Part 15 (1/2)

What ought Guynemer to do? Desist, no doubt. But, having been imprudent in his direct attack, he was imprudent again on his new tack, and his usual obstinacy, made worse by irritation, counseled him to a dangerous course. As he dived lower and lower in hopes of being able to wheel around and have another shot, Bozon-Verduraz spied a chain of eight German one-seaters above the British lines. It was agreed between him and his chief that on such occasions he should offer himself to the newcomers, allure, entice, and throw them off the track, giving Guynemer time to achieve his fifty-fourth success, after which he should fly round again to where the fight was going on. He had no anxiety about Guynemer, with whom he had frequently attacked enemy squadrons of five, six, or even ten or twelve one-seaters. The two-seater might, no doubt, be more dangerous, and Guynemer had recently seemed nervous and below par; but in a fight his presence of mind, infallibility of movement, and quickness of eye were sure to come back, and the two-seater could hardly escape its doom.

The last image imprinted on the eyes of Bozon-Verduraz was of Guynemer and the German both spinning down, Guynemer in search of a chance to shoot, the other hoping to be helped from down below. Then Bozon-Verduraz had flown in the direction of the eight one-seaters, and the group had fallen apart, chasing him. In time the eight machines became mere specks in the illimitable sky, and Bozon-Verduraz, seeing he had achieved his object, flew back to where his chief was no doubt waiting for him. But there was n.o.body in the empty s.p.a.ce. Could it be that the German had escaped? With deadly anguish oppressing him, the airman descended nearer the ground to get a closer view. Down below there was nothing, no sign, none of the bustle which always follows the falling of an airplane. Feeling rea.s.sured, he climbed again and began to circle round and round, expecting his comrade. Guynemer was coming back, could not but come back, and the cause of his delay was probably the excitement of the chase. He was so reckless! Like Dorme--who one fine morning in May, on the Aisne, went out and was never heard of afterwards--he was not afraid of traveling long distances over enemy country. He must come back. It is impossible he should not come back; he was beyond the reach of common accidents, invincible, immortal! This was a cert.i.tude, the very faith of the Storks, a tenet which never was questioned. The notion of Guynemer falling to a German seemed hardly short of sacrilege.

So Bozon-Verduraz waited on, making up his mind to wait as long as necessary. But an hour pa.s.sed, and n.o.body appeared. Then the airman broadened his circles and searched farther out, without, however, swerving from the rallying-point. He searched the air like Nisus the forest in his quest of Euryalus, and his mind began to misgive him.

After two hours he was still waiting, alone, noticing with dismay that his oil was running low. One more circle! How slack the engine sounded to him! One more circle! Now it was impossible to wait any more: he must go back alone.

On landing, his first word was to ask about Guynemer.

”Not back yet!”

Bozon-Verduraz knew it. He knew that Guynemer had been taken away from him.

The telephone and the wireless sent their appeals around, airplanes started on anxious cruises. Hour followed hour, and evening came, one of those late summer evenings during which the horizon wears the tints of flowers; the shadows deepened, and no news came of Guynemer. From neighboring camps French, British, or Belgian comrades arrived, anxious for news. Everywhere the latest birds had come home, and one hardly dared ask the airmen any question.

But the daily routine had to be dispatched, as if there were no mourning in the camp. All the young men there were used to death, and to sporting with it; they did not like to show their sorrow; but it was deep in them, sullen and fierce.

At dinner a heavy melancholy weighed upon them. Guynemer's seat was empty, and no one dreamed of taking it. One officer tried to dispel the cloud by suggesting hypotheses. Guynemer was lucky, had always been; probably he was alive, a prisoner.

Guynemer a prisoner!... He had said one day with a laugh, ”The Boches will never get me alive,” but his laugh was terrible. No, Guynemer could not have been taken prisoner. Where was he, then?

On the squadron log, _sous-lieutenant_ Bozon-Verduraz wrote that evening as follows:

_Tuesday, September 11, 1917._ Patrolled. Captain Guynemer started at 8.25 with _sous-lieutenant_ Bozon-Verduraz. Found missing after an engagement with a biplane above Poelkapelle (Belgium).

That was all.

IV. THE VIGIL

Before Guynemer, other knights of the air, other aces, had been reported missing or had perished--some like Captain Le Cour Grandmaison or Captain Auger in our lines, others like Sergeant Sauvage and _sous-lieutenant_ Dorme in the enemy's. In fact, he would be the thirteenth on the list if the t.i.tle of ace is reserved for aviators to whom the controlling board has given its vise for five undoubted victories. These were the names:

Captain Le Cour Grandmaison 5 victories Sergeant Hauss 5 ”

_sous-lieutenant_ Delorme 5 ”

_sous-lieutenant_ Pegoud 6 ”

_sous-lieutenant_ Languedoc 7 ”

Captain Auger 7 ”

Captain Doumer 7 ”

_sous-lieutenant_ Rochefort 7 ”

Sergeant Sauvage 8 ”

Captain Matton 9 ”

Adjutant Lenoir 11 ”

_sous-lieutenant_ Dorme 23 ”

Would Guynemer's friends now have to add: Captain Guynemer, 53? n.o.body dared to do so, yet n.o.body now dared hope.

A poet of genius, who even before the war had been an aviator, Gabriele d'Annunzio, has described in his novel, _Forse che si forse che no_, the friends.h.i.+p of two young men, Paolo Tarsis and Giulio Cambasio, whose mutual affection, arising from a similar longing to conquer the sky, has grown in the perils they dare together. If this book had been written later, war would have intensified its meaning. Instead of dying in a fight, Cambasio is killed in a contest for alt.i.tude between Bergamo and the Lake of Garda. As Achilles watched beside the dead body of Patroclus, so Tarsis would not leave to another the guarding of his lost friend: