CHAPTER EIGHT
_Terror Rides The Night Sky_
England was far behind in the darkness. The altimeter on the instrumentboard in front of Flight Lieutenant Wiggins said twenty thousand feet.Both Dave and Freddy had long since stuck the oxygen tubes in theirmouths, as had also Wiggins and the members of his crew. And whenevertheir heads felt a bit light they took a suck of the energy-restoringair and instantly felt normal again. Dave had to grin whenever he lookedat Freddy and the others. In their helmets and oxygen masks, they lookedlike a group of crazy creatures from Mars.
Presently they ran into a bit of weather. The plane heaved slightly, butWiggins kept it dead on its course. After another bit of time they raninto high clouds. Dave saw Flight Lieutenant Wiggins speaking into hisradio mike and knew that the pilot was ordering the other planes of thepatrol to spread out so as to avoid collision while flying blind. Thenodding of Wiggins' head indicated that the other pilots wereacknowledging the order and obeying it.
For some fifteen minutes the plane flew blind through the clouds, thencame out into clear air again. Wiggins and the navigator checked theirposition. Then Wiggins scribbled something on a piece of paper andhanded it back to the two boys. They glanced at the short message, whichread:
"Tired of looking at your funny faces. Time to make sure your 'chute packs are strapped on tight. You will probably need them on the way down!! Cheeri-o!"
Dave and Freddy grinned at each other, then impulsively they claspedhands warmly. No words were spoken. No words needed to be spoken. Theywould have been empty and meaningless. The firm pressure of the other'shand had told each far, far more than mere words. The first part oftheir venture was quickly drawing to a close. In a short time they woulddive away from the droning Wellington into the black night that shroudedGerman-occupied Belgium. In a few minutes--
But fate, perhaps, had suddenly decided not to let it be that way. Abovethe drone of the twin Pegasus engines came a sharp staccato yammer thatmade fingers of ice clutch at Dave's heartstrings. An instant later heheard the loud voice of the gunner in the tail.
"A couple of the beggers have picked us out!" he cried. "There go theblinking Paul Prys!"
At that moment the Wellington flew straight into a world of brilliantwhite light. Nazi searchlights on the ground, or Paul Prys, as the boysof the R.A.F. called them, had picked up the Wellington formation intheir revealing glare. Instinctively Dave and Freddy grabbed hold offuselage girders for support. And not a moment too soon, either. FlightLieutenant Wiggins had shoved the control stick forward and was droppingthe Wellington down into a roaring power dive. A couple of split secondsafter he started the dive, he sent the plane careening crazily off tothe left. The craft roared out of the searchlight beams and plowed awaythrough black night.
"Sweet going!" Dave heard his own voice shout in praise. "That's showingthe guys how good their Paul Prys are. Oh-oh! I had forgotten aboutthose birds!"
The last exclamation was caused by the staccato yammer of aerial machinegun fire coming to his ears once again. And almost instantly the soundof the guns in the tail of the Wellington was added to the chatter. Daveand Freddy hugged their seats and felt very helpless and useless. Theywere really passengers aboard the plane, and there was nothing theycould do but sit tight. Sit tight--and think.
That was the hard part. Thinking! Because their thoughts were far fromjoyous ones. Dave's hunch had started to come true. In another fewmoments they should have been floating down toward Belgium soil. But allthat was changed, now. Fate had guided night flying German planes totheir position in the sky, and those Nazi pilots were doing their utmostto finish them off right then and there.
"Just as though they knew we were coming, and were hiding in thebushes!" Dave muttered to himself as British and German aerial machineguns hammered away at each other. "Just as though--Ye Gods! Could thatbe true? Do the Nazis know that Freddy and I are--"
He cut off the startling thought short and gulped. Then suddenly thewhole night sky seemed to explode right on the tip of the Wellington'snose. Colored light and sound raced back to crash against Dave andFreddy as though they were things actually made of solid substances.Dave braced himself and squinted forward. What he saw brought a sharpcry to his lips, and he came up off his stool as though a coiled springhad been released under him.
"We're hit, Freddy!" he shouted over his shoulder. "Wiggins and theother chap caught some of that anti-aircraft shell."
Twisting past the navigator's cubbyhole, Dave went forward to whereFlight Lieutenant Wiggins sat slumped over against the controls. Hisweight had forced the Dep control stick forward, and the Wellington wasnow tearing down in a thundering dive. The second pilot had been knockedclean off his canvas seat and was stretched out motionless on thecockpit flooring. Bracing himself, Dave reached out and pulled theunconscious Wiggins back in the seat with one hand. Holding the manthere, he reached down and grabbed hold of the Dep wheel and gave it allof his strength. The nose tried to drag itself down to the vertical, butDave's pull on the stick was too much. Inch by inch the plane's nosecame up, and after what seemed like years the craft was climbing upwardat a slightly flat angle.
"Help me get Wiggins out of the seat!" Dave shouted to Freddy at hiselbow. "I'll take over while you fellows see if they're badly hurt."
"Right you are!" Freddy called out in a clear steady voice. "Here, I'llgive you a hand with Wiggins and this other chap."
Together the boys lifted and dragged Flight Lieutenant Wiggins and hissecond pilot out of the cockpit and back toward the navigator'scubbyhole. The navigator seemed too amazed to lend a hand at first.
"But who'll fly the bus, now?" he gasped when he finally found histongue.
"If she handles something like a Hurricane, don't worry!" Dave shouted,and vaulted into the seat vacated by Wiggins.
The searchlights had once again picked up the Wellington, and Dave hadthe crazy impression of flying right straight through the sun as hehunched himself over the controls. A world of brilliant, blinding lightsmote his eyes, and it was filled with the thundering roar of explodinganti-aircraft shells, and the snarling yammer of death-spitting aerialmachine guns. Instinct and instinct alone guided Dave's movements as hestruggled to wheel and dive that Wellington out of the dazzling whiteglare. He couldn't even see the instrument panel in front of him, thelight was so blinding. However, you don't need eyes to shove the controlstick this way and that. Nor do you need eyes to jump on left or rightrudder pedal.
Perhaps the designers of the Wellington bomber would have torn out theirhair in anguish at the way Dave Dawson booted their brainchild about thesearchlight-stabbed sky over Belgium. But Dave didn't give a thought tothat. Perhaps he didn't fly it real pretty like. But a twin-enginedWellington loaded with bombs isn't exactly like a swift sleek Hurricane,so what the heck? The idea was to cut away from those fingers of lightthat pinned them against the heavens, and that was the only idea. Howthe heck he brought it about didn't matter. That he could do it waswhat counted.
And he did succeed. Without warning the Wellington sliced right into awall of darkness. Dave instinctively reached for the throttles to takestrain off the howling engines, but he checked his hand, and let theplane roar deeper and deeper into that blessed sea of darkness. Thenpresently, when he saw the searchlight beams being frantically swungback and forth across the sky far in back of him, he put the ship in asteady climb and twisted around in the seat.
That is, he started to twist around in the seat, but such movementseemed to make the top of his head fly off. In a flash he realized whatwas wrong. In the excitement his oxygen mask had slipped down off hisface and he could not reach the tube with his lips. Night air waspouring through the shattered section of cockpit glass cowling wherefragments of shrapnel had struck, and the sensation was akin to amillion icy needles pricking the skin of his face and hands. He let goof the controls, adjusted his oxygen mask and sucked the life giving gasinto his lungs. In a second or so he was a new man. He set the controlsf
or level flight, then twisted around in the seat and looked back.
Freddy and the navigator were bending over Wiggins and the second pilot.Even as Dave looked, the flight lieutenant slowly sat up, made a wryface, and put a hand to his head. Dave sighed thankfully.
"Well, he's pretty much okay!" he breathed. "So that's one of them tohandle this bus."
He turned forward for a moment to check the instruments, then scrambledout of the seat and went back. Flight Lieutenant Wiggins saw him andsmiled thinly.
"Much obliged, old chap," he said, and slowly stood up. "Had a hunch youtwo knew something about planes. R.A.F., of course."
The flight lieutenant paused and winked.
"But we won't say a word about what we know," he whispered. "Must keepit very hush-hush, what? And, oh yes, I haven't thanked you for savingour blinking hides, have I? Well, I thank you sincerely, and all thatsort of thing."
"Forget it," Dave said, and grinned at him. "I was only thinking of myown hide. By the way, how's your pal?"
Dave pointed down at the second pilot, who was also sitting up andholding his head in his hands.
"Who, Chubby, there?" Wiggins echoed. "Oh, never worry about Chubby whenhe gets hit on the head. There's nothing inside to hurt, you see. Onyour feet, Chubby. We've got to coast about a bit, and find out justwhere the devil we are, and what happened to the rest of the patrol,too. Then we'll let these two gentlemen off at their stop. Come along,lad. After we've landed, I'll let you look at the cut on _my_ head."
Wiggins tapped his second pilot playfully on the shoulder, and then wentforward and took over the controls. The second pilot got to his feet,looked at Dave and Freddy and shrugged his shoulders in a gesture ofdespair.
"And to think I could have flown with dozens of other Wellingtonpilots," he groaned. "But I had to go and pick a heartless beggar likehim. Ah me! Such is life in the R.A.F., lads. All work, and not theslightest bit of appreciation from your superiors. Good luck!"
Dave and Freddy laughed as the second pilot slouched wearily forward tohis canvas seat. Five minutes later Wiggins had made contact with therest of his patrol, and had relocated his position. Another ten minutesand Flight Commander Wiggins turned the controls over to his secondpilot and came aft to Dave and Freddy. He replied to their questioningglances with a nod.
"Right-o, chaps," he said. "We're at seventeen thousand and about sixmiles south of Antwerp. Chubby will cut the engines and take her downanother couple of thousand. A free fall will take you out of the PaulPrys in case they hear us and start poking around. And many thanks againfor saving the ship. Chubby and I will always think kindly of you, verymuch so. Well, good luck again."
"Don't thank us," Dave said, and jerked his head toward the tail. "Thankyour tail gunner for driving off those night flying planes that werepotting at you. What about the rest of the patrol? Did you contact themby radio?"
"Oh, sure," Wiggins nodded. "One reports getting a Messerschmitt, too.They've gone on. We'll catch up with them after you chaps have steppedoff into space."
"You're continuing the patrol?" Freddy gasped, and looked forward atthe shattered glass of the cockpit cowling.
Flight Lieutenant Wiggins followed his gaze and chuckled.
"Oh, quite," he said. "That hole's nothing. Besides, the night air willkeep Chubby awake, you know. The blighter's always falling asleep andmaking me do all the flying. And also, I couldn't use up gas luggingthese bombs all this distance without dropping them where they'll do themost good."
"And I hope every one is a direct hit!" Dave said grimly, making surethat his parachute harness was properly buckled.
"Me too!" Freddy chimed in. "And I'll give you one guess who I hope youhit right on top of the old bean, too!"
"My, my! What a cold-blooded chap!" Flight Lieutenant Wiggins said inpretended horror. "I don't believe he likes the nasty Nazis a singlebit. Well, neither do I, for that matter. Right-o, Chubby! Dig the sleepout of your baby blue eyes, and slide us down three thousand. Our guestsare leaving us."
The last was shouted forward. Chubby nodded that he had heard and easedback the throttles until the Pegasus engines were just a rumblingmurmur. The nose of the Wellington dipped gracefully and the bomber slidgently down through the night sky. Dave and Freddy moved forward to thebelly door that the navigator had opened up. There they waited untilChubby had pulled the bomber up out of its glide and was prop plowingalong on an even keel. Dave looked at Freddy, and grinned.
"See you, you know where, pal!" he called out. "Watch out you don'tfloat down on a church steeple. Those things are doggone sharp, youknow."
"And you watch out, too!" Freddy cried as Dave got down and let his legshang down through the opening. "And if you get lost, just send me apostcard. I'll come get you. Happy landings!"
"Ditto to you, Freddy!" Dave shouted, and let his body drop down throughthe belly door.