By a certain point of identification all of the fliers knew Dusseldorf when that large factory center was reached. So far they had not seen an enemy plane. Essen was not far ahead now. Searchlights had been semaphoring over more than one town they had passed, but not until they had come over Dusseldorf did any of the Hun eyes from below see them. At Dusseldorf they were spotted and a veritable hail of anti-aircraft shell was hurled skyward. The signal to climb higher was given and they were soon out of reach of the "Archies."
As they approached Essen the fires from thousands of furnaces lit up the whole country round. Below them was the very heart of shell-production and gun-making. The sight was an awe-inspiring and magnificent one. The lights were so bright that the pilots and observers could hardly distinguish the flashes of the guns which were firing hundreds of shells at the menacing squadron.
Hovering but a few seconds above the scene of so much activity, guided by the flaring furnaces and the blazing chimney stacks far beneath, the signal was given to release the bombs, and down through the night air, into the fire and smoke, dropped bomb after bomb.
As they fell and exploded their flashes could be seen distinctly in spite of the blaze all about them. Great tongues of flame licked up heavenward as if trying to reach the aircraft that had hurled the destruction down upon the seething hives. A dull boom told of an explosion, and the air rocked with the disturbance.
Hundreds of pounds of high explosive fell on Essen that night. Great fires started here and there, visible to the Americans long after they had started for home, which they did as soon as their loads of bombs were loosed on the factories and munition plants beneath. Enemy planes had begun to climb up to engage the daring raiders, but the triplanes were well away before the German fliers reached anything like their altitude. Not one of the six bombers had been hit. Back they flew, satisfied that damage had been wrought to the enemy plants, back by the Rhine and the Moselle, back safely to their aviation base.
At last, ahead, the pilots could see the flares lit to guide their return. Each flier switched on his little light to see his instruments, and gracefully dropped nearer the ground. A night landing is always interesting. The familiar points near the airdrome have a strangely different appearance at night. Everything is vague in outline—-indistinct. Down the six machines dropped to the rows of lights, flickering in the night breeze. A last moment, then the instant for raising the elevator, then the gentle, resilient bump as the wheels touch the level floor of the airdrome, and the fleet is home.
It was a fine raid, well planned and splendidly executed. It did not cost our side a man nor a machine, and it spread death and destruction among the centers that turned out the means of destruction that had made the world-war a thing of horror. To bomb Krupp's works! The very thought had a ring of retribution to it! The very name Krupp had so sinister a sound. Well might the Brighton boys be proud of Joe for the part he had played in the inception of the idea and the work of carrying it through. They were proud. So was Joe's mother when she heard of it. Harry Corwin wrote home about it. He wrote three times, as a matter of fact, before he could concoct an account of the night flight that would pass the censor. Finally he accomplished that feat, however, and thus Joe Little's mother heard of what her boy had done. The brave woman cried a little, as mothers do sometimes, but her eyes lit up at the thought of the lad distinguishing himself among so many brave young men. Such a son was worth the sacrifice, she thought, with a sigh. "He is his father's son," she said to herself. And to her came his words, spoken many months before, "And my mother's," and her heart swelled with pride.
CHAPTER XIV
A FURIOUS BATTLE
For a time it seemed that the Brighton boys were doomed to be separated, but word came to the squadron commander in some way of the manner in which they had entered the service, and he so arranged matters that they were retained in his unit. Moreover, he saw to it that their work should so far as possible keep them in touch with each other.