Page:Air Service Boys Flying for France.djvu/202

Rh trouble, even to spattering one another with a hail of missiles from their mounted guns.

This was all very well, but Tom did not like the situation at all. He could not tell which way he was heading, since all view was cut off, and the loss of the compass badly felt.

Consequently they might be actually going back into the heart of the hostile country for all they knew, with a pretty good chance of being made prisoners of war.

More time passed. Unable to stand it any longer Tom decided to drop down to a lower level, and try to get free from that stifling enveloping cloud that wrapped them in its dense folds. True, other perils might await them there, but it seemed the best move.

Both young aviators breathed easier when they finally left the cloud above them, and were once more able to see something besides that opaque mass around them. Far below they could catch faint glimpses of lights, as though they were passing over some town, or perhaps a railroad center where troops and supplies were being loaded for the fighting front.

But where were they? Tom confessed to himself that he could not tell. He again got the sinking moon on his right, so that he felt positive they must be headed in a direction generally