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He told her to stay put and loped across the field in the silver ht

Austin MADE IT across thethe wall of the field stone building He found an unlocked door and stepped into the dark interior, where his nostrils picked up the garage odors of oil and gasoline He allowed hiht house a car or truck His groping fingers found a light switch and he discovered a second later that he was not in a garage, but in a sar

The bright red biplane had swept-back wings and a heart-shaped tail decorated with a black three-headed-eagle design He ran his fingers along the fabric fuselage, adone into the aircraft Attached to the underside of each as a torpedo-shaped metal tank A skull and crossbones was stenciled on the outside of the containers Poison

He peered into the twin cockpits The pilot's controls in the rear cockpit consisted of a single lever in front of the seat and a foot bar that controlled the rudder for steering The forward-and-backit from side to

side worked the ailerons at the ends of the wings, which tilted the plane for a turn The system was primitive, but at the same time it was a miracle of simplicity that allowed the plane to be floith one hand

The cockpit housed an array of instru handy devices like an up-to-date radio, a ation system Earphones connected the cockpits Austinwith tools and spare parts He peeked into a storeroom filled with plastic containers that were marked with skull and crossbones The labels identified the contents of the containers as pesticide

Austin snatched an electric torch frohts off and went to the door All was quiet He clicked the light on and off three times, and then watched as a shadow darted from the woods and ar He scanned the meadow and woods to make sure Skye hadn't been seen, and then pulled her into the hangar and shut the door

"What took you so long?" she said with irritation in her voice "I orried when I saw the lights go on and off"

Austin didn't n that she had regained her natural spunkiness He kissed her on the cheek "My apologies," he said "There was a line at the reservations counter"

She blinked at the darkness "What is this place?"

Austin switched the torch on and let the beae, from the wooden propeller to the coat of arms on the tail

"You're looking at the Fauchard family air force They must use this to crop-dust the vineyards"

"It's beautiful," she said

"It's more than beautiful It's our ticket out of here"

"Can you fly that thing?" "I think so"