again. "If you think we're going to leave our big boys unprotected and
go up after you, you're nuts. So come on down here, and mix it up, if
you dare. Come on!"
Minutes, and a few more minutes, and then as Dawson glanced downward
he discovered that they were over the Duisburg area. Because the light
was still bad he could not pick out definite landmarks, but the general
picture was that of Duisburg across the Rhine River from Krefeld. And
even as he looked downward he saw the first shower of incendiary bombs
strike and create the impression of a thousand street lights suddenly
being switched on.
"This is it!" he heard his own voice cry. "This is the end of the
line!"
And as though the Nazi fighters higher up in the sky had been waiting
for just that instant, they peeled off and came down with guns blazing!
CHAPTER ELEVEN
_Winged Fury_
"Here they come!" rang the voice of the Mustangs' leader in Dawson's
earphone. "Don't let a single tramp down through, or you'll hear from
me. At 'em, fellows! Shoot their whiskers off!"
Young Farmer saw him look, nodded, and waggled his wings. And then in
perfect team formation they hauled their two Mustangs right up on their
props and went up toward the diving Nazis. As though by secret signal
they fired their guns and air cannon together. Nothing that flies could
have withstood that concentrated blast of fire, and the leading diving
Nazi ship was certainly no exception to the rule. The plane seemed to
stop dead in mid-air, and then broke up into a million flaming bits
that went slithering down like the sparks from a spent rocket.
"One, Freddy!" Dawson shouted, though he didn't know whether young
Farmer heard him or not. "Now one more to make it one apiece, and then
we go to work."
"Right-o, old thing!" came Freddy's instant reply. "The beggar to the
left with the blue nose. Give it to him, Dave!"
Dawson had already spotted the blue-nosed Focke-Wulf One-Ninety, and
was kicking his Mustang that way. A split second later his guns, and
Freddy Farmer's, sang their song of concentrated destruction. This
particular Nazi plane didn't blow up, however. It simply lost a wing,
and what was left went screaming earthward like ten ton of brick in
high gear.
Neither Dawson nor Freddy Farmer took time out to watch their second
victim hurtle downward. If they had, the Grim Reaper would have tapped
them both on the shoulder right then and there. The remaining Nazi
pilots, infuriated by the loss of their leader and one of their vulture
comrades, veered toward the two zooming Mustangs and let go with
everything they had. That is, they started to do that little thing,
but that's about as far as they got. By then the other Mustang pilots
were up there with Dawson and Farmer, and when they opened up Nazi
planes started fluttering earthward like dried leaves in a stiff autumn
breeze.
Before the Nazis broke off the fight Dawson and Farmer had nailed one
more apiece. By then, though, dawn was coming up fast, and there was
no more time left to fool around. With a feeling of deep regret Dave
looked at a Nazi plane not over a quarter of a mile away, shook his
head, and waggled his wings to attract Freddy's attention. Young Farmer
saw him make the wash-out sign with his free hand, and nodded.
"Sure would like to wish you luck over the radio, kid," Dave whispered
as he shoved open his glass hatch, and knocked down the catch of his
safety harness. "But maybe it's best to keep mum, this time. No telling
who might be listening in on the ground. Just the same, pal, a million
in luck. A trillion, what I mean!"
With a faint nod for emphasis, and a wave of his hand at Freddy Farmer,
Dawson peered over the cockpit rim and carefully studied the shadowy
ground below. Recco plane photographs of the area were indelibly
stamped on his brain, so it did not take him more than half a minute to
spot the exact location of the factory where Freddy and he would touch
ground by parachute. As luck would have it, the spot was about a mile
off to his right, well on the eastern outskirts of the city, and the
drifting flak-burst smoke that still was in the sky told him that the
wind direction was just as he wanted it. That knowledge made his heart
pound with wild hope.
"Almost as if it had all been made to order!" he breathed softly. "For
once the elements are cooperating, and that, at least, is something.
Okay, here we go. And don't be far behind, Freddy!"
For a few seconds longer Dawson remained in the pit of his plane,
making doubly sure that he would take nothing American-made down with
him. From head to toe he was garbed in German uniform, and German
flying gear, with even the conventional German Luger automatic at his
belt. But rather than take chances he checked the contents of his
flying suit pockets, found all of them empty as a matter of fact, and
then took a deep breath.
"And this time we mean it!" he grunted.
Slamming the Mustang down in a shot dive, he fired all of his guns
at thin air, and then leveled off and jammed open the compensator
throttle. The result was that a wrong mixture was fed to the engine,
and the power plant started spewing back a long trail of oily black
smoke. The instant it showed in the air, Dawson rolled the Mustang over
on its back, let go of the stick, and allowed gravity to pull him down
into the open air. With the fingers of his right hand curled about his
rip-cord ring, he let his body free fall down through the air, and
counted slowly.
When he reached twenty he yanked the rip-cord ring and let his body
relax. He was upside down then and looking toward the pale heavens, so
he saw the pilot 'chute whip up past him, and pull out the silk folds
of the main 'chute. And an instant later invisible hands seemed to grab
hold of him, spin him over until he was feet first to the ground, and
then jerk him slightly skyward. And right after that he was dangling
comfortably at the ends of his taut shroud lines, and floating slowly
toward the earth.
"Okay, Freddy, where are you, kid?" he murmured, and threw back his
head to stare upward.
It was not until that moment that he realized that the Nazi fighters
had come whirling back to try again to break through the Mustang
umbrella and get at the bombers that were now some distance east of
the Duisburg area. There they were, and there were the Mustangs, too,
zooming and whirling all over the sky with guns yammering and pounding,
and tracer smoke making a crazy crisscross pattern in the dawn air.
No more than a couple of seconds after Dawson stared upward he saw a
Mustang explode in a tremendous flash of blood-red light as a dozen
Nazi pilots caught it in a withering cross-fire. In nothing flat all
that remained of the Yank fighter plane was a shower of bits smoking
earthward. Icy fingers curled about Dawson's heart; and he slipped his
'chute this way and that in a frantic effort to get a look at that
patch of sky directly above him but blocked out by the spread of his
own 'chute envelope. By slipping his 'chute, however, he managed to get
a look at it a section at a time. And when he had seen it all his heart
seemed to stop beating, and become nothing but a solid chunk of ice in
his chest.
For there was not a single sign of Freddy Farmer floating down by
parachute anywhere in that tracer bullet and flak burst-filled sky.
There wasn't even a sign of a Mustang plunging earthward. His own
had struck solid earth by now, but there was no other Mustang, that
might be Freddy's plane, diving earthward. There was nothing but the
showering debris of that one Mustang he had seen blasted into oblivion
with his own eyes.
"Freddy!" he choked out. "Freddy, boy, was that you? Did they nail you
as you rolled over to bail out? Oh, dear God, please, no! Please, _no_!"
Hot tears stung the backs of Dawson's eyes, and for a moment or two
everything was just a great swimming blur before him. He ripped up
his goggles, brushed both eyes with his hand, and peered at the air
above and about him. He saw two Nazi planes, and one more Mustang,
go hurtling earthward in a mass of flame, but there was not a soul
in the air, save himself, floating earthward by parachute. All the
other pilots, Nazi and Yank alike, had been killed in their pits, or
so wounded that they were unable to throw themselves clear of their
blazing planes.
"Freddy, boy, where are you?"
Dawson's own words echoed back to taunt him. In that moment he felt as
though a part of him had actually died. And presently it took all the
courage and will power that he would ever possess to stop scanning the
heavens for a sign of Freddy Farmer, and give all of his attention to
himself. He was close to the ground now, and if he was to carry out
his end of the job, and touch earth close to that large factory, he
would have to forget all about Freddy Farmer's fate and concentrate on
himself.
In spite of his determined efforts to do just that, it was quite
impossible. No man on earth could have given every thought to himself,
had he been in Dave Dawson's shoes. A memory picture of that single
Mustang exploding into bits was constantly before his eyes. In the
matter of seconds countless memories of Freddy Farmer paraded across
his brain. It all seemed to sap the strength right out of his body; to
turn his muscles to rubber, and his bones to jelly.
It was almost as though he were two separate persons. One was striving
to slip his 'chute so that he would drift closer to the factory that
now stood out in clear detail just a little ahead and below him.
And the other person was living over again in memory, heartbreaking
memory, the many, many things that Freddy and he had done together. So
certain was he that Freddy Farmer had gone to a hero's reward that he
was almost overcome by a wild, mad urge to unsnap his 'chute harness
and let his body drop straight down like a rock to his doom. Only a
fighting heart, and the determination to carry on for Freddy's sake
made it possible for him to retain his sanity, and guide his movements.
And then the ground was close, very close. The factory was like a
gigantic mountain looming up in his path. He saw figures running toward
the spot where he would touch earth. Some were in uniform and some
wore the unmistakable clothes of factory workers. There seemed to be
quite a number of the factory workers, and in an abstract sort of way
he wondered for a moment if it was the rest period, or the changing of
factory shifts.
But only for a brief moment did he absently wonder about that. In the
next moment, just as his feet were about to touch earth, Fate in the
form of a crazy cross wind played its dirty trick. His 'chute seemed to
lunge to the left, and drag him with it. As he jerked his head around
he caught the fleeting glimpse of a parked truck. Then the crazy cross
wind slammed him up against that truck. He flung out both hands to
soften the blow, but that action didn't help much.
From out of nowhere something slammed him on the chest. Something else
crashed down on his head. And something else hit him a terrific blow
in the middle of his back. The side of the truck, seemingly no farther
away than the end of his nose, exploded in a mighty display of colored
lights, sparkling pin-wheels, and golden rockets. Then as though by
magic a black curtain was drawn down over everything--and all was as
silent as the grave!
CHAPTER TWELVE
_War's Flotsam_
A throbbing drone penetrated Dave Dawson's brain, and slowly stirred
him back to consciousness. The first few moments were ones of utter
confusion and pain. The throbbing drone developed into the sound of
spoken words. Words spoken in both French and English. Despite the
pain that seemed to extend throughout his entire body, an inner sense
of caution warned Dawson to keep his eyes closed, and to lie perfectly
still. He knew that he was propped up in some kind of a padded chair,
and that he was in a room filled with people. There was the smell of
them in his nose, and there was also the half tangy, half sweet smell
of hot oil and grease. In an instant he placed it as the smell one gets
inside a factory that is equipped with many machines for working on
metal.
A joyous sense of satisfaction flooded through him when he told himself
that he had obviously been taken inside the factory to be given first
aid. But a split second later, as terrible memory returned in full,
there was not one bit of joy left in him. Freddy Farmer! Where was
Freddy? Dead or still alive? He hardly dared think that the last could
possibly be true. Yet hope does spring eternal within the human breast,
and he clung to that tiny hope with all his heart and soul.
And then through his bitter thoughts came the sound of spoken words.
Words that registered upon his still slightly stunned brain, and made
sense.
"Stand back, you fools!" a voice snarled in German. "Can you not see
that he needs air? Stand back! We must do all for this gallant hero of
the Luftwaffe."
"_Ja, ja!_" a second voice echoed hoarsely. "With my own eyes I saw him
destroy five of the swine before he was forced to abandon his airplane.
Look at him, you French dogs. There is a German hero. After such a
thrilling experience he is not hurt at all. Just a bump or two, and a
little winded. By this time tomorrow he will again be in his airplane
and again destroying those who would war with us. Look at him. See the
medals of bravery, and gallant service to the Fuehrer, that he already
wears? Five of them, I saw him destroy. With my own eyes!"
"Hold your tongue!" the first voice snarled again. "We all saw it, so
you do not need to tell us. Here, make yourself useful and soak this
towel in cold water again. He will be conscious in another moment or
two. Has anybody heard from the city? Did those swine dogs do much
damage?"
"A few fires from incendiaries," Dawson heard somebody reply, "but they
are all out, or under control by now."
"Good, good!" the snarling one said. "The swine dogs! But we will show
them. Wait and see! Ah! So you have finally brought the towel? Now we
will help our Luftwaffe hero."
Dawson sensed movement very close to him, and then suddenly his face
felt as though it had been buried in an iceberg. He had, of course,
expected a cool towel to be placed on his face, but actually the towel
was so icy cold that he gasped in spite of himself, and made as though
to brush it away with his hands. The towel was quickly removed and he
found himself staring up into the smiling face of a fat, double-chinned
German. The man wore civilian clothes, and a badge on the right lapel
of his coarse cloth jacket indicated that he was some kind of a
factory official.
"Ah, you are better now, yes?" he said, and beamed at Dawson. "You had
an accident with your parachute just before you struck the ground. But
you are safe now, and in good hands. I personally ordered you to be
brought inside and made comfortable. But, my pardon, _Herr Leutnant_,
there is perhaps something you wish?"
The way the man waved his puffy hands, and obviously tried to create
the impression that he personally had done a great service to an
officer of Hitler's Luftwaffe, instantly typed the man for what he was,
as far as Dawson was concerned. Dave sat up straighter in the padded
chair he was in and eyed the man coldly. And he also took a brief
moment to sweep the faces of the ten or twelve others crowded into what
looked like a factory office. He saw some faces that beamed with pride,
and even a little awe. Their owners he knew were German.
But there were a few that stared at him practically expressionless.
Deep sunken eyes were fixed on his unwinkingly. Deep sunken eyes in
faces that had a skin color of a sort of yellowish gray. The faces
of men who, though alive in the body, were dead of soul. He did not
have to look at them twice to know that they were Frenchmen. Frenchmen
uprooted from their native land and transported to Germany to perform
slave labor in Hitler's war factories.
Then Dawson brought his cold stare back to the double-chinned man.
"Yes!" he bit off in German, and drew a hand across his eyes. "Where am
I? What is this place? Who are you?"
"You do not know?" the puffy-faced one asked in surprise. "Then I will
tell you at once. This is the Farbin Factory, Number Six. You are in
my office, _Herr Leutnant_. I am the general manager. I am Herr Kurt
Krumpstadt. When I saw that you were in difficulties I at once took
personal charge."
Dawson grunted, and then saw that his flying suit had been removed and
placed over the back of a nearby chair. He looked at it and nodded
again.
"Yes, it comes back to me now!" he said in a harsh voice. "I had shot
down several of the swine, and then my guns jammed. Many of them came
at me, and I was forced to leave my plane."
"_Ja, ja!_" Herr Krumpstadt cried eagerly. "We all saw you. It was
wonderful. Never have I seen such bravery as you displayed."
"It was good of you to come to my assistance," Dawson said to him in
a flat voice. "Herr Kurt Krumpstadt, eh? I will remember that name. I
have a friend who is high in the Party. I will tell him how quickly you
gave assistance to a member of the Luftwaffe."
Herr Krumpstadt almost wept with joy at hearing those words.
"It was nothing, _Herr Leutnant_," he said. "It was a duty to be
performed, and I performed it. But I am overwhelmed with gratitude that
_Herr Leutnant_ will be so kind as to mention my little act to his
important friend."
"As soon as I meet him, which will be soon," Dawson grunted. Then, with
a puzzled frown on his face, he said, "Farbin Factory Number Six? What
do you make here, Herr Krumpstadt?"
The German's beam of joy instantly faded, and he looked like some fat,
oily creature that is suddenly cornered, and is very much afraid.
Dawson glared at him, and snapped his fingers.
"Well, are you deaf?" he barked. "Did you not hear a Luftwaffe
officer's question? Or do you make nothing here? Well?"
"Oh, no, no, no, _Herr Leutnant_!" the German fairly wailed, and
raised his hands in a pleading gesture. "We used to make treads for
the Fuehrer's tanks, but now it is something else. Something special.
Something very secret. I do not know if it is permitted for me to tell
even a hero of our wonderful Luftwaffe. I do not know."
On impulse Dawson made a quick decision not to press his point. He
had a feeling that he was perhaps skating on very thin ice, and that
it would be best to "test" out the ice a bit before really getting
tough with Herr Krumpstadt. And so, instead, he asked a question that
had been on the tip of his tongue since shortly after he had regained
complete consciousness.
"Did you see any of my comrades come down with their parachutes?"
Herr Krumpstadt frowned as though deep in thought. A moment later he
shook his head.
"No, _Herr Leutnant_, you were the only one I saw," he said. Then he
swung around and snarled at the others. "How about you? Did any of you
see one of _Herr Leutnant's_ brave comrades come down by his parachute?
Well? Have you tongues? Speak up!"
Almost everybody shook their heads, but Dawson thought he saw a tall
Frenchman start to open his mouth as though to speak, then snap it shut
and start at Herr Krumpstadt unwinkingly. The double-chinned German
turned back to Dawson and shook his head.
"No others were seen, _Herr Leutnant_," he said. "Only you. And now,
can I be of further service? You wish me to drive you to the nearest
Luftwaffe field? I would invite you to use the phone, only--only
all the phones have been taken out. An order of the Ministry of War
Production. But perhaps I can do something for you?"
"Yes!" Dawson snapped, and jerked his head. "Get these others out of
here. Is there no work to be performed in this place? Do you all drop
your tools, and stare, simply because a Luftwaffe officer comes down
with his parachute?"
Herr Krumpstadt shook his head so violently that some of the little
beads of sweat that had formed on his forehead flew off like fine rain.
"Oh, no, not at all, _Herr Leutnant_!" he gasped. "But we were all
here at a conference when we saw you descend in your parachute. I will
dismiss them at once."
The German played the factory big shot to the hilt. He swung around on
the others, and stabbed a thick finger at the door.
"Get out!" he shouted. "We will talk of that matter later. Now I am
busy. Get out! Heil Hitler!"
He received a mumbled reply to this vocal salute, and then Germans
and Frenchmen alike shuffled out of the office, the last one to leave
softly shutting the door. Dawson didn't watch them go. Instead he
spread his feet apart a little, hooked his thumbs in his uniform belt,
and stared fixedly at the back of Herr Krumpstadt's head. The German
presently turned around, a boot-licking, oily smile on his fat lips.
But when his eyes met Dawson's steady stare his smile faded, and a
worried look crept into his face.
"There is something, _Herr Leutnant_?" he asked in a strained voice,
and swallowed hard.
Dawson nodded coldly.
"Yes, Herr Kurt Krumpstadt, there is something," he said.
And with that he turned his back on the German and walked coolly over
to the nearest window. The window looked out on a broad expanse of
ground, that had before the war been rather artistically landscaped,
but since then had been allowed to go to seed. Withered shrubs sprawled
all over the place. The grass was dull brown and at least a foot
high. That is, the patches of it that were not trampled flat by truck
wheels, and countless feet. A half mile away was a woods, and Dawson
could see two German Army cars parked by a road leading into the woods.
Helmeted figures stood near the cars. And although Dawson wasn't sure,
he thought he saw a machine mounted by one of the cars.
Beyond the woods was the skyline of the City of Duisburg, and three
columns of smoke that he saw mounting from it toward the morning sky he
sincerely hoped were from burning buildings, and not from other factory
chimneys. One thing was certain, however. He was in the middle of a
strongly guarded area. The mounted machine gun and the parked Army cars
and the helmeted soldiers guarding one of the approaches to the factory
were proof enough of that truth. It would probably take more than just
bluff to get away from this place, once he had learned its secret, _if_
he ever did learn it.
And there was something else, too. Something, heaven forgive him, that
was as important to him as the secret of that factory. Freddy Farmer.
Freddy's fate. At the thought of his pal Dawson's heart seemed to weep
a little, and his whole body felt so weak that he impulsively put out
a hand and braced it against the window frame. A moment later he heard
the very timid voice of Herr Krumpstadt.
"You do not feel well, _Herr Leutnant_! I beg you, sit down. Here, at
my desk. You will find the chair most comfortable. I bought it long
before the war. It is like an old friend. Sit down, _Herr Leutnant_,
and I will get you some brandy. I have been saving it for the victory
celebration when our enemies are no more. But who is more entitled to
it than a hero of our glorious Luftwaffe?"
"No brandy," Dawson said coldly as he turned from the window. "You may
keep it for the victory celebration, Herr Krumpstadt. No, no brandy. I
feel perfectly well. Instead, I will ask you a few questions. You have
papers of personal identification, perhaps? Let me see them, then."
The German looked dumbfounded, and perhaps even a little angry, but
Dawson pretended not to notice. He turned from the man and went over
to the huge desk that completely filled one corner of the office, and
sat down in the most comfortable chair he had encountered in many a
day. When he relaxed with a gruff grunt of approval he turned his head
toward Herr Krumpstadt to see the German walking over to him with a
folder of papers in his hands.
"Here they are, _Herr Leutnant_," the man said. "You will find them
all in order. I prize them above everything I own. I am a loyal and
trusted member of the Party. But, forgive me, _Herr Leutnant_, I do not
understand. Why do you ask me for my--?"
"Is it for you to understand _all_ the methods of the Gestapo?" Dawson
barked at him, and snatched the papers away.
For a brief moment Herr Krumpstadt held his empty hand out in front of
him as his face seemed to turn yellow, and then green. Then he clapped
his outstretched hand to his mouth for all the world like a man about
to become violently ill. And as Dawson saw the terror mount in the
man's eyes he knew that he had the fat, puffy-faced German in the palm
of his hand!
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
_The Blank Wall_