The next hour was a highly unpleasant one to the two observers. The "anti" gun was plainly out to down them, and kept pitching shell after shell with most discomforting accuracy all around them. The winch below hauled them down and let them soar up to all sorts of varying elevations in strenuous endeavours to cheat the gunners, while the two observers did their best to pick up targets and lay their guns on to them, and the anti shells continued to scream up and burst about them. Several times the explosions were so close that it appeared certain the envelope must be holed, and the observers stopped work and waited with held breath to discover whether they were sinking and if they would have to jump for it and trust to their parachutes. But the balloon held up, and the two continued their shoot. It was unpleasant, highly unpleasant, but the hard-pressed infantry wanted all the assistance the guns could give them, and the guns wanted all the help air observation could give; so the observers held on, and chanced the shells, and kept their guns going on such targets as they could pick out of the dull light and grey mist. It must be admitted that, as the time dragged past, the strain began to tell on the tempers of both men. The only respite they had from the continued torment of the anti-balloon gun was when the mist closed down on them; and then the strain was in no way lessened, but altered only to that of watching out for an attacking enemy. And that looked-for attack came at last. There came a sudden and urgent call on the telephone from below, and both men strained their eyes out through the lifting haze to the next balloon in the line and, with an instinctive fumbling at the attachment of their parachute harness, made ready to jump. But what they saw held them spellbound for a moment. The next balloon in the line was being attacked. It was over a quarter of a mile away; but the silhouette of a plane could clearly be seen swooping down on the defenceless balloon, flashes of fire spitting and streaking from his guns as he came. The two balloon-men leaped over the edge of the basket. One plunged down the regulation distance, his parachute fluttered open with a shimmer of gleaming silk that looked exactly like a bursting puff of white smoke, began to drop down in wide pendulum swings. But with the second man's parachute something plainly had gone wrong. Dixie and the Boy, clutching the sides of their basket and staring horror-stricken, gasped as they saw the little figure go plunging plummet-wise hundreds after hundreds of feet ... hundreds ... thousands ... and still the parachute followed in a solid unopened black dot. The balloon was near 3,000 feet up when the man jumped, and he and the parachute went down 3,000 feet, as a stone would drop down a well. Dixie and the Boy watched fascinated, tried to turn their heads or shut their eyes--and couldn't. When it was over, Dixie spoke hurriedly. "Come on, kid! Over! Or it's our turn next!"