bomb when it goes off. More like an ammo dump, I'd say. And a couple of
dozen of them, too. How do you feel, Freddy?"
"Scared stiff, and absolutely pink!" was the prompt reply. "And you?"
"Ditto!" Dave echoed. "My knees are sure getting to know each other, the
way they're knocking together. I don't dare sit down for fear they'll
freeze solid, and won't let me get up. Boy! I sure wish it was time to
get going!"
"Won't be long, now," Freddy murmured with a look at the radium-figured
dial of his wrist watch. "But I agree with you. I'll feel much better
once we get in the air, and are getting on with the show. Remember all
of Major Barber's instructions?"
Dave laughed and then whistled softly.
"Twenty years from now you could ask me, and I'd be able to recite them
word for word," he said. "The Major should be a school teacher, or
something. He can sure put details in your head, and make them stay
there. He's a swell guy, the Major is."
"That he is!" Freddy echoed the statement. "A bit of all right. No doubt
his ancestors were English."
"Listen!" Dave shot back quickly. "I said the Major was a swell guy,
see? Just skip casting slurring remarks about him, see?"
"As if--!" Freddy blazed, and then saw the grin on Dave's face. "Well,
his ancestors didn't come from the Belgian Congo, like one chap's I
could mention!"
"Stop talking about yourself!" Dave threw at him. "Besides, we were
originally talking about this raid. What do you think our chances are,
Freddy?"
The English youth was silent for a moment. He walked a few steps
forward, staring unseeing at the ground.
"I don't know," he said finally. "My brain refuses to try and figure the
odds. Which is just as well for my nerves, I guess. I'm only hoping it
comes off as easily as the planning makes it appear. One thing, though.
Selecting me to go along with you is just about the finest honor I ever
received."
"Oh, think nothing of it, my friend!" Dave said with an airy wave of his
hand. "Back in New York when Major Barber asked me if I thought you were
well enough trained to--"
"Rot!" Freddy cut in harshly. "I was being serious, Dave. True, we've
seen quite a bit of the war. And we've accomplished an odd job or two
here and there. But there are plenty of men older than us, better
trained, and far more experienced in this kind of thing. It was a mighty
high honor to pick a--well, you might say, a couple of kids like us."
"You've got something there, pal," Dave said gravely. "But as the Major
pointed out, age doesn't mean a thing in this war. Kids and grown men
alike can turn out to be heroes with the right stuff. And, not to boast,
there are a couple of points in our favor. We're pilots, experienced
ones. We know that area pretty well from the first year of the war. We
also speak German well. And--well, there're a couple of other good
points about us, but skip them. The main point is that the Major
selected us. As far as that goes for me, it's okay. I don't care about
why he picked me as one of the pair. I only hope and pray I live up to
the trust he's put in me."
"Quite, and me, too!" Freddy Farmer breathed as though in prayer. "I
suppose I feel as I do every time we're handed a tough assignment, but I
truly feel that I want to accomplish this job tonight and tomorrow dawn
more than I've ever wanted to accomplish anything. It's--it's as though
my whole life had been built up to this night. Do I sound crazy?"
"Nope, not at all," Dave told him quickly. "You're simply saying the
words I couldn't think up. Say, how long now? I'm getting so jittery to
get going that if I wait much longer I won't have the muscle
co-ordination to hoist myself up into the pit. How long, Freddy?"
"Twenty minutes," the English youth replied. "Steady on, Dave. Don't let
it get you down, old chap. Things will start soon enough. Be like I am,
calm, cool, and--"
"A cockeyed liar!" Dave finished with a laugh. "But thanks for the
effort, pal. Your voice does have a soothing effect upon me, at times.
And note that I said, at times!"
"Gratitude for you!" Freddy snorted angrily. "But of course, I expected
that kind of a comment, coming from you. By the way! I hope you checked
to see if your Nazi uniform was stuffed in the pit?"
"I did," Dave replied, and laughed. "And my rigger mechanic saw it, too.
Made him plenty curious. The bundle, I mean. He couldn't tell that it
was a Nazi uniform. I thought it best to offer some kind of an
explanation, so I told him that it was an extra uniform in case I got
shot down in flames, and burned the one I was wearing."
"Good grief!" Freddy gasped. "What a crazy thing to say! And what did he
say?"
"He didn't," Dave chuckled. "He didn't say a thing--to me. He just
walked off, muttering something about all Yanks being a little balmy."
"And he wasn't far from wrong!" Freddy Farmer leaped at the opening.
"Particularly in your case. But let's start on back to the tarmac, shall
we? They should be starting up the engines for a brief warm-up soon. And
it isn't good to, give the other chaps the idea that we're trying to
snub them."
"Nuts!" Dave snorted. "Those guys are regular. They wouldn't think
anything like that, ever. But let's get on back, anyway. I want to give
my bus one more check, just for something to do. Oh-oh! There go some of
the egg boys. Happy landings, fellows! And smack them plenty, the bums!"
As Dave spoke the last he and Freddy threw back their heads and stared
up into the dark sky that was suddenly filled with the roaring thunder
of many bombers winging out across the Channel to "lay" their "eggs" as
planned. For a couple of minutes both sky and earth trembled from the
steady thunder of powerful engines. Then gradually it faded away in the
southeast.
"Boy! That was a bunch of them!" Dave exclaimed with a whistle. "The
whole raid area will probably be flat as a pancake by the time the
Commando troops arrive. Gosh! I hope their eggs don't scare von Staube
and von Gault away!"
"Or make the blighters hide in some bomb shelter where we can't find
them!" Freddy echoed with a little nervous laugh. "Well, let's buzz
over. There's the first of the Merlins starting up. Getting close now,
Dave."
Dawson didn't comment. He licked his suddenly dry lips, swallowed hard a
couple of times, and hurried with Freddy across the drome to the line of
twenty-one Spitfires on the tarmac. Pilots gathered in small groups were
breaking up, each man going over to his plane. Dave went over to his,
and Freddy to his own which was next to it. Both knew their planes by
heart, but from force of habit they each made one last and final check,
and found every little thing just as they knew it would be.
Then they met between the two planes and waited for the engine fitters
to climb in the pits and kick the Merlins into life. The whole drome,
now, was echoing and re-echoing to the roar of Merlin engines. But to
Dave and Freddy, and everybody else for that matter, the thunderous roar
was the sweetest music on earth.
"Well, have you two got it all straight, eh?"
They both spun around at the sound of the voice shouting above the
Merlins' roar. Squadron Leader Parkinson stood there dressed and ready
for flight. He was calmly smoking a cigarette, but there was a flashing,
eager-to-be-off look in his eyes. Dave nodded and answered for himself
and Freddy.
"All okay, sir!" he shouted back. "We go off second with Green Flight.
Up to ten thousand, and fly line astern by flights until we pick up the
Para-troop transports five miles off shore."
"Right!" the Squadron Leader said with a nod. "Then spread out in top
cover. Green right, blue left, Red center, and Purple Flight covering
our tails. Right you are, lads. Good luck to you both. If any night
Messerschmitts or Focke-Wulfs put in an appearance, don't let the
blighters go any place but down!"
"And with flames for company, sir," Dave added with a grin.
"Quite!" the Squadron Leader echoed the statement, and started to turn
away. He checked his movement, however, and turned back to give each of
the two youths a searching stare.
"I meant that," he said a moment later. "About good luck to you both. I
don't know a thing, but I fancy you didn't go over to Commando H.Q.
yesterday just to have a spot of tea. Anyway, mighty glad to have you
with us--until you have to peel off, and go on your own. Cheerio, until
we meet again sometime!"
Without giving either of the boys a chance to say anything, Squadron
Leader Parkinson flipped a hand to his goggles in salute and went
quickly away.
"Jeepers!" Dave presently ejaculated. "Maybe we should wear signs on our
backs, or something! That Parkinson is no dumb bunny, what I mean!"
"Oh, quite," Freddy said. "But after all, old chap, we're not strictly
R.A.F. these days, you know. And--well, I fancy it must have struck
everybody a bit queer, our just joining up with the Squadron wearing U.
S. Army Air Force uniforms. Plenty of Yank squadrons over here, now, for
us to be assigned to. And that call from Commando H.Q. would start any
chap thinking."
"Yes, I guess that's right," Dave said with a nod. "But here's hoping
the birds on the _other_ side of the Channel aren't so bright. But why
should they be? Oh, nuts! I'm just yelling down a rain barrel. Well,
Freddy, old tin of herring, Papa will look after you as best he can. But
try not to get in my way, and on my neck too much, see? I've got
important things to do from now on."
Freddy took the extended hand, and the pressure of Dawson's grip told
him all he needed to know.
"You mean that the other way around, I fancy!" he snapped. "And I warn
you, young fellow, this is absolutely your last chance! Mess up this
show tonight, and I'll definitely leave you behind in all doings in the
future. I'm completely fed up with shielding your mistakes from our
superiors each time we go out on a show. Those things in the leading
edge of your wings are guns, understand? They shoot bullets. But bullets
meant for Nazi planes, not British or Yank or French or Polish or
Canadian. Please have sense enough to remember this time. So don't
forget! This is your last chance to prove you're the type to tackle big
things with me."
"Boy! What a soap box artist you'd make!" Dave cried with a chuckle.
"Give that vocation a thought, if you last out this war, Freddy. And
right now stop breaking my fingers! What do you think you're doing?
Cracking walnuts! Go on! Get into your ship before I break into tears. A
tender babe like you, going along on a man's job! There should be a law,
or something."
"Rot!" Freddy snapped, but his voice was a little husky. "Well, happy
landings, Dave, old thing. See you anon at that cluster of
shell-battered barns over in Occupied France."
"I'll be there waiting, sweetheart," Dave said. Then as a parting shot,
"And don't forget the rip-cord ring. You have to yank it hard for the
thing to open. Very necessary, you know."
"I'll do my best to remember, Dave," Freddy Farmer assured him.
And the two air aces climbed up into their Spitfires.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
_Silent Wings_
France! The once brave, fighting nation now helpless in the steel-gloved
hands of its ruthless conquerors. Some vowed that treachery in high
places had doomed France. Others vowed it had been the vast superiority
of the enemy in all things. And others vowed there was some other reason
for the swift and devastating defeat of the once proud republic. But
what did it matter, the reason, now? Or what would it matter until after
the war had been fought and won by the United Nations? The fact was that
France was in chains; helplessly, but not hopelessly, enslaved by a gang
of war bandits who even insulted their own intelligence, what little
there was of it, by referring to themselves as men and human beings.
That was the one fact, the one great truth. And as Dave shoved open his
greenhouse and stuck his head out to look down at the carpet of night
shadows that was France, a sharp ache came to his heart, and he
unconsciously clenched his free hand into a fist of promised vengeance.
It had been a long time since he had flown over France. At least so it
seemed, so much had happened since then. Last year? No, that couldn't
be. Five years ago at the least. Maybe more. But not just last year. It
couldn't have been. Yet it was so.[1]
[Footnote 1: _Dave Dawson, Flight Lieutenant._]
"Keep your chin up, old girl!" he whispered downward. "Maybe this isn't
the beginning. But _the_ day is coming. It's coming just as sure as the
rain grows little apples. Britishers, Yanks, Dutch, Belgians, Canadians,
Poles, and your own Free French. That's a promise, _La Belle France_.
Thousands and thousands of them, with all the stuff they'll need to cut
Hitler down to snake level. Believe me, old girl!"
With a grim nod for emphasis, he pulled his head in and shoved the
greenhouse shut. He was flying Number Two on the right in Green Flight,
and Green was on the right of the general squadron formation. The
Para-troop transports were a thousand feet below, thirty-five of them
drilling steadily along into France. At the coast anti-aircraft
batteries had opened up with a savage fire and searchlights had crossed
and crisscrossed the heavens. But not for very long. A few squadrons of
low flying Hurricane bombers had jumped on the guns and lights, and
given their operators too much trouble for them to be able to
concentrate very closely on the huge aerial cavalcade passing by
overhead.
As for Nazi night fighters, there hadn't been the sign of one so far.
Perhaps the bombers earlier had chewed up their dromes and parked planes
so that there weren't any in condition to take to the air now. Or maybe,
the odds being so much against them, the Nazi pilots were simply
executing that well known German military maneuver. In short, never
fight unless there are three of you to one of your enemy.
"And then again," Dave continued the thought aloud, "maybe they are
waiting until we get deeper in, and near our objective. Then they'll
swarm up and dive down to try and do their stuff. Yeah! Maybe they know
these are Para-troop planes. And what fun it would be to pick off the
poor devils floating down by parachute. Just like shooting fish in a
barrel!"
Dave's heart skipped a beat as he thought of that possibility. And on
impulse he tilted back his head and stared hard at the still overcast
sky. Were there Nazi fighters up in that inky sky? Flocks of Hitler's
vultures tagging along on silent wings, ready for the moment to scream
down and strike? Dave's heart beat a little faster, and the palms of his
hands became cold and clammy. He shook himself and returned his gaze to
straight ahead.
"Cut it out, kid!" he growled at himself. "Get back on the beam. You've
got plenty of other things to worry about, without wondering about Nazi
night fighters tagging along upstairs. Just keep your thoughts on what
Freddy and you have ahead of you."
As he spoke his pal's name he turned his head and peered at the next
plane on his left. He knew it was Freddy's Spitfire, but he could only
see it as a darker moving shadow against the general background. A
sudden longing to talk and crack wise with Freddy was his. But, of
course, he made no move to speak into his flap mike. Squadron Leader
Parkinson would do all the talking. Nobody else was to say anything
unless addressed by the Squadron Leader. Not that the Nazis below didn't
know that enemy planes were up there in the skies. Their ears told them
that. Radio silence had been ordered simply to avoid all chance of an
unguarded or thoughtlessly spoken word giving Nazi listening stations a
clue as to what was actually taking place.
And so Dave killed the urge to talk with Freddy Farmer, and continued to
hold his position in the Flight formation, and keep his eyes skinned for
the first glimpse of Nazi night fighters that might suddenly come gun
yammering down and in among the Para-troop transports. Seconds ticked
by, and became minutes, however, without a single German pilot sticking
his nose into the business. Then, presently, as Dave glanced at his
cowled dash clock, he saw that the two formations were only one minute
away from their objective point in the air. By straining his eyes, and
peering hard, Dave could just make out the winding grey ribbon that was
the Seine River winding past the city of Rouen. The city, itself, was in
total blackout, though a light did show here and there. Staring at them,
Dave wondered if brave Frenchmen down there were playing their part in
this gigantic undertaking, risking the Nazi death decree by showing
lights that might guide the United Nations planes in the air. There were
many Frenchmen like that. They mounted up into the thousands--far more
than the rest of the world realized, let alone heard about.
Steel-hearted men, women, and, yes, children, who fought the Nazi beasts
twenty-four hours a day without guns, or cannon, or tanks, or airplanes,
but with their hands, and feet, and their brains. They were not people
living on the brink of death. They lived in the _middle_ of death. Night
and day, week after week, month after month, and on and on until death,
or victory, ended their misery.
Finally, the last minute was over and a part of time history. Dave
glanced down and saw the shadows that were troop transport planes
opening up wider formation. He imagined, if he didn't see, the tough,
painted-faced Commandos stepping out and going down by parachute. He
wondered if they were all Americans in that bunch down there. He hoped
so, and told himself that was so. It gave him a thrilling feeling to
have helped escort those boys over from England. And what they wouldn't
do to the Nazi tramps they met on me ground! There was no fighter on
earth like a Yank, once he got started. Not even the Australians could
get tougher than Uncle Sam's fighting fools. They--
The rest of the thought folded up in Dave's brain. At that instant he
heard the savage snarl and yammer of aerial machine guns. And he had
only to jerk his head around and look up to see the stabbing tongues of
yellow-orange flame etched against the black sky. Nazi fighters were
rushing down to enjoy a field day of killing and slaughter. But that's
what _they_ thought! There was good old Two Hundred and Three between
them and the Para-troop planes. Two Hundred and Three, that had one of
the best records in the R.A.F. for bringing down enemy aircraft.
"So come on down!" Dave grated, and slid his free hand up to twist the
firing ring of his trigger button on the stick. "Come on down and get
slapped in the face for keeps. We'll--"
"Tally-ho, chaps!" came Squadron Leader Parkinson's cry over the radio.
"Company here. Let's entertain the blighters, or make them go home.
After them, chaps!"
"And how!" Dave shouted happily, and started to whip his Spitfire around
and up toward the part of the night sky etched with streaks of yellow
orange. "We'll show--"
The rest died on his lips as common sense suddenly got the upper hand of
him, and roughly jogged his memory. Heck, yes, of course! Was he nuts?
He couldn't go kiting up there to do battle with those Nazi night
fighters. And neither could Freddy Farmer. This was the end of the line
for them. This was where they got off and changed trains. They had an
exact time schedule of their own. And if they wasted minutes fooling
around with those diving night fighters of Hitler's, their whole
schedule could very well be thrown completely out of whack.
"But it's like quitting!" Dave groaned as he checked his turn and
started to peel off and down toward the south. "Like getting the wind up
and running out on the boys. And they're such swell guys. Oh nuts! Would
five minutes make any difference? I might smack a couple in five
minutes, stop two of them from maybe cutting down through us and
spraying those Para-Commandos going down to earth. I--"
He groaned aloud again, for he knew that he was simply talking words
that didn't mean anything. He had a job to do. Freddy had a job to do.
And Two Hundred and Three had a job to do--_without them_! Major Barber
hadn't kidded around on that point when he'd given Freddy and him the
instructions. At the jump off spot, Freddy and he were to peel away from
the squadron and get on about their own little job. And that meant peel
away no matter if the whole German Luftwaffe dropped down on top of Two
Hundred and Three.
"But just let me get back to England!" Dave whispered as he went roaring
southward. "Just let me get back so that I can tell those boys, and have
them understand how it was we pulled out and left them in the soup.
Just let me do that!"
With a savage nod for emphasis, Dave squinted ahead at the searchlight
beams that were now cutting up from the city of Rouen, and then looked
to the right and to the left. Freddy Farmer's plane was on his right. He
could see it quite clearly, now. There was beginning to be quite a bit
of light. However, it was red light from explosions on the ground below
that reflected upward. And those explosions meant that some of the
Commandos had already landed and were going into planned action.
"Give it to them, boys!" Dave shouted impulsively, and shook his free
fist. "Give them the works, and not once over lightly, either. Sock it
to them where it hurts!"
As though a Nazi anti-aircraft gunner on the ground wanted to help out,
a shell exploded with a terrific roar just on the right to punctuate
Dave's last sentence. It was close enough to send his Spitfire jumping a
bit, and he almost slipped into a spin before he regained control. When
he did he spent a couple of very anxious moments waiting to see if
shrapnel pieces had done any serious damage. None seemed to have,
though, for the Rolls-Royce Merlin in the nose continued to roar out its
song of mighty power and pull the Spitfire through the night air at
close to four hundred miles an hour.
That single exploding shell, though, was but the first greeting of many.
As Freddy and he went clipping across Rouen, and over the twisting
Seine, it seemed as though all the anti-aircraft batteries in Europe had
opened up on them. And there were so many searchlight beams poking
upward and swinging back and forth, and around in circles, that the sky
ahead and on all sides was like a shimmering white fishing net. And the
searchlight beams certainly were _fishing_ for the two Spitfires.
A dozen times one caught Dave's plane cold and blinded him for a split
second or two. But just as an anti-aircraft battery would take a new
sight on him, he would manage to whip out of the brilliance of the
"Peeping Tom" and into blessed black sky that hid him from view. And
just as many times he saw lights catch Freddy's plane, and make the
English-born air ace do his trick dance before getting out of sight
again.
As a matter of fact, the closer they came to Evaux the more guns started
shooting at them, and the more searchlights sprang into action. The sky
was lighted up almost as though it were high noon. There were few
"black" spots, and cold sweat trickled down Dave's face as shells seemed
to burst right on top of his wings, and even inside the cockpit--which
of course they didn't.
"We're going to have to be good!" he muttered, as he dropped the Spit's
nose and cut down into momentary concealment. "Plenty good, or they'll
see us step off, and start a man hunt by the time we've reached the
ground. And that mustn't happen. Those birds down there have got to
think we're still in the ships when they see them catch fire. And
so--well, it's up to us to make it good."
As he spoke the last he put his lips to the flap mike.
"Better get out of here, Freddy!" he shouted.
It was the signal they had arranged in Major Barber's office, the only
words they would speak over the air. But they would mean plenty. Dave's
speaking those words was the signal for them both to bail out in the
next possible second, after yanking the lever that started the time
mechanism of the fire bomb. So the instant the words were off Dave's
lips he cut deeper into the dark area in the sky, yanked the fire bomb
lever, shoved open the greenhouse cowling, unfastened his safety harness
and got up on the seat.