“It was your own fault.”
“Wasn’t my fault. You fellows wouldn’t stop. I was afraid I was going to hit you. That’s why I lost control of the plane.” The pilot was working himself up into a temper. “You’ll pay for this, let me tell you. My plane is wrecked and I was mighty near killed just because a couple of fool boys didn’t know enough to stop.”
Frank and Joe Hardy stared at the man in amazement. The injustice of the charge passed belief. They were just about to reply angrily when they heard voices and saw men hurrying down the road toward them. A number of farmers in the adjacent fields had witnessed the accident and had lost no time in hastening to the scene.
“What happened? Anybody killed?” demanded one man, as they came up.
“The plane is wrecked. The pilot escaped,” explained Frank.
“No thanks to you young fools,” snarled the pilot. He turned to the farmers. “I’m lucky to be alive. I was trying to make a landing on the road and these young idiots in their car kept racing ahead of me so I couldn’t come down. I lost control of my machine and it’s wrecked.”
The farmers looked gravely at the Hardy boys. Frank laughed.
“I think you’d better wait until you sober up,” he told the pilot, “before you make any charges like that. You haven’t any business being in an airplane when you’re drunk.”
“Who says I’m drunk?” demanded the pilot belligerently. He clenched his fists and stepped forward. “My airplane is wrecked and I’m going to hold you young fools responsible.”
III
A Promise of Trouble
“You can’t blame us for this smash-up!” exclaimed Frank Hardy. “Why, that’s absurd! We were on the road, where we belonged. If you wanted to land, you should have landed in a field. There’s plenty of room.”
“I’ll land my plane wherever I please,” raged the pilot.
“Why pick on us?” asked Joe. “We did our best to get out of your way. I think you deliberately tried to run us down.”
“Never mind. You’ll hear more about this affair. I’m going to report this to the air mail service and they’ll come on you for damages.”
“Try to get ’em,” returned Frank.
A lanky farmer stepped forward.
“I saw the whole thing from the top of the hill,” he said slowly. “If I was you, Mr. Airplane Man, I wouldn’t try to collect no damages from these lads.”
“Why not?”
“Because they wasn’t to blame for the accident. The whole thing was your own fault. And, by jing, if you do try to blame them they can count on me for a witness to prove that they did their best to get out of your way. They was ridin’ peacefully along the road, and then you come swoopin’ and bouncin’ out of the sky and come slap down on the road where you shouldn’t be. You airplane fellows give me a pain. You’ve got the whole sky to move around in, and yet you think you have a right to chase people off the earth too.”
“Is that so?” sneered the pilot. “Well, you’ll have a chance to give your evidence, seeing you know so much.”
“I’m glad of that, Giles Ducroy,” said the farmer. “I’m glad I’ll have a chance to give evidence, for then I can tell ’em how drunk you were when you crawled out from under the plane.”
This shot told.
“I’m not drunk,” stormed Ducroy. “I’m nervous.”
“You must have a pretty bad case of nerves to make your breath smell so strong,” rejoined the farmer calmly. “I’ll bet the air mail service won’t keep you on very long after this, when they hear what I’ve got to say.”
The pilot turned his back.
“I haven’t got time to bother with you. It’s these boys I’m dealing with. I warn you,” he said, glaring at the Hardy boys, “you haven’t heard the last of this. There’s going to be plenty of trouble for you.”
Just then there was a roaring and clattering as a huge truck lumbered down the road, bound from the airport. The driver stared at the scene in amazement. Some of the farmers moved the wreckage of the plane out of the road to enable the truck to pass. Giles Ducroy strode forward arrogantly.
“Driver!”
“Yeah?”
“There are some bags of air mail in my plane. I want you to bring them to Bayport.”
“Who says so?” asked the driver calmly.
“I do. I’m pilot of this plane.”
The driver regarded the wreckage.
“Looks like you made a pretty good job of the crack-up,” he said finally.
Some of the bystanders grinned. Giles Ducroy flushed angrily.
“No nonsense about this,” he snapped. “It’s my duty to see that the mail bags reach the city.”
The truck driver sighed.
“Why didn’t you bring ’em to the airport in your plane?” he inquired.
“Can’t you see? I’ve had an accident.”
“You picked a nice day for it,” observed the driver, glancing up at the sky.
Giles Ducroy lost patience. He went over to the wreckage of the plane and burrowed among the debris until he found the mail bags. These he hauled forth and tossed into the truck.
“There!” he said. “Get them to Bayport as quick as you can.”
“Yes, Commander!” said the truck driver, with an elaborate salute. “The air mail must arrive on time. If I run out of gas I’ll come down in a parachute.” And the big truck lumbered off.
This exchange of witticisms, in which Giles Ducroy had come out second best, judging by the snickers of the farmers who were now crowding about, did not leave the pilot in a very good temper. He stormed into the middle of a group of men who were examining the wreckage, ordered them to stand back, and promised all sorts of dire penalties if anyone touched the airplane until he returned from the airport.
“As for you,” he said, turning to Frank and Joe Hardy before he stalked away, “you’ll hear more about this. You’re to blame for the whole business and I’m going to
