“Yeah.”
“I mean—personally.”
“Yeah.”
A pause. “You can’t be saying—!”
Jimmie chuckled. “A few times. After all, they had to have an expert along occasionally to observe the effect of that ‘special stuff’ I talked about. Don’t get me wrong! I never had any of that night-after-night, week-in-and-out grind. That’s the killer.
Just a few—oh, hell! A few junkets. As passenger. Deluxe trips. I wish—”
The older man leaned forward. His face was strange. “That—that wound on your leg!”
Jimmie reddened. He was going to lie again, but he changed his mind. Sooner or later they’d all know, anyway. The people in England did. His friends. Whatnot. The hell with it. He said, casually, “Not window glass, no. But what the deuce! What’s the dif? A scratch—that’s all. Somebody who gets clipped with a splinter from the leg of a—a billiard table is clipped as bad as somebody that gets it out of a muzzle on a Messerschmitt, isn’t he?”
Without answering, Mr. Wilson rose and walked away. Jimmie watched him—hurt, again—until he realized he was corning back. He brought a magazine. He spread it out on Jimmie’s knees. He switched on a bridge lamp. It was a picture magazine, and he had turned to a spread of photographs of night fighters getting ready for action somewhere in England. He put his long forefinger on one of the pictures. “These birds are Canadians. See that chap—fourth from the left? The one with the bum haircomb? In the caption it says his name is Lawrence Wilton. My son—ran away—when he was fifteen. That’s—my son.”