_Action C.O.D._
Steel claws slammed down on Dawson's shoulder, and spun him around.
Close-set pig-like eyes blazed into his, and thick lips twisted back in
a snarl.
"What are you trying to do?" the owner's voice roared in his ears.
"What kind of a trick is this? You think you can still escape, eh?"
Dawson stared steadily at the huge man, who wore a seaman's jacket over
civilian clothes. He stared steadily, then grinned, tight-lipped, and
shrugged a little.
"You'd never guess, Nazi," he said evenly. "And even if you did, you
wouldn't understand. Only white men would!"
The German bunched one huge fist, and it looked as though he were going
to smash it straight to the Yank's face. As a matter of fact, Dawson
expected just that, but he did not regret his words. He was too filled
with boiling rage to care what he said to these Naziland-born butchers.
However, the German seemed to think better of his first intentions. His
face remained puffed and red with rage, but he relaxed slightly and was
content to stab Dawson with his pig-like eyes.
"We will see about that tongue of yours later, Captain Dawson!" he
rasped out in a voice that shook and trembled. "Yes, later, we will see
about many things. Now, go aft with these other swine. And if you wish
a bullet in your swine skull, then just try another trick on me! So!
Move along, you dogs!"
With their hearts and hopes down in their boots, but with their heads
high and their jaws squared, the little group from the doomed Lockheed
permitted themselves to be herded to the conning tower and down into
the bowels of the U-boat. And from the central control room they were
shoved and cuffed forward to an empty torpedo storing chamber. The air
was thick and foul, and it was difficult to breathe. However, not one
of them so much as made a face. They were ordered to sit down on a
steel bench, and they did so without a word of comment, and with a look
of calm defiance on every man's face.
When they were seated, the man in civilian clothes and the commander
of the U-boat stood in front of them and swept them with leering,
triumphant eyes. Then the commander spoke to the other in German.
"My congratulations, _Herr_ Miller," he said. "It was as simple as you
promised it would be. Too bad we were forced to cast all that clever
superstructure camouflage adrift. We might have been able to use it
again before we return to the St. Nazaire base."
"Yes, it was very simple," the one addressed as _Herr_ Miller grunted
back, and toyed with a small but deadly Luger he held in his big hands.
"But it is perfect planning, and thoroughly knowing your swine enemies,
that makes things so simple. Do not forget that, _Herr Kommandant_.
But I think we had better submerge at once. There are many British
patrols in these waters. I can do what I came to do under water as
easily as on the surface. But send one of your men in here to assist
me in keeping an eye on these dogs. Two of them have the reputation of
being reckless, stupid fools. And I do not wish to deal with them until
another little matter is settled. So send one of your men in here, at
once."
"_Ja, ja!_" the U-boat commander replied, parrot-like, and turned and
ducked out through the compartment door.
Hardly had he disappeared when his place in the compartment was taken
by a hefty Nazi sailor wearing the familiar look of meek obedience and
Teutonic dumbness from the neck up. At a word from _Herr_ Miller, he
took up a position where the Luger in his hands could be trained dead
on any man in the bat of an eyelash. _Herr_ Miller glanced over at him,
nodded his approval, then let his leering gaze slide back over the row
of prisoners. He gave a jerk of his head, and a jerk of his Luger.
"Empty your pockets, at once!" he rasped out, and let his leering gaze
rest for a full second on Dawson's face. "Empty your pockets and toss
everything on the deck here at my feet. The swine who does not empty
out everything will be shot instantly!"
For a couple of seconds not one of the prisoners moved. Then Dawson
chuckled softly and began tossing his personal belongings down onto the
compartment's steel deck.
"Might as well give him his selection, fellows," he grinned at the
others. "He's holding the gun, he and his brother rat."
"Silence, swine!" the German thundered, and practically waved the
barrel of his Luger in the Yank's face. "And let me remind you, you
American dog, if you do not empty out _everything_, I will shoot you on
the spot!"
Dawson looked up at the man, and although he kept a thin grin on his
lips, there was nothing but a chip of ice in his chest.
"Okay, _Herr_ Miller," he replied in the man's own tongue. "I'm tossing
out everything I've got. And you can strip me, and search my clothes
if you want to. But I just want to ask one question. It's important to
_both_ of us, _Herr_ Miller!"
The Nazi narrowed his eyes, and gave Dawson a hard, searching stare.
Then he grunted and nodded.
"And what is the question?" he demanded in German.
"Has the Lockheed gone under yet?" Dawson asked with forced calmness.
The Nazi blinked, and looked just a trifle startled.
"But of course!" he finally rasped out. "It was sinking when you fools
came aboard. By now it is halfway to the bottom."
"Yeah?" Dawson echoed softly. Then with a head shake of mock pity,
"That's tough--for _you_, _Herr_ Miller. You should have made the
Lockheed empty _its_ pockets--if you get what I mean?"
The Nazi started to speak, but checked himself and slid his narrow-eyed
stare along to Freddy Farmer's face. The English youth was taking
a bunch of keys from his tunic pocket. He stopped the motion for a
moment, stared innocently back at the Nazi, then flipped out his hand.
"Here, catch, old bean!" he grunted. "The key to the situation, you
know, what?"
The German's brain was much too slow for his reflexes. He automatically
caught the bunch of keys as they came sailing through the air, and
stared down stupidly at them. Then he bellowed out an oath and flung
them down onto the steel deck.
"So!" he bellowed. "You swine dogs dare me to shoot, eh?"
"Why not?" Dawson cut right back at him in a flash. "It might as well
be now as later. But you're still out of luck, _Herr_ Miller. _We
haven't got it!_ I left it aboard, and you'll have to do some diving,
what I mean."
As Dawson clipped out the words, he held his breath, and kept his gaze
riveted on the German's face. But it wasn't more than a split second or
two before he knew beyond all doubt that the fantastic, and the utterly
incredible was indeed the truth. A Nazi U-boat, cleverly camouflaged
as a British submarine in distress, had shot down an R.A.F. Lockheed
Hudson for just one purpose: to capture its crew alive and secure a
sealed envelope that this _Herr_ Miller _knew_ was carried by someone
aboard. Moreover, he knew that that someone was either Freddy Farmer or
himself.
The conglomeration of inner emotions that swept across the Nazi's face
told Dawson the truth. And if he needed any further confirmation, he
received it right after he spoke again.
"That's right, _Herr_ Miller," he said evenly. "There's our stuff on
the floor. Strip us and search our clothes, if it will make you feel
any better. But you won't find a certain sealed envelope. No, not
unless you do some fancy diving and reach that bomber. You see, stupid,
we had _our_ orders, too. And you can guess what _they_ were!"
Wild, angry dismay flooded the Nazi's face. Not yet accustomed to
dumbfounding defeat, he was unable to maintain rigid control over his
emotions. His eyes popped out, and then popped back in again. His jaw
sagged, and his lips moved, though he didn't utter a sound. His hands
shook, and the beet red came surging up into his flat, moon-shaped
face. Dawson knew that the danger point was close, very close. The
German had been flung far off balance, and in the next second or so the
animal training in him would get the upper hand. Cold, common sense
would go flying out the window, and all that would be left would be the
savage lust to butcher and slaughter.
And so Dawson half stood up, and tore off his tunic.
"It's the truth, _Herr_ Miller!" he shouted, and started to rip open
the seams. "Take a look, stupid! You see anything hidden in the lining?
Take a look and weep, you fathead. See any sealed envelope? See
anything that interests you? I told you that I left it aboard. Okay!
See for yourself. Here! Take a darned good look!"
As Dawson spoke the last he held out his ripped tunic with his hands.
He practically shoved it right under the Nazi's nose. And then, as the
German automatically looked down at it, the Yank air ace practically
exploded in a whirlwind of action. He flung the tunic straight into the
Nazi's face. He slapped down his right hand, caught the Luger by the
barrel and twisted it free. His other fist he smashed to the German's
jaw, and one knee he brought up hard into the Nazi's belly. And then,
in what was practically a continuation of the original movement, he
reversed the Luger in his hand, half turned, and drilled a single shot
at the pop-eyed Nazi sailor. The bullet hit the steel plate right
behind the sailor's left ear. And that was close enough. His own gun
dropped from his fingers, as he flung both hands high in terrified
surrender. And the Luger had hardly struck the deck before Freddy
Farmer had dived from a sitting position on the metal bench and scooped
it up. But Dawson didn't see that fast bit of action. He didn't because
he was busy clipping _Herr_ Miller one for good measure on the back of
the skull as the man fell down. That done with, he shot a look over at
Freddy Farmer and grinned broadly.
"Nice going, pal!" he chuckled. "But I'll give you a kiss later. We've
got things to do, right now. Okay, you fellows. Get behind Farmer and
me. Maybe that shot of mine was heard, and we haven't got time to lose."
"But, good grief, Dawson!" Squadron Leader Hixon gasped out. "What in
the world can you do? There must be thirty Nazis, at least, aboard this
thing, man!"
"That's right!" Dawson shot back at him. "And I'll bet not one of them
has any hankering to drown! Catch on? Okay. Stick close while Freddy
and I rush the central control room. Okay, sailor! Step along ahead of
me!"
As Dawson spoke the last he whipped out his free hand and caught the
scared stiff sailor by the arm, and yanked him over and shoved him
through the compartment door leading to amidships. He and Freddy Farmer
kept right at the German's heels. Like blockers running interference
for a ball carrier, they went charging into the central control room.
Dawson saw the U-boat commander turn from his post at the periscope
sight. He saw the anger that flooded the Nazi's face as he recognized
the sailor, and right after that the look of dumbfounded fear that
glazed the man's eyes as he caught sight of Dawson and Freddy Farmer
right behind.
Perhaps it was just a nervous twitch of the U-boat commander's hand. Or
perhaps he actually did start to reach up for his holstered Luger. At
any rate, Dawson didn't wait to find out which. He squeezed the trigger
of the Luger he held in his own hand, and the bullet snipped a button
off the German's jacket before it smacked into the radio panel on the
far side of the control room.
"Don't move, anybody!" Dawson thundered in German. "Get stupid, any one
of you square-heads, and we'll all go to the bottom, to stay for good.
I--"
The Yank choked off the rest, half turned, and fired the Luger. A
thin-faced, hawk-nosed junior officer had tried to snatch up a gun and
shoot across his chest at Dawson. His gun didn't even have a chance to
go off. Dawson's bullet caught him in the chest, spun him like a top,
and dumped him flat on his face, to stay there motionless.
"Anybody else want to play?" the Yank grated, and swept his eyes over
the four or five other Germans in the control room. "Suits me swell, if
you want to. So just start something. Go ahead, you Nazi slobs!"
There was a moment of silence, save for the whine of the electric
motors driving the U-boat down below the surface. Then its commander
made sounds in his throat and licked his lips.
"What do you want?" he choked out. "You are prisoners. Not one of you
will live to tell of this madness."
At that moment, and for reasons that Dawson couldn't even understand,
a flood of war memories swept across the screen of his brain. He
remembered scenes of Nazi-slaughtered men, women, and children. He
remembered scenes in which houses, villages, and mighty cities had
been laid flat in smoking, stinking ruins by the Nazi hordes. He
recalled the floating dead bodies of Yank, British, and other United
Nations seamen from ship upon ship sent diving to the bottom by
Hitler's ruthless U-boat commanders. A hundred scenes of horror and
death that made the rage seem to freeze like lumps of ice within him.
Lips tight and eyes hard, he stepped over to the U-boat commander and
gun-whipped him with the Luger across each cheek.
"Dry up, rat!" he grated as the Nazi reeled back, moaning with pain.
"Just get this steel fish up on the surface, or I'll put one right
between your fishy eyes. Come on! Snap out your orders! And don't get
the idea I don't understand German. You get us top-side, and pronto,
or we'll wreck this tub, and all go down together. Step on it, you.
Top-side we go, and in a hurry!"
The German shook and shivered, and tried desperately to summon what
little courage he had left. But true to the German type, when he no
longer held the whip hand there was nothing but cowardly yellowness to
him. And he almost fainted with fright as Dawson suddenly drew a bead
on a point square between his eyes.
"Don't! Don't shoot!" he sobbed out. "I will do as you ask. I will
give the order to surface the U-boat."
"And tell everybody to stay right where they are at their posts, too!"
Dawson barked at him. "The first Jerry to stick his face inside this
control room will get you a slug right in your fat face. Get it? Okay!
Do your stuff!"
The U-boat commander trembled some more, then picked up the inter-com
phone and gave the necessary orders. Dawson watched him like a hawk,
and with ears tuned to every German word the man spoke into the
inter-com. Then, when the U-boat trembled and started up by the bow,
a great sense of joyous relief flooded through him. But he didn't let
any of it show for an instant on his face, or in the agate hard eyes
he kept fixed on the U-boat commander. He didn't worry about the other
Germans in the central control room, because he knew that Freddy Farmer
was keeping an eye on them. As a matter of fact, at just about that
same moment he felt rather than saw his English pal at his elbow. And
then he heard Freddy's quiet voice.
"What a shame you've already received all the medals they give out in
this war, Dave," the English youth chuckled. "Certainly deserve one for
this little bit. Though, of course, it didn't actually happen, you
know. Just a mad dream!"
"You telling me, sweetheart?" Dave shot out of the corner of his mouth.
"I won't even ever believe this, myself. But keep your eye on those
other birds. They might dive for their--"
"Hardly!" Freddy Farmer interrupted. "I've collected all their guns.
I'll show them to you sometime when you're not so busy."
"Do that, pal," Dave chuckled. "And get set to crank open that conning
tower hatch just as soon as we hit surface. There might be a plane or
two up there cruising around. Or maybe a British destroyer."
"What a cheerful chap!" Freddy groaned. "And do I hope you're all wrong
about _that_!"