Part 1 (1/2)

Eagles of the Sky

by Ambrose Newcomb

CHAPTER I

READY FOR BUSINESS

When the ”Big Boss” at Secret Service Headquarters in Washi+ngton sent Jack Ralston and his pal, Gabe Perkiser, to Florida with orders to comb the entire Gulf Coast from the Ten Thousand Islands as far north as Pensacola and break up the defiant league of s a game of hide-and-seek with the Coast Guard revenue officers, the task thus assigned was particularly to the liking of those two bold and dependable sky detectives

They loved nothing better than _action_--never felt entirely happy unlesslaw breakers--while to sup with danger, and run across allwith them

Since so much of their work must of necessity take the between the Florida coast and the far distant Mexican shore line, the wise ton had supplied Jack with a speedy plane of the as either on shore or in any of the nu equipped with both aluminum pontoons and adjustable wheels

Jack had spent several days at the Capital, conferring with various high officials, being thus put in possession of every available scrap of reliable information at the disposal of the Departiven docuent in all Florida to afford hi while learning the identity of the ”higher-up” capitalists guilty of financing the secret clique that had been giving the revenue men such trouble recently

The fact ell known that besides the valuable _caches_ of unset dia surreptitiously into the country without yielding the custoled into the innuthy coast line vast quantities of contraband in violation of the eighteenth amendment, also batches of undesirable aliens like Chinese, anarchists and Bolsheviks, such riffraff as Uncle Sa off under a strict ban

So, too, it was understood that besides the fleet of swift, sht in this profitable galers had been freighting their cargoes by means of airplanes that would be able to land the contraband stuff in lonely places far back of the low coast sections

It was therefore aa wide field of operation and with constant peril hovering over the heads of the two adventurous aviators who had undertaken so joyously to spread the net and draw itsbeen co in an isolated little bayou surrounded by inaccessible swa of the friendly shades of night

To those who enjoyed reading the preceding volume of this series of aviation adventures, where Jack and ”Perk,” in order to get their man--one of the boldest and most successful counterfeiters known in the annals of crime--found it necessary to fly across the Mexican boundary line and snatch their victim out of an extinct volcano crater that had once been the fort of the fierce Yaqui Indian tribe,[1] will think it a rather far cry for the Sky Detectives to be detailed to active duty some thousands of miles distant, and in the extreme southeastern corner of the republic

So it always must be with the famous Secret Service men--their motto, like that of our present day Boy Scouts, is ”Be Prepared”; for day and night they must hold themselves in readiness to start to the other side of the world if necessary--China, japan, India, the Philippines perhaps--detailed to fetch back some notorious malefactor wanted by Uncle Sam, and information of whose presence in distant lands has reached Headquarters

As a rule it was Perk's duty to see that their flying shi+p ell stocked with all necessary supplies, fro oil down to such food stores as they would require, even if forced to re the line of groceries and commissary stuff

Perk hiland and Canuck blood, one branch of his fa in Maine, while the other resided across the border Hence Perk sometimes chose to call himself a Yankee; and yet for a period of several years he had been a valuedall ions of Canada

He was considerably older than his gifted chu in France while with Pershi+ng's areneral that had caused Jack to pick hiht fire with fire, by pitting their own pilots and aircraft against those e aces

Soood and sufficient reasons of his own, did not fully explain the necessity forcertain lines

This was not because he lacked confidence in his loquacious chuue in his head or exercise due caution, but usually through a desire tothe arrangement to Perk's sharp criticism, which Jack valued even more than the other suspected

Consequently Perk, with the Yankee half of his blood stirred by an ever present curiosity, wanted to know and invariably asked nu clue

It was in the late Fall and already the advance guard of the winter tourist crowds had begun to arrive fro numbers, all set for an enjoyable winter in the sunny resorts of both coasts

Jack had already ation and picked up some important clues that he ht lead to definite results

The ali an alluring picture as seen between the jaws of sand points, with pal the entrance to the sheltered nook

It was just sunset, and inside another hour the night would have advanced far enough to perht up the coast