"Guess breakfast waits, pal." Dave grinned at Freddy. "Let's go. I guess Major Barber is with the Group Captain. I don't see him around any place. So maybe this is it."
"Maybe, but I wouldn't be too sure," Freddy murmured.
Dave looked at him sharply.
"What do you mean by that?" he demanded.
"Nothing, I hope," the English youth grunted. "But I believe I've heard of Group Captain Farnsworth. Very much of a stickler for rules and regulations. And—well, after all, this is an R.A.F. field, you know."
"So what?" Dave demanded as he stared, puzzle-eyed. "What's that got to do with it? Hey! What's eating you, anyway?"
Freddy shrugged and started walking toward the Field Commandant's office.
"Let's go and find out," he said. "I could be wrong, of course."
"You could be nuts!" Dave growled, still mystified. "And I think you are!"
The English youth let that one slide. He simply hunched his shoulders once and walked with Dave over toward the office. They reached it in time, knocked, and went inside when a rasping voice told them to do so. Seated at the desk inside was a heavy-browed, red-headed man in an R.A.F. Group Captain's uniform. The decoration ribbons under his R.A.F. wings showed that this was not the first war he had fought in. And they also showed that he had not exactly kept his feet on solid earth all the time in either war. But his eyes were his outstanding feature. They were like frosted cubes of ice that seemed to melt everything that came into their range of vision. Dave looked into those eyes and gulped a little.