That ended the interview, and an hour or two later Irving started in an automobile for the aviation field with a note from the colonel to the flying commander. There he was placed under an expert, and his schooling in the art of dropping from lofty heights began.
Private Ellis did not clearly understand just how all this program was to be carried out, but he had no doubt that Col. Evans had a complete plan in mind and that the missing details would fit in well with what had already been revealed to him. So he went about his new work confident that the outlook for success was good.
His training at the aviation field lasted a week. During that time he made half a dozen descents by parachute from various altitudes. The last descent was from a height of 3,000 feet. By this time the experience had become almost as commonplace a thriller as coasting on a long toboggan slide or "dipping the dips" at an up-to-date amusement park. He had never dreamed that descending with a parachute could become so matter-of-course a performance.
"I understand now how circus people can look on their death-defying stunts without being awe-struck with their own daring," he mused after he had floated down the fourth time at the rate of three-and-a-half feet a second. "Just think of it: a good swift sprinter would run a hundred yards in about one-third the time that I take to fall thirty-five feet. This is quite a revelation of physical science to me."
Irving was by nature a very observing youth. His instructor was something more than a mere bird-man, for he had studied aviation as a mathematical, as well as a physical, science. He showed the boy how to figure out the rate of falling after being given the diameter of a standard-made parachute and the weight of the aeronaut.
The parachute with which the young spy-student got his experience as a diver from the sky was one of several supplied for experimental work following reports that the enemy had perfected a similar device which had proved successful as a life saver in air battles. But the experiments of Allied aviators had not proved sufficiently successful to warrant providing all air fighters with "high-dive umbrellas." Descents could be made with reasonable assurance of safety from aeroplanes flying in good order, but if a pilot lost control of his machine the chances were small that he or his companion gunner or bomb dropper would be able to leap free from the struts and other framework with a parachute.
Irving would have liked to learn to pilot an aeroplane, but there was not time enough for him to take up that study. Indeed, before half the week had elapsed he decided he could like no occupation better than that of an aviator. He saw several expeditions start out to meet the enemy at the front, and also saw them return, followed by the announcement on two occasions that several of the British and Canadian flyers who had gone out to meet the foe, full of confidence in their own prowess, would return no more. They had been either shot down or forced to descend within the enemy's lines.
Nothing was said at the aviation field regarding the reason for the training that was being given to Private Ellis. No questions were asked and Irving did not volunteer any information. At last the instructor stated to the boy that he had completed his course and had learned his lessons well, and that he was now at liberty to seek further directions from the colonel. He accordingly returned to the latter's dugout.
Col. Evans asked him a number of questions, and then said:
"I want you to return to the field hospital and get some more information from that spy, Tourtelle, or Hessenburg. And in getting your information, remember that you are to impersonate him on the other side of the Rhine. Now, this is going to be a test of your spy-intelligence. Let's see how well equipped you can return here after your next interview with him. Do you get me, or must I give you some tips?"