"I want to show you all something, first," Gerard detained them. "We don't want to take any worries home that we can leave here. Give me that ball of tape you put in your pocket this morning, Corrie."
Astonished, Corrie obeyed.
"Hello, Rupert!" Gerard sent his clear voice across to where that black-eyed mechanician leaned against the Mercury Titan, a hundred feet away. "Catch!"
Rupert promptly turned. The improvised ball in his fingers, Gerard slowly raised both arms above his head in the old graceful gesture, his brilliant amber eyes smiling at his companions, then launched the sphere straight to its goal.
It was not Flavia who found overtaxed nerves give way.
"Gerard! Gerard!" Corrie's cry rang out; he sank down on a camp-chair and covered his face.
Alarmed and remorseful, Gerard sprang to him.
"Corrie—don't take it like that! It is all right; I've been fighting for this ten months under a French surgeon's orders."
"You never told me. Oh, Gerard, Gerard!"