Page:Flying Death.pdf/22

 "She was the pilot, was she?"

"She was the whole thing; nobody else aboard; she was alone."

He drew between his fingers the soft leather of the small, feminine gauntlet; he put a hand to his dripping hair and parted it with the habit of his of putting himself to rights.

"I had a glimpse of her first, Dave," he told me. "She's little, Dave; not too little; slim and young. it, Dave; I had a look at her and she's lovely. But she never looked at me till she rode me down."

"She couldn't have meant to ride you down," I objected.

"Oh, couldn't she? That's what I thought—till she hit me. That's why I couldn't dodge her."

"Where did she crash?"

"She didn't; she held the air. Flew off, cool as you like, after she knocked me spinning."

"She couldn't have counted on that," I insisted. Manifestly, any pilot intentionally riding down another must expect to fall, too.

"She counted on it," said Pete. "She'd done