The girl, who had not for a second lost her nerve, instantly realised the peril, and without a moment’s delay—nay, even without a word—she clambered across into the pilot’s seat and took the levers, being compelled to crush past her wounded lover as she did so, and not knowing the nature of his wound.
“That’s right, Beryl! Fight to the last!” the man gasped. “Bank her, then go right down and rise again. You may beat him off by that. Try, darling! Do—do your best!” he whispered, and then he sank back in the blackness of unconsciousness.
Beryl, as an expert air-woman, knew all the tricks of evasion while flying. She knew that her lover’s advice was the best, and she carried it out to the very letter.
Just as she banked, the Hun machine sent out another splutter of lead. Those angry spurts of red fire seemed to go straight into her face, but, though the bullets tore more holes in the fabric of the left plane and broke a strut, they whizzed harmlessly past her.
It was truly a flight for life. Flying “The Hornet,” as she was doing, she had no means by which to retaliate or to drive off the enemy. Their lives now depended upon her skill in manipulating the machine. This she did with marvellous judgment and foresight. To the very letter she carried out the orders of the man now lying back wounded and unconscious.
Beneath her breath she whispered a prayer to Almighty God for assistance, and set her teeth. Again the Hun seaplane spurted forth a venom of fire upon her, but with a dexterous turn she banked, and once more avoided him. He intended to shoot her down into the black waters below, but she had her wounded lover at her side, and thought only of his welfare. She recollected her own response when Ronnie had suggested that she should remain at home, and when she saw that cruel eye of bright light following her so steadily she grew more and more determined.
At last she decided upon flying by the compass quite straight towards the Essex coast, and seeing if her adversary could overtake her. At first it seemed a very perilous course, because the Hun coming up behind, shot at her continually, and once more the fabric was torn in one place near her elbow. But as she flew on in silence she all at once made a discovery. She listened. Her pursuer was gradually overtaking her. If he did, then she was entirely defenceless, and must share the same terrible fate as the machine that Ronnie had sent down into the sea.
The tension of those fateful moments was terrible. Yet she summoned all her woman’s pluck—the pluck that had come to the female sex in these days of war—and kept on flying in the direction of home.
Her ear caught something, for it was trained to the noise of aeroplanes.
Again she listened. That eye of light which was following her so ruthlessly was still upon her, yet by the noise, she knew that the hostile engine was not firing correctly. The throb was not even and incessant.