Читать книгу Our Pilots in the Air - William Perry Brown - Страница 6

Shortly after a bugle call the following order was posted in the general mess hall for all concerned to read.

"Members of Bombing Squadron No. - will carry out the following order. 10 a.m., 12 midnight, 2 a.m. are the respective times to start. At each time three machines, each carrying eight 25 pound bombs, will bomb respectively R——-, C———, L———. Secrecy is imperative. Each member of the three squads thus assigned will be ready at Hangars No. -, No. -, No. - at times mentioned above."

Meantime each aviator, with his observer, had been privately notified by the Sergeant in person. This was an every-day operation order and was taken as a matter of course. These night raids are mostly for the purpose of keeping the Boche busy and nervous after hard days and nights in the front trenches, thus supposedly lowering his morale. Usually the points thus selected are the shell-torn villages back of the front, where Fritz has been sent for a brief period of rest before being sent to the front again. About the time he lies down in the half-ruined house that is his billet, and dreams of home and conquering peace, a bomb falls inside. The walls are further shattered, some of his comrades killed or maimed, he perhaps among them. Other bombs fall, heavy explosions result, and Fritz finds that his night's rest is lost in general turmoil. This continues night after night and the damage to German morale is enormous.

From the point of view of the air-service, things are different. These night raids are a matter of course with the pilots. It is part of the regular work.

When Blaine and Erwin climbed into the Bleriot, bombs already stowed, and it was wheeled out in front of the hangar, everything was very quiet. A minute later they were climbing up into the inky darkness at the appointed signal, the only noises being the whirrings of their own and two other two machines appointed for the two A. M. hour.

Watching for the signal of the leader of the squad, at the right time they headed for the further front.

Over the trenches star-shells from the infantry could be seen. Under direction they headed over No-Man's-Land, keeping at sufficient altitude, hugging the darkness, avoiding glints of light, dodging occasional searchlights, and all practically without a word spoken.

"You've been out here before, Lafe"' said Orris at last. "How much further are we going?"

"Be there in two minutes. Keep easy! I'm going lower. Get your bombs ready."

Silently Erwin obeyed. Below lay blackness, relieved at one point by a few dots of light that marked the ruins of the hamlet on which they were to let loose the bombs. So far no sign of life in the air or below appeared.

The three machines in this detachment had scattered in order to distribute their supply of bombs at a given signal from the leader. In this night raid an escorting fleet that usually accompanied the daytime raids was omitted. There was little need.

"Now!" cautioned Blaine to Orris and the latter began to drop his first sheaf, a rather heavy one as the bombs weighed twenty-five pounds each. Others were at work also and the village below, already in half ruins, began to detonate with sharp explosions, lurid flashings and an uproar of human cries. It was evident that the raiders had struck the right spot.

For some minutes the work went on, Blaine swooping still lower, until glimpses of hurried scurryings of the soldiers thus rudely disturbed were mingled with the larger glares from the continuous explosions.

Orris Erwin, through though smaller and slighter physically, worked away until the last sheaf was exhausted.

Then, and only then, the scene below was illuminated by the flash and roar of hostile artillery. A shell exploded with a deafening report so near their Bleriot that it was evident that the firer had sighted them during Lafe's last lower swoop.

On the instant Blaine pressed a trigger, elevating the sharp nose of the machine. As the deflected planes responded to sundry manipulations at certain levers and they began to climb spirally into the upper air, the powerful engines, exerting greater strength, shot them rapidly upward where height and obscurity lessened the danger of further shots.

"Well, Archie came near getting us then, eh?" This from Lafe.

Receiving no answer, he glanced aside. What was his dismay to see Erwin's slender figure drooping nervelessly, his head sinking, and the emptied sheaf of bombs sprawling neglected in his lap!

"You're hit, Orry? For God's sake buck up! I've still got to climb or they'll get us yet."

Clamping his knee round the wheel, he managed with one hand to pull Orris forward and sideways, so that the boy's curly head, now capless, lay against his thigh. With one arm half around and upon that senseless head, holding the slight frame from slipping, he still manipulated the alert Bleriot, that responded instantly to each human spur with a mobility that was almost life-like.

The two other machines had vanished in the darkness, doubtless cleaving the higher air strata in a backward flight to the home aerodrome, which was now the goal of all. Meantime searchlights were flashing here, there, yonder through the inky sky. The swift reports of anti-aircraft guns split the night's silence in a most disconcerting manner. Erwin groaned and twisted his body.

"Stay still, Orry! We must 'a' been the last to quit, and they're making things hot back westward."

Here a blinding gleam of light flashed athwart his eyes and , letting go of Erwin, he darted aside suddenly on a differing course. Erwin's body crumpled into a heap. A heavier man might have toppled over the edge, perhaps hanging helplessly at peril of falling out, unless held by the straps which many old aviators neglect. As it was, the nerveless lad was held by the high rim of the opening that fenced them both in. For the moment the boy was safe.

Giving his whole attention to the machine, Blaine zigzagged and dodged, mounting ever and ever higher. Yet his trend was unavoidably towards the east, further within the enemy lines.

"For the present I've got to go this way," he thought. "I hope Lex and Milt got away west before those 'cussed Archies broke loose. We'll have to stay quiet until this ruction below settles down." Lex and Milt were the pilots of the two remaining machines of this, the third and last section of the bombing squadron of that night.

"Orry! Oh, Orry! Wakeup! Aren't you all right yet?"

These and other adjurations Blaine would make from time to time. A chill came over him more than once as he wondered if Erwin would not recover. Once only as Lafe moved his own leg, pressing it unduly hard against the other, Erwin gave another groan.

A whir as of wings sounded in his rear, and Blaine became aware of shadowy movements through the faintly growing light in the east. Undoubtedly it must be a hostile machine. He had been spotted as he flew eastward. In addition to the now waning fire from the Archies, planes were now out after him. Divining this, Blaine wheeled, put on more power and flow towards the northwest, the German keeping after him at increasing speed. As the light increased the clinging shadow in the east grew more plain. Whoever it was, the pursuer was determined not to be shaken off. Soon he would begin firing.

At this junction Erwin gave Blaine's leg an undeniable kick. He was at last reviving. The pilot leaned towards his bunkie.

"Say, Orry, are you coming to at last?"

Another kick, evidently part of a struggle by Orris to right himself.

Blaine saw the German making the first spiral upward, in an effort to attain a position suitable for using the machine gun. Blaine therefore zigzagged more to westward, thereby throwing the reviving Erwin into an easier position. At this an easier position. At this Blaine was pleased to see his friend look wonderingly at him and the bowed head slightly raise itself.

"Lay still right where you are, Orry," murmured Lafe. "There's a Boche after us. We've got out of Archie's range, but I've one of their planes on our heels. Whist! Git down lower! He's going to fire. If he does, I - I'll crumple up. We'll land and - and -"

Further talk ceased as the simultaneous rattle and spatter of opposing machine guns made talk impracticable. Blaine was below, the Boche above, each whirling, diving, spiraling as dexterous pilots do in such conflict.

True to his promise amid the first exchange of shots, watching both Erwin's recovery and the German, now closer than ever, Blaine concealed himself.

And now, seeing that Orris was quite revived, and following Blaine's counsel, they presented to the German only a collapsed form, half leaning as if hit again. Blaine, almost out of sight, steered groundward.

"Are you strong enough now to take my place?"

"I — I think so," returned the still reviving Erwin. "What you going to do — land?"

At this juncture the machine hit the ground in a decreasing glide, while Blaine, half rising, pitched forward as if dead.

"Take the machine, Orry," Blaine had said. "I'm dead; you're wounded."

Knowing that Blaine had his plans laid, Erwin followed. Then the Boche, feeling pretty good over the idea that he had captured an enemy machine with two men in it, also alighted from his own a few rods distant. To his view there appeared one man dead and another wounded.

Covering Erwin with his revolver as he sat leaning back ghastly and still bleeding from the shrapnel that had at first struck him down, the German eyed his apparently helpless victims.

"Get oudt!" he snapped in rather poor English to Erwin.

The latter started to obey, still covered by the pistol at his head. Suddenly Blaine, who had tumbled to the ground at the first landing, now sat up, his own revolver pointed straight at the German.

"Throw down that gun!" he announced in clear, steady tones. "Quick!

No nonsense, Fritz!"

One brief stare. Then, realizing that he had been outgeneraled, he sullenly obeyed. To his further amazement, Erwin, now quite recovered, rose up, got out, and though weak tied the Boche hard and fast under Blaine's direction.

"Now, Orry," said Lafe, looking his comrade over carefully, "are you right enough to take our machine back?"

"Bet your sweet life I am!" Orry's face was still pale, while blood was coagulated in his curly short hair. "I'm all right, Lafe. What are we going to do?"

"We'll put this chap in his own machine, and I'll take it and him back."

"You mean provided Fritzy lets us get through safe."

"Und zat ve wond do! Forshtay?" This from the now sullen German standing by bound hand and foot, yet mentally antagonistic still.

"Don't you worry, bo," said Blaine, coolly picking up the man, a follow of no small weight, and lifting, him into his own machine, a big Taube of many horse-power. "That is, if you've got petrol enough."

This was assured beyond doubt by subsequent examination. The German safely stowed, Erwin and Blaine made a hurried yet accurate inspection of both planes, and Orris at once started westward. Blaine was about to follow when horse hoofs were heard beyond a hedge not far away. The German's eyes flashed. He divined a forcible rescue. He began to yell, but with a swift move Blaine gagged him with his own bandanna 'kerchief.

The German struggled but Blaine had tied him also to the posts supporting the hollow chamber wherein pilot and observer sat, and now springing in himself, he started off.

Right then the heads of a column of cavalry debouched in the field. The roar of roar of the Taube filled the air and in an instant they saw what was happening. By this time Orris was well up in the air and still spiraling higher. The Taube, with which Blaine was already partly familiar through prior captured machines among the Allies, was making its first upward curve, when a thought came to Blaine. A ruse! The German lay still helpless, bound and gagged. Though struggling with his bonds, his eyes were spitting anger.

In its case, with pulley attached, was a small flag of one of the larger German aerial squadrons. Blaine plucked it forth, jerked the pulley cord, and there unrolled before all eyes the Imperial eagle, with certain other designs, all on a black background, and with a death's head in white at each corner. It was two or three feet square, and as it floated from one of the poles sustaining the biplanes, no one in the clear morning light could mistake its meaning.

Blaine himself was not sure as to the flag. But it really was the one used only by a certain squadron especially endorsed and. supported by the Kaiser and the Royal House of Hohenzollern and of which the Crown Prince was the special patron. By the time Blaine was above the treetops, some twenty or thirty horsemen had debouched into the sheep pasture where these happenings took place. They were lancers and, mistaking the real nature of this maneuver, every lance was depressed in salute and a horse shout rose up that sounded much like a series of Hochs with Kaiser at the end.

"Holy smoke!" said Blaine, getting the machine gun in shooting trim with one hand while manipulating the controls with the other. "Say, Fritzy," to the snarling German at his feet, who fairly writhed at his bounds and gag, "your folks think I'm off after those English or Yankee schwein! Savy?"

But here a sudden change came over the scene.