He held, too, an added advantage. Sanderson had the German running for the rear of the French lines, having intervened his Nieuport between the enemy and escape to the northward.
The injury to the German's aeroplane made it positively necessary for its pilot to descend. And he was descending in enemy territory. This being the case, he did what every aviator is supposed to do in like circumstances—and what the German airman always does.
Racing downward for a landing, with Sanderson in hot pursuit, the pilot of the taube saw that he could not reach the earth in safety and there fire his gas-tank, so destroying his machine that it should yield no "comfort or support to the enemy." Sanderson saw his antagonist turn deliberately and fire his gasoline tank while he was yet some hundreds of feet above the ground. The little taube was on fire in a moment. The pilot still endeavored to make a landing and save his own life; but the flames enveloped him.
Sanderson redressed his machine and made a safe landing. The burning taube came down in one place near by, while in another spot had fallen all that was left of the brave fellow who had piloted it.
The American reached the remains of the German before anybody else. He stood with head uncovered while a field surgeon made a perfunctory examination of the charred heap.
"Indeed, yes, Monsieur Américain, he is dead," agreed the French doctor. "But he was a brave man though a Boche."
Disaster stalked with hooded face across these waste lands of Northern France. Belinda felt the spirit of it before she heard a word of retreat. Before, even, the broken troops toiled thickly past the hospital and through the village from the trenches, the Germans in her ward seemed to know that along this sector their countrymen were making gains.
Changes in the personnel of the ward had finally cleared out every French soldier Belinda had nursed. There were only Germans left, many of them seriously wounded. She spoke German all day long. Even Erard, with the facility of the Latin, had picked up a speaking vocabulary that served in his care of the detested "Boches." The little infirmier with his afflictions of harelip and twisted foot was really accorded more polite treatment by the Germans than he had been by his compatriots.
A nervous air of expectancy overlaid the entire hospital. The removal of such wounded as could be moved started afresh. The médecin chef was short in his replies to questions. Madame la Directrice was in tears.