CHAPTER XI
THE BATTLES IN THE AIR
In a trice Blaine was rising in the air. The feeling that he had again his old machine was reassuring. It put new life into his nearly restored vitality.
With Buck Bangs a close second and Orris Erwin right behind him, the leading planes spiraled into the air, with the advancing Boches hardly two miles away, their bombs dropping as they flew.
Byers himself was getting into his own plane, a two-seated affair equipped with two machine guns. With him was his own observer, an excellent photographer and airman. The two opposing squadrons were about equal. Dividing into two columns, with Blaine heading one and Captain Byers the other, they bore directly off toward the enemy.
Such a start had the Boches gotten, by somehow missing the Allied planes that were supposed to be picketing the front, that a direct attack was inevitable. Up or down they rose or fell, each plane singling out its opponent, and each maneuvering for position. It was here that the superior speed and nimbleness of the Allied triplanes was soon apparent.
Byers in his big biplane made straight for the leading plane opposed to him and presently the rattle of machine gun fire interplayed with the whirring sounds of the motors, while the diving, flipping, looping, with all the other air stunts of sky battling, made the scene so interesting to those below that the adjacent bomb-proofs were hardly thought of.
On a small knoll the American senator and his two daughters, glasses in hand, were watching, listening, semi-oblivious as to any possible danger to themselves. Finally a spatter of bullets and shell fragments roused the father to a sense that more than himself might be in the line of fire at any moment.
"This won't do, girls!" he announced in peremptory tones. "Get into that shelter!" pointing at a half underground dugout near. "Run, run!"
Avella, without lowering her glass, replied:
"In just a minute, papa. See Mr. Blaine! My! What's he doing to that other horrid fellow?"
Blaine was at the instant trying to got on the tail of a big Taube, not unlike the one Blaine and Erwin had captured and used while on an earlier scout, as may be recalled by the reader. What accentuated Blaine's eagerness was the glimpse he caught of that Death's Head Flag, which had also adorned the former captured machine. But the Boche within this one was an adept and so maneuvered that Blaine, to save himself from an onset from behind, was obliged to try the risky side-loop, much to the surprise of the other. For Blaine, while upside down, was already firing at his opponent, and as he rose was directly on the tail. But to the girls below it looked as if Blaine was already crashing towards the earth. Andra gave a nervous scream. Avella was shocked, of course, but had her glass the next instant upon Buck Bangs, at that moment engaged in a fierce duel with two enemy opponents.
"Look! Look!" called Andra. "He's falling — ah-h-h!" This last word was long drawn out during which, to her intense joy, Blaine had righted himself and was behind and below the other plane. Now she could see the spitting of lire as he plugged bullets and shrapnel into his astonished opponent.
Scarcely did she breathe again before the Taube, its Death's Head Flag collapsing about its staff, was tumbling down, almost over them. At the same time one of the Huns battling with Bangs was hit in the tank by a rain of bullets from Byers' machine which was striving to rise above and behind the foe the captain had singled out for himself.
Down went this one of Buck's opponents in flames. Both planes fell just without the grounds, while the battle above filtered away towards the German front, the invaders evidently having gotten enough. Two other enemy planes were retiring in a crippled condition, all pursued by the Allies, who had so far lost only one machine.
The Senator, seeing little heed paid by his daughters to his commands, was seized by the spirit of the combat and recklessly hurried off towards the nearest wrecked plane that had fallen. The girls, with others, followed.
It was a sad sight. This machine, the wings still burning, lay in a confused huddle over a crushed human body that still gave signs of life. It was the plane that Byers bad sent down in flames.
Aided by men from the aerodrome, they extinguished the fire with a ready hose, the Senator and the girls assisting. Carefully they dragged out a horribly mutilated yet youthful form. A surgeon, with the girls aiding, tried to alleviate the, pain of the dying man. His lips moved.
"What's he trying to say, Vella?" demand the Senator. "You know some
German, don't you?"
"Sounds like 'Schwein, Schwein!' Doesn't that mean pigs, papa?"
"It sure does! There, he's talking again!"
The girls listened, but could not understand; while the surgeon, formerly an intern at one of the New York hospitals, smiled pityingly.
"Poor fellow!" he volunteered. "He's not complimentary."
"What's he saying now? Sounds like American — then something else."
"He says, 'Amerikaner-all swine-pigs,' and a lot more."
They drew back somewhat; but the girls whose sympathy predominated, continued to minister to his needs until the last breath announced that one more Boche had gone to his account.
It was an hour or so before the rest of the squadron again appeared. With them were the scouting planes that had been wished for when the enemy squadron so suddenly appeared. In the fights over the German trenches another of our planes had somehow vanished. No one could say further except that Erwin, the missing pilot, had been seen mounting high up amid a scurry of clouds, with two pursuing Fokkers on his heels.
Blaine and Bangs were in the midst of hearty congratulations from many, including Senator Walsen and his daughters, when the news was brought to them.
They had just alighted and were standing beside their machines.
Instantly Blaine turned to Buck, saying:
"You and your machine all right, Buck?"
Andra, at this, regarded Lafe closely.
"I'm O. K. and so is my bully little Nieuport. Say, old man, we've got to go out and see what's gone wrong with that little snipe Orry, eh?"
" Sure thing! Orry is a good fellow. I'm with you."
The next instant Blaine was back in his seat. He turned to the mechanic who had just finished examining the machine.
"Fill up the tank, Bill," he said. "And hand me out a few more sheaves of ammunition. Sure you've got enough, too, Buck?"
"Do you — do you — you don't mean that you two are going up again?" queried Andra, and for an instant Blaine detected something about her that betokened a more than casual interest.
"It's my — it's our duty to go, Miss Walsen," said he, meeting her eyes sympathetically. "Erwin is one of our best men. He's a true spad pilot. Besides that, he and I are great cronies. Buck feels the same way."
"Oh, I — I think I understand." But she spoke with a certain repressed agitation. If Lafe had been less se1f-conscious he would have understood and doubtless felt flattered.
As it was, he turned to Bangs, the Montana lad, now also seated in his pilot's place, with Avella on the other side saying something. He heard Bangs reiterate:
"Oh, sure, Miss Vella! We'll be careful — very careful — you bet! I'm only too anxious to get back with Orry and see more of you two girls. I say, Senator," to the father now looking approvingly on, "this lost pilot is one of our best. He's a turnip — a real joker! We can't go back on him."
"I guess you are right, Mr. Bangs. If you and your friends do return to us, I will see that you all have leave to run back to Paris and at least take dinner with us at our hotel."
By this time the two young nurses were standing back, watching the scene with the frank mien that American girls view something which they regret, yet at the same time admire. Then up came Captain Byers hurriedly, calling out:
"Are you lads going? That's plucky! I was about to dispatch some one. We cannot afford to lose Erwin. He's too valuable, and I know he'd do the same by you!"
"You bet, Captain!" This from Buck as his machine trundled off, propelled by two mechanics until it rose. "That was bully the way you busted that chap in the tank. He might have got me, else."
Blaine was already in the air, with Bangs a close second. A moment later and they were climbing rapidly, so rapidly that soon they looked like two great birds winging their way over the Allied front and across No-Man's-Land into the dark beyond. Blaine's observer, Stanley, was also in his seat behind.
When the two girls finally reached their quarters that night at the small inn in the adjacent village they were both dispirited. The Senator was writing letters while the girls were preparing for the evening meal.
"Funny, isn't it, how we seem to be interested in those lads?" said
Andra. "I think that young Blaine is just splendid."
"He is no better than Mr. Bangs." This from Avella. "Just think, Buck is from Butte! Why, that is right next door to us in Idaho."
Then they both sighed, looked queerly at each other and finally embraced and kissed. If both were somewhat smitten over the looks and conduct of these aviators, acquaintances of only a few days, certainly their stately father as yet could hardly suspect.
After the evening meal was over, they cunningly tried to persuade him to go with them down to the aerodrome to see if anything had occurred there. Probably the boys had not yet returned. The Senator doubted if they had.
"Look here, girls," said be, after being told that he was needed as an escort, "why are you so interested? They'll come back all right. And I am busy."
"Well, papa, said Avella, "we'd feel better to go down and inquire."
"Yes, daddy dear! You must go with us, please!"
The upshot of all this was as usual. The Senator went.
At the station they found Captain Byers returning from an observation post where he had been scanning the eastern heavens in a last effort to discern something of the absent planes that had long since vanished over No-Man's-Land into the unknown void beyond, which was enemy country.
"I am afraid for those lads," said he to the Senator after greeting all three. "They are both too risky at times, and they were much stirred up over Erwin's long absence. Great friends they were, too."
The Senator and the girls expressed concern. Especially so was it with the sisters, both of whom grew pale as they listened. Perhaps they were pleased that owing to the darkness this manifestation of inward concern was hidden from the others. They quietly pressed each other's hands.
Just then an orderly came up on the run, his night glasses in hand.
"Oh, Captain," said he, "there's a plane returning. I couldn't make it out clearly. It sags a bit is if it was crippled, sir."
"Wait for me, Senator," called Byers, starting out almost on the run, his night glasses again out. The orderly followed rapidly.
"Let us follow them, father," urged Andra, while Avella tugged at her sister's arm, sure that the Senator would go too. "Come on, papa."
Both girls were off, while the Senator came after, though at a slower pace.
Reaching the observation post — merely a platform erected on the highest elevation near by, they saw the captain and the orderly both scanning the eastern skies through their night glasses, instruments of the latest design. To the girls' nothing was as yet was visible but the stars now shining dimly through a thin haze that hung over h landscape.
"Let us go up. Papa will follow." This from Andra as they climbed the steps to the little platform where the two aviators were scanning the upper air.
From the disjointed remarks of the airmen the realized that something was in sight, yet hardly visible to the naked eye. At last, however, came a gasp from one of the girls who pointed eagerly to the other.
"Don't you see it?" exclaimed Andra. "Where are your eyes? My! It's sagging downward. I wonder —'
Here Avella interrupted with a slight scream as she too, caught sight of a faint, filmy something that was teetering slowly down, but not in straight lines as is usual when planes are descending in the regular methods employed by aviators when striving to reach a certain landing.
"What is the matter with it?" queried Andra to any one within hearing.
"That you, ladies?" Byers turned suddenly, then his eyes sought his glass again. "Why, it is quite evident that the machine is a Fokker and disabled. He'll make it all right, I guess."
"That is a German machine, isn't it?" asked Avella anxiously.
"Mightn't it be a hostile one?" queried Andra.
"The plane is of hostile make, Miss Walsen, but the chap inside is one of us, you may be sure. There! I fear he is going to drop."
Byers, followed by the orderly, was already running down the steps, almost colliding with the Senator who arrived at this moment. After the two aviators hurried the girls, meeting their father, and telling him what was occurring.
"And Captain Byers said that airman was about to drop - or fall out; I don't know which." This from Andra. "Let us hurry after them, father, and see what has happened."
Senator Walsen, evidently used to these sudden whims on the part of his daughters, turned and followed them, still in pursuit of the captain. If he objurgated the haste, he did it silently.
By the time the girls caught up with Byers, what had been a trim airplane came thumping to the ground not more than two hundred yards off in an unused corner of the big enclosure, its wings a mere mass of tattered rags, its body riddled by many perforations of machine gun bullets, fragments of shrapnel and so on. It was a marvel how it had stayed up for so long, but it happened that neither the engine nor petrol tank were vitally harmed.
Still lashed to his seat, his arms hanging loosely, his head resting on the rim of the small manhole, was the pilot, to all appearances lifeless or else in a swoon. It was Stanley, Blaine's observation man.