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Because the Oro Grande Mining Company, which ships gold
on buses, is being crippled by robberies, Stony Brooke parachutes from a
small plane onto the bus route and saves it from being robbed, aided by
his fellow Mesquiteers, Tucson Smith and Lullaby Joslin. After the
Mesquiteers get a badly needed $1,000 reward for their work, Stony
convinces mining company president Frank Harmon to hire pilot Ned Hoyt
to transport his gold, and puts up the reward for half-interest in the
venture. Stony suggests to Ned that he buy a bigger plane to ship
passengers as well as cargo, but Ned is reluctant as he once lost his
pilot's license for a year and changed his name to keep his identity a
secret. Stony then suggests to the townspeople, who are "cattle
poor," that they buy into the new airline, using their cattle as
collateral.
Soon they hire a second pilot, Bob Whitney, who knows
that Ned and his sister Beth's real family name is Vincent, but keeps
their secret out of friendship. Radio operator Joe Waddell, a
former flyer who lost his nerve six years previously, wants to co-pilot
with Ned, and is jealous when Ned instead chooses Bob. Mullins,
who heads the bus company, then approaches Joe with an idea, and shortly
thereafter a cattle train is held up. One of the cattlemen, though
wounded, rides to the airfield and tells the Mesquiteers, who ride to
the train in time to save the cattle.
Soon the "air express" opens to great success. One
day, on the bus, Mullins overhears two men talking about Ned after
seeing his name in the paper. A short time later, the same two men
hold up the passengers on the plane and kill Bob. Though Joe
receives the distress message, he does nothing, but when Stony and Beth
see parachutes mysteriously floating in the sky, they rush to the
airport. Because Ned has emptied the fuel tank, the two killers
need him to land, but the plane does not come back to the airport and
soon everyone in the territory knows that a $100,000 gold shipment is
missing. When word breaks that Ned had once been in prison, he
becomes the prime suspect in the robbery. After the two killers
secretly radio Joe, Joe informs Mullins, but Mullins refuses to let Joe
go to them.
Meanwhile, Stony, who thinks that the robbery is an
inside job, questions the passengers, who were forced to parachute from
the plane, and learns that just after the robbery, Ned had called Joe on
the radio. The Mesquiteers then tie Joe up and trick the killers
when Lullaby disguises his voice like Joe's on the radio and asks their
location. Then, while the Mesquiteers ride to the plane, Beth
finds Joe, who tells her he has been robbed. While she tries to
call the sheriff, Joe cuts the telephone lines, then goes to warn
Mullins.
At the plane site, the Mesquiteers overpower the killers
and attempt to leave, but are soon met by Mullins and his gang.
Stony makes a break for their horses, and the Mesquiteers take the gold,
but Ned is wounded. Soon, with the aid of smoke bombs, the
Mesquiteers defeat Mullins and his gang just as the sheriff, who found
Beth at the airport, comes to arrest them. Finally, with the
mystery of the robberies solved, a recovered Ned flies off to merge with
another airline. |
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