Page:The Night Born (London,1913).djvu/152
WINGED BLACKMAIL
sage, "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
138