Chapter V: The Flight to the Frozen North

Jerry Marbury's statement was uttered so ruefully that Slim Tyler shot a sharp glance at his chum.

"How come?" he asked.

"While you've been away," replied his friend, "Dave has accepted an offer from a group of scientists--oh, you'd know their names fast enough, if you heard them, Franz, Burke, Lewis, a lot of highbrows with all the letters of the alphabet tucked behind their names--to pilot an expedition into the wilds of Greenland. Some sort of exploring expedition."

"My name isn't up as a member of the expedition, I suppose," conjectured Slim wistfully.

"Not that you can notice," returned Jerry, with a gloomy nod. "That's what I meant when I said we were out of luck."

"You're not in it, either?" asked Slim, genuinely surprised.

"Guess there isn't room for me on the trip," was the reply. "I can't expect to be in on everything, you know."

"Who is going with Dave, then?" queried Slim.

"Biff Donovan for one. And I understand that Sardine Brown is going along. If they've got any one else, I haven't heard of him."

Slim Tyler could not help feeling envious of the lucky flyers. He would have given almost everything he owned to have been included in the plans for this expedition into Greenland. But common sense told him that Dave would want only the more experienced flyers for this kind of work.

"My time will come yet," he assured himself, trying to banish the disappointment that he could not help feeling. "There's no use getting sore over nothing."

Aloud he said:

"Does the expedition start from here?"

"I think so," replied Jerry, "although I understand Dave expects to pick up one or two others in Canada on his way to the Far North."

"When do they start?" asked Slim.

Jerry chuckled.

"According to latest reports from the Boyd hangar, in just about thirty-five minutes."

"So soon?" exclaimed Slim. "Things must have been humming while I was away."

"You don't know the half of it. Come with me and I'll show you."

Approaching the Boyd hangar, they found everything in a bustle of preparation.

The plane that was to be used for the expedition, the _Flying Cloud_, was being inspected for the last time in regard to its mechanical perfection, fueling, and provisioning.

The stir and excitement of the scene got into Slim's blood and intensified his sense of disappointment in not being included in it.

He and Jerry forced their way through the crowd that surrounded the hangar and were greeted jovially by Henry Cusack.

"Bet you boys wish you were going along," he remarked.

Slim Tyler grinned ruefully.

"Nothing else but," he agreed.

"Where's Dave?" asked Jerry.

"Around somewhere talking to the scientists. I ain't got any use for those fellers," the rotund boss of the hangar confided in a lowered tone. "Seems they always know so much that ain't so, and in the end they always come around to facts that common folks have known all along."

Jerry Marbury chuckled.

"Once in a while, though, they do succeed in turning up something, Henry. There's Edison. What about him?"

"Oh, well," admitted Henry grudgingly, "he's what you call a practical scientist. I was talking about the kind that go around with their heads in the clouds and never notice whether it's dry or muddy underfoot. That sort makes me tired."

Slim and Jerry found Dave Boyd surrounded by a distinguished group of men--that type of star-gazing scientists of which Henry Cusack so heartily disapproved.

The great aviator greeted the young men cordially.

"How's the little sick boy in Ernestville?" he asked Slim. It was one of the pleasant attributes of the great flyer that, no matter how deeply he might be absorbed in matters of importance, he never failed to keep in mind events that were of interest to his associates. He had a capacity for friendliness that was a never ending source of pleasure to those who admired and loved him.

"Coming along well, thanks," answered Slim. But his mind just then was not on the little Traut boy. He was thinking wistful things of Greenland and what he might do there if he had the chance.

Dave Boyd seemed to divine his thoughts.

"Sorry we haven't room for you and Jerry on this trip," he said. "I was asked to take Biff and Brown. But there will be other trips, and then you will get your chance."

"Much good that does me now," thought Slim to himself, still fighting his disappointment.

He loitered about the hangar during the final arrangements for the start of the expedition. The excitement infected him. The call to adventure was in his blood. He wandered about, nurturing a wild hope that at the last moment someone would be unable to go and he, Slim Tyler, would be called upon to take his place.

This flickering possibility received its death blow when the great plane that was to carry the expedition to Greenland was trundled out and the members of the party began to take their places in it.

One by one Slim counted them. They were all there! No hope of a vacancy at the last moment.

Police were on hand to prevent crowding and to give the plane a fair space for the take-off.

Dave Boyd was the last to board the plane. In the act of settling his heavy goggles in place, he turned to Slim and Jerry and held out his hand.

"Wish us luck, boys," he said. "We will keep you folks back here informed of our progress, as far as it is possible to do so. We have radio along and all the up-to-the-minute appliances. You should hear from us often."

"Good-by, sir," said Slim. "I don't have to wish any expedition luck when you're along," he added, with a smile. "I just wish them Dave Boyd."

The aviator laughed, shook Slim's hand again, and climbed into the plane.

The propeller whirled, the engine hummed, and the great plane swept down the field like a gigantic beetle.

But it did not rise as soon as they expected.

Jerry and Slim watched it with increasing anxiety.

"Too heavily weighted," muttered Slim.

Jerry nodded.

"They may have to ditch some of the duffle," he observed.

"No!" cried Slim. "There she goes! Look at her! See her lift! Now I ask you, what could be sweeter?"

He wandered about aimlessly for a while, trying to chide himself into a more cheerful mood. He was turning a corner of the Boyd hangar when he saw approaching him and evidently about to speak to him the person he most loathed in all the world.

He regarded Nat Shaley frigidly.

"Well," he said, not trying to hide his distaste, "what do you want?"