two minutes to 9
The French batteries played all over those fields , spraying down shrapnel , detonating the frightful charges of high explosives . But at an hour before the appointed time -- at 9 o'clock -- the French batteries would remit their fire for ten minutes upon the square where the biplane should fall . Hal looked at the clock fastened before him . It was two minutes to 9 ; he could see , directly below , the crimson splash of the great French shells ; a little way to the side showed the flashes of the German heavy batteries making reply . Now , as though smothered by the German fire , the French batteries ceased . It was 9 o'clock , and Hal circled above the German batteries , which were firing , and Chester released the first bomb . Before it struck and burst , he let go another .