He lost time, and several times had to turn aside and almost retrace his steps, but at last he knew from the lay of the country that he was in the right neighborhood. The moon had risen and was full. It cast the densest shadows and Lawrence slipped from one patch of blackness to another. He felt silly. He was not sure that this was not a wild goose chase. The cars might be the property of some eccentric man who wished to keep them in seclusion, and possibly he was trespassing on private ground. He plodded on, however, urged by an impulse he could not understand.
At last he emerged suddenly on the very aviation field itself; and on the other side he saw the big bulk that was the hangar. Once more plunging into the underbrush, he skirted the field and circled it until he found himself at the back of the hangar. There was a small door here, half open, and from within he heard voices.
He could not hear what was being said, however, and he took the chance an older man would have thought plain suicide. Entering the door, and fairly holding his breath, he stepped slowly and carefully along the side of the building, crept close to the little plane, and finally lay down and wriggled beneath it toward the dirigible. On the other side of the long body four men were sitting over a game of cards. Not until Lawrence felt the cool box of the plane above him did he think of danger. And then it came to him clear as the tolling of a bell ... discovery meant his death!
CHAPTER V
It was a strange game the men were playing, something far less quiet and controlled than poker, or any of the other American games that Lawrence was accustomed to see played by the men working round the planes. There was much slapping down of cards and a great deal of laughter from three of the players, while the fourth poured forth a steady stream of abuse and profanity. Strangely enough, while Lawrence was sure that they were foreigners, they all spoke English with no more accent than a slight twist of the syllables.
The game went on, and Lawrence gathered that one man was losing steadily.
Luck fluctuated between the others and they accepted gains or loss with careless unconcern. Not so the fourth man. He lost money as painfully as a man loses his very blood. It put him in a sort of wild panic, yet he could not leave the game. He kept hoping for a turn in the bad luck which pursued him and played on, cursing his luck, the cards, the unsteady light, and his partners themselves. Finally his evil temper commenced to grate on the mood of the other three. They too commenced to be faultfinding, until the dealer swept the cards together and announced that the game was over.
The men did not trouble to rise; they merely kicked the table over, and leaned back in their chairs.
“What of the night?” said one of them, peering out the crack of the big door.
“Clear as a bell,” said another, “and the moon big as the dial of the clock at Nuremberg. I say we take the two planes and go out.”