Henri had taken on the air of a sea captain who had lost his ship.
"That is an important question," said Roque, "There is only one fit mate to that craft in this part of the country."
Fortunately for the preservation of good feeling, Roten did not hear this latter statement.
It was necessary to detail two corporal aviators to take the wounded captain back to army headquarters, where he could have the skilled surgical attention that would hasten his recovery.
As the invalid was lifted into the machine that was to do ambulance service, he gave a hand each to Henri and Schneider.
"From my heart I thank you both," were his last words in profoundly earnest farewell.
Henri traveled as a passenger with Billy and Roque in the brief journey to the forest station in the pass where it was hoped to find intact the stranded biplane.
Schneider, who had been given a lift by Roten in the trip, was in high glee when it developed that the No. 3, behind its screen of bushes, had sustained no damage.
"See that?" The big fellow held aloft the rabbit's foot. "There's no jinx that can beat it."
Roque was delighted to learn, as the aërial expedition proceeded, that one of his cherished desires had matured—a large German contingent had arrived to support the determined effort of the Austrian forces to relieve the Przemysl fortress.