Before ten o’clock the next morning, Andy, with the savage-looking Ba rowing the little Red Bird, had been to the Leighton cottage on Goat Creek, and was back with the model of the bird-tail guide and a box of special metal-working tools. By noon the projected aeroplane was under way.

While daylight lasted, Captain Anderson and his assistant applied themselves to selecting timber, roughing out the frame of the flying machine, with frequent conferences. From Andy’s handbook, dimensions were readily secured, and that evening a working sketch of the car was made.

The following morning, Andy began a search for batteries. Those found at his uncle’s cottage were practically exhausted. There was much that the boy would have to do at the forge in his uncle’s shop in the way of metal work, but he was anxious that the batteries should be secured to test the engine.
 
“We’ll have to get cloth, too, for covering the planes. We ought to have balloon silk, but that is out of the question. Good muslin will do—we’ll waterproof it—I know how—alum and sugar of lead, equal parts in warm water—”

“I’m afraid we haven’t muslin enough,” interrupted the captain.

“Certainly not,” exclaimed the boy, “nor alum, nor sugar of lead, nor batteries. So I’ll go to Melbourne this afternoon and get ’em—it’s only eight miles. I can be back this evening—”

“There’s a nice breeze,” volunteered the captain, “and it’s abeam. We’ll have Ba sail the Valkaria, and you can take your mother and Mrs. Anderson.”

“Won’t you come along?” asked the boy, overjoyed, but feeling a little guilty.

“When I get set on a job,” answered the industrious captain, “I like to keep agoin’. I ain’t goin’ to let this one get cold on my hands. We’ve got to have those things, so hurry along and get ’em.”

By one o’clock, the supply expedition set sail, with a long list of needed material. In a half hour, Mrs. Anderson and Mrs. Leighton being[88] comfortably busy with their fancy work well up in the bow, Andy found opportunity to interview the mysterious Ba.

“Ba,” he began, “didn’t you like it over there in the Bahamas?”

“Didn’ Ah like it? Ah liked it all right in de big town—Ah liked it in Nassau, but dey ain’t gwine ’low me stay dar.”

“Why not?”

“’Case I done had my trial.”

“What did you do?”

“Me? Ah don’ do nuthin’. Me an’ Robert was in de sisal fiel’ and dar was de machete. Dis Robert he done say de machete was hissen. An’ I done rutch ober and tuck it to gib it to him. An’ Robert he riz up an’ cut hissef on de neck. Ah don’ do nuthin’.”

“Then what?” urged the interested boy.

“De big judge he jes look at me, an’ den dey put me in de jail.”

“And you served your term?”

“Ah don’ know nothin’ ’bout dat. But Ah pushed de bars out an’ Ah comed away.”

“Didn’t you have a home?” asked Andy.

Ba shook his head, and his eyes widened.

“I ain’t gwine back to no out islands.”

“Out islands?” repeated Andy. “What are they?”

[89]

But Ba made no answer. He looked at the boy with narrowed eyes, and then gave his attention to the flying boat. After a few moments, still ignoring the boy’s question, the strange black man, without facing Andy and in a new tone, said in a low voice:

“You ain’t nebber gwine on dat Timbado Key, is you?”

“Timbado Key?” asked Andy. “Where’s that?”

The slow-spoken Bahaman made no answer.

“Was that your home?” suggested the lad.

Again there was no immediate reply. Then, suddenly, in a whisper, the black said:

“Dat’s fetich. You ain’t gwine dar?”

The boy nodded his head reassuringly. He knew what “fetich” meant—the African’s sign of ill-omen. Alarmed over a fetich! Finally he went forward and asked Mrs. Anderson what she knew about the blacks of the Bahamas.

She told him that they were mostly descended from real Africans; that, in the days when slave stealing was being practised, it was the custom when slavers were caught by English or American men-of-war, to liberate the victims on the tropic Bahamas.

“There may be old men there now,” she[90] said, “who were born in the wilds of Africa. And the second and third generation are not much more civilized. Ba is probably almost as much African as if he were living in the Congo,” she concluded.

“Where is Timbado Key?” asked Andy.

Mrs. Anderson shook her head. “All the Bahama Islands, except Providence, are ‘out islands.’ This must be one of the smaller ‘out islands.’ I never heard of it.”

When the boy returned to the stern he again attempted to learn from Ba why Timbado was fetich, and where it was. But there was only blankness on the boatman’s immobile face. In a short time, Andy was to know a great deal about Timbado Key, but for the time he had to restrain his curiosity.

In Melbourne, Andy was greeted by a clerk from the general store. He had a message received by telephone from Captain Anderson. In addition to the things the boy was to get, there was a new list, which included more straight-grained and knotless pine.

The rather delicate question of who was to pay for the needed material might have embarrassed the boy and his mother had not Captain Anderson made it easy by assuming half the[91] expense as a partner and insisting on paying for the other half until Mr. Leighton could send a check for it.

The aeroplane architects were most anxious to secure a quantity of No. 12 piano wire for bracing the aeroplane, but as there was none available, Andy took an entire roll of the same size in plain steel. The next anxiety was that they might not be able to find needed turn-buckles for tightening the bracing wires. The store had a few—a little larger than absolutely necessary—and the town boatmaker had, fortunately, enough more to fill out Andy’s list.

He searched the town for shoemake............