Adventure Magazine Cover — page 161: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Fox’s Earth Lieutenant Berne’s being unknown to Phelps, and had formed a hasty little con- coction in his quick-working mind that he would pose as the secretary of a mythical aero club wanting the great Mr. Oster- mann’s support and patronage. “Mr. Ostermann? Mr. Ostermann i is in America. He vill not be ’ome till a long time. But I am his secretary-and I vill for- ward however any letters through. Eh?” ‘“Awfully sorry, but I can’t wait so long | for a reply. But I dare say, Mr. Phelps, that you will be able to help me. May I come in?” “You know my name, eh? You perhaps know Mr. Ostermann? Hein? But vot you want him fore”’ “Why, of course I know Mr. Ostermann! What flying-man doesn’t? My name’s Marcus Hambledon, and I’m the secretary for the greatest aviation meeting ever held yet. America won’t be in it! I want Mr. Ostermann to enter for it. May I show you the papers so that you can the better—ah, thanks!”’ The fervently expressed gratitude was caused by the man holding open the door and inviting him to enter. And Algy ac- cepted the invitation with alacrity. He was shown into a small study on the left of the door. There was a strong smell of tobacco in the air, and a tall tumbler with a drink mixed in it stood upon the center-table side by side with a pile of letters and a mass of papers. It was very evident that the man was alone in the flat, and that he had been occupying this room perusing the letters and papers when Algy’s ring at the bell disturbed him. : It was an error of judgment that he should have ushered his visitor into this special room, but he was flustered, probably, by the sudden advent of Brett when he doubtless was expecting some one else, and subconsciously led the way back to the apartment he had just vacated. But Algy was hugely delighted. It was the very thing he most desired. . He had not expected such luck to befall him as to be taken right in to the holy of holies, the secretary’s—and more than probably the master’s also—own room. Gleefully he raked the place with his keen, expectant eyes, although to the mere observer he appeared rather a shy,stupid young man who had come to ask a favor of “a very great man and who was apprehen- sively nervous at the magnitude of his daring. 917 (Se THE walls were hung with numer- Wael ous maps and sections of maps— mostly, Algy noticed, of the most sparsely-populated spaces of the world. One section, printed in a light pink coloring, par- ticularly attracted him, and more especially so Inasmuch as it had been taken down from its place on: the wall and was erected on the table, supported by a pile of books, directly facing Phelps, as though he had been study- ing it. It was a map of Pennydale Moor, a vast tract of bogland in the extreme north- east of Northumberland and spreading to the coast. Below the map, on the blotter at which the secretary had been at work, was a square of thin tracing paper, and Algy could see the lines and tracings of either a plan or a chart. As it happened, Algy knew the part of the country depicted on the pink-colored map very well, having an uncle—his father’s brother—living at Carter Fell Castle, a place situated in the wildest part of the country and well over the border-line of the moor itself. His heart beat faster as he recognized the wild and lonely spot and realized the possibilities of the place. Could it be that he had so easily discovered the heart of the mystery? Surely not. — And yet in all England where could a man find a more desolate patch of country? Not even Dartmoor could boast of such a continuous stretch of desolation. The isola- tion of Carter Fell Castle had eaten into his heart when, as a boy, he had spent in- terminable holidays there, and even now the memory of the bleak and lonely house on the edge of the bog chilled the warm blood in his veins and sent a shoot of nameless dis- like through his soul. And yet a thrill of triumph accompanied the dislike when he realized that perhaps those very holidays of bitter memory were now to prove of the utmost value to him. What if the ‘‘cove” spoken of by Oster- mann were somewhere on that wild and barren coast? What more probable? What spot of England more inaccessible? ‘The wild, waste moors stretching away for miles — on one side and girt by miles of cliffs and barrenness on the other? What if Ostermann had a secret haven for Gray Ghost in the very heart of Penny- dale Moor? Who would be one whit the wiser? No one. Not in years did a man cross the arid waste of bog and fen; no track COmiclbook CO