The appearance of half a dozen men wearing crested steel helmets helped to solve the problem. It was a French anti-air-craft gun, cunningly concealed in a camouflaged shell-hole, that had scored the direct hit, and the Frenchmen showed their delight with typical Gallic exuberance. Within a few minutes the highway resumed its usual war-time aspect. The battalion moved on; horse and motor transport scurried to and fro; while a gang of Chinese coolies set to work to remove the debris of the crashed Hun machine, and to mend the hole in the _pavé_ where the raider's bomb had fallen. EG 19 was found at the indicated spot, the air-mechanics having completed the slight adjustments necessary for the machine to resume flight. Derek examined his new steed critically. The biplane showed signs of being a "flyer" in the truest sense of the word. With a comparatively short fuselage and wing-spread, it looked a businesslike craft. Being a one-seater, the pilot had to do everything necessary when in flight, even to work the two automatic-guns, one of which was mounted in front of the "office", the other, for use when being pursued, was immediately in rear of the seat. "Nice little 'bus," declared Kaye, as he helped his chum to don his leather coat. "I've had 'em, and know what they'll do. Well, good luck, old man. S'pose you'll get back to the aerodrome before me. Gadfathers! I guess we'll be on the same patrol to-morrow, and then there'll be dirty work at the cross-roads." CHAPTER IX A Slight Disturbance. It was shortly after midnight that Derek was roused from his straw bed by the sounding of a tocsin-gong warning of the approach of hostile air-craft. The young pilot received the intelligence without emotion. He was getting accustomed to being turned out at unearthly hours, and the regularity of the proceedings made him stiff, especially when, in nine cases out of ten, the Hun failed to put in an appearance. With very few exceptions, the German airmen now rarely flew over the British lines during the hours of daylight. If they did, they generally paid dearly for their temerity, as frequently a whole squadron of chasers promptly pounced upon them. But at night there were opportunities, and the Boche was not slow in seizing them. Rising to an immense height above the aerodromes, they could glide, unseen and unheard, for miles, until they imagined that they had avoided the British air-patrols. Consequently alarms were frequent, but in the darkness the Boche often went wide of his objective, unless that objective happened to be a hospital, the roof of which was marked at night by an illuminated Red Cross--a Red Cross to a Hun being like a red rag to a bull. "'Nother of 'em," he muttered. "Getting fed up with dud calls. Jack, turn out, you lazy blighter!"