# Air Service Boys Flying for France/Chapter 13

CHAPTER XIII
THE ZEPPELIN RAID ON LONDON
"Is the old town on fire, Tom?" Jack gasped, as the two air service boys listened to the noise which was growing wilder every moment.
"It must be the Zeppelins have come and London is under fire from the skies!" Tom exclaimed.
"Oh! Hurry up, and let's get dressed!" cried the excited Jack. "I wouldn't miss this for anything! Just to think what we'll have to boast about when we get home—if ever we do. There's nothing to hinder our going out on the streets, is there?"
Tom was already flinging his clothes on with reckless speed, and did not stop to answer.
Presently the youths found themselves hurrying along the street, with hundreds of other curious sightseers, who seemed to forget the terrible danger hanging overhead in their eagerness to see the bombarding air fleet.
Coming to an open "circus," or intersection of two streets, around which the buildings are set in a circle, they found it filled by a ​seething mass of people. There were men and boys; women struggled with the crowd; and girls, who had better have stayed at home in some degree of safety, added to the throng.
All were staring up toward the heavens, covered with gray clouds. Powerful searchlights played across the sky, the long shafts of white light looking very weird.
Loud cries attested to the fact that one of the attacking airships had been discovered. Many fingers pointed it out, and as Tom had carried his binoculars along he quickly had the glasses focussed on the small object high up in the heavens.
"It's certainly a big balloon, and looks like a long sausage," he told Jack, as he stared entranced. "And all around it I can see queer little puffs of smoke breaking out, though most of them seem to be below the Zeppelin. Those must be the shrapnel shells they're firing up at the invader from the anti-aircraft guns used to defend the city. They're mounted on roofs of houses, they say."
It was a thrilling sight, and one the two chums would not have missed for a great deal. The lone Zeppelin was steering directly over a part of the city which was densely populated by the poor. Doubtless other great airships were moving in lanes that would take them ​over outlying districts. The fleet had evidently separated on nearing the city, thus minimizing the risk of being brought down by volleys or shrapnel, or the efforts of airplane defenders who were already rising to give battle to the German monsters.
"There, they dropped something, for I could see what looked like a spark falling!" exclaimed Tom suddenly.
"That was a fire bomb," said a man standing near, who probably had passed through number of similar attacks, and was well posted. "It is filled with combustible fluid, and on bursting sets fire to everything around."
Hardly had he spoken when they heard a terrific report. At the same instant there was a vivid flash, as of fire. The boys were reminded of lightning on a black night; but in this case the glare stayed, as though the fire had accomplished the work intended.
Quickly following there came another frightful smash.
"That was a regular bomb!" cried the man close to Tom. "Chances are it's done considerable damage, for it must have dropped in one of the congested districts."
"But there are no fortifications inside London, are there?" asked Jack, horrified at the thought of death and destruction being ​scattered among just such a crowd as had gathered in the streets around them.
"Oh! that's all tommyrot," explained the man, with a hoarse laugh. "They make out London is a regular fortified city and that they are smashing docks and sinking munition-laden steamers, as well as blowing up barracks. All they do is to murder half a hundred poor women and children and burn some of the crowded tenements. But just wait, the time will come when we'll get our revenge on Berlin!"
A second Zeppelin was discovered sailing along. The crash of bursting bombs became almost continuous, as though those above were trying to empty their reservoirs while passing over the capital that seemed to be the particular object of German hatred.
Carried along with the crowd, eager to see with their own eyes some of the exciting scenes, the two American lads found themselves in a more squalid section of the city. No doubt this was a part of what was known as the slums.
The narrow streets were filled with sightseers, men, women and children, as though the grimy tenements had emptied their entire contents for the occasion. Although the danger was great the crowd seemed to look upon ​in it all as a sort of holiday affair gotten up for their amusement.
Zipp! Bang!
Suddenly there was a blinding flash accompanied by a deafening detonation.
One of the bombs from a passing Zeppelin had dropped upon a row of tenements nearby and the walls were hurled into the street.
The greatest confusion followed, the crowd rushing this way and that in a delirium of excitement. Tom and Jack had been knocked down with many others by the concussion, but received only a few minor bruises.
"Hurt much, Jack?"
"Not a great deal, Tom. How about you?"
"A few scratches, that's all."
"Let's get out of this!"
They were quickly on their feet, and staring at the scene that lay before them. Already cries were heard from the mass of wreckage, and some of the more courageous among the spectators commenced to drag out the victims. As a rule these seemed to be women and children, the boys noticed.
The tremendous throng that gathered prevented their getting close up; but they could see ambulances come driving wildly to the spot, having been held in readiness for just such a call.
​Into these the wretched victims of German attack were hurried, and in a short time all that remained of the happening was a mass of bricks and stones and grimy plaster that encumbered the narrow street.
It was shortly after this, and while the racket was still at its height, that a cheer suddenly broke out. Looking up to where all eyes seemed to be directed, Tom and his comrade saw a thrilling spectacle in the heavens.
One of the twin Zeppelins was on fire! The crowd could see a glare spring up, and Jack, who at that moment had the glasses, announced to Tom that the huge aircraft was falling like a rocket-stick after its ascent.
Whether some of the shrapnel had found its mark, or a daring airplane pilot had managed to get above the Zeppelin to drop a fire bomb they could not tell just then. Nor did any one care particularly. The one exulting thought was that an enemy had been put out of action and that the entire crew of more than thirty men must meet the death they had just been dealing out to innocent people in London.
It was a wonderful sight, one which would never be forgotten by those who stood and gaped. They were thrilled by the spectacle of that great mass falling swiftly like a meteor drawn earthward, burning as it came.
​Jack declared he could see objects th?t might be human beings falling from the blazing mass as it neared the earth. He held his breath as he looked, shocked by the awfulness of the spectacle.
The wrecked Zeppelin disappeared beyond the roofs of rows of London houses. Then there came a rush of tens of thousands, wild to reach the spot in order to see all that was left of the great airship.
Jack would have joined in the rush, but Tom proved wiser.
"This man, who ought to know, Jack, says it's much further out than most of the people suspect, beyond the outskirts of the city proper. Let it go for to-night. Perhaps we'll find our way there in the morning."
Jack complained a little but decided in the end that it was best not to wander over London at that time of the night.
"But above all things, Tom," he said, as they started back toward their hotel, "we must see the wreckage of that airship in the morning. It's in line with our own business, understand, since we, too, are aviators. And don't be afraid that I'll be knocked out if we happen to run across one of the poor wretches who fell. I expect to get used to such things over in France. For all I know some day or other I may wind up by the same channel."
​"Huh," was Tom's grunted reply, when they turned in at the hotel entrance, "if any of the men fell to the ground they'll hardly be left lying around for hours for us to view."
The raid over London was at an end. The remaining Zeppelin sped away, as if loth to accept further chances of meeting the fate of its sister craft. Doubtless British airmen would follow after and harrass the invader as long as it remained over the land; and even when the Channel was reached they might still pursue with the dogged determination characteristic of their race.
The boys finally got to sleep again and were not disturbed with further outcries. There were other airships over England that night, they afterwards learned, but these did not get past the barrage fire that protected the metropolis, dropping their stock of bombs over Kent down nearer the coast.
In the morning the air service boys managed to reach the scene of the wreckage, but were unable to get close up because of the enormous crowds. Still, they saw the mass of wreckage, and even watched a corps of workmen digging away part of the piled-up airships in search of other bodies supposed to be still unfound.
All that day Tom and Jack went around London seeing what they could of the city. ​They eame upon several other places where damage had been done by the air raiders, and never would they forget the horror and detestation that filled their souls when they saw other hospital vans removing still more of the victims of that atrocious method of conducting war upon defenseless men, women and children.
"I can't get over to Pau any too soon," said Jack savagely, as they stood and watched the heart-rending scenes around one of the devastated districts. "I want to finish my schooling and be sent to the front to join the French and American fliers. If only they'll take us in the Lafayette Escadrille, and put us to work raiding German cities, I'll be pleased."
"The Lafayette Escadrille doesn't engage in that sort of work," Tom reminded him. "They leave that to the French bombing machines. Their business is to engage German airplanes single-handed and to drop bombs on military camps back of the lines. Also during a battle to keep in constant touch with the advancing troops, and by their system of signals have the fire-control of the batteries in their hands."
"Well," added the impatient Jack, "so long as it's getting a whack at the Kaiser I don't suppose it matters much what kind of work we engage in."
​They had made all their arrangements for crossing the Channel the following night. There was more or less red tape connected with it, for these were war times, and the spy scare had not yet entirely died out of England, and foreigners were being watched closely.
But the two Americans had with them papers to prove just who they were, and why they were headed for France. They also met several men connected with the British air service, who were pleased to show them many little courtesies.
"But we do hope America will soon decide to come in and take her part in the job we've got on our hands," these men told them more than once.
Night came, and the air service boys boarded a train that left London, connecting with the boat that was to cross the Channel. Everything was conducted with a grimness and secrecy that impressed the two young Americans as being warlike.
"It's plain to be seen England has long since passed the first stage of the war," remarked Tom, who noted all such things. "You know at first they tried to act as thuugh it was only a small affair, after all. London was as bright as ever, with business going on much the same. It's a different spirit that's abroad nowadays. ​The British bulldog has shut his teeth hard; and when he does that he never lets go—that is, hardly ever, but there was a time more than a hundred years ago when he released his grip on our country."
In the course of time they found themselves aboard the vessel that along toward midnight was to start from Dover for France. Once they left port, the utmost vigilance was exercised. Lights were extinguished, and in the gloom of the night they proceeded.
It was another thrilling experience not soon to be forgotten. Every little sound, every little wave slapping against the side of the boat, seemed to the excited passengers to mean sudden peril. There was no thought of sleep on the part of any one; even the numerous Red Cross nurses and attendants and the ambulance drivers, going to the front for service, remained on deck every minute of the time.
Each passenger had a life belt fastened on, to be ready if the hidden danger presented itself. But again fortune was kind; and if there were any cruising German submarines in the Channel that night they failed to run upon the regular boat from Dover to Calais.
Once safe in the Calais harbor the passengers had a chance for a few hours sleep. With the coming of morning they landed, passing through ​all the customary formalities that more than ever are exercised in war times, to make sure that enemy spies do not get a footing on the soil of France.
Jack was highly pleased when finally the air service boys found themselves speeding toward the south of France, where the aviation camp at Pau was located, not far from the snowcapped Pyrenees Mountains that constitute the boundary line between the republic and Spain.
"Before another night we'll be there!" was his exultant exclamation; and Tom shared his enthusiasm, for he was as eager as his chum to complete his schooling in aviation and begin his task of flying for the beloved French republic.