an, son?"

"Yes, and go on," Freddy said quietly. "That doesn't worry me a bit.
I'm a very lucky chap, you know."

"Thanks, and it's been nice knowing you, you bum!" the Yank air ace said
with a grin. And then in a deadly serious tone he went on, "It might be
curtains for one of us, Freddy, though I hope and pray not. However, you
never can tell, you know."

Dawson ended the last with a faint hunch of his shoulders, and an
adequate gesture with both hands. Freddy Farmer looked at him for a
moment, and then snorted softly.

"All right, old chap, all right!" he finally got out. "What do I have to
do? Get down on my blasted hands and knees and beg? What in the world
are you driving at, anyway?"

"Just this, pal!" Dawson came right back at him, and stuck out his jaw.
"Both of us, or one of us, anyway, has got to grab one of the Jap crates
up on the flight deck, and scram. Now, hold everything a minute, and let
me finish. I know that we are locked up here, and no way to get out. So
we've got to make a way, such as this. We bang on that door, there, and
shout our heads off. Somebody is bound to come. We tell them we want to
make a deal with Suicide Sasebo. In short, if he guarantees that we'll
be taken to Japan as special prisoners of war, then we'll--"

"Definitely, no!" Freddy Farmer snapped. "I wouldn't give that blighter
the satisfaction of--"

"Clam up your yap, will you?" Dawson hurled at him. "For cat's sakes,
let me finish, dope! I'm simply telling you what we're going to say,
_not_ what we're going to _do_! So just keep your shirt on, mug, and let
me finish. Okay! We bang and thump on the door there. Some guy comes,
and we give him a song and dance about how we're willing to swap
military info for a square deal from Sasebo. It stands to reason that
the guy will either go tell Sasebo on the run, or take us there. Okay.
Remember that last trip?"

"What do you mean, do I remember that last trip?" the English-born air
ace asked.

Dawson groaned and made the motions with his hands of twisting an
invisible neck.

"What do I mean, he says!" Dave grated. "I mean this, pal. To go see
Sasebo we have to walk along the flight deck, and weave in and out among
all those planes, okay. Supposing we suddenly duck under a wing, leap
into a cockpit, and kick the engine into life, and--and away we go,
huh?"

"I'm with you all the way, old thing," Freddy Farmer said quietly. "Of
course you know that, what?"

Dave grinned