“He did it, Jack, sure he did! You can see the cloud of dense smoke that is rising right now! He must have exploded a magazine, and created no end of trouble for the Turks. Bully for the man in the aeroplane, whether he’s my brother Frank or another of his stripe!”
Jack saw good reason to believe that what his comrade cried out was true. There had suddenly arisen a great cloud of smoke many times larger than would have followed the discharge of a single gun. They could not hear the thunder that may have accompanied the rending of the magazine walls, on account of the heavy cannonading that was going on intermittently around them.
As though satisfied, after having accomplished the errand with which he had been entrusted, the bold airman now commenced to bore upward in spirals, meaning to baffle all the attempts of the Turkish gunners to strike his machine.
“See, they are trying their level best to fetch him down, just in a spirit of revenge, I reckon!” cried Amos, as he kept the glasses glued to his eyes; for somehow he seemed to feel that he was looking at his long-missing brother Frank, because this venturesome feat tallied exactly with others which the American aviator had successfully carried through in the past.
A few minutes later and he seemed satisfied the aviator had risen beyond range of the shrapnel, for he handed the binoculars back to Jack. His face was beaming with happiness and pride, for Amos certainly felt that a new honor had come to the Turner family.
“This time I really believe the Thunderer is going to get out of the straits for good!” Jack observed. Although the battleship had swung around the circle a number of times, so as to always keep moving, and present a difficult target to the enemy, up to then they had invariably come back again for a few more shots at distant Kilid Bahr and Chanak forts, the one on the left and the other on the right of the Narrows.
Amos was delighted to hear it. His head rang with the terrible noise, despite his precautions with regard to stuffing his ears with cotton. Never in all his life had he heard one-tenth the racket that for two hours or more had assailed him even in the most terrible thunder storm of his experience.
Yes, the warships were actually leaving the straits, satisfied with the execution they had done. Thousands of tons of metal had been hurled upon the batteries and forts of the enemy, and great destruction must have followed. Still, this severe business could not be kept up indefinitely; it was too fierce a strain on both men and guns.
So by degrees the firing died down. A few vessels lingered as though their commanders were loth to abandon the practice; but when another half hour had passed the quivering air had a chance to quiet down. The battle had come to a close.