For he rarely came home without
bullet-holes in his wings or even in his clothes. The Boche, being the
Boche, had shown his usual respect for truth and generosity towards an
adversary.
Guynemer, when returning to camp after a victory, generally announced
his success by making his engine work to some tune. This time the
cadence was the tune of the _Lampions_. All the neighboring airplane
sheds understood, also the cantonments, parks, depots, dugouts, field
hospitals and railway stations; in a word, all the communities scattered
behind the lines of an army. This time the motor was singing so
insistently that everybody, with faces upturned, concluded that their
Guynemer had been "getting them."
In fact, the news was already spreading like wildfire, as news has the
mysterious capacity for doing. No, it was not simply one airplane he had
set ablaze; it was two, one above Corbeny, the other above Juvincourt.
And people had hardly realized the wonderful fact before the third
machine was seen falling in flames near Fismes. It was seen by hundreds
of men who thought it was about to fall upon them, and ran for shelter.
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