Almost before the words had passed Ned’s lips, an ugly black muzzle was
protruded from a window in the hanging body of the nearest Zeppelin.
Then came a puff of bluish smoke, a dull roar and flash of flame:
BZZ--Zz--z--z--z--z--z--z....
A huge shell had passed athwart the _Ocean Flyer’s_ bows in stern
warning for her to stop and await inspection.
Perspiration started out profusely on the boys’ foreheads. The huge
German war balloons were approaching in a rapidly narrowing circle.
There were at least fifty of them, and soon an advance patrol of
military “Taube” aeroplanes came skimming back to support them. Cannon
were shoved menacingly out of a score of portholes. There was no
mistaking the determination of the Germans.
“Heavens!” groaned Alan, his cheeks blanched. “What shall we do? If we
don’t stop in a minute, they’ll all get our range and blow even our
stout magnalium covering to bits. We haven’t a single weapon on board
that can compare with those heavy cannon!”
“Don’t surrender unless there is absolutely nothing else for us to do,”
cried Buck.
Bob added: “No, because then they’d simply lock us up in some German
prison and use the _Flyer_ for their raid on England!”
The two nearest Zeppelins could now be seen letting gas out of their
huge sausage-like bags as they settled down towards the almost
stationary airship. As they changed position, it left a narrow break in
the ring of enemies.
“Shall we risk a chance on breaking through there? That’s our only
hope,” said Ned quietly.
“Yes, yes. Quick--full power ahead before they think to close the gap!”
Ned jammed the acceleration lever hard down in its socket; the
machinery groaned with the pressure of too suddenly added power; the
exterior planes folded automatically before the rapidly increasing rush
of air. The _Ocean Flyer_ swept upwards at an abrupt angle, heading
straight for the only opening left unguarded.
Simultaneously the Zeppelin crews saw the boys’ desperate intent. Flame
belched from twenty cannon mouths. Shells burst screaming all around.
Four light aeroplanes skimmed like swallows up and over to cover the
gap in the ring. The two huge Zeppelins bearing down upon the Flyer
from above converged and charged her, head on.
“There’s only one thing for us to do,” groaned Ned, “and that is to
ram them. We can do it, but it means that the Zeppelins we hit will be
destroyed and with them I don’t know how many men. Those craft carry a
crew of forty or more, you know.”
“I hate to think of it too, but they themselves have made it our lives
or theirs!” yelled Alan. “So go to it, Ned.”
The _Ocean Flyer_ had now attained an incredible velocity. It was only
a matter of minutes, of seconds, or instants, before it would crash
straight into the huge but clumsier enemy advancing to meet it. There
was a bare glimpse of drawn, panic-stricken faces crowding the hanging
compartment. The pointed snout of the _Flyer_ tilted suddenly at an
eighty-degree angle and--
_B o o m--m--m--psthsh--sh--sh--ss!_
She had struck and pierced the huge gas bag of the Zeppelin, leaving
a huge, gaping rent from which the gas rushed as the craft sagged
sidewise more and more. Several of the heavy cables supporting the car
from the bag parted with reports like shell explosions. The Zeppelin
began slowly to sink, while her sister craft sheered off from the
rushing destroyer.
Wild-eyed and remorseful for the awful necessity of their deed, the
boys now saw the light aeroplanes darting up to block their path. The
futility of their trying to stop an airship when a Zeppelin twenty
times their size had failed, did not seem to occur to those daring
German aviators.
They sat braced there in their narrow seats among the intricacy of
wire rigging, guiding their frail craft with one hand and shooting
rapidly with the other. Rifle and revolver bullets rattled against the
_Flyer’s_ magnalium sides like hailstones.
The rush of wind set in lateral motion by the velocity of the huge
airship nearly capsized two of the little craft. The planes of a third
one were brushed roughly by the _Flyer_ as it rushed past.
The sun had now dissipated the last of the mist and the shapes of the
other Zeppelins could plainly be seen sailing down upon their prey. The
whole sky seemed to be full of them. No wonder England was terrified
by such a menace as this!
The _Ocean Flyer_ now had, however, a clear field in front of her and
the situation resolved itself into a race to get out of range. Here
was where the tremendous motive power of the airship stood her in good
stead. No Zeppelin could maintain such a terrific speed as Ned set.
The guns of the Zeppelins roared almost continuously, but a moving
target is hard to hit. Most of the deadly shells either fell short or
went wide of their mark. One by one the huge “bologna sausages” began
to drop behind and abandon the pursuit. Finally there were only two
left--one a quarter of a mile in the rear and the other hanging almost
stationary to the left of the _Flyer’s_ course. The last Zeppelin had
evidently been foremost of the raiding squadron.
“Good-bye, old chaps,” Bob yelled mockingly, just as the Zeppelin to
the left let fire a broadside with every one of her seven cannon. The
“kick” of the discharge caused her to careen backward amid clouds of
powder smoke.
Shells droned gruesomely past the speeding _Flyer_--overhead, beneath,
on both sides.
A rending thud that hurled the airship on her beam ends ... the
splintering crash of wood and metal ... frenzied cries for help from
Buck down in the engine room. A perceptible “missing” of the engines
and an alarming tilt to one side.
The _Ocean Flyer_ had been hit!