on shouted.

"By the scalp of St. Patrick!" O'Malley boomed. "An' I thought you would
drown sure before the boat got to you."

The bobbies nodded their heads and grinned broadly. They lifted their
sticks and moved out, well satisfied with their work. Stan called after
them:

"If you meet an ambulance wandering about tell the driver to go back to
the hospital and give my regards to the head nurse." He sank into a
chair and grinned up at his friends. "How about some clothes?"

"Coming right up. You can borrow my dress uniform," Allison said.
"O'Malley insisted we hold off replacements for another day. The
hospital said you'd be laid up for weeks, but O'Malley had a hunch you
wouldn't let them keep you."

Stan told what had happened. When he had finished O'Malley beat a bony
fist on the table.

"Faith, an' I think the gas business is a trick of that rotter, Garret.
What he's after needin' is a good taste of me fist," he bellowed.

"We have no proof. If one of you fellows beat him up we'd all be
grounded, you know," Allison cut in.

"If Garret was on the crew that handled the fueling that's enough for
me," Stan said grimly.

"He was put in charge of our hangar by the O.C. But you can bet he
covered his dirty work carefully. We'll just have to trap him." Allison
spoke grimly.

"And in the meantime we better check our ships before we go out each
time," Stan said. "If I'd done that this time I'd have brought my
Spitfire back whole and wouldn't have had to take a bath in the
channel."

"I'll bet the spalpeen will get a scare when you walk into that hangar,"
O'Malley said with a grin.

Stan got to his feet. "I'm going out there just as soon as I get some
clothes. I warn you, O'Malley, this is my fight. You stay out of it."

O'Malley's eyes glittered. "I niver could stay out of a good scrap, but
if you wade into him I'm thinkin' there won't be anything left for me to
do but pick up the pieces."

"You better keep a tight hand on your temper, old chap," Allison warned.

"I will. I'll have the low-down before I sock him," Stan promised.

A half-hour later, dressed in one of Allison's uniforms, and looking
little worse for his ducking, Stan strolled into the hangar. Garret was
not about so he went to the crew that had handled his ship. They were
really glad to see him, he was sure of that. He looked them over and had
a feeling none of them had had any part in the plot.

"Who gassed my Spitfire before she went ou