ons
concerning the probable writer of the message.

That night Tom and Jack preferred the quiet of their own apartment to
the general sitting-room, where the tired pilots gathered to smoke,
talk, play games, sing, and give their opinions on every topic
imaginable, including scraps of news received in late letters from home
towns across the sea.

"Do you know, Tom," Jack said unexpectedly; "I'd give something to know
where Bessie Gleason is just at this time. It's strange how often I
think about that young girl. It's just as if something that people call
intuition told me she might be in serious trouble through that
hard-looking guardian of hers, Carl Potzfeldt."

Tom smiled.

Bessie Gleason was a very pretty and winsome girl of about twelve years
of age, with whom Jack in particular had been quite "chummy" on the
voyage across the Atlantic, and through the submarine zone, as related
in "Air Service Boys Flying for France." The last he had seen of her was
when she waved her hand to him when leaving the steamer at its English
port. Her stern guardian had contracted a violent dislike for Jack, so
that the two had latterly been compelled to meet only in secret for
little confidential chats.

"Oh, you've taken to imagining all sorts of terrible things in
connection with pretty Bessie and her cruel guardian. He claimed to be a
Swiss, or a native of Alsace-Lorraine, which was it, Jack?"

"Uh-huh," murmured Jack Parmly, his thoughts just then far away from Tom
and his question, though fixed on Carl Potzfeldt and his young ward.

Bessie Gleason was a little American girl, a child of moods, fairylike
in appearance and of a maturity of manner that invariably attracted
those with whom she came in contact.

Her mother had been lost at sea, and by Mrs. Gleason's will the girl and
her property were left in Potzfeldt's care. Mr. Potzfeldt was taking her
to Europe, and on the steamship she and Jack Parmly had been friends,
and as Potzfeldt's actions were suspicious and, moreover, the girl did
not seem happy with him Jack had been troubled about her.

"I'm afraid you think too much about Bessie and her troubles, Jack; and
get yourself worked up about things that may never happen to her," Tom
went on after a pause.

"I knew you'd say that, Tom," the other told him reproachfully. "But I'm
not blaming you for it. However, there are several things Bessie told me
that I haven't mentioned to you before; and they help to make me fee