until he suddenly realized
that the Nazi pilots had cut their throttles, and in follow-the-leader
style were circling around and down toward that gray-green blurr.
Shoving up his goggles, he dug knuckles into his smarting eyes, then
impulsively leaned forward as though that bit of movement would afford
him a better look.

But whether or not it did, he certainly saw more than he had the first
time. The gray-green blur was a small group of shrub-covered hills that
rose right up out of the desert. That it was some kind of an oasis was
evident by the patches of pale green here and there.

One thing was definite, however. To Dawson it was the only thing that
mattered. That gray-green patch on the seemingly limitless expanse of
shimmering and quivering Sahara was the secret base of Goering's
Snoopers! He had found it! There it was! The first two of the bombers
were already on the ground on the eastern fringe of the gray-green
patch. They looked like beetles as they moved along over the ground.

A wild, fierce joy surged up in Dawson as he stared down at the place,
but when he happened to glance at his fuel gauges, a tiny icy shiver
went through him, and his joy was tempered by cold, hard reality. He had
fuel for about another half hour in the air. Fuel enough to take him a
fraction of the distance back to his Casablanca base. What he had
expected had happened, but only now did the full significance of it
descend upon him.

"But we found it!" he shouted wildly as he put his lips to his flap mike
and reached out to tune his set to the Casablanca Base wave length. "And
that's what matters most. Now to tell Casablanca and--"

At that moment Dawson's ears were filled with the savage yammer of
aerial machine guns and air cannon, above and behind him!

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

_Blazing Doom_

One, two, three seconds slipped by before Dawson could move a single
muscle. It was as though invisible hands of steel held him powerless.
Only his eyes and brain seemed able to function in that short space of
time. His eyes saw the top left section of his glass hatch melt away as
if by magic. His brain told him the shambles that was suddenly made of
his instrument board and radio panel would never in all this world
permit him to contact his Casablanca base. The golden moment had
come--and gone.

Keeping alive was his prime concern now. The Grim Reaper was savagely
striving to cut life short for one Yank air ace!

In three seconds