The boy was too occupied with the many confusing and disappointing problems of the past few hours to heed the idle chiding of Graham. He merely glanced up at the heckler with a frown and then turned away once more to his own troubles without offering any retort. The great siren blew and the pilots, alert for action, responded by taxiing their ships to a starting position with the major’s plane first in line. Panama stood up and looked back to make certain that everything was ready, reporting to the commander, who raised his arm high above his head, the procedure followed by every other pilot all the way down the line. The ground men hurried through the network of ships, bending low to make certain that the lights strapped to the struts of each ship were securely fastened and lighted. One these men jumped out of the way, the commander of the squadron dropped his hand and the planes made their take-off down the field, flying into formation as they gradually gained altitude. CHAPTER XVII A week previous to the time of this writing, a company of Marines, under the command of Lieutenant Walter Ranson, were ordered up into the mountains on a reconnoitering expedition. For four days and nights, they had searched through every pathway and crevice in the great mountain region for a sign of Sandino and his rebel horde, but their efforts were without success. The post commandant at Managua, acting upon the advice of the Federal Government military authorities of Nicaragua, sent a message to Ranson to return to the Marine base. It was the belief of the American commander and the Nicaraguans that Sandino had fled over the mountain paths, escaping north to Mexico. Relieved of his unpleasant task and a chance to escape the hardships and terrific heat, both for himself and his command, Ranson issued orders to break camp and start back, down the mountain to Managua, a good three days’ hike from where they were encamped. The following morning they arrived at a corral just a few miles from Ocotal, a small mountain town known to be inhabited by people whose sympathy fell with the lot of the usurping bandits. Due to a terrific rising heat wave and a desire to escape the possibility of having to spend a night in the rebel stronghold, the lieutenant halted the company and prepared to temporarily billet his men in the deserted corral. The place was surrounded by a low, thirty-inch wall of adobe, topped with palings. An old, iron gate, hanging off its hinges, was just in the center, behind which stood a nipa shack with a slanting roof of palm leaves. An overturned oxcart rested just to the right of the shack, half buried in mud caused by recent, heavy mountain rains. After the lieutenant and his men had commandeered the corral, making fires, setting up their pup tents and fixing a place behind the house for the horses and pack mules, he sent for his top sergeant, and together they walked to the gateway, surveying the lay of the land.