have to make him talk," Stan said thickly. His head was beginning to
feel light and his tongue thick. The corrugated dome of the Nissen hut
was wavering and swaying.

At that moment the door burst open. "Sure, an' I told you the rat would
come back here!" That was O'Malley's bellow. "And there the spalpeen
is!"

"I say, old man, are you hit bad?" Allison's voice came to Stan through
the dizzy haze closing in around him.

"Just nicked," Stan muttered and grinned. By some twist Allison and
O'Malley had escaped. He felt much better, so much better that he
laughed, or thought he did.

* * * * *

Stan lay on his bunk with a medic giving him treatment before the
ambulance boys packed him off. He opened his eyes and found the haze had
gone. He could feel the morphine working and knew he would drift away
again in a few seconds. O'Malley was looking down at him, his homely
face twisted into a scowl. There were two suspicious-looking beads which
were not sweat on each side of his nose. When Stan looked up at him,
O'Malley grinned broadly. Beside him, Allison was smiling too.

"We'll have him fixed up as good as ever in no time," the doctor said.

"How did you keep from getting gassed?" Stan asked.

"Aisy," O'Malley answered. "The rat was so scared we'd rush him that he
jest eased out through the door an' tossed a glass jug into the room.
It was fixed to break aisy if it hit anything hard. Allison caught it as
neat as iver he caught a Rugby football." O'Malley laughed.

"But the blighter had locked us in and that slowed us down some. Then
two of his henchman came along to use the radio and when they unlocked
the doors to air the gas out of the hut, we grabbed them." Allison
looked at the doctor to see if it was all right to talk. The doctor
nodded.

"Your phone call came in the nick o' time," O'Malley put in. "We located
Sim and trailed him from the mess to his hideout. It was one of our own
Nissen huts the boys had been using to store bedding in. The rats had
moved the piles of bedding away from the back end and made a place
there."

"Why wasn't their radio located?" Stan asked.

The doctor turned to Allison and Stan. "Better let the rest of the plot
wait," he said.

Splinters and Bugs edged forward. "Be savin' a cot for you, Wilson,"
they said.

Stan grinned happily. The morphine had claimed him, and it brought a
pleasant dream. He was again with his pals and another German plot