Fifteen minutes, fifteen weeks, or was it fifteen years since Freddy and he had left the old repair shop and entered the woods? Dave couldn't tell, and he didn't bother to guess. Every muscle and bone in his body ached from bumping into tree trunks and huge boulders that loomed up without warning in the darkness. And his face and hands were scratched from bramble thickets that tried to hold him back and pin him helpless.

How long had they been groping blindly through these darn woods? He had no idea. Perhaps the woods were endless. Perhaps ... and the sudden thought chilled him to the core ... they had simply been wandering about in a circle, and didn't know it. However, there was at least one tiny thing for which to be thankful. They had not bumped headlong into any Nazi patrols. As a matter of fact they had not heard a thing nor seen a thing to make their hearts loop over with fright. It was as though this section of Occupied France had gone sound asleep.

For that possibility Dave was thankful. Yet, at the same time it caused his worry to mount. In the back of his head was the faint hope that they might be able to steal that Messerschmitt One-Ten they had seen sliding down to a landing, and escape back to England. That von Peiplow had said it was a radio control plane made things that much better. No doubt British radio engineers would like very much to examine German radio control equipment. Yet, escape was not what Dave wanted most. Escape would save Freddy's life, and his own, but, it would mean leaving this area, the Nazis' testing ground for their newest weapon of war, untouched. True, a swarm of British bombers could be sent over to blast it off the map. But could they? What if swarms of TNT loaded gliders, and soaring planes, were sent aloft to bar the way? To not only bar the way, but be radio directed right into the R.A.F. bombers before they could be shot out of the skies by the British gunners? But, more likely than that, supposing before the British bombers could come over von Peiplow moved all his gliders, soaring planes, and equipment elsewhere? What then? The job would have to be done all over again. Von Peiplow's new hide-out would have to be found ... and there would still be the terrible danger of not being able to wipe it from the face of the earth. Still the danger that von Peiplow's new weapons would prove their full worth and destroy all British aircraft sent against them. True, perhaps von Peiplow's experiments and tests were far from being completed. Perhaps there was much more he had to do before this new deadly weapon was ready for continued active service. However, what happened to those Lockheeds last Tuesday night proved that the new weapon was far enough along to spread doom throughout war torn skies. It was....

Dave cut short his rambling thoughts as Freddy Farmer suddenly checked his forward movement and pulled him down onto the ground.

"What, Freddy?" he whispered excitedly. "See anything? Hear anything?"

"Shut up!" the English youth hissed in his ear. "We're practically on top of the spot. Look ahead, and just a shade to the right. See the glow of light between those trees? That's a tarmac oil-pot flare. And a light means somebody's there keeping guard. And...."

The English youth stopped short and squeezed Dave's hand hard in his mounting excitement.

"Look, Dave!" he whispered again. "See them? A half a dozen planes, pulled up under the trees! They look like Messerschmitt One-Nines to me, but I can't say for sure!"

"Boy, what eyes you've got!" Dave breathed and blinked hard. "So help me I can't see a thing but shadows. I.... Hold it! Yeah, I can see a faint glow of light, but nothing else. Looks about fifty yards from here. What do you say?"

"Yes, just about that," Freddy replied. "We'd better keep down on all fours, now. Here, better let me lead the way. But don't go crawling up my back, old thing. And for Pete's sake, don't make any noise!"

"I promise not to bust out singing!" Dave growled. "Get going, you old Eagle Eye."

Making far less sound than a jungle panther stalking its prey the two R.A.F. pilots wormed their way forward, inching under bramble branches, sliding around tree trunks, and gliding past huge hunks of rock that stuck up out of the ground. Dave didn't dare raise his head once to glance ahead. He spent every instant of the time sticking so close to Freddy Farmer's heels that his nose almost touched.

As a matter of fact, after a thousand years or so his nose did touch Freddy's boots. He bumped his whole face smack into them as the English youth came to a sudden stop. Dave swallowed the groan of pain that came to his lips, and lifted his head. Freddy had come to a halt directly in back of a clump of thick bushes. But they were not too thick for Dave to see what was beyond. The sight set his heart to pounding, and the blood to surging through his veins.

Not fifteen yards away was the first of a row of six Messerschmitt One-Nine single seater fighting planes. They were hauled back partly under the overhanging branches of some trees, and in the faint glow cast by a small oil-pot flare set out in front of them in the middle of the row the craft looked like prehistoric vultures crouched and ready to spring into the air. Dave gave them but a single glance. What caught and held his attention was the figure of an armed Nazi Air Force mechanic comfortably slumped in a canvas chair to one side of the oil-pot flare. He was smoking a cigarette and seemingly staring up at the night skies. Propped against an arm of the chair, and within split seconds reach was a high powered German Mauser rifle. And as Dave strained his eyes he saw the usual half dozen or so hand grenades hooked to the German's belt. That the German was armed with both rifle and hand grenades made it obvious that General von Peiplow was taking no chances of loyal French peasants in the area committing any acts of sabotage.

Dave took another good look at that rifle and hand grenades, and groaned softly.

"Think we can sneak up on him, Freddy?" he breathed softly.

"We won't have to," came the startling reply. "I can take care of that chap. What makes me mad is about that Messerschmitt One-Ten. Look, Dave, it's way around in back of the One-Nines. We couldn't hope to get it out in front where we could take off without waking up half of France. Blast it! I was hoping we could get that bus back to England!"

Dave stared at the shadowy shape of the three place Nazi plane completely blocked off by the row of single seaters. He started to nod his head in bitter agreement, and then cut it off short.

"Nuts to the three seater, Freddy!" he whispered excitedly. "I've got it!"

"Got what?" Freddy demanded.
............