"Waynsford, by Jove!" ejaculated Terence. "Bless you, Dick, I never expected to see you here and in this rig. What has happened?"
"Oh, I chucked the Motor Boat Reserve," declared Waynsford. "It was a bit too dull. They sent me to Southampton, and that was the limit. A superannuated postman could have done my job, which was delivering letters to transports. So I applied for the Naval Air Service. It's more in my line."
"Been across yet?" asked Terence, indicating the twenty odd mile strip of water that separated Great Britain from the scene of land hostilities.
"Dunkirk twice," replied Waynsford. "Was there when the Germans started shelling the place. But we're off again early to-morrow morning."
"Yes, I heard," said Aubyn. "Big operations. We are to engage the Zeebrugge and Ostend batteries while the Allied airmen play with the German lines of communication. So I may see something of you."
"I hope so—after the fun is over," replied the young airman. "Well, I must be moving. Early hours and a good night's rest are essential to this sort of work."
The two friends parted, Terence making for the hotel, while Waynsford walked off in the direction of the castle, in which the airmen detailed for the great raid were temporarily quartered.
Precisely at one hour before sunrise the first British waterplane rose from the surface of Dover Harbour. Almost simultaneously an Army aeroplane "kicked off" from the sloping ground beyond the chalk cliffs. Each was followed at regular intervals, until a double row of swift air-craft flying with methodical precision headed towards the Flanders shore.
Already the "Sunderland" and three other light cruisers, accompanied by a torpedo-boat destroyer flotilla, were shaping a course for the Belgian coast.
Off the East Goodwins they were joined by two monitors and three pre-Dreadnought battleships, and the battle line was formed. Away steamed the destroyers to act as screens to the heavier vessels, and to guard them from submarine attack. The monitors led the main division, the cruisers acting as links between them and the battleships, which, owing to their greater draught, could not approach the coast nearer than a distance of from four to seven miles.