Not for a single second, even while feeling that queer sensation grip him, did Tom cease working frantically to start his engine. He knew he had one last forlorn chance left. A few seconds would tell the story, and either he must be lucky enough to have his balky engine suddenly start again in response to his frantic efforts, or else—well, he dared not allow himself to dwell on what would happen to him when he struck the ground with all the frightful momentum of his falling machine.
The air service boy lived ages in that brief period of time. Never could he forget the agony that gripped his soul. There flashed before his memory the faces of those he loved at home, those whom he might never see again.
Then it was over. The engine had suddenly yielded to his frantic efforts, and once more commenced to throb with renewed life. Tom, with tremendous exertion, managed to right his tottering plane and steady it on an even keel.
His observer lay in a huddled heap in his seat. But for the safety belt he must have slid into space. Tom could not tell whether he was dead or had simply swooned.
That was a matter for the future. Just now he must concern himself with the task of extricating himself from his fresh perilous position. So rapidly had he fallen that amidst the swirling smoke clouds he could plainly see the Germans just below; and that he must be visible to his enemies he quickly had reason to understand.
Even as he started to spin away, shrapnel burst close beside his plane. Machine-guns also began to chatter underneath, and he saw that the wings of his plane were being cut by the hail of missiles that came up in swarms, like buzzing bees, each armed with a sting.
Dodging this way and that in eccentric lines, Tom brought into play all his acquired knowledge of a pilot's tricks in order to avoid being made a victim of this hot fire. He fully expected that, after all, the enemy would get him, but he was grimly determined that it would be only after he had exhausted every device possible.
He kept his head, and while dodging back and forth managed to follow a general course that promised soon to carry him closer to the American front. At one time he found himself above what seemed to be a very inferno of destruction. The air palpitated with the shock of a terrible explosion, as though a great mine had been fired. But Tom knew what it meant.
That must be the Big Bertha which for some days now had played an important part in shelling the rear of the American lines, even to knocking a temporary field hospital into fragments.
How Tom wished just then that his had been a bombing plane. With what savage joy would he have dropped his whole supply of air torpedoes down upon that mighty engine of destruction, forever silencing its thunderous voice and ending its power to do injury to the cause in which his whole soul was enlisted!