“It’s all there is left to do. We can’t climb on one motor. All we can do is to stay up a mile and go straight on.” “Oh! Perhaps a fight,” Mary thought as he went back in the cabin. The gray sands were turning white before the rising sun. She saw a speck in the distance. Could it be an enemy plane? She wished Sparky would come back. Supposing the fire broke out of the motor enclosure and the ship burned. She shuddered at the thought. “Of course,” she reassured herself, “we’d take to our parachutes and escape.” “But escape to what?” a voice seemed to whisper. To sifting sands. That was the answer. And then there was their precious cargo. Here was Sparky again. “All set.” His voice was almost cheerful. “Spoiling for a fight?” Mary teased. “I wouldn’t mind knocking down one or two of Hitler’s desert rats,” was the quick reply. “There’s fighting blood in my family. Grandfather in the Civil war and Dad all the way with the Canadians in the other World War. And here I am just flying, flying, flying, flying. Gets a bit dull at times. “Except,” he hastened to add, “when you have an attractive co-pilot.” He was talking, she knew, just to quiet her nerves. “There’s worse to come,” she told herself. And she was not mistaken. “The fire must be about out by now,” he said a moment later. “There are a lot of sprays shooting carbon-dioxide snow at that engine. It’s under 850 pounds of pressure. Turn off the extinguisher and I’ll work my way back there through the wing.” She snapped off the extinguisher. “Can you do anything about it?” “Oh, sure!” There was a forced cheerfulness in his voice. “I can get to that engine. I’ll take tools and a new tube. I’ll fix it. Wait and see!” “Sparky!” She gripped his arm. “Be careful. I wouldn’t want—well, you know, that desert looks awfully lonesome.” “I’ll be careful.” Once again he was gone, leaving her to the ship’s controls, the desert, and the spreading dawn. She could see a long way now. There really was an airplane out there on the horizon. But then there were planes
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