Jack levelled off a foot or so above the ground. Then tail-skid and wheels dropped to the hard-packed sand for a three-point landing.
“Beautiful,” the army flyer commented again, as he and Mr. Hampton started forward, with Tom Bodine rolling-leggedly alongside.
Tom and the mechanic who approached from the other side took the wings and guided the idling ship towards the hanger, but Jack waved them away.
“Let her go boys,” he said. “I want to run the motor out of gas.”
Obedient they stepped back. Then in a few moments, Jack snapped her off, and stepped out of the cockpit.
“Hello, Dad,” he called. “Got your message about Captain Cornell having honored us, so here I am. But if I hadn’t been taking Isabella for a ride when you radioed this morning, you wouldn’t have gotten me. Their radio’s out of commission. Tell you about it later. But here I am running on and you haven’t introduced us yet. Captain Cornell, I guess,” he added, turning squarely towards the army man, and holding out his hand.
“And mighty glad to meet you,” asserted the other, as their hands met. “Pretty landing,” he added.
Jack flushed under the praise, but so tanned was he like all the others that it would have been hard to distinguish the mantling blood in his cheeks.
“Oh, that was nothing,” he demurred. “But still it’s mighty nice of you to say so. Excuse me a minute while I talk with Tom. Something I want him to fix up.”
So saying, he strode off to where Tom Bodine and his mechanic were now trundling the plane into the hanger.