An idea flashed into my mind.

‘You’re going this morning,’ I said.

‘How did you know?’ he exclaimed.  ’I’m due to go today, but the grouse up in Caithness wanted shootin’ so badly that I decided to wangle another day’s leave.  They can’t expect a man to start for the south of England when he’s just off a frowsy journey.’

’All the same you’re going to be a stout fellow and start in two hours’ time.  And you’re going to take me with you.’

He stared blankly, and then burst into a roar of laughter.  ’You’re the man to go tiger-shootin’ with.  But what price my commandant?  He’s not a bad chap, but a trifle shaggy about the fetlocks.  He won’t appreciate the joke.’

’He needn’t know.  He mustn’t know.  This is an affair between you and me till it’s finished.  I promise you I’ll make it all square with the Flying Corps.  Get me down to Farnton before evening, and you’ll have done a good piece of work for the country.’

’Right-o!  Let’s have a tub and a bit of breakfast, and then I’m your man.  I’ll tell them to get the bus ready.’

In Archie’s bedroom I washed and shaved and borrowed a green tweed cap and a brand-new Aquascutum.  The latter covered the deficiencies of my raiment, and when I commandeered a pair of gloves I felt almost respectable.  Gibbons, who seemed to be a jack-of-all-trades, cooked us some bacon and an omelette, and as he ate Archie yarned.  In the battalion his conversation had been mostly of race-meetings and the forsaken delights of town, but now he had forgotten all that, and, like every good airman I have ever known, wallowed enthusiastically in ‘shop’.  I have a deep respect for the Flying Corps, but it is apt to change its jargon every month, and its conversation is hard for the layman to follow.  He was desperately keen about the war, which he saw wholly from the viewpoint of the air.  Arras to him was over before the infantry crossed the top, and the tough bit of the Somme was October, not September.  He calculated that the big air-fighting had not come along yet, and all he hoped for was to be allowed out to France to have his share in it.  Like all good airmen, too, he was very modest about himself.  ‘I’ve done a bit of steeple-chasin’ and huntin’ and I’ve good hands for a horse, so I can handle a bus fairly well.  It’s all a matter of hands, you know.  There ain’t half the risk of the infantry down below you, and a million times the fun.  Jolly glad I changed, sir.’

We talked of Peter, and he put him about top.  Voss, he thought, was the only Boche that could compare with him, for he hadn’t made up his mind about Lensch.  The Frenchman Guynemer he ranked high, but in a different way.  I remember he had no respect for Richthofen and his celebrated circus.

At six sharp we were ready to go.  A couple of mechanics had got out the machine, and Archie put on his coat and gloves and climbed into the pilot’s seat, while I squeezed in behind in the observer’s place.  The aerodrome was waking up, but I saw no officers about.  We were scarcely seated when Gibbons called our attention to a motor-car on the road, and presently we heard a shout and saw men waving in our direction.