It was coming straight down toward
the muzzle of the machine-gun and I let it have it right in the
breast; but still it came for me, so that I had to dive and turn,
though I was dangerously close to earth.
The thing didn't miss me by a dozen feet, and when I rose, it wheeled
and followed me, but only to the cooler air close to the level of
the cliff-tops; there it turned again and dropped. Something--man's
natural love of battle and the chase, I presume--impelled me to
pursue it, and so I too circled and dived. The moment I came down
into the warm atmosphere of Caspak, the creature came for me again,
rising above me so that it might swoop down upon me. Nothing could
better have suited my armament, since my machine-gun was pointed
upward at an angle of about degrees and could not be either depressed
or elevated by the pilot. If I had brought someone along with me,
we could have raked the great reptile from almost any position, but
as the creature's mode of attack was always from above, he always
found me ready with a hail of bullets. The battle must have lasted
a minute or more before the thing suddenly turned completely over
in the air and fell to the ground.
Bowen and I roomed together at college, and I learned a lot from
him outside my regular course. He was a pretty good scholar despite
his love of fun, and his particular hobby was paleontology.
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