“We carry that for land operations. You can’t set up an electric light plant overnight—you have to go back to the lamp-and-lantern age. Besides, many of the small island crafts burn kerosene in their motors. We’ll have a drum up from below at once.”
“One thing I want to know,” said the Commander, “and that’s the range of this ship. I’ve heard they’re hard on fuel. We’ll have the boys rig up a belly tank on your jet plane. Then you and I will give the ship a good tryout together.”
“That’s okay with me, sir,” said Jack.
“It’s not just for fun, or to try out a new toy. I want to warn you,” said the Commander, “that if this jet plane has enough range she’ll be the first scout sent out over Mindanao. It’s going to be very important that we have accurate information regarding ships in the harbor. With this plane you should be able to get that information and come back alive.”
“It will be a great honor, sir!” Jack replied soberly.
When the belly tank had been rigged and the jet plane fueled, they took off.
“If I were sure of the oxygen equipment, sir,” said Jack as he set the jet plane climbing, “I’d take you to the stratosphere. There we’d really have distance aplenty.”
“That can wait,” was the answer. “Climb to five thousand, level off, then follow the course the task force has just covered. Our fighters are maintaining a night watch for snoopers, but if our fuel holds out we’ll cover a much greater distance than they.”
Jack followed instructions, then, having set the ship at an economical speed, settled back to think of many things—of the island they had left, of the three Japs, and of the German who had gone over the cliff. He could easily imagine what had happened to them. However, to guess how they had come into possession of this American-made jet plane was not so easy.
He thought of Mary Brown and Ted. Mary was a good-looking girl—with her island brown off and a touch of an American lady’s war paint on. He thought Ted had rather fallen for her. Had he done the same? There was Patsy. There was always Patsy back home.