Meanwhile what had become of Buck Bangs, whom we left following the Boche flier that had first assaulted him, but who soon seemed to have enough of the game? The truth was that Buck, who was plucky to the core, did not want to give up and return to the home base any more than did Blaine. Both were fighters and loath to abandon what looked like success as long as there seemed a chance to win out. As he had told the Walsen girl once, when she remonstrated with him upon his temerity in the face of what more than once looked like certain death: "Reckon I don't know that, miss? You bet I do! But, somehow, death don't come just then and -- and I keep on riskin' some more. I - I guess I'm jest built that way." The German, who was rather clumsy, kept on along his eastward flight, with Buck in hot pursuit. Getting closer, Bangs again opened up with his Lewis. What was his surprise to see the clumsy German crumple up in his seat and fall forward, his hands and part of his arms out of sight, as well as the other could see in the starlit night. "I believe I got him at last," thought Buck, maneuvering to a closer position. "I'll fill him and his tank full of holes, then see what has happened." But just before Buck came into position, the German's plane suddenly veered athwart the nose of the other and deftly dove almost directly downward. The turn was a surprise. But Buck instantly knew that no machine, unless some one was handling the controls, would do a thing like that. Instantly he knew that the clumsiness of that Boche must have been assumed for the purpose of inducing Bangs to follow, thus leading the two planes away from the Allied squadron. "Fritzy is sharper than I gave him credit for being," thought Buck. "But he'll not get under me in that way without doing more stunts yet." Instantly the nimble scout machine darted upward, at the same time turning on its tail in such a way as to bring both opponents side by side with Buck now still higher up. By the time the German had gotten into a firing position Buck had his Nieuport slanted nose downward and pointing straight at the enemy. But scarcely had this been done, before the German was veering off to the left and sliding down, down with scarcely conceivable rapidity. Instantly Buck was after him, and for several minutes the two spiraled, twisted, dove, looped and performed other aerial feats accomplished only by expert fliers. By this time both were undeceived as to the skill of their opponents. Each knew that his adversary was worthy of all the dexterity and strategy the other might employ. And all this in the dark, as it were. That is, in the dark as darkness is in the upper air, a sort of transparent twilight, when the mists are either absent or the light haze is as a gauze curtain stretched between our eyes and an upper light beyond.