While some fired star shells that lighted the sky, others took quick aim with their rifles.
Aiming at the figures on the ground as best he could, just as Reade left the ground for the air, Prescott fired, loaded and fired, jamming in a fresh magazine whenever the automatic became emptied.
Twenty feet up in the air, fifty, a hundred! Tom Reade rose as fast as he could make the machine move.

More star shells, and now the anti-aircraft guns came into action.
At three hundred feet above the ground shells exploded about the fugitives.

One lucky shot of the enemy would be enough to bring them to earth.
The pistol was now too hot to use further.

Dick sat back, closing his eyes, while Reade drove at all the speed he could compel, ever rising higher.

Both Americans knew that other anti-aircraft guns further south would be turned upon them.
Finally Tom, after a glance at the barograph, roared at Prescott: "Five thousand feet up on a dark night, and we're going to fifteen thousand feet.