The infantry never knew how it was that the attack never reached them, why they did not have to beat it off with bullet and bayonet—or be beaten in by it—except that the guns perhaps had stopped it. The public did not know because the press did not say—perhaps because the press itself didn't know. And what the Air Service knew, as usual it didn't tell.
But Somebody evidently knew, because Washie and Pip found themselves shortly afterwards in Orders for a Decoration; and apparently the Squadron knew, because next morning when he went out to his 'bus Washie found that "Pan" had a neat little splash of paint on what you might call her left breast, an oblong little patch showing the colours of the ribbon of the Military Cross.
All that we are and all we own,
All that we have and hold or take,
All that we tackle or do or try
Is not for our, or the Corps' own sake.
Through our open eyes the Armies see,
We look and we learn that they may know.
Collect from the clouds the news they need,
And carry it back to them below.
We harry the guns that do us no harm,
We picture the paths we shall never take;
There's naught to help or to hinder us
On the road we bomb or the bridge we break.
Only to work where our footmen wish,
Only to guard them from prying eyes,
To find and to fetch the word they want,
We war unceasing and hold the skies.
All that we are and all we own,
All that we have or hope or know,
Our work and our wits, our deaths, our lives,
We stake above, that they win below.
IX
IF THEY KNEW—
A group of infantry in our front line trench watching the boiling eddying smoke and spurting fires of our artillery barrage on the enemy lines saw a couple of planes whirl suddenly up into sight above and beyond the barrage smoke. They were diving and twisting about each other like a couple of tumbler pigeons in flight, or rather, since one was obviously pursuing the other closely, like a pigeon hard pressed by a hawk. The excitement of the infantry turned to disgust as they caught plain sight of the markings on the machines, saw that the pursued was a British machine, the pursuer a black-crossed German. And when the British machine came rocketting and whirling through the barrage smother in plain flight from the German, who dared not follow through the wall of falling and bursting shells, the disgust of the men on the ground was openly and angrily expressed.
"Mastery o' the air," shouted one. "Fat lot he'll master." And from the others came similar jeers—"Hurry up, son, or he'll catch you yet—Why couldn't he have put up a fight?—Do they ever court-martial them blokes for runnin' away?—Fritz fliers top dog again."