So they tried and failed, tried and failed, time and again, while all the time the shouts were coming louder and from different points, as if a party had split up and was searching the field. A couple of electric torches threw dancing patches of light on the ground, lifted occasionally and flashed round. One was coming straight towards them, and Reddie with set teeth waited the shout of discovery he knew must come presently, and cursed Walk’s slowness at the “prop.”
Again on the word he whirled the starter, and this time “Whur-r-r-rum,” answered the engine, suddenly leaping to life; “Whur-_r_-_r_-ROO-OO-OO-OOM-_ur_-_r_-r-umph,” as Reddie eased and opened the throttle. He heard a babel of shouts and yells, and saw the light-patches come dancing on the run towards them. A sudden recollection of the only two German words he knew came to him. “Ja wohl,” he yelled at the pitch of his voice, “Ja wohl”; then in lower hurried tones, “Swing her, Walk; quick, swing her,” and opened the engine out again. The running lights stopped for a minute at his yell, and Walk Jones jumped to the wing-tip, shouted “Right!” and hung on while Reddie started to taxi the machine forward. His weight and leverage brought her lumbering round, the roar of engine and propeller rising and sinking as Reddie manipulated the throttle, and Reddie yelling his “Ja wohl,” every time the noise died down.
“Get in, Walk; get aboard,” he shouted, when the nose was round and pointing back over the short stretch they had taxied on landing, and which he therefore knew was clear running for at least a start. He heard another order screamed in German, and next instant the _bang_ of a rifle, not more apparently than a score of yards away. He kept the machine lumbering forward, restraining himself from opening his engine out, waiting in an agony of apprehension for Walk’s shout. He felt the machine lurch and sway, and the kicking scramble his observer made to board her, heard next instant his yelling “Right-oh!” and opened the throttle full as another couple of rifles bang-banged.
The rifles had little terror either for him or the observer, because both knew there were bigger and deadlier risks to run in the next few seconds. There were still desperately long odds against their attempt succeeding. In the routine method of starting a machine, chocks are placed in front of the wheels and the engine is given a short full-power run and a longer easier one to warm the engine and be sure all is well; then the chocks are pulled away and she rolls off, gathering speed as she goes, until she has enough for her pilot to lift her into the air. Here, their engine was stone cold, they knew nothing of what lay in front of them, might crash into something before they left the ground, might rise, and even then catch some house or tree-top, and travelling at the speed they would by then have attained—well, the Lord help them!