To climb right through them - a distance of, perhaps, several thousand feet - was, of course, impossible, for to keep the machine level in such conditions was out of the question.

Still, he hung on as long as he could, until, finding himself becoming giddy, he dived earthward again, and looked anxiously for his pursuer as he emerged into clear air.

To his annoyance, he saw that the Hun was still there, about three hundred yards behind him.

In turning to look behind he had put his left hand on the bird, and as he turned once more he saw, to his horror, that his glove was covered with blood.

I've been hit!' was his first thought.

Then he grasped the true state of affairs. No wonder the bird was quiet-it was dead.

It had stopped the burst of fire which in normal circ.u.mstances would have caught him - Biggles - in the small of the back!

The shock sobered him, but he found that it was a good deal easier to dispose of a dead bird than a living one. Twenty-odd pounds of dead weight was a very different proposition to the same weight of jerking, flapping, muscular life, and he had no difficulty in stowing it in the s.p.a.ce between the calves of his legs and the bottom of the seat.

This done, he quickly buckled his safety-belt, and, turning to his attacker, saw, to his intense satisfaction, that, presumably encouraged by his opponent's disinclination to fight, the Hun was coining in carelessly to deliver the knock-out.

Biggles spun the Camel round in its own length and shot up in a clear, climbing turn that brought him behind the straight-winged machine. That the pilot had completely lost him he saw at a glance, for he had raised his head from his sights, and was looking up and down, as if bewildered by the Camel's miraculous disappearance.

Confidently Biggles roared down to point-blank range. The German looked round over his shoulder at the same moment, but he was too late, for Biggles' hand had already closed over his gun-lever.

He fired only a short burst, but it was enough. The Albatross reared up on its tail, fell off on to a wing, and then spun earthwards, its engine roaring in full throttle.

He did not wait to see it crash. He was more concerned with getting home, for he was both cold and tired. He found a rift in the clouds, climbed up through it, and, without seeing a machine of any description, crossed the lines into comparative safety.

Judging the position of the aerodrome as well as he could, he crept cautiously back to the ground, and landed on the deserted tarmac.

With grim satisfaction, he hauled the corpse of his unwitting preserver from the c.o.c.kpit, and, flinging it over his shoulder, strode towards the mess.

It struck him that the bird had increased in weight, and he wondered at the reason until he recalled the length of the Hun's burst of firing, and deduced that most of the bullets, which had been partly arrested by the structure of the machine, must even now be reposing in the carca.s.s that dangled over his back.

A moment of dead silence greeted him as he opened the mess door, and, still in his flying-kit, heaved the body of his feathered pa.s.senger on to the table. Then a babble of voices broke out.

Mahoney pushed his way to the front, staring. 'Where on earth did you get that?' he cried incredulously.

'I told you I was going turkey hunting,' replied Biggles simply, 'and - well, there you are! Look a bit closer, and you'll see the bullet-holes. I don't like reminding you, old lad, but don't forget you're doing my early patrols next week.

And, finally, don't forget I'm carving the turkey!' he laughed.

18.

A SPORTING OFFER!.

The healthy, boyish face of the Hon. Algernon Lacey, of Squadron No. 266, wore a remarkable expression, as its owner walked in long strides towards the officers' mess from the direction of the squadron office.

He hesitated in his stride, as Maclaren, the doughty Scots flight-commander, emerged from his hut, cap in hand, and stared thoughtfully at the sky.

'Hi, Mac!' hailed Algy. 'Have you seen Biggles anywhere?'

'Ay. He's in the billiards-room'

'Thanks!' Algy hurried on, entered the mess, crossed the ante-room, and pushed open the door of the room in which a small billiards-table had been installed.

'Enter the gallant knight, Sir Algernon!' chaffed Biggles, who was sitting in a cane chair with his feet resting on the window-sill, with a small circle of officers around him.

'Hi!' cried Algy. 'I've some news that will shake you!'

'You may have news, but I doubt it will shake me: rejoined Biggles. 'I've been in this perishing war too long for anything to occasion me either surprise or consternation. What is it? Has Fishface decided to stand us a dinner?'

Fishface was the popular name for Brigadier-General Tishlace, general officer commanding the wing in which Squadron No. 266 was brigaded.

'No,' replied Algy; 'at least, not as far as I know. But Wat Tyler has just shown me tonight's orders they're being typed now. We've been detailed for a week's propaganda work. Several other units have got to do it, too, I believe.'

'Propaganda??

'Yes. You know the game dropping leaflets over the other side of the line telling the Huns that they're losing the war, and if they like to be good boys and give themselves up, what a lovely time they'll have in England!'

'Great Scott! What will they want us to do next? Do they think we're a lot of unemployed postmen?'

It's no joking matter,' answered Algy seriously. D'you know what the Huns do to people they catch at this game?'

'No. But I can guess.'

It's either a firing-party at dawn, up against a brick wall, or the salt mines in Siberia!'

'Then, obviously, the thing is not to get caught?

'You've said it: observed Mahoney. 'I had to do this job once when I was in Squadron 96.

We didn't go far over the Line, I can tell you; in fact, Billy Bradley dropped a load only about two miles over.

'There was a d.i.c.kens of a wind blowing at the time, and it blew the whole lot back over the aerodrome. It looked as if the whole blooming Army had been having a paperchase!'

'How do you drop em?' asked Biggles curiously 'They're done up in bundles, with an elastic band round them. You just pull the band off and heave the whole packet over the side. They separate as they fall, and look like an artificial snowstorm at a pantomime.'

Well,' declared Biggles, don't mind a roughhouse once in a while, but I'd hate to dig salt in Siberia. I never did like salt, anyway. When do we start this jaunt?'

'Tomorrow morning?

The door was flung open, and Wilkinson - better known as Wilks; of the neighbouring S.E.5 Squadron - entered, and broached the object of his visit without delay 'I hear you blighters have been detailed for this paperchase tomorrow?', 'So Algy says,' replied Biggles. 'Why, what do you know about it?'

'We've been doing it for the last three days? 'The d.i.c.kens you have!'

'We have. And we're pretty good at it!'

'How do you mean good? It doesn't strike me that it needs any great mental effort to throw a bundle of papers over the side of an aeroplane. Still, it's the sort of thing your crowd might easily learn to do quite well.'

'Don't you make any mistake! Headquarters usually has a job to make people go far over the line, but we're doing the job properly. I dropped a load over Lille yesterday?

'Lille! But you don't call that far. It's only about ten miles!'

It's far enough, and further than you Camel merchants are likely to go!'

Biggles rose slowly to his feet.

'We'll see about that!' he declared. 'I should say that where a palsied, square-faced S.E.

plane can go, a Camel should have no difficulty in going. In fact, it could probably go a bit further.

'In order to prove it, tomorrow I shall make a point of heaving a load of this confetti over Tournai?

'You're barmy!' jeered Wilks. 'How are you going to prove you've been there, anyway?'

'If you're going to start casting nasturtiums at my integrity, I shall have to take a camera - '

He broke off, and with the other officers rose to his feet as Major Raymond, of Wing Headquarters Intelligence Staff, entered the room with Major Mullen, the C.O.

'Good-morning, gentlemen!' said the Wing officer. 'All right, sit down, everybody. What were you talking about, Bigglesworth? Did I hear you say you were going to heave something at somebody?'

'Yes, sir: replied Biggles. 'Wilks here - Wilkinson - says he dropped a packet of these - er - propaganda leaflets over Lille yesterday. Just to show that there was no ill-feeling, I said I'd drop a load over at Tournai.'

'Tournai! It's a long way - about thirty miles, I should say, for a guess. I should be glad to see you do it, but it's taking a big risk.'

'No distance at all, sir. I thought it might be a good thing if we set Wilks and his S.E.5 people a mark to aim at. Shackleton's Farthest South sort of thing- or, rather, Farthest East: Major Raymond smiled.

'I see,' he said slowly. 'If your C.O. has no objection, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll present a new gramophone to the squadron that takes a packet of those leaflets Farthest East during the next two days.

'Time expires - shall we say - at twelve noon the day after tomorrow?'

'That's very sporting of you, sir!' replied Biggles. 'You might order a label made out to Squadron No. 266 -'

'You wait a minute,' broke in Wilkinson. 'Not so fast!' Then he turned to Major Raymond. 'You make the label out to us, sir; it will save you altering it: 'I think I'll wait for the result first!' laughed the major. 'I shall expect a photograph for proof, and I shall be outside, on the Tarmac, at twelve o'clock the day after tomorrow, to check up. Good-bye!'

Biggles bent forward and peered through the arc of his whirling propeller for the fiftieth time, and examined the sky carefully. Satisfied that it was clear, he turned and looked long and searchingly over his shoulder.

From horizon to horizon not a speck marked the unbroken blue of the sky.

He glanced at his watch and saw that he had been in the air rather more than an hour.

Thirty minutes of it he had spent in climbing to his limit of height over his own side of the Lines, and for the remainder of the time he had pushed further and further into hostile country.

It was the day following the discussion in the mess, and, in accordance with his declared intention, he had left the ground shortly after dawn, bound for Tournai.

So far he had been fortunate, for he had not seen a single machine of any sort. Even the archie had dwindled away as he had penetrated beyond the usual scene of operations.

Below lay a rolling landscape of green fields and woods, very different from that nearer the Lines. It was new to him, for although he had been as far over on one or two previous occasions, it had not been in this actual area.

Again he peered ahead, and saw that his course had been correct. Tournai, a broad splash of grey, red and brown walls, lay athwart the landscape, like an island in a dream sea.

He wiped the frosted air from his windscreen, unwrapped a piece of chocolate from its silver jacket, and popped it into his mouth, and once more began his systematic scrutiny of the atmosphere. The sky was still clear.

It looks as if it's going to be easy!' he thought as he took a camera from the pocket in the side of his c.o.c.kpit and placed it on his lap.

Then he groped under the cushion on which he sat and produced the object of the raid.

It was a tightly packed wad of thin paper, not unlike banknotes, held together by an elastic band.

Once more he searched the sky. Satisfied that he had nothing to fear, he eased the control-stick forward for more speed, and roared across his objective.

When he was slightly to the windward side of it, he took his unusual missile from his lap, pulled off the elastic band, and flung it over the side.

Instantly the swirling slipstream tore the papers apart and scattered them far and wide.

By the time he turned for home, a vast mult.i.tude of what appeared to be small white moths were floating slowly earthward.

It was an extraordinary spectacle, and a smile came to his face as he watched it.

Then he turned, to bring the sun behind him, aimed his camera at the scene below, and depressed the shutter release. He repeated the process, in case of an accident occurring to one of the plates, and then raced away towards the distant Lines.

Twenty minutes pa.s.sed, and only half the distance had been covered, for he was now flying against a headwind. Nevertheless, he had just begun to hope that he would reach home without being molested, when a cl.u.s.ter of fine dots appeared over the western horizon.

The effect was not unlike a small swarm of gnats on a summer's evening. He altered his course slightly to make a detour round them, but continued to watch them closely. The speed with which they increased in size made it clear that the machines were travelling in his direction, and presently he could make them out distinctly.

It was the formation of six British bombers, D.H.4's, being hotly attacked on all sides by some fifteen or twenty Albatross scouts. The D.H.'s seemed to be holding their own, however, and held on their way, flying in a tight V-formation.

The affair was nothing to do with Biggles; in any case, he could not hope to serve any good purpose by b.u.t.ting in, although he wondered why no escort -had been provided for the bombers, so he gave them as wide a berth as possible, hoping to pa.s.s un.o.bserved.

But it was not to be.

First one of the enemy scouts saw him, then another, until the air between him and the D.

H.4's was filled with a long line of gaudily painted aeroplanes, all racing in his direction.

'Those "4" pilots ought to be pleased with me: he thought bitterly, 'for taking that mob off their heels. This is going to be awkward!'

The Albatrosses were at about his own alt.i.tude; if anything, they were a trifle higher, which gave them a slight advantage of speed. To fight such a crowd successfully, so far from home, once they had drawn level with him, was obviously impossible.

He was, as near as he could judge, still a good twelve miles over the enemy's side of the Lines, not a great distance as distance counts on the ground, but a long way when one is fighting against overwhelming odds.

He looked around for a cloud in which he might take cover, or around which he might dodge his pursuers, but in all directions the sky was clear. He scanned the horizon anxiously, hoping to see some of the scouts of his own side with whom he could join until the danger was past, but the only British machines in sight were the fast disappearing D.H.4's.

The nearest Albatross was less than a quarter of a mile away. Once it caught him he would be compelled to stay and fight, for to fly straight on would mean being shot down like a sparrow.