Billy pressed over the lever and then pulled it back.

"Stand olear!" he shouted, and the ohooks were pulled away from the wheels. He waved back the wing-tip men; Jenkins, with 8 last look round, saluted and stood clear; and with a wave of his hand to Trevor and Pat, Billy pushed over the pressure lever. The machine quivered an instant, and then slipped forward, noiselessly gathering way as the air-speed dial-hand slid round, "20, 25, 30." The joystick came back at the very edge, it seemed, of a bomb orater, and she lifted into the air like a soaring kite lifts over a wall.

True flight this, felt Manning. No whirring propeller, no olattering roaring engine spitting oil, just the poetry of motion in perfect silence, save for the faint whirring noise the wings made, and only the whip of the wind in your face to show that you were moving. He pulled her up more, climb. ing straight towards the city with its domes and minarets gleaming in the morning sun. The altimeter rose steadily, 3000, 4000, 5000-something like 2000 feet a minute. He orossed the walls at 7000 and pulled the stick back to see how steeply she would climb before stalling.

He knew it would be 8 pretty big angle, farther back than in any 'plane he had ever seen, but this time practice was in advance even of theory. It was nearly 24 degrees upward inclination before he felt the control slacken and the

stick waver idly in his hand as she slid back on her tail. He pulled back the pressure lever and let her go. She hung in the air, hesitated on a wing-tip, and then her nose dipped and she shot downwards, the stick steadying in his hand as she flattened out automatically to a gliding angle that must have been about one in fifteen.

He forced her down once more, pushing over the pressure lever as he dived. Then he pulled her over in a series of perfect loops, finally sending her down in a spinning nosedive to well under the thousand mark, when he flattened out and started a steady climb in great sweeping spirals, for all the world like the vultures he passed at intervals.

Pat was right. He certainly had the best of all possible machines, the nearest thing to a bird that man had yet flown, Nothing else ought to be able to stand up to him, not even the big multiple-engined triplanes.

The buzz of the wireless telephone-receiver, attached to his oap, drew his attention, and he slipped up the mouthpiece from the breast-pocket of his coat.

"Hulloa-is that you, Trevor?" A feminine voice came back

"No-me-Pat. How's she

Trevor I was coming in, 'bus,' so there. The 'Babe's 'rung me up here to tell me they're operating on Jimmy now. It'll be touch and go, I'm afraid."

"Poor little Kiddy. Tell her to keep smiling and he'll pull through all right. I'm off north now. Tell Trevor to keep on the line all the time. Good-bye, dear."

on

The "Grey Hawk" was climbing steadily, and a glance at the power indicator showed that she was running generated power direct without touching the storage-plant. The atmospheric conditions were perfect-clear bright sky and hot, although cooler every minute now as they drew nearer the 10,000-feet mark. Manning wanted to get well up, over 15,000, before the enemy arrived. They would probably be flying pretty low, contemptuously low they had been of late; but he liked to be on the safe side.

The growing cold made him pull his gloves on, for he was oursed with a bad circulation, While doing so he sat up and looked round the empty sky, and then behind him to where Delhi lay, a formless ant-heap of houses fast fading into a blur, as he set her head towards Panipat, where in the past Delhi's fate had been settled more than once. To-day might settle it yet once more, for if the "Hawk" failed, that would be the end, since another uninterrupted week would enable them to wreck the concentration beyond hope of redemption. Even now it was pretty well delayed.

He thought of the tumbled heap of wrecked girders and broken piers that marked what had been the Delhi Jumna Bridge, its destruction doubling the strain of traffic on the western lines.

He looked at his watch. They should be along shortly now: the wind was in their favour. He pressed the buttons of the guns one after another, and they stammered away cheerfully.

Once more he strained his eyes to the north. Surely something this time, just a speck on the horizon below him. He steadied the machine and pulled out his glasses. Yes, there they were, or rather two of them, for the third was nowhere to be seen. He oraned out to try and locate her, but without success. Perhaps she had gone off on a special stunt.

As they drew nearer, he studied them intently. They showed up clearly in the field of his large-aperture prismglasses, while with the sun behind him and at just the right angle, he was in all probability invisible to them.

Big triplanes, pale blue all over, save where on the upper 'planes a curious red conventional sign showed the nationality. Quite three times his size, and probably very heavily armed with guns fore and aft. He could hear now, faint and far off, the hum of the big multiple turbine-engines, growing in intensity as they drew nearer.

He slid forward the armoured head-cover, although he would far rather have taken his

chance with it open and kept the better field of view. But he could afford no chances to-day. The blue 'planes drew closer, passing to westward and below him. He swung the "Hawk round, and with full power on dived on to the rear 'plane. Noiseless, and dropping out of the eye of the sun, it is probable that the enemy did not realise his presence until he was within range. Certain, it seemed but a bare second from the time he saw through his telescopic sight the rear gunner fling himself round and bring his gun into action, and then flop, an inert mass, over the mounting, till, as with all three guns going, Manning swept diagonally across the blue 'plane, raking her from end to end, and saw three shells burst one after another on the armoured fuselage just where he knew the fuel tanks to be.

As he cart-wheeled round right-handed to get behind her again, he caught a glimpse of smoke and saw her nose going down, while at the same instant the splash of bullets on his armour showed that the other 'plane was taking a hand in the game, and she shot back past him on a climbing turn.

But his pace was too fast, and as she swept round again to catch him he was two hundred feet above her, and olimbing at nearly twice her speed.

The first 'plane was well alight now, thank goodness. She was diving unsteadily down, with great gouts of black smoke streaming behind;

and as he watched, Billy saw her tilt over with one wing flaming, and then lurch sickeningly downward.

"One up," he muttered, and dived towards No. 2, who pulled up to meet him, letting drive with an automatic from above the top 'plane as she came. The angle was too steep to bring her heavier guns into action without stalling, and the pilot evidently feared to lose height against this new machine that could climb so fast.

Billy swooped straight for her, and as he swerved off at the last possible fraction of a second into a vertical bank, he saw the man in the forward cockpit hanging out helplessly over the side. He pulled up the "Hawk" at that marvellous climbing angle of hers, and she shot up like a partridge towering, and hung again above the enemy 'plane.

A third dive brought him several more bullets clattering on his armour, and one splintering on the edge of the visionslit ripped open his cheek; but he had a perfect position as he dropped from straight behind, spraying the blue beast from tail to nose, and suddenly found her drop out of his sight as he looped over almost on top of her wings.

"Good-bye-ee, I think," he said, pulling out. The blue biplane was spiralling down, apparently hopelessly out of control. He wiped the blood from his face and followed. She didn't seem to have much kick left, and the near engine had stopped. Drawing closer,

he let her have it once more as close as he could get, and again saw the burst of shells on the fuselage as he slid past without drawing any answer. The pilot seemed to have vanished-probably slipped, dead or unconscious, from his seat. Billy watched her downspinning in aimless erratic eiroles until she crashed just outside a village.

He circled slowly round for a minute or two, fingers on gun-buttons, but nothing moved in the wreckage. Then sliding back the armoured head-cover, he climbed again to see if the third enemy 'plane was anywhere in sight. The sky, however, seemed absolutely empty, so he turned Delhiward, calling up as he did so on the wireless telephone.

"That you, sir?" came the anxious voice of Trevor at Delhi. "What luck?"

"Found two, and pushed 'em down, but number three's missing. Ask Lahore if they've any further news. And tell my wife the machine is perfect, will you."

He circled high above the ridge until the telephone started again.

"Lahore report that one turned back after bombing Ferozepur. They think she's having engine trouble, and are hoping to hear of her coming down en route. Hill with the only 'plane at Ferozy has gone after her, and if her engines are really giving trouble, he might stand some chance."

"Hope he downs her. All three down would give the

swine something to think about."

"Frontier report very heavy storms and snow in the hills, sir. Probably no more will

come over to-day." "Right-oh; then I'll come down.'

Billy switched off and dropped her nose, and with her wonderful, bird-like, flatgliding angle she spiralled down. He slipped off his gloves. The aerodrome drew nearer, and as he circled in and turned up wind for the run in, he caught sight of Pat standing near the wireless.

With hardly a tremer the "Grey Hawk "touched ground, and as she did so he altered the wing incidence and brought her up all standing in thirty yards. He mopped his face and did his best to clean his fur collar for Pat's sake. Face wounds seem to bleed such a lot.

She found him thus engaged, and apologising for not having used the dressings. "Forgot all about them, dear; I was so busy thinking about the 'Hawk' and all she could do, and it's only a deepish scratch really. How's Jimmy?" he said, as she fussed over him with lint and iodine.

"They've finished now, and Colonel Williams is far more hopeful. I rang him up and asked. They say he has really a good chance now of getting over it."

"Thank God! We'll both go round this evening." He lit a cigarette as Pat finished with the bandage. "You've made me feel as if I really

was wounded," he said ruefully as the iodine livened up.

Trever came up full of congratulations and hungry for details. He showed the General a oode wire from Welsh at Bombay announcing the despatch of two completed Hawks, accompanied by some of the mechanics he had been specially training. Also, best of all, the wire stated that the two pilots he sent with them had flown the machines after four hours' instruction; and though, of course, further praotice would be required, they ought to be perfectly at home in them in a couple of days.

if we're left in peace. Thank Heaven for the storms up north. I'm off for a bite of breakfast now, and, I suppose, a visit to the hospital en route. I'll give you a lesson in handling the 'Hawk' afterwards."

He olimbed out of the machine, and leaving Jenkins to run her in, walked over to the oar with Pat.

"So the dream has come true after all, dear, hasn't it? Do you know, I was dreaming all the way back of what the future might hold now that we've found it, and what utter horrors it would have meant for the world if the others had found it first."

GANPAT.