Evening star., 1938-07-03
Hiuh in the thin air above the
Andes man played for his lite
A ONE-PAGE STORY

The man with the heavy countenance
snapped, You will do as tell you?"
Sure" said Bill. Think want bullet
in my head?"
saw the steward sway back along the aisle.
He collapsed in seat. The three passengers
remained standing behind us. As we banked
and headed east, my heart banged. Bill said
to me:
They must have pulled the old stunt
Those other five reservations were fakes, just
50 these three mugs could have the plane to
themselves.
ANY idea who they are?" asked, and my
voice wasn't very steady
mo. They probably robbed bank or
something at Barranquilla. and they're using
US for the getaway. Chances are that when we
land and they don't need us any more, they'll
pump bullets into our heads = so we can't
fly back and report where we dropped them,
Nice going. hey, kid?'
must have looked as scared as | felt.
yeah, nice" said huskily. What - whatn
we do?"
He didn't reply for fully five minutes. We
droned on over the mountains Then he grated,
Watch this, kid Hang on to your seat and
watch"
Before realized what he had in mind, he
lifted the planes nose toward the clouds. 1t
was so sudden change of direction that it
almost broke my neck; so steep and crazy
climb that fell back and yelled.
Behind me there were shrieks. A gun
cracked, and something changed on metal over
my head looked around to see the three
passengers tumbling down the aisle as if they
were diving into well And beside me Bill
sat grinning savagely.
Steward all right" he asked.
strapped in his seat!'
Good Hold your hat. kid. Here we go
again.
The plane abruptly nosed over and went
down in roaring power dive that was almost
vertical. Still gaping back. saw the three
passengers poured down the length of the
aisle. They crashed behind us in a wild, con-
fused heap They'd lost the automatics. All
you saw were waving arms and legs.
Before they could even begin to rise, Bill
Hornay repeated the performance. He did it
again and again. the plane rising up and
plunging down like a porpoise. Within two
minutes the men lay bruised and unconscious,
one bleeding pretty freely.
Holy smokes" gasped, regaining my
breath. What the ="
That's that" Bill said. levelling off. He
pointed the planes nose back to our normal
route for Bogota Take her, kid. I'll go back
and tie up those mugs with safety belts"
When we landed at Bogota for twenty
minute stop we discovered the three men
weren't bank robbers or anything of the kind.
The airport officials recognized them at once
- with great deal of excited, and wild-eyed
yammering They were, we learned, the lead
ers of the Maracca revolutionary party.
Emilio Maracca himself, who wanted to be
Dictator, was among them - the muscular
one who had given us orders to head for Lake
Antilla And by delivering them to the
authorities we had, it seemed, cut the heart
out of an insurection that was to have begun
in two days.
Boy" said to Bill Hornay when we
flew on for Guayaquil, you'll get medal or
something for this!'
But all he got was cablegram. 1t was wait
ing for him when we returned to Barranquilla.
Bill stood staring at it with stunned eyes.
He must have read it half dozen times
before he finallv naSsed II on to me He didn't