Page:The Zeppelin Destroyer.djvu/94

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94
THE ZEPPELIN DESTROYER

Cuxhaven, Essen, Dusseldorf, and even as far as Berlin; carrying several tons of explosives.'

'How many?' asked my friend.

'Oh! four or five it is said.'

'Phew!' remarked Lionel, again stirring in his bed. 'That sounds really healthy—doesn't it?'

'Yes—the realization of the dream of every flying-man to-day,' I said.

Then our conversation drifted into another channel, and, half an hour later, I left him.

During the past few days Teddy and I had been very busy with our own invention, and had made a number of further experiments down at Gunnersbury.

We could easily direct the electric current upon those insulated steel guys around our distant wireless-pole, but our difficulty was how to increase our power without increasing the bulk of the apparatus which we should be compelled to take up in the monoplane for purposes of attacking a Zeppelin.

There was a limit to the weight which my Breguet with its 200 horse-power engines would carry, and though, of course, we believed it would be unnecessary to use bombs, yet some should be carried for purposes of defence, as well as a Lewis gun.

Therefore we were faced by a very difficult problem, that of weight.

The next day was Sunday, and Teddy having returned from Yarmouth, we spent the whole afternoon and evening down at the workshop, making further experiments. I had not seen Roseye since Friday evening, which I had spent at Lady Lethmere's, Sir Herbert being absent in Liverpool. There-