Dastral of the Flying Corps

CHAPTER XI
"BLIGHTY"

AFTER the fall of Himmelman the supremacy of the air was wrested from the Germans; the enemy's advance was definitely stopped. Thus was the way paved for the final victory, which was to end in the defeat of militarism, the restoration to Europe of her liberties, and to civilisation of her freedom.

There is only one more incident to record, before this story of adventure and heroism is finished. It concerns one of those unfortunate persons whose heroic soul had been confined, by some mysterious dispensation of Providence, to the narrow limits of a misshapen and deformed body.

We have met this poor fellow once before, in the earlier part of the story. Then it was that we saw his brave young spirit yearning with desire to do some manly deed, but we found him broken-hearted and dismayed, because all his efforts to serve his country, in her time of peril, had been refused. Now, by another strange dealing of Providence, which always assigns to every brave man his post in the day of trial, we meet him again.

When Dastral, after his fight with Himmelman, crashed just behind the British lines, he was carried away unconscious from the wreckage, scorched and blistered, and wounded in no less than three places, and taken to the field hospital. From there he was removed quickly to the base hospital, and, after three days of feverish tossing, during the whole of which time he remained unconscious, he was sent, at the urgent request of a General Officer commanding, by the next hospital ship to Blighty.

It was during the voyage from Havre to Southampton that he first regained consciousness. Once, on opening his eyes and trying to look about him, he asked:

"Where am I? What is the matter? And why is it so dark?"

A gentle hand was laid on his fevered brow. Dastral thought it was the hand of his mother, so soft it felt and kind. Then a tender voice, which seemed to echo far down into the distant past, whispered:

"Be quiet yet a little while, and you will soon be better."

The wounded pilot tried to turn his face towards the voice, but found that he could not move, for his head, his hands and limbs were powerless. The light also in the room was very dim. So he lay still, and tried to think, but his head was confused, and his brain was in a whirl.

"What is the matter? Have I been wounded?" he asked after another minute or two, without trying to turn his head this time, for the pain racked him so.

"Yes, you have been seriously wounded, and you must not try to talk or think much for the present. You just need to rest quietly, and you will soon be out of all danger," came the answer in those same quiet, but strong tones,

Again that voice which stirred the memories of the past, yet Dastral could not fix it. Somewhere he had heard it before, but where?

His eyes burned like live coals, and his body ached in every limb. He fancied that he could hear the throb, throb of an engine, and, as he dozed off again, with that pulsating throb in his ears, he was away again in his wild dreams, rushing through the heavens to meet Himmelman, and, over the German trenches, he was fighting his last great fight over again. But his dream kept changing, for the constant watcher by his bedside saw at times a stern look, and then a smile, flicker over his countenance.

"I wonder of what he is dreaming now?" murmured the hospital attendant, who, himself, wore the ribbon of the D.C.M. on his breast, lately awarded for bravery on the high seas, in the service of his country.

Suddenly the pilot started again, and opened his eyes. As he did so, he caught sight of the face bending over him, and instinctively the words fell from his lips, as from the mouth of a child:

"Tim Burkitt!"

"Yes, Dastral, you are right. It is Tim Burkitt. God has sent me to watch over you, and to nurse you back to life."

Tim, who had been serving latterly as ward attendant on board one of His Majesty's hospital ships conveying the wounded men back to Blighty, had heard of Dastral's accident, and had been to fetch him from the base hospital, having secured permission from the D.D.M.S. to have him under his own special care.

"There, that will do, Dastral. I did not intend to let you recognise me until you were out of all danger."

Despite his orders, however, Dastral would persist in half-raising his hand, to grasp that of his friend. And, seeing the ribbon on his tunic, he gasped:

"Tim, where did you win that?"

"Hush! That will keep till another time," replied Tim.

"But, Tim, how came you here?"

In a few words the attendant told him how he had at last, after persistent effort, gained a footing in the services, and, though only the humble post of sick-ward attendant on a hospital ship had been offered to him, yet he had gladly accepted it.

"And so you see by a stroke of luck you happen to be one of my patients. And I am going to take you all the way home."

"Home! Blighty! Home!" murmured the patient. "Are we on the way home?"

"Yes, we are on the way to Blighty. We are now only a matter of twenty miles from the Nab Light at the eastern end of the Isle of Wight. In another two hours we should be in Southampton Water."

"Thank God!" replied Dastral quietly and reverently, as he closed his eyes, bewildered by all he had heard. But he opened them again shortly, and said:

"Tim, war is a ghastly thing. I hope it will soon be over, for it turns brave men who might otherwise be friends into enemies. But I am happy to think that you have won that decoration."

"Tut, tut! Dastral," replied the other. "Do you know that the King has conferred upon you the honour of a C.B., and also made you a Wing Commander. Do you know also that the whole country is talking of your fight with Himmelman, the German air-fiend?"

"Tim, I would willingly shed all these honours if I could bring back my brave comrades, who are buried in unknown graves out yonder. Alas, I shall never see them again," and here Dastral closed his eyes to keep back the tears that tried to force themselves out, and to gulp down a sob. Then he fell fast asleep, and Tim let him sleep on, till they had passed the Nab Light, and steamed along by the Southsea Forts, and Spithead, and Portsmouth, and had entered the lower reaches of Southampton Water.

Then again Dastral opened his eyes, and called softly for Tim.

"I have had such a dream," he whispered. "And I have seen Himmelman, and we are friends again. And I saw Steve, and Brum and Mac, and they were with Himmelman, for there are no enemies in the other world, amongst the brave men who have gone there. And the captain of the German warplane, he who died in my arms on the aerodrome near Contalmaison–he was there too. They were all happy together, and they said that one day I should meet them all. Oh, tell me, Tim, you who are so wise and learned, and know all these things, was it a dream or did I really see them?"

"Dastral, I don't quite understand. You say you have seen them, and they are all dead?"

"Yes, all dead, all brave fellows, killed by this accursed war. But come, tell me, do you really think I saw them, or was it only a dream, a spirit dream?" and the wounded pilot looked appealingly up at his friend.

"I do not know, Dastral," calmly replied the scholar after a full minute's pause. "We often discussed these things in the old days at college, though, after what has happened, it seems years and years ago. We will talk of it again, when you are stronger, but I do believe that for brave men, who have followed the star which has called them, and served God truly, there is, there must be, after death, something like that of which you have spoken, where good men are re-united, even though they have fought with each other in the days that are past."

Then, after another long pause, he added

"Yes, Dastral, I believe there is a heaven."

* * * * *

Thus ends this tale of adventure and heroism during the great war. Dastral eventually recovered his health and strength, under the careful nursing of his friend, Tim Burkitt, but his work in the great war was finished. He had served his King and country nobly. He had crowded into twenty months of service a record second to none during the great war. He was the recipient of great honours from his King and Country. And right nobly had he carried them, for he had believed that the cause for which he fought was for freedom against tyranny.

In days gone by the brave and daring sons of Britain–men like Drake and Cromwell, Blake and Nelson–gained for this country the liberties of the present. And when the story of these days of bitter struggle is fully told, the names of Dastral and his comrades will be engraved in letters of gold, for, against the most fearful odds, they went out in jeopardy of their lives, risking every day a terrible death, so that they might lay deep and sure the foundations of our future liberty and peace.