"Glad to meet you, Captains Dawson and Farmer," he said, and shook hands with them both. "Be seated, please. No, Commander, don't leave. I think you'd better listen in on this. You had some trouble, Captains?" As the station commandant spoke the last he glanced down at the hands of the two air aces, and the strips of surgeon's plaster that showed white against the sun- and wind-bronzed skin. "A little trouble, sir, yes," Dawson answered for both of them. Then, lifting his hands a little, "But luckily we came through it with no more than these, and a pretty ticklish few minutes." "I'm glad of that," the vice-admiral replied. Then as he seated himself at the desk, he said, "But we'd better keep things in order. Naturally, I know something of what happened. I mean, over on the mainland. Vice-Admiral Carter radioed me in code. It would be better, though, for you two to tell it to me in your own words. Begin right at the beginning, and don't leave out anything, if you can possibly help it." Twenty minutes later Vice-Admiral Stone and Commander Drake knew as much of what had happened as Dawson and Farmer knew themselves. Silence settled over the room, and all four frowned deep in thought. "There's a question I'd like to ask, sir," Freddy Farmer spoke up. "Something that's been bothering me. Probably unimportant, but ... well, I'd like to ask it, if you don't mind, sir?" "Of course I don't," came the instant reply. "Go right ahead, Captain Farmer. What is the question?" "The business during the flight across, sir," the English-born air ace said. "Do you...? I mean, do you think it was just accidental sabotage? That is, as far as Dawson and I are concerned? Or do you really think that that Jap followed us north and was instrumental in having those time fire bombs put in the mail sacks?" The frown that already knitted the vice-admiral's brows deepened and he did not answer for a moment or two. "We will probably never learn one way or the other, Captain Farmer," he finally said slowly. "But my personal feeling is that the Jap is, or was, the skunk in the woodpile. The longer this war goes on the more amazed I become at the fiendish, devilish ingenuity of the Japs, once they put their minds to it. In countless things they are unquestionably the stupidest people on the face of the earth. But for devilish tricks that have to do with torture, maiming, and ruthless slaughter, they are the world's best. They could give lessons to the Nazi Gestapo and Secret Service any time. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the Nazi cunning in the matter of booby traps actually originated in Tokyo. So I'd say, yes, Captain Farmer. I'd say that mail sack business was definitely linked to that Jap spy." "Thank you, sir, for your opinion," Freddy Farmer said with a smile. Then he added in a brittle voice, "I sincerely hope that I meet up with that blighter again. Under more favorable circumstances, of course."