As he asked this question his eyes, wildly distorted, roamed round the open space now lighted up for a hundred yards or more by the burning airplane.
Just then he happened to look upward, and all at once saw the cause of his present trouble. One of the longer limbs of an old, battle-scarred poplar, partly broken and hanging lower than usual, had caught in one of the top wings, thus halting him as he was about to rise.
"What a fool I am!" This while wrenching loose the ragged wing-end.
"Let me get out of this somehow!"
Already he was again in his seat, turning on the power, swiftly yet surely manipulating the controls. The high-powered scout and battle plane rose with a rush and almost immediately began to climb, spiraling in long acute sweeps and turns.
"There they come!" breathed Lafe, venturing a last look around down below.
A field battery of horse artillery was emerging from the torn timber into the open space, which the burning plane had already showed Blaine to be a beet or turnip field of considerable extent. The constant roaring of artillery and a continuous red glow on the western horizon made known the cause of the uproar that had been growing for some time back.
"They're fighting hard," conjectured Blaine. "Guess wrecking them sausages must 'a' stirred Fritzy up a bit. Hullo! What's that?"
Already Lafe was a thousand or more feet up. The field battery was now fading from view as the flames of the burning plane died down.