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Table of Contents | Complete Story

III

IN Portland, thousands shared this concern. The modern newspaper works fast. A few minutes after the light on Mount Hood, an edition was on the streets telling about it. The raucous chorus came from the newsboys:

"Morning p-a-per! Illumination of Mount Hood. Boys lost on Shasta! Oregonian p-a-per! Paper, mister? "

The account read as follows:

"The most unique Fourth of July event ever staged in Oregon and probably the whole nation was the illumination of Mount Hood. Precisely at ten P. M., the time appointed, a bright red light shone way up in the sky above the eastern horizon. It lasted for fifty-five seconds and was greeted with cheers from the thousands congregated on the bridges, wharves, roofs and the hills back of town, and with vigorous and long-continued whistles from the vessels in the harbor.

"But what has happened to the boys that climbed Mount Shasta to illuminate it in a similar manner?

"Three pigeons have returned to the cote of Forest Examiner James McDuff. Two of these are from Mount Hood, where we know the boys are safe. The one from Mount Shasta was turned loose at 8:30 A. M. and reached Portland at 12:30 A. M., making the two hundred and fifty miles in four hours. It brought this abbreviated message: 'Jly 4, 81/2 A. M. 1/2way up slope from timber line. Evrybdy O. K. Pel. Patrol.'

"The second pigeon was to be released as soon as the patrol reached the summit. Why hasn't it arrived? What has happened to the boy climbers of Shasta?"