sh. It was the first surrender in mid-air I had
seen. In my amazement I watched the couple right down to the ground,
till the enemy landed in a big meadow across the high-road and our own
man in a field nearer the river.

When I looked back into the sky, it was bare. North, south, east, and
west, there was not a sign of aircraft, British or German.

A violent trembling took me. Archie was sweeping the heavens with his
glasses and muttering to himself. Where was the fifth man? He must have
fought his way through, and it was too late.

But was it? From the toe of a great rolling cloud-bank a flame shot
earthwards, followed by a V-shaped trail of smoke. British or Boche?
British or Boche? I didn't wait long for an answer. For, riding over
the far end of the cloud, came two of our fighting scouts.

I tried to be cool, and snapped my glasses into their case, though the
reaction made me want to shout. Archie turned to me with a nervous
smile and a quivering mouth. 'I think we have won on the post,' he said.

He reached out a hand for mine, his eyes still on the sky, and I was
grasping it when it was torn away. He was staring upwards with a white
face.

We were looking at the sixth enemy plane.

It had been behind the others and much lower, and was making straight
at a great speed for the east. The glasses showed me a different type
of machine--a big machine with short wings, which looked menacing as a
hawk in a covey of grouse. It was under the cloud-bank, and above,
satisfied, easing down after their fight, and unwitting of this enemy,
rode the two British craft.

A neighbouring anti-aircraft gun broke out into a sudden burst, and I
thanked Heaven for its inspiration. Curious as to this new development,
the two British turned, caught sight of the Boche, and dived for him.

What happened in the next minutes I cannot tell. The three seemed to be
mixed up in a dog fight, so that I could not distinguish friend from
foe. My hands no longer trembled; I was too desperate. The patter of
machine-guns came down to us, and then one of the three broke clear and
began to climb. The others strained to follow, but in a second he had
risen beyond their fire, for he had easily the pace of them. Was it the
Hun?

Archie's dry lips were talking.

'It's Lensch,' he said.

'How d'you know?' I gasped angrily.

'Can't mistake him. Look at the way he slipped out as he banked. That's
his patent trick.'

In that agonizing moment hope