With her engines all out the battleplane darted across and far beneath the downward course of the two German aircraft. A sharp burst of machine gun fire from the Huns was futile, for under-estimating the speed of their antagonist they made insufficient allowance in their aim. Harmlessly a sheaf of several hundred bullets whizzed astern of the secret battleplane.
Round swung the Fokkers in pursuit. For the first time they realised that in a climbing contest they were hopelessly beaten. In twenty seconds Blake had secured an undisputable gain. He was nearly a thousand feet above his opponents, and almost immediately overhead.
In that position the British battleplane was immune from her opponent's fire. The machine guns of the Fokkers were mounted so that they could fire ahead between the blades of the swiftly-moving propellers—less than five per cent. of the bullets being deflected in their path through the arc of revolution. The guns could also be swung round to fire on either side, but training of the weapons in a vertical plane was considerably restricted. It was impossible to fire at any target that was anything like overhead; a contingency that the Huns had not provided for, since their hitherto superior speed enabled them to decide their own conditions of fighting.
"Stand by, Athol!" shouted Blake.
Considering that Athol had been "standing by" during the whole of the flight the order seemed unnecessary until the lad grasped the significance of his superior officer's bidding.
Like a kestrel the battleplane dived towards the nearmost of her opponents. The pilot of the Fokker saw the danger. Discharging a large smoke-bomb he strove to escape under cover of the dense pall of vapour. For a few seconds it seemed as if the manoeuvre would prove successful, until Blake turned his craft and brought her on a parallel course to the escaping Hun.
The Fokker could now use her machine guns, although aiming was a matter of extreme difficulty. A hail of bullets clipping neat little holes in the tips of the battleplane's wings showed how close the shots were to securing telling hits.
Athol and Sergeant O'Rafferty opened fire simultaneously, since both machine guns could be brought to bear upon the German aircraft. Caught by the stinging hail of bullets the Fokker's struts and tension wires seemed to fly into fragments. Her shattered planes tilted upwards as she commenced to fall earthwards. Then, bursting into flames, the Hun machine crashed to the ground two thousand feet below.
A peculiar and disconcerting ping close to Athol's head warned him that the fight was not yet over. The second Fokker, finding that the mysterious aeroplane was directing its attention upon Hun No 1, had manoeuvred for its favourite position, and owing to the battleplane describing a circle the relative distance was now considerably decreased.
In a trice Blake banked steeply. As he did so O'Rafferty let loose a couple of dozen rounds. The Hun, hit more than once, turned and fled.