THIS week we have a story by H.P.S. Greene. Henry Paul Stevens Greene was a newspaper man who wrote aviation tales from the late 20’s to the early 40’s for magazines like Wings, Air Stories, Sky Fighters and, the magazine this story appeared in—Aces.

Billy King hated the French. A year in the Foreign Legion infantry, under hardboiled officers and non-coms, was mostly responsible. That was before the United States entered the war and Billy became eligible for transfer—a transfer that shot him right back into another French outfit again! It was in a cafe wallowing in his misfortune that Billy King wound up getting mixed up with a girl, an ex-king of Monravia. and a hairbrained scheme to snatch the mustaches of Captain von Grunow of the Imperial German Air Service! From the pages of the December 1931 Aces, it’s H.P.S. Greene’s “Kings Up!”

Take a Yank pilot soured on the world. A Paris mademoiselle. A strange gent with a monocle, and a red-nosed taxi hawk. Mix well with champagne, toss into tracer-torn sky—and watch for fireworks!

• Download “Kings Up” (December 1931, Aces)