“Good pilot you mean,” spoke up one.
“Pilot nothing, up in that buggy blanket you didn’t know your prop from your tail; whether you were going or coming, upside down or right. Rotten piece of piloting gunning into a flock like that.”
“I did not go gunning into them. The things came along so thick I couldn’t get out of them. They got all over the plane and plastered everything, look at it, even my goggles are covered with them. I got you down without a smashup, didn’t I? You can thank me that you’re not hash—”
“Well, I’m not thanking you,” the other retorted, then added with an oath, “and if you had busted the plane, I’d a pumped you full of lead, see. You can thank me that you aren’t a sieve this minute.” During this disquieting dialogue the boys had made little progress, then suddenly a voice shouted.
“I say, who else are you expecting?”
“Nobody, you know very well.”
“There’s a plane here—”
“A plane?”
“Yeh. One of those whirligig ones.” At that announcement the boys stopped in their tracks.
“Let’s go back,” Bob whispered, tugging at Jim’s coat.