A few minutes later the Staff Officer, who had retired for repairs and refreshment, entered the pilot's cabin.
"You're doing well," he remarked. "I know this part of Spain intimately, and we are heading straight for Corunna. You'll see the harbour in a few minutes. But you look a bit done up. Try a drop of this."
And he handed Derek a flask.
The pilot accepted the liquid gratefully. It acted as a stimulus, although he drank sparingly.
"There you are!" continued the Brigadier-General, as an apparently narrow slip of water appeared in view between the enclosing high ground. "That's Corunna Harbour. I'll tell you when to—er—alight. I was almost on the point of saying 'land'."
"Quite a professional term in the R.A.F., sir," rejoined Derek. "Without being guilty of perpetrating an Irish bull, one may correctly apply the term 'land' to flying-boats and sea-planes alighting on the water. What space do I want? Two hundred yards will be ample, sir, and the harbour doesn't seem to be crowded."
Descending to five hundred feet Derek brought the triplane head to wind, and then, "choosing his pitch", made a creditable landing within fifty yards of a quay. Then, taxi-ing to a buoy, the giant sea-plane was secured, but not before she was surrounded by a small fleet of motor-launches and rowing-boats.
"I'll be back in two hours," said the Brigadier-General, as he boarded a Customs launch. He spoke as casually as if he were ordering his chauffeur to wait outside his club. "In the meanwhile, I expect that you will make all necessary preparations for the return journey—petrol and all that sort of thing."
Punctually to time the British Staff Officer returned in a Spanish Government launch, and attended by a bevy of brightly-uniformed grandees and naval and military officers. His bronzed face was wreathed in smiles. He looked like a schoolboy granted an unexpected half-holiday.
"I'm afraid I cannot let you into state secrets, Mr. Daventry," he remarked, when safely on board the triplane; "but, without divulging anything of a strictly confidential nature, I can tell you that my mission has been entirely successful. The result of my conference with certain Spanish authorities means the death-blow to Bolshevism in Spain, for, as you possibly know, there has been for months past a dangerous tendency in that direction amongst a certain section of the Iberian populace. Certain measures had to be taken instantly, and you have contributed in no slight way to their success. I congratulate you. And now concerning the return journey. How long will it take?"