XIVTHE BOOTLEG PACK-MULE TRAIN
“What’s up?” demanded Jack as if he could surmise from his companion’s peculiar question that Perk had made a pleasing discovery of some kind.
“Lady Luck’s gone an’ picked us out again to play us for favorites, ol’ hoss,” Perk told him, at the same time half rising in his eagerness to point out something far ahead.
Jack possessed very good eyesight and as the sun chanced to favor him just then he could manage to make out a snake-like line of small objects that appeared to be moving slowly along in zigzag fashion, evidently following a crooked mountain trail that wound upwards toward the peak of the divide.
“So, that’s one of them, is it?” Jack burst out, himself a bit thrilled by the spectacle after having heard so much concerning the pack-mule trains said to have been adopted by the venturesome souls engaged in smuggling operations across the Canadian border.
“With the glass here, Jack, I c’n make ’em out all to the good,” declared the excited Perk—“a fairly big caravan in the bargain, the mules loaded for keeps an’ toilin’ along jest like they do down in Mexico whar motor cars ain’t so plentiful or cheap. Whee! what a sight for sore eyes that is, buddy! Seems like you’ll have somethin’ to wire Mister Maxwell after all. Nothin’ o’ a newspaper yarn ’boutthatbunch, let me tell the world. Must be all o’ twenty animals in that string with several boobs mounted on hosses an’ armed in the bargain, ’cause I c’n see the sun glintin’ from guns they’re holdin’ as they ride ahead o’ the line an’ in the rear to boot.”
“That goes with the rest of the story, Perk,” said Jack as he started toward a lower altitude as though wishing to secure a better view of the moving cavalcade in order to make assurance doubly certain. “You remember we read in that clipping how they carried an armed guard along to defend the caravan in case it was held up by a bunch of hijackers. Queer how these law-breakers make war on each other in cities, the wilderness, and even along the salt water coasts.”
“Huh! got to be a part o’ the game these days,” grunted wise Perk, “jest like the fish-hawk drops down with a rush, grabs up a fat fish from the lake or lagoon and in turn is robbed by the lordly eagle. I kinder guess now that’s about where they got the idea o’ hijackin’—snatched a leaf from Nature in fact. But say, what are we goin’ to do ’bout this thing—why do you strike down closer, I want to know, Jack?”
“We ought to get a better look in, for one thing,” he was informed, “and if you could only work that little camera of mine once or twice so as pick up to a telltale picture of the caravan, it would be the finest evidence we could send by mail to Mr. Maxwell!”
“Glory! that’s a great scheme, boy—watch my smoke! I’m some photographer when it comes right down to brass tacks an’ I’ll prove it by gettin’ you the smartest pictur goin’ an’ that’s no lie either.”
Perk seemed to know just where everything aboard the big ship could be laid hold of in what he would call jig-time for almost as he spoke he was clutching the small but excellent camera that Jack owned, he being something of a crank along that particular line.
“I’m meaning to swing around once or twice while lowering the ship,” he explained to his companion so that Perk might not waste a single cartridge of film in taking a snapshot prematurely, with distance as a handicap.
“Go to it, partner,” sang out his mate quite merrily, “I’ll do my little bit when you gimme the word. Got her all fixed up for distance an’ the sun happens to be jest right—say, ain’t that a sweet sight, though with them mules cavortin’ like they might be scared by such a monster bird sailin’ over their stupid ol’ heads? An’ see the guards swingin’ around, shakin’ them guns at us like they meant to shoo us off by lookin’ fe-rocious! Zowie! but this is a heap int’restin’ I’m sayin’, eh Jack?”
“I bet you!” came the short answer, Jack being so taken up with staring at the greatly disturbed pack-train under the swinging airship that he could not find time for further words just then.
Not so loquacious Perk who never knew when to hold his breath since he was peculiarly gifted along that line and could work as well as gabble at the same time.
“Seems like they jest don’t know what to think ’bout seein’ an airship sailin’ over their heads,” he went on to say aloud, “an’ I kinder guess now some o’ them begin to smell a mouse. Think things ain’t goin’ to run so slick and greased as they’ve been doin’ right along. Another dip like that, buddy, ought to fetch me close enough to get the snap on the bloomin’ bunch.”
There he held up—for a brief interval. The fact was Perk had not run out of breath but was only so intensely occupied with trying to fix his little camera so that the lens would take in the whole of the lagging mule-pack train that he forgot to keep on speaking.
Really it did seem as though some kindly fortune had conspired to afford all possible assistance in order to successfully carry out this little racket on the part of Perk. Just as his waiting finger pressed the button the entire cavalcade came to a sudden stop. Indeed, if the actors, both two-legged and four-hoofed had intended to make a grand-stand play to the galleries they could hardly have bettered the conditions.
Perk did not stop at his first exposure but with a commendable rapidity turned on another portion of the reel and once again pressed the button, after which he burst into a roar of ecstatic delight.
“Got it that time boys, sure thing an’ I bet you all looked pretty for the set-up. Hoopla! Jack, that was a great snap you gave me an’ chances are, Mister—er, hey, what’s this mean?”
He bellowed the last few words and with a very good reason for something had come to pass that Perk had not reckoned on as part of the program. There was the sudden rattle of firearms from below and—the motor having ceased functioning while Jack continued his smooth dive—all around them could be heard a strange hurtling, hissing sound which an old experienced war veteran like Perk instantly knew must be made by savagely menacing bullets passing in close juxtaposition to their ship.
Then Jack had the situation in hand again as he pulled the stick back against his chest and with a shrill rat-tat-tat they were once more shooting at an upward slant through space, Jack putting his craft through all sorts of angles in hopes of further causing the sharpshooters to miss connection.
Perk had instantly dropped the camera, though luckily it did not go over the side as might have happened. Jack knew his mate was making a swift sweep with his hand and could give a fairly shrewd guess what his object might be, knowing Perk’s combative disposition as well as he did.
The worst of the danger was really past, since they had made such a speedy getaway after that first lunge. Anxious to hold the impulsive one in check, since nothing was to be gained from further aggravating the rum-runners, he continued to keep up that eccentric motion until they had climbed sufficiently to prevent Perk from starting hostilities on their side.
“Swing around and let’s go down once more partner,” implored Perk, keenly disappointed because his golden opportunity had given him the slip.
“Oh! I reckon it isn’t worth while,” replied Jack evenly as though not nearly so stirred up as his chum seemed to be and as he thus spoke kept on going, with the ship headed due northwest by north.
“But—see here Jack, you don’t mean to let ’em have the merry ha ha on us, I sure hope? Why, it’s got my blood het up to nigh the boilin’ point right now. On’y a little slip so I c’n reach the blamed bunch with my machine-gun. For ol’ times’ sake I’d like to pepper that crowd good an hard! The nerve o’ ’em, dustin’ us with that shower o’ lead! Might have bust our biler an’ then where’d we been, tell me? Jest one swoop an’ I’ll be satisfied. I could get in a dozen shots before they’d have time to crawl under their’ mules.”
But Jack was obdurate to his wild entreaties.
“No use Perk,” he told the other through means of the handy ear-phone apparatus. “They failed to do us any damage, though their intentions were plain enough and remember, ‘he who laughs last laughs best’. If your snapshot turns out fairly decent it’s bound to put a lot of those dangerous guys in the soup when Mr. Maxwell fits out a bunch of revenue men to round them up. In other words, brother, because of our little job today the chances are we’ve put the kibosh on this bootleg mule-train racket and for keeps in the bargain!”