wisps, watching below for customers. Paterson watched P-B anxiously.
He had been roaring drunk an hour before. Groggy and drunk still,
probably. He closed in a trifle and climbed above him, but P-B waved
him down and wiggled his fingers from the end of his nose.
He looked ahead and down at Trent. Trent had been drunk, too, but he
was steady now, sawing wood above and slightly behind Hoyt.
Then, suddenly, beyond Trent and far below, he saw a Hun two-seater
alone. The old stunt. Hoyt shifted and pulled up his nose to climb
above it and wait. Trent followed him up. Somewhere above that
two-seater, and a half mile behind, there would be a flight of Hun
scouts skulking under the clouds, waiting to pounce on whoever dived
for the two-seater. Hoyt knew it for a decoy. Paterson knew it. They
would climb above the cloud edge, circle back, and catch the Hun scouts
as they passed underneath.
Paterson trembled slightly. This was his chance at last. There’d be a
long dive and a sure fight from behind, and in the mix-up he’d wabble
down and out of the war via Lazaret VI in Cologne. He glanced around
to see if Mallory was above him, and suddenly, out of the corner of
his eye, he saw P-B shove his nose full down and throw himself into a
straight dive for the decoy bus.
He gazed and shouted “No!” into the roar of his engine. P-B, in a nasty
temper and half fuddled, didn’t smell the trick. There was one awful
second, while Crowe closed up into P-B’s place and Hoyt banked to wait
above, for the Hun scouts to pounce down on the Camel.
P-B fired, pulled up and dived again, far below them. The Hun
two-seater banked sharply and came up and over in an Immelmann turn
to get away. P-B caught it halfway over and a trickle of smoke swept
out from its engine. Then in an instant Hoyt dived, with the rest of C
Flight after him.
The next thing Paterson knew there were two Huns on his tail and a
stream of tracer bullets pecking at his left wing. He pulled back on
his stick and zoomed headlong up under Mallory. So close he was for
a second that he could see the wheels turning slowly on Mallory’s
undercarriage and almost count the spokes glinting in the sunlight
where the inside canvas sheathing had been taken off.
Mallory pulled away from him in a quick climbing turn and the Huns
passed underneath, banking right and left. Paterson picked the
left-hand one, thundered down on him in a short dive, and let go a
burst of ten shots into the pilot’s back. He saw the pilot’s head snap
sideways and his gloved hands fly up from the controls. Then Mallory
dived over him after the other one. He turned in a wild split-air and
followed Mallory.
There were more Huns below him and to the left, with two of the C
Flight Camels diving and bucking between them. He raced furiously
into a long dive, picked the nearest, and opened fire again in short,
hammering bursts. His Hun wabbled and started down awkwardly in long
sweeps. He picked another, still farther below, and pushed his stick
forward until the rush of air gagged him. Wildly he fired as he
ploughed down on it, and the chatter of his guns stabbed through the
roar of his engine. He yelled like a madman, shot under the Hun, pulled
up sharply, and fired into its gray mud-streaked belly. There was a fan
of scarlet flame and a shock that tossed him to one side. He stalled
and whipped out into a spin. Far below him he could see the decoy
two-seater trailing a long plume of reddish smoke and flopping, wings
over, toward the floor.
Then, suddenly, he saw his chance to wabble down and get away. He
ruddered out of the spin and ran his stick once through the slow
ellipse he had planned. But somehow he had to force himself to do it.
There wasn’t the relief he had expected. He looked back. Three C-Flight
machines were still above him, fighting madly--P-B, Trent, and Hoyt.
No--not this time. He pulled his stick back and climbed up. There were
five Huns circling the Camels. It was a long shot, but he fired at the
nearest and came up under the tail just as one of the Camels hurtled
into a nose dive, twisted over, and snapped off both wings. He saw the
pilot’s arms raised wildly in the cockpit and no more.
Blood streamed into his mouth. He had torn his lips with his teeth in
the excitement. The warm salty tang mounted to his brain. His goggles
were sweat-fogged. His fingers ached with their pressure on the joy
stick, and his arm was numb to the elbow. In a spasm of blind hatred,
he fired. Tracers raced across his top plane and struck with little
smoke puffs that ripped the fabric into ribbons. His own bullets clawed
at the Hun above him and fanged home.
He threw himself up and over in an Immelmann turn and came under the
next, still firing. He let go his stick and jerked his Lewis gun down
its sliding mount on his top plane. It fired twice and jammed. He
yanked madly at the cocking lug, but it stuck halfway. He hurtled down
again in another spin. The ground swept around in a quick arc that
ended in clouds and more Hun busses. He caught at his thrashing joy
stick. Again the ground flashed through his centre section struts in a
brown smudge, with the blaze of the sun hanging to one end of it. Then
there was a Camel above him and a Camel below him. He closed in on the
one below and squinted at the markings. Hoyt. He looked up at the other
Camel, but the numerals on the side of its fuselage were hidden with a
torn flap of fabric. Together, the three turned westward and started
back.
Presently, near the line, the bus above him wabbled and dipped its
nose. He stared at it. It went into a long, even glide that grew slowly
steeper as he watched. He looked down for Huns. There were none. The
glide became a dive, the dive twisted into an aimless spin, like the
flopping of a lazy swimmer turning over in shallow water. The spin
flattened and the Camel whipped out upside down, stalled, snapped out
again, and again spun downward in that ghastly slow way. Over and over,
only to whip out, stall and spin again. It was miles below him now.
Nothing to do. Fascinated, he watched it as he followed Hoyt’s tail.
It was a mere dot now, flashing once or twice in the sun as it flopped
over and over. Close to the ground now--closer. Then, suddenly, a tiny
sheet of pink flame leaped up like the flash of a far beacon. That was
all.
Hoyt was side-slipping below him, and he saw his own airdrome under the
leading edge of his bottom wing. He followed Hoyt down. They landed
together and taxied slowly in toward the hangars. They stopped side by
side and climbed out stiff-legged. Paterson looked down and saw that
his right flying boot was torn and flayed into shreds across the outer
side. There was a jagged fringe on the skirt of his coat where the
leather had been ripped into ruffles. Dumbly, he looked back into his
cockpit. The floor boards were splintered and the wicker arm of his
seat was eaten away. He shrugged and walked over toward Hoyt. There was
blood on the rabbit fur of Hoyt’s goggles, blood that oozed slowly down
and dripped from his chin piece in bright drops.
“Cigarette?”
Paterson gave him one. They walked into the flight office and slumped
into chairs. Hoyt ripped off his helmet and dabbed at the scratch on
his cheek. “I’m glad you got out, Pat,” he said absently.
Then the fear spot broke and spattered into the four corners of
Paterson’s soul. He sprang up trembling, with his fists beating the air.
“The dirty lice!” he screamed. “They’ve killed P-B! They’ve killed
Trent! D’y’ hear me, Hoyt?--they’ve killed ’em! They’re gone! They’ll
never come back! They’ve----”
Hoyt’s voice came evenly, calmly, through his screaming. “Steady, boy!
Steady! You can’t help it. No one can. Steady, now!”
A mat of white oil-splotched faces stared at them from the open
doorway that led into the hangar. The boy turned wildly. “Clear out!”
he shrieked. They vanished, open-mouthed. Hoyt drew him down into a
chair. “No, Hoyt, no! Can’t you see? P-B and you and Trent have meant
everything to me. I can’t go on. I’ve fought this thing till I’m
crazy.” Hoyt reached quickly and slammed the door. “I’ve fought it
night and day!” He threw up his arms hopelessly and covered his face
with his shaking hands.
Hoyt put his hand on his trembling shoulders and patted them. “Steady,
now! Steady! None of that!” he said awkwardly.
Paterson’s head whipped down across his sprawled arms on the desk top
and the sobs tore at his throat in great gusts that choked him. “Oh,
God!” he sobbed. “What’s it all about, Hoyt? What’s the use of it?”
“Steady, son! I don’t know. Nobody knows. It just happened, as
everything happens. It’s much too late to talk causes. We’re here and
we know what we have to do. That’s enough for us. It’s all we have
anyway, so it must be enough.” He took his blood-soaked cigarette from
his mouth and hurled it into a corner. It landed with a soft spat.
Someone knocked at the door. “Come in.” It was the runner from squadron
office. He saluted. “Yes?” said Hoyt.
The man glanced at Paterson’s face and snapped his eyes quickly back to
the captain’s.
“Beg pardon, sir,” he said. “Squadron’s just been signalled through
wing. One of the C Flight machines came down near B Battery, the 212th.”
“Who was it?” asked Hoyt.
“Lieutenant Mallard, they reported it, sir. That’ll be Lieutenant
Mallory, sir, won’t it?”
“Yes.” Hoyt’s voice was quite flat. “Thank you.”
The man saluted again and shut the door. Hoyt dabbed at his cheek and
reached into his desk drawer for another cigarette. Paterson stood up
suddenly and grabbed his arm. “Listen, skipper!” Hoyt’s eyes met his
calmly. “I’m going to tell you something. I’ll feel better if I do.
I’ve been a weak sister in this flight. I’ve planned for days to go
down and let myself be taken prisoner--to get out of it all. I’ve been
sick of it--sick of it, d’y’ hear, until I couldn’t think straight. I
wanted to get out alive. I wanted to get away in any way I could. This
morning I broke. I let go and started down----”
Hoyt smiled. “Your trouble, Pat, is that you think you’re the only
person in this jolly old war.”
Paterson stared at him. “But I did! I started down, out of it, this
morning!”
“How’d you get here?” asked Hoyt.
“But if I hadn’t broken for that moment this morning----”
“That’s a lie!” snapped Hoyt. “You’re talking poobah! I know how those
things happen. If P-B hadn’t gone down after the two-seater they’d
all be here now; and by the same reasoning, if my aunt wore trousers
she’d be my uncle. The important thing is that it’s you and me now and
nothing else matters. We’ll have four brand-new men to whip into shape
to-morrow, and whatever you think of yourself, you’ve got to do it. I
can’t do much, for I’ll be ahead, leading. You’ll be behind them and
you’ll have to do it all. They’ll be frightened and nervous and green,
but the job’s to be done. Understand? You’ve got to goad them on and
get them out of trouble and watch them every minute, so that in time
they’ll be as good as P-B and Trent--so that when their turn comes they
can do for other green men what P-B and Trent did for you. Do you see
now what this morning has done for you?” He paused for a moment, and
then, in a lower tone--“Afraid? Who isn’t afraid? But it doesn’t do any
good to brood over it.”
C Flight did no duty the next day, nor the day following. Hoyt went up
to the 212th and identified Mallory for burial, while Paterson flew
back to the Pool for the replacement pilots and a new Camel for Hoyt.
In Amiens he heard the first whispered rumours of what was going to
happen. Intelligence was ranting for information. Everybody had the
story and nobody was right. The hospitals were evacuating as fast as
possible. Fresh battalions were being hustled up. It wasn’t a push.
Anyone could tell that with half an eye. Something the Hun was doing.
The spring offensive a month earlier this year. G. H. Q. was plugging
the gaps frantically, replacing and reinforcing and wondering where the
hammer would fall and what it would carry with it. Hence the pictures
that had cost the lives of P-B and Trent. The air itself trembled with
uncertainty, and rumours flew fast and thick.
Paterson flew back with the four new pilots and brought the rumours
with him. Hoyt had more to barter in exchange. The talk ran riot at
dinner.
“It’s a Hun push, all right, but where, nobody knows. We’ll have word
in a day or so, but it’ll be wrong whatever it is, mark what I say!”
And then on the evening of the twentieth things started. A signal came
for the major just as they sat down to mess. He went out and presently
called out the three flight commanders. When they came back, they took
their places thoughtfully. Silence trembled in the room like the hush
that precedes the first blasting stroke of a great bell in a cathedral
tower. The major swept his eyes down the board.
“You will remain at the airdrome to-night, gentlemen, and remain sober.
Officers’ luggage is to be packed and placed on lorries which Mr.
Harbord is providing for that purpose.” He paused for a moment. “This
is a precautionary move, gentlemen. We are to be ready to retire at
a moment’s notice. Flight commanders have the map squares of the new
airdrome. You can take that up later among yourselves.” He leaned back
in his chair and beckoned to the mess sergeant. “Take every officer’s
order, sergeant, and bring me the chit.”
The talk broke in a wild flood that roared and crackled down the length
of the table. The tin walls trembled with the surge of it and the
echoes broke in hot discord among the rough pine rafters. Offensive
patrols for all three flights, to start at five minutes to four A.
M. Air domination must be maintained. Wing’s instructions were to
stop everything at all costs. Go out and fight and shut up. Somebody
presented the adjutant with the sugar bowl and asked him if he had
his umbrella for the trip back. The adjutant had spent eighteen days
without soles to his boots in 1914. He and the medical officer stood
drinks for the squadron.
About ten o’clock, Hoyt called the five men of C Flight into his hut.
“To-morrow, something is going to happen, I’m afraid, and you’ve got
to meet it without much experience. What I want you to understand is
simply this: You’ve got Pat and you’ve got me. Follow us and do what
we do. We won’t let you down so far as it is humanly possible. If the
flight gets split up in a dog fight, then fight your way out two and
two--and go back to the new ’drome two and two. Don’t go separately.
Further”--he paused--“if anything happens to me”--Paterson looked up
at him quickly and something tugged sharply at his heart; Hoyt went
on quietly--“take your lead from Mr. Paterson. You’ll be Number 5,
Darlington. You’ll climb up as deputy leader. And if anything happens
to Pat, then it’s up to you to bring the rest home.” He smiled. “There
is a bottle of Dewar’s in this drawer. Take a snifter now, if you
want it, and one in the morning. It’s for C Flight only. Oh, yes, one
more thing: The fact that we’re moving back to a new airdrome seems
to indicate that staff thinks nothing can stop the Hun from breaking
through. The fact that nothing can stop the Hun seems to indicate that,
for the nonce, we are losing our part of the war. If the thought will
help you--it’s yours without cost.”
* * * * *
The caller rapped sharply and threw back the door. Paterson leaped to
his feet half asleep and pushed back the window curtains. The clouds
were down to about four hundred feet, lowering in a gray mass over the
mist on the airdrome. He went into the next cubicle and turned Hoyt
out. Hoyt sat up on the cot edge and ran his hand across his forehead.
“Stop the caller,” he said. “Let’s see what’s what before we turn
everybody out.” They shrugged into their flying coats and groped down
the passage to the major’s cubicle in the next hut block.
“Let ’em sleep,” said the major. “Can’t do anything in this muck. Turn
out one officer in each flight to watch for the break and to warn the
rest. Send Harbord to me if you see him wandering about.”
They woke up the skippers of A and B Flights and told them the news.
Paterson took the watch for C. He turned up his coat collar and went
out. It was cold and miserable in the open, and the chill crept into
his bones. The smoke from his cigarette hung low about him in the still
air.
Presently to the eastward there came a low roar. He looked at his wrist
watch. The hands pointed to six minutes before four o’clock. The ground
trembled slightly to the sound of the distant guns and the air stirred
in faint gusts that pulled at blue wraiths of his cigarette smoke. The
push had started. His muscles stiffened at the knees as he listened.
The first shock of the guns was raw and sharp in the quiet air; then
it settled into a lower, full-throated rumble like the heavy notes of
an organ growling in an underground basilica. Now it rose again in its
greater volume--rose steadily, slowly, as if it were a colossal express
train hammering down the switch points at unthinkable speed. Presently
it soared to its highest pitch and held the blasting monotony of its
tone. The minutes ticked off, but the guns never faltered in their
symphony of blood. At 4:35 one pipe of the organ to the southeastward
cut out suddenly and almost immediately began again, closer than
before. Again it broke, as he listened, and crept nearer still.
He walked down the line of huts, thrashing his arms and blowing on his
cold hands. An impersonal thing to him, yet he shivered slightly and
stared upward at the low clouds. Men out there to the eastward were
in it. The suspense was over for them. And suddenly he found himself
annoyed at the delay, annoyed at the fog and clouds above, that kept
him on the ground. He wanted to see what was going on--to know. He
turned impatiently and went into the mess. The sergeant brought him
coffee, and presently Muirhead of A Flight came in with Church of B.
“It’s on,” Church said absently. “I suppose this fog means hell up the
line.”
They drank their coffee and smoked in silence. The sound of the guns
crept nearer and nearer, and one by one the rest of the squadron
drifted in for breakfast.
Hoyt sat down next to Paterson. “I don’t like it,” he said. “Something
is giving way up there.” He went to the window and looked out. “Clouds
are higher,” he said, “and the fog’s lifted a bit. What do you think,
major?”
They crowded out of the mess doorway and stood in an anxious knot,
staring upward. It was well after six o’clock.
“All right”--the major turned around--“get ready to stand by.”
C Flight collected in a little knot in front of Hoyt’s Camel, smoking
and talking nervously. Paterson kept his eyes on Hoyt and stamped his
feet to get the circulation up. A strange elation crept into his veins
and warmed him. In a moment now--in a moment. Awkward waiting here.
Awkward standing around listening to Darlington curse softly and pound
his hands together.
Somewhere behind him on the road, a motor bike roared through the mist,
and then to the southward a shell crashed not a thousand yards from the
’drome, and the echo of it thumped off across the fields. Darlington
jumped and stared at the mushroom of greasy black smoke. A moment
more--a moment now. Paterson reached over and tapped Darlington’s
sleeve. “Keep your guns warm, old boy.” Darlington nodded fiercely.
The major climbed into his cockpit and a mechanic leaped to the
propeller. The engine coughed once and the propeller snapped back. The
mechanic leaped at it again. It spun down and melted into a circle of
pale light. Everyone was climbing in. Hoyt flicked his cigarette away
sharply and put a leg up into his stirrup.
They were taxi-ing out into the open ground, with the mechanics running
after them. Presently they could see the road. Paterson stared at it in
amazement. It was brown and crawling with lorries and troops. Something
had happened! A Flight, with the major, sang off across the ground
and took the air together in a climbing turn. B Flight waited a brief
second and followed. Out of the corner of his eye, Paterson could see
the mess sergeant climbing up on the lorry seat beside Harbord, the
equipment officer. Then Hoyt waved his hand. Mechanics yanked at the
chock ropes and waved them off. They blipped their motors and raced out
after Hoyt.
At five hundred feet they took the roof in the lacy fringe of the
low clouds. Bad, very bad, Paterson thought. He ran his thumb across
the glass face of his altimeter and his globe became wet with the
beaded moisture. He could hardly see Darlington’s tail. Ahead of
them the clouds were a trifle higher. Hoyt led them up and turned
northward. Murder to cross the line at that height, with the barrage
on. Darlington was lagging a bit. Afraid of the clouds. He dived on
Darlington’s tail and closed him up on Number 3. Darlington glanced
back at him and ducked his head.
Hoyt was circling back now in a broad sweep. Over there somewhere was
Cambrai. He looked up for an instant just in time to see the underside
of a huge plane sweep over him. He ducked at the sight of the black
crosses, but the plane was gone before he could whip his Lewis gun
into action. Almost immediately one corner of his windshield ripped
away and the triplex glass blurred with a quick frosting of a thousand
cracks. He cursed into the roar of his motor and kept on.
They were higher now, but the visibility was frightful--like flying
in a glass ball that had been streaked with thick dripping soapsuds.
Here a glimpse and a rift that closed up as soon as you looked; there
a blank wall, tapering into tantalizing shreds that you couldn’t quite
see beyond. He fidgeted in his cockpit and turned his head from Hoyt,
below him, to the gray emptiness behind. Nothing.
Presently Hoyt banked around, and following him, the compass needle on
Paterson’s instrument board turned through a half circle. They were
going back toward the south again and climbing still higher. An even
thousand feet now--just under the rising, ragged clouds. He felt a drop
of rain strike his cheek where his chin piece ended. It bit his skin
like a thorn and stung for seconds afterward. His goggles were fogging.
He ran a finger up under them and swept the lenses.
Then, in a breath, it happened. A gray flash swept down out of the
clouds in front of the formation. Hoyt zoomed to avoid it. The Hun
zoomed and they came together and melted into each other in a welter of
torn, rumpled wings and flying splinters. Something black and kicking
rose out and disappeared. The cords stood out in Paterson’s neck and
his throat closed. Somewhere his stomach leaped and kicked inside of
him, trying to get out, and he saw coffee dripping from the dials of
his instruments.
In a second he had thrown his stick forward and gone down into Hoyt’s
place. He didn’t dare look--he couldn’t look. He was screaming curses
at the top of his voice and the screams caught in his throat in great
sobs. His goggles were hopelessly fogged. He ripped them off. Behind
him the four new men closed in tightly, with Darlington above them as
deputy leader.
There was blood again on his lips. He pulled back his stick and
climbed. There, somewhere in the clouds, were the men who had done it!
All right! All right! His eyes stung and wept with the force of the
wind, and his cheeks quivered under the lash of the raindrops. With his
free hand, fist clenched, he pounded his knee in stunned anguish until
his muscles ached. Hoyt! Hoyt! Then he saw what he wanted and dived
down furiously at the shape in the mist. Bullets tore at his top plane
and raked across the cowling behind him. He closed on the Hun and sent
it spinning. There was another--three--five--nothing but Huns. He dived
in between them. Fine! He was screaming again, and firing. He forgot he
was flying. The joy stick thrashed crazily between his knees and the
ground and the clouds were a muddy gray scarf that swept from side to
side across his eyes. Guns were the thing. Once, in a quick flash, he
saw tiny men running upside down through the ring sight of his Lewis
gun--the gun on his top plane--funny.
His wrists ached and his fingers were quite dead against the Bowden
trigger. No, not that; that’s a Camel--Darlington. He grabbed at his
joy stick and pulled it back. Funny how hard it was to pull it. Another
Camel swept in beside him, and another, with startling suddenness. It
had been a long time now--a long time. Somebody had been afraid once
and there had been a man named Hoyt. No, Hoyt was dead. Hoyt had been
killed days before. Must have been P-B. P-B was probably in Amiens
by now. He’d left in the tender at six o’clock. And always his guns
chattered above the roar of his engine.