scape the high-angle guns of
the Grays.

"We've got them all! No lips survive to tell what the eye saw!"
exclaimed Feller, his words bubbling with the joy of water in the
sunlight. "As I thought," he continued in professional enthusiasm and
discrimination. "We are getting the theory of one feature of the new
warfare in practice. It isn't like the popular dream of wiping out
armies by dropping bombs as you sail overhead. The force of gravity is
against the fliers. You have only to bring them to earth to put them out
of action. Plane driven into plane dirigible into dirigible, and an end
of bomb-dropping and scouting! War will still be won by the infantry
and the guns. Yes, the guns--the new guns! They--"

Feller recalled with a nervous shock flashing through his system that he
was a gardener, a gentle old gardener. He put his hat back on a head
already bent, while the shoulders, after a pathetic shrug, drew together
in the accustomed stoop. His slim fingers slipped under the largest
chrysanthemum blossom, his attitude the same as when he had held it up
for Marta's inspection before they heard the roar of the Gray squadron's
motors.

"I think that we might cut them all now and fill the vases," he
suggested, a musical, ingratiating note in his voice. "To-morrow we may
not have a chance."

"Yes," she agreed mechanically, her thoughts still dwelling on the
collision of the squadrons.

"And some of the finest ones for you to take now," he added, plying the
shears as he made his selections. "I'll bring the rest," he concluded
when he had gathered a dozen choice blossoms.

His fingers touched hers as the stems changed hands. In his eyes,
showing just below the rim of his hat, was the light which she had seen
first during the dramatic scene in his sitting-room and the appeal of
deference, of suffering, and of the boyish hope of a cadet.

XXI

SHE CHANGES HER MIND

The indefatigable captain of engineers had turned spectator. With
high-power binoculars glued to his eyes, he was watching to see if the
faint brown line of Dellarme's men were going to hold or break. If it
held, he might have hours in which to complete his task; if it broke, he
had only minutes.

Marta came up the terrace path from the chrysanthemum bed in time to
watch the shroud of shrapnel smoke billowing over the knoll, to
visualise another scene in place of the collision of the squadrons, and
to note the captain's exultation over Fracasse's