THE FIGHT IN THE BLUE
John turned his glasses toward the northwest, where cloud wrack hung. At first he could see nothing, as the dark blue sky was obscured by the darker mists and vapors, but he presently discovered in the very midst of them an object that looked jet black. It was moving, and slowly it took the shape of an aeroplane. He wondered at the keenness of Lannes' vision, when he was able to pick out so distant an object with the naked eye.
"What do you make of it?" asked Lannes.
"It's an aeroplane, or some other kind of flying machine."
"And which way do you think it's going?"
"The same way that we are. No, it seems to be nearer now."
"Likely it's running parallel with us in a sense; that is we two are moving down the sides of a triangle, and if we continue long enough we'd meet at the point."
"Perhaps it's Castelneau and Méry in the other plane?"
"Impossible! They would certainly stay on the mountains far behind us. They would never disobey orders. We're back into a bank of fine air now and the machine almost sails itself. Let me have the glasses a moment."
But he looked many moments. Then he calmly put the glasses away in the tiny locker and said: