“But he did,” said Hank. “Some people have all the luck! Cousin of mine was in the war, and he got gassed and shell shocked and had five shrapnel wounds, and one of ’em took the top of his head off, so he wears a silver plate and the gassin’ took off all his hair so he wears a wig and his face is all smooth and shiny, and he has gold wire on his jaw where a piece of shrapnel broke it.”
“Hully gee!” cried Bill. “You don’t call that luck, do you?”
“Of course!” maintained Hank stoutly. “When anybody asts him, he always has something to talk about.”
“Well, I’ll say I will talk about the weather,” said Bill. “I don’t want any conversation whatsoever that has to be made out of pieces of me. I don’t mind doing any job like the one we are on, and I was sore because I was too young to get into the war. I wouldn’t have been afraid of anything, and you know it, but there’s no use inviting trouble by wanting to make conversation out of it. I guess not!”
After a little O’Brien returned. “It looks like a fog was coming,” he remarked. “I wish this English coast would clean up its fogs.”
“We can get above it, can’t we?” asked Bill.
“Not an English fog,” said O’Brien. “The only place above an English fog is Heaven and the only place below it is deeper than I think of travelin’. I do hope we won’t have anything like that to bother us.”
The night dragged along, and the men anxiously watched the banks of vapor rolling around them. O’Brien insisted on Ollie and Hank and Bill taking a good nap while he, O’Brien, sat motionless at the wheel. He was leaving his next move to fate. Just how he should act his part he did not know. As he had told Hank and Bill, he was sure that the speed of the car leading was the greatest protection that they could have or would need. And he remembered happily that he and Lawrence had settled on a signal which he was sure Lawrence had since tried out. If Lawrence only suspected that he was not in the car following, there would be no danger at all for Mr. Ridgeway.
O’Brien was glad the night was passing.
But the passing of the night brought only a shivery gray light as they rolled through billows of heavy fog. O’Brien, at the wheel, set the delicate tentaclever, the wonderful little instrument by which they were able to find the whereabouts of any other aircraft within a hundred miles. It at once caught the direction of the balloon ahead, and reported on its dial that there was no balloon following. So they had not passed one of the other balloons in the fog. They were within two hours’ flight of the coast of England. A half hour passed and there occurred one of the strange freaks of a dense fog. It suddenly lifted, and ahead they saw the dirigible they were following and ahead of that, far, far away, the airship containing the treasure. A moment later the wireless commenced to hum and click. Hank and Bill and O’Brien reached it together.