He pressed the bell and instructed Evans to have the engineer officer of the field report at his office immediately. Then the four men plunged into a discussion of guns, food, and other details. Graves had exact figures at his finger tips. Not a detail was brought up which he did not settle as smoothly and quickly as he talked. There was something ruthlessly direct about him—an air of resistless efficiency that was queerly at variance with his appearance, which inclined rather more toward being that of a student than a man of physical achievement.
Mutual respect grew in the minds of the flyers and of Graves. He was no amateur at reading character and estimating men, and he found the airmen to his liking.
The engineer officer, ordered to use every facility at his command to expedite the changing of the Martin, said that on the morning of the second day the ship would be ready for test. At noon it should be ready to go.
“Good,” said Graves. “I guess we’ve covered everything, gentlemen. Hinkley and Broughton will attend to gathering the equipment, general, providing you furnish them proper authority. I will be back about nine a.m., day after tomorrow. I guess there is no need for me to emphasize the need for absolute secrecy—you all realize that. If any of you want to reach me, you can call the Monticello Hotel in Norfolk and ask for Room 220. Don’t ask for Graves.
“Thank you for your help—I’ll see you day after tomorrow. Good-by until then.”
With a smile and slight bow, he left.
“Now I wonder just who in ⸺ he is?” inquired Hinkley as the two flyers started to walk toward the bachelor quarters.
“Search me, but he’s turning up two thousand a minute, looks like. I figure I might not mind having him behind me in a scrap of any nature whatsoever.”
“He’s probably some big agent of the secret service. There’s a lot of those eggs that pull off big stuff and nobody ever knows it. Take that Zimmerman note, for instance, during the war. At least, that’s what my ex-pilot Dumpy Scarth says.”
“Dumpy ought to know,” grinned Broughton. “What do you think of our coming soirée?”