The minutes dragged along.
In the deserted office building there was almost no sound—a rat crept toward a wastebasket, ran back as Bob moved in his chair; but otherwise the place was very still.
“There’s an airplane engine!” Bob mused, as, in the silence, he caught the faint, steady drone coming from the sky.
It grew louder—rapidly, much louder!
“It can’t be Lang, coming back!”
Bob went to the window. The sound seemed to come from the other side of the building. He ran across the hall into the directors’ room and got to the window, which had a fire escape stairway outside it.
Just as he peered through the bars of the fire escape, he saw a craft swoop down, quite low. It did not land! Instead, it seemed to zoom along and to rise swiftly.
“Overshot the field,” Bob mused. “Why doesn’t he drop a Verey light to signal the watchman to turn on the landing floods? Or—maybe the watchman isn’t out there. I’d better see.”
He ran down the stairs and out into the yard, across it and onto the small landing field. The craft had passed, but he could still hear the engine. It seemed from its change of location, that the craft was coming around in a spiral.
Bob ran toward the switch controlling the flood lights. One of the large, hooded lamps was near it. As the sound of the engine came closer he switched on the floods.