"After all, that is for our seconds to arrange. My friend Epinard of
the Roullens Aerodrome will act for me. He will also instruct me how
to bring serpents to the ground."
"With the idea of cleansing the sky of cauliflowers," said Gaspard, "I
shall proceed to the flying-ground at Dormancourt; Blanchaille, the
instructor there, will receive your friend."
He bowed and walked out.
Details were soon settled. On a date six months ahead the two
combatants would meet three thousand two hundred feet above the little
town in which they lived, and fight to the death. In the event of both
crashing, the one who crashed last would be deemed the victor. It was
Gaspard's second who insisted on this clause; Gaspard himself felt
that it did not matter.
The first month of instruction went by. At the end of it Jacques
Rissole had only one hope. It was that when he crashed he should crash
on some of Gaspard's family. Gaspard had no hope, but one consolation.
It was that no crash could involve his stomach, which he invariably
left behind him as soon as the aeroplane rose.
At the end of the second month Gaspard wrote to Jacques.
"My friend," he wrote, "the hatred of you which I nurse in my bosom,
and which fills me with the desire to purge you from the sky, is in
danger of being transferred to my instructor. Let us therefore meet
and renew our enmity."
Jacques Rissole wrote back to Gaspard.
"My enemy," he wrote, "there is nobody in the whole of the Roullens
aerodrome whom I do not detest with a detestation beside which my
hatred for you seems as maudlin adoration.
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