Chapter II: Part 2

“Why—I—nothing really,” Dave hesitated. “You see my uncle is in the news service here. He was coming over in the Clipper. He invited me to come along. So here I am. Perhaps it wasn’t quite as simple as all that, but he fixed it up.”

“I see,” the Young Lord murmured.

Did he? Dave doubted that. He made a second start. “You see I’ve had two years in college. Didn’t like it any too well, the class-room part. Oh, math was well enough. In fact I really liked it. But the rest,” he heaved a sigh. “Well, I majored mostly in football, basketball, tennis and golf. So—oo,”

“So they didn’t care much whether you stayed on?”

“I suppose not. Anyway, all the colleges in America have been crammed with fellows who haven’t anything else to do but go to college now,—”

“All that will change fast,” said the Young Lord. “The way things are going over there now those boys are going to have things to do. Ever do any flying?” he asked abruptly.

“Yes—a little—quite a bit in fact. Uncle was a flyer in the World War. Not an ace exactly, but he got to like flying. He’s always had a flying crate or two about, and naturally I had to have a turn at them.”

The Young Lord guessed, and quite shrewdly too, that Dave was being too modest about his flying.

“I’m trying out a new plane tomorrow,” he said slowly. “It’s a two-seater. Want to go up? Just a little sky patrol. Nothing’s likely to happen.”

Dave seemed to see that Tomahawk of the afternoon plunging downward apparently headed for destruction. He wanted to say “no”. For some reason his tongue wouldn’t form the word. So he said:

“Yes. Sure. I’d like to.”

“Righto.” The Young Lord reached for the door of his big old English car. “I’ll be after you in this bus at 10:00 A. M.”

His motor roared. He was away.

“Now why did I say that?” Dave asked himself aloud.

“Say what?” He started. Brand was at his side.

“I promised to go up with Applegate tomorrow.”

“Sayee! That’s corking! Just what I’d like to do! In fact,” Brand’s tone was sober, “I want to join up. Since this afternoon I want to more than ever. Mother objects. Says I’m needed to manage the farm. Says the army needs our butter and fat cattle. This farm! Of course, we love it. All of us do. But when all of England is threatened—when the others are doing their bit—to be tied to the sail! God!” Brand stamped his foot.

“It’s all the way you think, I guess.” Dave laughed lightly. “Well, I’ll be up having a look at your native land from the clouds in the morning. So, goodnight.” Half an hour later, in his bed beneath the rafters of that ancient house, Dave was asking himself: “Why did I come to England?”

The answer seemed simple enough. This war was too big to miss—that is—miss seeing. But why had he persuaded Cherry to go with him to London where bombs were falling? Why had he promised to go up with the Young Lord in the morning? He did not know the answers. All he knew was that he felt like a fly caught in a web. The web did not have a very strong hold on him yet. He could break away if he wished. But did he wish? Not knowing the answer, he fell asleep.

In another corner of that broad upstairs, her door leading into the children’s room ajar, Alice was hearing a shrill childish voice cry:

“You’re a spy, a little lady spy. I’m a frog, a great big black frog. I’m going to swallow you—swallow you right down. Here I come!”

This was followed by a low, half-suppressed exclamation, a giggle, then a loud “Shish.” After that all was silent.

Alice was nearly asleep when suddenly from far overhead there came the roar of powerful motors. London was in for one more beating. Would those terrible bombings never end?

It was with a strange thrill tickling his spine that Dave climbed into the rear of the lord’s two-seater plane the next day. This, he knew, was a fighting plane, his very first. This plane carried a sting in its nose, eight guns capable of firing nearly ten thousand shots per minute.

“Of course,” he thought, “this is broad daylight. Not much chance of picking up an enemy. And yet, there’s yesterday.”

After fastening his safety belt with great care, he waited for the takeoff. It came with a roar. They were in the air. Some ship!

He studied it with great care. It had a dual control. If something happened, just happened to go wrong with the Young Lord, he could bring the ship to earth. He might, in a pinch, do a great deal more. The firing of those guns seemed simple. He had had a great deal more flying experience than he was willing to admit,—at least 200 hours.

Seeming to read his thoughts, Applegate gave a slight squeeze at his firing button. In no uncertain tones the guns spoke. Dave was thrilled to his fingertips.

He began studying the electric switches, the emergency boost, the petrol switch, the air-speed indicator, the directional gyro, the climb indicator, and all the other instruments. A born mechanic, he could study these out one by one, eliminate the ones least needed, then picture himself guiding the ship.

Watching a mirror, studying his face, Applegate nodded in approval to the sky. As they climbed to 10,000 feet Dave saw London in the distance. Smoke hung over it. There had been a bombing, fires started. Homes of simple, honest, hard-working people who had not asked for this war had been destroyed. He hated all that.

White clouds, like distant snowbanks, were drifting through the blue as blue sky.

“Take her for a minute, will you?” The Young Lord spoke in a matter-of-fact voice.

Dave’s hands trembled as he gripped the controls. He kept the ship going on an even keel while his companion, after unstrapping heavy binoculars, studied the sky.

Suddenly Applegate threw out a hand. Swinging it to the right, he directed Dave into a fluffy white cloud.

“That’s it,” he approved. “Now just lurk around in here for a bit.”

With a tickling sensation at the back of his neck Dave “loitered round”. At the same time he was asking himself, “Why did I let myself in for this?”

Twice they came out of the cloud, but on the wrong side. At last, after one more wave of the lord’s hand, Dave headed straight out, on the side from which they had entered.

He caught his breath sharply as, on breaking out into blue sky, he sighted an airplane beneath and beyond them. He trembled as he saw the hated swastika on its tail.

“Will there be a scrap?” he asked himself. Strangely enough he felt quite cool about it. The Young Lord took the controls. The motors roared. This gave Dave time to study land and sky. As near as he could tell the other plane which was slowly circling, was just about over Ramsey Farm. “That’s why Applegate is putting on such speed,” he thought.

Just then, like a squirrel darting for shelter, the enemy plane leapt upward and into a cloud.

“You better!” Applegate growled, at the disappearing enemy.

Only when they were near the cloud did he slacken his speed. Then, like a dog waiting for a squirrel, he loitered about in the sky.

“If the enemy really wished to get away,” Dave thought, “every advantage is with him.” A whole string of clouds was drifting in from the distant sea. Was he glad or sorry? At that moment he could not have told.

After a time, like a dog watching clumps of bushes where a rabbit is hiding, the Young Lord began skirting that long procession of clouds.

They had followed almost to landsend and the shore when suddenly the Young Lord pointed to a black speck against the distant sky. Dave heaved a sigh of relief. Turning about, they headed for the airdrome.

“He was bashful, that Hun,” Applegate laughed into his mouthpiece. “Perhaps he came over to find his pals who paid us a visit yesterday. Sorry to disappoint him. Even the wreck has been carted away.”

“One of his friends is still at large,” Dave suggested. “Might have set up a signal. Black cross cut from the sod would do the trick.”

“That’s right,” Applegate agreed. “Anyway,” he laughed as they began circling for a landing, “we’re back just in time for lunch. It’s cold beef and plum pudding. You’ll stay, I hope.”

“Oh! Sure!” Dave agreed.

His visit to the flying corps’ mess was one not soon to be forgotten. He had read magazine stories of these fighters. Loud, boisterous, wild and a bit coarse, that was how they had been pictured. To his surprise he found them a simple, kindly lot, with manners that would have put many a college group to shame.

“You’ve really got to be up to things to be a-flying in this squadron,” the Young Lord explained. “And in any other, for that matter. Drinking, loud laughs, roughness—well, it doesn’t seem to go with life-and-death flying, that’s all.

“You have to be a man,” he added after a pause. “And a man’s nearly always a gentleman as well.”

_Chapter_ VIII
Roll Out the Barrel

When late that afternoon Dave walked with Cherry to the village to catch the bus to London, he carried a parcel under his arm. “My hiking boots,” he explained. “These hard roads have worn the soles thin.”

“Oh! I’m glad,” Cherry exclaimed. “You are going to like Uncle John. He’s our shoemaker. We call him that though I’m sure he’s really uncle to no one. He’s very old and still does all his work the hard way, by hand. Wonderful work it is, too.”

Dave did like Uncle John. Seated there at his bench, a leather apron on his lap and nails between his teeth, he seemed to have just moved out of a very old story book.

“Do you still make shoes as well as repair them?” Dave asked.

“Oh, yes, now and then.” The old man’s smile was good to see. “I’ve made all the Young Lord’s shoes since he was a baby.

“But then,” he sighed, “times have changed. You can’t get the leather any more. It used to be that I could make a pair of shoes and guarantee them for five years. Those times are gone.

“But perhaps it is best that it should be so,” he added cheerfully. “Nowdays people like change. If you only pay one pound for a pair of shoes, you can afford more than one pair.” Taking a tack from his mouth, he drove it home, then another.

“He lives in two small rooms behind the shop,” Cherry said when they were outside. “His little wife was just like him, always cheerful and kind. She died three years ago.

“Nearly all the people in the village are like that,” she added as they walked on. “The butcher has his stall in front of his home. The baker’s shop is in his basement. So is the grocer’s. Everyone works. All are kindly. They never have much, but they make it do—and are happy.”

Dave was to recall this picture with a sudden pull at his heartstrings in the days that were to come.

The bus came lurching in. They climbed aboard and were away for London.

Arrived in London they hurried up to the radio studio for Cherry’s audition. Singing in a bare studio with a strange accompanist, the girl was far from doing her best. For all that the director gave her a small spot on the “People’s Choice” program at 9:00 P. M.

Once more on the street where shadows had grown long and dark, and people by hundreds were hastening home before the air raid siren sounded, Cherry gripped Dave’s arm as she said in a tragic whisper: “David, I never can stick it out. It will only be a dismal failure.”

“Nonsense!” Dave laughed. “It’s only stage-fright. Come on. My uncle took me to a rare little basement eating place once. They serve good old American coffee and waffles with maple syrup. That will put you on your toes.”

In the quiet of the sub-cellar, they drank great quantities of coffee and ate their waffles joyously.

“I—I guess I’ll make it now,” Cherry murmured. Once more they were on the deserted streets.

Then, as if to crush her high hopes, all hell let loose. The roar of powerful motors, the scream of sirens, the boom and bang of anti-aircraft guns filled all the night with terror.

“I can’t let you in ’ere now,” said a burly guard at the entrance to the broadcasting station. “It is quite impossible. You shouldn’t be ’ere at all.”

“But this lady is to sing over the radio at nine!” Dave protested.

“Can’t be ’elped.” The guard was firm. “Orders is orders. No ladies hallowed in the station during an alarm. If you’d ask me sir, I’d hadvise a subway station at once, sir. Yonder’s one not ’alf a block haway.”

The words were scarcely out of his mouth when there came a low, whining sound, followed by a flash that lit all the sky. Then came a roar fit to burst their eardrums, and a tremendous push that tossed them to the pavement five yards away.

Without a word Dave scrambled to his feet, picked the slight girl up in his arms, dashed half a block, and was down two flights of stairs to the subway station before he fully realized what he was doing.

Seated on the hard floor of the station, with thousands of people all about them, for a full moment they were completely silent. Then Dave began to laugh. Cherry joined in, and the spell was broken.

The laugh over, they looked about them. The whole long platform was filled with people. Young and old, rich and poor, salesgirls in thin, shabby coats, gray-haired ladies in mink and ermine, they all were there. And all, it seemed, were bent on making the best of an unpleasant situation. Bye and bye they would do their best to snatch a little sleep, for tomorrow would be another day.

“Look at them.” There was a catch in Dave’s throat. “They seem almost happy.”

“Yes.” Cherry’s chin went up. “They’re not going to let Hitler get them down. He wouldn’t be pleased if he could see them now!”

In a bright corner four old men were playing cards. In the shadows a shopgirl was whispering to her young man. Sitting on their bedrolls, two sedate matrons were knitting. Children were everywhere, and all of them whooping it up in hilarious fun.

“Excuse me,” said a smiling young lady. “Aren’t you Cherry Ramsey?”

“Why—why yes, I am.” Cherry looked into a pair of eager blue eyes.

“I knew it!” the young lady exclaimed. “I heard you sing at Lady Applegate’s home once. It was truly quite wonderful. Now—” she hesitated, “well, you see, I’m just helping out down here, sort of social service work, don’t you know. And I thought you might not mind, well, you know,”—she hesitated—“well, perhaps you wouldn’t mind singing a song or two for these people. They’d think it quite the berries if you would.”

“Well, that—” Cherry laughed, “that’s what I came to town for, to sing on the radio. But the guard wouldn’t let us go up to the station.”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” Miss Meeks, the social worker murmured. “Listen!” There came a deep, low rumble like the roll of distant thunder. “You can’t help loving these people, don’t you know.” Her tired face brightened as she spread out her arms. “Not one of them knows whether his home will be standing in the morning. But you see how they are.”

“Yes—yes I see.” Cherry swallowed hard.

“The radio,” Miss Meeks murmured. “Now I shouldn’t wonder. Will you sing for them, Miss Ramsey?”

Cherry nodded.

From somewhere a small piano was made to appear. A little Irish girl with a tumbled mass of red hair took her place before it. A small platform—a heavy packing box—was placed beside the piano.

After shedding her heavy coat, Cherry stood before her strange audience. All lovely in gold and blue, she caught their eyes at once. Leaning over, she whispered to the girl at the piano, giving her the name of her first song. The social worker clapped her hands for silence. Deep, appreciative silence followed.

“Miss Ramsey, a friend of Lady Applegate, from Dorset way, will sing to us,” Miss Meeks announced. “Let’s give her a hand.” The applause was tumultuous.

Somehow, a light, not too strong, was made to play on the slender girl as she sang.

“In the gloaming, Oh my darling,
When the lights are dim and low.”

She sang the song through to the end. The applause that followed drowned out the sound of exploding bombs.

“More! More!” came from every corner.

The social worker slid a microphone before the singer. Bending over, a smile on her lips, Cherry once more whispered a title. Then, lifting her voice high, she cried: “Roll out the Barrel! Everybody sing! Let’s make it ring!”

Everybody did sing,—more people than Cherry will ever know, for through the microphone that had been placed before her, Cherry was at last singing on the radio. From end to end of England the song boomed on: “Roll out the Barrel.”

Every platform in the subway had its radio. Station by station they joined in until the whole tube, miles on end, echoed with the song.

“Roll out the barrel! We’ll have a barrel of fun
Roll out the barrel! We’ll put the blues on the run.”

It seemed to Dave as he listened after that song was over, that even the Führer must have heard the applause that followed, heard and shuddered.

Dropping into a mellow mood for the oldsters who recalled that other terrible war, Cherry sang:

“There’s a long, long trail a-winding
Into the land of my dreams,
Where the nightingale is singing
And the white moon beams.”

Then, scarcely pausing for breath, leaning far forward, a bewitching smile on her face, she sang: “No! No! No! Papasista.”

When the roar of applause had died away, Dave heard a gray-haired lady in a Persian lamb coat say:

“Such a vulgar song!”

“Quite,” agreed her mink-coated friend. “Vulgar and wonderful. I quite love this war. It has given me one more chance for a fling at life.”

“All out for England!” Cherry called into the megaphone. “Everybody sing, ‘We’ll roll the old chariot along’.”

They sang. They roared. They sang.

“If Hitler’s in the way, we’ll roll it over him.
If Tubby’s in the way, we’ll roll it over him.
If Il Duce’s in the way, we’ll roll it over him.
If the devil’s in the way, we’ll roll it over him.
We’ll roll the old chariot along
And we won’t tag on behind.”

In the hush that followed, Cherry announced in a low, husky voice: “God save the King.”

There followed a shuffling of feet. Every man, woman and child was on his feet. Even the enemy planes above seemed to hush as the glorious National Anthem rolled over England from Dover to Newcastle.

There were tears in the social service worker’s eyes as she took Cherry’s hand. “You’ll come again, won’t you?” she said in a low voice full of meaning. “Often and often.”

“If—if you need me,” was the quiet reply.

“And you said you couldn’t do it!” Dave laughed happily as he guided her up the stairs and back to their sub-basement for one more cup of good American coffee.

_Chapter_ IX
The Hideout

That night members of that motley subway throng shared their beds with their new-found friends. Dave found a place with a young disabled veteran of the battle of Flanders. They slept on a thin pad and were covered by blankets none too thick. The subway was cold and drafty. For two hours Dave lay there thinking. Those were long, long thoughts. Back to the pictured walls of his mind came the peaceful pastures of Ramsey Farm, the racing planes overhead, the falling bombs, and the drifting parachutes. He rode once more with young Lord Applegate in that two-seater. His blood raced again as they played hide-and-seek with an enemy plane in the clouds. Again he heard the thundering crash of a bomb that had exploded, not, he supposed, more than two blocks from where he and Cherry had stood. What if it had been only one block, or no block at all? He tried to think this last question through, and could not quite make it. Nor could he answer to his complete satisfaction, his second and third questions,—why had he come to England? And why did he not go home? There would be a plane for Lisbon the day after tomorrow. Would he take it? He doubted it. And yet it seemed to him a voice whispered, “It is to this or no other. Think it over.” He did not think. Instead, he fell asleep.

Cherry had been given a welcome by a bright young lady who sold shoes in a great store. This young lady was wondering whether a bomb had scattered her shoes over a city block, and her job with them. In the midst of her chatter Cherry fell sound asleep.

Before they could leave the subway next morning two people were after them.

The manager of the radio station, who the night before had given Cherry such a lukewarm reception, came bustling down the stairs. She, he said, had been “Splendid! Splendid! Quite remarkable indeed! How the people had taken to her! There had been wires, phone calls,—everything. Would she come back at nine that night and sing at the studio? She should have a competent accompanist and every courtesy. Would she come?”

“No.” Cherry favored him with her brightest smile. “I won’t sing in your studio. I can’t sing in a stuffy little box with no one about except a man in a glass case who waves his arms, pretends to cut his own throat with his fingers, points to the tip of his nose, and goes through all manner of other contortions just to tell me what to do.”

All this left the man staring at her, speechless.

“But if,”—Cherry burst into a merry laugh—“if you’ll let me sing on my box with my glorious red-headed Irish girl to tickle the ivories, I’ll come back, not tonight, but very soon, and often.”

“Oh! My dear child!” the manager exploded. “You are generosity itself. But the subway is cold and drafty.”

“No place,” said Cherry, and she did not smile, “can be cold where so many warm hearts are beating as one.”

The man stared at her in speechless silence for a moment. Then he murmured, “May God forgive me if this child is not a genius.”

But here was her mother. She too had heard the broadcast and thought it marvelous. This was her day off. Her small car was just around the corner. She would take them back to Ramsey Farm in time for scrambled eggs, coffee and scones. And she did.

Mrs. Ramsey, David realized at once, was a strong, efficient person, with a will of her own. She directed the affairs of her household as the O. C. directs his squadron. Breakfast over, she called in the entire group to discuss farm affairs. She commended Jock for his fine job of plowing, and the boys for their work in the turnips and Brussels sprout patches.

“England is going to need food,” she declared. “We must all do our best. The nights are growing cold. We may get a freeze at any time, so—oo—”

“So it’s the potatoes next.” Brand gave vent to a good-natured groan. He hated picking up potatoes. Stooping over made his back ache. But theirs was a fine crop, and it must be gathered in.

Jock got out the potato plow. Soon they were all hard at work. David joined in. So too did Alice. Even the “enfants terrible”, Tillie and Peggy, helped a little. They were, however, at their best throwing clods, so in the end they were banished.

The place where the potatoes were stored held for Dave a real fascination.

“We call it the Hideout,” Alice explained, dropping down on a sack of potatoes for a short rest. “It’s as old as the hills. Did you note the moss on the roof?”

“Six inches thick,” Dave agreed. “And look at the walls! Solid masonry!”

“We believe it goes back to Feudal days.” Alice’s eyes took in the one large room, its broad stone fireplace, two narrow windows, and massive beams. “In those days it was a real hideout, I shouldn’t wonder,” she murmured.

“And might be again,” Dave suggested.

“Yes, if the Huns really come,” she agreed. “But they’ll never get this far—England will beat them back even if they swarm in on the shore like the waves of the sea.”

All that day Cherry sat curled up in a great chair before the fire in the farmhouse kitchen. She sometimes slept, sometimes thought soberly, and sometimes dreamed. To this her wise mother offered no objections. Cherry, she realized for the first time, had a great gift. She might, it seemed, be of extraordinary service to all England. She could bring them the spirit of youth, buoy them up, give them courage for the great ordeal that lay ahead.

The potatoes were stored in a narrow, dark underground tunnel that one entered through a door at the back of the Hideout.

“A grand air raid shelter,” suggested Dave.

“Hope we never need it,” Alice replied soberly, “but you never can tell.” Her brow wrinkled. She was thinking of the hole in the ground where an ancient playhouse had once stood. “How about a tramp to the village?” she suggested.

“O. K. by me,” said Dave. “I’ll see if my boots are finished.”

The boots were not finished. But then, boots at the cobbler’s never are—at least, not the first time you call.

“You’ll have to pardon the delay,” the old man apologized. “So many boys from the airdrome have brought in their boots.

“But things will go faster now.” His face brightened. “You see I have a helper.”

For the first time Dave noticed a short, sturdy young man sitting in the corner. He was sewing on a sole and never once looked up.

Dave thought with a start, “He has a vaguely familiar look. But I’ve never seen him before, that’s certain.”

“He does very fine work.” The old man rubbed his hands together. “Very fine indeed.”

Appearing a little disturbed by Dave’s lingering look at the stranger, old John followed him out of the shop to close the door behind him. “He’s quite proper,” he said, jerking a thumb backward toward the shop. “He looks like a German, but he’s a refugee, a Hollander. You understand?”

“Yes,—I”

“His papers are in perfect order. I saw to that you may well believe.” The old man laughed a trifle uncertainly. “Our local magistrate looked over those papers for me,” he went on. “We can’t take chances. But this, you see, is a rare opportunity. I’ve never made any real money, not in all my long life. And now, with all these fliers coming in—”

“Gives you a break,” said Dave. “I wish you lots of luck.” As it turned out, the old man was to need it,—lots and lots of luck.

When the cobbler opened the door to retrace his steps, Flash, the collie, who had come up as a sort of vanguard to Alice, put his nose in at the cobbler’s door, gave a long sniff, then uttered a low growl.

“Well now, I wonder what he means by that?” Dave thought as he hurried away to join Alice.

That night, after the others had retired, Mrs. Ramsey, Dave and Brand sat for a long time silently watching the fading glow of the wood fire.

“Mother,” Brand said suddenly, “I’d like to join the Royal Air Force.”

“Oh! No!” The mother’s words came short and quick. “You are needed here. Besides, there’s little enough for our aviators to do now. After the beating up we gave them, the Jerries, as you call them, are only coming over at night. You can’t find them at night. That’s work for the anti-aircraft batteries.”

“I’m not so sure of that,” Brand murmured beneath his breath. “But mother,” his voice rose, “the Huns may come over, a million of them, by air and sea, perhaps tomorrow. We must be prepared!”

“And we must be fed,” his mother replied quietly. “Perhaps later—” She did not finish. She knew a great deal about war, did the brave-hearted English mother.

“Wars,” said David, speaking before he thought, “are wrong. There should be no wars.”

Instantly the woman’s slow, steady gaze was upon him. “She’s angry with me,” he thought. His lips were parted for the words, “I’m sorry.”

But she spoke first. “You are exactly right, David. Wars are terrible. I should know. Wars have cost me those I loved far more than life. Now another war may cost me my son, and perhaps my daughters.

“Some of us,” she went on, “did what we could to prevent this war. We failed. Why? Perhaps none of us will ever know for sure.

“However,” her voice was steady and sure, “we have a war. We have no choice but to fight it. We must fight or be enslaved. Our enemy has left no room for doubt there. England has always been free.”

After that for some time, save for the slow, steady tick—tock—tick—tock of the dependable old English clock in the corner, there was silence in the great room.

Later, as they stood outside beneath the stars, Brand told Dave that for more than a year the Young Lord had been training him, teaching him how to become a fighter. “And he’s a real fighter himself, you may be sure of that.” His voice was low and strong. “He’s no braggart like some of those flying Huns. He has a real record all the same. He flew in France during the Blitzkrieg. Sometimes it was ten Messerschmitts to his one Hurricane. He got two of them. That was just one time. There were many others. You just wait!” His voice rose sharply. “I’ll be right up there beside him in a Tomahawk one of these days!”

Would he? Dave wondered.

_Chapter_ X
First Blood

Next day, just after lunch, feeling very much like a small boy slipping away to go fishing, Dave made his way toward the airdrome. He wanted, he told himself, to study a Spitfire. He had seen that one in action over the farm on the day of that air battle. It had fascinated him. Truth was, he hoped to run across the Young Lord and perhaps to be invited for one more ride in that two-seater. There was, he realized, a slight element of danger in such an excursion, just enough to give it tang, like a frosty morning.

He was not to be disappointed. Lieutenant Applegate was just having the machine rolled out.

“Greetings!” he cried. “Just in time! But then,” his voice changed. “I must not tempt you too much. This, you will understand, is our life. It is easy to ask too much of one who is not in on the great game.”

“I’ll be glad to go up again,” Dave said quietly. “To tell you the truth, that’s what I had hoped to do.”

“Righto! Climb in!” Applegate exclaimed. “You see,” he added, “we’re just giving this ship a tryout. Perhaps after we’ve done a stretch of patrol, we’ll ask the ground crew to run up a sky target and I’ll let you have a try at it with a few bursts of machine gun fire.”

“Oh!” Dave caught his breath sharply. But if he had known!

“We’ve always got more men than ships,” Applegate went on. “So if two men in a ship like this, by dividing the things to worry about, like dials, controls, gun-sights and all, can accomplish more than one, why then, that’s the berries. What say? Shall we be away?”

Dave nodded. Then they were off and away into the blue.

As on that other day, the sky was magnificent—bright blue, with clouds like huge cotton balls floating through it. Dave could not recall a moment in his life he had enjoyed so much. There was the thrill of speeding through space at three hundred and better miles an hour, and of looking down upon a world that was entirely new to him. Added to this—a real dash of red pepper—was the possibility that they might—just might bump into an enemy craft. Did he wish the last? He could not tell. Flying was strange. It was like a game, basketball or football—you went into it cold. As your blood warmed, a certain reckless daring came over you. You didn’t will it, perhaps did not, in your sober moments, so much as want it. It was there, and for the time being you could but yield to its urge.

Today it was just like that. Now diving into a fleecy cloud, they were lost to the entire world. But not for long. Like a dove flying from a cloud in a picture postcard, they glided once more into the bright sunshine.

Little patches and squares, forests, fields, homesteads, lovely villages all lay beneath them.

Seized with a sudden impulse, Dave spoke hoarsely into his mouthpiece: “Let me take her for a minute.” Ten seconds later he was working the joystick and Applegate, like an old lady in a wheelchair, was lolling back in his place.

But not for long. Suddenly Applegate straightened up, shaded his eyes, stared straight ahead, reached for his field glass, looked again, then said in a cheerful voice:

“See that long white cloud over to the left?”

“Ye—yes.” Dave’s heart pounded, he scarcely knew why.

“Swing over into it, then stay in it, going straight down it toward the channel. It must be all of four miles long. I—I rather smell a Hun.”

Dave obeyed instructions. The world was again lost to view.

Their journey along that cloud could scarcely have lasted two minutes, but to Dave that seemed a long, long hour. What was beyond the other end of the cloud? Something, he was sure. Did it mean a fight? He hadn’t counted on that. This was not his war. Was he sorry? He did not know. The ways of a human mind are past finding out.

Then, as if their plane had given a sudden leap, they were out of the cloud. And there, off a little to the right, was a dark spot against the blue of the sky.

The Lieutenant made one gesture, a stiff arm, pointing. That was all.

They were a full ten minutes coming within striking distance of that large plane. Every second of that exciting race Dave expected his companion to take over his controls, and all the time he remained silent, impassive.

At last, in a calm, even tone, he spoke: “That’s a Dornier. London took a terrific beating last night. Many women and children were killed or injured. That Dornier’s been taking pictures so they can find fresh spots to bomb. His pictures must not reach Allemond. We must get him.” His words were like rasping steel. Even then he did not take the controls.

A strange, cold wrath took possession of Dave’s entire being. “Women and children killed and injured.” He did not want the Young Lord to take the controls. And he knew what was to be done. He wanted to do it, at all risks.

Dropping a little below the flying level of the Dornier, he added a little speed, then streaked straight on. His heart was pounding, but his head was clear. At last, having risen to the attack, they were within striking distance.

“It’s football,” he was thinking calmly. “That Dornier’s got the ball. But in the end, it’ll be thrown for a loss.”

Even as he thought this, the Dornier banked sharply to soar away to the left. At the same time the air was ripped,—rat—rat—rat. The side shots from the Dornier went wild.

Once again they were after the foe. Once more they were all but upon the enemy’s tail when he swung sharply to the left. From the Dornier’s side came a wild burst of gunfire.

“Wasting his slugs,” Applegate exulted. “Keep right after him.” His hand was on the firing button. One push and eight guns would spray death, nearly ten thousand shots a minute. He could wait. It took just ten seconds when everything was right.

On the tip of Dave’s tongue were the words; “Here, take the controls.” He did not say them. His tongue would not waggle that way.

The Dornier took a nose-dive. When he came out of it the two-seater was with him. He tried climbing. No use. They could outclimb him, two to one.

Once again he straightened out, then curved to the right.

Recalling how so very often a football runner will repeat a pattern, a dash to the right, one to left, then straight ahead, Dave worked out a plan. Would it succeed? Only time, a terribly short time, could tell.

True to his pattern the Dornier pilot banked first right, then left, and after that went into a power dive.

Measuring this dive with greatest accuracy, Dave managed to come out of his own dive just in time to glide squarely up on the enemy’s tail.

Squinting through his sight, the Lieutenant gripped his gun control and waited. Dave found himself counting, “One—two—three.” Then came a sudden burst of sound that all but startled him into a tail spin.

Regaining his control, he shot heavenward.

The Dornier had received a ten-second burst of gunfire, hundreds of slugs, straight down her pencil-like fuselage. What would be the result? They must wait and see.

The Dornier lost its steady, straight onward flight. It began to smoke, then to lose altitude. Just then it went into a cloud.

“Dumb!” said Harmon.

Fearlessly Dave drove into that cloud. It was a long one. A full minute passed, another, and they were out.

Beyond them now was all clear, blue sky. There was no spot against that patch of blue.

The Young Lord took the controls. They spiralled downward toward the sea. At last they were beneath the cloud. There was nothing hiding there. But on the surface of the sea was a white spot. It was not foam. There were no white-caps.

“Good!” exclaimed the Young Lord. “We’ll head for home. If we hurry a bit we’ll be in time for tea.” And they were.

“We got that Dornier right enough,” the Young Lord whispered the minute they were on solid ground again. “But not a word about this! It’s frightfully irregular, I’m afraid.”

“I’m sure it is,” Dave agreed.

“And after all, it’s not your war,” his companion added.

“No. Of course not,” Dave agreed. “It’s not my war.” For the first time in his life those words seemed a bit strange.

At headquarters Dave asked for coffee and got it, good coffee served by a bright faced English girl.

He had just taken his first swallow when two young men entered. At once the Young Lord was on his feet.

The slim, dark-eyed one of the new arrivals said: “As you were.” At once tension relaxed.

“Commander Knox,” said the Young Lord, “I want you to meet my friend Dave Barnes from America. He thinks he can fly.” He grinned slyly.

“All Americans think that.” The Squad Commander chuckled. “Didn’t you ever notice that?”

“Yes—yes I have,” the Young Lord agreed. “And mostly they can’t. But this chap,”—he gave Dave a quick grin—“I shouldn’t wonder if he could fly. Oh, just the least little bit.”

“You wouldn’t be spoofing us?” said the red-headed companion of the Commander. He was grinning broadly.

“No one could spoof you!” the Young Lord laughed. “You’ve already been spoofed.”

“Dave,” he said, turning to his companion, “meet the singing murderer. We call him the Lark because he sings as he flies. You should hear him roaring away! He sings ‘On the Road to Mandalay’ while he swoops down on the tail of some unsuspecting Messerschmitt and blasts him from the sky.”

“That,” said the Lark without smiling, “may be a joke. It works for all that. I learned the trick when I was a boy fishing for salmon in Scotland. If I could whistle, carrying a tune, while I was landing a big one, I’d not get excited and I’d land my fish. It’s the same with the sky fighting. If you can carry a tune in the thick of it—”

“If you can,” laughed Dave, “then I’ll say you’re good!”

“He’s right as he possibly can be,” said the Commander.

“The good old Leader of Squadron 73 over in France used to say: ‘Boys, you may have as many good points as you like, but two are absolutely necessary: courage that will stick, and an unfailing sense of humor. Nothing keeps up a fellow’s sense of humor better than a song.’

“Guess we’ll have to toddle along.” The Commander moved away. “Good to have met you, Barnes. If you can really fly, and I must say you do look the part, we’ll sign you up just any time you say.” At that he and the Lark vanished through the swinging doors.

As Dave stared after them, awed respect was registered in his eyes. “So he was with Squadron 73!” he murmured.

“Sure was.” Applegate beamed. “In France, all the way, right through the Blitzkrieg. That was the fightingest aggregation that ever flew in formation. They shot down more than a hundred planes for sure, and sent a likely hundred more limping home.”

“How many came back to tell the story?” Dave was visibly impressed.

“Nearly all,” was the reply. “I think they lost two commissioned and two non-commissioned officers. That was all.”

“Sayee!” Dave murmured. “Air fighting is almost as safe as football!”

“Absolutely,” his companion agreed. “Providing you know your stuff and have been born in the air.”

“And that,” Dave thought, as he started for home some little time later, “is how I keep out of this man’s war. I’d better look up the plane schedule to Lisbon tomorrow.” But would he?

_Chapter_ XI
Cobbler or Spy?

Dave walked toward Ramsey Farm in a thoughtful mood. Always for him, in the past, the ability to do a thing well had meant a clear track ahead. “But now,” he whispered, stopping stock still in the road to think. With the Young Lord’s help he had accomplished something that in this war-shattered land seemed rather more than well worth doing.

There was nothing startling about the part he had played. Back in America his uncle, a World War ace, had put him through his paces, that was all. In a staunch old two-seater they had banked, rolled, power dived and looped the loop until he really knew how. What fun it had been! He had not thought of it as preparation for anything. Yet today, when the test came, he was prepared. Yes, the ability to do a thing had always meant “Go ahead.”

“I could do it all again,” he assured himself as he thought of the day’s adventure.

For a moment more he stood there looking at the blue sky, white clouds, and gay autumn leaves that were England at her best. “This is England,” he whispered, “Bit by bit it is being destroyed by one man’s hate and lust for power.”

“Damn!” he swore softly. Then he hurried on.

He decided to take the long way home, the road that ran through Warmington. “Shoemakers,” he thought, “always have your work finished the second time, never the first. My boots will be done.”

“Here you are, sir,” said old John, handing out a neat package and taking the pay. “I ’opes you find them satisfactory, sir.”

“Oh, I shall, I am sure,” Dave said absent-mindedly. He was not thinking of the boots. His eyes were once more upon the young cobbler in the far corner. As before, his face hidden, he was bent low over his work.

“I ’opes you’ve ’ad a pleasant afternoon,” said old John.

“Oh! Very!” said Dave.

“If he only knew,” he murmured with a low laugh after he had left the shop.

Across the street was the village Pub. Its sign proclaimed it to be Ye Old Angel Inn. How long did an angel have to live in order to be considered really old, Dave asked himself whimsically. He had thought of angels as being ageless. Perhaps there weren’t any angels after all. He had once seen a picture of a French war plane going down in flames, and of two angels waiting, with hands crossed, to catch the unhappy pilot as he fell. “Shall I ever be in need of two angels?” he asked himself dreamily.

He crossed the street to enter Ye Old Angel Inn. He liked these English Pubs. They were village clubs. There was about them a pleasant aroma of beef roasting over an open fire, of hot toddy and strange English tobacco. He could, he thought, stand for one more cup of coffee. The weather had suddenly turned cloudy, damp and cold.

The coffee was good. He lingered over it, then ordered a second cup.

As he sat there he heard voices. Two villagers sat at a table in the corner drinking hot toddy.

“I’m tellin’ ye now, James,” one voice rose sharply, “’e’s nothin’ more nor less than a bloomin’ Jerry. ’E’s a spy, that ’e is.”

“Aw now, Danny,” the other admonished, “you know what old John told you ’e is. ’E’s ’Ollander, no more, nor no less. ’Is papers they is all in horder.”

“I know. I know,” Danny agreed petulantly. “But that don’t make it so. You know as well as I know ’ow easy as nothin’ it is fer a Jerry to git papers fixed to suit ’is own self.

“Now look, Jimmy.” Danny’s voice dropped. “Ye mind the last war. There were our castle, Warmington Castle, as fine an hedifice as there be in all Hengland. An’ what ’appens? Ramsey, over at the farm, ’e ’ires ’imself a Jerry, a prisoner of war ’e was. ’e treats ’im like a long-lost brother, Ramsey does. An’ what ’appens? I asks you, what ’appens?”

“It weren’t never proved that it were this Jerry that signaled to the bloomin’ airplane that come over an’ blasted the castle,” James protested.

“I know—I know. But who would doubt it?”

And so the argument ended. Dave finished his coffee, then wandered out into the chill of falling night. Danny and James had given him fresh food for serious thought.

Cherry was booked for a return to her subway studio on the following evening. Dave spent the greater part of that day teaching her a new song. He knew the tune and could pick it out for her on the piano. By great good fortune he found the words written out in longhand on a scrap of paper in his Sunday clothes.

“It’s not a new song,” he told her. “In fact, it’s more than twenty years old. An orchestra leader named Orrin Tucker dug it out of the file and gave it to his little five-foot singing doll named Bonnie Baker. It’s gone across America like a Nebraska cyclone. This is it:

“Oh! Johnny! Oh! Johnny!
How you can love!
Oh! Johnny! Oh! Johnny!
Heavens above.”

“Catchy,” said Cherry, beginning to hum it.

Catchy was right, and Cherry was the one person in all the world to set England on fire with it.

That night in the chill damp of the subway, she sang it over and over. Next day in the airdromes and factories, barracks, schools, stores and on the street, one might hear: “Oh! Johnny! Oh! Johnny!”

The song was made. So too was Cherry. In the days that followed she was to become the sweetheart of all England. Newspapers were to print her picture in color. These pictures were to appear on the rough board walls of cantonments all over England, and in the cabins of boats, large and small, sailing the dangerous North Sea.

She was to be taken up by the nobility. Lady Perkins, a friend of the Young Lord, who lived in London, was to make her a part of her household, with privilege of coming and going as she pleased.

Only now and then did she sleep with some working girls in the subway. Most nights after the “all clear” had sounded, she sped away to creep beneath downy covers in a wing of Lady Perkins’ mammoth old home.

“It’s not that I crave magnificence,” she confided to Dave, “It’s just that I must have rest. It—well, you see—it all must seem so simple and easy, my singing. And it truly is, but,”—she heaved a sigh—“when it’s all over, I’m a rag.”

“I know,” Dave agreed. “It’s always that way. The thing you do with apparent ease because you have yourself under perfect carefree control, is just the thing that takes it out of you.”

By himself later, Dave recalled words of a great old poem:

“If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
And walk with kings, nor lose the common touch,—”

“That,” he told himself, “is just what Cherry can do. And nothing can ever spoil her.”

If he had quoted from that same poem:

“If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same,—”

he would have been telling Cherry’s fortune, for Cherry was to meet with both Triumph and Disaster.

_Chapter_ XII
“The House Is Gone”

It happened, or shall we say began, on a Sunday night. During the many days previous to this, things had picked up little by little in Cherry’s subway radio studio. One evening the little Irish girl who played the piano had brought in a young fellow with a shabby violin case under his arm. “Can you play it?” Cherry asked.

“A little,” was the modest reply.

The young fellow, who had gone through all the horrors of the Battle of Flanders and Dunkirk, was Scotch. He could do weird things with that violin. With it alone he could make you believe that a score or more of bagpipers were marching down the street. And when it came to that mellow old Scotch song:

“Flow gently, Sweet Afton
Among thy green braes
Flow gently. I’ll sing thee
A song in thy praise.”

he could bring a happy tear to many a tired eye. So he was given a place on the program, and weary Cherry sang a little less than before.

Other musicians wandered in. Where they all came from no one will ever know. Next there came a cellist, then a drummer, two bass viols, two clarinets, two more violins, a gypsy girl with tambourine and castanets,—all these and half a dozen others wandered in. After that they had an orchestra. There was not an “artist” in the hard and fast meaning of the word among them all, but they could roll the barrel, set Johnny loving, swing the chariot low, roll the old chariot along, and do a hundred other songs dear to the hearts of the good common people of old England and to many another who did not consider himself quite so common.

All this gave Cherry a breathing spell now and then. But when the members of the orchestra had each done his bit for just so long, there would come calls from all down the subway:

“Cherry! Cherry! We want Cherry! We want the Singin’ Angel.”

The Singin’ Angel, that is what they came at last to call her. That was because of Sunday nights, for on that night they left the Old Chariot at home, put lovin’ Johnny to bed early, rolled the barrel far back in the corner, and pushed “The Old Rugged Cross” right out in front.

No one seemed to mind. Indeed they appeared to love that hour of the week best of all. In times such as this people cling to their religion. One moment “Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me” would go rolling on and on from end to end of the subway.

Some one in the orchestra would start “Throw Out The Lifeline to danger frought men.”

Then Cherry in her strong young voice would sing:

“When all my trials and troubles are o’er
And I am safe on that beautiful shore
That will be glory, be glory for me.”

“Now!” she would cry. “Everybody sing!”

“Oh! That will be glory for me,
Glory for me, glory for me.”

Yes, religion seemed very real on these Sunday nights. On this particular night, it was midnight when Cherry reached Lady Perkins’ home. She remembered it afterward, for at that very moment Big Ben was gloriously booming the hour of twelve.

She had walked home alone. It was not far. She let herself in with her latchkey. The “all clear” had sounded, so, feeling weary and happy all in one, she stretched out on her bed fully dressed, and fell asleep.