Air Service Boys over the Atlantic; Or, The Longest Flight on Record

E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan, and the Project
Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
1920
Look! What does that mean, Tom?
It means that fellow wants to ruin the Yankee plane, and perhaps finish the flier who went down with it to the ground.
Not if we can prevent it, I say. Take a nosedive, Tom, and leave it to me to manage the gun!
He isn't alone, Jack, for I saw a second skulker in the brush, I'm sure.
We've got to drive those jackals away, no matter at what risk. Go to it, Tom, old scout!
The big battle-plane, soaring fully two thousand feet above the earth, suddenly turned almost upside-down, so that its nose pointed at an angle close to forty-five degrees. Like a hawk plunging after its prey it sped through space, the two occupants held in their places by safety belts.
As they thus rushed downward the earth seemed as if rising to meet them. Just at the right second Tom Raymond, by a skillful flirt of his hand, brought the Yankee fighting aircraft back to an even keel, with a beautiful gliding movement.
Immediately the steady throb of the reliable motor took up its refrain, while the buzz of the spinning propellers announced that the plane was once more being shot through space by artificial means.
The two occupants were Tom Raymond and Jack Parmly, firm friends and chums who had been like David and Jonathan in their long association. It was Tom who acted as pilot on the present occasion, while Jack took the equally important position of observer and gunner.