by Joan Clark
CHAPTER IV
WINDS OF CHANCE
Caught in a swirl of air currents, Hal Dane and his craft were hurledthis way and that like some toy shot from a giant's hand. Watchers belowheld their breath.
Although a hundred feet and more intervened between them, those on theground could see that the boy in the air was exerting every ounce ofcraftsmanship in his battle with the wind. He banked to the right, nowdipped and rose, as though striving to ride the twist of air currentsflowing about him, instead of drifting helplessly in their batteringclutch. At times the wind ship seemed to whirl completely around, yetmostly it was held to an even keel.
Then the heavens opened and the rain came down in torrents; preluded bylightning and thunder, a cold blast swept down the valley with somethingof the fury of a small cyclone. Caught in this tempest, the crude planebucked and went rearing upward like an affrighted horse.
"There goes the last of Grandma Harrison's sheets," roared Uncle Tel,hardly conscious of what he was saying and charging through the crowd asthough he, on his rheumatic old limbs, would keep up with that flyingwhite in the sky above.
"There goes my boy!" thought Mary Dane. It was a silent prayer.
Higher than it had ever gone before surged the wind bird. Storm,darkness, and rain seemed to cut it off from men's sight.
The crowd began to run down the valley, letting the push of the windguide them in the direction the aircraft must surely be following also.Clinging wet garments and the rain torrent made progress heartbreakinglyslow.
Fuz McGinnis turned and began a stumbling progress against the wind backtowards the starting point at Hogback. After a while he reappeared,charging along over the roadless, stony valley in his grotesquelyinadequate looking Yellow Spider. Into it he somehow crowded Mrs. Daneand Uncle Tel. Others turned back and went for their cars. Raynor caughta ride with someone. Quite a procession went skidding and lumberingthrough the rain-washed valley.
Then, as quickly as it had come, the summer storm cleared. The sun evencame out.
Something white showed up, flapping dismally in a distant tree top. Itmust be the remains of the wind bird. It--it couldn't be anything else.
Fuz let out the yellow cut-down, speeding by stumps, dodging boulders.From the car behind him he could hear Raynor's voice urging on thedriver.
These two cars were by far and away the lead of practically the entirepopulation of Hillton that surged running, walking, riding down thevalley.
Mary Dane, and Raynor not far behind her were the first to reach thattree with its flaunting ragged streamers of the wrecked windcraft. Halwas not lying at its foot, battered and crashed. Instead, with blood onhis face, and his clothes half torn off, he was gingerly loweringhimself from branch to branch. He shinned on down the trunk, droppedbeside his mother, and fair picked her up in a great boyish bear hug.
Above him, half of the wind bird hung in streaming tatters from a coupleof tree branches. The other half had already descended and lay like avast white splotch on the ground.
"Reckon I'd better go get the truck and haul this in," said Hal, usinghis fist to mop blood out of his eye from a cut on the forehead. "I'msort of used to hauling in the remains and patching up things afterevery flight. I--"
As man to man, Raynor clapped him on the shoulder and thrust out a hand."Put her there!" he said.
"I--er--had the luck to land in the soft part of a tree. I--I got downanyway," said Hal gruffly to hide the emotion that was stirring him.
"You got down--but you did more! Man, man! Without any engine, on somesheets strung on sticks, you flew to the clouds, banked, dipped, soaredwith the best of them, till that whirlwind caught you. Prettiest thingI've seen in years."
"If only that wrong wind hadn't got me," moaned Hal.
"If!" said Raynor, narrowing his eyes. "Aviation's full of ifs,boy--don't let 'em--"
"I won't," said Hal, grinning in spite of the fact that half of his bestwind bird was dangling from a branch in a tree top.
* * * * *
The next day Rex Raynor was leaving. Pilot Osburn had come down to flyhim off in the now fully repaired airplane. After a warm handclasp forall the friends into whose kindness he had dropped, Raynor started toclimb up into the cockpit of the R.H.3. Then he stepped back to ground,drew out a notebook and wrote a few lines. He turned to Hal.
"I expected to write you a letter about this. But," with a grin,"aviation's too full of ifs, so--thought I might as well attend to itnow while we're together. You saved my life. And you're not the kind ofa chap I can get a reward off on. But there's something I want to do foryou, and this note will tell you what." He slid the piece of paper intoHal's pocket, then climbed up into his plane.
The pilot removed the blocks, the motor roared, and the R.H.3 taxiedforward and zoomed into the air. The boy stared upward until the greatplane grew small, became a mere speck, disappeared beyond the horizon.Then he silently turned away from the crowd and headed towards home,walking fast. He rather wanted to get into the privacy of his own oldworkshop before he opened Raynor's note.