“Let him die, then!”
“Yes, but you didn’t finish him. You let him live.”
“All right. I’ll take him a mask and two oxygen bottles. It’s a waste of that precious stuff, but there’s the rule of war. I’ll be back.”
He vanished and on the instant Mary wished that she had not spoken. “What is one spy, more or less?” she asked herself. “Now I’m here to face it alone!”
CHAPTER VIII
DESERT BATTLES
Oddly enough, as Mary set the big plane climbing she recalled Sparky’s words, “You are with me to the journey’s end.” Was this to be the journey’s end? One thing was sure. During their moments of excitement over the captured spy, they had allowed the enemy to come dangerously close. Six fighting planes were coming roaring toward them at top speed.
Breathless with suspense, Mary watched their altitude increase. Ten thousand feet, eleven, twelve, fifteen thousand. It was not as fast as this; instead, to her excited mind the figures appeared to creep upward like a man with a crutch going upstairs.
One plane was ahead of the others. “He’ll get us! I am sure of that!” she groaned. “Oh! If Sparky were only here!”
Then the on-rushing enemy did a strange thing. Instead of coming right on, like a catbird after a hawk, he circled wide, going completely around the big plane.