never in the world be able to explain his possession of that bit of
copied code. His only hope was quick action, and flight. He went for
his gun. Lamb didn't give me the details of the fight. He won, and
Babson is dead. Then Lamb got busy. He began with the little office
Babson used on the ground floor. He--It seems incredible! I thought
that Lamb was crazy, or blind drunk, and making it up. But he wasn't,
of course. Babson had actually installed a dictograph in our working
room. The other end was in his office. The wire led out behind the
files, under the corridor boards and down the elevator shaft, and
under the lobby floor to his office. He could hear every word we said
up there. How he learned that safe combination, we'll probably never
find out. In his Washington hotel room Lamb found enough stuff to hang
the man a dozen times over. Too bad we won't be able to do it. I feel
like going out and shooting myself. I'm the one responsible, of course.
One of my own trusted men! That's the worst of it!"
The Colonel gave a bewildered shake of his head, and groaned heavily.
"That's war, I guess," Dave murmured sympathetically. "And the same
thing has happened in other countries, sir. It isn't going to help any
to take it too hard, you know. Anyway, the rat is dead, and the leak is
plugged up. That's something, at least."
"But mighty little!" the Colonel said bitterly. Then, stabbing a
finger at the window facing the harbor, he grated, "There's the Indian
out there. In an hour she weighs anchor. Aboard her is the most
dangerous rat of all. He possesses information that could well mean the
difference between victory and defeat if it falls into Jap hands. We
can't hold the Indian. She's got to sail. Without her the whole battle
plan is mixed up. Yet if she sails and we don't catch that scoundrel,
who knows what will happen? I had hoped, but--well, now that's all
shot, too."
"What's all shot, sir?" Dave asked quickly.
"The job I had planned for you and Farmer aboard the Indian," the
Colonel replied. "It was a wild hope even at best, but now it isn't
even that. The rats know why I wanted you two aboard her. True, maybe
the man you're after doesn't know. I've a feeling, though, he does.
The way things have gone, I feel certain they got word to him somehow.
If they did, he'd know exactly why you were there the moment you came
over the side. And--well, to put it bluntly, he's killed twice already.
Twice more wouldn't bother him if he suspected you were getting close
to him. He'd--"
"We can watch our step," Dave cut in grimly.
"Too great a risk," the Colonel replied. "You see, it wouldn't be a
matter of your actually getting close, but the matter of his _thinking_
that you _were_ close. He'd know who you were, and why you were aboard.
The advantage would be all his. It would be unfair to ask any man to
tackle a job like that."
"I don't fancy so, sir," Freddy Farmer spoke up quietly. "After all,
rats usually do have all the advantage until you get them cornered.
Supposing he does know why we're there? Let him, I say. It's a job to
be done, and somebody's got to tackle it, sir. Good grief! If somebody
doesn't go after the blighter, it's like letting the Indian sail with a
lighted fuse leading to her powder magazine."
"I check on that, too, sir!" Dave cried eagerly. "Freddy and I aren't
trying to toot our horns, Colonel. Maybe we'll fall flat on our faces.
But maybe we won't. However, at least we'll be aboard in case something
does turn up that gives us a clue."
"Yes, of course," the Colonel grunted, and frowned. "That's quite true.
But you could be throwing your lives away--and uselessly, too. You two
helped accomplish something almost as big today, perhaps even bigger. I
can't say yet. But capturing those two American born rats was a mighty
big step toward smashing a lot of the Fifth Column business in this
country. I mean that, too. That place was one of their arsenals where
they've cached guns to be used when Berlin sends the order to strike
at the United States from within. It's one of several arsenals located
about the country. Those papers contained names and addresses of key
men in their organization. And right now some of my agents, and F.B.I.
agents, are waiting in that shack for the so-called big boss. His
capture alone will be something mighty big. Yes, you two played a major
part today in nipping something big in the bud. So it isn't fair to ask
you to--"
"Okay, okay!" Dave suddenly snapped. "If you don't think we rate a
crack at it, then have the Indian sail without us. I'm willing to take
the chance. So's Freddy. But if you think we'd mess up things, then
skip it. Let it slide."
The Colonel blinked and gave Dave a startled look. It wasn't every day
that a junior officer flung words into his teeth, and it caught him
completely off balance.
"But it's you I'm thinking of!" he blurted out. "I--"
"Oh, quite!" Freddy snapped him off. "We understand perfectly! We
bungled it last night, Dave and I, not getting away from that beggar in
the Waco. Shouldn't let him hit the engine. Yet, we'd probably make a
worse mess of things if you sent us aboard the Indian."
"Now, that's not true!" the Colonel shouted. Then, sucking in his
breath: "You two are making me mad. You're taking it the wrong way.
I--"
"And how do you think _we_ feel?" Dave stepped right in on him. "Last
night you had a job for us to tackle. We might click on it, or we might
muff it. You didn't have a thing for us to work on. But at least we
were going to have a crack at it, and be aboard a ship that's going
into action. Well, have you any more for us to work on, now, than you
had last night? No. Not a thing more. The only difference is that the
rat aboard knows we're coming aboard. At least we think he knows. But
we're not even sure of _that_! Yet--well, holy catfish! Now you want to
call everything off because the other guy holds more cards than we do;
because we might get hurt. Look, Colonel! What do you think Freddy and
I have been doing with the enemy ever since we got into the Royal Air
Force? Playing snowball with them? We run the risk of being blacked out
for keeps. So what? Doggone it! We've seen enough of this war to know
it's no tea party."
"Exactly, and absolutely!" Freddy Farmer echoed vigorously as Dave ran
out of breath.
Colonel Welsh glared at them for a full ten seconds. Then his stern
face slowly broke into a grin, and he gave a little baffled shake of
his head.
"Wild men!" he grunted. "I don't believe either of you knows even how
to spell common sense. But maybe that's been the secret of your war
success. That, and cold courage. All right, you win. You sail with the
Indian. I'll see that you're put aboard the tender and taken out to
her. The least I can do is spare your lives as long as I can."
"You mean because of what happened to your two agents last night?" Dave
asked with a grin.
Colonel Welsh stood up and shook his head.
"No," he said. "The tender will leave in secret from a point up the
shore, and the Indian's Captain will be informed of your coming. No,
I mean sparing your lives for a while by sending you out officially.
Otherwise, you two would probably try to swim out to her and be shot in
the water by the deck watch. So I'll send you officially, and--well,
God bless both of you--and keep you in His shadow. Amen!"
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
_Invisible Walls_
Her engines turning over at close to top speed, the Aircraft Carrier
Indian sliced her bow through the sky blue waters of the Pacific on a
southwesterly course. To port and to starboard her destroyer escort
scooted and twisted about like little smoke-belching water bugs having
a field day. High in the air and several miles out in front, the
advance scouting section winged along with all eyes on the watch for
the first sign of possible enemy interference.
For eight days, now, the Indian had been racing across the vast Pacific
for her rendezvous with the cruiser squadron and other navy craft that
were to make the surprise attack on the Jap-occupied Marshall Islands.
For eight days, and eight nights, racing westward and southward toward
a well planned blow, and victory. Yet it might not be victory but
disaster and death. For eight days and eight nights Freddy Farmer and
Dave Dawson had played an active part in the life aboard that mighty
ship of eagle's wings. They had made new friends, they had thrilled to
the thunder and the power of their Douglas Devastator torpedo bomber as
they went ripping off the carrier's flight deck and up into the blue
Pacific sky for their daily practice patrol trick. They had felt once
again the tingling excitement of the alert alarm, and the hunt for
possible enemy craft in adjacent waters.
It had been eight days and nights of new things, a new routine, new
orders, new faces, almost a new language in a new world. They were
a part of what would be in not so many months to come the mightiest
fighting force in all the world's history. It was perfect, it was
tops--but it was not enough. Not enough, because with each passing
hour, each passing day, their own personal defeat drew closer and
closer. Eight days, and eight nights, and they were no nearer to
accomplishing their special mission than they had been the very first
moment they heard details of it fall from Colonel Welsh's lips way back
in Washington, D. C.
"It really is an invisible wall this time, Dave," Freddy Farmer
muttered bitterly as he and Dawson sunned themselves in the flight
deck crash nets on the starboard side. "We might as well admit it. We
haven't the faintest idea who the blighter might be. For all we know,
he's already passed on his blasted information to the Japs; tossed it
over the side at night, with a delayed flare bomb, for some trailing
Jap submarine to sight and pick up. Blast it all! For all we know, the
blighter may not be aboard at all."
"You're telling me?" Dave groaned, and rolled over on his stomach.
"For all we know he's been watching us every minute, and laughing his
darned head off. When I let fly at Colonel Welsh back there in San
Diego--and it's a wonder he didn't knock me kicking for my lip--I felt
sort of cocky. I had a hunch that we'd be sure to trip over a break.
What, I had no idea. But we've gone into things before with our heads
down, and nothing else but a prayer. And somehow we managed to barge
or stumble into something that paid off. But this? We're just a couple
of guys without a prayer. Doggone it, Freddy! I haven't even met a guy
aboard this ship I didn't like at once. And that goes for the ratings,
as well as the officers. Nuts! I guess I must have expected to see some
ugly-faced bird with dark glasses and a fake mustache sneaking around
the flight deck at night. It's got me stopped cold."
"Me too!" Freddy said with a heavy sigh. "I heard a story once of
something that happened in the last war. It was in a camp in England,
an infantry training camp. A spy was sabotaging things, causing gun
accidents, and several chaps were hurt. Well, they hunted high and low
for the lad, but no go. Then one of the chaps working on the case got
an idea. One evening when all the men were in barracks, and lights were
out, he went from barracks to barracks, popped open the door, switched
on the lights and yelled, 'Attention!' in German. In the third barracks
a chap leaped out of his bed and sprang to attention. He was the
blighter they wanted. German Army training drilled into him, you know.
He reacted to the German command automatically."
"I get it!" Dave snorted. "So we should go all over the ship yelling
'Attention!' in German? Nice, but I've got a better idea. We dress up
to look like Hitler and cover the ship. The first bird who gives us the
Nazi salute we throw to the deck and nail him down. Then we search his
quarters and find the stolen plans. It would be a cinch, but I guess
there aren't any Hitler uniforms aboard. Too bad! We'll have to think
up something else."
"Well, I certainly didn't offer it as a suggestion!" Freddy Farmer
muttered. "Frankly, the best thing we could do would be to throw
ourselves overboard. It would at least put an end to _our_ worries."
"Nope, that's out," Dave grunted. "The darn thing would still haunt me
wherever I went. And no crack, now, about _where_ I'd go! Nope! We're
stuck. Our only hope is a break, some kind of a break--any kind. Heck!
I wonder if I'd be able to recognize a break even if it stepped up and
kicked me in the face. Oh-oh! Something's going to happen, maybe!"
As Dave spoke the last he sat up and watched the young watch officer
come striding across the deck toward him. The youth was about their
age, and held an ensign's rank. He grinned as he approached and jerked
a thumb aft.
"All pilots wanted in the Ready Room, Lieutenants," he announced.
"Executive Flight Officer's orders."
"Something up?" Dave asked eagerly.
"Could be," the Ensign said with a shrug. "But maybe the flying's been
sloppy, too. You never can tell when the Exec gets in the mood to
crack down. Luck, anyway."
Dave and Freddy thanked him and went scurrying aft and down the steps
to 'tween decks and the Ready Room. The place was already half filled,
and other pilots came hurrying in after them. There was an air of eager
expectancy about the room that seemed to charge it with high voltage
electricity. The Executive Flight Officer, and the Senior Section
Leader, stood waiting on the little raised platform at the far end of
the room. Behind them hung a huge detailed chart of that section of the
Pacific west and south of the Hawaiian Islands. Colored pins dotted
its surface, and the bright light hung above it made the little pins
glitter and sparkle like so many precious stones. Five minutes after
Dave and Freddy arrived the room was packed, the doors were closed, and
a hushed silence had settled down. The Executive Flight Officer cleared
his throat, stepped to the edge of the platform, and grinned faintly.
"Don't get in too much of a sweat," he said. "This doesn't mean that
Battle Stations is going to sound in the next hour or so. However,
we're getting close to the rendezvous point, and there's some work for
us to do. In short, we're steaming into Jap waters now, more or less,
and we don't want to be caught with our wings folded. In fact, if we
are to run into unexpected action, we want to be ready to throw the
first punch, and make it count."
The senior officer paused, walked back to the map and touched a little
gold-headed pin.
"That's the Indian," he said. "That's our position right now. We're a
day's run from the cruiser squadron we are to meet, but we're plenty
near some of the Pacific islands that the Japs may be using for
submarine fuel bases. In the air, or on deck, we've got to be on our
toes every minute from now on. A torpedo or two in us now, and the
whole operation would be in danger of complete collapse. Also, we've
got to watch out for any Jap surface ships that may be on the hunt
for us. That's where you fellows come in. You've got to find any such
ships, and give them the works, before they can get the chance to spot
the Indian and her escort. In short, you fellows have got to see to it
that _nothing_ gets near the Indian from here on in."
The Executive Flight Officer paused again, and shrugged.
"Of course it's quite possible that we won't run into any trouble
at all," he said presently. "Maybe we'll just waste gas and oil
maintaining a constant patrol. That's unimportant, though. The point
is, we can't run any risks of getting snarled up in any kind of an
engagement before we make the rendezvous. So from now on every one of
you is on constant twenty-four-hour duty. The section patrols are all
plotted. Your own Section Leader will give you your chart copy each
time you take the air. Stick to the course plotted for you, and don't
worry about what the other fellow is doing. Just tend to your own
knitting. Now, here's one thing to remember every second of the time
you're away from the carrier."
The Executive Flight Officer stopped talking again, and took time out
to rake the room full of pilots with his steel grey eyes.
"Keep your radios silent all the time!" he finally said. "If you are
shot down, or forced down on the water, then it'll be just too bad for
you. Somebody else will have to pick you up. Neither the Indian nor
any of its escorting destroyers are turning back for anybody. So don't
expect help if you go down. You won't get it. The chance of meeting
enemy ships in these waters, particularly submarines, is too great to
warrant risking any rescue work. So keep your radios silent, and--well,
keep your wings up out of the wet stuff. That's all, except that
Commander Brattle, here, has rearranged the sections, and made up a
new flight board. He'll give you all the dope on the patrol schedules.
Thumbs up, to all of you!"
Half an hour later Commander Brattle had had his say and the patrol
schedules were perfectly clear to all concerned. Dave and Freddy were
to fly the Number Two plane in Section Eight. Their first patrol trick
was due in three hours. They were to fly a patrol course due north
of the steaming carrier, cover an area of several hundred square
miles, and be back on the flight deck just before darkness. It was the
toughest patrol trick of any, for the simple reason that it was the
last one before darkness set in, and flying was washed-out until early
dawn. If by any chance they got lost and were forced to spend precious
time locating the Indian, they would be out of luck. They wouldn't be
able to land after dark. And if by any chance they went down in the
water, they would first have to survive many hours of darkness floating
about on the water before they could even begin to hope for rescue.
It was a tough patrol trick to fly, but the very fact that it was tough
set Dave's heart thumping in eager expectation. Luck alone had placed
them in that section, because the section members and patrol schedules
had been arranged by drawing lots. In that way every man stood an equal
chance to get a tough assignment or an easy one. And all possibility
of favoritism went completely out the porthole. Luck, yes, but it made
Dave and Freddy feel good just the same to be handed one of the tough
patrols.
As they trooped out of the Ready Room along with the others, they
winked happily at each other, and for the moment forgot the real reason
for their presence aboard the Indian. The Executive Flight Officer had
not said much about the possibility of meeting action, but he didn't
have to. Every pilot knew that the constant patrol schedule wouldn't
have been set up if it weren't pretty certain that enemy sea and air
forces were lurking about in the immediate vicinity of the Indian and
her destroyers, if not directly in her path ahead. Come nightfall and
at least some of Uncle Sam's Navy eagles would have gone into action.
"And I sure hope it means us!" Dave echoed the thought aloud, as he and
Freddy walked forward along the flight deck. "And how, I do!"
"Do what?" Freddy asked. "What's buzzing in that brain of yours now?"
"That we see some action," Dave replied, and jerked his thumb toward
the north. "You know, Freddy, I've got a hunch. I've got a hunch, sure
as shooting."
"You usually have," the English youth sighed. "What is it this time?"
Dave stopped walking, half turned, and faced his pal.
"The break we've been hoping for, praying for," he said in a low voice
that was tight and full of excitement. "I have a hunch we're going to
get that break. Wait, now! As the Exec said, we're in enemy waters now.
From now until tomorrow night when we make the rendezvous, that unknown
skunk aboard this Carrier is going to try and make contact with the
Japs. I feel dead certain that he hasn't made any effort yet. He's been
lying doggo until the Indian got into enemy waters. Beginning with now,
though, he's going to try and make that contact."
"Well," Freddy muttered with a scowl, "as you would say, so what? How's
he going to make contact? How are we going to know it? How are we going
to be able to spot him? We haven't the faintest idea who he is, one of
the officers, or one of the men. Maybe he's just an engine wiper buried
down deep below decks. Maybe--"
"No, you're wrong there," Dave interrupted. "I've figured it out
that he is either one of the pilots, or one of the mechanics. Nobody
but pilots and mechanics have access to the flight hangar, you know.
And that's where Commander Jackson and Lieutenant Commander Pollard
were killed. No, I've figured all along that the man we're after is
connected with the actual flying end aboard ship."
"Again, so what?" Freddy grunted. "Even suppose that he's one of the
pilots? And I personally have the feeling that he is. What help is
that? We're flying in only one section, one patrol trick. He could be
in one of the other sections. He could take off, make his contact when
out of sight of the Indian, and return on schedule, and neither you nor
I be one bit the wiser."
"You're such a help!" Dave growled. "I know. Heck! Maybe I'm talking
just to make myself feel good. I don't know. Just the same, I've got a
hunch that that break is going to pop for us, and soon. A mighty strong
hunch, too."
Freddy Farmer pursed his lips, and then let a little sigh slip between
them.
"Well, I'm certainly not pulling against you," he murmured. "You have
more hunches than a stray dog has fleas. But if I ever hoped and prayed
that one of them would come true, it's certainly this one. And I mean
that from the bottom of my heart."
"Then keep praying!" Dave said grimly as an eerie chill suddenly
rippled through him. "And meantime, it might be a good idea for us to
watch our step. I've got another hunch somebody's been watching _us_!"
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
_Battle Stations_
It lacked twenty minutes to take-off time, and Dave was hurrying
through the hangar deck to go top side and report to his Section
Leader, when suddenly a groan off to his left slowed him up. He heard
the groan again, and stopped in his tracks and stared hard into the
shadows beyond some parked bombers. An instant later he saw two feet
sticking out from under a wing. He bent over and scrambled under the
wing. A man lay stretched out on the deck. His eyes were closed,
there was a blood-smeared cut on the left side of his head, and he
was groaning as he struggled weakly to force himself up to a sitting
position.
Dave cried out in sharp alarm and gave the man a helping hand. The man
was Freddy Farmer, and he was acting as though a building had just
dropped down on top of him.
"Easy, Freddy, old pal!" Dave soothed, and put his arm about his chum.
"Take it easy. Lean on me. It's Dave. Gosh! What happened, Freddy? Are
you okay?"
The sound of Dawson's voice pried open the English youth's eyes. It was
a few seconds before he could focus his eyes on Dave's face, and even
then they held a blank, befuddled look.
"I don't know," he mumbled, and gingerly touched his fingers to the cut
on his head. "Ouch! My blasted head feels in six different pieces. I
don't know what happened, Dave. Some chap bashed me, but I don't know
who. I didn't see him. I--"
Freddy paused and glanced about as though to make sure where he was.
His eyes opened wide in surprise.
"But I was way over there on the port side!" he gasped. "Just about to
go up that companion ladder to the flight deck when suddenly I got a
terrific bash on the head. I didn't hear anything, or see--Wait, Dave!
I didn't see his face, but I remember seeing his legs as I fell down.
He was wearing pilot's jumpers, so it must have been one of the pilots.
It--Good grief, Dave!"
"Check!" Dave breathed excitedly. "Our rat friend has made himself
known. This is the break, Freddy! This is the break!"
"Break, my hat!" the English youth growled, and slowly got up onto his
feet. "You call having my head practically bushed in, a break? The
beggar probably thought he'd killed me, and didn't bother to make sure.
Just dragged me over here and left me to be found a corpse."
"And what a lucky corpse you turned out to be!" Dave said with a tight
chuckle. "Hold everything, pal. Don't take things too fast. You got a
nasty crack. A clean one, though. The ship's surgeon will fix you up in
no time. Here, hang on me, and we'll go hunt him up."
"I'm all right!" Freddy protested, and hung back. "Stick to the
subject. How do you figure my coming a cropper was a break? I certainly
don't follow you there!"
"Sure it's a break," Dave said excitedly. "The luckiest break you and I
ever bumped into. And it was certainly luck, all of it. Don't you see,
Freddy? Our little rat friend is worried. He's not sure whether we've
got him spotted or not. He's got a job to do, see? He wants to be sure
he'll be able to do the job, so he tries to remove us from the picture
by crowning you. Get it?"
"Of course I don't get it!" Freddy Farmer snapped. "You're talking in
blasted riddles, Dave. Make sense!"
"Look, pal!" Dave said slowly. "We know darn well now that he's a
pilot, don't we?"
"Well, the lad who bashed me was, and is, a pilot," the English youth
admitted with a nod that made him wince.
"Okay, he's a pilot," Dave continued. "That means he plans to make
contact with the Japs by air, when out on patrol. He doesn't know if
we are keeping an eye on him, so he slugs you so that we won't go on
patrol this trick. See?"
"But what if we don't make the patrol?" Freddy cried. "What's that--?"