"Himmelman?" replied Dastral, becoming suddenly serious.
"Yes, Himmelman. Why not? I believe you'll be a match for him, if you can only meet him at the same level, and with your drums full," replied the young commander of "C" Flight.
For answer Dastral picked up the paper again, and pointing to the column about the air-fiend, said brusquely,
"Read that."
For the next two minutes the newcomers crowded around the paper, and read, partly aloud, the paragraph above referred to.
At the time of which I write the supremacy of the air was still in question. The daring exploits of Himmelman and his school had been causing much anxiety to the Directorate of Air Organisation. Much consternation had also been caused amongst the British public by the manner in which certain sections of the press in Old Blighty had talked of the merits of the Fokker, the new type of fast fighting monoplane which the enemy had produced. But it was the bold and daring tactics of Himmelman himself, and his few immediate followers, which had given rise to this.
A new British School had come into existence, represented by Dastral and his type. These were very often mere lads from the public schools, full of the sporting instinct in which Englishmen excel. They were soon to make their presence felt, and gain for Britain and her Allies the complete mastery of the air.
What it cost in life and limb to gain this mastery over a wily and efficient foe will be known some day, when circumstances permit the veil of silence to be drawn aside. England will then know what she owes to her daring airmen, and every pilot's grave in France and Flanders--and they are legion--will be honoured and decked with the imperishable flowers of a nation's love.
When the trio in the officers' mess had finished reading the paragraph, it was Graham who spoke first.
"Dastral," he said, in quiet tones, "there will be no peace, and no victory, till Himmelman goes down. Nothing else matters, it seems to me; neither bombing raids, registering targets, nor spotting, till this air-fiend gets his coup-de-grace. What say you?"