he opened fire.

Parker was going at such speed that the fifty rounds he loosed off
apparently missed his opponent, in spite of the fact that but forty
yards separated them when the last bullet left Parker's gun. The
German went down in a clever spiral for a couple of thousand feet.
When he flattened out, however, Parker, who had dived with and
after him, was close behind. More, he was in an ideal position,
from which he fired another fifty rounds. These steel messengers
reached their billet, and the German flier went straight down to
earth.

But while Parker had been dropping with eyes on the first Boche, the
second had dropped after Parker. Parker reached for a new drum for
his Lewis gun, and as he did so the second Boche, who had got on
Parker's tail, let go at close range. The hunter was riddled. Parker
felt that he was hit, but not badly. That was his impression, at
least, at the moment. He spun his hunter round and dropped sheer
for a thousand feet, coming up in a fairly thick bank of white cloud.
He there flattened out again and began climbing, not being sure of
his altitude. No sooner had his engine begun to drone out the
rhythm of its full power, and the good hunter-plane begun to rise
majestically, than what should he see but the second enemy fighter
right in front of him! A new drum was in place on his Lewis gun,
and he let go. The Boche pilot threw up both hands and fell back,
and down into the cloud went the enemy plane, clearly out of control
and quickly out of sight.

Parker examined himself as well as he could, but was unable to locate
his wound. It was in his back somewhere, for he felt a stiffness
and numbness all down his spine, but he still could move his arms,
and felt no faintness. He decided that it must be merely a scratch,
and climbed up as fast as he could to get into the fray again.

The other three American hunters had engaged in close, desperate
encounters to a man. Joe Little was lucky enough to bring down his
adversary and circled round toward the two triplanes, which had
both finished their work and were climbing fast to get out of the
range of the "Archies." Jimmy Hill had missed his man, who went
down in a spiral, Jimmy spinning down after him. Owing to the
greater pace at which Jimmy was traveling he had to make a wider
spiral. The Boche flattened out and Jimmy dived for him again,
but before he could come within range the German dived straight
down to the ground