into full view. It was a man of war, a heavy cruiser, and Dave did not
need a second look to recognize it as a Japanese cruiser. But that was
not what caused his heart to zoom up his throat and lock the air in his
lungs. Right behind the cruiser was another of the same class. Both
ships were slamming along through the water, and even as Dave stared at
them they changed course and veered around to the south.
On they came at top speed, and for a crazy instant Dave thought they
had sighted his Devastator and were steaming southward to blast him out
of the air with anti-aircraft fire. It was, of course, an absolutely
crazy idea, and it was gone almost as it was born. And then an inkling
of the truth cut through his brain. Cold chills rippled down his spine,
and the inside of his mouth went bone dry. He impulsively glanced at
his radio panel, and gave a savage nod of his head.
"That must be it!" he grated through clenched teeth. "The rats in that
other Devastator _did_ use their radio! They must have sent out the
Indian's position, and those cruisers heard it. Now they're racing
south to get the Indian under cover of darkness. That's it, sure as
shooting. The rats figure that if they can't deliver the stolen plans
of the battle operation in time, they can at least do some damage.
Yeah! Give away the Indian's position and have her blown out of the
water with her planes helpless in the dark. Good grief! Why are such
vermin ever born?"
Dave didn't add anything to that. He didn't because there was even more
pressing business at hand. During the precious seconds he had gazed
pop-eyed at the two onrushing Japanese cruisers, the pilot of the other
Devastator had taken full advantage of the opportunity offered. He had
brought his plane wing screaming up and around, and was tearing in at
Dave and Freddy from the side. As a matter of fact, it was the savage
yammer of the English youth's guns that snapped Dave out of his trance.
He jerked his head around, felt a tiny sting on one cheek, and saw a
section of the right side of his glass hatch seem to melt away into
nothing. Had he not turned his face just at that moment, he probably
would have lost a good part of his jaw.
He didn't take time out to pat himself on the back for being so
fortunate. Fact is, he didn't take time out to do anything but
concentrate on slamming and booting the Devastator out of range of that
withering blast of fire. The instant he was in the clear he whipped out
his free hand to the release toggle that would drop the deadly torpedo
slung in the rack under the plane's belly. Even as his fingers touched
it he jerked his hand away and shook his head. No, he had to save
that steel fish until later. Freddy and he would have to risk having
it exploded by the fire from the other plane. And that went for the
Devastator's wing bombs, too. Freddy and he would need those in the big
battle to come, the battle against two heavy Jap cruisers.
"We've got to get the blighter in a hurry, Dave!" Freddy's voice of
confirmation suddenly cut his thoughts. "We've got to get him and not
let either of those cruisers pick him up--pick _them_ up. If they do,
everything is lost, Dave. They're bound to have those stolen plans of
battle operations with them, or at least stamped in their heads. If
they once get aboard either of those cruisers, everything will become a
terrible mess. It mustn't happen, Dave!"
"You're telling me?" Dave roared, and hauled the Devastator around in
a dime turn that virtually made the wings groan in protest, and the
threatening wave of a blackout rise up before his eyes. "You're doggone
right we can't let them make contact. Hang on, Freddy! And let go with
your guns the instant you get the chance. I'm going to charge them.
It's either them or us, Freddy!"
"All set!" the English youth howled back. "Let her rip, and blast their
dirty hearts!"
For a couple of split seconds Dave held the Devastator in its tight
turn, and kept his eyes glued on the other plane. It was banking around
to get underneath him and come thundering up for an all gun blast at
the belly of his plane. So he deliberately held his Devastator in the
tight turn until he saw the nose of the other ship start to come up.
The instant it started up, Dave slammed farther over on wing, kicked
rudder hard and dropped the nose down to the vertical.
Like a battle grey streak of lightning, Dave's plane rocketed downward.
He leaned far forward, straining against his safety harness, and kept
his mouth open to relieve the pressure in his pounding ears. It was
as though a thousand fingers of steel were curled about his insides
and striving to rip and tear in all directions at the same time. White
balls of fire leaped and bounced around in his brain as the Devastator
went down at a terrific rate of speed. It was agony to try to breathe,
for the walls of his lungs seemed pressed flat against each other.
For perhaps three seconds the agony lasted, or maybe it was three
years. Then he was practically right on top of the other Devastator, so
close that he could actually see the whites of the pilot's fear-glazed
eyes staring up at him. The pilot was trying desperately to kick off to
the side and cut out from under Dave's diving plane. But there wasn't
time, and the terror in his eyes seemed to indicate that he realized it.
Three seconds, and then Dave jabbed his electric firing trigger. His
guns hammered and pounded out nickel-jacketed destruction, and a hail
of doom tore into the other Devastator like red hot pokers slashing
into snow. The plane actually leaped off to one side like a bird nailed
in full flight. It rolled over twice, and its right wing started to
tear away in shreds. As Dave went thundering on past it he heard Freddy
Farmer's gun taking up where he had left off. A moment or so later he
was able to ease his plane out of its wing straining dive and circle up
and around and back.
Almost reluctantly he slid his finger off the trigger button. There
wasn't any need to continue drilling the crippled plane. It was shy
one wing, and was slip sliding about in the air like a dead leaf in a
raging gale. Its propeller was still spinning over, but even as Dave
looked at it black smoke belched out from under the engine cowling, and
licking tongues of flame went darting backward.
"Poor devils, just the same," Dave heard his own voice mutter. "But
they're probably stone dead now, anyway, so the fire won't add to
their--"
He never finished the rest. Rather, he finished it with a wild shout
of anger and maddening defeat. The pilot and gunner of the other
Devastator were not dead. By a miracle the withering fire from Dave's
guns and from Freddy's guns had passed them by. On the contrary, they
were very much alive. Out of anger-filmed eyes, Dave saw both of them
push up out of their bullet-shattered greenhouse and leap out into
space and down toward the rolling blue waters of the Pacific.
Both the pilot and gunner were alive! Both had bailed out with their
parachutes! Both would land in the water--and both could very easily be
picked up by either of the onrushing Japanese cruisers. The gods of war
were screaming with glee. A valiant effort by two valiant war eagles
serving Uncle Sam was going for a complete loss, would completely fail
in its purpose.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
_Eagle Madness_
A thousand little demons seemed to be screaming their mocking laughter
in Dave's ears as he watched the two parachute envelopes billow out and
catch in the wind. Seething white rage boiled up within him, and he
impulsively started to kick his Devastator around and down toward those
two flying garbed figures swaying like clock pendulums at the ends of
their parachute shroud lines. But even as he started to drop down, he
made strangling noises in his throat and pulled the Devastator up onto
even keel.
"I can't do it!" he cried hoarsely. "I can't shoot them like a couple
of helpless dogs. That's murder. That's the Nazi way. That's not our
way. I just can't do it."
"But we've got to do something, Dave!" Freddy Farmer screamed in his
ear. "Satan himself must have saved them. And look, Dave! That leading
cruiser! She's shot one of her scouting planes off the forward
catapult. A seaplane! They're going to land and try to pick them up,
sure as you're born. That means they know perfectly well who those two
beggars are, and what they've got."
Dave nodded grimly, but didn't bother to make any reply for the moment.
Icy fingers were once again coiling about his heart. He knew that
Freddy Farmer had spoken the truth, if the truth had ever been spoken
by anyone. Yes, it was certain that the commanders of those two Jap
cruisers knew that the two U. S. Naval Aviation clad figures floating
slowly down toward the water possessed the information that the entire
Jap Navy had been waiting to receive.
Word of what had happened aboard the Indian in San Diego harbor a
few weeks before had of course leaked ashore. Axis Fifth Columnists
had gathered up that news and passed it on higher up. It was a dead
certainty that the instant the Indian had weighed anchor and sailed
out of San Diego harbor, word had been flashed to the Japanese Navy
command, and from there to all of the Nipponese sea units on patrol.
True, they probably didn't know where the Indian was bound, or what
she would do when she reached her destination. Dave felt very sure
that the secret of the surprise attack on the Marshall Island group
was something the Japs still didn't know, or even suspect. However, it
was equally certain that they knew that two of their spies were aboard
the Indian. And, also, that they possessed information that was worth
a major naval victory to the Japanese. For that reason every unit of
the Jap Navy was on the lookout for the Indian. And every one of its
brown-skinned rats, from the admirals down, had been waiting with
savage expectancy for the spies to make some kind of contact.
That contact was now close to being made. It was unquestionably luck
that had sent the bogus Miller and Kaufman off on this particular
patrol. And it was undoubtedly luck that had placed these two Jap
cruisers just a little north of the end of the plotted patrol course.
However, war without luck, and miracles happening left and right, just
isn't war. And now there were the two Axis spies floating down toward
the water, and there were the two Nipponese cruisers. And one of them
had already catapulted one of its scouting seaplanes to land and pick
up the two airmen.
All that, and more, whizzed through Dave's brain in nothing flat. Then
he tore his eyes off the two men going down by parachute and fastened
them on the Jap cruiser's seaplane skimming along the surface of the
water. One look, and then he went into action again.
"That's their mistake!" he shouted, and slammed the Devastator's nose
down. "Like picking off clay ducks in a shooting gallery. But those rat
Japs are asking for it. So they get it!"
Dave emphasized the last with a savage nod of his head and slid his
finger over the trigger button. By then the Jap seaplane pilot saw
what was going to happen. He hauled the nose of his plane up as though
to give battle. Almost immediately, though, he got cold feet and went
cartwheeling around toward the east. But it didn't do him any good. He
might just as well have tried to zoom up and hide behind the setting
sun. Dave had him cold in his sights, and the Jap was caught like a rat
in a trap.
One long burst from Dave's wing guns. Another long burst from Freddy
Farmer's guns, as Dave banked off and gave his pal an aim, and that was
that. The slow Jap seaplane came apart as though it had flown full tilt
into a brick wall. It seemed to explode all over the place and hit the
water in a shower of small pieces. Dave instantly nosed up and twisted
around for another look at the steaming cruisers still a considerable
distance away. Even as he spotted them, he saw tongues of flame stab
out from their forward decks, and the air about him was filled with a
roar akin to that of an express train racing into the yawning mouth of
a tunnel. A blood-chilling roar, and then the Pacific sky was splotched
with bursting anti-aircraft shells that glowed red and orange and
yellow all at the same time.
Dave grinned, tight-lipped, and instantly nosed down. It had been
a pretty rotten bit of shooting, even for Jap gunners. But maybe
they weren't to blame. Dave's Devastator was too low for their angle
of fire, and the shells exploded well above the Devastator. Just
the same it was no cause for great joy. On the contrary it was an
advanced warning of what the Jap cruiser commanders intended to do. A
ten-year-old child could guess what it was, too.
Realizing that it was useless to pick up the two parachutists by
seaplane, the Japs were going to hold Dave and Freddy at bay by the
sheer power of their concentrated fire, and steam alongside the two
spies, who were no longer floating down through the air, but had hit
the water and were floating around in their orange-colored life
jackets. Dave cast a quick glance down at those two gobs of orange in
the water, and groaned in bitter exasperation. How simple if Freddy and
he were fighting on Adolf Hitler's and Hirohito's side! All he would
have to do would be to stick the nose down at those two orange spots in
the water and no more than brush his finger across the trigger button
of his guns. Just a short burst and two rats would be dead, never to
reveal what they knew. How simple, how easy it would be to do it that
way!
But he couldn't. And he knew that deep in his heart, and in his soul.
No matter how much he hated the Nazis and the Japs, and all the
ruthless, rotten things they stood for, it wasn't a hate that could
make him murder in cold blood. He and Freddy would have to accomplish
their purpose some other way.
Some other way? Those three words exploded in his brain like bombs. As
more shells from the cruisers' guns exploded well overhead, he twisted
around in the seat and stared at Freddy Farmer. The English youth was
gripping his guns with white knuckles and staring down at the floating
spies. But stamped on Freddy's face was the very same thing that was
in Dave's brain. It would be so very, very simple. Yet it couldn't be
done. It wasn't the way of the civilized white man.
"We've got to try it, Freddy!" Dave shouted, and was conscious of the
dry tightness in his throat. "It's our only hope--our only one. If
either cruiser gets alongside those two rats in the water--"
Dave stopped and let a shrug speak the rest. Freddy turned his eyes
from the surface of the water, looked at him, and nodded grimly.
"Quite!" he said, tight-lipped. "Us against those two blasted cruisers.
We're mad even to try it. If a single one of their shells gets close
before we've got rid of our torpedo and bombs, why then--"
It was Freddy's turn to cut off his words, and let a gesture of his
hand finish the sentence.
"Yeah, we'd probably come down on the moon, or on a star!" Dave
shouted, and banked the Devastator around toward the north. "We can
get one with our torpedo, and go after the other with our bombs. Darn
it, anything to stop them from picking up those two rats, finding out
things, and getting busy on the radio. It's a job that can't be done,
Freddy. But, heck! We've got to _do_ it!"
"Then get on with it!" the English youth cried. "They may try to
catapult more planes, and we certainly can't do a million different
things at once."
"Here we go!" Dave roared, and pushed the Devastator's nose down. "Good
luck to us both, Freddy. And it's been nice knowing you, pal!"
If Freddy Farmer made any reply, Dave didn't hear it. The engine in the
nose was roaring out full blast, and the gunners aboard the two Jap
cruisers, realizing what was happening, were opening up with everything
they had. The din that hammered and pounded through that section of the
Pacific sky was akin to that of worlds colliding. Hunched tight-lipped
over the stick, Dave sent the torpedo bomber all the way down until
its belly was almost slapping the water. There he leveled off, banked
around to the left and headed directly for a broadside shot at the
leading Japanese cruiser.
Squinting ahead was like looking into the mouth of an exploding blast
furnace. Every gun, from small machine guns and pom-poms to the big
stuff, was hurling roaring steel in his direction. Everything else
seemed to fade out of his vision. He could see nothing but that moving
wall of spouting flame and smoke directly ahead. Split seconds seemed
to take years in passing. A hundred times he was tempted to release
the torpedo and zoom up for safe altitude. But each time he killed the
desire.
The Devastator carried one torpedo, and he had to make it good. He
couldn't take any chances of missing the sleek side of that steaming
cruiser. He had to get in close, real close, and then slam home the
steel fish. A bow hit or a stern hit wouldn't count. It had to be
square amidships, where the explosion would tear the heart out of the
Jap craft and sink it like a rock. He had to--
The Devastator suddenly seemed to half stop and lurch crazily to the
side as a furious blast of fire from the enemy cruiser's guns crashed
into it. Dave had the feeling that he had been slapped in the face with
a barn door. He went dumb and stiff from the top of his head to the
bottom of his feet. Everything turned into spinning red light before
his eyes. He knew that he was lashed to the seat, and that both hands
gripped the controls with fingers of steel. But he wasn't sure.
He wasn't sure of anything any more! Was Freddy Farmer still with him
in the Devastator? Was the plane still with him, for that matter? Or
had the withering blast of gunfire from the Japanese cruiser sent him
sailing off into thin air and death?
He mustn't die now. Not yet! The suicide mission had only begun. The
aerial torpedo was still in its rack under the Devastator's belly. Or
was it? Had the cruiser's gunfire touched it off--and had Freddy and he
failed?
"Freddy! Freddy Farmer! Are you with me, fellow? Are you still there,
pal?"
Was that his own voice he heard--that faint little squeak that sounded
in his ears? If only he could see something besides the darned dancing
balls of light. If only he could get his muscles to move. But they
wouldn't move. His whole body had been turned to stone, and he was
falling straight down through a world of blazing flame. He was--
Suddenly it was as though a gigantic invisible hand had reached out and
wiped away all the dancing colored light from in front of his eyes.
Like a man waking up from a heavy sleep, he found himself staring at
the instrument panel of the Douglas Devastator. He lifted his gaze,
stared through the bullet-shattered front of his glass hatch, at the
nose of the plane with its whirling prop--and at the shadow-filled
Pacific sky beyond!
"You're nuts, you're completely cockeyed. You should be falling down,
not zooming _up_!"
The sound of his own voice seemed to come to him from a great distance.
He tried to shake his head, and found that he could. The movement
dashed some of the cobwebs and the fog from his brain. He started to
turn around in the seat when something hit him a terrific clip on
the shoulder. It was Freddy Farmer's fist, and the English youth was
yelling his head off.
"Bull's-eye, Dave! A perfect bull's-eye! But I thought for fair you
were going to ram us straight into the cruiser's fighting top. Look
at her! Look at her! Goodbye, you dirty brown rats! I only wish your
big-toothed Emperor was with you. Make war on decent people, will you,
you rotten beggars!"
"Hey! What gives?" Dave cried, as his still slightly benumbed brain
refused to grasp the true meaning of Freddy Farmer's half screamed
words. "What in thunder are you raving about?"
"What's _that_?" Freddy cried, and peered at him in dumbfounded
amazement. "You don't--"
The English youth choked himself off, and the amazement in his eyes
changed to a look of alarm. At almost the same instant Dave began to
feel a dull ache on the left side of his head. He impulsively reached
up his hand and touched strips of his torn helmet. The strips were wet
and sticky, and when he lowered his hand it was to see his fingers
stained with his own blood.
"Well, knock me for a loop!" he gulped foolishly. "Somebody, or
something, must have slugged me!"
"I'll say!" Freddy cried. "A piece of shrapnel, I guess. A lot of it
hit us. But are you all right, Dave? Does it hurt much? Had I better
take over the controls? The other cruiser is--"
"_Cruiser?_" Dave boomed. And then like a curtain snapping up to flood
his brain with light, he suddenly remembered where he was, why, and
what had happened. He _had_ actually fired the torpedo at the cruiser.
Ignoring another question that spilled off Freddy's lips, he twisted
in the seat, automatically shoved the Devastator down onto even keel
and stared down over the side. What he saw made his breath catch in his
throat, and his heart stand still in awe and gruesome horror.
One of the cruisers was way over on its side and well down by the
stern--that is, what little he could see of her. Mostly it was a
boiling patch of red flame in the water that fountained upward and
outward to hurl licking tongues of fire out in all directions. In
a crazy sort of way he knew that the cruiser's powder magazine had
probably exploded. At any rate, the craft was being ripped to shreds as
though her steel plates were so much paper.
Then, suddenly, as he moved his gaze across the water, he saw a sight
that made him cry out in terror, and shudder violently. He saw two tiny
spots of orange almost directly in the path of the keeled over cruiser.
And then he didn't see them any more. A tongue of boiling flame,
perhaps an oil drum or something on fire, came slashing straight out
of the smoke-filled air and down on that spot. The flames splashed out
like drops of molten metal, and white spray rose up like a cloud. The
two spots of orange that were the life jackets worn by the two spies
disappeared from view as though by magic. When the flames and the spray
melted away, the two spots of orange weren't there any more. There was
nothing but a smoking slick of oil.
"Poor devils!" Dave muttered shakily. "What a horrible way to die. They
were rats, but--but that was a terrible way for even rats to die.
They--"
The last was cut off as though by a knife. A section of the sky seemed
to drop down and explode right on the nose of the Devastator. For a
brief instant Dave found himself in a world of utter darkness. Then
the plane went tearing out into clear light again. It was shuddering
and trembling like a spent race horse. He knew without looking that
the right wing had been blasted by bits of shrapnel, and that the tip
was beginning to flutter. Instinct and instinct alone caused him to
shove the nose down and lose altitude fast. But even as he went down he
knew that losing altitude wasn't going to help much. The second of the
Japanese cruisers was just ahead and below. And every gun aboard her
was thundering away at the Devastator at practically point blank range.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
_Death Hates To Lose_
"Our bombs, Dave! Can you get us down lower and right over the blasted
thing?"
Above the thundering roar of bursting anti-aircraft shells, Freddy
Farmer's voice came to Dave as little more than a whisper. He heard it
nevertheless, and nodded his head vigorously to let the English youth
know that he had heard. They were right in the middle of the cruiser's
fire now. It was just as safe to keep on going down on her as it was
to try and break away. So long as he was able to dive, the Devastator
presented a difficult target for the Jap gunners. But should he pull
out of the dive, and arc off to either side, the Devastator would then
instantly become a target tripled in size.
No, there was but one thing to do: to go on down on her and then let
go with their wing bombs in the last instant allowed. That their bombs
might put the cruiser out of action, to say nothing about sinking
her, was completely out of the question. It was plain silly even to
hope that such a miracle as that would come to pass. But it would be
possible to put some of her guns out of action. And it was just barely
possible, too, that the bombs might damage the craft enough to force
the Jap commander to reduce her speed. That at least would be something.
Yes, indeed. If the cruiser was forced to reduce speed, she would at
least have to give up the search for the Carrier Indian. And now that
the two spies were gone, it was only logical that the Jap commander
would go steaming southward in a desperate effort to find the Indian
and pounce upon her in the dark.