  Gale and Jan climbed down the rocky cliff over which the radar set had been blown by the enemy’s bomb until it seemed they could go no farther. They at last found themselves on a narrow rocky ledge that overlooked a perpendicular wall of rock. “Get a grip on my leg,” Jan said. “Just in case I get dizzy. I’ll lay down flat and look over.” “I’ve got you.” Gripping Jan’s right ankle with both her hands, Gale sat down and braced herself with her feet. “Okay. Here I go,” Jan grunted. Flat on her stomach, she crept out a foot—two feet—until her head and shoulders hung over thin air. “Jan! That’s far enough!” Gale cried in consternation. “You’ll be killed! Let the old radar set go!” “I—I see it,” Jan panted. “How far down?” “’Bout forty feet.” “Fine!” Gale tried to be cheerful about it. “We’ll take it at a running jump.” “I—I see something else,” Jan puffed. “That wire cable that brought us our electricity is caught on this ledge we’re on, only farther over. If we could only get hold of that—” “We could fasten it some way and I could shinny down it!” In the excitement Gale barely missed letting go of Jan’s leg. “Al—all right. We—we’ll try. Pull me back,” Jan ordered. It was only by a feat of acrobatics, plus expert mountain climbing in which Gale narrowly escaped tumbling into the abyss below that they at last reached the tangled mass of wire. After testing the wire and finding it devoid of electric current, they untangled it far enough to give Gale support on her way down. “Now for a good secure hold.” Gale looked about her. “There’s the very thing!” Jan exclaimed. “A regular thumb of rock reaching up from the ledge.” After making their way a little farther along the ledge, they found a three-foot column of rock jutting up from the main ledge and really a part of it. “Fair enough!” Jan exclaimed. “An elephant couldn’t tear that loose. Even I could go down!” she laughed. “Why not let me?” “No. I’ll go. I want to make sure that I have all the secret parts when you pull it up. Well,” Gale sighed, “Here I go.” Bracing her feet against the side of the rocky wall and at the same time gripping the cable with both hands, she went hand-over-hand and foot-over-foot down the perpendicular wall until with a low grunt she hit bottom. After shouting “Yoo-hoo! Okay!” she started her search for the spot where the radar set had landed. This was a wide ledge. On it grew many scrub pines that, gnarled and twisted, seemed a company of grotesque gnomes watching her at her task. As she passed these Gale imagined she heard a sound like the scraping of a heavy shoe on a rock. Stepping short she thrust her hand into her jacket pocket to grip the handle of a small blue automatic. Jimmie had given her this dangerous plaything. “A girl with hair like yours, wild and unruly, needs a real gun,” he had said with a laugh. “I got it off of a dead Jap.” “But it was made in America,” she had exclaimed. “Just one of those nice little things we did for the Japs before the war.” His laugh was pleasant to hear. “We sold them, of course. Someone made money on that deal. Now the Japs use the guns to kill us.” “But not this one,” she had said, thrusting the gun into her pocket. She was in a lonely spot at this moment, perhaps too in a tight place. The cold steel in her hand felt good. For three tense moments she stood there, poised like a tiger for a sudden spring. It was hot down there. A breeze set the gnome-like pines whispering. Other than this, there was no sound. “Probably imagined that,” she told herself. “Nobody here.” At that instant Jan called: “Gale! Are you there? Did you find it?” “Here!” Gale called back. “I’ll have it in a jiffy.” She wasn’t going to get Jan excited about nothing. A few moments later she came upon a tumbled pile of rocks, broken glass and wood that had but an hour before been her hideout. Half hidden in this pile, was her precious radar set. It had been badly torn and crushed. For all that, it somehow managed to hang together while she dragged it out. “Grand prize for our enemies,” she grunted softly. Then with a start she straightened up. Again from behind a row of twisted pines there had come a sound. “Might be a tiger,” she thought with a shudder. That there were tigers in these mountains she knew well enough. “Or head-hunters, or even enemy spies,” she went on thinking. Which did she fear most? She could not tell. “Better get up out of here,” she told herself. Then she called: “Jan! Jan! Here I am!” “Coming!” Jan called. “Jan. Draw the cable up. Bring it over this way. Then let it down again.” “Okay.” Gale could hear Jan moving along the ledge above. Keeping her eyes on the dwarf pines as much as possible, Gale dragged a tangled mass of electric wire from the mass of rocks. After untangling this, she wound it round and round the radar set. “There,” she breathed. “Now I can attach it to the cable and Jan can draw it up.” “Here it comes,” Jan called a moment later as the twisted cable came gliding down the rocky wall. In a twinkle Gale had the cable attached to the radar set and was watching it go up. Strangely enough, at that moment she was seized with a sense of wild panic. It was only by exerting all her will power that she avoided ordering Jan to let the radar set down so she could go up instead. Little wonder, for she had been through much that day. And then she heard it again,—that strange scraping on rock that was like shuffling footsteps, but not quite. Instantly her eyes were on the dwarf pines. Did she get a fleeting glimpse of a face and gleaming eyes? She could not be sure. “In case of doubt, act!” had been her father’s motto. She acted now. Aiming low, she fired two shots. Bang! Bang! To her startled ears, the shots echoing in the cavern seemed like cannon fire. There followed a sound of commotion behind the pines. Then all was silence. Out of that silence came Jan’s voice. “Gale! Who fired those shots? Gale! Are you hurt?” Gale made no reply. Instead, pistol in hand, she strode across the rocks toward the pines. Arrived there, she parted the branches to find herself staring into a wide empty space beyond. She stood there staring in surprise. No living creature was there. Her eyes swept the place in all directions. Then she looked down. There, almost at her feet, was a thing covered with leather. It was like a shoe. There was a strap attached to it. The strap had been cut by a bullet. With a low cry she picked the thing up and thrust it deep into the pocket of her coat. Then stepping back over the rocks, she called: “Jan! Lower the cable. I’m ready to come up.” “Cable coming down,” was the instant reply. |
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