Triple Spies Part 14

What had surprised him most of all had been the j.a.p's remark, as he read the notice:

"The blunderer! Wooden-headed blunderer!" Hanada had muttered as he read the printed words.

"Would you take him if you saw him?" Johnny had asked.

The j.a.p had turned a strangely inquiring glance at him, then answered:

"No!"

But they had not found him. And now the ice was going out. Soon s.h.i.+ps would be coming and going. Little gasoline schooners would dash away to catch the cream of the coast-wise trading; great steamers would bring in coal, food, and men. In all this busy traffic, how easy it would be for the Russian to depart unseen.

Johnny sighed. He had grown exceedingly fond of d.o.g.g.i.ng the track of that man. And besides, that thousand dollars would come in handy. He would dearly love to see the man behind prison bars. There would be no holding him for crimes he had attempted in Siberia, but probably the United States Government had something on him.

"Look!" exclaimed the j.a.p. "The tower has tipped a full five feet!" It was true. The ice crowding from the sh.o.r.e had blocked behind the tower, which stood several hundred feet from land. A dark line of water had opened between the two towers. Evidently the harbor committee would have some work on its hands.

"They're running down there," said Johnny, pointing to three men racing as if for their lives toward the sh.o.r.e tower. "Wonder what they think they can do?"

"Looks like the two behind were chasing the fellow in the lead," said Hanada.

"They are!" exclaimed Johnny. "Poor place for safety, I'd say, but he's got quite a lead."

At that instant the man in front disappeared behind the sh.o.r.e tower. As they watched, they saw a strange thing: the swinging platform began to move slowly along the rusty cable, and, just as it got under way, a man leaped out upon it.

"He's started the electric motor and is giving himself a ride,"

explained Johnny, "but if it's as bad as that, it must be pretty bad.

He's desperate, that's all. The outer tower's likely to go over at any moment and dash him to death. Even if he makes it, where'll he be? Going out to sea on the floe, that's all."

Slowly the platform crept across the s.p.a.ce over the black waters, then over the tumbling ice. The outer tower could be seen to dip in toward the sh.o.r.e. The cable sagged. The two other runners were nearing the inner tower.

"C'mon!" exclaimed Johnny, "The Golden West. A telescope!"

Closely followed by Hanada, he leaped away toward the hotel where, in a room especially prepared for it, was a huge bra.s.s telescope mounted on a tripod. Johnny, glancing out to sea, knew that the tower would be over in another thirty seconds. The platform was not twenty feet from its goal. His eye was now at the telescope. One second and he swung the instrument about. Then a gasp escaped his lips:

"The Russian!"

"The Russian?" Hanada s.n.a.t.c.hed the telescope from him.

As Johnny watched he saw the man leap just as the platform lurched backward. The two men at the other tower had reversed the motor, but they were too late.

The next moment the outer tower toppled into the sea; the cable cut the water with a resounding swish. Johnny saw the Russian leap from ice cake to ice cake until at last he disappeared behind a giant pile, safe on a broad field of solid ice.

Hanada sat down. His face was white.

"Gone!" he muttered hoa.r.s.ely.

"A boat?" suggested Johnny.

"No good. The ice floe's two miles wide, forty miles long and all piled up. Couldn't find him. He'd never give himself up. But he'll come back."

"How?"

"I don't know, but he'll come. You'll see. He's a devil, that one. But we'll get him yet."

"And the thousand," suggested Johnny.

Hanada looked at him in disgust. "A thousand dollars! What is that?"

"Is it as bad as that?" Johnny smiled in spite of himself.

"Yes, and worse, many times worse. I tell you, we must get that man!

When the time comes, we must get him, or it will be worse for your country and mine."

"Ours is the same country," suggested Johnny.

"Huh!" Hanada shrugged his shoulders. "I am Hanada, your old schoolmate, now a member of the j.a.panese Secret Police, and you are Johnny Thompson.

Whatever else you are, I don't know. The Russian has left us for a time.

Let's talk about those old school days, and forget."

And they did.

CHAPTER XIII

BACK TO OLD CHICAGO

In the spring all the ice from upper Behring Sea pa.s.ses through Behring Strait. One by one, like squadrons of great s.h.i.+ps, floes from the sh.o.r.es of Cape York, Cape Nome and the Yukon flats drift majestically through that narrow channel to the broad Arctic Ocean.

So it happened that in due time the ice floe on which the Russian had sought refuge drifted past the Diomede Islands and farther out, well into the Arctic Ocean, met the floe on which the j.a.p girl had been lost as it circled to the east.

All ignorant of the pa.s.senger it carried, the girl welcomed this addition to her broad domain of ice. She had lived on the floe for days, killing seal for her food and melting snow to quench her thirst. But of late the cakes had begun to drift apart. There was danger that the great pan on which she had established herself would drift away from the others, and, in that case, if no seals came, she would starve. This new floe crowded upon hers and made the one on which she camped a solid ma.s.s again.

Spying some strange, dark spots on the newly arrived floe, she hurried over to the place and was surprised to find that it was a great heap of rubbish carted from some city. Though she did not know it, she guessed that city was Nome.

With the keen pleasure of a child she explored the heaps, selecting here a broken knife, there a discarded kettle, and again some other utensil which would help her in setting up a convenient kitchen.

But it was as she made her way back to her camp that she received the greatest shock. Suddenly, as she rounded a cake of ice, she came upon a man sprawled upon the ice, as if dead. The girl took no chances. In the land whence she came, it was not considered possible that this man should die. She sprang between two up-ended cakes, and from this shelter studied him cautiously. Yes, there was no mistaking him; it was the Russian. A slight movement of one arm told her he was not dead. Whether he was unconscious or was sleeping she could not tell.

Presently, after tying her dagger to her waist by a rawhide cord, she crept silently forward. An ear inclined toward his face told her that he was breathing regularly; he was sleeping the torpid sleep of one worn by exhaustion, exposure and starvation.

Ever so gently she touched him. He did not move. Then, with one hand on her dagger, she felt his clothing, as if searching for some object hidden in his fur garments. Her touch was light as a feather, yet she appeared to have a wonderful sense of location in the tips of those small, slender fingers.

Once the man moved and groaned. Light as a leaf she sprang away, the dagger gleaming in her hand. There were reasons why she did not wish to kill that man; other reasons than the fact that she was a woman and shrank from slaying, and yet she was in a perilous position. Should it come to a choice between killing him or suffering herself, she would kill him.

Again the man's body relaxed in slumber. Again she glided to his side and continued her search. When at last she straightened up, it was with a look of despair. The thing she sought was not there.