Meanwhile the German airplanes got rid of their
bombs all around us, and we could feel the ground tremble.
The Storks looked on with the indifference of habit, thinking of their
beds and awaiting the end. One of them, a weather prophet, said:
"It will be a good day to-morrow; we can start early."
As I spun towards Dunkirk in the motor, these young men and their
speeches were in my mind, and I seemed to hear them speaking of their
absent companion without any depression, with hardly any sorrow. They
thought of him when they were successful, referred to him as a model,
found an incentive in his memory,--that was all. Their grief over his
loss was virile and invigorating.
* * * * *
After watching his friend's body through the night, the hero of
d'Annunzio goes to the aerodrome where the next trials for altitude are
to take place. He cannot think of robbing the dead man of his victory.
As he rises into the upper regions of the air he feels a soothing
influence and an increase of power: the dead man himself pilots his
machine, wields the controls, and helps him higher, ever higher up in
divine intoxication.
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