“It gives me the queerest sort of feeling, Jack, just to believe that any minute now I may be squeezing Frank’s hand, and looking into his eyes again. I was always mighty fond of my big brother, you know, and it nearly broke my heart, small chap that I really was at the time, when he told me he was going away forever, because our father had unjustly accused him of doing something which he denied. If only I find him safe and sound I’ll be the happiest fellow in all Europe.”
“Except one, perhaps, Amos, and that’s little Jacques, whose father came back to him from the dead.”
“Well, finding Frank and carrying him home with me will be almost like the same thing, for he’s been as dead to us for many years!” declared Amos, eagerly watching the aeroplane that was now soaring swiftly aloft, already a target for hostile fire, as the little white puffs of smoke told where the shrapnel shells were bursting all around the daring pilot. “I’m wondering again whether that can be Frank up yonder, and if he’ll come back safely. It would be a terrible thing if something happened to him just when I had run him down.”
“Oh! don’t allow yourself to give way to such an idea,” said Jack. “Look on the bright side of things all the time. Think how we’ve been carried through our troubles so splendidly. No matter how dark things seemed they always took a turn for the better in the end, and every time it proved the best thing that could have happened to us.”
With an effort the boy managed to get a better hold upon himself. This companionship with Jack was the luckiest thing that could ever have happened to Amos; for the Western lad always seemed to steady him at times when his nerves were sorely tried, so as to give him renewed strength of purpose.
“There goes another ’plane up, Jack!” he exclaimed a minute later. “That first pilot, now high over the German lines, seems to be holding his own in spite of all the shrapnel they can send after him. Yes, you must be right in saying we’re coming to where we will find the controlling force of the aviation corps. Before another half hour goes by I’m likely to know the best—or the worst!”
“You’ll be wringing Frank’s hand and telling him how proud you are to learn that the boldest of all the Allied aviators, known under the name of Frank Bradford, is your own dear brother—make up your mind to that!” said Jack, sturdily, for he saw that his chum was trembling with suspense.
When one has dreamed and thought of a certain object for days and weeks, and it comes time when he may know the truth, small wonder that he shivers with alternate hope and dread. Amos was only human. You and I most likely would feel the same nervousness under similar conditions.
Amos uttered a cry of dismay, as though he had received a sudden shock.
“Oh! Jack, they did get that second pilot, you see!” he exclaimed. “He’s volplaning down now like everything, and will fall inside the German lines perhaps!”