CHAPTER XXIX.
THE DEATH OF A TITAN.
Quickly the three leaped out. In spite of the Germans hovering overhead, Hal examined the ’plane.
“Great Scott!” he exclaimed, after a quick, though careful, inspection. “I can fix this thing in five minutes.”
Now the German machines came to the ground a short distance away. From each craft leaped three men, who dashed toward the three friends.
Alexis turned to Hal and Chester.
“Do you,” he said calmly, “fix up the airship. I will meet these fellows!”
Before either lad could reply, he had hurled himself upon the foe.
For some reason, probably because they did not wish to attract the attention of the Swedish authorities by the sounds of a struggle, the Germans, at first, drew no firearms. Perceiving but one form rushing toward them, they advanced to meet him confidently. Plainly they considered it the wild dash of a madman.
Hal and Chester turned their attention to the aëroplane, and while Alexis fought against overwhelming numbers, they overhauled it carefully.
Right into the midst of his foes rushed the giant. Such a superb attack was never seen before–such a mad wild dash as he took the enemy by surprise and hurled them back–all of them–back against the airships that stood on the sands.
As the huge Cossack rushed forward, his sword flashed above his head. His revolver he gripped tightly by the barrel. A fighting fire darted from his eye, and his thin lips were bared in a slight smile.
If ever a man felt the joy of battle it was he. He heeded not the number of his adversaries nor the steel that flashed forth against him. Slashing, cutting, parrying, thrusting, he hurled himself in upon them. They were carried back by the very fierceness of his attack. They gave way before him, parting to retreat around one of the aircraft. With one swift sweep of his foot, Alexis tore a ragged hole in the bottom of the first craft; and at the same instant two men fell beneath his slashing blows.
They could not stand before him–their very numbers were against them as the giant pressed ever forward. Now a man dropped to the ground and seized the giant by the left leg, thinking to drag him down. Alexis drove his right boot into the man’s face, and at the same moment, by a quick back-handed sweep of his sword, cut down a man who would have sprung upon his back.
His revolver rose and fell, once, twice, three times, and beneath these crushing blows more Germans went down. But Alexis did not escape unscathed. A sword thrust had pierced his chest, not deeply, but the blood streamed forth. There was a gaping wound in his cheek; his clothing was pierced in a dozen places.
But in spite of this he pressed on. He thought only of advance, never of retreat; and as he hurled his gigantic body, time after time, upon the overwhelming number of his foes, they gave back in consternation and astonishment.
Ten men lay dead upon the ground, their skulls battered by fierce blows of the revolver, or pierced through and through by the great sword.
And now Hal and Chester, the aëroplane once more ready for flight, dashed forward to the rescue with loud cries.
They ranged themselves alongside the fighting Cossack. He greeted them with a half-smile; he had no time for more. Three men threw themselves upon him. One he hurled from him with a stroke of his mighty leg, another felt the weight of his revolver butt and the third fell back with a sword wound in his chest.
Unmindful of his own danger, the giant turned to the aid of Chester, who, at that moment was at the mercy of an enemy’s sword. A mighty stroke of the massive arm and the German lay dead on the ground.
The Germans, having had the worst of this encounter with a single foe, stood back and drew their revolvers. Quickly Alexis reversed his own weapon and fired. There was one enemy less. A bullet struck him in the chest. He staggered, but recovered, and again fired at his foes.
The revolvers of the two lads were also spitting fire. A bullet grazed Hal’s head and he toppled over. He was up in a moment, however, fighting more fiercely than before. Chester felt a stinging sensation in his right arm. Quickly he transferred his weapon to his left hand, and it continued to send out its deadly missiles.
But this unequal contest could not last. It must be ended.
Alexis, wounded in a score of places, his giant body hacked and hewn, hurled himself forward in one last desperate attack. Germans quailed before the very fury of his face; they tumbled here and there beneath his sword, or sweeping blows of his now empty revolver. A bullet struck the giant in the throat. He dropped his revolver and clapped his hand to the wound. Another struck him in the shoulder. He sprang forward, struck down another of the enemy, then staggered back.
And at that moment there came the sound of tramping footsteps on the sand. Turning quickly Hal and Chester perceived approaching rapidly a body of Swedish troops. The Germans saw them at the same instant. They were still a mile away across the sands, but the Germans had no mind to be caught and interned. Quickly they leaped for their aircraft, all except those who remained upon the sands, their faces turned upward or buried therein.
Hal and Chester each seized Alexis by an arm and dragged him back toward their own aëroplane, now righted and waiting only the touch that would send it into the air. The giant Cossack staggered along, but it was plain to both lads that he was about to collapse.
“Come, come, Alexis!” cried Hal, trying to urge him on. “Only a few more steps and we will be all right.”
To the very side of the craft they carried him; but here, shaking himself free of their detaining hands, he suddenly fell, face forward, upon the ground. Quickly the two lads bent over him, and succeeded in turning him on his back.
His voice came in faint gasps. The boys bent near to catch what he was saying.
“Leave me here! You go on!” came his voice. “I am done for! Save yourselves!”
The lads waited to hear no more. Chester took him by the feet and Hal by the head, and with great effort succeeded in placing him within the aëroplane, stretching him out, as well as they could across two of the seats. Then Chester sprang in and Hal jumped to the wheel.
Along the beach the craft skimmed lightly, then arose from the ground. At the same instant a volley rang out from the approaching Swedish troops and the officer in command called out to surrender. The German airships, for some unaccountable reason, had not waited to resume the fight upon ascending into the air, but had made off.
Hal headed the aëroplane due westward, making for the coast of England. Alexis had lapsed into unconsciousness upon being placed in the machine, but now he stirred feebly and spoke.
“A real fight, wasn’t it?” he gasped. “I told you I could do it if I were on the ground. How many was it I killed? Twenty–thirty–forty—”
He broke off and burst into a fit of coughing. Chester bent over him anxiously.
“You’ll be all right in a day or two, old man,” he said gently.
Alexis smiled feebly.
“Don’t try to fool me,” he said. “I am a man. I know when death is near and I am not afraid to face it.”
Both lads realized that their giant Cossack friend was near his end, but there was nothing they could do for him. Chester bound up the wounds as well as he could, stopping the flow of blood, but that was all.
As the aëroplane flew over the sea toward the coast of England, the dying man continued to talk. Now he sat up in the craft and gazed down over the side.
“I had always thought,” he said slowly, “that I should end my days in my own land. As it is I shall not end them in any land at all; but in the air. It is strange.”
Hal slowed the aëroplane down until it was barely moving and turned to Alexis.
“You are wrong,” he said. “You are not going to die. In a few hours we shall be in England, where you shall have the best of medical attention.”
“It is too late,” replied the Cossack calmly. “I shall not live an hour.”
His breath came with difficulty.
“There is one thing I should like to know,” he said.
“What is it, Alexis?” asked Hal.
“Will you tell me what you meant by ‘drawing the long bow’?”
Hal was silent for some moments, and then replied gravely.
“When a man boasts of things he has never done, in America it is called ‘drawing the long bow.’ I was mistaken in your case. It would be impossible for you to ‘draw the long bow.’ You have done too much.”
“That is true,” agreed Chester.
Suddenly the giant frame fell back. Hal turned as best he could while Chester leaned over him anxiously. Alexis extended a hand to each of them, which they grasped.
“This,” he said, pressing their hands in a still strong grip, “is the end. I wish that I could have lived to see the outcome of this war.”
“There can be but one outcome,” replied Chester softly. “You may rest assured of that.”
“True,” said the giant, “but I would like to have seen my old home again.”
The lads were silent. Finally Hal spoke.
“To think,” he said, “that we are responsible for your fate; but for us you would have remained with the army and have lived to the end of the war. We are to blame.”
“Sh-h-h,” whispered the dying giant. The hand which held Chester’s freed itself and groped in his pocket. “But for you lads,” he continued, “I should never have won this.”
He pulled from his pocket the Cross of St. George, pinned to his breast by the Russian emperor, and gazed at it lovingly.
“It is well worth the sacrifice,” he said.
Still holding the medal his hand again sought Chester’s and pressed it. His other hand still gripped Hal’s.
“Good-by, boys,” he said firmly. “Let the Grand Duke know.”
The pressure upon their hands relaxed. The giant frame of Alexis Vergoff, brave man and fighter extraordinary, stiffened and lay still. He was dead.
And as the aëroplane swept over the sea to the distant coast of England Hal and Chester mourned the loss of a true and stanch friend.
Arrived in England the lads saw the body of Alexis laid to rest with fitting honors, and continued their mission to the continent, where Hal put the document entrusted to his care by the Russian Grand Duke Nicholas into the hands of Field Marshal Sir John French, commander-in-chief of the British forces on the continent.
And so we shall take leave of them for a short time. Their subsequent adventures will be found in a succeeding volume, entitled: “The Boy Allies in the Trenches; or Midst Shot and Shell Along the Aisne.”
THE END.