Dave glanced at Freddy, but the English youth shook his head.
"You tell it, Dave," he said.
Dave shrugged, stared at his two hands for a moment to get things arranged in his own mind, and then told detail for detail of their movements and actions from the time they were summoned by the commander of the Harkness, right up to when they scrambled aboard the patrol Catalina. Air Vice Marshal Bostworth listened in silence, but the frown on his face deepened as Dave talked along. And by the time the Yank born R.A.F. ace had finished his little speech there was both anger and worry glowing in the senior officer's eyes. Even when Dave finally stopped talking he didn't say a thing for several long moments. He sat puffing hard on a thin stemmed pipe he clutched between his teeth and scowled darkly at the clouds of blue smoke that curled upward.
"Damnedest thing ever!" he finally muttered. "A Jap sub, eh? Of course it was a Jap, right enough. We've suspected that they've been sneaking close into these waters whenever they got the chance. But to come to the surface and blast away at you chaps! Well.... Well, I'll be blessed if that isn't a new one. Quite sure you couldn't make head nor tail out of their heliograph signals, eh?"
"Quite, sir," Freddy said quietly.
"Not a single blink meant a thing," Dave said with a curt shake of his head. "They certainly weren't any Morse letters or numbers that I ever learned."
"A code of their own, no doubt," Air Vice Marshal Bostworth grunted. "Well, before I start my little tale let me explain why you had to float around so long. Only I and the Admiral commanding knew that I'd radioed those orders to the Harkness, you see? I had expected to be at the Air Base to meet you but I got tied up on an inspection tour of some emergency fields on the Johore side, and didn't get back until long after I expected to. It gave me a bit of a start, I can tell you, not to find you waiting, and to see the Harkness riding at anchor in the Strait. Went aboard at once and received another start when I learned you had taken off. So I hurried ashore, routed out this Catalina crew, and came hunting for you. Thank God, we got to you in time!"
"We were beginning to feel less happy by the second, sir," Dave said with an apologetic grin. "But one thing I can't figure is, why weren't there patrol planes out? Why didn't some other plane pick us up long before then? But we didn't see a single plane or surface ship during the whole time. We.... Hey! England's not at war with Japan, is she?"
"Not a declared war by either side, anyway," Air Vice Marshal Bostworth replied gravely. "However, we are watching each other like a couple of strange cats. And if you want my opinion on the matter I think the Japs are going to have a go at us inside of ten days at the most."
Dave stiffened slightly and glanced at the calendar hanging on the compartment wall. It told him that today was the sixth of December, Nineteen Hundred and Forty-One. He looked at Freddy and gave him a sly wink, and then turned to the Air Vice Marshal.