though he were going to dive right into the bow mounted guns. In the
last instant allowed he let fly with his guns, practically tore the new
gun crews to bleeding shreds with his deadly fire, and went curving
upward and around to give Freddy Farmer a point blank shot at the
half crouching machine gunners. And the English youth didn't waste a
split second, or a single shot from his twin guns. His fire was every
bit as deadly as Dave's, and it knocked over the crouching machine
gunners like a shotgun would knock over frozen birds perched on an icy
telephone wire. The little Japs went down like ten pins. And what's
more, they stayed down!
Then, suddenly, as Freddy Farmer let drive with a parting burst, a
column of orange red flame came shooting up out of the open conning
tower. It leaped three hundred feet straight up into the air and then
blossomed out on all sides like a gigantic flower of fire. At almost
the same instant invisible giants down in the depths of the shimmering
blue water seemed to push upward against the keel of the submarine. The
whole craft rose clear out of water, seemed to hover motionless for a
split second, and then buckle in the middle and fall back in again.
White spray, red flame, and boiling smoke spread out in all directions.
And then presently there was nothing but an ever widening oil slick on
the water to indicate the spot where the submarine had gone down for
good.
Struck speechless by the weird, horrible sight, both boys stared frozen
eyed for a long moment. Then Dave shook himself out of his trance and
hauled the Albacore off the top of its zoom. Once the plane was level
he twisted around and grinned at Freddy.
"What was that about not having depth bombs, or aerial torpedoes?" he
echoed. "Boy! With you around to shoot right down the open conning
tower and touch off something in her innards, we don't need anything
else. Nice going, pal! That gets you a kewpie doll, or something."
"Think _what_ it gets me, if British High Command ever finds out!"
Freddy Farmer said in a tight voice. "Good Lord, Dave! I've just sunk a
Japanese submarine, and...."
"Yeah, I know!" Dave cut in sharply. "England's not even at war with
Japan ... yet! The big shots in London and Tokio haven't made it
official, yet. Lot of good that did _us_ yesterday, didn't it! And a
lot of good it did those poor devils aboard the courier plane! Nuts!
You and your traditional rules of war give me a pain in the neck. Wake
up, little man. That sort of thing is all changed these days. Nowadays
you hit first, you hit hard, and you hit for keeps! If you don't you're
going to find yourselves waking up in a hospital ... if you _do_ wake
up!"
"Yes," Freddy Farmer mumbled and swallowed hard. "Yes, of course you're
dead right. But, it gives a chap a queer feeling just the same. I mean,
if that had been a Nazi U-boat, why...."
"Who says a Nazi wasn't her commander?" Dave snapped. "Jap, Nazi, or
one of Mussolini's funny looking things! Who cares? It's down where
it belongs, now. And down to stay. And I still say that was sweet
shooting, sonny boy. Sinks a sub with a couple of machine guns. No, I
guess we'd better not ever report it. Nobody would ever believe us.
We'd be called a couple of first class.... _Omigosh!_"
"What's the matter?" Freddy Farmer cried in alarm as Dave stiffened and
jerked his head front. "Another one?"
"No such luck!" Dave cried and heeled the Albacore around toward
the northwest. "I'll have to wait until next time for my chance to
duplicate your neat little trick. No. I just took a look at the gas
gauges? Did you ever do much camping out, Freddy? I mean, just go out
and live off the land, and all that sort of thing?"
"I have a little," Freddy replied. Then sharply, "But what the blasted
blazes are you raving about, now? What _is_ the matter?"
"Not a thing, not a thing!" Dave chanted and stuck the nose down
slightly to pick up all the extra speed he could. "Only we've been
using up fuel like there was a filling station out here every other
mile. Unless Lady Luck gives us one awful big break we may have to do
some camping out tonight somewhere maybe in the wilds of Thailand or
Burma."
"But we can't, Dave!" Freddy cried before he could check his tongue.
"We've got to get to Raja, or ... or Lord knows what may happen."
Dave turned around and squinted an eye at his pal.
"Brother, are you kidding?" he muttered. "Or didn't you think I knew
that?"
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
_Raja, the Invisible_
For the ten millionth time in the last five minutes Dave Dawson let
his eyes come to rest on the main and emergency gas tank gauges on
the instrument board. Both needles were pressed hard against the zero
peg, and they had been that way for the last five minutes. It was as
though the powerful engine in the nose was now simply running on its
reputation. Of course, that wasn't true. Even when the gauge shows you
have no gas there is always a certain amount left in the feed lines
that will permit the power plant to function for a bit longer. But the
Bristol Taurus had been turning over for five full minutes on seemingly
dry tanks, and as far as Dave was concerned that was most certainly
some kind of a record for aircraft engines.
And so as he stared at the gauges again there was bewildered amazement
in his eyes ... and a cold lump of fear in his stomach. If Freddy's
navigation had been accurate, and if the land marks they had been able
to sight from their high altitude really were those that were marked on
the flight map Serrangi had given them, they were still a good fifty or
sixty miles short of their destination!
If they were flying over England, or the States, or eastern Canada,
or places like that, there would be no cause for worry and the cold
lump of fear. But, they were flying over the godawful region of the
world cut by the Thailand-Burma border. And they had only to glance
down over the side to realize full well what would happen when their
engine finally gave up and they were forced down. True, they might live
through it; they stood a chance. Perhaps it was only a million to one
chance. However, if they could sit down in the tree tops, or on the
side of the rocky jagged peaked mountains, or on the bottom of some
jungle choked gorge ... and not break every bone in their bodies ...
everything would be fine. At least for the time being. What happened
tomorrow, the next week, and the next year, were things best not to
think about.
"We've got to make it, Dave! We've got to make it! Get all the altitude
you can. It will give us a longer glide."
Dave clenched his teeth hard, and fought back the savage impulse to
spin around and let fly with a barrage of verbal abuse at Freddy
Farmer. Only the cold realization that his own pal's nerves were every
bit as frayed as his prevented him from doing so. And after all, for
the last hour it had been Freddy Farmer who had kept the conversation
going to take their thoughts off the approaching inevitable, and ease
the torturing strain somewhat. Yes, they had to make it. But would
they? If the engine should cut out now would they be able to make the
rest of the distance in a glide? True, they had almost top ceiling
under their wings, but it would still be a long glide. And to reach the
spot indicated on the map and then circle it five times at the exact
altitude of six thousand feet was something that was strictly up to the
gods. In his heart, Dave had the quaking feeling that they wouldn't be
able to circle the spot once at even six feet.
"Or even reach it!" he spoke the thought harshly. "We got us a Jap sub,
but heaven knows what wasting that time is going to cost us."
"And it was my fault, Dave!" Freddy Farmer's voice suddenly spoke in
Dave's ear. "I'm sorry as can be. I shouldn't have suggested that we
go look for the courier plane. After all, we were on a mighty important
mission."
Dave swung around and fixed him with a scornful eye.
"Eavesdropping on what a guy even says to himself, huh?" he growled.
Then softening his words with a grin, "You stick to your knitting, son,
and leave us grown-ups alone. And don't start grabbing off credit for
going on that courier plane hunt. I had my mind all made up to do it
before you so much as opened your yap. I was just waiting to hear what
you thought of the idea. And besides, this little old engine hasn't
stopped _yet_, has it?"
The last word hadn't even started to become an echo before the Bristol
Taurus in the nose uttered a few rusty metallic gasps and then became
silent as a tomb, save for the soft swish of the propeller as momentum
turned it over in the wind. Freddy Farmer gulped and forced a smile to
his lips.
"Yes, I'm afraid it has, Dave," he said. "But it's certainly been a
blasted wonder up to now. Well, we've got lots and lots of altitude for
gliding. And now that the engine's stopped, it is a bit peaceful up
here, don't you think?"
"Very," Dave said with a nod. Then chuckling, "I'd like to stay up
here awhile. Boy! _How_ I'd like to stay up here awhile! But I always
was a selfish cuss. Any particular altitude at which you'd like to get
out, Mister? We're making all stops on the way down, you know."
"Just let me out at the ground floor!" Freddy replied with a slight
grin on his stiff lips. "And I mean the ground floor, not the basement,
my good man!"
Dave gave a little wave of his hand to acknowledge the wisecrack and
then concentrated every ounce of his attention on keeping the Fairey
Albacore just a hair below the stalling point. Every inch of altitude
he saved was at least five inches farther forward the plane would be
able to travel. It wasn't a question of precious feet, or yards, or
miles, now. It was a matter of inches. And every additional inch was
just another little bit in their favor.
But as Dave held the controls in a steel fingered grip and peered
narrow eyed ahead at the heart chilling terrain, the little hammers
of dread and doubt began to pound away in his brain. His mouth and
throat became dry, and the cold lump of lead formed once more in the
pit of his stomach. He had flown over a lot of terrible country in his
time, but nothing like this. As far as he could see in any direction
there wasn't a piece of flat ground big enough to place your foot on.
Nothing but jagged rock sided mountains, and deep ravines choked with
jungle growth. A plane force-landing would be ripped to ribbons before
it touched the ground. And even though its occupants did live through
the crash it would really be only postponing death. Death in a thousand
different forms would be waiting for them down there in the jungle when
they tried to fight their way out to civilization. It was an airman's
graveyard, that's what it was. It....
Dave cut short the rest of his disagreeable thoughts as he felt Freddy
Farmer's hand pound down on his shoulder, and heard the English youth's
excited voice in his ears.
"Bear a few degrees to port, Dave!" Freddy cried. "I guess our compass
must have gone a bit balmy, or my last calculation of position was
wrong. Look way over there to the left and ahead! There's the sharp
S bend in the Salween River that's marked on this map. Dave! If I'm
right, we're not in the soup at all. We should make that easily in a
glide. And not get down below six thousand feet, either!"
Dave leaned forward, wiped the back of his hand across his stinging
eyes, and squinted hard. But the hope that had zoomed up within him at
Freddy Farmer's words took a nose dive when he couldn't see anything
on the ground that looked like the S turn in a river. As far as he
could see the few square miles indicated by Freddy's pointed finger
weren't one bit different from the hundreds of other square miles of
treacherous terrain he could see. However, hope didn't die completely
within him because this was not the first time Freddy's eagle sharp
eyes had spotted things long before he had. Just the same after nosing
the plane to port a bit and slushing forward at the flat gliding angle,
the tiny flame of hope burned lower and lower.
"Don't you see it, Dave?" Freddy called out finally.
"Not yet!" Dave replied grimly. "And I hope it's not a mirage you're
seeing. But.... Hold everything! Yeah! see it now, Freddy. Gee! It
looks exactly like a curving shadow on the jungle trees. Yes, that's
the S bend. And we'll make it easy, Freddy, easy. Remind me to hang
another medal on you for sweet eyesight. Me, I would have glided right
on by and not known the difference. Okay, boy! Looks like we're coming
to the end of the line."
"And the beginning of the worst part, I fancy," Freddy Farmer muttered
through clenched teeth. "Lord, Dave! I hope that beggar, Serrangi, told
us the truth. I mean, that there really is a hidden drome down there."
"Me, too, and how!" Dave echoed almost reverently. "Between you, me,
and that dead engine in the nose, I'd be tickled pink to drop right
down into Uncle Goering's arms right about now. But, sweet tripe,
Freddy! How could there possibly be a secret drome down there? A hole
in one of the mountains, perhaps? And they shoot them off by catapult?
It just doesn't seem possible, so help me!"
"It's got to be, it's got to be!" the English youth repeated over and
over. "If we've come this far just to land in some blasted trees,
I'll ... I'll never forgive that black hearted blighter, Serrangi, as
long as I live!"
Freddy Farmer's crazy remark snapped the tension a little and caused
Dave to laugh out loud.
"That's telling him, Freddy, old sock!" he cried. "Boy! Would Serrangi
be sore if you never forgave him!"
"Go ahead and laugh!" Freddy snapped. "But we're not out of the woods,
yet!"
"Oh, yes, we are!" Dave corrected. "And what we want to do is _stay
out_ of them and not _get in_ them. Catch on?"
"Quite!" Freddy snapped again. Then thrusting his hand over Dave's
shoulder, he cried, "And there's something else very funny, my lad.
The altimeter. We've got not over four thousand feet left before we
reach the altitude when we start our circle signals."
"Sure, I know," Dave said good naturedly. "Keep your pants on. Little
Dave has everything under control ... he hopes. Yup! We make it easy.
Get your eyes skinned, Freddy, for signals. We're going to be over the
spot almost any instant, now."
It was, perhaps, four full minutes before Dave brought the Albacore
directly over the middle of the S bend in the river, and at an altitude
just a shade over six thousand feet. He had allowed an extra hundred
feet so that he would not go too far below the six thousand foot mark
by the time he had completed his five circles. After all, Serrangi had
been most particular about sticking at six thousand feet. And for that
reason he couldn't take chances. If there were Jap guns down there
trained on the Albacore....
Dave swallowed hard, shook himself as though to drive off the
unpleasant possibility, and hauled the Albacore around for the first
circle. He guided the plane by instinct, keeping the nose no higher
than the law of gravity would allow. He stuck his head out through the
opened cockpit hatch and stared intently downward. Freddy Farmer was
doing the same thing, and like two men of stone they sat rigid in the
pit, not speaking, and hardly daring to breathe.
Three, four, and five times Dave completed a circle, and by his expert
flying the plane didn't lose more than a hundred feet. The altimeter
needle quivered at the six thousand foot peg when he came out of
the final circle and glided straight northward. That also he did by
instinct for his eyes were still riveted to the ground below. Perhaps
ten seconds clicked by, or perhaps it was ten years. But, suddenly, a
red ball of fire seemed to zoom right up out of the lush green jungle
below them and come arcing up toward the belly of their plane. It
mounted upward no more than a couple of hundred feet, probably, then
curved over and down to wink out before it struck ground.
"The signal flare, Dave!" Freddy Farmer roared at the top of his voice.
"Serrangi didn't lie to us! There is somebody down there."
"I knew it all the time, I did!" Dave cracked back, as his heart looped
in his chest with joy. "But, I still want to know _where_ in heck a
field could be down there. It's.... Holy smoke! Am I seeing things,
or ... or what?"
Dave stuttered out the rest as he stared in dumbfounded amazement
down toward earth. An airplane had suddenly appeared before his very
eyes. It was a swift Japanese Nakajima 96 single seater. A Land of the
Rising Sun copy of the American Boeing F4B. But the cockeyed point
was that the craft, with its red and white rising sun markings and
all, had seemingly popped right out of a tree top. One instant Dave
had been staring at the top of the lush jungle stretch below him, and
in the next he was looking at a Jap plane zooming up toward him at
top climbing speed. It was incredible, it was nuts, and it was all
cockeyed. But, nevertheless, it was fact. The Jap plane was coming up
like a rocket off on a holiday.
"Dave! I'm not crazy, am I?" came Freddy Farmer's tight voice. "That is
a Jap plane, isn't it?"
"Unless we're both crazy!" Dave replied and watched the Jap pilot swing
out wide of them, and then curve back in toward their right wings.
"But where in thunder he came from, don't ask, pal, don't ask! Jumping
Messerschmitts! Will we have something to tell the boys ... if we ever
get back!"
"You could have left off that last bit," Freddy grunted. "I don't want
to even think about that. There! The lad is signalling, Dave! He's
motioning for us to swing in behind him, and follow him down."
"Yeah!" Dave said with a nod. "This time I see it with my own eyes.
That dirty brown rat! Boy, is it a temptation, Freddy!"
"What do you mean?" the English born R.A.F. ace demanded.
"That Jap," Dave said and went through the motion of depressing the
electric trigger button on the stick. "Could I shoot the buck teeth out
of him from here! And with both eyes shut, too! I...."
"Dave, don't be mad!" Freddy cried in alarm. "That would be a fine
mess."
"Don't be dumb!" Dave shut him up and chuckled. "Do you think I am? I
was only _thinking_ how good it would make me feel, that's all. Well,
here we really start down, and from now on it's going to be miracles,
as far as I'm concerned. They say a Jap is as good as a monkey in a
tree. Maybe they've got planes that cling to branches like monkeys too.
But, if so, it's going to be too bad for this baby _we're_ in!"
What happened in the next five minutes was actually not a series of
miracles being revealed for the benefit of the thumping hearted and
aching eyed R.A.F. aces in the Albacore. However, it might just as
well have been. The nearer they glided to the earth in the wake of the
Jap plane, the more and more they both became convinced that there
wasn't a spot big enough for a fly to sit down in down there. However,
when no more than eight hundred feet separated the belly of their plane
from the ground the big "miracle" came to pass.
Actually, it was simply the truth registering in their amazement filled
eyes. It was not all lush jungle down there. No, not all. They suddenly
saw a half mile long, and two hundred foot wide strip of jungle that
wasn't jungle at all. It only _looked_ like jungle. It was a cleared
off section of ground with camouflage covering so cleverly painted
that it all blended in perfectly with the surrounding lush green,
rock studded landscape. The "strip" ran straight along the lip of a
deep ravine, so that if there seemed to be any difference where the
camouflage met the real thing, it would be taken as a line where the
edge of the ravine dropped off.
Almost not daring to believe his eyes, Dave gingerly worked the
Albacore around and down toward the southern end of the camouflage
strip. The Jap plane was little more than a couple of hundred yards in
front of him. And even as Dave turned the Albacore around on a line
with the long side of the camouflage strip, the Jap plane touched earth
and quickly taxied ahead until it virtually disappeared under the heavy
jungle foliage at the far end.
Another fifteen seconds, or so, and Dave's wheels touched ground.
For reasons of personal safety, and also to impress eyes that were
unquestionably watching he made a sweet feather-on-velvet landing and
let the plane truddle slowly forward to finally come to a full stop.
But, no sooner had he stopped rolling than half a dozen Jap mechanics
dashed out, and grabbed the wing tips, and motioned for him to taxi
ahead. He shook his head, and pointed to the dead engine. One of the
mechanics, who seemed to be in charge, turned his head and shrilled
something toward the jungle growth in his native tongue. In practically
nothing flat a dolly crew came streaking out. And in just about the
same time the other mechanics hoisted up the tail of the Albacore,
and the dolly was run under it. Chattering like magpies they caught
hold of the dolly handle and dragged Dave and Freddy backwards off
the camouflage strip and in under the shelter of the jungle trees. To
Dave it was like being hauled backwards into the yawning entrance of a
tunnel. One moment the brassy sun was glaring down on him, and in the
next he was in semi-darkness and staring out through an opening at the
sun flooded world.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
_Sons of Nippon_
The faint jar as the Albacore's tail was lifted out of the dolly trough
and lowered none too gently to the ground, seemed to snap Dave out of
his trance. He licked his lips, swallowed hard and took a good look
around. For a few seconds he didn't see anything but blurs because
of the sudden change of light. But when they did focus and the blurs
took on definite shapes and outlines, he came within a hair's breadth
of letting out a wild yell of amazement. Even at that he did start
violently, and his eyes popped out of their sockets like marbles on
sticks.
What he saw was perhaps the most weird, grotesque, unbelievable sight
he had ever seen since the day of his birth. True, he had seen the
underground airdromes and hangars the Nazis had constructed along
the Franco-German border, and he had seen the expertly camouflaged
fields built by the German Luftwaffe on the burning sands of the Libyan
desert. But this hidden field and array of nature made hangars were
almost beyond the powers of even one's wildest imaginations. On three
sides of him were row after row of Japanese military planes. They were
of all types from the small Nakajima that had come up to lead him down
to the giant long range Mitsubishi bombers. They were parked wing to
wing, with a small plane between each two big ones, so that there
didn't have to be any reshifting around when the time came for them to
take off. One by one they would go shooting down the jungle tunnel to
flat open ground, and then up into the air ... like a string of beads
coming undone, or a row of stitches being pulled put.
But there was much more to the scene than just the row after row of
parked planes. Much more. Included also was all the mobile equipment
needed to service the craft, and keep them in constant perfect
condition. There were also great piles of bombs, and small mountains
of cans filled with high test gas and oil. There were jungle huts used
for living quarters. Huts where meals were obtained. In a few words,
that area of the Burma jungle covered an entire active service airdrome
complete from cook stoves to death dealing winged chariots of war.
"_Gott!_ Once I leave here I shall never believe that I have seen such
a thing!"
The voice was that of Freddy Farmer speaking in German. It was a tip
to Dave to remember the part he played, but it was also a truly felt
belief of the English youth. He had slipped out of his 'chute and
safety belt harness, and was standing up in his pit and looking around
out of eyes that had widened as large as dinner plates.
"And I agree with you, my comrade!" Dave exclaimed hastily in the same
tongue to let Freddy know he was on his guard. "I can hardly wait to
tell _Der Fuehrer_ what a wonderful thing we have seen with our own
eyes. It is indeed a great tribute to the cleverness of our brave and
loyal allies!"
As Dave spoke the words he looked down at the group of buck toothed,
wide grinning brown faces about the plane. Instinct told him that a
couple of them understood German, but he acted as though he believed it
an unknown foreign tongue to them.
"We come from Serrangi, of Singapore!" he boomed out. "It is to be
our great honor to report to General Kashomia. Does one of you speak
German, and can escort us to his exalted presence?"