"Huh, huh, sir?" Dawson gasped out. "You mean--? Holy smokes! A _second_ time?"
"The second time, Dawson," Colonel Welsh said gravely, and placed the twice bullet-battered pilot"s wings into their owner"s hands. "For the second time they saved your life. Frankly, I"ll never tell this story to anybody else because n.o.body else would believe it. But it"s true. And there you are. A war souvenir you couldn"t duplicate, not even if you lived to be a billion."
The colonel said some more words, but Dawson was only half listening. He was staring at his bullet-battered wings, and living over in memory all those terrible hours when his chest had been filled with searing flame.
Then presently his vision blurred, and without realizing it he slipped off into blissful, contented sleep. And Freddy Farmer and Colonel Welsh smiled down at his peaceful face, and slipped silently out of the cruiser"s sick-bay.
---- THE END ----
_A Page from_
DAVE DAWSON AT CASABLANCA
For the umpty-umph time Dawson checked his position and made absolutely sure that he was where he was supposed to be. And for the umpty-umph time countless fears shot through his brain to taunt him and jeer at him. He wasn"t at the agreed rendezvous. His navigation was all c.o.c.keyed. He was a hundred miles north of the point. He was a hundred miles south. He was--
"Cut it out, fellow, cut it out!" he rasped aloud at himself. "This is a fine time for you to go haywire! You simply got here ahead of time. Your watch tells you that, sap. Freddy was held up, that"s all. Maybe he ran into a bit of weather, or something. Maybe--"
Or something? But just exactly _what_? That was the question. Freddy Farmer could fly through the toughest weather made. He was that kind of a pilot. It was crazy to say that weather had held up Freddy. No. It was something else, not weather. But what? _But what?_ Why wasn"t Freddy Farmer here?
Dawson groaned, and shook his head as though to drive away the tantalizing thoughts. But that didn"t do any good. He started stunting his plane all over the empty sky to take his mind off his thoughts. But that didn"t do any