Chick’s actual elimination from basic training school did not occur for a few days. Captain Branch’s recommendation had to be confirmed by the Stage Commander, who first flew with the unhappy cadet in a final test. His report, duly filed with those of Chick’s instructors and his Flight Commander, must be reviewed at the next meeting of the elimination board. All this took time.

On the evening before Chick was to hear the verdict, Barry and Hap made a special effort to cheer him up.

“Being ‘washed out’ is no disgrace, fella,” Barry told him. “It doesn’t mean that you’re kicked out of the Air Forces—only that you can’t be a pilot. You’ll get your officer’s commission just the same, in some other classification. So why worry?”

Chick’s homely face cracked in a wan smile. He had not regained his natural color since the ground-loop that wrecked his plane. The freckles stood out more plainly than usual on his snub nose.

“I hope you’re right, Barry,” he said huskily. “It’s only ‘under the hood’ that I go to pieces. Ever since that time I got the itch in the Link Trainer, instrument flying gives me the jitters. If it doesn’t carry over to advanced training school....”

“It won’t, Chick,” Hap Newton assured him stoutly. “What course have you picked for a first choice—Photography, Navigation, or Communications? You’re better than most in ‘buzzer’ code. Why don’t you ask for the advanced course in radio?”

“That would be my second choice, Hap,” Enders replied. “Bombardment’s my preference, though. Next to being a pilot, I’d like to dish it out to the enemy in big, explosive chunks. I’ve already told Captain Branch. He’ll put in a good word for me. And, listen, you bums! Don’t think I haven’t appreciated the way you’ve helped. A man’s got no right to be downhearted with a couple of friends like you.”

The next day Chick came into the room with a broad grin.

“Bombardment school for me!” he announced. “I’m leaving tonight. The board didn’t question Captain Branch’s recommendation. Now it’s all settled, I’m almost as happy as if I’d passed all my pilot tests. Only thing I hate is leaving you fellows, and—and the grand bunch of officers that we’ve had here at the Field. They tried to make me feel as if they didn’t like to say good-by, either.”

“They meant it, Chick!” Barry Blake exclaimed softly. “Student pilots aren’t just so much grist through the mill—not as our teaching officers see us. They’re real and personal friends of each cadet who’ll meet them halfway. It’s a big honor to know men like that!”

Parting with Chick Enders was a hard wrench for his roommates. As he boarded the bus for San Antonio that evening, they realized that they might be seeing him for the last time. In a world war of many fronts only a rare coincidence would bring them all together again.

“Happy landings, you goons!” Chick gulped as he gripped their hands.

“Pick your targets, fella—and remember us when you’re dropping block-busters on Tokyo!” Barry replied.

“Yeh, we’ll be right behind you with some more of ’em!” grinned Hap Newton, as the bus door slammed shut.

A few days after Chick’s departure for bombardier school, graduation separated the two remaining roommates. Barry, whose cool, quick brain and steady nerves would have fitted him for either fighter or bombardment flying, was allowed to choose the latter. Hap Newton’s one hundred and eighty-five pounds removed him automatically from the pursuit class. Recommended to twin engine school at Ellington Field, he said good-by to Barry in the Flying Cadets’ Club in San Antonio.

“We’ll keep in touch, Hap,” Barry promised. “And there’s just a chance we’ll meet up before this war is over. Keep eager, you stick-mauler! I’m taking off for Kelly Field now!”

“Set ’em down easy, you old sky-jazzer!” Hap smiled. “If you don’t, I’ll come along and lay an egg right on your tail assembly.”

Barry Blake strode away with a lump in his throat. He’d have to get used to parting with good friends, he told himself. The Air Forces were like that. Sometimes a flier had to watch his squadron members torch down under enemy fire. That was a lot tougher than shaking hands for the last time, with a grin and a wisecrack. Time to lay a new course, now—for Kelly Field and a pair of silver wings!

For Barry, the nine weeks at Kelly Field passed even more swiftly than those at Randolph. His acquaintance among his fellow cadets widened considerably. Yet, perhaps unconsciously, he avoided making friends so intimate that good-bys would be painful.

From training planes he graduated to handling the steady, reliable B-25 bombers. Taking off, flying and landing these medium bombers presented problems quite different from those he had met at Randolph Field. Barry caught on quickly. Gathering every scrap of skill he had ever learned, his mind “sensed” the right maneuver, the correct touch on each control.

“You’re cut out for a Fortress pilot, Blake,” his instructor told him. “You’re naturally methodical. At the same time you’re as quick to grasp a new emergency as any cadet I’ve ever seen. Tomorrow you’ll shift to the old B-17. She has no tail turret, but for training purposes she handles like the newer types.”

Barry was more thrilled than he cared to show. Since pre-flight school, he had envied the pilots who flew the big flying forts—the famous B-17F’s. When the hour came that he actually sat at the controls of his Fortress, he knew beyond all doubt that these were the ships for him. The quadruple thunder of the bomber’s 4,800 horses was sweeter in his ears than a pipe-organ fugue.

First, in the co-pilot’s seat, he learned the exact touch needed on the throttles, the turbos, the r.p.m. adjustment, to keep the winged giant’s airspeed constant. This, for accurate bombing, would be a most important factor. Next, he learned exactly how to follow the Boeing’s P. D. I., or pilot director indicator, which kept the ship straight on her course with not the slightest change of altitude, while the bombardier sighted his target.

His final lessons included setting down and taking off on small, rough fields. Under war conditions many a bomber pilot has escaped destruction by knowing just what his ship can do in a pinch. Barry Blake was now as ready as any training school could make him.

What he longed for now was actual combat—the take-off before dawn on a real bombing mission—the swift descent on the enemy city, camp, or convoy—the blasting of his bombs on the target—the sight of enemy fighter planes falling apart before his ship’s guns.

But where would it be? Europe, Africa, the South Pacific, or the Aleutian chain?

Barry had hoped for a few days’ furlough after receiving his commission. A week at home would be like a taste of paradise after these seven crowded months. Even five days with Dad and Mom and the kid sister would be worth the heartache of saying good-by again. Yet, at the last moment, he learned that this was not to be.

Like a flooding tide the mighty crest of America’s war effort was sweeping everything before it. More planes than ever were needed at the fighting front. More planes were going there—and that meant more pilots. Twenty-four hours was the limit of Barry Blake’s time at home.

It was all like a dream. Walking up Craryville’s old main street, Barry felt like a beardless Rip Van Winkle. He had left there a green kid of eighteen. Now, an inch taller and ten pounds heavier, he passed neighbors who didn’t know him—until he spoke. And, speaking to them, he hardly knew himself. Professor Blake’s gangling offspring, who’d been the high school valedictorian, who had jerked sodas on Saturdays in the corner drug store—what had that self-conscious kid in common with Lieutenant Barry Blake, pilot of multi-engined bombing planes?

There was Mom and Dad. He’d never be different to them, or they to him. To the kid sister, he was a hero, of course, but Betty was only fourteen. She’d changed, too, in the past seven months. Barry wondered what in the world she’d be like when he came back again, after the war ... if he did come back. There wasn’t time for such thoughts, though. Half of his twenty-four hour visit was gone already!

When the train pulled out of Craryville next morning, Barry the high school kid was only a dim memory in the mind of Lieutenant Blake. His orders were to report at Seattle, Washington, where he would join the crew of a new B-17F as co-pilot. It was better, far better, to keep his thoughts fixed on that. Otherwise, recalling the good-bys just ended would be a bit too much to bear.