The nurse came in on the talk about this time and banished Henri.
A week later, when Billy was himself again, the boys, so long accustomed to the plain fare, and often no fare, the hardships, the makeshifts, the discomforts and dangers of military campaigning, began to believe that they had hitched up with another Monte Cristo. Nothing was too good for them in the well-ordered train of Sergius.
“If we don’t get out of here pretty soon,” declared Billy, “we will be afraid to sit near an open window on account of the draught!”
Here was a pair not built for coddling.
But the days of ease were slipping into the scroll of time. It was not intended that the flying boys should too long linger in the lap of luxury. Their patron had another side to his make-up, and that was adamant and of boundless determination.
The call of the Black Sea was in the air—there was plenty of powder burning in and about those strange waters, and another belligerent nation involved, the like of which the young aviators had never before encountered during their varied experiences in the great war zone.
CHAPTER XIX.
A CRUCIAL TEST.
Strong winds were raising clouds of chalky dust over the great seaport when the boys caught their first glimpse of Odessa, the terraced city, rising nearly 200 feet above the level of the surrounding steppes. By all manner of conveyance, by land or water, but ever in continuous motion, the Sergius party made remarkable progress from Petrograd to the borders of the Black Sea. Behind the expedition was that power which, as Billy observed, “makes the wheels go ’round.”
The last leg of the journey landed the travelers at the basins of the mighty rivers Dnieper and Dniester, upon which floated fleets of Sergius’ ships, and more of the same vessels controlled by the master of money lay in the two harbors of the Bay of Odessa. These latter the boys viewed from the head of the superb flight of steps descending from the central square, adorned with a statue of Richelieu, to the sea. On the chief embankment was the magnificent residence of Sergius, fronted by a fine promenade.
“Some mixture in this town,” remarked Henri, marking movement in Odessa streets, through which they were passing—Great Russians, Little Russians, French, Jews, Italians, Greeks, Roumanians, Servians, Bulgarians, Tartars, Armenians, Lazes, Georgians, and so forth, and so forth.