Adventure, July 1, 1928 — page 42: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

36 THOMSON BURTIS his ship once more. Only blind luck had saved him from being shot down. His wings had holes in them. He saw his chance. The other ship was banking to give the back seat man a ’ chance to shoot. In an instant the Duke’s belt was off, and he had plunged head first into the front cockpit. As the DH faltered in a stall he grabbed the stick. He got to the seat, and as he strapped the belt he sent the bomber curving madly through the air. He had one advantage—front guns to aim with the ship. They had altitude, but they had to present a broadside view to give the machinexgunner a chance. He was a big man. “By God, I believe it’s Henry Ivers!” the Duke told himself slowly. “Going to get to Mexico if he doesn’t shoot me down, eh?” The two ships circled, their motors fairly shaking the earth as they roared along at full speed. The Duke was very quiet and very calm now. He watched like a hawk. He must spoil their shots, waiting his chance. Spots of fire came from the gun above. He went into a dive, twisting as he dived, at right angles +to their course. The cruiser banked to keep him in range. They figured on getting him as he passed underneath them. In a split second he changed his dive, banking steeply to the left. Their course was to the right. The DH was quiver- ing with the terrific speed of that full power dive, and the Liberty’s roar rose to a mad bellow as the tachometer showed eighteen hundred and fifty revolutions a minute-and the airspeed hovered around two hundred and fifteen. He glanced around. They were bank- ing to the left. In a moment the guns would be on him, but for a small interval of time the ships would be too far apart for accurate shooting. There he shot the dice with destruction. Without hesitation he lifted the frail De Haviland upward in a clean arc. Up and up it went with that excess speed. Every second he expected to feel a bullet. It started over on its back, five hundred feet higher than it had been before. With rudder and stick, plus the feel of the ship which had made him a great pilot, he turned the DH‘on its horizontal axis, in a half roll. Hanging upside-down; then sideward as the ship answered, there came a second when there loomed before his sights the bulk of the other ship. It had twisted again, reversing its course. As his DH turned his hand was pressed down on the gun control, and his front guns were spraying lead. How he did it he did not know, but even as the DH was turning he kept its nose pointed at the other ship. Then the cruiser passed out of range. Right side up, stalled, he looked about for it. He was as high as they were now. He was higher! They were below him and seemed in trouble. The cruiser turned loggily, “To hell with you,” he said to himself with icy calmness, and dived on them. He saw his tracers travel almost the length of the ship, and then he scarcely watched it as it spun earthward. He was already on his way toward those gallop- ing horsemen, who were just entering the open, when the cruiser hurtled to the ground and a great ball of fire lit up the earth for miles around. Would the bandits give up now? He wondered. Probably not. They could not know that Ivers himself had been in that ship, largely for the purpose of making a clean getaway. They had figured on getting Daly with those first shots. “‘And they nearly did!’”’ he thought. Suddenly he felt hope bounding in his heart. He was a half mile to one side of the bunched riders. He sent the DH downward ina fast dive, pointed at them. The motor sputtered. Had some bullet taken effect in it? God, he must hurry. That roar didn’t sound right. Sort of uneven. Now he was close to them, flying at two miles and a half a minute, only five feet off the ground. comicloooks.com