"Dear Barney:
"I'm off for somewhere far North; guess not the Pole, but pretty well up that way. Second officer on a U. S. Sub. She's loaned to a queer old chap they call Doctor. No particulars yet. Hope this finds you 'up in the air,' as per usual.
"DAVE." "That is a coincidence," said Bruce. "Perhaps we'll meet him up there somewhere among the icebergs."
"I'll suggest it!" exclaimed Barney, reaching for his pen.
"Dear Dave," he wrote. "Am thinking of a little trip North myself. Our ship's a 500 HP Handley-Page. Bring your guitar and oboe along. My partner and I are bringing saxophone and mandolin. We'll have a little jazz. Till we meet, as ever,
"BARNEY."
If the boy had known under what strange conditions this particular jazz performance would be given, he might have felt queer sensations creeping up his spinal column.
"I say!" exclaimed Bruce suddenly, "who's this Major chap, anyway? I've a notion he's something rather big, maybe the biggest—"
"You don't mean?—"
"I'm not saying anything," protested Bruce, "but this other man I'm thinking of left a toe or two in the Arctic, and his face has freeze scars on it. His name's—well, you know it as well as I do."