CHAPTER XV.
DUEL TO THE DEATH.
SCHNEIDER was a very walking furnace, with his burning desire to meetagain, on equal footing, any individual of the Cossack band that hadthrust him, lamblike, into the stone tomb under the farmhouse, and,particularly, the fake peasant for whose wiles he had so foolishlyfallen.
"Give us a biplane hunt for that gang," he importuned Roque, "or I willnever get the red out of my eyes. Filimonoff himself might have been inthe crowd, for all I know, and you ought to be doing some tall biddingfor his headdress. It was just like one of his tricks."
The firebrand felt that he had hit the mark with the last part of hisheated argument. Roque would have counted full reward for the chase inthe bagging alone of the wily chieftain of the strange horsemen.
He turned to Stanislaws, remarking: "You men for awhile will have toresume the use of your own machines in the carrying service. I haveconcluded to give Schneider a chance to retrieve his blunder and returna lesson that will stick into savage hides."
"We won't stand in the way for a minute," quickly and earnestlystated the Austrian flyer, "and more power to you, sir. What'smore," he added, "we can spare an aeroplane or two, and I knowseveral full-blooded lads who would be mighty willing to join such anexcursion."
"Meaning that you are one of the volunteers," rejoined Roque. "Howabout it, Schneider?"
"It is hitting the nail on the head," heartily approved the brick-topwarrior, "Stanislaws, Breckens, Bishoff, and Mendell--there's two crewsthat would help some."
"What's the matter with us?"
The Aeroplane Scouts had edged into the circle. The idea of a biplanehunt especially appealed to them.
"Sure you're going," proclaimed Schneider, glancing first at Roque forsign of assent, which was given by a nod.
Four military biplanes twelve hours hence lay in readiness to startfor the Cossack roundup. The Austrians in the party carried a supplyof bombs for emergency work, but the most elaborately armed of all wasSchneider, in the role of chief challenger. He bristled with revolvers,a shoulder-hung carbine and a heavy cavalry saber.
"If you should have a fall, old fellow," laughed Stanislaws, "it wouldsound like a barrel of tinware rolling down a mountain."
"Never you mind," said the one-man arsenal, "I have a job of makingsieves on hand."
The plan was to hover for a time in the vicinity of the farm whereSchneider and the boys had been held up, or, rather, down, and if nosight of the Cossack company, to reconnoiter still further north.
The flyers were given a great send-off by the soldiers at headquarters.
"Just like a balloon ascension at a county fair," observed Billy, as hetook his place as pilot in front of Roque.
"Something new here, I see," Henri calling the attention of hisaviation companion Schneider, to the fact that Stanislaws had providedtelephone helmets for each of the crews, whereby pilot and observercould communicate with one another without yelling their heads off,receivers over the ears and a transmitter close to the mouth.
"This will save my voice for singing," jollied Henri.
Schneider, remembering the vocal effort in the cellar, came back withthe expression of hope that the telephone invention would not serve tothat extent.
"Oh, but you are a jealous cuss," declared the boy, as he guided themachine upward, in compliance with the signal given to all by Roque.
"We have all the advantage this time,"'phoned Billy to Roque, when theflight was well under way; "if the outfit below is too heavy for us wecan stay out of reach; if we feel that we can lick them, a dive willsettle the question--our choice both ways."
For the first few miles all the creeping figures below were of thefriendly forces, but with the onrush of the aeroplanes all traces ofthe camp were obliterated and only a trackless waste presented itselfto the view of the lofty travelers.
Directly, Schneider reported to his pilot that the farm enclosure wasjust ahead, with its yellow ribbon border, which the river wound aroundit.
The observers on the four biplanes gave the premises a thorough lookingover with their glasses, but had no announcement to make of any humanmovement below.
Separating the machines, each distant from the other several hundredyards, the pilots guided northward, at reduced speed, and within a fewhundred feet from the ground.
Some twenty miles forward, the little fleet encountered a snowstorm,and the earth was already covered with a dazzling white carpet.
A range of hills forced a higher flying altitude, and in an atmospheregrowing decidedly chilly. The aviators were quickly compelled to closetheir coats at the throat, and to huddle down in the protecting foldsof their service blankets.
On a high level, Roque instructed Billy to make a stop, so that thelong sitting airmen might work the cramp out of their joints by abrisk runabout. The snow had little depth on the wind-swept plateau,and landing could be made with smooth certainty.
A spot of blackened surface showed bare through the powdery snowcovering, indicating a recent campfire there.
"Trot out the coffee pot," Henri called to Schneider, "here are themakings of a blaze."
The recent heavy rains had filled with water the rocky basins near athand, and the thin skim of ice now forming thereover was easily broken.
The Austrians elected tea as their special inspiration on the occasion,and the rival fumes soon ascended from the spouts of coffee and teapots.
As the sky above was now clearing, from the elevation the aviatorscould see the brown and white summits of other hills, divided by valleycuttings, as far as the eye could reach.
Schneider was just about to light his beloved briar pipe, when all ofa sudden he dropped the ember he was lifting to the bowl, and pointedtoward the high ground edging the opposite side of an intervening gulchto the right of their bivouac.
A solitary horseman had ridden into view, and both rider and steedposed, statue-like, on the verge of the steeply descending slope.
Roque like a flash covered the smouldering fire with a blanket,checking tell-tale spirals of smoke.
Fixing a glass on the equestrian, Stanislaws uttered the oneword--"Cossack."
"He's our meat," snapped Schneider.
"It's your first go this time," reluctantly conceded Stanislaws, whowas himself aching to draw first blood.
Schneider, taking general consent for granted, gave Henri a nodsidewise, and both moved as quickly as they could on all fours to theirbiplane. While the boy was getting the motors in play, the fightingobserver shifted his carbine from shoulder to knee.
The buzzing of the aeroplane had evidently caught the ear of the wildcavalryman across the gulch, for the horse was rearing, lifted by anunexpected wrench of the bit.
Nothing, however, on four legs or two, would have a ghost of a chanceto outdistance a racing aeroplane.
Spur as he would, the horseman was overhauled in the space of threeminutes.
The aeroplane, skimming the earth, mixed its scattering of snowparticles with those raised by the pounding hoofs of the wildlygalloping horse.
So close together were pursuer and pursued, that the Cossack's firstlance thrust came within a hairline of reaching the ribs of Schneider,leaning forward in preparation to make a flying leap from the aircraftwhen it should lessen speed sufficiently to enable him to keep hisfeet when alighting on the stony soil.
Why the observer did not immediately use carbine or revolver in returnfor the lance attack, queerly impressed the young pilot ahead, who,naturally, would expect such action on the part of his armed companion,gravely menaced by a wicked weapon too lengthy to be successfullyresisted by counter strokes of a saber.
Henri's second thought was that Schneider had been touched in a vitalspot by the steel point, and that he, too, would next get into the dealof death. To send the machine aloft was a third thought, followingin a flash, but the execution of this purpose was as quickly delayedby a motion indicating a lift of weight behind. Schneider had jumpedfrom the biplane, now wheeling the g
round, and within two lengths of aprecipice, hitherto unobserved.
The Cossack, on the very brink of this dizzy declivity, had jerked hishorse to its haunches, at the same moment when Henri checked furthermovement of the biplane by a skillful side turn.
"It's you and me for it now," roared Schneider, "and the devil take thequitter!"
Turning in his saddle, the Cossack, desperately at bay, accepted thechallenge with ferocious alacrity, backing the fiery animal he bestrodeand taking to foot with drawn sword.
Henri saw that it was the same man who in the guise of a peasant hadplayed them such a scurvy trick--the same, but yet seeming hardlypossible, viewing this upstanding, powerful specimen of a hardy,unconquerable race.
Schneider, never forgetting a face, had known the impersonator at thefirst glance, which added to the incentive of wiping out the scorecreated by the Cossack company at the farmhouse down on the plain.
Noting that his adversary was armed only with sword and dagger, havingblunted his lance against the armored side of the biplane, the aviationfirebrand discarded his carbine and pistol, tossing them one by oneonto the snow carpet. He had the notion of settling this affair in amanner that would completely retrieve certain prestige of which heconceived himself to be the loser.
In the meantime, the balance of the aviation party swooped down uponthis level, and leaving their biplanes, advanced to the scene of theimpending duel.
"Keep back, all of you," shouted Schneider, the bloodlust gleamingfrom his eyes; "it is one to one here, and though he put twenty to oneagainst me, I will give him his chance, and take mine."
"Better humor him," suggested Stanislaws in an aside to Roque, "he willnever rest easy if he does not get rid of the black mark he has rubbedon his own nose."
"He may get a red mark or two in this combat," grimly observed Roque,"but let them fight it out. Schneider ought to be able to take care ofhimself."
Billy and Henri followed with fascinated gaze the movements of theirchampion, who, though he sized up almost half a head shorter than hisextremely tall antagonist, was all wire and a swordsman without equalin the estimation of the Heidelberg student body.
The duelists indulged in no time-saving tactics. Schneider rushed hisman from the outset, but every rapid lunge of his heavy saber foundclashing counter from the curved and guardless steel in the practicedhand of the wily Cossack.
Forward and back, ever fiercely fencing, the sworn foes panted defianceat one another, and each with blasting words renewed efforts to strikea death blow.
"Oh!" Billy had seen blood dripping from Schneider's left sleeve, andleaving a tiny trail of carmine splotches in the trampled snow. Inagony of apprehension, the boy again fairly shouted: "Don't let himdown you, Schneider; look out for the next!"
Roque gave the excited lad a muttered order to hold his tongue.
"Ha!" This from Stanislaws. A scarlet seam crossed the forehead of theCossack, and he wavered for a second, as if partially blinded. Onlyfor a second, though, did his sword arm hesitate. Schneider receivedanother wound, this time close to the throat.
"He's done for," tremulously whispered Henri, wondering why the soldieronlookers did not interfere, and eager to make a saving move himself.
Then, as though a whole row of wine glasses had been riven by a knifestroke, the Cossack's blade, cleft near the haft by a biting downwardcut of the saber, fell tinkling at his feet.
This was the last flare of Schneider's waning strength, of which,however, the Cossack was apparently unaware. He did not wait to meet anexpected heart thrust from the victor.
With a piercing yell, he turned, waved the sword stump about his head,and leaped far out into the void before him.
Schneider, on hand and knee, game, but all in, as the saying is,mournfully shook his head, and faintly murmured: "He would have hadanother chance to finish."
Stanislaws, something of a surgeon, stanched the blood welling fromthe wounds of his comrade, applied bandages, and soon had the fallenfighter on his feet.
The Cossack's mount had disappeared, a fact first noticed by the acuteRoque. "Mark you," he predicted, "that riderless horse will be sure tostir up a wasps' nest, and somebody here will get stung if we attemptto hold this position. Schneider's punctures are enough for one day."
Roque's prediction was a sure shot, for he had hardly ceased speakingwhen a score or more of horsemen charged from the cover of a rockydefile and bore down in force upon the aviation party.
"To your places!" thundered Roque.
The pilots of the several aeroplanes were already making ready forhurried flight, and Henri, in addition, had assisted the wounded andweakened Schneider to his seat in their machine.
Breckens, Bishoff and Mendell emptied their carbines and revolvers inthe direction of the oncoming lancers, clearing a saddle or two, andswung into the rigging of the waiting biplanes just in time to permit aclean getaway.
Right over the brink of the precipice the start was made--it had tobe the quickest way--and a thousand feet of ascent gained without anupturn.
Circling about on high the soldier-observers scattered the horsemen onthe plateau with a shower of bombs.
Schneider had had his innings, and returned in full measure all thatwas owing.
Our Young Aeroplane Scouts in Germany; or, Winning the Iron Cross Page 15
