Page:Edgar Wallace--Tam o the Scoots.djvu/105

 pleasantly through deep and sunless gulches or had clambered on the back of a sure-footed bronco up precipitous mountain-slopes, the mental picture he conjured was in the nature of a double exposure, for ever there loomed a dim figure of a mysterious anti-aircraft gun. He took up the book for about the tenth time and read two lines, when a bell in the corner of the room rang three times. Three short thrills of sound and then silence.

Tam slipped from the bed, lifted down his leather jacket from the wall and struggled into it. He took up his padded helmet, switched off the light and, opening the door, stepped out into the darkness. Buttoning his jacket as he went, he made his way across by a short cut to the hangars and found Blackie surrounded by half a dozen officers already on the spot.

"Is that you, Tam? I want you to go up—there she goes!"

They listened

"Whoom!"