“Are we going to attack the town?” inquired Ethel, as Komoru asked her for the water-bottle.

“Oh, no,” he replied, “nothing of the sort; we are simply bluffing.  There are a number of expeditions going out to-day.  We must make the appearance of a great invasion.”

“How many planes are there all told?”

Komoru smiled.  “Not so many,” he said.

“But how many?” persisted Ethel.

“Fifteen thousand, maybe,” Komoru replied.

“To invade a country with nearly two hundred million inhabitants!  We will surely all be killed.”

Komoru smiled.

“By sheer force of numbers,” explained Ethel.

“Wait and see,” replied her enigmatical companion.

For hours the little aerial squadron sailed through the balmy air of Texas.  They passed over Austin and Waco and Fort Worth and Dallas.  They turned eastward and passed over Texarkana, and thence south to impress the people of Shreveport.

The excitement evinced in the towns increased as the news of their flight was wired ahead.  They were frequently shot at by groups of excited citizens or occasional companies of militia, but at the height and speed at which they were flying the bullets went wide.  One plane was lost.  Something must have snapped.  It doubled up and went tumbling downward like a wounded pigeon.

The sun was dropping toward the western horizon.  The invaders had been flying for ten hours.  They had been without food or sleep for thirty-six hours.  Save for the brief relaxation of the morning, Komoru had not taken his hands from the steering wheel, nor his foot from the engine control since the previous sunset in the Bay of Tehauntepec.

[Illustration:  The two women of Aryan blood worked together in the cotton field side by side with the Orientals.]

As they passed near other planes, Ethel noted that in many cases the women were driving.  Notwithstanding her dislike for him, the girl found herself wishing that she could relieve Komoru.

She pondered over his “wait and see” and began to discern a new possibility in an invasion of thirty thousand Japanese.  She tried to imagine one of the society favorites of her Chicago girlhood sitting in front of her driving that plane.  She remembered distinctly that aeroplane racing was a part of the diversion of such men and that five or six hours of driving was considered quite a feat.

The more she considered the man before her, the more she marvelled at his powers.  She confessed he interested her; she wondered why she disliked him.  The only answer that seemed acceptable was that he was “not her kind.”

Towards dusk, they hove in sight of the derricks of the Beaumont oil region.  The leader with the red plane descended in a large meadow.  Komoru was well to the front and brought his plane to earth a few meters from the red wings.  The man in the flag plane who had that day led them over a thousand miles and a score of cities got out and stretched himself.  With an exclamation of joyful surprise, Ethel recognized that he was Professor Oshima.