"Anything in sight yet, Bewsh?" he asks. "We must be up near Dunkerque by now. We can't have passed it!"
Still the unbroken coast below.
"I'd better fire a light," I suggest.
"All right," he says. "Carry on—stop a minute, though! We are over the lines, aren't we?"
"We must be ... I think. We passed Nieuport miles back. I can't make out where we are. I'll give a white!"
I load my Very's light pistol and fire it over the side. A ball of white fire drifts below towards the mocking emptiness of the mist. I stand up and look all around. Through the haze comes no welcome gleam.
"No answer, Jimmy! What shall we do? If we go on we'll get miles down towards Calais! If we go back, we get over the lines. Go up and down here, and I'll try to find Dunkerque—it must be somewhere near!"
I fire another white light, and then another. No answer comes from the ground. No searchlights move across the sky. All we can see is a vague circle, bisected by the coast-line—one half being sea, the other half sand-dunes.
Then, in my excitement, I accidentally fire a Very's light inside the machine. The ball of blazing fire rushes frantically round our feet and up and down the floor. I hurriedly stamp it out amidst the curses of the pilot, who says later that in my eagerness I picked it up and threw it over the side.