“Yes, you.”
The pilot looked anywhere but at his questioner, and a picture passed before the commander's eyes—a memory, perhaps, of something he had read about at school—of Christians in Nero's day being asked what their religion was.
“Are you afraid to tell me?” he asked, softening his voice to a kinder tone as he remembered that God did not make all men Englishmen, and turning just in time to cause Crothers to withdraw his right leg.
The pilot's toes were, after all, not destined to be trodden on just then.
“No, sah, Ah'm not afraid.”
“What are you, then?”
“Ah'm—”
“Well? What?”
“Ah'm English!”
“What?”