FIGHTING BOTH ENEMY AND ELEMENTS
The Bleriot which Erwin was now piloting, though far in the upper air,
was seen to be whirling round and returning, apparently to Blaine's
rescue.
Evidently Orris had also seen the irruption of lancers and had no
intention of deserting his comrade and friend while in possible peril.
To intensify the strain he began to spray the Germans below with the
remaining sheaf of bullets in the magazine of the machine gun.
Seeing no further need of camouflage on the part of the Americans,
Blaine, with one foot crushing down the German, who was now attempting
to rise despite his bonds, whirled the German machine gun round upon
the now suspicious lancers below.
These were unslinging their carbines. Blaine anticipated them with a
spatter of bullets from their own weapon. At this bedlam broke loose
below.
While Erwin had done little or no damage, probably owing to distance,
Blaine's discharge was pointblank and deadly.
Meantime in some way the German managed to loosen one arm. Recklessly
he seized hold of one the controls, wrenching it violently.
"You will, will you?" exclaimed the American, "We must get away from
here at any rate!"
Releasing both hands, he seized the German by the throat, pinning him
against the rim of the hole that held both, and with his feet on the
accelerator rose rapidly upward. By this time bullets were spitting
round them, one of which seared the German's bare scalp deeply.
Uttering a curious groan, the fellow sank back and Blaine released his
throat.
"He's out of it for the time being," thought Lafe. "Good thing, too.
Hard work to keep a strangle hold on that chap and keep his machine
right side up. Hey there, Orry!"
By this time Erwin had forged so close in swinging round again that
only a few yards separated the planes.
"Don't you go any nearer those Boches. I am all right. We got some of
them. Look at those riderless horses!"
True it was that several riderless horses were careering about the
field below. Also at another angle some men were dragging forth an
antiaircraft gun, or so it looked to be by its peculiar carriage and
mounting.
"Sure you are all right?" called Orris as the two machines sped along
side by side, all the while rising. "Didn't that fellow give you
trouble?"
"None to speak of. I've looped a cord about his throat, and got the
other end round a cleat. If he tries to jerk away he'll strangle. Put
on more power, man! Can't you see they've dragged the Archies out and
are stuffing in sheaves of bullets?"
"All right!" called Erwin, now spiraling higher, higher, climbing
cloudward. "Sure you got the Taube straight -- hey, Lafe?"
"Course I have! Didn't I work one of them at --?" But the name was
lost to Orris as the distance increased.
To Blaine's relief the Boche did not move for a moment or two. This
gave him time to twist that free arm back where Lafe could press the
weight of one big foot thereon, and also complete the adjustment of the
cord. He arranged it by looping twice round the cleat, the length
reaching to Fritz's throat being drawn taut. Moreover, as the German's
body was resting sidewise upon his other arm, still tightly bound,
Blaine felt that he had the man for the time being at least.
Now came heavier roars from below. Not only one gun but several had
been brought up, trained on the fliers and were being fired rapidly at
the receding airplanes.
Also the true nature of the situation aloft must have been divined.
Hence the extreme activity among the Germans, now trying desperately to
reverse the progress of events by bringing one or both machines down.
The fact that the life of one of their own comrades might be snuffed
out did not weigh with them at all. Such is the German militaristic
creed. The individual, his life, or welfare is as nothing when
compared with the welfare of the cause, the state, the whole brutal,
efficient system.
After all, this comrade might be dead now. They must get at and, if
possible, overtake these schwein at all cost. Were not they retreating
with a choice Prussian machine, that even now flaunted in derision the
Death's Head Flag?
No wonder the Boches were mad -- good mad!
But our Yankee adventurers were by no means at the end of their raid.
The sun was rising. With the rare promise of a clear day, considering
the time and the region, it was more evident than usual that a very
high altitude must be reached and maintained.
There were the German trenches to be passed, the trenches raided only a
few hours before, the No-Man's-Land, before the welcoming shelter of
friendly areas and support might be reached. At any rate, they could
see and signal other and also keep close together and be ready to
afford mutual support in case of meeting the foe. This last was soon
verified by the rise and approach of a small squadron of scout
cruisers, winged monoplanes, each with a ed monoplanes, each with a
single pilot only and one machine gun.
"Keep well under them," signaled Blaine to his friend. "Got any
ammunition? What? The devil!"
Orris had replied to Lafe's queries by shaking out the now empty
cartridge sheaves and dropping them again. Lafe, then swooping closer,
Called forth to his mate:
"By its looks this gun is a rebuilt Lewis. Can you use any of mine?
You know the Boches are great in reconstructing captured weapons to
their own use. Get below me and to one side. Hurry up! I'll try to
toss you a sheaf. Here -- damn you!"
This to the German who again evinced signs of life. Having no time to
spare, Blaine jerked the throat cord closer and gave a heavier foot
pressure to the prisoner's twisted arm. Meanwhile with no time to
lose, Orris swooped lower, rising gently under Blaine's right or
starboard side. The latter had to rise in order to toss the weighty
sheaf of cartridges exactly where he wished them to fall -- into
Erwin's lap.
This he did successfully. But in so doing his weight relaxed upon the
Boche's arm. At the same time Orris, in catching the sheaf, allowed
his control grip to relax. The nose of Orris's machine, now rising,
bumped into Lafe's under plane, tilting it up sharply.
Precisely at this juncture, and as Blaine's foot pressure on his
prisoner's arm relaxed, the tilting planes threw him sharply forward,
down and upon the German. The latter, seeing his one chance, wrenched
his partially released arm forward and caught it round Blaine's legs as
he stumbled. At the same time this double movement somehow operated to
release Fritz's other arm.
By now, Orris, unconscious of the mischief his own upward shove had
caused, sheered his machine aside, still climbing upward and onward,
only to find three of the enemy scouts nearing rapidly and making ready
for an encounter.
Looking back, he saw, in the place of Blaine's leather cap and goggles,
a dimly shimmering twinkle of arms and legs flashing above the rim of
the open enclosure where the pilots sit.
"Great guns!" he ejaculated, his blood tingling with thrills. "That
chap has got loose and they're having it. What must I do?"
Even while these thoughts were flashing, he was working. He dared not
turn to Blaine's relief. He did not know yet if the sheaf thrown him
would fit his own machine gun. But first he must dip, circle, come up
underneath and try his luck.
As has been said, Orry was no novice. He had flown at the front for
months as one of the Lafayette Escadrille. Before that he had worked
his way up in aerial mechanics in the United States and also here in
France.
Even while diving, circling, swirling in mid air, ten thousand feet up,
he was adjusting the new sheaf to his own gun. Happily it fitted.
That was a good sign, and pirouetting, not unlike an expert dancer
executing a new turn, he dove aside and came up fairly behind the
nearest Boche. Without hesitation he began to spray the enemy with a
shower of their own bullets. It was indeed lucky the new cartridges
fitted. It was merely one blunder committed by the extra efficient
Germans in converting British weapons to their own use.
Evidently the ammunition dealt out to the Death's Head Squadron was of
the best. It was intentionally so. Another proof of this lay in the
fact that the German plane thus attacked fell sideways, recovered,
plunged half staggering away, while a tiny spark of flame became
visible to Erwin as he sheered aside in the opposite direction and
prepared for a new onset from above by the second plane. So far as he
could see, the other plane was making for Blaine's machine that still
flow the Death's Head Flag. Yet it was acting strangely as seen from a
distance by the Boches, who might or might not be posted as to the
strange change of its ownership.
The second plane, rendered more cautious by the fate of the first,
which was now descending a mass of flames, began a series of divings,
wrigglings, and even nose dips, in its efforts to confuse Erwin and
find a good position from which to shower the daring invader with
bullets.
On his own part Orris went through the usual maneuvers customary when
two airmen, both skillful, are seeking the advantage of the other.
Well it was for the young man that his own Bleriot was one of the best
of the up-to-date fighting planes.
Numerous shots were taken on both sides, and in the excitement f or the
moment Orris lost all sight of the fate of his partner. At last, in
trying by a desperate and perilous maneuver, to "get on the tail" of
his adversary by a side-loop in mid-flight, the Boche pilot, while
upside down, came for an instant fairly within range. Quickly Orris
took his advantage.
He was above and to the right of the German, and with a single whirl of
his Lewis gun brought it fully in line with the Boche's head as he sat
head down, strapped in his seat, while his machine was swiftly turning
in its side evolution so as to bring him in the rear of his enemy.
"Now!" gasped Orris, beginning his bullet spray. "Help me, Mars!"
A queer prayer, but it was quickly answered. The German machine
righted more slowly, however. Erwin dove swiftly down and came upright
in the rear of his now swaying adversary. Then the lad saw what fate
had done for him.
The German had collapsed in his seat, to which, as has been said, he
had strapped himself. His head lay on the rim, apparently a mass of
streaming crimson. His machine, a renovated Fokker, was tipsily
zigzagging along without any guidance except its stabilizer and its own
momentum.
To say the boy was half paralyzed at first is not too strong. But a
revulsion swept through him in a flood. At the same time there came to
his brain a vivid flash, reminding him that while thus desperately
engaged for his own life, he had heard sounds of aerial battling
somewhere in his rear.
While he was making up his mind what to do next, the whir of speeding
motors rose rapidly. Looking back, he saw the Death's Head flag waving
from the nearest one and soon distinguished Blaine, apparently all
right, but chugging away at top speed in Erwin's direction.
Just now the Fokker with its dead occupant gave another side drop and,
uninfluenced by the usual controls, came nearly to a standstill. It
toppled again, then down it went earthward at increasing speed,
carrying its occupant along.
"Hey-you!" This from Blaine as he swept up and by, while rounding to.
"Look behind! I dropped that chap -- the first one! But he's brought
a lot of others. Let's make for home, boy!"
Apparently it was too late without a further scrimmage, for no less
than half a dozen Boche planes were swooping around their rear, some
already within range. In maneuvering into position Blaine again picked
up his megaphone, saying:
"I saw you drop those chaps. Oh, you Orry! Here we go -- right for
some more of them! Whoopee!"
It seemed little short of blasphemy -- this uproarious spirit, in the
face of the odds gathering in behind. But Blaine was built that way.
Danger, the closer and more menacing, instead of rousing fear, nerved
him to his best or, as it might turn out, worst.
"Where's your prisoner?" shouted Erwin. "I feared he'd get you."
"Nit, old man! I got hold of a monkey-wrench and knocked him cold.
But he was game, you bet!"
"Where is he then?"
"Cold and stiff under my feet. Watch out, Orry!"
Megaphones cast aside, both Americans now addressed themselves to the
desperate task of fighting these new assailants and reaching their own
lines.
But in the first firing that ensued Erwin's Lewis gun suddenly jammed.
This was probably one result of his having to use the German-made
ammunition tossed to him earlier by Blaine, when his own had been
exhausted. He signaled to his partner:
"Gun jammed! Must cut for home -- understand?"
"All right! Go up - up -"
A burst of flame from Blaine's machine, and the toppling down of the
nearest adversary was the first result of this new encounter.
Evidently that flag waving from Blaine's captured plane had fooled the
Boches again.
Down, down went the hostile machine, its pilot frantically but
ineffectually trying to right himself.
Passing Erwin, the latter saw the Boche, evidently a mere lad, working
at the controls as the plane dropped down like a dead leaf in the air.
"Poor fellow," sighed Orris, beginning to spiral upward. "What a
deadly cruel thing war now is!"
Up, up he climbed, two of the enemy following, while Blaine was
engaging another, the last. The final view Erwin had of his bunkie the
two were engaged in a close duel, dipping, darting, flashing about each
other. Now came interchanging machine gun fire, with both gradually
following Erwin higher, higher, until the latter began to feel that the
thin air of these upper regions was getting on his nerves. A glance at
his own register showed eighteen thousand feet or thereabouts.
Still his adversaries climbed after him. Now and then a spurt of flame
and a spatter of bullets indicated that his own plane was being more or
less perforated. The lad became doubtful as to the wisdom of waiting
longer for his comrade. Evidently Blaine would fight on as long as his
ammunition lasted or until disabled himself. After all, two hostile
planes dropped and the third one brought home with its occupant was not
a bad conclusion for a night's bombing raid on the enemy trenches.
Here a sudden, fierce gust of wind from the north catching him unawares
half tilted his machine and then as he righted it sent him scurrying at
terrific speed southward. At the same time a black cloud, belching and
flaming thunder and lightning, swept down on him with almost the force
of a hurricane.