Probably Radin had come up as much far this as anything else. He waved a hand and grinned at the American as they went into action at three thousand feet above the airdrome.
Reading had courteously waited for Radin to make the first attack. It came in a diving rush from blinding sunlight high and to the rear.
If Reading had not thrown his ship into a swiftly zooming loop there would have been a collision. Radin’s left wing missed him by less than a yard.
“The lad plays rough,” thought Reading, and went into action. A thousand feet down, the Russian came out of his dive to find Reading plunging with the speed of gravity and a wide-open motor down on his tail.
His swift descent was almost vertical, and if he had not swerved at the last moment he would have crashed into his opponent’s cockpit. Radin, possibly because he was not at his physical best, had been outmaneuvered.
It was a brief dog-fight, and Reading gave the critical spectators on the ground ample reason to believe that he might have defeated Radin at the Russian’s best. Bearing in mind that first savage rush of his opponent, Reading retained the offensive and soon forced him to land. The Russian nearly crashed.
Laughter at Radin’s expense was mingled with the applause of both the Russian and German pilots for the visitor. Radin’s twisted smile when he extended punctilious congratulations had something in it that caused Reading to wonder if it would not have been more diplomatic to avoid so pointed an issue.
Then he noticed that Manuel Perez had joined the group of spectators since his take-off. A moment later when he looked for him he was gone. Radin, too, had disappeared.
As Reading approached the hangars he was met by Rossiter, who had accompanied him to the field.
“Give them a polite excuse for returning to your hotel,” he said in a lowered voice. “I’ve just learned something that will mildly interest you.”
After an exchange of compliments with his hosts, Reading drove off with Rossiter in the latter’s car.
“Jim, that was a pretty piece of work. But you came close to letting that bird get you in the first round. I don’t suppose you were looking for anything as realistic as that first diving attack?”
“No,” replied Reading. “He was sure enough coming for me. Probably he misjudged the distance, or maybe he just wanted to show off a bit at my expense.
“Anyhow, I thought it best to bear down on him from then on. He drank quite a lot last night, and I wasn’t sure that he might not have carried on this morning.”
Rossiter was silent for a moment. “You’d better not fly to Germany with Radin and Perez,” he said. “And don’t accuse me of trying to swerve an officer from his duty until I’ve told you what you’re up against.”
“All right, Dave; like a good newspaper man get to the point of your story.”
“While the pilots were making a fuss over you after you landed, I noticed Radin stride off to one of the hangars. He seemed to be slightly drunk and more than slightly sore. A pretty good pilot, but a vain one, shown up by the visiting American, he was feeling his humiliation very keenly.
“Perez, who had come to the field after you took off, followed Radin into the hangar. The greaser said something to him, and they climbed into the cabin of an idle plane. He looked around once to see if any one was near, and didn’t notice that I was watching them.
“I followed and went around to the other side of the plane, where I got out of sight, and into a packing box standing on the hangar floor between this plane and another one.
“The cabin door on my side of the ship was not tightly closed — Perez probably hadn’t noticed it — and I could hear what they said. They spoke in French, and I got most of it.
“Perez either is sure that you are on his tail, or he suspects it so strongly that he has convinced those he is acting for that, to make sure, an accident had better happen to you before you leave Russia. He has found out that Radin has gone deeply into debt with gamblers in Moscow and is in desperate circumstances.
“There was no frame-up to drive you into the ground in that show to-day. But Perez saw that Radin was ripe for something of the kind when he came down. He is a vindictive bird, for it didn’t take Perez long to convince him.
“For five thousand rubles you are going to be polished off after the ship leaves Smolensk — somewhere in wild country between Vitebsk and the Latvian border.
“Radin at first shied at murder, but Perez convinced him that it was a patriotic duty to Soviet Russia to exterminate an enemy. Most of the pilots are not particularly ardent Communists, but Radin happens to be one.”
Reading smiled grimly. “And just how is this job to be done, Dave?”
“I’m getting to that. There is to be motor trouble and a forced landing. You will, of course, get out of the plane to stretch your legs while the trouble is located and repaired.
“Perez will club you from behind; you will be lifted back into the plane, and when it is on its way again you will be thrown out.
“This will be reported as an accident when Perez and Radin get to Königsberg, and your body will be aboard the plane to prove it.
“It will have been crushed by a fall of a thousand feet or so, which happened when you opened a door to throw out some waste paper and the plane lurched suddenly in rough air and threw you out They landed and recovered your body.
“Even if there is suspicion there will be no one to prove anything, and there will be the mutually corroborative testimony of Radin and Perez.”
“Sounds like a workable scheme, if the victim wasn’t looking for it,” remarked Reading, “and I guess I’ll give them a chance at it.”
“Don’t be a damn fool, Jim. You might be able to handle them in a fight, but you’re taking an unnecessary chance.”
“What about my chance in Moscow, if the word is out to do me in? No, I guess I’ll sit in.”
VII
Smolensk, and then Vitebsk, merged into the landscape in the wake of the plane. Wooded country, wild and sparsely inhabited except for wolves and bears, lay four thousand feet below.
Perez had been, as usual, a delightful traveling companion; the charm of his smile never faded when he addressed Captain Reading, who smiled back at him with squinting gray-blue eyes.
Radin hunched morosely over his controls. He had shaken hands with Reading at the field, but avoided conversation.
Just before the departure Moldenko had found opportunity to tell Reading that Perez’s dispatch case had been concealed in the wing of the big monoplane, to avoid inspection of it by the German customs officers at Königsberg.
The motor began to miss. Reading could not, because of Radin’s bulk, see what he was doing, but he knew that he was manipulating the throttle and preparing to cut the switch. Less than a mile ahead was a level clearing, with plenty of room for an emergency landing and take-off.
Perez feigned a look of alarm and clutched at the sides of his seat as the plane circled downward.
The motor had stopped, and the wings made a swishing sound as they cut through the air in the glide to the ground.
Radin made a perfect dead-stick landing, and crawled down from the pilot’s seat to the ground. He offered his cigarette case to Reading and Perez when they stepped down from the cabin.
“We may as well have a smoke before we see what is wrong with the motor,” he said with a casual air. “I think it is only a fouled spark plug.”
“Thank you,” Reading replied. “I’d be glad to help with the motor.” His right hand was in his coat pocket and it held an automatic.
Perez, slightly behind and to Reading’s right, struck — and as the detective stepped lightly aside, the butt of Perez’s weapon harmlessly bludgeoned the air of western Russia.