Page:Air Service Boys Flying for Victory.djvu/30

20 with Jack. With Jack! That thought aroused him.

Still no Jack! He grew more and more concerned, and began to picture all sorts of grievous things as having happened to his chum.

Several times he thought he heard the well known voice near by, but on each occasion discovered that he had deceived himself. Tom felt he could stand it no longer, and had even commenced to set forth when, to his delight, he discovered Jack coming.

"But what's he doing with that mite of a French child?" Tom asked himself, staring in wonder and perplexity. "A cunning little girl she seems to be; but a battlefield isn't just the place for such an innocent. Poor thing! I suppose she's lost all her kin, and Jack brought her along because he couldn't let her stay at the ruins of her home and starve."

He was so filled with joy over the coming of his chum, who did not seem to be wounded in the least, that everything else was forgotten.

"Letters from home, Jack, old scout; hurry your stumps!" he called out, waving the epistles above his head.

Jack, still in his pilot's dress, was so eager to hurry that he picked up the little six-year-old French child, and ran the last fifty yards.