Dad turned to Kiwi. “Kiwi, you had better look up Bert and go back to the hangar with him.”
Kiwi’s face fell. Plainly disappointed, he nodded his head and disappeared into the darkness toward the place where Bert’s car had been parked.
The crowd thinned with the usual remark that this was another false alarm.
As suddenly as it had started, the rain stopped.
Jack, who had expected these local showers, said he thought it would clear up soon. Not long after, a faint, gray light appeared in the east, telling of the approach of a new day.
The Skipper was impatient to get away. He told Billings to take the cover off the engine, and he and Jack made a last examination of the whole plane. They looked at the shock absorbers, noting that with the heavy load there was very little play left in them. The Skipper said, however, that there was enough.
By this time Billings was ready to start the motor. Before the eyes of the small group who had waited through the rain, Jack and the Skipper got into their flying suits.
The big moment had come.
In the excitement of the last minute preparations Kiwi had been missed, and although Dad asked several of the men about the plane if he had been seen, there were conflicting rumors. Some thought he had gone back to the hangars; others were not sure but that he had found shelter in one of the cars.
