THE BLUE DAUNTLESS!  The Man Who Helps!     

 Story & Characters © 2010 by Peter W. Mitsopoulos  

                Illustrations by Jana Pivkova

                    Chapter Three of Ten

                           Origin  

     “So, someone gave old Frenchy a right good nailing, eh?”

     “Sure did,” said Linda.  “Five times straight through the door.”

     “Can’t say I’m sorry.”  Hanover rubbed the stitches on his chin.  “Slicing up an older chap, then sneaking into a lady’s boudoir.  Isn’t cricket, you know.”

     “I’m sure glad your friend was there.  I’m also glad he helped out when the police showed up.  That made things a lot less messy for me.”

     “B.D. has worked with the local constabulary a time or two in the past.  They trust him.”

     The plane had reached cruising altitude and was humming along smoothly.  Linda glanced down at the jungle, then back at Hanover.  He wasn’t quite as creepy as when he’d hypnotized her in the bar, though he still made her nervous.  Yet the Dauntless put complete faith in him.  “With my very life would I trust Hanover,” he’d told Linda.  “And more than once have I done so.”  That was just before the little Englishman met them at the airport.

     Linda leaned back and looked at the cockpit door.  “He’s a good pilot, huh?”

    “Exemplary, my dear.  That’s what he did in the war.  Flew for your navy.”

     “Tell me about him.”

     Hanover took a sip from a pocket flask.  “I actually don’t know much about his life before I met him.  He participated in the sinking of several Japanese ships, but then he was hit by flak and his plane went down in the South Pacific.  His gunner was killed and he nearly bought it as well.  He was floating unconscious in his Mae West life jacket when some fishermen from one of the local islands picked him up.  He lay in a coma for a week in their village.  When he finally came out of it, as he later told me, he said that a bright Blue Being of some kind had appeared to him.”