“Great Julius Cæsar!” he muttered. “I am in for it. I wonder when my part in the show begins!”
It came much sooner than he had expected. While several of the Lafayette machines below and to the rear of the Caudron were engaged in deadly combat by the enemy a fighting plane with the ominous Maltese crosses on its wing flashed past Don Hale, diving vertically toward the tail of the Caudron.
The crucial moment had arrived. Don Hale’s heart was throbbing fast again; his lips were compressed; his eyes flashing. Then, without a second’s indecision—without a thought of the consequences—he, in turn, began a headlong swoop through space.
In a moment or two he shut off the motor; for he was about to execute that evolution taught in the acrobatic school at Pau known as the “Russian Mountain.” Although he had performed it many times under different circumstances, the terrific downward rush never failed to make him gasp for breath. It was the same on this occasion, and his ears seemed to be almost bursting. The rushing wind beat fiercely against him, its whistling notes, ominous and threatening, ringing out loudly. Like a plummet dropped from the clouds, he still plunged in a vertical descent. Now he dashed past, dangerously close to some of the fighting machines, and through an air filled with tracer and flaming bullets.
By this time the Caudron was desperately trying to avoid the enemy in the rear. But it seemed impossible that it could escape from the marvelously swift and brilliantly maneuvered German plane. This machine had just succeeded in gaining an advantageous position when Don Hale swept by.
Now he pushed the control stick away from him, which, raising the ailerons, caused the machine, with startling abruptness, to end its fall and come out on an even keel.
Though jarred and dizzy, the combat pilot lost not a second in starting the engine. Another movement with the control lever, and the Nieuport was shooting upward directly toward the tail of the German plane. Its pilot was already busily engaged in pouring a hail of bullets in the direction of the Caudron.
Don had gone through some thrilling experiences in the war zone, but there had been nothing like this. He realized that the fates had decreed that through his efforts alone the safety of the photographic machine depended. Never before had he fired a Vickers gun in actual combat, and for the briefest interval of time an overwhelming sense of agitation—of excitement gained a hold upon him; and before it had passed, and while the perspiration stood out on his face, he took aim, operating the gun with his left hand, and fired.
He could hear the spitefully-crackling reports; he saw the bursts of smoke spreading outward and upward. Then his machine swept past, in an ascending flight, at a distance of not more than fifty yards.
It was a strange sensation to be gazing upon an enemy’s machine so close at hand, and, in his instantaneous glance, the details seemed to be indelibly impressed upon his mind. He saw the helmeted pilot turn; and for the fraction of a second the two gazed into each other’s faces.