Thus far in the career of the Brighton boys with the aero forces at the front their fortune had been on the side of the ups.  The time came when the downs had an inning.

Bad luck overtook Bob Haines and Dicky Mann while on an observation flight far over the firing lines and well inside territory occupied by the enemy.  They were on their outward journey, bound for a point which they hoped to photograph quickly and then run for home.  The day was not an ideal one for flying, as shifting clouds gathered here and there, some high up, some low.  When they were in the vicinity of their objective the clouds beneath them obscured their view to an annoying extent.  They had seen no other plane, friend or enemy, since they had left their own lines.  Suddenly, without the slightest warning, the engine stopped.  Bob switched off the power, switched it on again, and repeated the maneuver again and again while volplaning to preserve their momentum.

Try as he would, he could not get a single explosion out of the motor.  Of fuel he had plenty.  His wires and terminals—–­so much as he could see of them—–­were apparently in good order, but the engine had just coolly stopped of its own accord, and could not be coaxed to start again.

Dicky looked round at Bob from the observer’s seat in the fuselage and raised his eyebrows inquiringly.  His glance fell on Bob’s white, set face, and he saw that Bob was methodically going over one thing after another, and trying first this, then that, as if examining every part of the plane’s mechanism that he could reach.  They were still above the low-lying clouds that hid the earth.

“Engine?” queried Dicky.

Bob nodded.  Still he ran his hands over the controls, as if loath to believe that he had exhausted every possibility of finding and rectifying the trouble.  It was all in vain.

Still they swept lower and lower.  Soon they would be below the clouds, and soon after that, landing so far inside the German lines that by no possibility could they hope to regain their own.  It was a bitter time for Bob.  Dicky, curiously enough, took the first realization of their predicament less hard.  He was all eyes to see what fate had in store for them in the way of a landing place.

As they swept through the last bank of clouds and the country below spread before them, they saw that it was level pasture land for the most part, divided by green hedges, with here and there a cultivated field.  A village lay some distance to the left, a mere cluster of mean houses.  No chateau or large building was in sight, but small cottages were dotted about here and there in plenty.

“Not much room in one of those pastures,” commented Dicky.  “Mind you pick a decent one.  Don’t spoil the hedge on the other side of it, either.”

Dicky’s mood was infectious.  Bob was sick at heart, but his friend’s joking way of speaking had its effect.