The Trail of the Hawk: A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life

Hank Odell liked so much, and many others, all dead, like Moisant. I don't think I take any undue risks, but it makes me stop and think. And Hank Odell with a busted shoulder. Captain Paul Beck once told me he believed it was mostly carelessness, these accidents, and he certainly is a good observer, but when I think of a careful constructor like Nieuport---- Punk money I'm making. Thank heaven there will be one more good year of the game, 1912, but I don't know about 1913. Looks like the exhibition game would blow up then--nearly everybody that wants to has seen an aeroplane fly once, now, and that's about all they want, so good bye aviation, except for military use and flying boats for sportsmen. At least good bye during a slump of several years. Hope to thunder Forrest and I will be able to make our South American hike, even if it costs every cent I have. That will be something like it, seeing new country instead of scrapping with fair managers about money. _December 22_: Hoorray! Christmas time at sea! Quite excite to smell the ocean again and go rolling down the narrow gangways between the white state-room doors. Off for a month's flying in Brazil and Argentine, with Tony Bean. Will look up data for coming exploration of Amazon headwaters. Martin Dockerill like a regular Beau Brummel in new white flannels, parading the deck, making eyes at pretty Greaser girls. It's good to be _going_. * * * * * _Feb. 22, 1912_: Geo. W's birthday. He'd have busted that no-lie proviso if he'd ever advertised an aero meet. Start of flight New Orleans to St. Louis. Looks like really big times, old fashioned jubilee all along the road and lots of prizes, though take a chance. Only measly little $2,500 prize guaranteed, but vague promises of winnings at towns all along, where stop for short exhibitions. Each of contestants has to fly at scheduled towns for percentage of gate receipts. _Feb. 23_: What a rotten flight to-day. Small crowd out to see me off. No sooner up than trouble with plugs. Wanted to land, but nothing but bayous, rice fields, cane breaks, and marshes. Farmer shot at my machine. Soon motor stopped on me and had to come down awhooping on a small plowed field. Smashed landing gear and got an awful jar. Nothing serious though. It was two hours before a local blacksmith and I repaired chassis and cleaned plugs. I started off after coaching three scared darkies to hold the tail, while the blacksmith spun the propeller. He would give it a couple of bats, then dodge out of the way too soon, while I sat there and tried not to look mad, which by gum I was plenty mad. Landed in this bum town, called ----, fourth in the race, and found sweet (?) refuge in this chills and fever hotel. Wish I was back in New Orleans. Cheer up, having others ahead of me in the race just adds a little zip to it. Watch me to-morrow. And I'm not the only hard luck artist. Aaron Solomons busted propeller and nearly got killed. _Later._ Cable. Tony Bean is dead. Killed flying. My god, Tony, impossible to think of him as dead, just a few days ago we were flying together and calling on senoritas and he playing the fiddle and laughing, always so polite, like he used to fiddle us into good nature when we got discouraged at Bagby's school. Seems like it was just couple minutes ago we drove in his big car through Avenida de Mayo and everybody cheered him, he was hero of Buenos Aires, yet he treated me as the Big Chief. Cablegram forwarded from New Orleans, dated yesterday, "Beanno killed fell 200 feet." And to-morrow I'll have to be out and jolly the rustic meet managers again. Want to go off some place and be quiet and think. Wish I could get away, be off to South America with Forrest. _February 24_: Rotten luck continues. Back in same town again! Got up yesterday and motor misfired, had to make quick landing in a bayou and haul out machine myself aided by scared kids. Got back here and found gasoline pipe fouled, small piece of tin stuck in it. Martin feels as bad as I do at Tony's death, tho he doesn't say much of anything. "Gosh, and Tony such a nice little cuss," was about all he said, but he looked white around the gills. _Feb. 25_: Another man has dropped out, I am third but still last in the race. Race fever got me to-day, didn't care for anything but winning, got off to a good start, then took chances, machine wobbled like a board in the surf. Am having some funny kind of chicken creole I guess it is for lunch, writing this in hotel dining room. _Later_: Passed Aaron Solomons, am now second in the race, landed here just three hours behind Walter MacMonnies. Three letters forwarded here, from Forrest, he is flying daily at army aviation camp, also from Gertie Cowles, she and her mother are in Minneapolis, attending a week of grand opera, also to my surprise short note from Jack Ryan, the grouch, saying he has given up flying and gone back into motor business. There won't be much more than money to pay expenses on this trip. Tomorrow I'll show them some real flying. _Later_: Telegram from a St. L. newspaper. Sweet business. Says that promoters of race have not kept promise to remove time limit as they promised. Doubt if either Walter MacMonnies or I can finish in time set. _Feb. 26_: Bad luck continues but made fast flight after two forced descents, one of them had to make difficult landing, plane down on railroad track, avoiding telegraph wires, and get machine off track as could hear train coming, awful job. Nerves not very good. Once when up at 200 ft. heighth from which Tony Bean fell, I saw his face right in air in front of me and jumped so I jerked the stuffings out of control wires. * * * * * _March 15_: Just out of hospital, after three weeks there, broken leg still in splints. Glad Walter MacM got thru in time limit, got prize. Too week and shaky write much, shoulder still hurts. _March 18_: How I came to fall (fall that broke my leg, three weeks ago) Was flying over rough country when bad gust came thru hill defile. Wing crumpled. Up at 400 ft. Machine plunged forward then sideways. Gosh, I thought, I'm gone, but will live as long as I can, even a few seconds more, and kept working with elevator, trying to right her even a little. Ground coming up fast. Must have jumped, I think. Landed in marsh, that saved my life, but woke up at doctor's house, leg busted and shoulder bad, etc. Machine shot to pieces, but Martin Dockerill has it pretty well repaired. He and the doc and I play poker every day, Martin always wins with his dog-gone funeral face no matter tho he has an ace full. _March 24_: Leg all right, pretty nearly. Rigged up steering bar so I can work it with one foot. Flew a mile to-day, went not badly. Hope to fly at Springfield, Ill. meet next week. Will be able to make Brazil trip with Forrest Haviland all right. The dear old boy has been writing to me every day while I've been on the bum. Newspapers have made a lot of my flying so soon again, several engagements and now things look bright again. Reading lots and chipper as can be. _March 25_: Forrest Haviland is dead He was killed to-day. _March 27_: Disposed of monoplane by telegraph. Got Martin job with Sunset Aviation Company. _March 28_: Started for Europe. * * * * * _May 8, Paris_: Forrest and I would have met to-day in New York to perfect plans for Brazil trip. _May 10_: Am still trying to answer letter from Forrest's father. Can't seem to make it go right. If I could have seen Forrest again. But maybe they were right, holding funeral before I could get there. Captain Faber says Forrest was terribly crushed, falling from 1700 ft. I wish I didn't keep on thinking of plans for our Brazil trip, then remembering we won't make it after all. I don't think I will fly till fall, anyway, though I feel stronger now after rest in England, Titherington has beautiful place in Devonshire. England seems to stick to biplane, can't make them see monoplane. Don't think I shall fly before fall. To-day I would have been with Forrest Haviland in New York, I think he could have got leave for Brazil trip. We would taken Martin. Tony promised to meet us in Rio. I like France but can't get used to language, keep starting to speak Spanish. Maybe I'll fly here in France but certainly not for some time, though massage has fixed me all O.K. Am studying French. Maybe shall bicycle thru France. Mem.: Write to Colonel Haviland when I can. _Must_ when I can. Part III THE ADVENTURE OF LOVE CHAPTER XXIV In October, 1912, a young man came with an enthusiastic letter from the president of the Aero Club to old Stephen VanZile, vice-president and general manager of the VanZile Motor Corporation of New York. The young man was quiet, self-possessed, an expert in regard to motors, used to meeting prominent men. He was immediately set to work at a tentative salary of $2,500 a year, to develop the plans of what he called the "Touricar"--an automobile with all camping accessories, which should enable motorists to travel independent of inns, add the joy of camping to the joy of touring, and--a feature of nearly all inventions--add money to the purse of the inventor. The young man was Carl Ericson, whom Mr. VanZile had seen fly at New Orleans during the preceding February. Carl had got the idea of the Touricar while wandering by motor-cycle through Scandinavia and Russia. He was, at this time, twenty-seven years old; not at all remarkable in appearance nor to be considered handsome, but so clean, so well bathed, so well set-up and evenly tanned, that one thought of the swimming, dancing, tennis-playing city men of good summer resorts, an impression enhanced by his sleek corn-silk hair and small, pale mustache. His clothes came from London, his watch-chain was a thin line of platinum and gold, his cigarette-case of silver engraved in inconspicuous bands--a modest and sophisticated cigarette-case, which he had possessed long enough to forget that he had it. He was apparently too much the easy, well-bred, rather inexperienced Yale or Princeton man (not Harvard; there was a tiny twang in his voice, and he sometimes murmured "Gee!") to know much about life or work, as yet, and his smooth, rosy cheeks made it absurdly evident that he had not been away from the college insulation for more than two years. But when he got to work with draftsman and stenographers, when a curt kindliness filled his voice, he proved to be concentrated, unafraid of responsibility, able to keep many people busy; trained to something besides family tradition and the collegians' naive belief that it matters who wins the Next Game. His hands would have given away the fact that he had done things. They were large, broad; the knuckles heavy; the palms calloused by something rougher than oar and tennis-racket. The microscopic traces of black grease did not for months quite come out of the cracks in his skin. And two of his well-kept but thick nails had obviously been smashed. The men of the same rank as himself in the office, captains and first lieutenants of business, said that he "simply ate up work." They fancied, with the eager old-womanishness of office gossip, that he had a "secret sorrow," for, though he was pleasant enough, he kept very much to himself. The cause of his retirement from aviation was the theme of many romantic legends. They did not know precisely what it was he had done in the pre-historic period of a year before, but they treated him with reverence instead of the amused aloofness with which an office usually waits to see whether a new man will prove to be a fool or a "grouch," a clown or a good fellow. The stenographers and