not.
Johnny veered slightly, pointing the Thunder Bird's nose straight
toward the light.

Cliff half turned, handing something back over his shoulder.

"Can you drop this for me, old man, when we are almost over the
hacienda? The fuse is lighted, and I'm afraid I might heave it on to
the wing and set us afire."

Johnny heard only about half of what Cliff was saying, but he
understood what was wanted and took the bomb-like contraption and
balanced it in his hand. Cliff had said rockets, but this thing was
not like any rocket Johnny had ever seen. Some new aerial signal bomb,
he guessed it, and thought how thoroughly up-to-date Cliff was in all
his tools of trade.

He poised the thing on the edge of the cockpit, waited until they were
rather close, and then gave it a toss overboard. For a few seconds
nothing happened. Than, halfway to the ground a great blob of red
light burst dazzlingly, lighting the adobe building with a crimson glow
that floated gently earthward, suspended from its little parachute.

Cliff handed back another, and Johnny heaved it away from the plane.
It flared white; the third one, dropped almost before the door of the
main building, revealed three men standing there gazing upward, their
faces weird in its bluish glare. Red, white and blue--a signal used
sacrilegiously here, he thought.

Johnny circled widely and came back to find the landing place lighted
by torches of some kind. He was not interested in details, and what
they were he did not know or care. The landing was marked for him
plainly, though he scarcely needed it with the moon riding now above
the low rim of hills.

He came down gently, and Cliff, remembering to give Johnny his money,
climbed out hurriedly to meet the florid gentleman who had never yet
failed to appear when the Thunder Bird landed. Johnny did not know his
name, for Cliff had never mentioned it. The two never talked together
in his presence, but strolled away where even their voices would not
reach him, or went inside the adobe house and stayed there until Cliff
was ready to return. News gathering, as Johnny saw the news gathered,
seemed to be mighty secret business, never to be mentioned save in a
whisper.

The florid gentleman came strolling toward them through the moonlight,
smoking a big, fat cigar whose aroma reminded Johnny of something
disagreeable, like burning rubbish. Tonight the florid gentleman's
stroll did not seem to match his face, whic