Over the trench tops poured thousands of khaki 252clad warriors, sallying forth in the most resolute endeavor ever attempted by American troops.
They had not advanced ten feet from the trenches before the fog swallowed them, magically, and many were never to retrace their steps. The big show they had so long waited for was here with an ear-splitting, nerve-racking tempest of thundering guns. The Big Parade!
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At any other time the air forces would have stayed safely at home, not daring to take wing on such a day when the ceiling was scarcely higher than a man’s head. But now they must go out, at any cost, blindly flying and vainly seeking some view of the advancing troops. But they went out singly, for to attempt formation flight on such a morning would be to court disaster and death.
McGee and Larkin were the first of the squadron to take off for the front, the interval between their time of departure being sufficient to avoid any meeting as they climbed.
The fog bank was much thicker than McGee had anticipated. At a hundred feet he could not see a thing above, below, or on either side. He headed his new ship, a swift Spad, in the direction of Vauquois Hill, intending to cross the line there and hoping that 253the crest of the hill might loom up out of the fog.
Vain hope. It was impossible to see a thing. Any minute he might go plowing into some hillside or foul his landing gear in the tops of trees. It was eerie business, this flying by instinct and facing the dreaded possibility of coming a cropper.
Several times he cut his motor, and at such times could hear the din of battle below–and it was not any too far below, either.
Added to the fear of crashing was the thought that any second he might cross the path of a high angle shell which had been directed at some enemy strong point. It was not a pleasant thought, but he could not shake it off. Certainly the air was full of them, and if he was to get any information as to the progress of the battle he must keep low and accept all hazards. Then too, there was the chance that he might meet up with some other plane drilling through the fog.
“Well,” he thought aloud, “I’m a poor prune if I lose my nerve now. I expressed my opinion of Siddons–and gee! how he’d like to be facing no more than this.”