Elinor had been watching the return of the squadron and searching the group for a sight of Lefty. When she saw the commander call the other men into a hurried conference that ended by two planes again taking off and flying back in the direction from which they had just come, her heart beat faster as a cold, foreboding feeling of uneasiness took possession of her mind and body. She ran toward one of the pilots and stopped him as a pathetic look of anxiety darkened her face. “Where’s Lefty Phelps?” she asked. “That’s what we’d all like to know,” the man replied grimly without looking at the girl, “He and Graham disappeared during the fracas. The skipper just sent a couple of ships back to search for them.” She looked up with terror-stricken eyes and caught sight of Panama not far from where she was standing. Without further adieu, she ran off in the sergeant’s direction, reaching his side a moment later, completely out of breath. “Where’s Lefty, Panama?” she panted, “What’s happened to him?” The sergeant made no attempt to even look at the frightened girl but continued on his way, quickening his steps. She ran along at his side, struggling to keep up with him and trying to regain her breath at the same time. “Panama!” she pleaded once more, “what has happened to Lefty?” “Out in the swamps with the rest of the snakes, I hope,” he speculated grimly, still avoiding the girl’s anxious eyes. “Aren’t you going to do something?” He turned his head and looked at her with a piercing sign of resentment upon his face, becoming secretly the more indifferent over his former friend’s fate because of Elinor’s apparent concern for the boy’s welfare. “Why should I do anything?” he snapped. His words gave her new spirit and she stepped before him, blocking his path as her words bristled with anger. “So that’s the extent of your friendship, after all he tried to do for you?” she cried. “Panama, you’re the blindest of the blind! Lefty is the sweetest boy in all the world—and I love him!” “Elinor!” the man protested in an effort to save himself from further wounds directed at his heart. “Yes, I love him, more than all the world and with all my heart,” she confessed, unmindful of the interruption. “I know that he was meant for me and I for him the very first moment my eyes fell upon his. I’ve been living in despair, torturing myself for months now, believing that he didn’t care for me. Do you know why he shielded himself behind that indifferent attitude?” “No, and I ain’t much interested!” Panama barked. “Well, you should be! He pretended that he didn’t love me because he thought that I belonged to you, because he was too fair, too decent to rob another man of something that he valued himself more than life. I’ve never loved you, I’ve never belonged to you! Lefty had as much right to try and win my love as you did!” “Elinor, please—I don’t want to listen!” the love-torn soldier beseeched vainly.