章节正文
at Sol Witberg--"in each of these cases I am compelled to give
the defendant the benefit of the doubt. Gentlemen, you are both
dismissed."
"Let us have a nip on it," Watson said to Witberg, as they left
the courtroom; but that outraged person refused to lock arms
and amble to the nearest saloon.
WINGED BLACKMAIL
PETER WINN lay back comfortably in a library chair, with closed
eyes, deep in the cogitation of a scheme of campaign destined
in the near future to make a certain coterie of hostile
financiers sit up. The central idea had come to him the night
before, and he was now reveling in the planning of the remoter,
minor details. By obtaining control of a certain up-country
bank, two general stores, and several logging camps, he could
come into control of a certain dinky jerkwater line which shall
here be nameless, but which, in his hands, would prove the key
to a vastly larger situation involving more main-line mileage
almost than there were spikes in the aforesaid dinky jerkwater.
It was so simple that he had almost laughed aloud when it came
to him. No wonder those astute and ancient enemies of his had
passed it by.
The library door opened, and a slender, middle-aged man,
weak-eyed and eye glassed, entered. In his hands was an
envelope and an open letter. As Peter Winn's secretary it was
his task to weed out, sort, and classify his employer's mail.
"This came in the morning post," he ventured apologetically and
with the hint of a titter. "Of course it doesn't amount to
anything, but I thought you would like to see it."
"Read it," Peter Winn commanded, without opening his eyes.
The secretary cleared his throat.
"It is dated July seventeenth, but is without address. Postmark
San Francisco. It is also quite illiterate. The spelling is
atrocious. Here it is:
Mr. Peter Winn,
SIR: I send you respectfully by express a pigeon worth good
money. She's a loo-loo--"
"What is a loo-loo?" Peter Winn interrupted.
The secretary tittered.
"I'm sure I don't know, except that it must be a superlative of
some sort. The letter continues:
Please freight it with a couple of thousand-dollar bills and
let it go. If you do I wont never annoy you no more. If you
dont you will be sorry.
"That is all. It is unsigned. I thought it would amuse you."
"Has the pigeon come?" Peter Winn demanded.
"I'm sure I never thought to enquire."
"Then do so."
In five minutes the secretary was back.
"Yes, sir. It came this morning."
"Then bring it in."
The secretary was inclined to take the affair as a practical
joke, but Peter Winn, after an examination of the pigeon,
thought otherwise.
"Look at it," he said, stroking and handling it. "See the
length of the body and that elongated neck. A proper carrier. I
doubt if I've ever seen a finer specimen. Powerfully winged and
muscled. As our unknown correspondent remarked, she is a
loo-loo. It's a temptation to keep her."
The secretary tittered.
"Why not? Surely you will not let it go back to the writer of
that letter."
Peter Winn shook his head.
"I'll answer. No man can threaten me, even anonymously or in
foolery."
On a slip of paper he wrote the succinct message, "Go to hell,"
signed it, and placed it in the carrying apparatus with which
the bird had been thoughtfully supplied.
"Now we'll let her loose. Where's my son? I'd like him to see
the flight."
"He's down in the workshop. He slept there last night, and had
his breakfast sent down this morning."
"He'll break his neck yet," Peter Winn remarked, half-fiercely,
half-proudly, as he led the way to the veranda.
Standing at the head of the broad steps, he tossed the pretty
creature outward and upward. She caught herself with a quick
beat of wings, fluttered about undecidedly for a space, then
rose in the air.
Again, high up, there seemed indecision; then, apparently
getting her bearings, she headed east, over the oak-trees that
dotted the park-like grounds.
"Beautiful, beautiful," Peter Winn murmured. "I almost wish I
had her back."
But Peter Winn was a very busy man, with such large plans in
his head and with so many reins in his hands that he quickly
forgot the incident. Three nights later the left wing of his
country house was blown up. It was not a heavy explosion, and
nobody was hurt, though the wing itself was ruined. Most of the
windows of the rest of the house were broken, and there was a
deal of general damage. By the first ferry boat of the morning
half a dozen San Francisco detectives arrived, and several
hours later the secretary, in high excitement, erupted on Peter
Winn.
"It's come!" the secretary gasped, the sweat beading his
forehead and his eyes bulging behind their glasses.
"What has come?" Peter demanded. "It--the--the loo-loo bird."
Then the financier understood.
"Have you gone over the mail yet?"
"I was just going over it, sir."
"Then continue, and see if you can find another letter from our
mysterious friend, the pigeon fancier."
The letter came to light. It read:
Mr. Peter Winn,
HONORABLE SIR: Now dont be a fool. If youd came through, your
shack would not have blew up--I beg to inform you respectfully,
am sending same pigeon. Take good care of same, thank you. Put
five one thousand dollar bills on her and let her go. Dont feed
her. Dont try to follow bird. She is wise to the way now and
makes better time. If you dont come through, watch out.
Peter Winn was genuinely angry. This time he indited no message
for the pigeon to carry. Instead, he called in the detectives,
and, under their advice, weighted the pigeon heavily with shot.
Her previousflight having been eastward toward the bay, the
fastest motor-boat in Tiburon was commissioned to take up the
chase if it led out over the water.
But too much shot had been put on the carrier, and she was
exhausted before the shore was reached. Then the mistake was
made of putting too little shot on her, and she rose high in
the air, got her bearings and started eastward across San
Francisco Bay. She flew straight over Angel Island, and here
the motor-boat lost her, for it had to go around the island.
That night, armed guards patrolled the grounds. But there was
no explosion. Yet, in the early morning Peter Winn learned by
telephone that his sister's home in Alameda had been burned to
the ground.
Two days later the pigeon was back again, coming this time by
freight in what had seemed a barrel of potatoes. Also came
another letter:
Mr. Peter Winn,
RESPECTABLE SIR: It was me that fixed yr sisters house. You
have raised hell, aint you. Send ten thousand now. Going up all
the time. Dont put any more handicap weights on that bird. You
sure cant follow her, and its cruelty to animals.
Peter Winn was ready to acknowledge himself beaten. The
detectives were powerless, and Peter did not know where next
the man would strike--perhaps at the lives of those near and
dear to him. He even telephoned to San Francisco for ten
thousand dollars in bills of large denomination. But Peter had
a son, Peter Winn, Junior, with the same firm-set jaw as his
fathers,, and the same knitted, brooding determination in his
eyes. He was only twenty-six, but he was all man, a secret
terror and delight to the financier, who alternated between
pride in his son's aeroplane feats and fear for an untimely and
terrible end.
"Hold on, father, don't send that money," said Peter Winn,
Junior. "Number Eight is ready, and I know I've at last got
that reefing down fine. It will work, and it will revolutionize
flying. Speed--that's what's needed, and so are the large
sustaining surfaces for getting started and for altitude. I've
got them both. Once I'm up I reef down. There it is. The
smaller the sustaining surface, the higher the speed. That was
the law discovered by Langley. And I've applied it. I can rise
when the air is calm and full of holes, and I can rise when its
boiling, and by my control of my plane areas I can come pretty
close to making any speed I want. Especially with that new
Sangster-Endholm engine."
"You'll come pretty close to breaking your neck one of these
days," was his father's encouraging remark.
"Dad, I'll tell you what I'll come pretty close to-ninety miles
an hour--Yes, and a hundred. Now listen! I was going to make a
trial tomorrow. But it won't take two hours to start today.
I'll tackle it this afternoon. Keep that money. Give me the
pigeon and I'll follow her to her loft where ever it is. Hold
on, let me talk to the mechanics."
He called up the workshop, and in crisp, terse sentences gave
his orders in a way that went to the older man's heart. Truly,
his one son was a chip off the old block, and Peter Winn had no
meek notions concerning the intrinsic value of said old block.
Timed to the minute, the young man, two hours later, was ready
for the start. In a holster at his hip, for instant use, cocked
and with the safety on, was a large-caliber automatic pistol.
With a final inspection and overhauling he took his seat in the
aeroplane. He started the engine, and with a wild burr of gas
explosions the beautiful fabric darted down the launching ways
and lifted into the air. Circling, as he rose, to the west, he
wheeled about and jockeyed and maneuvered for the real start of
the race.
This start depended on the pigeon. Peter Winn held it. Nor was
it weighted with shot this time. Instead, half a yard of bright
ribbon was firmly attached to its leg--this the more easily to
enable its flight being followed. Peter Winn released it, and
it arose easily enough despite the slight drag of the ribbon.
There was no uncertainty about its movements. This was the
third time it had made particular homing passage, and it knew
the course.
At an altitude of several hundred feet it straightened out and
went due cast. The aeroplane swerved into a straight course
from its last curve and followed. The race was on. Peter Winn,
looking up, saw that the pigeon was outdistancing the machine.
Then he saw something else. The aeroplane suddenly and
instantly became smaller. It had reefed. Its high-speed
plane-design was now revealed. Instead of the generous spread
of surface with which it had taken the air, it was now a lean
and hawklike monoplane balanced on long and exceedingly narrow
wings.
. . . . . .
When young Winn reefed down so suddenly, he received a
surprise. It was his first trial of the new device, and while
he was prepared for increased speed he was not prepared for
such an astonishing increase. It was better than he dreamed,
and, before he knew it, he was hard upon the pigeon. That
little creature, frightened by this, the most monstrous hawk it
the defendant the benefit of the doubt. Gentlemen, you are both
dismissed."
"Let us have a nip on it," Watson said to Witberg, as they left
the courtroom; but that outraged person refused to lock arms
and amble to the nearest saloon.
WINGED BLACKMAIL
PETER WINN lay back comfortably in a library chair, with closed
eyes, deep in the cogitation of a scheme of campaign destined
in the near future to make a certain coterie of hostile
financiers sit up. The central idea had come to him the night
before, and he was now reveling in the planning of the remoter,
minor details. By obtaining control of a certain up-country
bank, two general stores, and several logging camps, he could
come into control of a certain dinky jerkwater line which shall
here be nameless, but which, in his hands, would prove the key
to a vastly larger situation involving more main-line mileage
almost than there were spikes in the aforesaid dinky jerkwater.
It was so simple that he had almost laughed aloud when it came
to him. No wonder those astute and ancient enemies of his had
passed it by.
The library door opened, and a slender, middle-aged man,
weak-eyed and eye glassed, entered. In his hands was an
envelope and an open letter. As Peter Winn's secretary it was
his task to weed out, sort, and classify his employer's mail.
"This came in the morning post," he ventured apologetically and
with the hint of a titter. "Of course it doesn't amount to
anything, but I thought you would like to see it."
"Read it," Peter Winn commanded, without opening his eyes.
The secretary cleared his throat.
"It is dated July seventeenth, but is without address. Postmark
San Francisco. It is also quite illiterate. The spelling is
atrocious. Here it is:
Mr. Peter Winn,
SIR: I send you respectfully by express a pigeon worth good
money. She's a loo-loo--"
"What is a loo-loo?" Peter Winn interrupted.
The secretary tittered.
"I'm sure I don't know, except that it must be a superlative of
some sort. The letter continues:
Please freight it with a couple of thousand-dollar bills and
let it go. If you do I wont never annoy you no more. If you
dont you will be sorry.
"That is all. It is unsigned. I thought it would amuse you."
"Has the pigeon come?" Peter Winn demanded.
"I'm sure I never thought to enquire."
"Then do so."
In five minutes the secretary was back.
"Yes, sir. It came this morning."
"Then bring it in."
The secretary was inclined to take the affair as a practical
joke, but Peter Winn, after an examination of the pigeon,
thought otherwise.
"Look at it," he said, stroking and handling it. "See the
length of the body and that elongated neck. A proper carrier. I
doubt if I've ever seen a finer specimen. Powerfully winged and
muscled. As our unknown correspondent remarked, she is a
loo-loo. It's a temptation to keep her."
The secretary tittered.
"Why not? Surely you will not let it go back to the writer of
that letter."
Peter Winn shook his head.
"I'll answer. No man can threaten me, even anonymously or in
foolery."
On a slip of paper he wrote the succinct message, "Go to hell,"
signed it, and placed it in the carrying apparatus with which
the bird had been thoughtfully supplied.
"Now we'll let her loose. Where's my son? I'd like him to see
the flight."
"He's down in the workshop. He slept there last night, and had
his breakfast sent down this morning."
"He'll break his neck yet," Peter Winn remarked, half-fiercely,
half-proudly, as he led the way to the veranda.
Standing at the head of the broad steps, he tossed the pretty
creature outward and upward. She caught herself with a quick
beat of wings, fluttered about undecidedly for a space, then
rose in the air.
Again, high up, there seemed indecision; then, apparently
getting her bearings, she headed east, over the oak-trees that
dotted the park-like grounds.
"Beautiful, beautiful," Peter Winn murmured. "I almost wish I
had her back."
But Peter Winn was a very busy man, with such large plans in
his head and with so many reins in his hands that he quickly
forgot the incident. Three nights later the left wing of his
country house was blown up. It was not a heavy explosion, and
nobody was hurt, though the wing itself was ruined. Most of the
windows of the rest of the house were broken, and there was a
deal of general damage. By the first ferry boat of the morning
half a dozen San Francisco detectives arrived, and several
hours later the secretary, in high excitement, erupted on Peter
Winn.
"It's come!" the secretary gasped, the sweat beading his
forehead and his eyes bulging behind their glasses.
"What has come?" Peter demanded. "It--the--the loo-loo bird."
Then the financier understood.
"Have you gone over the mail yet?"
"I was just going over it, sir."
"Then continue, and see if you can find another letter from our
mysterious friend, the pigeon fancier."
The letter came to light. It read:
Mr. Peter Winn,
HONORABLE SIR: Now dont be a fool. If youd came through, your
shack would not have blew up--I beg to inform you respectfully,
am sending same pigeon. Take good care of same, thank you. Put
five one thousand dollar bills on her and let her go. Dont feed
her. Dont try to follow bird. She is wise to the way now and
makes better time. If you dont come through, watch out.
Peter Winn was genuinely angry. This time he indited no message
for the pigeon to carry. Instead, he called in the detectives,
and, under their advice, weighted the pigeon heavily with shot.
Her previousflight having been eastward toward the bay, the
fastest motor-boat in Tiburon was commissioned to take up the
chase if it led out over the water.
But too much shot had been put on the carrier, and she was
exhausted before the shore was reached. Then the mistake was
made of putting too little shot on her, and she rose high in
the air, got her bearings and started eastward across San
Francisco Bay. She flew straight over Angel Island, and here
the motor-boat lost her, for it had to go around the island.
That night, armed guards patrolled the grounds. But there was
no explosion. Yet, in the early morning Peter Winn learned by
telephone that his sister's home in Alameda had been burned to
the ground.
Two days later the pigeon was back again, coming this time by
freight in what had seemed a barrel of potatoes. Also came
another letter:
Mr. Peter Winn,
RESPECTABLE SIR: It was me that fixed yr sisters house. You
have raised hell, aint you. Send ten thousand now. Going up all
the time. Dont put any more handicap weights on that bird. You
sure cant follow her, and its cruelty to animals.
Peter Winn was ready to acknowledge himself beaten. The
detectives were powerless, and Peter did not know where next
the man would strike--perhaps at the lives of those near and
dear to him. He even telephoned to San Francisco for ten
thousand dollars in bills of large denomination. But Peter had
a son, Peter Winn, Junior, with the same firm-set jaw as his
fathers,, and the same knitted, brooding determination in his
eyes. He was only twenty-six, but he was all man, a secret
terror and delight to the financier, who alternated between
pride in his son's aeroplane feats and fear for an untimely and
terrible end.
"Hold on, father, don't send that money," said Peter Winn,
Junior. "Number Eight is ready, and I know I've at last got
that reefing down fine. It will work, and it will revolutionize
flying. Speed--that's what's needed, and so are the large
sustaining surfaces for getting started and for altitude. I've
got them both. Once I'm up I reef down. There it is. The
smaller the sustaining surface, the higher the speed. That was
the law discovered by Langley. And I've applied it. I can rise
when the air is calm and full of holes, and I can rise when its
boiling, and by my control of my plane areas I can come pretty
close to making any speed I want. Especially with that new
Sangster-Endholm engine."
"You'll come pretty close to breaking your neck one of these
days," was his father's encouraging remark.
"Dad, I'll tell you what I'll come pretty close to-ninety miles
an hour--Yes, and a hundred. Now listen! I was going to make a
trial tomorrow. But it won't take two hours to start today.
I'll tackle it this afternoon. Keep that money. Give me the
pigeon and I'll follow her to her loft where ever it is. Hold
on, let me talk to the mechanics."
He called up the workshop, and in crisp, terse sentences gave
his orders in a way that went to the older man's heart. Truly,
his one son was a chip off the old block, and Peter Winn had no
meek notions concerning the intrinsic value of said old block.
Timed to the minute, the young man, two hours later, was ready
for the start. In a holster at his hip, for instant use, cocked
and with the safety on, was a large-caliber automatic pistol.
With a final inspection and overhauling he took his seat in the
aeroplane. He started the engine, and with a wild burr of gas
explosions the beautiful fabric darted down the launching ways
and lifted into the air. Circling, as he rose, to the west, he
wheeled about and jockeyed and maneuvered for the real start of
the race.
This start depended on the pigeon. Peter Winn held it. Nor was
it weighted with shot this time. Instead, half a yard of bright
ribbon was firmly attached to its leg--this the more easily to
enable its flight being followed. Peter Winn released it, and
it arose easily enough despite the slight drag of the ribbon.
There was no uncertainty about its movements. This was the
third time it had made particular homing passage, and it knew
the course.
At an altitude of several hundred feet it straightened out and
went due cast. The aeroplane swerved into a straight course
from its last curve and followed. The race was on. Peter Winn,
looking up, saw that the pigeon was outdistancing the machine.
Then he saw something else. The aeroplane suddenly and
instantly became smaller. It had reefed. Its high-speed
plane-design was now revealed. Instead of the generous spread
of surface with which it had taken the air, it was now a lean
and hawklike monoplane balanced on long and exceedingly narrow
wings.
. . . . . .
When young Winn reefed down so suddenly, he received a
surprise. It was his first trial of the new device, and while
he was prepared for increased speed he was not prepared for
such an astonishing increase. It was better than he dreamed,
and, before he knew it, he was hard upon the pigeon. That
little creature, frightened by this, the most monstrous hawk it
- scheme [ski:m]
n.计划；阴谋，诡计 (初中英语单词) - slender [´slendə] a.细长的；微薄的 (初中英语单词)
- amount [ə´maunt] n.总数；数量 v.合计 (初中英语单词)
- opening [´əupəniŋ] n.开放；开端 a.开始的 (初中英语单词)
- spelling [´speliŋ] n.拼法；缀字 (初中英语单词)
- pigeon [pidʒin] n.鸽子 (初中英语单词)
- freight [freit] n.运货 vt.运送；充满 (初中英语单词)
- examination [ig,zæmi´neiʃən] n.检查；考试；检验 (初中英语单词)
- winged [´wiŋd] a.有翼的 (初中英语单词)
- correspondent [,kɔri´spɔndənt] n.记者 a.符合的 (初中英语单词)
- writer [´raitə] n.作者；作家 (初中英语单词)
- threaten [´θretn] v.恐吓；有....的危险 (初中英语单词)
- upward [´ʌpwəd] a.&ad.向上(的)；以上 (初中英语单词)
- incident [´insidənt] n.小事件；事变 (初中英语单词)
- excitement [ik´saitmənt] n.兴奋；骚动；煽动 (初中英语单词)
- previous [´pri:viəs] a.先，前，以前的 (初中英语单词)
- flight [flait] n.逃走；飞行；班机 (初中英语单词)
- barrel [´bærəl] n.(琵琶)桶；圆筒 (初中英语单词)
- acknowledge [ək´nɔlidʒ] vt.(公开)承认；感谢 (初中英语单词)
- beaten [´bi:tn] beat 的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
- junior [´dʒu:niə] a.年少的 n.年少者 (初中英语单词)
- altitude [´æltitju:d] n.高度；海拨 (初中英语单词)
- instant [´instənt] a.立即的 n.紧迫；瞬间 (初中英语单词)
- fabric [´fæbrik] n.织物；结构；组织 (初中英语单词)
- firmly [´fə:mli] ad.坚固地，稳定地 (初中英语单词)
- despite [di´spait] prep.尽管 (初中英语单词)
- generous [´dʒenərəs] a.慷慨的；丰盛的 (初中英语单词)
- device [di´vais] n.装置；器具；策略 (初中英语单词)
- comfortably [´kʌmfətəbli] ad.舒适地 (高中英语单词)
- campaign [kæm´pein] n.战役；行动 vi.从军 (高中英语单词)
- carrier [´kæriə] n.搬运工人；托架 (高中英语单词)
- specimen [´spesimən] n.标本，样品；抽样 (高中英语单词)
- temptation [temp´teiʃən] n.引诱，诱惑(物) (高中英语单词)
- apparatus [,æpə´reitəs] n.仪器；装置 (高中英语单词)
- thoughtfully [´θɔ:tfuli] ad.深思地；体贴地 (高中英语单词)
- outward [´autwəd] a.外面的 ad.向外 (高中英语单词)
- explosion [ik´spləuʒən] n.爆炸；爆发；发作 (高中英语单词)
- learned [´lə:nid] a.有学问的，博学的 (高中英语单词)
- handicap [´hændikæp] n.障碍 vt.妨碍 (高中英语单词)
- cruelty [´kru:əlti] n.残忍；残酷行为 (高中英语单词)
- determination [di,tə:mi´neiʃən] n.决心；决定 (高中英语单词)
- aeroplane [´eərəplein] n.飞机 (高中英语单词)
- tackle [´tækəl] n.用具；装置 vt.处理 (高中英语单词)
- concerning [kən´sə:niŋ] prep.关于 (高中英语单词)
- automatic [,ɔ:tə´mætik] a.自动的 n.自动装置 (高中英语单词)
- inspection [in´spekʃən] n.检查；视察；参观 (高中英语单词)
- exceedingly [ik´si:diŋli] ad.非常地，极度地 (高中英语单词)
- astonishing [əs´tɔniʃiŋ] a.令人惊讶的 (高中英语单词)
- monstrous [´mɔnstrəs] a.怪异的；庞大的 (高中英语单词)
- vastly [´vɑ:stli, ´væstli] ad.巨大地；广阔地 (英语四级单词)
- classify [´klæsifai] vt.把...分类(归类) (英语四级单词)
- respectfully [ris´pektfuli] ad.恭敬地 (英语四级单词)
- workshop [´wə:kʃɔp] n.车间；工场；创作室 (英语四级单词)
- eastward [´i:stwəd] a.&ad.向东(的) (英语四级单词)
- uncertainty [ʌn´sə:tənti] n.不可靠；不确定的事 (英语四级单词)
- defendant [di´fendənt] n.&a.被告(人)(的) (英语六级单词)
- nameless [´neimlis] a.无名字的；无名声的 (英语六级单词)
- middle-aged [´midl´eidʒid] a.中年的 (英语六级单词)
- illiterate [i´litərit] a.文盲的 n.文盲 (英语六级单词)
- financier [fi´nænsiə] n.财政家，金融家 (英语六级单词)
- genuinely [´dʒenjuinli] ad.由衷地 (英语六级单词)
- powerless [´pauələs] a.软弱的；无资源的 (英语六级单词)
- denomination [di,nɔmi´neiʃən] n.命名；宗派；派别 (英语六级单词)
- untimely [ʌn´taimli] a.&ad.不合时宜的(地) (英语六级单词)
- applied [ə´plaid] a.实用的，应用的 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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