"I want you to stay here until I get an answer from the general, Dennis," said the brigadier. "If you've never seen the workings of a kite balloon, they're just sending one up over yonder. You'll probably be able to join Bob inside an hour."
Behind a little hollow, close to brigade headquarters, Dennis saw the section busy about the huge sausage-shaped observation balloon, which had been hurried up to direct some batteries already concealing themselves in the vicinity.
"This is the sort of job that would try the nerves of some of you foot sloggers," said a perky little officer, as the lieutenant approached. "By Jove, we're a bit too close to be pleasant! Would you like to go up with me?"
There was something in the observer's tone that rather nettled his hearer, and Dennis replied promptly: "I should like it very much, if you mean it?" without giving a thought on the spur of the moment as to how long the balloon would remain in the air.
"Of course I mean it. Come on!" And as Dennis flung his leg over the edge of the basket the perky youngster gave the order to let her go.
The steel cable began to unwind as the men of the section loosed their hold, and Dennis soon enjoyed the novel experience of seeing the panorama unfold beneath him, and identifying the white-walled château they had captured the night before.
At an altitude of two thousand feet the observer 'phoned down to the men at the windlass to stop. A stiff wind was blowing, but the "sausage" behaved itself well until, as the observation officer turned to Dennis with a cheery laugh, something passed screaming beneath them and burst!
Some fragments of shrapnel struck the bottom of the basket; but that was not all. The shell had hit the cable fair and square, the observation officer's laugh changed to a shout of consternation as it snapped, and with an upward jerk the freed balloon floated away towards the German lines!