drew at last to near the town from which the stream was pouring. It
was all very pitiful, very cruel. But worse was to come. The road
was one of those long main national route highways common in France,
running straight as a ruler for miles on end, up hill and down dale.
The roofs of the village were half a mile away, and suddenly, over
these roofs, an aeroplane came skimming. It flew low, and it flew
in a bee-line along above the wide straight road; and as it flew
there sounded louder and plainer the unmistakable _ac-ac-ac-ac_ of a
machine-gun; there was plainly to be seen a stream of spitting fire
flashing from the flying shape. It swept nearer, and the clatter of
its guns sounded now through a rising wail, a chorus of shrieks and
calls and sharp screams, and the cries of frightened or hurt children.
The gun shut off abruptly as the machine swooped up; burst out again
in a long savage tattoo as it curved over and came roaring down in a
steep dive. In the road there was a pandemonium of screams and cries:
a wild turmoil of figures rushing hither and thither, flinging down
into the ditches, scrambling over them and fleeing in terror out over
the open fields. As the machine dived the two observers could see the
streaking lines of the tracer bullets, hear the sharp cracks and smacks
of explosives hitting the ground--and other things. They could only
stand and curse in impotent rage, and the Hun machine, with a rush and
a roar, spat a last handful of bullets over and past them and was gone
on down the road. The two stood and watched its graceful soaring and
plunging, listened to the steady rattle of its guns, swore savagely
again, then turned to help some of the shrieking women and crying
children about them. But next moment another distant _tat-tat-tat_
made them look up to see another black-crossed machine, and then a
third, leap into sight over the village and come tearing down above
the road. Dixie and the Boy both filled the few intervening seconds
trying to hustle the fear-stricken villagers off the road down into
the cover of the ditches, behind carts--anywhere that might be out
of reach of the bullets. But the newcomers had gone one better than
bullets for fiendish destruction. As the first one approached a black
blob fell away from it, and next second there was a rending crash, a
leaping cloud of smoke and dust whirling and eddying up from the road.
The machine roared over and past, with her machine-gun hailing bullets
down the road, and far down the road came another billowing cloud of
smoke and the crash of another bomb. The third machine followed close,
also machine-gunning hard and also splashing bombs down at intervals,
one falling with horrible effect fairly in a little crowd of women
and children clustered under and behind a country cart. The cart was
wrecked, and the horse and half of the women and children....
The two observers gave what help they could, their faces white and
their hands shaking and their ears tingling as they worked. The whole
scene after the passing of the destroyers was heart-rending and pitiful
and far too horrible for description. And the cruel part of it was
that it was all such useless destruction, such wanton savagery, such
a brutal and wilful slaughter of the innocents. The low-fliers were
too close down for there to be any possibility of their not knowing
well what they were shooting and bombing. There was not a sign of a
uniform on the road; it was packed with what clearly and unmistakably
was a crowd of refugees, of helpless women and children. It was hard to
imagine what the Huns hoped to gain, what object they could have had in
such indiscriminate murder; but, object or no object, its happening is
a matter of cold history.
It was growing late when the two observers, continuing their journey,
saw a distant aerodrome, made their way across the fields to it,
explained themselves, and were offered dinner first, and then transport
back to their unit.
The two told their tale of the day while they waited with the Squadron
for dinner to be served. It was dark by this time, and an annoying
delay came before dinner in the shape of an order to put all lights
out, and in the droning approach of some enemy bombers. They passed
somewhere overhead, and the machine-gun defences fired a few streams of
ineffectual bullets up at them. One bomb whistled and shrieked down and
burst noisily a few hundred yards from the 'drome and others farther
afield. The pilots and the two observers were collected again just
outside the door of the mess listening to the distant drone of the Hun
bombers, watching the flicker and jump of gun flashes in the horizon
and a red glare that rose in a wide steady glow from one or two points.
It was an unpleasant reminder of the trying time the Army was having,
of the retreat they had made, of the stores and dumps that had been
fired to prevent the enemy taking possession of them.
One of the pilots--a youngster of under twenty, with two wound stripes
on his cuff--laughed suddenly. "That Hun bomber just about rounds off a
complete day of frightfulness for you two fellows," he said. "You have
had a lively time, one way and another."
"We have," said Dixie. "I've had thrills enough for this day to fill a
boy's adventure library full an' overflowin'."
"Too many for me," said the Boy, "when I think of watching that man go
down with an unopened parachute."
"It was worse seeing that Hun come down the road," said Dixie, "and
bein' able to do nothin' to stop him. An' when I think of that mother
with a dead baby, an' that kid--a girl--about five years old, that an
explosive bullet----" And he stopped abruptly.
There was silence for a minute, broken by the young pilot.
"Speaking of thrills," he said, and laughed again, "there was a
paragraph--some of you will remember how we grinned over it. Wonder
if I could find the paper? It would tickle you diving balloonatics
especially. I'll see," and he disappeared into the mess-room and began
to hunt round with an electric torch.
He found the paper and brought it out and read the paragraph by the
light of his torch. It was headed "60,000 Thrills," and it ran:[7] "A
Blanktown cable, received by the Chief Representative for Blancountry,
states: At an aquatic carnival, held by the Big Stone Swimming Club at
Light Falls, there was an attendance of 60,000. The proceeds go to the
Soldier's Fund. Prince Walkiyick--known as Alec Walker the Middle Seas
sprint champion--dived from a height of 200 feet into the water. He was
two seconds in the air and thrilled the spectators with his exploit."
[7] Except that names are altered, the paragraph is reprinted here word
for word as it appeared in a daily paper and was read by thousands of
men in the line at the time of the first retreat in the spring of 1918.
I have the cutting now.--B. C.
"Good Lord!" said the Boy helplessly.
"Thrilled the spectators," repeated Dixie. "_Thrilled_ ... well, if
that doesn't take it."
The young pilot was laughing again, long and immoderately, and some of
the others, looking at the two observers' faces, had to join him.
"Sixty thousand, you said," the Boy was beginning, when he was
interrupted by a distant _boom--boom--boom_.
"Huns bombing Blanqueville again," said the young pilot. "More women
and kid casualties, I suppose."
Dixie was cursing, low but very intensely. "If those spectators are out
for thrills----" he said, and looked to where a red glow was beginning
to rise in the sky over Blanqueville.
XVII
THE SEQUEL
There was a strike in one of the aircraft factories; in fact, there
were simultaneous strikes in many, if not most, of the factories,
although for the moment this story is concerned only with one of
them--or rather with its sequel. At the front they knew little or
nothing of the strike, although, unfortunately, they knew a good deal
of the result. On the other hand, the workers probably know nothing of
what their strikes may mean to the front, and this is what I want to
tell them. They have, it is true, been publicly told by a member of the
Government that the strikes resulted in a waste of so many hours' work,
a shortage or reduction of output of some hundreds of machines, and so
on; but these things are a matter of cold figures. If they are told
the result in flesh and blood, they may look at a strike in rather a
different light.
One Squadron in France first "felt the breeze" of the strike in a
drying up of the stream of "spares" and parts that are constantly
required for repair, and the mechanics having to make good this
shortage by many night hours' sheer hard labour, by working long
shifts when they ought to have been sleeping, by hacking out with cold
chisel and hammer, and turning upon overworked lorry-shop lathes, and
generally making by hand what the idle machines in the factories should
have been punching out in dozens on a stamping machine, or turning
comfortably on automatic lathes.
That was a minor item of the strike's sequel. Another and more serious
item in the same Squadron was that one or two machines, which had
been marked off for return to the depots and complete overhaul and
setting up, had to be kept in commission and hard at work. This was
unpleasantly risky, because at this time the Squadron was very actively
engaged in the preparation for a coming Push, and the machines were
putting in even more than a fair average of flying hours. The life of
a machine is strictly limited and countable in these "flying hours,"
and after a certain life machine and engine, with constant wear, and
despite regular and careful looking after by the Squadron mechanics,
come to be so strained and shaky that for safe flying they must have
such a thorough overhaul and tuning up that it almost amounts to a
rebuilding.
One particular machine in the Squadron--the old "Gamecock"--had
for some time back been getting rather rickety and was to have been
replaced before the anticipated heavy operations of the air activity
that would open the way for the Push. One out of those hundreds of the
strike's lost machines should have come to the Squadron to release the
"Gamecock," but, of course, when it did not come there was nothing for
it but to keep the "Gamecock" flying. She managed to get through her
share in the work without any further trouble than a still further
straining, and an engine which for all the labour lavished on it grew
more and more unreliable. She carried on up to the actual morning
of the Push, and her pilot and observer, the Flight and Squadron
Commanders alike heaved sighs of relief to think that the rush was
nearly over, that there would be no further urgent need to risk her in
the air. But as it happened their relief was premature, and there was
still a "show" and a serious one for the "Gamecock" to take a part in.
The Squadron was an artillery observing one, whose work it was to
fly over the enemy's lines and observe the fire of our batteries on
selected targets, and, "spotting" where their shells fell, wireless
back to our guns the necessary corrections of aim to bring them on
the target. The night before the Push a reconnoitring Squadron had
discovered a fresh group of enemy batteries, and Headquarters allotted
the destruction of these to various batteries in conjunction with
certain artillery flying Squadrons. The "Gamecock's" Squadron was
included, and since there was already a heavy morning's work portioned
out to the Squadron, there was nothing for it but to detail the
"Gamecock" to help handle the fresh job.
"Do it?" said her pilot scornfully in answer to a doubting question
from the observer. "Course she can do it, and a dozen jobs on top of
it. There's nothing wrong with her."
"Oh no, nothing whatever," said the observer sarcastically. "You'd
claim there was nothing wrong with her if her engine turned round once
a week, or if her planes were warped like a letter S. How many times
did her engine cut out to-day? And she was rattling like a bag of old
bones when you were stunting her to dodge those 'Archies,' till I
thought she was going to shake herself into the scrap-heap right away."
"Rats," said the pilot stoutly. "She's strong as a house."
The Flight Commander evidently did not agree with him, to judge by
the conversation he had that night with the C.O. "I hate sending the
'Gamecock,'" he said. "But I suppose there's no help for it."
"Afraid not," said the Major. "Every machine had enough to do before,
and this new job will give them all their hands full. We just _must_
send every machine we've got."
The Flight Commander sighed. "All right. I do wish they'd replaced her
though, as they promised to do a week ago. Wonder why they haven't."
"Well, a machine isn't made as easy as knitting a sock, you know,"
said the Major. "I dare say it's a hard job to keep up to the wastage.
Four machines we've had crashed and replaced ourselves in this last
week. I suppose those people in the factories can't keep up the pace,
even working night and day." (The Squadrons knew little or nothing
of the strikes then. What they and the Major would have said if they
had known, what they did say when they came to know, is a different
story--_quite_ a different story.)
There was just one hour of light before the time set for the attack,
the "zero hour" when the infantry would go over the top, and that hour
was filled with a final intensive bombardment that set the earth and
air quivering like a beaten drum. The "Gamecock" and the rest of the
Squadron were up and over the lines with the first glint of light, and
the fighting scouts were out with them and busily scrapping with any
Hun machines that came near or tried to interfere with the artillery
and reconnoitring machines.
The "Gamecock" waddled off to her appointed place, and after picking
up the targets with a good deal of difficulty, owing to the billowing
clouds of shell smoke and dust, and getting in wireless touch with the
first battery, the observer waited till the machine was in a favourable
position to let him see the shot and signalled the battery to fire.
For half an hour the "Gamecock" circled steadily with a fairly heavy
"Archie" fire breaking about her, and the observer picking up one
target after another and putting the guns on to it. As fast as he
signalled back that a direct hit had been obtained he went on to the
next target and observed for another battery, while the battery he had
just finished with proceeded to pour a hurricane of high explosive on
the spot it had "registered," and to blot the enemy battery there out
of active existence.
Then the "Gamecock's" work was interrupted. A couple of Hun scouts
dropped like plummets out of the clouds and dived straight for the
"Gamecock," their machine-guns rattling rapidly as they came. The
observer at the first sound of their shots whipped round from where he
was hanging overside watching his target below, glanced up and grabbed
for his machine-gun. He hastily jerked the muzzle in the direction
of the coming Huns and ripped off a burst of fire, and at the same
moment heard the sharp hiss of their passing bullets, saw the streaking
flashes of fire from their tracers flame by. One hostile finished his
dive in a sharp upward "zoom" just before he came down to the level of
the "Gamecock," whirled round in a climbing turn, plunged straight down
again at the "Gamecock," opening fire as he came, and before reaching
her level repeated his tactics of zooming up and turning. The other Hun
hurtled down past the "Gamecock's" tail, turned under her, and whirled
upward, firing at her underbody. The observer ceased fire a moment and
tapped back a message on his wireless to the battery saying the last
round was "unobserved." He used the code of course which condenses
messages into one or two Morse letters, and knowing that the battery
would not fire until he passed the word that he was ready again, he
turned his attention to driving off the two machines that plunged
firing at them. The underneath one was practically concealed from him,
so he first directed a carefully aimed burst of fire on the top one as
once more it dived on them and its bullets whipped flaming past. He put
in another burst as the Hun spun up and away again, then leaned out
over the side and just caught a glimpse of the lower machine driving
up at them. He swung his machine-gun round on its turret mounting and,
thrusting the muzzle down, rattled off a score of rounds. At the same
moment he heard the crack and rip of bullets tearing through their
wings, and heard also the sharp _rat-tat-tat_ of the overhead enemy's
gun reopening fire. The observer swung his gun upward again, took a
long breath, and directed careful aim on the body whirling down on
them. He realised that the game was too one-sided, that with two fast
enemies attacking in concert from above and below, it was merely a
matter of minutes for the "Gamecock" to be sunk, unless he could down
one of the two hostiles first. He opened fire carefully and steadily.
Up to now the pilot had been unable to take any part in the fight,
because his gun only fired directly forward and the Huns had taken care
to keep astern of him. But now he suddenly throttled down and checked
the speed of the "Gamecock" by thrusting her nose up and "stalling"
her. The move answered, and next instant the upper machine swept
forward and up and ahead of them. The pilot opened his engine full
out and drove for his enemy, pelting fire upon her. His bullets went
straight and true to their mark, and the Hun, hearing them tear through
his fabrics, dipped over and plunged hastily down a full thousand feet.
The "Gamecock" heaved herself over and dived after him with the pilot's
gun still going. Almost immediately he heard the observer's gun firing,
and, stopping his own, glanced over his shoulder and saw the full width
of the other Hun's wings wheeling close astern of them. Immediately he
checked his dive and flattened out to give his observer a fair shot,
and knew instantly from the long-sustained rattle of the observer's gun
that the chance had been seen and taken.
He leaned out and peered down for sight of the other machine, and
then--his heart jumped at the unmistakable sound and throb--his engine
missed, picked up, missed again, cut out, and stopped completely. The
"Gamecock's" speed, held as she was at the moment on a slightly upward
slant, began to fall away, and the pilot hurriedly thrust her nose
down and went off in a long glide, while he tried desperately every
device he knew to get his engine started again. There was no sign of
the petrol leaking, so he knew the tanks were not hit, but on the
off-chance he switched on to the emergency tank--without result. Oil
pressure was all right, and--he broke off to glance round as the rattle
of fire came again to his ear. His observer was standing up blazing at
one machine which swooped after them closing in on the one side, while
the other climbed and swung in from the other. The pilot groaned. There
was just a last faint chance that they might manage to glide without
engine back over the line, provided the observer could stand off the
two attackers and prevent the "Gamecock" being shot to pieces. The
chance was so small that it was hardly worth taking, but since it was
the last and only chance the pilot swept round until his nose was for
home, gave the "Gamecock" a good downward plunge to get her speed up,
eased into a glide, and turned his attention to the engine again. The
two hostiles, supposing his engine hit or at least seeing it out of
action, leaped after and past the "Gamecock," and, whirling inward,
each poured a burst of fire upon her. They were repeating the tactic,
which shielded them from the observer's fire, and the "Gamecock's"
chances began to fade to nothingness, when the game took a fresh turn.
A scarlet-nosed grey shape flashed up out of nowhere apparently, past
the "Gamecock"--as swiftly past her as if she were standing still--and
hurtled straight at the nearest Hun, spitting a stream of fire upon
him. The Hun, with the bullets hailing and cracking about him, checked
and wheeled; but without a break the stream of drumming bullets beat
and tore in under his fuselage, and just as the red and grey scout
zoomed up and over him he dived, a spurt of fire flashed out from him,
and he whirled down out of the fight with black smoke pouring from him
in clouds. The other hostile spun round and streaked off, with our
victorious scout tearing after him. And at that moment the "Gamecock's"
engine sputtered, stopped, spat and sputtered again, picked up and
droned out in full song.
The observer seized the communicating 'phone and shouted into it. "Are
we damaged, d'you know?"
"Lord knows," the pilot shouted back. "She seems to be running all
right though. What next?"
"Back where we broke off the shoot," yelled the observer. "Three
batteries to put 'em on yet; and look at the time."
The pilot glanced at his clock. It was nearing the "zero hour,"
the moment when the infantry would be swarming out into the open No
Man's Land--and into the fire of those enemy batteries upon which the
"Gamecock" had not yet directed our guns. Both pilot and observer knew
how much it meant to have those hostile batteries silenced. The word
had come from Headquarters and had passed down to the Squadron that
it was very certain, from the fact that the batteries had been kept
concealed and had not fired up to now, they were meant to be used for
repelling the attack, that they would be reserved and unmasked only
when the infantry began their advance, that they would then unloose a
tempest of destroying fire on the attackers.
And because both pilot and observer had served a time in the infantry
before they joined the Flying Corps, they knew just what it meant to
the infantry to have such a fire to make way against, and both turned
anxiously back to complete their job.
Down below the ground was hidden under a drifting haze of smoke and
dust, and the "Gamecock" circled slowly while pilot and observer
searched for their objectives. They found the other spots on which they
had directed the guns--spots which now were marked by whirling, eddying
clouds through which the bursting high-explosive still flamed red at
quick intervals. From there at last they found the next target, and
the observer hastily signalled back to his battery to fire. The engine
was giving trouble again, missing every now and then, running slowly
and laboriously, while the pilot fiddled and fretted about throttle
and spark and petrol feed and tried to coax her into better running.
The observer failed to catch the puffing smoke of the battery's first
shot and signalled the code to fire again. Before the next shot came,
a stutter of machine-gun fire broke out overhead, and pilot and
observer glanced quickly up at the clouds that drifted over and hid the
fighters. The machine-gun fire rose and fell in gusts, and then out
of the cloud 1,000 feet up a machine whirled and spun down past them,
recovered an instant and shot eastward in a steep gliding plunge, fell
away suddenly, and crashed amongst the trenches.
Immediately after her there fell out of the sky a cluster of machines,
wheeling and circling and diving at each other like a swarm of
fighting jackdaws. The "Gamecock" suddenly found herself involved in a
scrimmaging mix-up without her crew knowing who or what was in it. A
pair of wings, with thick black crosses painted on them, whizzed across
the "Gamecock's" bows, and the pilot promptly ripped off a quick burst
of fire at her as she passed. "Never mind them," shouted the observer,
"get on with the shoot," and leaned out from his cockpit to watch for
the fall of the next shell. The "Gamecock" resumed her steady circling,
while the fight raged round and over her and drifted in wheeling rushes
clear of her and away quarter, half a mile to the south.
But they were not to be left unmolested. A Hun two-seater dropped
out of the fight and raced at the "Gamecock," putting in a burst of
fire from his bow gun as he came, wheeling round the "Gamecock's"
stern and pouring bullets on her from the observer's gun. The hostile
was tremendously fast, and the "Gamecock" with her crotchety engine
was no match for him. The observer, for all his anxiety to finish the
shoot, was forced to defend himself, and he turned to his gun with
black rage in his heart. "Brute," he growled, and loosed a stream
of bullets at the shape astern. "I'd like to down you just for your
beastly interference," and his gun rattled off another jet of bullets.
The enemy swooped down and under the "Gamecock's" tail with his gun
hammering viciously. The pilot lifted her nose so as to sink the tail
planes and rudder clear of the observer's line of fire and give him a
shot, but the "Gamecock" had barely speed enough for the manœuvre, lost
way, stalled badly, slid backward with a rush, and plunged down.