood the Wind- 
 jammer ready for a flight. Hardy and Legs were 
 'climbing to their seats while Turner appeared 
 to be making ready to give them a send-off. 
 
 " Look, Jimmy, look! " sputtered Cat.
 
 106 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " That's what I call a low-down, scurvy trick." 
 
 " Blamed if it ain't," panted Jimmy, who had 
 used up all his wind in his effort to keep on the 
 heels of the flying Cat. 
 
 The latter now made a still more strenuous 
 spurt, but, despite the utmost exertion of both 
 the lads, they struggled up, breathless and pant- 
 ing, to Turner's side, only to see the aircraft a 
 hundred feet above their reach and mounting 
 every second. 
 
 A wave of the hand from the triumphant pas- 
 senger added to their cup of bitterness, as did 
 also a playful grin with which the Tarheel 
 greeted them. 
 
 " Grab 'em, boys, grab 'em," Turner joked 
 grimly. " How 'bout some salt to sprinkle on 
 the bird's tailt " 
 
 " What's this mean? " demanded Cat as soon 
 as he could get his wind, keeping his eye glued 
 fast on the ever-mounting flyer. 
 
 Along with a choice spice of kidding from the 
 solemn-looking Turner, the reason for the abrupt 
 departure came out bit by bit. 
 
 " I don't see what he took Legs for," snarled 
 Jimmy. " Might have given us a show."
 
 At Cape Peril 107 
 
 " Don't worry, he ain't goin' far," was the 
 consolation. " Hardy's goin' to stick some 
 stamps on him and send him back by parcel post. 
 I think he took him because he's a math, 
 shark." 
 
 " Oh, golly, Jimmy, why couldn't we squeeze 
 Whiskers for a brainful? " said Cat ruefully. 
 " First time I knew that stuff would get you 
 where you could have some fun." 
 
 " Say, boys, stop lookin' up there for star- 
 fish," drawled Turner, after the crestfallen pair 
 had watched the bird dwindle and vanish in the 
 distance. " It's an ill wind that doesn't blow 
 somebody good. How would you two persimmon- 
 mouths like to take a little skim over the briny 
 in my hydro after breakfast! " 
 
 The dismal faces bloomed in a twinkling. The 
 news was like a refreshing shower to two wilted 
 strawberries. 
 
 " Oh, Jimmy," yelled Cat, dancing around 
 with his companion in a frenzy of enthusiasm. 
 " Old Legs can have his lift. We're the lucky 
 guys, I'll say." 
 
 " And we'll anchor the flying ship over there
 
 108 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 by the fish-nets, and do a little angling," further 
 promised the Tarheel. 
 
 A shout of approval greeted the suggestion. 
 
 " Might hook a reed bird or two," added 
 Turner. 
 
 11 Reed bird! " echoed Jimmy. 
 
 " Sure, that's what we call red herring down 
 home." 
 
 The lads were all eyes, ears and expectation; 
 and, with full-grown appetites, trudged on with 
 their leader back towards Seagulls' Nest. 
 
 " Hope there's more game in the ocean than 
 there is outside," remarked Jimmy, looking 
 down the deserted beach when the three were 
 crossing the sand hills. " Gosh! I'd like to 
 hunt and fish up in the Arctic where the water 
 and the shore swarms with polar bears and sea- 
 birds and the seals and penguins. Remember 
 those polar travelogues, Cat! What got my eye 
 was the way those penguins flopped along just 
 like this. Look! Darn if they didn't have the 
 Charlie Chaplin shuffle to a finish." 
 
 At this point, Jimmy paused to give a piece 
 of mimicry that drew a roar from Cat and a 
 chuckle from Turner.
 
 At Cape Peril 109 
 
 " He and you must have taught 'em," joked 
 Cat, as the clown's legs sprang back to the per- 
 pendicular. *' But, say, don't forget about 
 whales when you are talking about big game. 
 They tell me some little ones have been washed 
 up on the beach down this far." 
 
 " Some winters they seem to get the wander- 
 lust," drawled Turner. " One was washed up 
 at Virginia Beach a couple of years ago, and I 
 believe that wasn't the first they'd found." 
 
 Suddenly an idea, a bright one, occurred to 
 Jimmy. 
 
 11 Don't reckon they laid any eggs around 
 here, do you? A whale's egg must be a 
 whopper." 
 
 The Tarheel's face spread and he broke into 
 a low cackle. Cat caught the cue on the instant. 
 
 11 Don't you know, bonehead, that whales don't 
 lay eggs," he struck in, looking wondrous wise. 
 
 " They don't! " exclaimed Jimmy, only half 
 induced to believe the fact. 
 
 11 They produce snarks," mildly observed 
 Turner, breaking into a full-sized grin. 
 
 " I'll say, Jimmy," hooted Cat, " you just 
 pulled a whale bone."
 
 110 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " That's right, grin your silly head off," 
 retorted Jimmy, in no pleasant humor; " but 
 talking of burying, that gibe needs a first class 
 funeral, with mourners blubbering." 
 
 " Don't know so much about that," objected 
 Cat, with his grinniest grin. " If I don't tell 
 this on you when I get back, my name's not Cat 
 Miller." 
 
 " I dare you," threatened Jimmy fiercely. 
 
 " Dare some more! " 
 
 " I double-dare you," shot back Jimmy, and, 
 after these words, the speaker proceeded to cup 
 his hands and whisper in Cat's ear. 
 
 Whatever it was, it had a magical effect. 
 
 " I resign," said Cat meekly, and added coax- 
 ingly, " Say, for Pete's sake, don't let that get 
 out or I'm ruined. I'll can the whale's egg, 
 swear I will." 
 
 The matter being thus adjusted, much to 
 Turner's amusement, the lads shed their gar- 
 ments, dashed into the ocean for a dip, and were 
 dressed and heavily engaged at breakfast fifteen 
 minutes later. 
 
 " Needn't hurry so," admonished Turner. " I 
 ain't goin' for an hour after grubbin', anyway."
 
 At Cape Peril 111 
 
 And, in spite of all their urging, he wouldn't. 
 
 " To kill time, tell you what I will do, though," 
 he conceded when all were standing on the porch 
 after the meal was finished. * ' I '11 try you with a 
 little pistol practice, that's what I'll do." 
 
 This was reasonably consoling. So, fetching 
 his automatic and a box of shells and adding to 
 his equipment a dozen apples from the store- 
 room, he issued out on the lawn, where the 
 eager scouts were awaiting him. 
 
 Placing one of the smaller apples on a con- 
 venient post and taking his stand at fifty paces 
 distance he squinted an eye, aimed, and in three 
 shots had plugged the target into fragments. 
 
 Loud applause from the two spectators greeted 
 this feat. 
 
 " How did you get to be such a crack shot? " 
 Cat wanted to know. 
 
 " You see it was this way," confided the Tar- 
 heel. " Down home on the Pasquotank the mus- 
 skeeters grow so almighty big and get so mon- 
 strous vicious I had to lay in bed of a night and 
 have my fun wingin' 'em with a pistol. They 
 were the size of Scuppernong grapes, and that's 
 no fairy tale."
 
 112 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 "Ha! ha! " said Cat and Jimmy echoed. 
 
 " Now, you, William Tell," said the joker, 
 handing the pistol to the little chap, after a fresh 
 apple had been placed in position. ' ' Your shot ! ' ' 
 
 The short fellow cocked his eye, fired, missed 
 his goal in all three attempts, but created con- 
 siderable stir in a sand bank beyond. Miller 
 followed, and, after two misses, nicked his apple. 
 He beamed with satisfaction, swelled visibly and 
 crowed over his companion. 
 
 Before an hour's practice was over, however, 
 both the lads, though they had not quite attained 
 the mosquito-winging stage, had improved tre- 
 mendously, and their instructor, seemingly 
 greatly gratified with his pupils, suggested get- 
 ting the tackle together and making for the 
 seaplane.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 PLUGGING A MAN-EATEB 
 
 "I don't like this line-fishing," asserted 
 Turner as he prowled around the store-room. 
 " I've been used to fishing with a rod and reel 
 on the Pasquotank and I can't get over the 
 habit." 
 
 No rod was in sight, however, but he suddenly 
 hit on the expedient of taking a pole with a 
 hook in the end, used by Luke for some domestic 
 purpose. 
 
 " I haven't got any reel," the Tarheel con- 
 tinued, " but I'll hitch my line on the end of 
 this, like Simple Simon, and see how the fish 
 take to new inventions." 
 
 Soon the three, equipped for their sport, pro- 
 ceeded to Lake Herring, and filed out on the 
 narrow plank bridge to the nest of the hydro- 
 plane. As Turner proceeded to make all needful 
 preparations for the flight, the two scouts, 
 although familiar with the seaplanes that soared 
 over Hampton Roads, found novel points of 
 
 113
 
 114 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 interest in the improved prow and high curved 
 tail of this biplane flying boat. 
 
 The tank filled and fishing tackle stowed, the 
 pilot nimbly climbed to his seat, the lads scram- 
 bled to theirs just behind, the propeller set to 
 threshing, and off went the bird skimming the 
 tranquil waters for a hundred feet, then rose 
 upon the air like some magic creature of Eastern 
 fable. Over the lake she soared, left the sand 
 bar behind, and sped along far above the 
 combers. 
 
 For twenty minutes, that seemed but one to 
 the enraptured scouts, she circled over the deep; 
 then planed gracefully till she tipped the water; 
 spanked along over the waves until she lost her 
 momentum, and was brought to a halt as the 
 pilot cast anchor at a point no great distance 
 from the spot where the fishnets had been set 
 for their prey. 
 
 Not many minutes later Turner, with a line 
 attached to the end of his hook-tipped pole, was 
 manipulating this clumsy instrument more as a 
 joke than with any great expectation of results. 
 Jimmy, sitting cross-legged on the starboard 
 side of the boat, was line-fishing, and had already 
 landed two mullets and a small alewife. On the
 
 At Cape Peril 115 
 
 other side Cat, shoes off, with his feet dangling, 
 was engaged in the more thrilling and productive 
 pastime of crabbing. The net that lay beside him 
 was frequently called into play to scoop in some 
 unwary shellfish toled to the surface by the 
 cautiously raised piece of meat suspended from 
 a line. The victims, squirming and clawing, 
 were dumped into the cockpit to create a small 
 pandemonium about the toes of the long-suffer- 
 ing pilot. 
 
 Suddenly, this peaceful scene was shattered 
 by a wild yell from Miller, who fell back, feet 
 in air, as if propelled by some powerful spring, 
 and rolled against Jimmy. The latter, struggling 
 to his feet, gazed upon a pallid face and two 
 staring, terror-stricken eyes. Turner, startled 
 from his own pursuit, whirled about, and as his 
 glance passed from the terrified boy to the 
 water in search of the source of the commotion, 
 his eyes fell upon a pale bluish torpedo-shaped 
 body of monster proportions, in the act of rolling 
 to one side, exhibiting, as it did so, a gleaming 
 white belly and, below the muzzle, a hideous 
 many-toothed mouth agape in preparation for 
 snapping the meat bait.
 
 116 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " Good heaven! " almost shrieked the ordi- 
 narily stolid pilot. " A shark, it's" a shark! " 
 
 Jimmy, after scrambling to his feet, had 
 dragged up the terrified Cat, and the two, hug- 
 ging one another and shuddering, were staring 
 down at the object of their terror. 
 
 " For heaven's sake, hold on! Don't slip, 
 your life depends on it," cried Turner as with- 
 out a moment's hesitation he vaulted from the 
 cockpit, dragging the pole out after him. Sup- 
 porting himself by the framework of the well 
 with one hand, he thrust the hooked end of the 
 pole with unerring aim with the other straight 
 into the gaping maw of the monster and, with a 
 powerful twist of the wrist, jabbed and dug the 
 iron in behind the triple teeth of his prey. 
 Instantly the shark began to writhe and squirm 
 and flip his huge tail so convulsively that the 
 airship was shaken from stem to stern. For the 
 man, it was question of releasing the pole in a 
 very few seconds or being dragged overboard. 
 
 " Cat Jimmy! " he yelled, " my pistol here 
 belt shoot head or belly quick 
 quick!" 
 
 The two lads, forgetting their own plight in
 
 At Cape Peril 117 
 
 the imminent peril that seemed to confront 
 Turner, made a grab for the weapon at the 
 same time, but Miller was the first to close his 
 hand over the butt, snatching the weapon from 
 the holster. 
 
 By a supreme effort, the man still clutched the 
 pole, his teeth clenched and with a desperate 
 look on his tense face. 
 
 "Shoot shoot!" he commanded. 
 
 Cat's form became rigid, he thrust his arm 
 downward, tightened a finger on the trigger, 
 and as a swelling wave brought the great fish a 
 foot closer, he plumped shell after shell at his 
 victim. The first steel plopped the water, but 
 the rest found their marks in the head and 
 throat. After several tremendous churning flips 
 and convulsions, the creature rose and fell an 
 inert mass on the surface of the water. 
 
 Turner, heaving a sigh from the bottom of his 
 chest, released his hold on the pole and staggered 
 back against the cockpit. 
 
 " Thank God! " he gasped as every muscle 
 relaxed from the tremendous tension. " That 
 was a man's shot! Cat, boy, it gives me the 
 shivers all over even now to think of what might
 
 118 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 have happened to you in another minute. A 
 shark, a blue shark, not the worst kind, thank 
 heaven, but devil enough! " 
 
 He passed the back of his arm over his fore- 
 head to wipe away the sweat that stood in great 
 beads. 
 
 Cat and Jimmy, still shuddering, were unable 
 to take their gaze from the great, grinning, now 
 bloody, mouth of the floating monster, rising 
 and falling with the waves and thudding against 
 the boat side. 
 
 " Gosh! " exclaimed Cat shakily, his heart still 
 pounding. " Seven feet long if he's an inch." 
 And then his invincible turn for jesting came 
 upon him. " Plenty of room for you inside, 
 Jimmy," he added with a forced grin. 
 
 The boy stooped to pick up the pistol that had 
 slipped from his hand and was on the point of 
 rolling overboard. 
 
 " You did it," admitted Jimmy. " You para- 
 lyzed him, believe me, you sure did paralyze 
 him." 
 
 " Back to your seats," directed Turner, " they 
 go in schools. May be some more around, and 
 I don't think I care to tackle another just now."
 
 At Cape Peril 119 
 
 " Can't we land him? " asked Cat, with ris- 
 ing bravado, as pride in his feat began to assert 
 itself. 
 
 " I'll attend to the landing part," retorted 
 Turner, pushing the lads towards the cockpit. 
 " Get back and stop talking." 
 
 The mysterious commotion on the floating 
 hydro had already created a tremendous flutter 
 among the fishermen, and at the climax of the 
 pistol shots one boat had put out and was 
 swiftly nearing the scene of the mystery. 
 
 " It's a shark," shouted Turner to the oncom- 
 ing rowers. 
 
 Instantly the men rested on their oars. 
 
 " Dead? " inquired one excitedly. 
 
 " As he ever will be! " bawled Turner. 
 
 " Gosh! " 
 
 " Ain't any more o' them things prowlin' 
 around, is there? " the man was anxious to know. 
 
 " No," yelled Turner, " come on. Land him 
 for us and it means ten dollars for you." 
 
 The offer of money had a magnetic effect. The 
 man took his seat once more, and all pulled for 
 the plane with a will, keeping a sharp lookout 
 as they did so. Drawing up alongside, the crew,
 
 120 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 under directions of the Tarheel, .-secured the 
 shark in tow by means of an anchor barb 
 attached to a rope, and made ready to return to 
 shore. 
 
 " First time I ever heard tell of goin' fishin' 
 with a pistol," declared the skipper after hear- 
 ing a full account of the episode. " You folks 
 has sho' learned me a new one." 
 
 " Now, boys," said Turner as the scouts 
 watched the boat pull away with their huge prize 
 in tow, " let's get out of here in a jiffy. The 
 wind's rising, so we'll beat it. Believe I've got 
 a steady enough hand for the joy-rod by this 
 time." 
 
 " Let her clip," approved the triumphant 
 Cat, and off went the plane. She rose, breast- 
 ing the wind, circled gracefully, and a few min- 
 utes later was back at her starting point; 
 
 " Poor old Legs," Cat grieved as fhe three 
 made their way back to headquarters. " Just 
 think, he's trying to kill time on that lonesome 
 Knott's Island, while we've pulled off the big- 
 gest show ever seen on this old coast. But, 
 golly, if his props had been hanging where mine 
 were, that brute certainly would have put a
 
 At Cape Peril 121 
 
 crimp in him. On the other hand, Jimmy's are 
 so short the whale wouldn't have noticed them." 
 
 " That's all right," retorted Jimmy, " you 
 notice the shortest fellows always dance with 
 the tallest girls." 
 
 "Ain't girls soft!" propounded Cat. 
 
 " I don't know, are they? " asked Jimmy as 
 one appealing to authority. 
 
 " This is strictly a stag party," put in Turner. 
 " No discussing the softer sex on a shark hunt. 
 I wonder how Hardy is making it," he suddenly 
 changed the subject. " I believe there's a blow 
 coming up." 
 
 " S'pose he took Legs all the way? " Jimmy 
 wanted to know. 
 
 " He's got a little sense. Hatton's safe in 
 the pickle shop on Knott's Island. But I'm 
 afraid Hardy may have had to land somewhere 
 short of Kitty Hawk." 
 
 " Can't a plane stand a pretty high wind! " 
 asked Cat. 
 
 " In France, I've seen 'em in a small-sized 
 hurricane," answered Turner with a laugh, 
 " but that was war, and you might as well take 
 chances one way as another. But, in peace
 
 122 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 times, most folks look out for theiu own skins. 
 Fact is, though, to an experienced pilot, there's 
 not much danger if the velocity of the wind 
 isn't greater than the speed of the motor. " 
 
 When the party reached the house, Luke 
 came out with the news that the coast guard, a 
 short time before, had brought the report of the 
 oncoming gale. While Turner made a rush for 
 his wireless, the lads stopped to recount to their 
 audience of one of the blood-curdling incident 
 through which they had just passed. 
 
 " Got a message," announced Turner half an 
 hour later. " Hardy hasn't been heard from yet, 
 but there's nothing strange about that, as he 
 hasn't had time to get to Kitty Hawk with the 
 stops he had to make." His tone was a trifle 
 disturbed. " There's something else," he con- 
 tinued. " Hatton's father's yacht is coming up 
 the coast and trying to reach Hampton Roads 
 ahead of the gale. He won't be able to stop 
 anywhere. From the latitude given when the 
 yacht wirelessed, she ought to pass us by early 
 this evening." 
 
 For a moment the lads' faces fell as the yacht 
 trip they had counted on went up in smoke.
 
 At Cape Peril 123 
 
 " Gee ! I thought it was in Cuba, and wouldn't 
 be up for four days. That's what Legs told us," 
 said Cat. 
 
 " That's what I don't understand," returned 
 Turner, " Something important must have hur- 
 ried him. But I'm telling you all I could get." 
 
 " Well, if he had stopped," remarked Jimmy, 
 in a tone of some relief, " he wouldn't have 
 found Legs around and I bet you there 'd been 
 some hot times raised." 
 
 " That's so," conceded Turner. " I reckon it's 
 just as well he shouldn't know about that wild 
 goose chase. Doggone it! I wish Hardy hadn't 
 been fool enough to take this trip." 
 
 " Don't think there's really any danger, do 
 you? " demanded Jimmy anxiously. 
 
 " Oh, no! " explained Turner. " No more 
 danger than we're in right now." 
 
 He had changed his tone directly he noticed 
 the effect his remark had had on the boys, and 
 then, to divert any more conjectures, hastened 
 to suggest a trip over to the fishing settlement 
 to inspect their prize. Instantly, shark filled 
 every corner of the lads' minds and off started 
 the three.
 
 124 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 "Well, sharks do lay eggs at'least, some 
 do a couple at a time," informed Turner. 
 
 " I know," Cat struck in, " those black things 
 with points to 'em you pick up on the beach." 
 
 " They're the cases, not the eggs," corrected 
 the Tarheel. 
 
 " Somebody else's dome is solid ivory," 
 Jimmy thrust at Cat. For answer Miller re- 
 turned a comical leer. 
 
 " Those are the empty cases," proceeded 
 Turner. " The young sharks, when hatched, 
 hreak through the case at the weakest place. 
 Some folks call those black pill-boxes * mer- 
 maids' purses.' I reckon, because the fishy ladies 
 keep their powder puffs and beauty jiggers in 
 'em," he added, with a knowing chuckle. " But, 
 speakin' of sharks, there are other fish kin to 
 'em without havin' their shape and bad habits. 
 The dogfish infestin' these waters is one of 
 'em." 
 
 " That's where you have to beat it, Cat," 
 flashed Jimmy. 
 
 " I'm the burr kind of cat," objected Miller, 
 " the kind that lights on a dog's back and buries 
 in. You can't shake this Cat off, sonny."
 
 At Cape Peril 125 
 
 " The only Simon-pure, pious, kind-hearted, 
 law-abiding, Sunday-school shark I ever heard 
 of," Turner went on, " was one I was reading 
 about the other day, a freak variety, white all 
 over. He was called the Pilot shark of New 
 Zealand. His parlor trick was to guide every 
 ship through a narrow, dangerous pass between 
 the rocks by leaping, diving and cutting up 
 capers in front of the bow till the craft got to 
 safety. The sailors swore they couldn't bribe 
 him from his path of duty by chuckin* meat to" 
 him. Even Mrs. Shark and the little Sharkeys 
 couldn't entice him till he had finished his job." 
 
 " You believe that? " demanded Cat skeptic- 
 ally. 
 
 " I saw it in a paper," declared Turner. 
 " 'Nuf said."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 WARNINGS IN THE AIB 
 
 When Turner and the boys reached the beach 
 skirting the fishing settlement, a group of about 
 twenty men were inspecting the booty stretched 
 out on the sand. Among the spectators stood 
 the bandy-legged Cap'n Buffum, who, getting 
 wind of the adventure, had waddled down to 
 gloat over the prize with his own eyes. 
 
 Loud plaudits greeted the arrival of the 
 intrepid heroes. Cat in particular was the 
 object of attention, and, undtr the admiration, 
 swelled like a pouter pigeon. It was the proud- 
 est moment of the near six thousand days of his 
 eventful life. 
 
 11 Here's my hand to all of ye," said Buffum, 
 with heartfelt pleasure, suiting the action to the 
 word. " I never had no use for them flyin' ships 
 befo', a-droppin' bombs and scrap iron to mess 
 up good seaworthy vessels, but if they kin light 
 and scavenger the ocean o' varmints like these 
 
 126
 
 At Cape Peril 127 
 
 hyuh, I'll vote for 'em good and hearty. But 
 where's Hardy and that leggy lad? " 
 
 Turner proceeded to explain the occasion of 
 their absence. 
 
 " Them lighthouse superintendents is cracked 
 to be sendin' men kitin' aroun' in the air, with 
 a storm dead-ahead. They don't git Bill Buffum 
 a-sailin' hither and thither. I was give my light- 
 house job to set, and set like hardtack I will 
 aginst all the flyin' powers in creation." 
 
 " That reminds me," said Turner. " I got a 
 wireless that Commodore Hatton's yacht is due 
 to pass sometime this evening. He's young 
 Hatton's father. Keep your light burning." 
 
 " I'll have it extry bright," promised the ex- 
 mariner, " but if I had my hands on them there 
 wires I'd 'a tol' him to snug in some handy 
 port, for, take a Jack tar's word for it, it'll be 
 bio win' great guns and loaded ones, with Old 
 Nick servin' 'em, by sundown." 
 
 On the outskirts of the group of brawny 
 fishermen gathered about the shark, stood a man 
 who seemingly was not of the company, though 
 he wore a longshoreman's oilskin coat reaching 
 nearly to the heels of his rubber boots, while a
 
 128 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 hat of the same material covered his head and 
 shadowed the upper part of his face. A bushy 
 black beard was most conspicuously in evidence. 
 
 As Buffum and Turner had begun to talk, he 
 had drawn closer to the two, but now as Buffum 
 suddenly looked sharply about, the stranger 
 whirled around, sauntered away and appeared 
 to be idly inspecting the ocean. 
 
 " Who's that thar felluhf " asked the light- 
 house keeper of one of the fishermen, pointing 
 at the same time at the intruder. 
 
 " I ain't seen him befo'," declared the one 
 addressed, " He tol' some of the folks at the 
 settlement jus* now that he come from Belle 
 Haven and was waiting for the mail carrier to 
 take him to Millford." 
 
 " He don't look like no genuwine fisherman 
 to me," asserted Buffum, staring keenly after 
 the now retreating figure. 
 
 " Nor me neither," agreed the other. "Ain't 
 set up right." 
 
 " Hope that 'ere yacht will keep well out at 
 sea," continued the Cap'n, turning to Turner 
 once more. " The Cape Peril shoals ain't got no 
 respect for Commodores or for Admirals either.
 
 At Cape Peril 129 
 
 They don't salute nobody as I ever heard of. 
 What's that 'ere Hatton Commodore of f " 
 
 Turner explained that it was merely a compli- 
 mentary title conferred on the yacht owner by 
 his cronies. 
 
 " His handle come off'n the same bush as 
 mine did," chuckled the old fellow. " If you've 
 ever blowed a whistle on the sea or fired a pop- 
 gun at a clay pigeon on land and gits a few years 
 on ye, these folks shoots a Cap'n or a Gen'ral at 
 ye. I knowed a man once who was a gen'ral nui- 
 sance, and his acquaintances he didn 't have no 
 friends all called him 'Gen'ral.' It's the 
 same as the police force. You calls 'em all 
 1 officer.' Thar ain't no more prives left above 
 the sod. But Gen'ral or Commodore, I'll have 
 the light fer him. Let the wind blow high or 
 low, the light's always a-burnin'; and if they 
 come close enough to the shoals to see it and 
 don't go a-scootin' off like them water-bugs that 
 slides on a pond, they're spilin' for trouble, and 
 submarines ain't nothin' to what them shoals 
 kin do for 'em when they takes a notion. 
 
 " Didn't I tell ye, mates," he continued, 
 addressing the whole group, " a blow was
 
 130 Tke Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 comin'T I tol' them boys, too. The weather 
 reports jus' aftertells what my feet has been 
 a-howluT fer three days. They're better than 
 any barometer I ever seed blowed in glass, and, 
 as I gets older, they gits aocurater and accu- 
 rater." 
 
 During the Cap*n's harangue the youngsters 
 were busy, with open penknives, progging at the 
 mouth of the monster. 
 
 "What's them boys tryin' to do?" Cap'n 
 Buffum asked Turner. " Torment a critter after 
 he's dead? That aint no way to do." 
 
 " Want to get some teeth as souvenirs," 
 explained Cat, looking up. 
 
 " 1 11 be bound you can't get 'em out that-a- 
 way, sonny," asserted one of the fishermen, 
 *' Come along with me and we'll go up the house 
 and get some pinchers and a jackknife." 
 
 Eagerly the boys jumped up and trotted along 
 with the man, and in a short time were back 
 with the implements and proceeded to extract 
 a number of tusks from the grinning mouth. 
 Some of these they counted on having mounted 
 for scarf-pins; others would be distributed 
 among their intimates.
 
 At Cape Peril 131 
 
 First one and then another of the 
 around began " reminiscing." 
 
 " This is the first one I ever 
 parts," declared one fisherman, " 
 body or the other tells me every summer they's 
 spied one. Say. them varmints can chaw up a 
 fish net same as a spider web." 
 
 "And they ain't squeamish about their mess, 
 neither," quoth Cap*n Buffum. " In the tropics 
 I heard tefl of one that was landed and sliced, 
 and in his belhr they lit on a lady's workbox, 
 with pins and needles and scissors and all them 
 other jimcracks that women folks cuts up with." 7 
 
 The crowd applauded this as a genuine 
 whopper. 
 
 "And IVe seen 'em," said another traveled 
 seaman, " thirty-seven feet long, and that's no 
 sea yarn; and they could flip over a rowboat 
 same as I could a splinter." 
 
 " Beconee' that sucker that turned up on the 
 Jciacy coast a summer or two ago and chawed 
 up a kid in, swimmin'f " said a third. 
 
 " When I was learnin' this hydroplane game 
 on the Florida coast," related Turner, " one of 
 my chums topped in the sea, and by the time we
 
 132 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 could row out to where he fell, th^re wasn't a 
 strand of him left not a sliver. But those 
 folks down there don't seem to mind 'em. They 
 go on in swimming regardless, and when an 
 alarm's given, they hop on shore, and in fifteen 
 minutes back they go again." 
 
 The shark chit-chat went on a half hour after 
 the boys had laid in their supply of teeth. Then 
 Turner, suddenly remembering his wireless, paid 
 the fishermen the promised ten dollars, and 
 insisted on an immediate return to Seagulls* 
 Nest. 
 
 Cap'n Buffum accompanied the party as far 
 as his lighthouse. " Wind's still gettin' chip- 
 per," remarked the old man as he parted with 
 the others, " but I b'lieve that 'ere hurricane 
 will butt up aginst Cape Hatteras and twis' out 
 to sea. We won't get more'n the tail of it, but 
 like the tail of one of them there sharks, a hurri- 
 cane's tail kin lash up water considerable." 
 
 " Hope you are right about the turning," said 
 Turner. "And don't forget to signal if you see 
 the yacht." 
 
 Then Turner and the lads proceeded to their 
 destination.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 TREASURE TROVE 
 
 " Hang it! If we can't go in swimming I'm 
 going out exploring the sand hills," proclaimed 
 Cat after lunch. " What say, Jimmy? " 
 
 " Somebody else has got a say in that," inter- 
 posed the prudent Turner. " I've got to stay 
 here to look out for the wireless. Besides that 
 shark skirmish gave me enough excitement for 
 one day. And there's one thing, sure as shoot- 
 ing, I'm not going to let you youngsters go 
 a-mooning over those treacherous sand hills by 
 yourselves. First thing you know, you'd be 
 buried with nothing but a leg sticking out to tell 
 the tale." 
 
 "Great Gee!" snorted Cat. "Don't you 
 reckon we can take care of ourselves. We're 
 scouts. ' ' 
 
 " Scouts be scat! You're not going by your- 
 selves. I don't care if you're Pathfinder and the 
 whole Lewis and Clark expedition to boot." 
 133
 
 134 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 The sight of Luke through the % open door 
 stimulated an idea in Jimmy's mind. 
 
 " Can't Luke go with usf " the boy begged. 
 
 Turner meditated a moment, reflected that he 
 would like a few minutes to himself, interviewed 
 the mahogany-hued cook, and settled it that the 
 boys should have him as guide as soon as the 
 dishes were washed. 
 
 A little later the three marched off, Jimmy 
 provided with field glasses for scanning the 
 ocean and Cat in possession of the house shovel. 
 
 " What's the idea of the shovel! " asked 
 Jimmy. " Going to level off the sand hills T " 
 
 " Level the mischief! " retorted Cat. 
 " Treasure, boy, treasure! Maybe my dream 
 will come true." 
 
 " Great Golly, Cat, you talk like a ten cent 
 whistle," Jimmy returned. " Why don't you 
 put that back where you got it? " 
 
 " You grabbed the glasses, didn't you? Lemme 
 carry what I darn please." 
 
 " Take the redhot kitchen range if you want 
 to," consented Jimmy. "It's not my funeral, 
 only I hate to see you act like a darn fool." 
 
 " This sho' is a lonesome place," Luke com-
 
 At Cape Peril 135 
 
 mented in an injured tone. " It sho' will trick 
 you if you stay here long enough. I'm gittin' 
 kinder mollygrubby already. I ain't seen no 
 ladies for a month and I jes' natchelly lan- 
 guishes for ladies' sassiety, and I'm goin' back 
 to town befo' this summer's out, sho'." 
 
 With this introductory remark, the mulatto 
 proceeded to enlighten the lads on his charms as 
 a lady-killer, and, with this entertainment, they 
 headed for the sand dunes that lay in a direction 
 opposite to that of Cape Peril. The trampers 
 had to keep their way high up on the beach, for 
 the surf, riding before the heavy wind, broke 
 tumultuously on the shore, and at times a moun- 
 tainous breaker would collapse into a sweep of 
 bubbling water that ranged afar and sent the 
 three scampering to a higher place of refuge. 
 
 From time to time the lads would stop to 
 examine some strange shells or stranded fish, 
 and the imaginative Cat, especially, was on the 
 alert for a mysterious box or bottle that might 
 bring a message from the deep, as happens so 
 often in the story books. Through the glasses, 
 first one and then the other would gaze over the
 
 136 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 face of the swelling waters, but nothing in the 
 semblance of a yacht rewarded their search. 
 
 The three-mile walk covered, they reached the 
 remarkable sand formations, the work of the 
 winds, dunes to a height of thirty feet above the 
 shore line. The boys climbed to the top of one 
 of these hillocks, and, bracing themselves against 
 the full sweep of the wind, gazed first inland 
 upon sandswept groups of scrub pines, scraggy 
 and wind-bitten, a scene stark in its desolation, 
 and then, from their coign of vantage, turned 
 their eyes upon the thrilling grandeur of the 
 ocean in tumult. 
 
 While Jimmy was still looking at the sea, 
 Cat's eager glance roved over the depression 
 between their observatory and the next hill. It 
 rested on a strange looking whitish spot in the 
 valley and grabbing the glasses from his com- 
 panion, he inspected the spot for a moment, 
 handed them back, and without a word of 
 explanation scrambled, shovel in hand, to the 
 base of the sand dune. 
 
 "What's the matter with you, Cat? " yelled 
 Jimmy. " Gone batty? " 
 
 Cat's only answer was a desperate fit of
 
 At Cape Peril 137 
 
 shoveling at the white spot. Jimmy and his 
 guide held their ground for a minute as they 
 watched the operation. Then curiosity got the 
 better of them and they slid down to the scene 
 of Cat's activities. In evidence there was 
 nothing more exciting than a heap of oyster 
 shells, apparently recently laid bare by a sudden 
 shifting of the sands. 
 
 11 What sort of fool doings is this? " sneered 
 Jimmy as he watched his imperturbable com- 
 panion plying his shovel amid the crumbly shells. 
 " These ain't anything but oyster shells." 
 
 11 That's all right," Cat condescended to 
 answer as he dug away. " You wait. What are 
 oyster shells doing way up here? " 
 
 " Reckon somebody just had an oyster roast," 
 surmised the short lad. 
 
 Luke had picked up some of the shells and 
 was crumbling them between his powerful 
 fingers. 
 
 " Them's oyster shells, all right," he 
 announced. " I used to be a oyster opener, and 
 I know these here ain't no new shells. Ain't 
 no tellin' how old they is." 
 
 " See," exulted Cat, stopping his labor for a
 
 138 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 moment. " That's what I thought. .'These oys- 
 ters are about two hundred years old. Black- 
 beard may have put 'em here to cover up some 
 treasure, and then he hid 'em with sand, and 
 they've been covered up all this time till the 
 wind blew it off lately. Here's where my dream 
 comes true, see? " 
 
 And back he went to his digging. 
 
 " Quit wasting your time, and let's go on 
 home," urged Jimmy. 
 
 But Cat, vigorously plying his implement and 
 sending the sand and shells flying in every 
 direction, was not to be moved. Jimmy and Luke 
 resigned themselves to looking on idly. 
 
 Suddenly the worker's shovel struck something 
 hard, and the excited delver reached down and 
 drew forth, not a treasure chest, but a piece of 
 broken pottery. This he cast aside with a look 
 of disgust and proceeded with his digging. A 
 few moments of work brought to view a rotten 
 plank, and when this was raised there appeared, 
 to the amazement of all, charred bones and bits 
 of charcoal. 
 
 " Bones," announced Cat as he picked up one 
 of the fragments with a puzzled look and vague
 
 At Cape Peril 139 
 
 visions of ogres floating through his brain. 
 11 Babies. Must be the whole Blackboard 
 family." 
 
 Luke edged away superstitiously, or perhaps 
 craftily, to avoid being called on to engage in 
 unnecessary labor. 
 
 " Chicken bones," sniffed Jimmy contemptu- 
 ously, as Cat dropped them and set to plugging 
 away once more. 
 
 Suddenly the digger was on his knees, scrap- 
 ing with his hands in the moist sand and then 
 sifting it through his fingers. A few moments 
 later he was triumphantly holding up for 
 Jimmy's inspection a small beadlike object. 
 Then, under more scraping, several other pieces 
 of broken pottery came to light, and finally, with 
 a hatchet head of stone and several arrows, the 
 revelation was complete. The Blackboard theory 
 had exploded. 
 
 " Oh, shucks," wailed Cat. " Nothing but the 
 grave of some old Indian. I was looking for 
 blunderbusses and coins and here I light on 
 beads and arrows." 
 
 Luke's eyes popped, while Jimmy burst into a 
 roar of laughter, so droll was the look of disap-
 
 140 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 pointment on the face of the treasure seeker. 
 
 " I ain't goin' to stay here no longer," 
 declared the mulatto, making ready to move 
 off. "It's bad luck fooling 'round graves. No 
 sir, I don't stay aroun' this place." And off he 
 strode. 
 
 The boys lingered over their awesome find. 
 
 " Cheer up, Cat," encouraged Jimmy. 
 " You've made a big find anyhow. I tell you 
 what those little bones are. Don't you remem- 
 ber about reading that the Indians killed the 
 warrior's dogs and buried them with him so 
 they could be with him in the Happy Hunting 
 Grounds? And when they ate dogs, they buried 
 what was left, too." 
 
 " B'lieve I have," recalled Cat, still with a 
 dismal look on his upturned face. 
 
 " Sure," proceeded Jimmy, " and they used 
 to bury the chief sitting up and with him every- 
 thing he owned, arrows, beads, wampum, tommy- 
 hawk and all his junk. They used to give dead 
 people things instead of leaving things in their 
 wills like we do now." 
 
 " Oh, ye-ah, I remember," Cat put in. "And 
 they used to set a kettle of food on the grave
 
 At Cape Peril 141 
 
 with three weeks' rations. That's what that 
 pottery was for." 
 
 " Sure! " 
 
 Jimmy yawned and turned away. 
 
 " Well, where 's the Indian? " Cat insisted. 
 " 'Spose he's down deeper? " 
 
 "After the three weeks' rations gave out he 
 piked on to the Happy Hunting Grounds," 
 jested Jimmy. " Now come on, let's get away 
 from here or Luke will go bughouse." 
 
 " Well, I'm coming back and dig some more 
 to-morrow," Cat declared, as he proceeded to 
 gather up some of the relics and stuff them into 
 his pockets. 
 
 This completed, the boys joined Luke, who 
 was happily unconscious of the gruesome speci- 
 mens Cat was carrying in his pocket. They 
 made their way back to Seagulls' Nest by a 
 road some distance from the ocean in order to 
 avoid the high running surf. 
 
 Arriving at the house, they found Turner 
 without news of the flyers, and then Cat pro- 
 ceeded to pour forth the story of his find, exhibit- 
 ing his relics at the same time. 
 
 Turner listened with interest and inspected
 
 142 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 the miscellaneous collection wi*h no little 
 amusement. 
 
 " Sorry to disappoint you, boys, but. I don't 
 think you are holding in your hands the remains 
 of Powhatan or Sitting Bull or their squaws or 
 papooses, but I do think you've struck what they 
 call a shell heap, and you've got hold of some of 
 the bones of the dogs and chickens and so forth 
 they feasted on." 
 
 " Blame it then! " exclaimed Cat disgustedly, 
 at the same time throwing the bones on the 
 floor. " I wouldn't mind carrying a Big Chief 
 around to show to all the girls, but blessed if 
 I'm going to tote any chicken bones around." 
 
 " What'd I tell you? " said Jimmy. " Thought 
 you knew more'n I did. Told you it warn't 
 anything but dogs' bones." 
 
 " That's all right," encouraged Turner, " he's 
 made a big discovery anyhow, and he'll get a 
 write-up in the paper. This is what the re- 
 porters call a scoop. Wait till I show you 
 something in an Indian book I've got up- 
 stairs." 
 
 Jimmy continued to joke Cat about his bone 
 find till Turner appeared with a book.
 
 At Cape Peril 143 
 
 " Listen here," he said opening the volume, 
 and then he began to read: " ' Many ancient 
 sites have been discovered along the streams of 
 tidewater Virginia, marking the positions of vil- 
 lages indicated by Capt. John Smith. In some 
 localities, banks of oyster shells, intermingled 
 with bits of pottery, implements of stone and 
 bone, and fragments of bones of animals which 
 had served as food, alone mark the position of 
 some ancient settlement.' Now, as long as I've 
 got the book," he continued, " I'll read you 
 what the historian Strachey said about the 
 Indian villages in these parts." 
 
 " * Their houses or towns are generally by the 
 rivers, or not far from springs, and commonly 
 built on a hill or rise of ground so that they may 
 overlook the water and see everything that stirs 
 on it. The houses are built far apart and there 
 is no pretense of a street. All the houses, 
 including the chief's house, are exactly alike. 
 Round roofs are made of young twigs thatched 
 with mats thrown over them. The walls are 
 made of the bark of trees. 
 
 " l In the middle of the house, there is a 
 smoke hole, through which the smoke from the
 
 144 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 fire below can get out. Every house has two 
 doors one in front and one in the rear. The 
 doors are never bolted, but simply hung with 
 mats, which are raised or dropped at pleasure. 
 The houses are usually built under great trees to 
 protect them from the winter winds and the 
 summer sun. They have no windows. All the 
 light comes through the doors or the smoke 
 vent. The Indians eat, sleep and cook all in one 
 room. 
 
 " ' Their beds are made of short posts driven 
 in the ground around the sides of the wigwam, a 
 foot high, with poles laid along and reeds cast 
 across them. They sleep on a mat which they 
 roll up on arising. 
 
 " * In March and April, they net fish and hunt 
 turkeys and squirrels, and in May they plant 
 out their corn. In the hunting season, they 
 leave their houses, gather together in companies, 
 and with their families, go to the most deserted 
 places up near the mountains where there is 
 plenty of game. The huts in which they live 
 during this hunting season are flimsy cabins, 
 with mats thrown over them. These mats the 
 squaws carry when a move is made. They like-
 
 At Cape Peril 145 
 
 wise carry the corn, acorns, mortars, and all the 
 bag and baggage.' 
 
 " Now to prove to you they ate dogs, listen to 
 what Henry Hudson said about the Algonquin 
 Indians on the Hudson: 
 
 11 ' I sailed to the shore in one of their canoes 
 with an old man, who was chief of a tribe con- 
 sisting of forty men and seventeen women; these 
 I saw there in a house well constructed of oak- 
 bark, and circular in shape, so that it had the 
 appearance of being built with an arched roof. 
 It contained a great quantity of maize, or Indian 
 corn, and beans of last year's growth, and there 
 lay near the house for the purpose of drying, 
 enough to load three ships, besides what was 
 growing in the fields. On our coming into the 
 house, two mats were spread out to sit upon, 
 and immediately some food was served in well 
 made wooden bowls: two men were also dis- 
 patched at once with bows and arrows in quest 
 of game. Soon after they brought in a pair of 
 pigeons which they had shot. They likewise 
 killed a fat dog, and skinned it in great haste 
 with shells which they had got out of the water.' 
 
 " There's your dog feast," said Turner, " and
 
 146 The Boij Scouts of the Air 
 
 it's all a matter of taste. If you'd been brought 
 up on them or rats or what not you smack your 
 lips over 'em." 
 
 " I'U take the what not," declared Cat, " but 
 excuse me from Chink's grub." 
 
 " You know," said Turner with a smile, " the 
 Chinese used to think that pig wasn't fit to eat 
 till a young Chink fingering around in the ashes 
 of a burnt-down house stuck his thumb in the 
 cremated family pig and then stuck it in his 
 mouth to cool and got the taste. And, when he 
 spread around the news of what a dainty it was, 
 every Chinaman in the neighborhood burnt down 
 his house with the pig in it so as to pleasure him- 
 self with that wonderful taste. They'd been 
 doing that for a thousand years before they dis- 
 covered you could roast a pig without burning 
 a house down." 
 
 " Where 'd you get that from! " inquired 
 Jimmy. 
 
 " That's from Lamb on Roast Pig." 
 
 " Lamb on Roast Pig! " laughed Cat. " What 
 are you giving us I " 
 
 " I mean," drawled Turner, " a fellow named 
 Charles Lamb wrote the dope."
 
 At Cape Peril 147 
 
 " Must have had some dope to write that fool 
 stuff," surmised Jimmy. 
 
 Cat booed. 
 
 " That'll do," commanded Turner. " Now 
 chase yourselves out with that truck, and let 
 me work."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 HOW THE AIEBUG STAETED 
 
 After the boys had unloaded their minds of 
 the Indian discovery and reviewed the shark 
 episode half a dozen times or more, they began 
 to grow restless. A vague apprehension about 
 the fate of Hardy and Legs took possession of 
 them, while the dismally howling wind fur- 
 nished an unpleasant accompaniment to their 
 thoughts. Cat beat a tattoo on the window- 
 panes and gazed out moodily at the curling 
 whitecaps. Jimmy sought Luke's company in 
 the kitchen, but the mulatto with a sulky scowl 
 emitted nothing but grunts, so the lad hunted 
 up Turner. 
 
 " No news from Kitty Hawk yet," announced 
 the latter, adding such encouragement as he was 
 able to conjure up. 
 
 After joining Cat once more in his gloomy 
 occupation of staring at the high running surf 
 and scurrying clouds, Jimmy suggested killing 
 time by a nap. If there ever were a time when 
 
 148
 
 At Cape Peril 149 
 
 it was profitable to be dead to the world, this 
 seemed the occasion; so upstairs bounded the 
 two, after getting Turner's promise to wake 
 them in case anything exciting turned up. 
 
 At six, they were down again, hurrying out 
 to watch the mighty upheaval of the ocean. 
 Breasting the wind, they scurried along the low 
 sand hills above the beach. Now that the tide 
 was approaching its maximum, the foaming 
 breakers beat the shore with redoubled fury. 
 The low stretch between Cape Peril and Sea- 
 gulls' Nest was completely submerged, and the 
 waves were washing over into Lake Herring. 
 The spillway appeared in danger of demolition. 
 
 Excitement grew when the watchers saw in 
 the far distance a big liner upreared on the 
 summit of a great wave, only to disappear the 
 next moment in the trough, and then mount 
 into sight once more on another swell. 
 
 When the wind drove the boys indoors once 
 more, they found dinner waiting to furnish a 
 half -hour's diversion. The evening dragged by 
 without news of yacht or flyers. By nine o'clock 
 darkness had shrouded the ocean except where 
 sections gleamed under the shafts of light that
 
 150 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 poured forth from the lighthouse of Cape Peril. 
 
 " Buffum's on the job," declared the Tarheel. 
 
 About eleven, the three watchers noted a per- 
 ceptible lull in the blast and, amid the scudding 
 clouds, stars peeped out here and there. The 
 barometer was rising, as Turner noted. 
 
 ' * The storm must have turned tail at Hatteras 
 as Buffum predicted," was his opinion, " and 
 the worst is over. I was afraid we'd have one 
 of those August blows that come once in a 
 generation and lift a few house lids and rear- 
 range the forestry, but it seems that's given us 
 the go-by. How about bed! " 
 
 As it was evident that the speaker had no 
 intention of turning in himself, the lads, forti- 
 fied by their nap, firmly declined. They meant 
 to see the thing out. Turner allowed himself 
 to be persuaded. With blinds tight shut and a 
 bright light burning, the room was filled with 
 talk of Indians for half an hour longer. Then, 
 aircraft bobbed up. After an hour and more 
 of war-aeronautic talk, the Tarheel woke up to 
 the very evident fact that, although the break- 
 ers kept up their uninterrupted boom against 
 the beach, the main fury of the wind was well
 
 At Cape Peril 151 
 
 over, leaving in its wake a chain of rapidly suc- 
 ceeding flaws. 
 
 " Look here, boys," insisted the man, after 
 his weather wisdom was sufficiently satisfied, 
 " all danger of our doing the Noah's ark stunt 
 is over. Hardy and Company are snug in bed 
 and the yacht's in port. Off to bed with you." 
 
 " Say, just one more thing," pleaded Jimmy. 
 " Before we go, tell us how people first got 
 hold of the flying idea. Come across." 
 
 "Well, of all the" yawned Turner and 
 then conceded. " All right. I'll give you about 
 ten minutes' dope on that, and then I'm sealed 
 and soldered. Get me? " 
 
 Jimmy and Cat got him. 
 
 " As to the flying idea," proceeded the host, 
 " I reckon dreams started it. There's no dream 
 more common than the one in which you think 
 you are flying or gliding through the air, and 
 it's a pretty keen sensation." 
 
 Cat and Jimmy hastened to recount some of 
 their own experiences in this line, but Turner, 
 mindful of his time limit, was quick to cut 
 them off. 
 
 " Then, when folks got to thinking about fly-
 
 152 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ing," he proceeded, " their idea was to get up 
 to heaven without dying and turning to angels. 
 The earliest nations in history have traditions 
 and legends along this line. Of all the fancies, 
 the imagination of the Indians took the cake. 
 I mean the inhabitants of India, not the Ameri- 
 can Indians, misnamed by the first explorers 
 tinder the impression their ships had struck the 
 other side of the globe. 
 
 " One funny yarn was about a Brahmin, one 
 of the Hindoo priests, who spied the god Indra's 
 Wishing Cow wandering about on a meadow. 
 The idea occurred to him that if he'd freeze 
 tight to the cow's tail he'd get a lift up to their 
 heaven on the top of the Himalayan mountains. 
 So sure 'nuf, when the kindly cow had laid in 
 her stock of hay and was ready to frisk back 
 to heaven, the Brahmin, with a stranglehold 
 on her tail, got in too, and saw the whole 
 menagerie free. The next day, when the cow 
 took a notion to slide down to earth again, she 
 carried the passenger in the Pullman tail-car, 
 and landed him safely on his native heath. 
 
 " Very proud of his feat, he told the neigh- 
 bors and got the whole gang worked up for
 
 At Cape Peril 153 
 
 the same picnic, so he concocted a plan. ' Pals,' 
 he said, * I tell you how we'll all get a finger 
 in the pie. I'll hang on to the cow's tail, and 
 one of you can stretch out and clamp on to my 
 feet, and the next one on to his feet, and the 
 next - on to his, and so down the line, and we'll 
 all get a lift like the tail of a kite.' Well, that's 
 what they did I mean so far as the start 
 was concerned. The Wishing Cow made her 
 spring-off and carried a string of about twelve 
 husky Brahmins hanging on to her elevator. 
 But, en route, one of the lower Brahmins, crav- 
 ing some conversation, called out to the tail- 
 holder, * How tall did you say the god Indra's 
 crown was? ' And the top chump, who must 
 have been a little soft in the attic, answered, 
 * Bout this tall,' and let loose the cow's tail so 
 as to spread his hands and show the height of 
 the crown. Very naturally, the whole train of 
 passengers came down a-kiting on their last 
 journey, hit the soil, and got pancaked." 
 
 This tale made something of a hit. 
 
 11 The Greek and Roman mythologies," con- 
 tinued the entertainer, " are chock-full of yarns 
 about flying gods and air-prowling beasts. The
 
 154 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 winged horse Pegasus had a steady job fur- 
 nishing air rides to bucks who knew how to 
 handle him, But a fellow named Bellerophon 
 tried to get up to Olympus, the Greek heaven, 
 on him; whereupon Jupiter sent a gadfly to 
 pester the beast till he gave the ambitious rider 
 a tumble. Used to be a ship in the English 
 navy, by the way, called The Bellerophon, which 
 the sailorboys proceeded to twist into The Bully 
 Ruffian. 
 
 " Then, there was the god Mercury, who used 
 to plane through the atmosphere with winged 
 sandals and a feathered cap, carrying aero- 
 grams for his daddy, Jupiter. When he was 
 off duty one day he invented the lyre not the 
 kind you are thinking of, but the 1-y-r-e the 
 ancestor of the jews '-harp that we boys call the 
 juice-harp." 
 
 " That's where quicksilver gets its name 
 ' mercury,' after him, isn't it? " asked Jimmy. 
 
 " That's right, Solomon. Now we'll get down 
 to the first account of a man trying to fly, in 
 the Greek fables. It seems a chap named 
 Daedalus broke out of a tower in which he'd 
 been jugged by King Minos, but the tower was
 
 At Cape Peril 155 
 
 on an island, and the question was how to get 
 away from the island without a boat. Then 
 the bird idea struck him, so he got busy making 
 wings for himself and his son Icarus. He tacked 
 big feathers together with thread and stuck the 
 little ones on with wax till the whole contrap- 
 tion had the curve of a bird's wing. His son, 
 Ikey, seems to have been a mischievous little 
 monkey who kept blowing the feathers around 
 and meddling with the wax, and I suppose that's 
 the reason he got what was coming to him later, 
 as happens to all the sprightly kids in the pious 
 story books. 
 
 " Well, when the old man had finished off his 
 two pair of wings he hoisted his up and gave 
 'em a wave and found he could get a lift as 
 easy as falling off a log. Then, he proceeded to 
 put young Ikey wise. * Now, Ike,' says he, * no 
 tail-spins or nose-dives, or loop-the-loops, but 
 just straight business, and don't you fly too low 
 or the damp sea air will take all the curl out 
 of those Marcelle wave feathers, and, on the 
 other hand, don't you get to rocketing too high 
 or the sun will melt the wax. ' In those benighted 
 days, folks thought the sun was just a couple
 
 156 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 o' flights upstairs, and the higher you got, the 
 hotter, which don't seem like such a fool con- 
 clusion after all. 
 
 " Well, to go back to our muttonhead, Ikey 
 what should he do but get to feeling his oats 
 and forget all the advice his dad gave him? 
 He started right off to skylarking; the wax 
 melted and down flopped Ikey into the sea. No 
 sharks in those waters, it seems, for the old 
 man planed down, fished out all that was left 
 of Ikey's ambitions and buried it, and then went 
 on his way and made an eggshell landing in 
 Sicily. 
 
 " It's the same old story with flyers learning 
 these days. Most of the smash-ups in the early 
 part of the war were caused by young smart 
 Alecks thinking they knew it all on the first 
 jump-off. Take that in and think it over good 
 and hard. Even after you graduate at college, 
 you have hardly begun your education." 
 
 " What's the use of starting, then? " 
 demanded Cat. 
 
 Turner glanced sharply at the boy. 
 
 " Because if you don't and, unless you keep 
 on plugging, you'll degenerate into a big,
 
 At Cape Peril 157 
 
 flabby, wop of a numskull. That what you're 
 aiming for? " 
 
 " Naw," conceded Cat, " not all that." 
 
 " Well! Come back to common sense and 
 stay there. 
 
 " Now to come down to modern times, there 
 was a monk in Spain along about the fourteenth 
 century who is said to have jumped from a 
 tower with a parachute sort of contrivance and 
 flown some distance. Then, in the seventeenth 
 century, there was a locksmith who made a flying 
 device. He began by jumping out of the first 
 story window, like a disappointed lover I heard 
 of once who tried to commit suicide that way." 
 
 " Ha! ha! " said Cat. " Some bold inventor 
 he was. 'S'pose he jumped into a net, too." 
 
 "'But, my dear Catboy, don't you know you 
 can't put your foot on the top round of the 
 ladder first thing? Every invention has been 
 worked to a finish by a chain of people feeling 
 their way in that direction, in some cases through 
 hundreds of years. Every big bug you hear of 
 in any line of invention is standing on the top 
 of the brains of folks you don't see, some of 
 them as dead as Caesar thousands of years.
 
 158 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " Well, anyway, the locksmith .kept a-going 
 till he tried the second story and then the third, 
 and finally he was able to fly over houses and 
 rivers, so they say. I wasn't there. So other 
 people, on down through the centuries, kept jug- 
 gling their brains, and projecting and projecting. 
 At last, somebody in France invented the * aero- 
 nautical fish ' that attracted a lot of attention. 
 This was a sort of balloon, shaped like a fish, 
 and was propelled with wings, or fins, worked 
 by cranks not human ones. But the trouble 
 with even the best of these devices was that 
 they could operate only when the air was abso- 
 lutely still, so of course they were of no prac- 
 tical service. It was evident, too, to more sensi- 
 ble men that the fish idea was off, so far as the 
 air was concerned, but, if anything serviceable 
 was to come, the machine would have to be 
 modeled after a bird, which is going back to 
 the Greeks, after all. 
 
 " Even the balloon idea doesn't go so far 
 back," proceeded Turner. " It depended on the 
 discovery of hydrogen gas about a hundred and 
 fifty ye,ars ago. Then somebody thought of fill- 
 ing hogs' bladders and paper-bags with this
 
 At Cape Peril 159 
 
 stuff, to see if they would work. But neither 
 did. The only thing they could raise with it was 
 a soap-bubble. After a while two brothers 
 named Montgolfier, paper-makers in France, hit 
 on the idea of generating a gas from slightly- 
 moistened straw and wool set to burning; and 
 found that this gas would raise a silk bag when 
 allowed to enter an opening in its bottom. The 
 truth was, though, it wasn't a gas that did it, 
 but just the hot air. 
 
 11 Satisfied they could turn the trick, the 
 brothers staged a free show and set Paris frog- 
 eyed. After some improvements to the body of 
 the balloon, the inventors attached a wicker- 
 basket and, after some persuasion, induced a 
 sheep, a rooster, and a duck to take a trip. This 
 congenial trio rose aloft and then came down 
 once more in safety." 
 
 * * Bah-bah ! Quack-quack ! Cockadoodle-do ! ' ' 
 Cat horseplayed. 
 
 " Dunno what sort of language they used," 
 laughed the Tarheel, " but I hope it wasn't 
 that rotten. Anyhow, when I studied French, 
 I was surprised to find that French roosters 
 don't talk like ours, but say ' Co-co-ri-co! at
 
 160 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 least that's what the book gave. But when I got 
 over on the other side, during the war, I couldn't 
 tell a bit of difference between their barnyard 
 clatter and the fowl conversation we hear this 
 side. 
 
 ' * Well, to get back to the airships from 
 that time, everybody went balloon crazy. All 
 sorts of improvements were made in the machine. 
 The silk was varnished, the bag was covered 
 with a net, and the apparatus was furnished with 
 a valve, barometer and sand-ballast. Instead 
 of the old dangerous way of filling them with 
 hot air from a fire, hydrogen or coal gas was 
 used. Then the parachute game began, with 
 more than one broken neck and pancake landing, 
 as we used to call a plane smash-up in France. 
 
 " Then, before the end of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury, balloons began to be used in war to observe 
 the enemy, same thing our sausage affairs are 
 used for now. In addition to this, they were 
 used by scientists to sample the upper atmos- 
 phere. One fellow got as high as 23,000 feet 
 over four miles. Our country too, has had fans 
 do all sorts of daredevil stunts with balloons, 
 flying from coast to coast and what not. Pretty
 
 At Cape Peril 161 
 
 lively fun till the airplane made it look just about 
 as lively as croquet." 
 
 " I've been up in one," announced Cat, 
 proudly, " because the old man bought some lib- 
 erty bonds during the war and he let me have 
 the lift in one of those army baskets he was 
 entitled to for buying them." 
 
 " You've been up in pretty much everything," 
 laughed Turner. " It's about time you were 
 going down in a coal shaft to see what the 
 other direction looks like. But you haven't 
 been up to the moon yet, like Hans Phaal in 
 that balloon trip that wild-eyed Edgar Allan Poe 
 wrote about. Bunk, but pretty entertaining 
 bunk. Then, too, he wrote a hoax about a bal- 
 loon crossing the Atlantic that took in a lot of 
 suckers when it came out in the New York Sun. 
 He was quite a bird at slinging fake scientific 
 bunco. ' ' 
 
 11 Quoth the Raven, ' Nevermore,' " put in 
 Jimmy, rejoicing in his acquaintance with the 
 author. 
 
 " * Nevermore * is right," assented Turner, 
 " and this raven here is going to his downy, 
 and you've got to, too, if I have to drum your
 
 162 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 hides to make you. Now for one .more look at 
 the sea.'* 
 
 As Jimmy and Cat stopped behind a moment 
 to argue the question as to whether they would 
 allow themselves to be driven to bed at the 
 early hour of two, Turner sauntered to the 
 door, opened it to a gust that sent papers whirl- 
 ing about the room, bounded out, and slammed 
 it behind him. An instant later, there was a 
 sharp exclamation. Both lads started up, rushed 
 to the door under the impression that some 
 wreck was battering on the coast, and, as the 
 room light fell upon Turner's form the two could 
 distinguish his hand pointing in the direction of 
 the spectral lighthouse. 
 
 " Look, boys, look," he yelled. " The Cape 
 Peril light is out."
 
 CHAPTEE XII 
 
 THE CAPE PERIL, LIGHT IS OUT 
 
 " Look, look," he had cried as the two scouts 
 stood aghast. " The Cape Peril light is out! " 
 
 The lads' hearts almost stopped beating as 
 they stared wildly into the gloom at the dark 
 curtain of the horizon against which, by the 
 faint glow of the few stars peeping through the 
 clouds, the lighthouse was faintly outlined in 
 shadow. The din and hullabaloo of wind and 
 waves, struggling like two fiends, heightened 
 the horror of the mystery. 
 
 " He's he's dead! " stuttered out Cat, with 
 an exclamation, as Cap'n Buffum's prediction 
 flashed on his mind. 
 
 Turner appeared to give no heed to his words. 
 
 "And look, look there!" The man thrust 
 a finger out towards the sea. 
 
 In the distance a rocket was showering the 
 sky with a cluster of bursting stars. Then, the 
 pall of darkness settled once more. 
 163
 
 164 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 11 Good night! " shrilled Jimmy, trembling 
 with anxiety. " What what's that mean? " 
 
 "A ship in distress on the shoals, maybe 
 that's what it means. " 
 
 "It's the yacht," gasped Cat all in a breath. 
 "I bet it's the yacht." 
 
 "Can't be! Watch! Look there! Look there! 
 Look! " 
 
 Another fiery cluster burst and fell. 
 
 With an agitated countenance and quickly 
 beating heart, Turner stood for a moment or two 
 longer staring into the gloom, his wits working 
 violently. 
 
 The brief pause seemed an eternity to the boys. 
 
 " We can't walk and we can't swim, that's 
 sure," muttered the man. " Buffum must have 
 been taken sick. No, that's off. The light was 
 going and would have kept on Great hea- 
 ven! " he thought aloud. " Of all the cold- 
 blooded villainy! Some devil's put it out! " 
 
 Turner halted and frowned. 
 
 He paced up and down a couple of minutes 
 longer. Then, evidently a plan had suggested 
 itself to his mind, for he turned short around 
 and started for the door.
 
 At Cape Peril 165 
 
 " What you going to do I " Cat called after 
 him. 
 
 11 Show you later," flashed the reply. " One 
 of you go and haul Luke out. You go, Jimmy. 
 You follow me, Miller." 
 
 So saying, Turner dashed into the house, took 
 time to snatch up an electric flash-light, then 
 rushed through the kitchen to a rear shed, leav- 
 ing Jimmy the job of resurrecting Luke, asleep 
 in his shoes and half his clothes, on a cot in the 
 closet-room adjoining the kitchen. 
 
 Beaching the shed- Turner seized a great can 
 of kerosene. 
 
 " Is that oil? " asked the mystified Miller, 
 who had made the best use of his legs to keep 
 on his leader's heels. 
 
 " Yes, kerosene." 
 
 " What's that for? Not going to set the 
 house afire? " was the boy's excited query. 
 
 " Don't ask fool questions," snapped the 
 other. " Stop talking and work. Grab up that 
 tow there there in the corner, cram it in 
 that basket that one and come on. Here, 
 stick this axe on top when you're done." 
 
 Turner held the light impatiently while Cat,
 
 166 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 his mind in a whirl, pressed in as -much tow as 
 the basket would hold and then thrust the axe 
 under the receptacle's handle. 
 
 " Now, come on! " 
 
 As Turner passed the closet, he reinforced 
 Jimmy's desperate efforts to bring the mulatto 
 to full consciousness. Finally, the cook came 
 forth, rolling his eyes about in his coffee-colored 
 face. At sight of the oil can, he faltered and 
 fell into a state of agitation, looking for all the 
 world like a fish out of the water, gasping for 
 breath. Clearly his suspicions ran along with 
 those Cat had expressed. 
 
 " Lighthouse light out. Going to set a shack 
 up the beach on fire," blurted Turner to relieve 
 the suspense. " Here, take that basket." He 
 pointed to a huge one in the pantry. " And you 
 and Jimmy pile in it every magazine and news- 
 paper in sight; then clamp the lid on, and make 
 the best time you know how up to that old 
 Thompson cottage. You understand? Lightning 
 quick. And lock the door after you when you 
 come out." 
 
 Luke, now completely awake and consoled by 
 the news that the roof was not to be burned over
 
 At Cape Peril 167 
 
 his head, grabbed up the basket, hurried into 
 the living room, and assisted Jimmy in creating 
 a small hurricane as the two bustled and scram- 
 bled about, harvesting the papers. 
 
 11 Now double quick! " was Turner 's order 
 to Miller. 
 
 Man and boy hurried out into the wind and 
 darkness, and, guided by the rays of the flash- 
 light, made for the trail back of the sandhills. 
 The stiff wind behind them aided their speed as 
 they struck into the path, and it took but a 
 short time to reach the ramshackle cottage. 
 Windowless and doorless it stood, a flimsy skele- 
 ton. How it had so long resisted being swept 
 away entirely seemed little short of a miracle. 
 
 At the entrance, Turner set down his burden, 
 and, seizing the axe, set to work slashing at the 
 decaying weather-boarding that splintered like 
 tinder under his efforts. By the time Luke and 
 Jimmy arrived panting, a considerable pile of 
 kindling had accumulated. 
 
 In a few minutes more paper, tow and wood 
 heaped near the central partition was saturated 
 with the contents of the can, and, on the applica- 
 tion of a match, burst into sputtering and crack-
 
 168 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ling flames. Fanned by the full sweep of the 
 wind, the blaze soon had the partition wall in its 
 embrace. 
 
 11 Burn, for heaven's sake, burn quick! " 
 Turner exhorted the fire. 
 
 Before many moments had passed, his eager 
 wish was gratified. The flames rose high above 
 the smoke, licking up the dry, mouldering wood. 
 It was merely the question of a short time before 
 the whole building would be in flames one 
 huge, roaring bonfire. 
 
 11 Now," shouted Turner, his duty here dis- 
 charged. " That'll help a little while and may 
 save a ship. Here, let's beat it." 
 
 He had already moved off, and, with his back 
 to the blaze, was scanning the ocean eagerly. 
 Seeing nothing, he started off at a trot, axe in 
 one hand and flash-light in the other. The boys 
 and Luke tried to keep pace, the mulatto in a 
 state of superstitious tremor at the whole 
 proceedings. 
 
 " This come o' them boys diggin' up them 
 bones befo' their time," was his conclusion. 
 
 At a high point of the way, Turner halted 
 for a moment and gazed seaward.
 
 At Cape Peril 169 
 
 " Thank heaven! " he exclaimed, seizing Mil- 
 ler's arm and directing his attention to a quick 
 succession of rockets. " That means they've 
 seen the light and got their bearings. Thank 
 God! " 
 
 A little later the same signal appeared once 
 more. 
 
 * ' See ! see ! ' ' Turner shouted against the wind. 
 " No mistake. It's all right. Now they can 
 haul off and keep from being pounded to pieces. 
 We've saved 'em. Thank God! " 
 
 " Going to Cape Peril? " asked Cat, as they 
 jogged on again. 
 
 11 Straight as I can make it," was the answer. 
 " If I have to fight a whirlwind to get there." 
 
 " Don't you s 'pose some of the fishermen 
 have gone over? " suggested Jimmy, hopefully. 
 
 " Not counting on anything. More than 
 likely they're all sound asleep and haven't seen 
 a thing. I'm not taking any chances. Some- 
 thing's happened to Buffum and my business is 
 to see what it is." 
 
 Until the party reached Seagulls' Nest nothing 
 more was said, for, with heads down and run- 
 ning against the blast, talking was difficult.
 
 170 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " Now," said Turner with decision, as they 
 reached the house. "I'm going U> cross Her- 
 ring in the seaplane, and I want one fellow to 
 help me. Jimmy's the smallest and the speediest 
 and I'm not going to get in any danger if I 
 can help it." 
 
 " Going to let me go? " said Jimmy with ready 
 eagerness. " Me? " 
 
 11 Why not me, too? " demanded Cat almost 
 angrily. 
 
 " No time for arguing," snapped Turner as 
 he hurried about providing himself with some 
 necessary articles, Cat pleading at his heels. 
 " You and Luke stay tight in this house. There 
 may be crooks around. When you see a light in 
 the Cape Peril lighthouse window, then you'll 
 know we're there and all's 0. K." 
 
 A few minutes later, Turner and Jimmy, 
 equipped for their hazardous expedition, had 
 dashed from the house, leaving Cat disconsolate 
 and Luke only too delighted to be able to return 
 once more in peace to his slumbers.
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 EESCUB THROUGH THE STOEM 
 
 Jimmy, keyed to the highest tension by this 
 sudden plunge into a perilous adventure, fol- 
 lowed close on Turner's heels, axe a-shoulder, 
 down to Lake Herring. While the lake presented 
 a peaceful scene in comparison with the billowy 
 ocean, its wind-lashed surface could scarcely be 
 likened to a millpond. 
 
 " I wonder where in the mischief the row- 
 boat is? " Turner took time to ask as he shot 
 his light about the shore near the hangar bridge. 
 
 " What rowboat? Were you going in a row- 
 boat? " Jimmy returned with some uneasiness. 
 
 "No time for that, boy, when the hydro can 
 do the business. Remember we had a rowboat 
 chained here the one that belonged to the 
 house? " 
 
 Jimmy recalled the fact instantly. 
 
 " Maybe the wind tore it off? " he suggested. 
 
 " Maybe it did, but it's powerful funny, for 
 there's the chain hanging to the post." 
 
 171
 
 172 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 There was no time for further speculation. 
 The two made their way along the foot bridge, 
 moving with great caution to keep from being 
 swept over. The hydro shed seemed intact, and 
 within, the pilot, examining every section of his 
 machine, found she had ridden the swelling 
 waters without damage. In a few minutes^ he 
 had her ready for action. 
 
 Once Jimmy had interrupted the work by 
 declaring he had heard a sound of oars in the 
 distance. Turner, pricking up his ears, noticed 
 nothing but wind and splashing water. 
 
 " Wind, my boy, can make you think you hear 
 almost anything on a dark night. Get in here 
 and forget your nerves," was all the satisfac- 
 tion he gave the detective. 
 
 Silently, Jimmy climbed aboard. 
 
 The lad in place, the pilot started his motor. 
 Swiftly the boat glided out into the night. 
 Guided partly by his instruments and partly by 
 instinct acquired by long experience, Turner 
 headed her boldly due south, let her skim the 
 waters for a space, then took a flying leap of 
 something over half a mile, and before Jimmy 
 had time to take full stock of the flying sensa-
 
 At Cape Peril 173 
 
 tion, he felt the spray on his face and knew that 
 the boat was once again cleaving the water. 
 
 " Now," shouted the pilot. " Nearly there! 
 Now for a place to anchor." 
 
 Swift maneuvering brought the ship athwart 
 the shore-line, vaguely visible in the gloom. 
 
 Jimmy was almost too excited by the experi- 
 ence just past to think of any perils ahead. A 
 journey even such a brief one in a flying 
 ship by night would have thrilled any youngster. 
 
 " Now," directed Turner when the anchor 
 was cast and the boat tipped the sand. " Out, 
 quick as you can make it. Hold tight to the axe. 
 Don't drop that, for heaven's sake! " 
 
 " Reckon any crook will smash the ship while 
 we're gone? " the boy asked as they ploughed 
 through the sand. 
 
 "I'm not reckoning anything. You follow 
 me." 
 
 The two made their way stealthily from the 
 lake through the sand path up to the mound, 
 pausing from time to time to listen for suspicious 
 noises amid the howling of the tempest. Before 
 them in the gloom the lighthouse loomed like a 
 weird and gigantic phantom. Jimmy, fighting
 
 174 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 % 
 
 off any rising nervousness, felt his heart pound- 
 ing against his ribs as he followed his resolute 
 guide up the slope. On the summit of the sand- 
 hill, Turner paused again to reconnoiter, his 
 pistol ready for action. Then he pushed on to 
 the door. He tried to open it but it refused 
 to budge. His first impulse was to yell for 
 Buffum. His next to go for the fishermen. 
 He dismissed both thoughts. He no longer 
 hesitated what he should do. 
 
 11 Here, the axe," he whispered to Jimmy, as 
 he thrust his pistol into its holster. " Stand 
 away while I smash the door in and stay there 
 till I call you." 
 
 Under a few pounding blows, the door yielded 
 and crashed open. 
 
 " Be careful," he whispered once more in 
 Jimmy's ear as he made ready to enter. " Stay 
 where you are till I whistle, you understand; 
 then come in." 
 
 Leaping ahead, Turner dropped his axe within 
 the doorway and flashed his light, his right 
 hand holding the pistol with perfect steadiness. 
 A glance assured him that the brick paved, circu- 
 lar room, bare as a vault, was free of lurkers.
 
 At Cape Peru 175 
 
 Then he softly called up the stair, ' Cap'n 
 Buffum! " 
 
 With tense ears he listened. A slight noise, 
 the mere ghost of a scraping sound, attracted 
 his notice. Again he called. This time the same 
 scraping, scratching sound followed, a shade 
 more distinct. 
 
 Casting aside all thought of danger to him- 
 self, Turner thrust his flash-light into his 
 pocket and, revolver advanced, began to grope 
 his way up the pitch-black stair, stealthily as 
 an Indian, fully aware that he might receive a 
 bullet at any moment. Up, up he crept until 
 his left hand felt the floor of the upper room. 
 Then he listened for a brief moment. Again, the 
 scratching sound, louder and more insistent. 
 His keen ear had located its direction to the 
 inch. He bounded up the last steps, and snatch- 
 ing out his flash-light, held it at arm's length 
 shooting its ray straight at the noise, his pistol 
 ready for instant action. There, revealed by the 
 ray, was a form bound hand and foot, roped 
 to the great chair, and with eyes bandaged and 
 a gag in the mouth. It was Cap'n Buffum. 
 
 By a desperate effort, the captive had managed
 
 176 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 to strain and stir his chair a'' few inches and 
 thus create the mysterious sound that the Tar- 
 heel had heard. 
 
 " This is Turner," called out the rescuer in 
 a low tone, " Is the man who did this upstairs? " 
 he took time to ask as he advanced. 
 
 The head shook a feeble negative. 
 
 Flashing his light, Turner's first act was to 
 survey every nook and corner of the room, 
 moving with swift steps. Then he rushed to the 
 head of the stairway, gave a shrill whistle, and 
 lighted the way for the plucky Jimmy as the 
 lad bounded up the stairs. 
 
 " Hold the light," he commanded. "It's 
 Cap'n Buffum knotted up. Here here." 
 
 The lad took in the situation at a glance. 
 
 Instantly the man set nimbly to work to release 
 the captive. He snatched the handkerchief from 
 the eyes that stared out in a mute and pathetic 
 gratitude. Then he succeeded in extracting the 
 gag. 
 
 " The light! My light! Bill Perkins! " were 
 the words that came feebly from the throat. 
 Then the eyes closed ; the lips and face blanched ; 
 the old man had fainted.
 
 At Cape Peril 177 
 
 Without a word, Turner worked like a demon 
 with his knife to sever the cords that cut into 
 the wrists and ankles and those that bound the 
 prisoner to the chair. 
 
 " Some sailor did this," he muttered as he 
 slashed the hemp. Freed of his bonds, Cap'n 
 Buifum revived for the moment, passed his 
 hand over his brow, and started up; but his 
 feeble knees gave way and he would have sagged 
 to the floor if Turner and Jimmy had not sup- 
 ported him. 
 
 " Get him to the bed," commanded Turner. 
 
 A moment later the limp burden was stretched 
 out on the cot, and the Tarheel had located and 
 was lighting the lamp. 
 
 " Quick, water," he cried to Jimmy, at the 
 same time pointing to the washstand. Jimmy, 
 seizing the pitcher, began to lave the wan face, 
 while Turner, snatching a flask of stimulant 
 from the cupboard, forced a liberal dose down 
 the old man's throat. 
 
 In a few moments the closed eyelids opened. 
 " Where am I? " he asked, light-headedly. 
 
 " You're all right. Just a little faint," encour- 
 aged Turner, leaning over him. " It's Turner
 
 178 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 and one of the boys with you. Easy, now! " 
 
 The old man's fingers began to pluck nervously 
 at the buttons of his coat. " My light! My 
 light! " he whispered as recollection dawned on 
 him once more. 
 
 " Listen," Turner said earnestly. " Don't 
 worry. I've set fire to a shack on the shore 
 you know Thompson's old cottage so there's 
 no danger to ships. Cheer up now, and tell us 
 how it happened when you feel a little stronger. ' ' 
 
 The words had their effect. 
 
 " You done that? You throwed out the life- 
 belt. Lemme see it, mate." 
 
 To humor him, Turner lifted him so he could 
 see the glow through the window. 
 
 " You done it, mate, and to think my light 
 ain't never been out befo'. 'Twar that scum 
 Bill Perkins that tied me and smashed my light, 
 and" 
 
 What the Cap'n was about to add was inter- 
 rupted by sounds without. Turner rushed to 
 the window and was able to distinguish a group 
 of men, with lanterns swinging in the wind, a 
 party from the fishing settlement. There was 
 a rush for the stairs and the men thronged into
 
 At Cape Peril 179 
 
 the room. Anxious questions and a babble of 
 speculations filled the air; it was some minutes 
 before the crowd could be sufficiently calmed to 
 listen to Buffum's story. 
 
 " My heart near cracked them two hours I war 
 tied up a-thinking about my light bein' out," he 
 moaned. " That thar fire won't last till day." 
 he added with a sudden attack of dismay. 
 
 " Listen here, Cap'n," put in one of the 
 fishermen, " soon as you tell us yo' tale I'll go 
 up and fire a shanty near the settlement. That '11 
 keep goin* till daybreak that ain't far off. 
 Tomorrow a lightship will come down. Tain't 
 no use to worry." 
 
 The words seemed to put more life into the 
 old man, and he launched off on his story.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 CAP'N BUFFUM'S REVELATIONS 
 
 " 'Twar Bill Perkins what done it! " 
 
 " Bill Perkins! " echoed several of the group 
 gruffly. " Who is he? We'll get him! " 
 
 " You recollec' the party I tol' you I fit the 
 duel with thirty year ago? " asked the Cap'n, 
 looking at Turner. " And I tol' them boys 
 about it, too," he added, nodding at Jimmy. 
 
 " You saw the man, then, and know him? " 
 Turner demanded excitedly. 
 
 " No, I ain't seen him this time, but I know 
 'twar Bill Perkins." 
 
 One fisherman put his hand to his forehead 
 and made a wheellike movement, giving, at the 
 same time, a knowing glance at a neighbor. 
 
 " That's that 'ar stuff he took that's talkin' 
 that ain't him," was his inference. 
 
 " He didn't tie hisself up, that's sho'," 
 replied the other, picking up a piece of the rope. 
 
 The thought of Perkins had choked the utter- 
 ance of the Cap'n for a moment. Then he went 
 
 180
 
 At Cape Peril 181 
 
 on, " Yes, 'twar him we saw on the beach 
 yestiddy." 
 
 " That stranger the one in the oilskins? " 
 asked Turner, starting, while a stir occurred 
 among the fishermen. 
 
 " It war him," insisted the old man promptly. 
 
 " I suspicioned that man o' some devilment 
 soon as I seen him prowlin' around," declared 
 one fisherman. 
 
 " But we'll get him as soon as day come on," 
 said another hotly, ' ' and when we ketch him ! ' ' 
 
 He added a significant gesture. 
 
 " Now, Cap'n Buffum," encouraged Turner, 
 " tell us how it all happened, in order. Stop if 
 you feel excited. Take your time." 
 
 " 'Twar this way," began the old man, catch- 
 ing his breath, and talking in panting phrases. 
 11 After I eat my supper and dark war comin' 
 on, I goes up to start the light, and seen every- 
 thing was shipshape and cosy, fer I knowed if 
 thar ever war a night when a light war needed, 
 this war the time. Then I come down and set 
 a while. Then, thinks I to myself, I'll go ashore 
 and limber up my legs and take a look at that 
 nasty sea good and close, and down I walks. I
 
 182 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 own it, mates, I ain't locked the* do' after me, 
 sence it never come in my head no critter would 
 sneak in to do no mischief. Off I goes and stays 
 down thar a-watchin' that grumpy sea and 
 a-lookin' fer twenty minutes, it might be, and 
 then I turns in agin, and locks the do' and goes 
 up fer another mindin' of my light." 
 
 " Sure you didn't see anybody suspicious 
 hanging around outside? " Turner put in. 
 
 " Nary a soul has I seen except that Hank 
 Thomas thar over by the settlement, and I ain't 
 considerin' him suspicious." 
 
 Hank, present, becoming the center of interest, 
 turned very red and began to mutter. His com- 
 panions' glances, however, were cast in jest 
 rather than in earnest. 
 
 " I went up to mind the light," proceeded 
 Buffum, " and then I come down and set by 
 my lamp, and my rheumatism bein' worse fer 
 walkin' on my legs, I took some painkiller to 
 ease 'em." 
 
 At this several fishermen winked at one 
 another. 
 
 " And then I did a thing I ain't never recollec' 
 doin' befo'. I dozes off in my chair."
 
 At Cape Peril 183 
 
 Despite the suspense, this innocent statement 
 aroused a general grin, for nearly every person 
 present, at one time or another, had found the 
 lighthouse keeper fast asleep in his accustomed 
 seat. 
 
 " I must have been nappin' fifteen min- 
 utes " he went on. 
 
 " Say, Cap'n, how long you think your light's 
 been out? " interrupted a fisherman. 
 
 " Sumpin' like two hours as fer as I kin cal- 
 kerlate, mates, sence I war tied up and heard 
 that scum smash the light." 
 
 " Eight after dark you fell off? " persisted 
 the questioner. 
 
 " Right after dark it war." 
 
 11 What happened those other two or three 
 hours? " Turner took up the quizzing. 
 
 11 Maybe it war more'n fifteen minutes I war' 
 sleep. Maybe it war." conceded the Cap'n, " or 
 maybe it war more'n two hours sense the devil 
 lit on me." 
 
 Turner and the others, raising no further 
 objection to the misfit in time, allowed the old 
 man to go on. 
 
 " As I war sayin', after I had been 'sleep
 
 184 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 fifteen minutes, or maybe mo ', I wpked a-sudden, 
 feelin' a rope coilin' roun' and roun' me same 
 as a sarpint; and, befo' I could bat a lid, mates, 
 I war lashed tight in that thar chair. I never 
 knowed such quick work as that varmint done. 
 I yells, but it ain't done no good; and what I let 
 out I ain't got no way o' knowing fer thar is 
 times when a man's words ain't come from his 
 senses." 
 
 " And you didn't see the man! " Turner asked 
 quietly. 
 
 " I couldn't, mates. He war behind me, and 
 I war tied stiff as a corpse befo' I knowed it, 
 and one twis' o* that thar rope war roun' my 
 neck." 
 
 " And you claim it was a man you knew as 
 Bill Perkins! " 
 
 " Bill Perkins it war that I hadn't seen befo' 
 fer thirty year." 
 
 " And you didn't see him this time! " insisted 
 Turner. 
 
 " Let the Cap'n talk," growled a longshore- 
 man. " You can't tell a yarn straight when 
 you're pestered by a felluh tryin* to twis' 
 sumpin' out o' you like a pesky lawyer."
 
 At Cape Peril 185 
 
 Turner flushed, but kept out of a dispute. 
 
 " When I war tied that-a-way," went on the 
 old man, " I knowed it war a sailor that turned 
 the trick, that's what I knowed fust." 
 
 Turner nodded in approval of his own sus- 
 picions along this line. 
 
 11 I tried to turn my head, but, quick as light- 
 ning, a hand slip roun' my bandanna handker- 
 chief, and though I jerk my derndest he got it 
 over my eyes; but, mates, befo' he done that 
 thing, I seed a fist on my larboard side, and 
 'twar his'n. I'd a knowed that claw if I'd a 
 seen it hangin' on a monkey-tree in Africky. 
 'Twar Bill Perkins's." 
 
 At the harrowing thought, the Cap'n paused 
 to recover from his emotion, and demanded 
 another draft of his medicine. 
 
 " Bill Perkins," he continued, apparently 
 refreshed, " had two claws on his left handle. 
 They warn't no longer than the first joint; his 
 fingers warn't never cut off; he come into the 
 world that way, fer them stumps had a nail 
 growin' on the end o' each of 'em. 'Twar Bill 
 Perkins's left I seen. One second I seen it, but 
 in that second I knowed. And I felt a burnin'
 
 186 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 feel I ain't never felt so powerful ^since that 'ar 
 duel. But I ain't tried to call his name fer, if 
 he'd a knowed 'twar me, he'd a killed me cold- 
 blooded on the spot that ornery critter would 
 'a done it." 
 
 " Look here, Cap'n," put in the doubting 
 Turner once more. " Why couldn't somebody 
 else have had a hand like that? " 
 
 " Nobody but the Old Scratch. Blister my 
 boots, thar ain't no other hand like it created." 
 
 To humor the old man, Turner did not insist 
 on this doubt, but nevertheless put another 
 query, " If this was your Bill Perkins " 
 
 " He ain't no Bill Perkins o' mine! " exploded 
 the Cap'n. 
 
 " I mean," corrected Turner, smiling. " If 
 this was Bill Perkins, why hasn't he found out 
 you were the Buffum he knew, while he's been 
 prowling around here? " 
 
 " He never would 'a knowed no Buffum," 
 explained the old man, " because, when I fust 
 shipped to sea, I warn't Bill Buffum no longer. 
 To make my old daddy easy I called myself out 
 o' my name. I war Jim Happer to all who 
 knowed me aboard ship. That war the name
 
 At Cape Peril 187 
 
 Perkins heard me called the month he war on 
 ship with me.'* 
 
 " I see," said the questioner, apparently satis- 
 fied with the explanation. 
 
 " I warn't tellin' him who I war after I seen 
 that hand, but I war spittin' and sputterin' good 
 and hearty when he stuck that thar dirty rag in 
 my mouth till he cut off my holluh instantaneous. 
 I ain't seen nor speak nothin' mo', but I hed my 
 feelin' lef ', mates, and my hearin' were thar. He 
 twist my wrist and my legs till the cut hurt so 
 hard I ain't felt the rheumatism on account of 
 that other misery killin' it off by bein' so mighty. 
 He lashed me up, mates, and then my heart turn 
 turtle and crack and my stummick raise a billy- 
 hoo when I hear him go up and bus' the light. 
 He stove it to smithereens, thar warn't no mis- 
 takin' that thar sound, thar warn't." 
 
 " Did the scoundrel hang around after that? " 
 coaxed Turner. 
 
 " Right away he went as soon as he done that 
 dirty deed. I heard his steps a-sneakin' down 
 from aloft; he comes through this room and then 
 I hear him start to go below, but he stumbled 
 and fell; then howls and cusses low, but it ain't
 
 188 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 kilt him, fer five minutes later I hear the out- 
 door lock. I heard it plain as I hears you now. 
 Then, hyuh I set all this time a-sufferin' what I 
 I ain't suffered befo' and, with that howlin' wind 
 in my years, a-killin' my brain to know what 
 war happenin' on them wicked shoals. Ain't no 
 signal of distress been seen? " 
 
 " Best easy, Cap'n," assured Turner. " No 
 ship's in trouble." So saying, the speaker made 
 a warning sign to the rest of the group. 
 
 More questions were put by various members 
 of the group, but no more definite information 
 could be extracted. Then it was voted that the 
 time for action had come. Several went upstairs 
 to inspect the damage; others by the light of 
 their lanterns examined the immediate neighbor- 
 hood for footprints or other evidence of the 
 criminal. 
 
 Turner and Jimmy joined first one and then 
 another of the exploring parties ; but it was soon 
 evident that in the darkness nothing was to be 
 expected, so man and boy decided the wiser 
 course was to remain quietly with the Cap'n 
 till the first sign of dawn.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 CAT FINDS A KEY 
 
 When Cat looked out after Turner and Jimmy 
 disappearing in the darkness, he had to swallow 
 a pretty bitter pill. 
 
 " Tough when a fellow's got the pep, not 
 to have a chance to show it," he grumbled to 
 himself. 
 
 Then, like the good loser he had always been, 
 he began to soothe his feelings with common- 
 sense reflections. Turner, it was clear, had 
 some reason for wanting the smaller lad, and 
 an addition to the party might be a drawback. 
 It's pretty hard luck, however, to be left in a 
 lonesome house when your chum is out running 
 his nose into all sorts of exciting adventure. 
 
 " Well, I can eat anyhow," he consoled him- 
 self, and taking advantage of Hardy's invita- 
 tion to the guests to forage in the pantry when- 
 ever appetite moved them, he managed to find 
 and stow away a choice assortment of cake, 
 pickles and crab-apples. 
 
 189
 
 190 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Thus bucked up with nourishment, he went 
 upstairs and gazed out of the window in the 
 direction of the lighthouse. In a few minutes, 
 the expected light shone from the window, a 
 mere ghost of a glimmer, but it told its tale. 
 
 " Gee! " thought the watcher, with a relieved 
 sigh. " They're there, and I reckon every- 
 thing's all right, except maybe old Buffum's 
 sick or dead. But dang it all, I do wish I 
 could have had a night ride in the seaplane! 
 That shark stuff wouldn't be in it." 
 
 Satisfied in his mind that his friends had 
 safely reached their objective, the lad ran to 
 the other end of the passage to take a look north- 
 ward. In the distance a bright glow still illu- 
 minated the darkness, but it was evident that the 
 roof of the ruin had already collapsed and that 
 the blaze was slowly sinking to the smouldering 
 embers. 
 
 Next he hurried down to the porch to scan 
 the sea for rockets. No spark of signal fire was 
 to be seen; but from the lighthouse still shone 
 the feeble light. 
 
 " B'lieve I'll read till they come," he said, 
 turning indoors again.
 
 At Cape Peril 191 
 
 The Indian book, left on the table by Turner, 
 attracted his attention. He settled himself in a 
 chair by the light and, turning the pages at ran- 
 dom, came to a passage that engaged his interest. 
 He started reading aloud to break the monotony : 
 
 " * Arrows are the principal weapons that 
 they use in war and in hunting. These arrows 
 are barbed at the tip with a stone, sharpened 
 and cut in the shape of a serpent's tongue; if 
 knives are lacking, they use arrows also for 
 flaying the animals which they kill. They are 
 so adroit in bending the bow that they scarcely 
 ever miss their aim; and they do this with such 
 quickness that they will have discharged a 
 hundred arrows sooner than another person can 
 reload his gun. They take little trouble to make 
 nets suitable for catching fish in the rivers, 
 because the abundance of all kinds of animals 
 which they find for their food renders them 
 somewhat indifferent to fish. 
 
 " 'However, when they take a fancy to have 
 some, they enter a canoe with their bow and 
 arrows; they stand up that they may better dis- 
 cover the fish; and, as soon as they see one, 
 they pierce it with an arrow.'
 
 192 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 11 Gee! " the reader paused to* remark, " I 
 didn't know that, but, by golly! they haven't 
 got much on our shark hunt with that stunt 
 we pulled off this morning." 
 
 Turning to another page, he read on: 
 
 " ' When they have escaped any great danger 
 by sea or land, or have returned from war, in 
 token of joy they make a great fire about which 
 the men and women sit together, holding in their 
 hands a fruit like a pumpkin or a gourd, which, 
 after they have taken out the fruit and the 
 seeds, they fill with small stones or big kernels 
 to make the more noise, and fastening that upon 
 a stick, they sing to its accompaniment and 
 make merry.' 
 
 " Wish Indians or something else was around 
 to stir up a little excitement. Darn if I'd care 
 whether it was merry or not, just so it was 
 noise," sighed the lone watcher, shutting the 
 book with a slam and tossing it onto the table. 
 " I can't stand this any longer,'' he continued. 
 " I'm going down to meet Jimmy and Turner, 
 that's what I'm going to do." 
 
 No sooner was it thought than acted upon. 
 After providing himself with a flash-light from
 
 At Cape Peril 193 
 
 Hardy's belongings, he hurried out, locking the 
 door after him and pocketing the key. More 
 stars were now shining, and, without assistance 
 from his pocket light, he made his way to Lake 
 Herring, pausing at times to listen for any 
 possible suspicious sound. 
 
 Near the shore a distinct clanking struck his 
 ear, but shooting his light, he discovered nothing 
 more exciting than the chain of a wave-rocked 
 rowboat attached to a post by the bridg of the 
 hangar. The oars, their blades wet, lay across 
 the seats. 
 
 Why not take the boat," thought the boy 
 to himself, " and row on over to Cape Peril? " 
 
 " No," objected his conscience, " you can't 
 do it. You've got your orders." 
 
 "Gosh a Moses! Somebody's been using it 
 already," was the lad's conclusion on a closer 
 inspection of the boat. Then it occurred to 
 him that the waves splashing over the sides 
 had caused the soaking. 
 
 Suspicion of trespassers out of his mind, he 
 went along the bridge and inspected the empty 
 hydro shed. Then he started back to the shore, 
 where temptation seized him again. He climbed
 
 194 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 into the boat and began to finger the oars. 
 Presently, releasing them, he began to play his 
 flash-light around the bottom of the boat. 
 Suddenly his eye was caught by a dull object. 
 On closer observation, it proved to be an unusu- 
 ally large key of somewhat antique pattern. 
 
 " Where in the mischief did this come from? " 
 he asked himself as he took it in his hand. 
 " Looks like one I've seen before." And then, 
 with a sudden flash of memory, " I know I've 
 seen it before. It's the key to the Cape Peril 
 lighthouse. If it's not, it sure is powerful 
 like it." 
 
 The unusual size and make of the lighthouse 
 key had attracted the boy's attention on the 
 occasion of his visit to Cap'n Buffum. 
 
 " By golly! that's funny," he kept repeating. 
 " How the mischief I " 
 
 He turned the key over and over in his fin- 
 gers, but the longer he examined it the more con- 
 vinced he was of its identity with the one he 
 had noticed before. 
 
 "Maybe old Buffum 's skipped or maybe 
 I know, maybe that old woman's come and kid- 
 napped him."
 
 At Cape Peril 195 
 
 Both guesses were wild enough, but the most 
 plausible he could hit on. He finally put the 
 key into his pocket and sat spinning more 
 speculations. 
 
 " Blame it! " he exclaimed after several min- 
 utes. " If Turner and Jimmy don't hurry I'm 
 going." His eyes turned northward. " And I 
 know where I'm going. I'm going over and 
 take a look at that fire." 
 
 Glad to get away from any further temptation 
 to use the boat, he acted on his new impulse and 
 moved over to the path leading to the burning 
 building. Jogging on, he had covered most of 
 the way to his goal when suddenly he gave a 
 start and came to a dead halt. Not far ahead 
 of him and just back of the smouldering ruin 
 he could distinctly see, lighted by the glow, a 
 human form whose progress was so slow as 
 to make it seem almost stationary. 
 
 Who was it? Cap'n Buffum was the lad's 
 first thought, but, as he advanced a little farther, 
 he was convinced that the figure was that of a 
 less thick-set person. Whoever it was, the dis- 
 covery called for instant action. He must get 
 a closer view of the night prowler.
 
 196 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 The boy began to run till he d^ew close to 
 the blaze; then he veered off, skirting the shore 
 just above the surf line. Opposite the fire, he 
 slipped up to a sand hill, crawled to the top 
 and peered over. 
 
 The form, though fast approaching the region 
 of shadow, was still visible in the glow, and the 
 sound of crunched sand was distinctly percepti- 
 ble. The cause of the slow gait of the stranger 
 was now apparent. 
 
 " He's got a game foot. Wonder if he's been 
 shot," was the watcher's thought. 
 
 His scout training, the obligation to go to the 
 aid of the injured, first asserted itself. 
 
 " You bet I won't go yet," was his second 
 thought. " If he's all square, why didn't he 
 come up to the house for help? I'll lay low till 
 I find out what sort of bird he is. Gee! " 
 
 Up once more, the lad slipped along below 
 the sand hills to a point well beyond the glow 
 of the embers. Then he cautiously made his 
 way to a higher point and looked over. The 
 form, dragging slowly, was still in sight. 
 
 " I'm going to keep an eye on that fellow even 
 if I run the risk of a bullet," Cat declared.
 
 CHAPTER XVT 
 
 CAT IN AMBUSH 
 
 The mysterious prowler would be out of the 
 firelight in a few moments more. Where was 
 he going? That was the question that puzzled 
 the lad. In the man's crippled condition, climb- 
 ing the sand dunes would be an impossibility. 
 Then Cat recalled that the path the man was 
 following ended a short distance beyond at its 
 point of intersection with an inland road that 
 led to the county turnpike some three miles 
 away from the ocean. Unless insane, the man 
 had some objective in view, so what could it 
 be but the road? And, up this road, there was 
 no single habitation for half a mile's distance. 
 It would take several hours to reach that at 
 his present rate of progress. 
 
 " Must be somebody waiting for him at the 
 road," the boy concluded. "I'll beat on up 
 the beach ahead of him and lie hidden near the 
 head of the road. The way he's going now, it'll 
 take him fifteen minutes to get there." 
 
 197
 
 198 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 There was no danger of pursuit by a lame 
 man, and that any damage could be done by a 
 bullet fired in the dark seemed equally unrea- 
 sonable. Ambush seemed a safe proposition. 
 
 So the boy slipped softly down to the beach 
 and, by the dim starlight, kept well up out of 
 the way of the rolling surf. Once the thought 
 came to him, " How 'bout it if there's a gang 
 of crooks waiting there! " 
 
 Then he said to himself after a moment: 
 
 "I'm on my way and I'll keep on my way; 
 that's Cat Miller." 
 
 Presently he had reached a point recognizable 
 by landmarks as just opposite the meeting place 
 of the inland extending road and the path that 
 skirted the coast. Climbing up the bank, the 
 boy stretched himself out and lay with head 
 cautiously raised and ears alert. In case of any 
 alarm, he knew he could slip down the bank 
 and make off without difficulty in the darkness. 
 The wind, sweeping over him, had little chill 
 to it. He could stand that indefinitely. 
 
 He looked back in the direction of the slowly 
 dying glow and listened. For ten minutes, per- 
 haps, he heard nothing. Then suddenly, borne
 
 At Cape Peril 199 
 
 on the sweeping wind, a sound, very, very faint 
 the sound of sand crunched under a 
 boot. With head raised higher, he waited 
 expectantly until he was sure he detected a dark 
 shadow moving along the lighter background. 
 All of a sudden the sound of footfalls ceased 
 and a groan came in its place. 
 
 " Gee! he must be hurt bad," thought the lad. 
 11 Can't help it. I'll watch on." 
 
 Once more the sound of grating sand was 
 heard; the stranger was moving. Very slowly 
 he dragged along till he had reached a point 
 just in front of his watcher; then, after a short 
 pause and another groan, his footsteps seemed 
 to be slowly retreating. Cat ducked as a search- 
 light flashed and he fidgeted in spite of himself. 
 The man was evidently just getting his bearings. 
 
 In the lad's excitement, he kept crawling 
 nearer and nearer the road head, worming along 
 on his stomach as soldiers do in battle under 
 shell fire. His curiosity was overpowering his 
 discretion. 
 
 A few feet from the road the boy stopped, 
 raised himself on his hands, and looked. The 
 man, flashing his light at intervals, was still
 
 200 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 moving away from him. Then ihe light was 
 flashed straight ahead and the rear of a motor 
 car was clearly in view. 
 
 " I see,'* said the boy, almost disappointed. 
 " That's his game, is it? Wonder how many 
 crooks there are in it." 
 
 But no sound of voices reached him. 
 
 " Must be whispering," he conjectured. 
 
 Presently the watcher started, with throbbing 
 heart, as another sound, the faint put-put of a 
 distant motor, reached his ears. 
 
 Meanwhile, the man, who was examining his 
 machine, had caught the sound also. He turned 
 his head as if to listen and Cat was able to 
 get a brief glimpse of two horror-stricken eyes 
 in a haggard face. It was a flash-light picture 
 of agony. 
 
 The noise of the oncoming motor increased. 
 Over a sandhill glowed the headlight of the 
 approaching car. The man, apparently despair- 
 ing of getting his engine started in time, had 
 scurried off the road. Cat heard a vague sound 
 as of a body rolling down a slope. 
 
 The boy fixed his eyes on the glow of the 
 moving car, coming at a moderate speed around
 
 At Cape Peril 201 
 
 the point where the road curved to avoid a 
 sand mound. Suddenly he heard a crash, a 
 sound of shattered glass, followed by noisy 
 exclamations and then complete darkness. The 
 chauffeur, not seeing the stationary car in time, 
 had gone full tilt into one corner of it. A 
 moment later a search-light flashed. 
 
 " What the mischief is this? " he heard the 
 voice of the man who had jumped from the 
 car say. Then were was a hum of voices. 
 
 " Lucky we had the heavier car, light as it is," 
 another voice remarked. 
 
 " Wonder who in the mischief left a car stand- 
 ing out here without the sign of a light. 
 Smashed the dickens out of his windshield and 
 twisted his axle and fender, I see. We got off 
 pretty easy." 
 
 " Suppose it could be the detective's car? " 
 asked the man who had first spoken. 
 
 Cat, in a flutter of excitement, had been try- 
 ing to catch every word of the dialogue. At 
 the last speech, he gave a start; he had recog- 
 nized the voice. 
 
 " Sure you didn't get any glass back there? " 
 he heard the same voice remark.
 
 202 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " No, you bet I'm all right," came back in a 
 youthful tone. 
 
 " Don't see anybody hanging around? " said 
 the familiar man's voice. 
 
 " Not a soul," was the answer. " Keep your 
 hand on your gun." 
 
 Cat, eager to call, lay still for fear of getting 
 a bullet before he was recognized. 
 
 " Say, you'll camp by the machine, won't you, 
 while I take this boy up to the house? " 
 
 Cat glided back rapidly and slipped down the 
 bank until he felt himself protected from a hasty 
 bullet. Then he yelled : " Hardy! Hardy! It's 
 Cat. It's Gat Miller, don't shoot!" 
 
 He had recognized two of the three voices as 
 those of Hardy and Legs Hatton.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 HAEDY STRIKES A HOT TKAIL 
 
 The morning of the day before, when Hardy 
 had got the peevish doctor in place and had 
 taken his own seat in the airplane, he steered 
 his bird off from Roanoke Island in what, by 
 no stretch of fancy, could be called flying- 
 weather. The wind was freshening to a gale and 
 the waters of the Sound were choppy and ugly- 
 looking. But, even if the pilot had to play hide 
 and seek in the storm-clouds, the emergency 
 admitted of no hesitation, and, after all, it was 
 merely a question of a very few minutes ' flying. 
 So the venturesome airman gritted his teeth, 
 clamped his rod, and with the machine swaying 
 to and fro in the sweep and swelter and with 
 wings at times perilously tipped, plunged into 
 the teeth of the tempest. 
 
 As Windjammer approached the sea, the going 
 became more and more hazardous; but the 
 inevitable luck of the pilot warranted his confi- 
 dence. He soon hovered over his goal, and, after
 
 204 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 some maneuvering, the staggering feat was 
 done. Under heavy pressure, he landed on the 
 bleak coast in full view of the heaving ocean. 
 
 The danger over, Smith, the passenger, 
 jumped from his seat with the change of counte- 
 nance of a man risen from the dead. He evi- 
 dently thought that for the rest of his life he 
 would be living on borrowed time after what 
 he had just been through. He recovered him- 
 self sufficiently, however, to lend his aid to Hardy 
 in sheltering the flyer from the wind and threat- 
 ening rain. Then the two proceeded to the 
 lighthouse. 
 
 The wireless operator of the Kitty Hawk 
 Station, who was in temporary charge, bubbled 
 over with delight on seeing the new arrivals. 
 The regular keeper had been removed to his 
 home in a serious condition, he reported with 
 a wealth of detail. 
 
 The doctor hurried off to his patient. 
 
 " Just given you up," he pursued, " and was 
 looking for one deuce of a time. What with a 
 storm roaring and bellowing, and the chance 
 of my apparatus being blown to kingdom come, 
 I wasn't feeling very jimmy."
 
 At Cape Peril 205 
 
 " I know you weren't," agreed Hardy. 
 
 " And, by the way," continued the operator, 
 " about two hours ago, just before my machine 
 broke down, I picked up a message for Sea- 
 gulls' Nest." 
 
 " You did? Let's have it quick," said Hardy 
 eagerly, turning his head in order to listen with 
 greater sharpness to the answer. 
 
 " It was from Commodore Hatton. Said he 
 was passing and wouldn't be able to stop. He 
 was trying to beat the gale and put into Hamp- 
 ton Roads. Important business was hurrying 
 him." 
 
 " Where you s'pose the yacht is by this 
 time? " demanded the pilot as the other paused. 
 
 " Judging by what they said when they spoke 
 to us, the boat was then right off this point; so 
 it must be well up the coast by now." 
 
 " Don't think he'll have any trouble making 
 his port? " 
 
 " Ought not to. And see here, there was a 
 message for us here, too. He had expected to 
 stop in the Sound to report on that suspicious 
 case " 
 
 " Suspicious case? What suspicious case? "
 
 206 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 insisted Hardy with breathless interest. 
 
 " I thought you'd got wind of that. That 
 drowning." 
 
 1 ' Drowning ! Who ? Where T ' ' 
 
 " We all thought there was something crooked 
 about it." 
 
 " Let's have it, man, quick! " Thought of the 
 telltale lifeboat had instantly flashed across 
 Hardy's brain. 
 
 " Well, I swear I thought you'd 'a heard of 
 that by this time," the operator went on. " It 
 was this way. A couple of weeks ago when the 
 Commodore's yacht was lying here in the Sound 
 to take on some local capitalists he was going 
 to carry down to Mexico to look into those oil 
 fields, there happened what looked like a pretty 
 serious accident. The night before the boat 
 planned to steam out was dark as tarred pitch. 
 Now, it seems Hatton had a Dago or Greaser 
 or some such cuss on board who could speak 
 Spanish s 'posed to be taken along as an inter- 
 preter. Well, this night the fellow insisted on 
 going ashore for one reason or the other; had 
 to mail an important letter or send a telegram 
 some trumped-up excuse."
 
 At Cape Peril 207 
 
 Hardy gave an involuntary start that the other 
 did not fail to notice. 
 
 " And they went in one of the ship's boats? " 
 the airman could not resist putting in. 
 
 " Of course, how else was he to go? " 
 demanded the operator. " You didn't see him, 
 did you? " 
 
 " No, go on! " 
 
 " Well, he got permission and *"oked a sailor 
 to help him row. About twenty minutes after 
 the pair had pulled off, the crew heard a yell 
 from the water, a yell for help, and on lowering 
 a boat to investigate, found this same sailor 
 splashing around in the water pretty near 
 played out, or making out he was. They hauled 
 him aboard the lifeboat, got him on the yacht, 
 and stimulated up to the talking point. Then 
 he panted out a yarn about his lifeboat being 
 run down in the Sound by a tug or something 
 that didn't show a light, which sounds pretty 
 fishy to start with. Said the boat was smashed, 
 and that his companion must have gone down 
 like a stone, for, as soon as he managed to get 
 his own senses, he swam around and didn't see 
 a sign of him. He floundered around, he claimed,
 
 208 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 for several minntes; then he realized his only 
 hope of safety was to make for the yacht half 
 a mile away, a heap nearer than the shore. So 
 he struck out and made it by the hardest. 
 
 " As soon as that bird told his tale, they 
 got him to his bunk, for he did seem all in, and 
 then the Commodore started to investigate. He 
 sent another boat over to the supposed scene of 
 the collision, V-.J: not a sign of anything was in 
 sight not a plank floating on the water so 
 far as they could make out. Then they came 
 over here and sent a message to the sheriff to be 
 on the lookout and make every effort to recover 
 the body." 
 
 "I've seen the boat," blurted out Hardy, who 
 had been listening with deep absorption. 
 
 " The mischief you have! " exclaimed the 
 operator, his eyes popping. " Where? " 
 
 Hardy recounted the story of the discovery 
 on Knott's Island. 
 
 " The darn crook! " the operator burst out 
 when he had heard him through. " That makes 
 it clear as day. It was a frame-up." 
 
 " What does it all mean! " Hardy wanted 
 to know.
 
 At Cape Peril 209 
 
 " That's what I can't make out. Here a fel- 
 low who had just got a job, and then tries to 
 beat it and make his employer think he is dead. 
 Something behind it." 
 
 " Anything missing from the yacht in the 
 way of valuables! " 
 
 " Nothing reported. You see, the Commodore 
 had to steam out the next day, as he didn't have 
 any more margin left him before the time he 
 was due in Mexico. It appears a pile of money 
 was dependent on his getting down in time to 
 pull off a deal." 
 
 11 So he left the next morning? " 
 
 "Must have! When I took a look out, the 
 yacht was gone." 
 
 " Has Hatton communicated with anybody 
 since he's been away? " 
 
 11 I hear he's been in touch with the sheriff, 
 but King that's the deputy who's on the job 
 is mum as wax about it, attending to his own 
 business. That's what I hear from Dareville." 
 
 " He has his headquarters in Dareville? " 
 asked Hardy. 
 
 " Ye-ah, and I know they've made a pretty 
 close search of the waters hereabouts for that
 
 210 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 busted boat and the remains of the fellow 
 Blanco." 
 
 " Called himself Blanco, did he? " 
 
 " That was the name he gave Hatton. I 
 reckon he picked up that Buffalo Dare alias when 
 he heard that crazy man's name over in 
 Dareville." 
 
 " Funny the sheriff hasn't searched the other 
 end of the Sound.'* 
 
 " Maybe he did, but detectives, amateur ones, 
 think they know it all. They see pretty much 
 everything but what's right under their noses." 
 
 " That's sure so," agreed Hardy. " But what 
 happened to that rescued sailor? He must have 
 been in the game." 
 
 " He was carried off in the yacht, but I under- 
 stand that Hatton left word he would keep him 
 close till the matter was cleared up." 
 
 "It's a blame funny thing," said Hardy, 
 half to himself. "And beating it up to Knott's 
 Island! That's not actually an island, though; 
 it's connected with the mainland, and he could 
 have made off on foot through the wilds. S'pose 
 he had any reason to go to Cape Peril? " 
 
 A vague apprehension had seized the speaker
 
 At Cape Peril 211 
 
 that the villain might be meditating some devil- 
 ment in that direction. 
 
 " Cape Peril! If he's hooked something," 
 declared the operator, " he's going to get to 
 some big city and try to lose himself. No Cape 
 Peril for him." 
 
 " Anyhow, I'd like to get over and interview 
 that deputy." 
 
 " Well, you won't get that interview for 
 some time yet, I'm thinking, from the sound of 
 that wind and the look of that aggravated ocean. 
 You're not fool enough to try to fly back, I 
 hope." 
 
 " Not quite," conceded the pilot. 
 
 " Didn't think you were," granted the opera- 
 tor. " Beckon you want to solve this mystery 
 before you pass in your checks." 
 
 " That would be some satisfaction," laughed 
 the other. 
 
 " Glad you are gradually getting a little sense. 
 Though I'm powerful glad you got here, believe 
 me, if I'd been in your place, I'd stuck to where 
 I was and let lighthouse keepers be hanged. 
 But you airmen get to thinking you are wind- 
 proof and thunderproof and every other sort of
 
 212 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 proof until you slip a cog sometime and get a 
 dose of discretion that is, if you ever come to 
 your senses again after you tumble." 
 
 11 I know my business," asserted Hardy, some- 
 what hotly. 
 
 " They all do; I never knew one who wasn't 
 thoroughly familiar with his business. Don't 
 want to hear any more of this? All right. I'll 
 shut up. But we're all fools in the same boat 
 together." 
 
 Hardy had frowned, but his face cleared 
 instantly. He didn't mind a little jollying. 
 
 11 I have been a big one today," he granted. 
 " I brought Commodore Hatton's son as far as 
 Roanoke. Intended to leave him at Knott's 
 Island, but, after that boat find and when Smith 
 didn't turn up, the boy pestered me so I had to 
 fly him further." 
 
 Then he told of the house-party at Seagulls' 
 Nest. 
 
 " You're just a kid along with the rest of 
 them," asserted the operator, " and you always 
 will be. You'll never grow up till your dying 
 day. Well, I reckon that's the way to die with- 
 out making the acquaintance of trouble. I'm
 
 At Cape Peril 213 
 
 thinking, though, the Commodore will make a 
 little trouble for you if he hears about this trip." 
 
 " That's the reason I want to beat it back as 
 soon as possible. Isn't there any way of get- 
 ting off this forsaken sandbar? " 
 
 " Not today or tonight," declared the opera- 
 tor cheerfully. " Afraid you'll have to give me 
 your ^company for some hours, or maybe days 
 yet." 
 
 " Confound it! " exploded Hardy. 
 
 " 'Tis pretty tough! " 
 
 " How long you think this blow will last? " 
 
 " To tell you the truth, I don't think it will 
 be a long one. ' ' And he added, to give the excited 
 man a grain of comfort, " Maybe a tug or 
 something will be in hailing distance after the 
 worst is over." 
 
 " If I can get over on anything floating," 
 declared Hardy, grasping at the possibility, 
 " I'll have you keep an eye on Windjammer and 
 I'll try to scare up an auto to make Cape Peril 
 through the country. Turner and I can come 
 down in the seaplane after this blasted storm 
 peters out and pick up my bird again." 
 
 With this arrangement in mind, the pilot tried
 
 214 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 to make the best of the situation. % He and the 
 operator settled themselves in the wireless sta- 
 tion to smoke and chat away the hours, inter- 
 rupting the occupation to snatch a bite to eat 
 and, ever and anon, to inspect the prospects out 
 of doors and the condition of the barometer. 
 Amid the howling wind and the rain, they sat 
 till the tempest that evening had spent its force. 
 By ten o'clock things looked vastly more 
 promising. 
 
 At this hour, Hardy learned to his great 
 delight that a tug, weathering the blast on the 
 Sound side of the Kitty Hawk bar, was about 
 to put out for Roanoke Island and then proceed 
 to Knott's Island and he found that he could 
 get accommodations for the voyage over.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE NIGHT RIDERS 
 
 When Hardy set foot on Roanoke Island, he 
 probably felt almost as elated as did the first 
 English settlers in America when they landed 
 near the same spot three hundred and thirty-odd 
 years before. For him, however, it was the 
 mere start of the journey. His business was to 
 get Hatton back to Cape Peril and get him there 
 in a hurry. Besides, he still felt disturbed 
 about the whereabouts and devilish plans of this 
 mysterious Blanco. 
 
 With some difficulty, the pilot made his way 
 up the unpaved street of the still and desolate 
 hamlet. Scarcely a light was visible. The Dare- 
 villers, even if not all healthy, wealthy and wise, 
 were early to bed at any rate; and persons 
 prowling around after nine o'clock were more 
 or less suspicious. Hardy, steering his course 
 by a solitary lamp shining through a window of 
 the " hotel," reached the porch without inter- 
 ference, and no sooner had his foot touched the 
 
 215
 
 216 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 planks than the vigilant Legs was out of the 
 door, and, in another moment, let out a yell of 
 recognition. 
 
 " Shut up," urged Hardy. " Stop your fuss, 
 or we'll both be jugged by the constable for 
 disturbing the peace at this ungodly hour; it 
 must be nine o'clock if it's a minute." 
 
 " How did you get here? What's happened! " 
 the boy shot at him in a slightly lowered tone. 
 
 " Let's get in out of this wind and I'll tell 
 you." Inside, Hardy proceeded to recount hur- 
 riedly the events since his abrupt departure. 
 The boy listened breathlessly. Relieved to hear 
 that his father's yacht was well on to port, his 
 mind gave all its attention to the Blanco mystery. 
 
 " I thought that fellow looked like a slick 
 one," declared the lad when Hardy had finished 
 his story, " but he sure had father hoodooed." 
 
 This was an afterthought, inspired by recent 
 events. The truth was, when the lad got his 
 glimpse of the interpreter, he had not given him 
 much attention one way or the other. 
 
 " And you don't know any reason the man 
 had for making off this way? " asked Hardy. 
 
 " Not unless he's swiped something." was
 
 At Cape Peril 217 
 
 Legs's suspicion. " But, say, let's get on that 
 tugboat. I'll die if I stay in this place ten min- 
 utes longer." 
 
 " 'Fraid you'll have to die, then. I'm going 
 to get hold of that sheriff first. I'm going to 
 wake a few citizens up if I start a riot in 
 doing it." 
 
 The landlord was the first to suffer. He was 
 finally rooted out in a state of negligee and 
 indignation; but, when the airman offered to pay 
 for the boy's room and for one he himself might 
 occupy, but did not intend to, the appeased host 
 agreed to dress and direct the way to King's 
 house. 
 
 " Reckon it's a good thing to get rid of that 
 kid," he thought to himself. " I never seen such 
 a squirmy varmint since I was bawn." 
 
 Ten minutes later, Hardy was knocking on the 
 door of the deputy sheriff. Fortunately that offi- 
 cial, after being detained abroad on some crim- 
 inal business, was still awake over a late supper. 
 He ushered his guests in politely and a very rea- 
 sonable sort of person he turned out to be. 
 
 " Yes, I've had some cable messages from 
 Commodore Hatton," he returned to Hardy's
 
 218 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 questions, after listening to the pilot's interests 
 in the matter. " He's got enough evidence to 
 convict that crook if we can get the hooks in 
 him. What he done I don't know any more than 
 you do. All I know is IVe &?i to try to catch 
 him. I've wired the description around, and I 
 think we're on the trail. What you tell me about 
 that boat you found goes in with a report I 
 got that a man lookin' like Blanco was seen in 
 the back country not far from Knott's Island. 
 But I've got hold of another piece of informa- 
 tion I can't let out yet, and I'm going up Nor- 
 folk way tomorrow was going today if the 
 boats hadn't been held up by this here storm. 
 Commodore Hatton offers right smart money 
 reward if the man's landed." 
 
 " How about going tonight? " suggested 
 Hardy. 
 
 The deputy gave a look that showed he 
 thought he was dealing with a lunatic. 
 
 "I'm not dangerous," laughed Hardy, inter- 
 preting the other's glance. Then he told of 
 the waiting tugboat. 
 
 " What would you do when you got to Knott's 
 Island? " objected the reluctant deputy.
 
 At Cape Peril 219 
 
 " That's easy," explained Hardy. "I've got 
 a friend there who owns an automobile. He'll 
 lend it to me for love or money, or maybe both. 
 We'll get to the island, if the tug don't break 
 down, by one o'clock. It's an hour's or an hour 
 and a half's run to Cape Peril. I'll put you up 
 at Seagulls' Nest, my place there, till tomorrow, 
 and then send you wherever you want to go." 
 
 " Eotten roads and a howlin' night," medi- 
 tated the deputy. 
 
 " You can sleep on the tug and take a wink 
 in the auto," promised the other. " I'll attend 
 to the roads. Nash's car's special trick is climb- 
 ing out of mud holes." 
 
 The deputy thought a while longer, figured on 
 what he would save financially, consulted his 
 wife in retirement, got her permission after 
 some argument, and made himself ready to go. 
 
 Shortly after the three night travelers were 
 aboard, the tug bravely started, ploughing the 
 rolling waters on its way up the Sound. Hardy 
 and the deputy had soon made themselves com- 
 fortable on benches and were sound asleep. Legs, 
 however, had to contend for an hour with a 
 queasy feeling closely related to seasickness.
 
 220 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 One o'clock found the party safely ashore on 
 Knott's Island, and by the aid of the lantern 
 of the tngboat captain they managed to pick 
 their way to Nash's store. His dwelling place 
 was above and, in the rear, stood his garage. 
 
 " Well, I'll be jiggered again! " was his 
 exclamation when he was roused after some 
 effort in the way of door pounding and, armed 
 with a pistol, came down to investigate the dis- 
 turbance. "I'll be jiggered! How'd you get 
 here this time o* night? Darn if I don't b'lieve 
 you've been fool enough to fly." 
 
 The pilot rattled out his explanation and the 
 pressing business in hand, offering ample com- 
 pensation for the use of the auto. 
 
 " Anything to accommodate a friend like 
 you," said the good-natured Nash. " Just so 
 you don't ask me to go with you." 
 
 The motor was produced, Hardy took the 
 wheel, the deputy the place by him, Legs 
 sprawled on the rear seat, and the car was off, 
 leaving the owner almost as flabbergasted as he 
 had been at first sight of his visitors. 
 
 To call the road across Knott's Island bad 
 would be to compliment it; it was one not to be
 
 At Cape Peril 221 
 
 mentioned in polite motoring society. But some 
 cars can negotiate almost anything, and Nash 'a 
 car was of that breed. When this nightmare 
 of a trail was left behind and the car crossed 
 the tongue of land that connected the so-called 
 " island " with the mainland, they struck a 
 passable shellroad, and Hardy, having the law 
 by his side, tried to outspeed the wind on his 
 northwesterly journey. An hour's run brought 
 him to the point where the branch road struck 
 off in the direction of Seagulls' Nest. He had 
 made this without incident to the point where 
 he was rounding the curve. Here, knowing that 
 he had practically reached his destination, he 
 had taken his eyes from the illuminated road 
 in front to direct the deputy's attention to the 
 position of Cape Peril, with some remarks about 
 the possible effects of the storm, when, to his 
 consternation, he found he was right on an 
 object standing to one side in the road. An 
 instant's glance showed m'm it was a runabout, 
 but despite his desperate effort to veer off he 
 was unable to avoid crashing into it. 
 
 Then followed the excited talk that Cat Miller 
 had heard from his covert.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 KNITTING UP THE CLUES 
 
 " Who's that? " demanded Hardy sharply 
 when he heard a voice cry out in the darkness. 
 
 All three from the colliding auto were instantly 
 on the alert. 
 
 "It's Cat! Cat Miller! " sang out the voice 
 lustily. "Don't shoot! It's Cat." 
 
 "It is Cat! " assured Hatton excitedly. 
 
 Hardy, who, at the first sound, had drawn 
 his revolver, now returned it to its holster, and 
 yelled out: "Where in the dickens are you? 
 Come on here! " 
 
 Cat bounded up and ran forward. As soon as 
 his face came into the glare, it showed an expres- 
 sion of the greatest agitation. 
 
 " There was a man, a man, lame, trying to 
 get into the machine," he panted out to the per- 
 turbed listeners. " He slipped down there! " 
 
 The boy stretched his hand toward the left 
 road side. " I heard him! I saw him! " 
 
 His astounding news created a great stir 
 222
 
 At Cape Peril 223 
 
 among the new arrivals. Hardy and the deputy 
 instantly drew their pistols, pulled the two boys 
 up to the shelter of the machine, and, after 
 extinguishing the light, managed to get from the 
 youngster a coherent story of what he had seen. 
 
 All had crouched and dropped their voices to 
 whispers. 
 
 " It must be him," declared the deputy. 
 
 Then followed a brief recital of what had gone 
 on at Seagulls' Nest, of the extinguished light, 
 Turner's excursion, and the discovery of the 
 telltale key. 
 
 " The dastardly scoundrel! " exploded Hardy, 
 in spite of himself. " That's his game, is it? " 
 
 The deputy urged absolute silence on all while 
 he listened. 
 
 " Not safe to follow him till light," whispered 
 the officer to Hardy. " If he's lame, he can't 
 get far." 
 
 " Wonder if Turner winged him? " 
 
 He was concerned about what might have 
 happened at Cape Peril. 
 
 " Look here," whispered the officer in Hardy's 
 ear. " We must get these boys away from 
 here."
 
 224 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Hardy thought a moment, then'he said in a 
 low tone to the two lads: 
 
 " Here, boys, you get on to the house. Make 
 a break for the shore and beat it back as fast 
 as you can; and, when you get there, stay 
 locked up till morning light. As soon as Turner 
 turns up, tell him what's doing. Mr. King and 
 I will watch here off by the road with an eye 
 on the machine. No questions. Now go, and be 
 quick! " 
 
 Cat was inclined to protest, but Hardy shut 
 him up without ceremony, and the two boys, Cat 
 leading, made a break for the shore and under 
 the shelter of the sand bank started off for 
 Seagulls ' Nest. 
 
 "Great Gee, Legs! This is the dickens, 
 ain't it? " said Cat, making himself heard 
 against the wind when he felt they were at a 
 safe distance. 
 
 " You're right it is! " returned Hatton. 
 
 " Who was that other manT " Cat was eager 
 to know. 
 
 " That was the sheriff from Roanoke Island. 
 He's after the crook. Father cabled him, and 
 say, Cat, I found the boat that put 'em on the
 
 At Cape Peril 225 
 
 trail and and but I can't talk in this noise 
 and watch my step at the same time. Wait till 
 we get there." 
 
 When the pair reached the house, Miller 
 opened the door, locked it carefully after them, 
 and, exhorting Legs to back him up, made a 
 thorough search of the lower floor. Everything 
 appeared intact, and Luke was still busily snor- 
 ing away in his cubicle. Then followed a thor- 
 ough examination of the upper floor, with the 
 assistance of the lamp. Nothing exciting there. 
 A glance through the window showed the light 
 still gleaming through the window of Cape Peril. 
 On the heights beyond, another fire was glowing. 
 To Legs' uneasy inquiries Cat explained this 
 as probably another beacon. 
 
 Then they betook themselves to their bedroom 
 and stretching out on their cots, started to swap 
 yarns. First came Legs's find and its sequel; 
 then Cat told of the killing of the' shark. 
 
 " I might 'a been inside that sucker right 
 this minute," speculated the narrator at the 
 end of his shark tale, " if my foot had slipped. 
 Gee! You were lucky Legs, he'd a swiped one 
 of your props sure."
 
 226 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Their own experiences exchanged, their minds 
 turned to the future. 
 
 " No chance of that lame duck crawling 
 away,'* assured Cat, with regard to the man in 
 hiding, " and if he tries it, Hardy will sure 
 wing him." 
 
 tt "\\r e > re no t sure it's the same man yet," 
 doubted Legs. 
 
 " I'd bet the airplane I expect to own some 
 day on it," Cat declared. 
 
 " Well, it won't be long before we know, 
 will it? " 
 
 " 'Bout an hour or two," returned Cat, 
 languidly. 
 
 For the last ten minutes, their conversation 
 had been growing more and more forced. Both 
 were worn out, and tired nature was gradually 
 asserting itself. 
 
 A few more remarks and then the two yielded 
 completely, their best intentions to hold out 
 shattered. Without interference the garrison, 
 three strong, including Luke, all fast asleep, 
 held the fort until
 
 CHAPTEE XX 
 
 COMPARING NOTES 
 
 At noon, Hardy burst into Turner's room at 
 Seagulls' Nest with a loud exclamation. There 
 lay the Tarheel on his bed with most of his 
 clothes on, fast asleep. It took some pretty 
 strenuous shakes to arouse him. 
 
 " Wake up here, and tell me what's hap- 
 pened,'* demanded the newcomer. 
 
 " Hardy! " exclaimed the aroused man, sit- 
 ting up. 
 
 "I'm Hardy, all right. It's twelve o'clock, 
 man, and everything in this establishment asleep 
 as the dead. I broke in here and found Luke 
 still hitting it off; then I rushed up stairs and 
 hammered the boys' door locked and not a 
 sound, then there was Jimmy asleep on my bed, 
 and here you are in the same condition." 
 
 " How did you get here! " asked Turner, now 
 wide awake. 
 
 " Tell you in a minute as soon as you explain 
 yourself. ' ' 
 
 227
 
 228 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 11 Where is Legs? " 
 
 " Haven't you seen him? Isn't he here? " 
 Hardy flashed out in alarm. 
 
 " I haven't seen him. I thought Cat was in 
 that room by himself," Turner protested. 
 " Jimmy and I got back from the lighthouse at 
 daybreak. There was trouble over there " 
 
 " I know." 
 
 " You do! " exclaimed Turner. 
 
 " Yes, Cat told me, last night." 
 
 Turner stared. " You got in last night? " 
 
 11 'Bout two o'clock and a deuce of a time I've 
 had since." 
 
 " For heaven's sake, you didn't fly, did 
 you? " 
 
 " Don't talk like a fool, Turner. I came in a 
 motor. I'll tell you all that in a minute. But 
 what I want to know first is where Cat and 
 Hatton are." 
 
 " You say you looked in their room and they 
 weren't there? " 
 
 " Wake up! I said the boys' room was locked. 
 Here, I'm going to see." 
 
 He grabbed up a chair and rushed from the 
 room. In a few moments he was back, before
 
 At Cape Peril 229 
 
 the bewildered Turner could fully come to his 
 senses. 
 
 " They're there all right," Hardy announced, 
 with a look of relief. " I peeped over the tran- 
 som, and saw 'em dead asleep." 
 
 " How did Legs get in there if you didn't 
 know it? " persisted Turner. 
 
 Hardy immediately started his story and, 
 while Turner listened with tense interest, 
 brought it down to the point where he sent the 
 lads away from the scene of the collision. 
 
 "After we got rid of the boys," he proceeded, 
 " King and I squatted down on the side of the 
 road with our fingers on the triggers of our 
 automatics to fix our unknown friend in case he 
 tried to make off in our machine. His was out 
 of commission good and proper. We listened 
 and listened, but not a suspicious sound did we 
 hear. As soon as day broke and we could see 
 objects with some clearness, we began to peer 
 around cautiously. Nothing suspicious was to 
 be seen in the immediate neighborhood of the 
 machine, but just beyond, were tracks. Now 
 about fifty feet from the road, there is a slope 
 of some fifteen-foot fall. We crawled up to this
 
 230 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 and took a look over. No human being was in 
 sight, but there were marks as of a body that 
 had rolled down. We were on the trail. 
 
 " Leading from this little valley, there was a 
 sort of pass between the sand hills. So we 
 snaked around, making a wide detour and 
 crawled up to the top of one of these. Tracks 
 were distinctly visible in the depression. We 
 slid down and followed these to a broad stretch 
 of sandy ground beyond. You remember that 
 well enough. There was the trail plain as day. 
 The man had evidently been dragging along by 
 the hardest effort. Now and then, we could see 
 traces of his having sat down or lain in the 
 sand. At the distance of about a quarter of a 
 mile, in a more exposed place, the tracks dis- 
 appeared, evidently covered by the wind-blown 
 sand, but we calculated it would have been 
 impossible for a man in the condition Cat 
 described to get much further in the short time 
 since the collision. 
 
 " To avoid the chance of being pinked from 
 cover, we slipped up to the top of a dune near 
 the ocean and tried to search with our eyes every 
 foot of ground around. Suddenly I lit on a
 
 At Cape Peril 231 
 
 peculiar low mound on the side of the dune 
 nearer the ocean and thought I saw sand roll 
 down as if dislodged by something stirring 
 beneath. I called King's attention, and he agreed 
 with me. There was a telltale place in the 
 sand partly covered by a piece of wood that, 
 in our whispered consultation, we decided was 
 left for an air hole. Our course of action was 
 decided on. We circled around, crawled to the 
 top of that sand hill, and, getting our bearing, 
 slid down a space and then both gave a spring 
 and piled plumb on that suspected spot. And 
 great Lawd, man, you would have thought we'd 
 hit the top of a volcano, from the shindy the 
 corpse raised when it acknowledged receipt of 
 our attention, but we had him pinned and it was 
 a question of his suffocating in two minutes, or 
 lying quiet. First a foot resurrected, a shoe- 
 less foot swollen to twice its natural size, and 
 then an arm. The right hand, not the left with 
 the stumped fingers." 
 
 " He had two stumped fingers on his left 
 hand, did he? " 
 
 " How did you know that? Did you see 
 him? " inquired Hardy in surprise.
 
 232 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " No, but Buffum got a glimpse of his paw 
 when he tied him up! " 
 
 " Tied him up before he smashed out the 
 light? " 
 
 " Go on," insisted Turner eagerly. "I'll tell 
 you my part when you finish your story. Go 
 on! Go on! " 
 
 " Well, the exciting part about that right hand 
 was that it held an automatic, but I had that 
 out of his grasp with one grab. He wouldn't 
 have had the strength to pull the trigger any- 
 how, for he was pretty near done for as it was. 
 The rising of those limbs was just a sort of con- 
 vulsion, I reckon. In two seconds more, we 
 had him dug out and exposed to light, and a 
 more perfect picture of abject misery I never 
 saw. His face was nearly black from the 
 smothering. A man of fifty-odd, he was, and 
 a sinewy specimen for his age, and he must have 
 had a ton of endurance, for how he managed 
 to stump that far on that broken foot gets me." 
 
 " Then he broke it when he fell down the 
 lighthouse stairs and " Turner could not help 
 putting in, but, as Hardy paused and seemed 
 eager to have him go on, he declined to say more
 
 At Cape Peril 233 
 
 before his friend had finished his part of the 
 story. 
 
 " All right, I'll stick to it," promised Hardy. 
 " He wasn't such a bad looking specimen, not 
 the book kind of villain at all, looked more like 
 a sort of dissipated seaman, but his eyes when 
 we got the sand out were sorry sights, and the 
 grilling he had been through hadn't improved 
 their beauty any. It was fifteen minutes before 
 our handcuffed friend had recovered enough to 
 use his mouth, and then it was to emit groans 
 and yells of pain, but we were determined to 
 make him talk and we told him not a step 
 would we carry him till he loosened up. Then 
 he yowled out something about having lost his 
 way and sprained his ankle, and asked, for 
 heaven's sake, or words to that effect, to be 
 taken to a doctor. 
 
 " King gave him his word of honor he should 
 have a doctor's assistance as soon as he got to 
 the county jail; and proceeded to take from his 
 own pocket and read a detailed description of 
 the man Blanco, who had disappeared from the 
 yacht under pretense of drowning, and informed 
 him of the discovery of the boat I told you about
 
 234 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 just now, with some other particulars I'll tell 
 you later. Meanwhile, I was searching his per- 
 son, and found a pocketbook with a fat roll of 
 bills in it. If he had had any burglar tools, he 
 had chucked them away somewhere. Well, he 
 proceeded to yowl and deny some more, but 
 we'd had enough of that, so, handcuffed and 
 trussed up, he was trotted off to our auto. The 
 machine was battered, but would run all right, 
 so we hurried our qpptive up the road to the 
 county jail, sent for a doctor and left him to his 
 happy meditations. 
 
 " First thing, we got in communication by long 
 distance with Commodore Hatton in Newport 
 News." 
 
 " He was there, was het " questioned Turner. 
 
 " Sure, his yacht got in safely early in the 
 afternoon. ' ' 
 
 " Then, thank the Lord, it wasn't his boat 
 that came near hitting the shoals last night! " 
 Turner rejoiced. 
 
 11 He was snug in port by four o'clock, it 
 seems, and was making ready to get on Blanco 's 
 trail this morning. First thing he wanted to 
 know was about the boys, and you can bet your
 
 At Cape Peril 235 
 
 boots, I was happy when I could tell him his 
 son and the others were safe and well at Sea- 
 gulls' Nest. Of course, I didn't blow on you 
 and Jimmy. After he'd got the boys off his 
 mind, he informed me his skipper would be 
 down today to identify the man, and give us all 
 particulars. I hurried on back to find out what 
 was going on in this roost, and left word for the 
 skipper to follow here when he finishes with the 
 bird and has his talk with King at the jail. Now 
 it's your turn." 
 
 After a few questions Turner started on his 
 story. Finally, he reached the mystery of the 
 boat missing when he started for Cape Peril 
 and in place on his return. 
 
 11 Miller told me this morning he found it 
 there not long after you left. Seems he got 
 restless and wandered down to meet you and 
 saw the boat. It was just after he hiked over 
 in the direction of the fire, spied the escaping 
 bird and still had his eye on him when my 
 machine came in sight and collided." 
 
 Then Hardy had to give more particulars of 
 the collision. 
 
 " I remember now," said Turner, returning
 
 236 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 to the boat incident. " Jimmy thought he heard 
 a rowboat. The little rascal had keener ears 
 than I had, for that devil must have put in just 
 after we left." 
 
 " And Cat found the lighthouse key in the 
 boat, too," announced Hardy, to Turner's fur- 
 ther amazement. 
 
 The two continued their speculations for some 
 minutes longer as to the means Blanco used to 
 accomplish his purpose and his plans for escape. 
 
 " Now I've just got to have a little sleep," 
 asserted Hardy. " You'd better go down and 
 be sure that Luke's stirring. Give him orders 
 to wake us all up when the food is ready, but 
 right this minute I'd rather sleep than eat." 
 
 So, leaving Turner to attend to this commis- 
 sion, he hurried to his room, stretched himself 
 on a cot by the one Jimmy was occupying and 
 fell asleep in a moment.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 THE SKIPPER FILLS THE GAPS 
 
 It was three hours later before breakfast or 
 luncheon, or whatever else the meal might be 
 called, was forthcoming. Turner's first com- 
 mission to Luke was to carry a note to Cap'n 
 Buffum telling of the discovery of the criminal 
 and to inform the fishermen that further search 
 was unnecessary. The messenger had to pick 
 his way with some care along the beach, and 
 when he reached Cape Peril, took as long as 
 possible to deliver his message, so that it was 
 quite an hour and a half before he was back 
 on his job again. 
 
 Turner was the first one to awake. He decided 
 to let Hardy sleep, but shook up the boys, and 
 such a riot of conversation as resulted had 
 seldom been heard before. At the table they 
 hardly noticed what they were swallowing, so 
 busy were they getting the full story from Turner 
 and comparing notes with one another. In antic- 
 
 237
 
 238 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 ipation was the promised arrival of the yacht's 
 captain from Newport News. 
 
 About four o'clock, this person, Williams by 
 name, arrived in an auto. Hardy was summoned 
 at once to meet him, and, with the group gath- 
 ered about, the new arrival first insisted on 
 pumping everyone present for details concern- 
 ing the apprehension of Blanco, and then told 
 his story, or at least as much as he was at 
 liberty to reveal. 
 
 The substance of his revelations was about as 
 follows : 
 
 " When that fellow was taken on at Newport 
 News, I didn't like his looks from the start, but 
 the Commodore was clean taken in by his Span- 
 ish talk and, as the occasion was a pressing one, 
 he thought he'd be an invaluable man. He was 
 good at the typewriter, too, and seemed to have 
 picked up right smart education. Had letters of 
 recommendation that I reckon were faked. You 
 know, the Commodore wanted to get hold of oil 
 lands down there in Mexico and there were other 
 companies trying to beat him to it. Now, it turns 
 out that this Blanco, or Perkins if your friend 
 Buffum is right or whatever else his name was
 
 At Cape Peril 239 
 
 (I don't believe for a second he was a Mexican) 
 was in the pay of the Revolutionists down there, 
 who wanted to get some proof that the regular 
 government was having dealings with foreigners 
 over the oil lauds. So he got on to the Commo- 
 dore's game, landed the place on the yacht, and 
 made off with some papers that time he worked 
 his drowning stunt. The loss of the papers 
 wasn't discovered till later, and then we got the 
 dots on that sailor who was in with him. He 
 had bribed the man for a big sum to be delivered 
 to him by an accomplice in Mexico if things 
 worked. 
 
 " When we got to Mexico, we found some of 
 the revolutionists had gone over to the govern- 
 ment side and given away some of the secrets. 
 This game was one of them. Blanco hears this 
 by cipher cablegram, I figure out, and, knowing 
 the Commodore intended to turn up heaven and 
 earth to discover him, and that his enemy had 
 planned to stop by Cape Peril to take on his 
 son, he hangs around here and makes one des- 
 perate effort to send the boat down with all on 
 board. It was a fool thing to try, as the chances 
 were all against him, but sometimes a hunted
 
 240 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 criminal will do the craziest tbhigs in creation. 
 Anyhow, he slipped his cog this time.'* 
 
 The captain went on to give some minor details 
 that had no great bearing on the main point at 
 issue, and finally announced that he could make 
 no further disclosures. 
 
 " Now, young men," he said at last, turning 
 to young Hatton and his two companions, "I've 
 got a message for you. Your parents were 
 scared to death about you boys during that wind 
 storm yesterday and their nerves weren't helped 
 when they heard about that crook being in this 
 neighborhood, so I was told to let you know you 
 must come home to-morrow." 
 
 " Oh, Gee! " demurred Cat, with a sour look. 
 " They don't think we're babies, do they? I 
 know my dad wasn't worried." 
 
 " I don't bring any full particulars of their 
 state of mind; all I know is that you're directed 
 to come home." 
 
 " How 're we going to get there! " objected 
 Jimmy. " We can't walk, and Mr. Hardy's plane 
 is at Kitty Hawk." 
 
 " 'Fraid they wouldn't let you come home in 
 a plane after all this excitement, if there were a
 
 At Cape Peril 241 
 
 hundred here. The Commodore's auto will be 
 waiting at two sharp. That's my message and 
 you've got it." 
 
 There was some further grumbling, but, on 
 second thought, towns were pretty good places 
 to spread big news, so the return wasn't so bad 
 after all. However, it was a little ignominious 
 for new-fledged flyers to have to return in such a 
 tame fashion as a motor car. 
 
 Williams finally took his departure, and the 
 rest of the day was occupied with intervals of 
 eating, sleeping and talking. The ocean, the 
 hosts decided, was not yet sufficiently tame for a 
 dip. Then came night with a good and much 
 needed ten hours' sleep for every soul in the 
 establishment.
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 The morning of the next day, the day of 
 departure, was calm and peaceful as if tempests 
 in the air and the sea and the souls of men were 
 things unknown. This time, it was the calm 
 after the storm instead of before one. But the 
 thrills were still vivid in the minds of the three 
 boys, and would stay with them till their last 
 day. 
 
 They were reconciled enough to go now, for 
 they were all bursting with eagerness to take the 
 town by storm, and to see themselves written up 
 with photos in The News and Herald, as Hardy 
 had confidently predicted they would be. The 
 hosts, too, realized that, after the momentous 
 episodes of the last two days, any further stay 
 might prove tame and tiresome; that it was 
 better for the boys to leave while in the highest 
 feather. Then they would be eager to come 
 again sometime. 
 
 The first pleasant duty after breakfast was to 
 
 242
 
 At Cape Peril 243 
 
 trot off merrily together to call on Cap'n 
 Buffum. He was still a little shaky, but eager 
 to hear over and over again the circumstances, 
 outside of his own part, in the apprehension of 
 the man he confidently asserted to be Perkins. 
 Though with some little nervousness he looked 
 forward to the time when he should be sum- 
 moned as a witness to face the man in court. 
 
 Finally, the visitors announced that they must 
 be off. 
 
 " Sorry to see ye go," declared the old man 
 huskily. " One of ye did me a turn I won't never 
 f ergit, and all of ye would a done the like if the 
 'casion had riz to do it. Come back to see Bill 
 Buffum, will ye? I ain't no more'n teched the 
 top layer o' my pile o' sea-yarns. I don't have 
 to do like the preachers turn my bar'l over and 
 start 'em all over agin. Blister my boots, my 
 bar'l ain't got no bottom, it ain't." 
 
 " You bet we'll come back," asserted Cat. 
 " Won't we, fellows? " 
 
 " You bet we will! " echoed the other two. 
 
 A gratified smile crossed the keeper's face. 
 
 " Say, Cap'n Buffum," suggested Legs, 
 " how about running up and spending a week-
 
 244 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 end at our house? Mother and Father sure 
 would be glad to see you." 
 
 " My weak end is my legs, boy, though I 
 ain't quite sho' it ain't my head sence I war 
 tied up," returned the old man with a chuckle. 
 " No, lad, I can't run up nowhar. I couldn't 
 do that. I ain't never took the lessons how to 
 'nipulate them tools and whatcha-may-call 'ems 
 you toney folks eats with, and, when I shovels 
 peas in my mouth with these hyuh narrow-bladed 
 eatin '-knives they gives you these days, blister 
 my boots, if half o' them slippery green pellets 
 don't slide off into my lap. 
 
 "A ole- timer like me don't feel good and com- 
 fortable in the towns nowadays noway; they is 
 always a scramblin' 'em upside down, and what 
 you see one day you don't see no mo' the nex', 
 till my brains is well-nigh addled. But, though 
 the ships may change, this hyuh water don't. So 
 I'll stick down hyuh where nobody can't be 
 a-messin' and a-meddlin' with the scenery, and 
 what I sees one night I knows will be thar the 
 nex' mornin*. 
 
 " The old time towns war the places fer me, 
 when, seem like all the houses had been there a
 
 At Cape Peril 245 
 
 hundred year, and ev'y drug-sto' had colored 
 three and fo' story jars a settin' in the window, 
 red and green and yaller and cinnamon and pink, 
 maybe; and, in front of ev'y tobakker shop war 
 a wild Indian carved o' wood pintin' at the do* 
 with his tommyhawk. And the patent medicine 
 men used to come aroun' in their kerridges and 
 spring the side-splittin'es' jokes I ever hyeard 
 that made me bow-leggeder than I war by 
 nature. Them war the towns I could navigate in. 
 But thank you kindly, lad, jus' the same. Thank 
 you agin. 
 
 " Now to go back to that there Perkins," he 
 hurried on to avoid having to decline once more 
 the invitation Hatton seemed on the point of 
 repeating. " You may calkerlate he's been in my 
 mind considerable and I ain't denyin' most o' 
 them thoughts warn't complimentary, and boys, I 
 laid thar las' night on my donkey's break- 
 fast" 
 
 " Lay on what? " asked the wondering Jimmy. 
 
 Cap'n Buffum's eyes kindled with laughter as 
 he nodded towards his bed. 
 
 " That's what we sailor boys used to call our 
 straw mattresses we bunked on when we warn't
 
 246 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 a'swingin' in hammocks. I laid tUSar and thought 
 what I'd do if that thar Bill Perkins war to be 
 brought back now to ask me to fergive him. But 
 I'd a done same as I tol' you befo' he played his 
 las' trick on me. Says I to myself, ' You'd fer- 
 give him. Maybe he warn't responsible. His 
 mammy might 'a let him fall on his head when 
 he war a puppy and that busted his good inten- 
 tions. I'd fergive him and if you're good scouts 
 you'd fergive him, too." 
 
 " It was fun for us," asserted Jimmy with 
 relish. 
 
 " Have yo' fun," rejoined the good old soul, 
 with great seriousness, " thar's plenty o' room 
 fer it, but don't have it over other folks wicked- 
 ness er their tribulations. Play your game 
 squar, lads, play it squar." 
 
 " You bet we'll do that," Jimmy hastened to 
 make amends for his blunder. 
 
 " Now, look at that thar Perkins," proceeded 
 the Cap'n. " Fer thirty year and mo' he's been 
 a prowlin' up and down the earth inventin' new 
 kinds o' meannesses. What a mess o' evil he 
 done thar ain't no way o' knowing but he's come 
 to the end o' his rope now. I'll be boun' on
 
 At Cape Peril 247 
 
 that. Mo'n one man, lads, starts a-skyrocketin' 
 and ends a coal-chutin'. It's the way a man 
 ends not speakin' o' bow-legs that counts. 
 Always have a good end in mind and you won't 
 never go wrong. That's what you scouts is fer, 
 ain't it? " 
 
 " That's our oath," declared Legs solemnly. 
 
 Cap'n Buffum paused long enough to re-light 
 his pipe and take a few puffs. The operation 
 seemed to change the trend of his thoughts and 
 he proceeded with the utmost good-humor, "A 
 lively time, lads, you've had fer a picnic. I 
 b'lieve it beats, so fer as quickness of action is 
 consarned, any sea tale I got in my locker. I 
 never knowed so much to happen in twenty-four 
 hours befo' in peace times on a picnic, but, fer 
 all the dangers me and you have been through, 
 they ain't no thin' to what I'm facin' this hyuh 
 minute." The old man's face suddenly became 
 solemn. 
 
 11 Not afraid Bill Perkins will break loose, are 
 you? " asked Gat. 
 
 " I ain't afraid er nothin dead er alive," he 
 returned promptly, and then added, " exceptin' 
 one. I kin face everything that give me a fair
 
 248 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 show that's live and, as fer the dead, I kin 
 handle easy all the sperits I ever seen. But it's 
 sumpin* else a-pesterin' me. You recollec' I tol' 
 you about what war lef o' a gal I had once. 
 Well that very evenin', day befo' yestiddy it 
 war, I got a letter. It begun with one 'o them 
 healths repo 'ts. ' I hev gained ten pounds since I 
 saw you, Bill, and I'm eatin' my heart out fer 
 you '. Says I , when I reads that, ef it agree with 
 er that good, she better keep on a-eatin' and thar 
 ain't no tellin' to what dimensions she'll swell 
 to. Then come the bombshell, lads, when she 
 continue, * I'm a-comin' down to a picnic in the 
 fishwagon next Saturday week, just me and a 
 basket, and me and you can set on the sand and 
 eat fried chicken and pull the wishbone and talk 
 old times together. Ef my head is gray, my 
 heart is evergreen.' 
 
 " Lads, the way I feel when Bill Perkins knot 
 me up warn't nothin' to the aggravated feelin' I 
 has when I sets eyes on them words. But no 
 fried chicken ner broiled nuther, with or without 
 wishbones, ain't a-goin* to tear me from this 
 hyuh light. It's my duty, this hyuh light 
 is, and, blister my boots, duty is the almighti-
 
 At Cape Peril 249 
 
 est word in the whole English language, 
 or the Chinese either, I reckon. It's the bes' 
 motto to live by, and, when yon casts yo' las 
 rope, ain't nothin' like it fer to give you a 
 smooth passage. 
 
 " You're them things they calls scouts, and 
 you hev proved you kin hoi' yo' own with any 
 man that ever shaved a whisker er let 'em grow 
 either. Keep a scoutin' straight, and thar ain't 
 nothin' goin' to down you nowhar. Take Bill 
 Buffum's word fer it." 
 
 After a few more words and repeated prom- 
 ises to return before long, the lads were off on 
 their way back to Seagulls' Nest. 
 
 " When I get old and all my children get mar- 
 ried," remarked Jimmy prospectively as they 
 trudged along, " blessed if I don't keep a light- 
 house. He's the happiest old geezer I ever 
 saw." 
 
 " Da-da-da-da-da! " hummed Cat, with a gibe 
 in his eyes. 
 
 " What '11 your wife be doing? " asked Legs. 
 
 " She can keep one, too, and we can talk by 
 wireless. No telling what women will be doing 
 by the time I get old and greybearded. "
 
 250 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 Cat chortled. 
 
 "Say, Jimmy," he joked, " if you get one of 
 those tall ones, she'll reach over and haul you 
 out without standing on tiptoe." 
 
 " You better be satisfied if you can get one 
 any size with that mouth," Jimmy retorted. 
 
 But as boys are not usually oversensitive 
 about their mis-features, all three reached the 
 house without bloodshed.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 EXIT THE SEABOARD AIRLINE PATROL 
 
 Some hours later, the Hatton motor was wait- 
 ing for its three passengers at the end of the 
 road by the sea. Brisk as bees and as noisy as a 
 brass band, the youngsters had been stirring 
 around packing up their shark's teeth and other 
 mementoes. This occupation was interrupted by 
 Hardy with a proposition that met with loud 
 approval. 
 
 " Stop just one minute. We've got to have a 
 small-sized ten minute jamboree before you boys 
 go, with a pledge and promise you'll come again 
 for a rest cure, just fishing and swimming and 
 such quiet parlor sports. I'll promise your par- 
 ents to have every villain exterminated from the 
 county. ' ' 
 
 " Just keep one or two loose,'* suggested Cat 
 with a grin. " We don't want to go stale." 
 
 " You'd go something worse than that with a 
 few more nights like that wild one we managed 
 to live through. But here comes Luke with the 
 
 251
 
 252 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 cakes and ginger ale for a fast pledge and 
 promise. ' * 
 
 With a whoop the scouts crowded around the 
 refreshments, and, glasses in hand, listened to an 
 announcement from Hardy: " Last night to 
 soothe myself, so I could get to sleep after all 
 the excitement, I scribbled off some little verses 
 which are appropriate to each of the three young 
 Scoutlets toasted You get what I mean, I 
 hope," he interrupted with a laugh, " You'll find 
 them highly complimentary. Now here's to 
 Miller first": 
 
 With great applause all glasses were raised. 
 
 " Here's to Cat Miller, a taking young fellow, 
 He never gets blue and rarely shows yellow; 
 He flies in the sky and he dives in the ocean, 
 And flirts with a shark when struck by the notion. 
 He craftily trails on a crook in the night, 
 But yells like a wildcat when faced by a light." 
 
 " Pretty tough on a brave scout," declared 
 Cat, pretending indignation, while the other two 
 applauded vociferously. 
 
 " You get off easy in this Knockers' Club," 
 asserted Hardy. " Listen at this. Glasses up!
 
 At Cape Peril 253 
 
 " Now the next of this gang that the poet will chat on, 
 Is a fellow who's known for keeping his Hatt-on; 
 In meat, he is rich and in brains he is rare, 
 And, as to his legs, he has nothing to spare; 
 He has aeroed by day and motored by night, 
 Though everyone saw he was pallid with fright." 
 
 This brought whoops from Cat and Jimmy and 
 a slightly pained look from the sensitive Legs. 
 ' ' Cheer up, Legs, and listen to the dose Jimmy 
 
 " Now here's to that bold young adventurer Jimmy, 
 Though he's long on his tongue he can't be called 
 
 limby ; 
 
 The wind and the waves had to give him a wide row, 
 When he jumped over Herring one night in a hydro ; 
 And now, meeting people, he tries hard to stuff 'em, 
 By claiming he's rescued a sailor named Buffum." 
 
 Jimmy here got all that was coming to him 
 from his two chums, and the ginger-ale went its 
 way merrily. 
 
 " Now, look here, fellows," exhorted Hardy, 
 " Hope you didn't take that seriously? I meant 
 just the opposite, didn't I, Turner? You're the 
 swellest lot of chaps I know, but I just wanted to 
 see how you'd take a little merry knocking.
 
 254 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 You've got to take a lot of it later, and maybe 
 it's a good thing to keep chaps from getting the 
 swell-head. You know some freshmen in college 
 have to be taken down a peg for their own good. 
 Get me? " 
 
 The boys took the lesson in good part, and the 
 jollity went on till the refreshments were 
 exhausted. Then the lads were off to get their 
 packs in final trim. 
 
 Jimmy was the first to finish and make his 
 appearance. He took his seat at the table and 
 began to scribble, when Turner, who had been 
 chatting with Hardy on the porch, came in. 
 
 " Look here, Jimmy," he asked, " just a little 
 curiosity on my part, but, if I swear not to let it 
 out, can't you tell me what shut Cat Miller up so 
 quick the other day when he thought he had the 
 joke on you about the whales' egg? " 
 
 " Sure I'll tell you if you won't give it away," 
 said Jimmy, looking up slyly from his paper. 
 " You see, Cat's people didn't move to Newport 
 News till he was about seven years old. Well, I 
 ran across a fellow at the Springs from the town 
 Cat lived in before and he let it out that Cat's 
 mother used to call him ' Buttercup ' when he
 
 At Cape Peril 255 
 
 was a baby and kept on calling him that till he 
 was about seven, and then they christened him 
 Alonzo. Wouldn't that jar you? So when Cat 
 tries any monkey business on me, I just buzz 
 * Buttercup ' in his ear, and he shuts up like a 
 clam. 'Course I'm not going to squeal on him, 
 but it don't hurt to have some ammunition handy 
 to make your friends behave, does it! " 
 
 " You're sure right," laughed Turner. " But- 
 tercup! If that ain't a rich one! Butternut, I'll 
 say. It sure is one rich handle to a modest mug. 
 Don't worry, I'll keep it tight." 
 
 He went off chuckling to himself, and, for the 
 next week every time Cat's face rose in his mind 
 and he thought of the endearing name, he 
 chuckled again. 
 
 A few minutes later when Cat and Legs came 
 bounding down the stairway swinging their 
 knapsacks, they found Jimmy still engaged with 
 the paper. 
 
 "All ready for the home run," shouted Cat, 
 grabbing at the writer's collar. " Come on, 
 Jimmy! Eh, what you doing there? Writing a 
 letter to the shark's grandma to tell her about 
 her grandson's funeral? "
 
 256 The Boy Scouts of the Air 
 
 " One second, " insisted the "writer, as he 
 added a final word to his composition. " Listen 
 to this," he added, rising and holding the sheet 
 of paper out in front of him. 
 
 " Golly, it's some of that limber Rick stuff," 
 noted Legs, peeping over. 
 
 " We sure are getting poetry showers to-day. 
 Sing on, oh muse! " Cat baited him. 
 
 " Shut up, listen," demanded Jimmy, " and 
 then I'm with you 
 
 " The Seaboard Airline Patrol 
 
 Has rescued a yacht from a shoal; 
 
 It has swatted a shark; 
 
 Winged a crook, on a lark, 
 And copped a Chief's bones in a hole." 
 
 " That's not rough on you like Hardy's stuff," 
 approved Cat. " We'll send that to the paper for 
 that write-up. Now, for home, boy, home and 
 glory!" 
 
 And a few minutes later, the three merry 
 scouts were having a hilarious time of it in the 
 motor speeding homeward. 
 
 THE END
 
 
 
 QL 
 
 Date: Tue, 17 Sep 91 12: Ol PDT 
 
 To: ECL4BAT 
 
 Subject: SRLF PAGING REQUEST 
 
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 Item Information 
 
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