A DISTRESS CALL

Immediately after breakfast the Sky Buddies, Carlos and Senor de Castro went to the office of the Detention Bureau where, without being observed themselves, they took a good look at several men held under suspicion as implicated in the murder of Ollie Boome. Although the three boys were mighty careful in the scrutinizing they agreed they had never seen any of the prisoners before. Then Jim wrote a detailed description of the airplane they had seen hovering over Amy-Ran fortress, also as good an account as possible of the pilot, for police broadcasting through North and South America. Where and how this information was obtained was to be kept a strict secret. That was arranged by Senor de Castro without difficulty.

“Any time you young travelers desire to pay us a visit and go through the prisons, we shall be most delighted to have the pleasure of escorting you,” the official promised elaborately. The Flying Buddies had caught glimpses of the pens, cells, yards, high wall and guards which were sufficient to satisfy their natural curiosity.

“Thank you very much,” Jim said politely.

“Next time we come to Peru we’ll not forget,” Bob added. He was thinking at the moment that if men and boys could get a peek at the place they would turn their talents toward something which would keep them out of jails. It seemed strange that anyone should risk freedom, liberty and the respect of his fellows by breaking laws which were made for the general good of all in order to get possession of something which did not belong to him. They were very thoughtful as they drove home and when the Flying Buddies stood on the broad piazza overlooking the beautiful land, Jim drew a deep breath.

“Tough luck, isn’t it?”

“What?”

“Those fellows held in there until we could come and look them over. Imagine being on that platform, made to stand up, turn around, put their heads up and down, show their hands and walk before a thick curtain. Of course they knew that someone, or maybe a dozen people were back of it examining them as if they were bugs under a glass, and whoever those people were would recognize them again no matter where they saw them, and know that they were men branded by the police.”

“I was thinking of things like that too,” Bob nodded soberly.

“Probably they will be let go, but they must have some sort of bad record, or they wouldn’t be rounded up like that, and I suppose whenever a crime is committed, they stand the chance of being hauled in again.

“Uneasy lies the head—”

“Go on, you’re mind’s wandering. Their heads do not wear crowns,” Jim interrupted.

“I was going to wax into poetry myself and say, uneasy lies the head that gets a man into difficulties, but it doesn’t sound so good at that,” answered Bob ruefully. “Here’s the mail and a package.” They accepted several items from the servant who had just appeared. One was a message from the Central Laboratory saying that some agricultural experiments were ready if Caldwell was interested. If the Flying Buddies would bring the “Lark” to Amy-Ran Fastness the new radio could be installed while the development was under observation. The package was from Don Haurea himself and contained some electrical and chemical instruments and compounds for Jim’s special attention, for Austin was taking a very advanced course from the Laboratory in Texas. During their absence from home he had continued his studies, and since the return was delayed for a while, Don Haurea had some of his scientific men forward things which could be tried out without elaborate equipment.

“I say, old man, look.” Bob held out his message eagerly, for making things grow and improving the land on the ranches in Texas was his chief ambition. “Come along—”

“Wait a minute. I’ve got something I can work on here. Suppose you take the plane and look after the onions, or whatever it is. I’ll stay and see if I can get any results with this. You don’t mind flying alone, do you? They’ll keep their eyes on the ‘Lark.’ The radio-television can be installed and when you get home you can show me the works.”

“Suits me, but Jim, bet you are going to miss something great—why, you know farmers—”

“Sure I do. They have no idea how much more they could do with their land. I know your whole spiel, old hayseed,” Jim laughed.

“If it wasn’t for the farmers you wouldn’t get anything to eat,” Bob retorted good-naturedly.

“That’s why I like them so well. Fly away, little boy, fly away,” Jim urged, and a few minutes later he was in his own room, his coat off and an array of books opened before him.

Carefully he removed the apparatus and set to work. He glanced up as the plane thundered into the sky, and although he would have enjoyed going along, he was even more familiar with the great Laboratory and its workers than Bob was, so he did not mind remaining behind. He was so absorbed in what he was doing that the hours slipped by and it wasn’t until a servant brought in an attractive looking lunch tray that he remembered the two De Castros had said they would not be home for the midday meal. They had made the trip to the power-plant in the huge limousine because it would be most convenient that day, and their own private plane was left in the hangar, which was built to accommodate three machines. Of course the plane was not so well equipped as the “Lark,” but she was the last word in flying machines as modern inventors could make them. The night of the “stage volcano” the family’s first plane had been stolen, but it had proved so useful that Senor de Castro immediately purchased another. This one he kept under guard both at home and at the works so that her instruments could not be tampered with and her fliers could not get into such dangerous situations as that stormy night when the compass had played them false because the needle hand had been deflected. For no reason at all those things slipped through Jim’s mind as he ate his solitary lunch, but when it was finished he turned his attention to the task at hand, and everything else was dismissed.

“Senor, please—” Jim looked up and saw the servant, his face deeply anxious and through his mind flashed an idea that something had happened to Bob.

“What is it?” he demanded quickly. Glancing at his watch he noticed that it was nearly the middle of the afternoon.

“A gentleman—most urgent,” the man apologized. Instantly the boy was on the alert.

“Who is it?” Through his brain raced the several unpleasant episodes of the past two days and he wasn’t taking any chances.

“I do not know. He begs to see you.”

“All right, come along down.”

The two went to the front of the house where the boy saw a man who seemed very much distraught. He was pacing the floor in quick nervous strides, and as he held his hat in his hand, with his other hand he kept brushing back his hair, and jerking his arms as if the passing moments were matters of life and death. When Jim and the servant entered, the chap spun around on his heel.

“Pardon, pardon, senor—I am as one mad. You are not a father, you cannot know. I beg of you to help me—Please come—” The sentences were chopped off incoherently.

“Tell me who you are,” Jim interrupted sharply.

“Gonzalas, that is my name. Pedro Gonzalas. I have been in America where you do things well, and are humane—”

“Suppose you sit down and tell me what you want,” Jim invited. The servant drew up chairs, and the man sat on the edge of one, but he jumped up again immediately.

“I cannot sit quietly when my child is at death’s door, senor. I beg of you to help me—”

“You’ll have to tell me what you want.”

“Yes, yes, your pardon. My child, we live in the mountains below the pass, and my child is dying. The doctor say something in the tube will save his life—I have the tube—but the hours are passing and I cannot drive home quickly enough. In the town they say you are an American, a clever man, and you have a plane. Please, I beg of you delay not. I will pay you well—”

“You mean that you want me to take the stuff to where your baby is?” Jim asked, any suspicion of the man completely dispelled by his very evident anxiety.

“Of a certainty,” Gonzalas told him. “Please, my wife—it is our first born—he had the soft eyes like a fawn, and his life it is ebbing away from us—so helpless we are to save him.”

“My brother has the plane and I don’t expect him home for a couple of hours at least,” Jim explained.

“Oh, my God!” The man flopped into the chair, buried his head on his arm and cried bitterly. “My little son,” he moaned.

“But there are other planes in Cuzco,” Jim reminded him. “You could telephone from here and I am sure that someone will take it for you.”

“Three I have tried,” the man sighed hopelessly. He gave the names of men who owned machines. “One, she has broken her wing, two she is far to the north, three leave one hour ago for Panama. Nothing I can do. Oh, my God, my little son!” Then, suddenly Jim remembered the De Castro’s plane. He was positive they would have no objection to his taking it to save the child’s life.

“How far is it?” he asked.

“One hundred and fifty miles. Senor, you have a good heart. You do not help because you cannot.” He started to leave and his feet dragged as if they were weighted with lead.

“Just a minute. The folks here have a machine. I’ll use that,” he promised quickly. “Wait for me!” He raced up stairs, put his books and instruments out of harm’s way, slipped into his aviation suit, and then hurried back to the distracted father who was fervently counting his beads as he murmured prayers of thankfulness. At the reappearance of the Flying Buddy, who looked like a young Viking, the man leaped to his feet, caught the lad’s hand and embarrassed him indescribably by kissing it fervently.

“If Senor de Castro returns before I do, please explain where I have gone, and why,” Austin said hastily to the manservant, who seemed glad that a way had been found to help the stranger.

“Si, senor,” he agreed.

“Come along,” Jim urged and the two made their way to the hangar where Pedro Gonzalas was settled in the seat beside the pilot. “You have your stuff all right?”

“Mother of God be praised, it is safe.”

“Good.” Jim made a hasty inspection of the plane, hopped into his own seat, and gave her the gun and they rolled out. She required considerably more space than the “Lark” before her wheels left the ground, but at last she lifted gracefully and began to climb bravely into the air. They went up in a wide curve which brought them three thousand feet above the De Castro homestead, the machine’s nose screwing forward on an air-line for the well-known pass. Swiftly they thundered along, and then suddenly the man beside the boy wrote something on a piece of paper and handed it over because he knew nothing of the speaking tube.

“Cyat Pass,” Jim read and this surprised him.

When Gonzalas had said that he lived “below the pass” the boy had concluded that he meant the well-known one through the Andes. He glanced suspiciously at his companion, then he reasoned that the man’s home was at Cyat Pass, or below it; the fact that he had failed to give the name was not surprising. The mountains were full of narrow highways going through one spur or range to another and to each locality they were of equal importance. But one thing did bother him. If there was any sort of treachery afoot the De Castros and Bob would start a search for him in the wrong place. He took the tube and motioned to his companion how to use it.

“Where is it?” he asked.

Gonzalas made a rough sketch on the back of an envelope, and after a few more questions, Austin understood. As they flew he recalculated his course, and although he had not revealed the correct destination at once, Jim was convinced that there was nothing criminal about the chap at his side. Gonzalas glanced at him with anxiety which was genuine but as they rushed forward he became more and more composed. Several times his eyes wandered over the globe rolling beneath them and as he seemed to recognize familiar landmarks he was apparently relieved. The first hour slipped by and during the second they were flying over a part of the country dotted with fertile plains and great plantations. Then they turned sharply and soared with a roar that the echoes took up as they rushed along near the ceiling while mountain ranges tipped out of their vision, very much as telephone poles do when watched from a rushing train, but not quite so fast. The second hour had gone by when Gonzalas, his eyes alert, pointed to series of foot hills.

“There are buildings on that plateau under the ledge,” he announced.

“That where you want to come down?”

“Si, senor.”

“That will be easy.” Austin could see the rugged cliff and realized that getting through it from the ground would be a hazardous business. He surveyed the plateau, which had a few rough buildings such as formed hundreds of plantation or ranch homes, and a good road wound toward it from the back.

“It is four times so far by road,” Gonzalas explained.

“Expect it is,” agreed Jim. He selected a section which would afford the plane abundant room for the landing and then he noticed two men standing as if watching for the flyers. The motor was shut off and the machine began to alight.

“That is the doctor,” Gonzalas told him. “My place is further in.” This was another surprising bit of news and Jim scowled. The machine made a perfect landing, and the two men, both with bags, hurried to meet them. For a minute there was a swift exchange of conversation in Spanish and then Gonzalas turned to the boy. “The doctor must come to administer, and his helper. If you cannot carry so many, I shall get out, for they are to me important.”

“Tell them to hop into the back,” Jim directed.

“If you require gas there is some here,” Gonzalas suggested.

“It will not be a bad idea to have it,” the boy answered, so the extra supply was put in quickly.

Austin sized up the two passengers. One of them was short and slender, as if just past young manhood, but the other was mature. The medical man did not look like anyone else of the profession that Jim had ever seen, but there was nothing especially disturbing about any of them. They climbed into the back cock-pit, and were finally settled safely, then the plane rolled again, finally lifted the additional weight, and roared into the sky.

“I will direct you,” Gonzalas explained.

“All right,” agreed Jim. Although he was not afraid, he had a suspicion that all was not exactly as it should be and he determined to be on constant guard. He moved the mirror so that the occupants of the rear seat could be observed with little difficulty, and out of the corner of his eye he kept watch on Gonzalas. He had made up his mind that none of the passengers were airmen so at least he had that advantage over them if they made a false move. Half an hour passed, then the man beside him pointed ahead in a wide ravine.

“Beyond there.”

Jim nodded and a few minutes later they were following the course of a river toward its source until they came to an abruptly rugged section. Here Gonzalas made careful observations, and after several minutes, pointed to the rim of the range, and motioned with his hands for Jim to follow that, which the boy did. At last they were nearing a small lake, the water of which appeared from that height to be very low, and on one side was a wide white beach. Austin wondered if the man’s home was on the edge of the lake, but they flew across, then Gonzalas pointed out a narrow stream which almost looped in its winding twists as it made its way through the forest.

“Are we almost there?” Jim asked casually. “Don’t want to come down here after it gets dark.”

“Can you land there?”

Gonzalas pointed to a level spot that was quite low and dotted with vegetation, but the boy could see no sign of a habitation of any kind. However, it wasn’t impossible for a home to be so situated that he had not picked it out, or it might be located further on where landing sites were less safe. He shut off the motor and they glided down on a long incline until finally they were standing still and as the boy glanced around he saw that they were in a sort of wide deep basin. His companion scrambled out quickly, and the two in the back seemed to be following his example, but there certainly wasn’t a house in sight, nor any sign of one.

“We owe to you much, senor.” It was the smaller of the two who had been in the rear, and Jim noticed that the chap’s face was greatly troubled. “Please, permit me to speak with you and explain.”

“Glad to have been able to get you here,” Jim said heartily, and the fellow’s eyes met his, then dropped.

“We—we have—what you call—played a trick on you, senor, but please I beg of you, listen and let me explain,” he urged. Jim noticed that the other two had hurried away and the boy scowled.

“Well, why did you—”

“Please, patience. No harm, senor, shall come to you, only good, if you will listen.”

“I’m all ears,” Austin answered. The whole performance was mighty queer, but it certainly didn’t look as if they had any evil intent.

“Gonzalas, he is my husband, and we have a little boy—one for whom we have great plans that his future may be big—not full of hardship.” Jim stared, then chuckled inwardly because, of course, the smaller man was a woman. Being a Texan and a gentleman he hastily scrambled to his feet, and would have sprung to the ground, but he had another idea.

“Won’t you sit here?” He pointed to the cock-pit, and she accepted.

“You are an honest boy, I know, and I shall tell you quickly, then you can decide what you will do,” she smiled as he settled into his own place. “Weeks ago, my husband was lost in the forests, many days he wandered, sustaining himself on the roots and berries, which are many, and breaking his way until he could reach a settlement.”

“Yes, I see.” Jim was interested.

“In his school he studies the precious minerals, and he came to a place which attracted him very much. Senor, he found platinum; it is very valuable. He carefully marked the spot, stayed some time, and at last started again to find us. With him he brought a quantity of the platinum. He told no one his secret, but he took much which he sold in the north above Panama for a good price. He is returning—with me and his brother—and at Cuzco we learn rumors, doubted, but whispered from mouth to mouth, that platinum is found. This alarms us greatly, and we confer together. Many treacherous men would cut our throats, even kill our baby, to know of this spot my husband found, so we make a plan—you are an upright American boy, but to you we had to tell something false. May the Mother of God forgive us our sin—”

“You needn’t feel badly about it,” Jim hastily assured her.

“Thank you, senor. We have prepared a paper—what we find we will give to you an accounting and one-fourth of the mineral itself or we will pay you its value when it is sold,” she said earnestly. As she talked she produced a number of folded papers which she opened and Jim saw an agreement which looked as if it were a perfectly legal instrument and at the end the three Gonzalas had put their signatures.

“You need not have done that,” the boy said hastily.

“We wish you to be fully repaid,” she smiled. “Put it in your pocket, and we will go.”

“I ought to beat it back into the air,” Jim hesitated.

“Before leaving you can see and tell my husband—shake with him the hand that you forgive the—false thing he tell to you,” she pleaded so earnestly that it made Jim laugh to himself.

“All right,” he agreed. They certainly were a queer bunch, not at all like many of the strangers he had encountered since his arrival in South America, but it was a mighty big relief to be assured that they were peaceful citizens; not out to kill him or anyone else. He hopped out of the plane, assisted Mrs. Gonzalas to alight, and she started toward a great boulder which they skirted.

“On this side is a small stream, which we follow; my husband told me the way many times,” she explained with a smile.

The route was pretty rough, so Austin took her arm and helped her over the worst places, but she was so happy at their successful arrival that she hardly noticed the unevenness beneath her feet. In sections the brush was high and thick but the brothers had just broken through, leaving the way unmistakable, so the two proceeded until they reached a point where the river branched. Mrs. Gonzalas took the right turn and after ten minutes more travel, they came to a second fork, but water ran in only one of the beds. The woman plunged along the dry bed, scrambling so swiftly over the stones that Jim was sure she would stumble, but she was sure-footed. Presently they heard the voices of the men.

“Hello,” Jim called.

“Helloo,” Gonzalas responded quickly. He came toward them, followed by his brother, and Austin held out his hand.

“Glad I was able to help you,” the Flying Buddy assured them.

“We pray for pardon for the sin,” the brother put in quickly.

“And for your guardian angel ever to watch over you, for you were most generous,” Gonzalas declared warmly.

“And the platinum, Pedro mio, it is here, si?” Mrs. Gonzalas was skipping about like a happy youngster and the two men exchanged anxious glances. “Show it to me,” she urged.

“Patience, beloved one,” Gonzalas urged.

“We seem not to find what we seek,” his brother helped him.

“Not find it, mio? It is the river—the Platinum River we called it, with the forks, the dry bed—”

“Yes, everything—” Her husband shrugged his shoulders, then smiled cheerfully. “We are in the right place. We will search more careful. It could not—puff—be blown away.”