“You could do with those kids,” said Mac “They are really too big by now to be called kids, as a matter of fact.  Why, they will be flying soon themselves.  Why don’t you ask the major if you can’t have two of them down here to help clean and tune up the school machines?  It is a bit irregular, but so is their being here at all.  I don’t see why, if the Old Man can use them around the offices, we can’t have a couple of them here.  I have had the young Frenchman here with me now for some time, and he is worth a lot to me.  He says two others, one named Hill and the other Little, want to get down to the hangars.  Be a good chap and ask the major about it.”

Parks did.  The major was very busy at the time, and said, “I guess so,” and let the matter go at that.  Parks passed that laconic permission on to the sergeant-major, and the two boys reported to Parks forthwith.

That left Bob Haines, Harry Corwin, Archie Fox and Dicky Mann at headquarters to be generally useful.  They had come to be on the best of terms with the sergeant-major, and when they pointed out to him that the three boys in the hangars were “having all the fun,” he suggested that he so assign them to duty that but two of them would be “on” at the same time.  Thus when Bob and Dicky Mann were standing ready for whatever might be required of them, Harry and Archie were free to spend their time in the hangars, where the sergeant-major could lay his hand on them in case of sudden calls.

Thus the summer was not far advanced before the Brighton boys were in the very thick of the flying game, not as onlookers, but as parts of the machine into which the various component parts of the camp and its numerous units were rapidly becoming merged.

If they had not tried to learn, the Brighton boys must have picked up some general information about aeroplanes and flying.  With their special eagerness they were rapidly becoming well acquainted with most details of the work of the airmen.  No casual word in their hearing fell on barren ground.  When one of them mastered a new idea, he passed it on to the others.

None of the boys studied the machines themselves more devotedly than did Harry Corwin.  Close application to many a dry volume bore good fruit.  He felt he could set up a Farman type biplane by himself.

One morning Harry was standing beside a monoplane of the Bleriot type, which had come from somewhere as an old school machine, and had not been much in demand owing to the fact that no other monoplanes were in evidence at the camp, when an army airman, an entire stranger to Harry, came out of the hangar and glanced at the engine in evident preparation for a flight.

The airman was about to start the engine when Harry noticed that the elevator control wires were crossed.  Whoever had attached them had done so mistakenly.  Harry could hardly believe the evidence of his eyes, yet there it was, undeniable.  Stepping forward, he said to the airman:  “Excuse me, but your control wires are not right.”