CHAPTER ELEVEN
_Moscow Magic_
Freddy Farmer heaved a long sigh, and shifted, around a little so thathe could glance out the bomb compartment window. But what he saw wasexactly the same picture he had seen ten minutes before. In fact, it wasthe same picture he had been looking at for the last two hours or more.Nothing but mass upon mass of dirty grey clouds through which theWellington bomber prop-clawed, as though it could go on forever, andstill there'd be clouds.
"Great grief!" the English youth suddenly groaned. "I've seen enoughclouds to last me for the whole war. And two or three other wars, forthat matter."
"You and me both!" Dave Dawson grunted, and squinted out the littlewindow on his side. "Talk about your blind flying! This sure isn't anyfun for Squadron Leader Freehill, and Navigator Parsons, up front. I'mglad I'm a passenger on this trip."
"Not me!" Freddy said with a shake of his head. "I'd much rather bedoing something, instead of just looking at this stuff. However, Isuppose we shouldn't complain. With this soup all around, any Jerryplanes on the prowl are bound to miss us."
"Unless they should happen to plow into us head on!" retorted Dawsonwith a grin. "I guess Freehill isn't very happy. He probably figures, bynow, that we're bad luck. He was counting on a brush or two with Jerryplanes. If this stuff holds all the way to Moscow, he'll have all he cando to find the field and get us down okay. He--What's on your mind,pal?"
Dawson checked himself, and then spoke the last because Freddy Farmerhad suddenly stiffened, and pressed his nose against the glass of thecompartment window. For a full thirty seconds the English-born air aceacted as though he hadn't heard. Then he turned from the window and madea face.
"Just my imagination going a little haywire from it all, I fancy," hesaid. "Thought for a moment there I'd spotted Messerschmitt wingsthrough a break in the stuff. But it must have been shadows. It wasn'tthere the second look I took. Well, I wonder just where we are, and howfar from Moscow?"
Dawson glanced at his wrist watch and shrugged.
"Another hour at least, I guess," he said. "Longer, if we've run intohead winds. Let's go forward and find out from Freehill."
"You go," Freddy Farmer suggested with a yawn. "I'm quite comfortable,thanks, though terribly bored. Find out all the details, my good fellow,and then report back to me. There's a good chap."
"And who was your valet last year?" Dawson growled, and got up onto hisfeet. "Nuts, I'll report back to you! You can just stay sprawled outthere, and wonder."
"Sorry, old thing," Freddy Farmer grinned after him, "but I can't bebothered doing even that. Let me know, anyway, when we arrive at Moscow.I wonder if Stalin will be there at the airport to meet me?"
"He won't!" Dawson snapped, and started forward. "Stalin has sense!"
Leaving Freddy to mull that one over, Dawson made his way along thecatwalk to the navigator's compartment. Flight Lieutenant Parsons wasbent scowling over his chart table, so Dave didn't pause to askquestions. He continued on by and finally slipped into the co-pilot'sseat. Squadron Leader Freehill glanced over at him and grinned sadly.
"Looks like a bit of a washout for our hopes, what?" the pilot murmured,and let go of the controls long enough to wave a hand at the walls ofcloud that pressed in from all sides. "Don't mind, do you, if we finallysit down in Iceland, or some place like that? Old Parsons is about readyto cut his throat. Mostly instrument and dead reckoning now. We don'tdare open the radio and ask for a bearing. The Russians probablywouldn't give it to us, anyway. It would reveal their station locations,too. Well, we've got plenty of gas, anyway."
"Now I'm all cheered up," Dawson replied with a grin. "I had thoughtthat maybe you had no idea where you were."
"Oh, perish the thought!" the other said with a chuckle, and pointed afinger downward. "Always know where I am. The ground is that way,straight down eighteen thousand! But don't ask me who owns thatparticular bit of it. Blast this stuff, though! When in the world are wecoming out of it?"
Dawson only half heard the last. What he took to be slight movement offto his left had suddenly caught and held his attention. He stared hardat the spot, but for all of his effort he could see nothing but dirtygrey clouds. True, they were a bit lighter in spots: an indication thatthe sun was doing its best to burn a path through. But the stuff wasstill too thick for the sun's efforts to make more than a faint glowhere and there. However, just as Dave was about to turn his head andlook at Squadron Leader Freehill, he caught a glimpse of movement again.And this time he saw something that brought him up straight in the seat,and started his heart to hammering against his ribs.
Just off the right wing, and no more than a hundred feet below, half ofa German Messerschmitt wing had cut out into clear air, and instantlycut back in out of sight again. But he had seen the square-tipped wing,clearly. And he had also seen the black cross outlined in white. SoFreddy Farmer's imagination hadn't been going haywire! There was a Jerryship up there in the air with them! But for what reason? Was the Jerrylost, and milling around trying to find his way home? Or was he playingcat and mouse with the Wellington, and keeping tabs on its flight almostdue eastward?
Dave asked himself the question, but he didn't bother guessing around atthe answer. Instead, he kept his eyes on the spot where he had seen theMesserschmitt wing, and reached out with his near hand to rap Freehillon the arm.
"We've got company, sir!" he called out. "Just saw a hunk ofMesserschmitt One-Ten wing cut up into clear air off to starboard anddown a hundred feet."
"Really?" came the excited answer. "Do you think he spotted us? Could beone, you know. Parsons figures that we're about over the middle ofOccupied Latvia. Just one, eh?"
"Just one, I saw," Dawson replied, and continued to bore the dirty greyclouds with his eyes. "Maybe he's some lost Nazi tramp, or maybe he'sup here on purpose looking for us. How about buzzing Sergeant Dilling tospin his wave length dial? Maybe he'll pick up that bird talking toground stations--or some of his pals in the air with him."
"Splendid idea!" Squadron Leader Freehill said instantly. "I'll do that.Stand by, half a moment, and keep your eyes skinned."
Dawson heard Freehill mumbling words over the inter-com to theWellington's radioman, but he didn't bother straining his ears to catcheach word. He kept his head turned to the right, and his eyes roamingabout the masses of dirty grey clouds. Perhaps four minutes dragged by,and then suddenly he felt Squadron Leader Freehill's hand on his leftshoulder.
"Top-hole idea, that!" the British bomber pilot shouted. "Just got areply buzz from Dilling. He picked up a little something. Seems thebeggar is up here tailing us, and keeping the ground informed. Thatmeans there must be clear air soon, and the beggars will be there tomeet us. Splendid, I say! They'll wish they hadn't, I fancy!"
Dawson grinned, stiff-lipped, but didn't say anything for a moment, ortwo. It wasn't that he didn't welcome a scrap with Nazi planes. Well,not exactly. The point was that Freddy and he didn't have time right nowto mill around the sky with Nazi pilots. This wasn't a patrol with achip on his shoulder. This was an emergency flight to Moscow, and thesooner they got there the better it would be. No, a mess of NaziMesserschmitts suddenly blocking the way wouldn't be a diversion that hewould exactly welcome now. Freddy and he had a mission to carry out, andto get shot down, and be forced to bail out over enemy-occupiedterritory, would of course knock the whole carefully worked out planhigh, wide and handsome. No! To be truthful, he wanted very much _not_to meet any German planes this trip. For once he had no desire to givebattle to Hitler's black-winged vultures. He wanted only to arrivesafely in Moscow, and as quickly as this Wellington bomber could get himthere. However, if--
He had automatically slipped on the co-pilot's inter-com head phones, soat that moment he heard Freddy Farmer's sharp, clear voice.
"A Jerry One-Ten dead astern of us, Squadron Leader!" Freddy reported."I'm at the tail gun now. The blighter knows we're here. Shall I openfire?"
Freehill glanced over at Dawson and caught the Yank's quick no
d andgrin.
"Blast the beggar, of course!" he called back. "Shoot the Iron Crossright off his tunic, old thing. And--"
And that was all Squadron Leader Freehill said for the moment. He cuthimself off short, and for a very good reason. The wall of dirty greycloud suddenly ended as clean as a whistle. The Wellington went zoomingout into a world of brilliant sunshine--and considerably more thanthat. To Dave, snapping his eyes forward, it seemed as though half theGerman Luftwaffe were milling around in the air directly ahead. He tookone swift glance at the aerial picture, and then jerked off hisinter-com phones, tore out of the co-pilot's seat, and went chargingback to the blister gun turret amidships.
By the time he had reached the blister and was swinging his twin gunsinto position, the air all around was alive with German planes, and theentire heavens shook and vibrated with the savage snarl and yammer ofaerial machine guns, plus the louder, deeper note of aerial cannon fire.
As though Lady Luck had simply been waiting for Dawson to swing intoaction, the square-cut wings of a One-Ten came smack into his sights.Instantly he jabbed the electric trigger button, and the One-Ten just aspromptly acted as though it had suddenly flown right into a brick wall.Both its wings came off as though sliced by a knife. The fuselage rolledover twice, and like a crazy rocket went zooming upward to smash squareinto a second One-Ten banking off to the side. A burst of flame followedthe mid air crash, and the whole blazing mass went slithering down outof sight, leaving behind a long trail of oily black smoke.
The instant the mid-air crash took place, Dawson whipped his eyes off itand swung his guns to bear on a third One-Ten. Before he could press thetrigger, though, he heard Freddy Farmer's guns in the tail startsnarling. And the Messerschmitt simply wasn't there any more. It wasjust a shower of pieces falling downward through the golden sunshine.
No cheer of joy broke from Dawson's throat, though. There were threeOne-Tens down, and maybe a couple of others that Freehill and SergeantDilling and Flight Lieutenant Parsons had nailed. But there were stillten times that number of German planes still twisting and boring in, andraking the Wellington from spinning props to rudder post with theirfurious fire. Dawson wasn't sure, but he thought he could feel thebomber shake and tremble as each new burst of bullets tore into it.
He didn't bother to look around, though, for any signs of damage. He wastoo busy holding up his end of the terribly uneven fight, smacking andslapping away at anything winged that came into his sights, and silentlydamning the invention known as the aircraft detector. The aircraftdetector, of course, explained the presence of all those German planes.The Nazis, if Air Vice-Marshal Leman's wire was to be believed, knewthat the Wellington would be heading for Moscow. Maybe they hadn't knownthe route to be flown in advance. But they didn't have to know it.Aircraft detectors all up and down the German-occupied coast of Europewould have been constantly on the alert. Any aircraft heard that couldnot be identified as Nazi would have been investigated instantly, ofcourse.
That explained that lone Messerschmitt flirting about with theWellington in the clouds. Its pilot had spotted them, judged theircourse, and communicated with ground stations. And--and there were theaerial butchers waiting for the Wellington the instant it cameprop-clawing out into clear air.
"So if you want it this way, then okay!" Dawson roared impulsively, andlet fly at a brace of One-Tens cutting around to catch the bomber in acold meat cross-fire.
Perhaps, if they had been given a few seconds more, the Nazis would havesucceeded in their goal. But Dawson's deadly fire put an end to theattempt, and a very speedy end, too. A two second burst caught theOne-Ten on the left square in the cockpit. The pilot died instantly,and so he couldn't control the One-Ten from veering off drunkenly to theother side. Too late the other Messerschmitt pilot saw what was headedhis way. True, he made a very good try, but it wasn't any better than notry at all. The One-Ten with a dead pilot at the controls whanged upinto his belly, and speared him like a fish. Seconds later there wasjust a great big ball of seething flame flip-flopping down intooblivion.
"Seems to be the day for Nazis ramming into each other!" Dave gaspedout, and swung his guns for a new target. "Well, that's--Hey! Well, whatdo you know? Hey, _everybody_! See what we've got to help us. Boy, ohboy!"
Dawson wildly shouted other things, but in his great joy he didn't evenknow what he said. All he was conscious of was the very delightful factthat there were other besides German wings in the air about theWellington. There were planes with the Red Star of the Soviet Air Forceon the wings and fuselage. They were the swift and deadly Russian "Rata"One-Sixteen B pursuit aircraft, powered by special 1,000 hp.M-Sixty-Three engines of Wright "Cyclone" design. Out of the sun theyhad come like so many crazed hornets on the rampage. And even as Davesaw them, four German Messerschmitts simply broke apart in the air andfell away out of sight.
It was one of the most perfectly executed aerial attacks Dawson had everwitnessed. Each Russian pilot seemed to know just which Messerschmitt hewas to handle. And he went right smack at his victim and did the jobwith the least amount of bullets possible. In fact, the arrival of thoseSoviet Ratas was almost as though invisible hands had swept an invisiblebroom across the skies, and taken three fourths of the GermanMesserschmitts along with it. The other fourth that was missed by theinvisible broom didn't hang around for a second sweeping. EveryLuftwaffe pilot dropped the nose of his plane, and got out of there asfast as his screaming engine could take him. A flight or so of the Ratasgave chase, just to keep the Messerschmitts on their way, while theother Rata pilots took up close escort position on all four sides of theWellington, and above it.
A little over half an hour later Squadron Leader Freehill sat thebullet-riddled Wellington down at the Moscow airport as lightly as afeather floating on a strip of velvet. A few of the Ratas landedalongside, and the aerial cavalcade taxied over to the huge camouflagedhangars. Both Dawson and Freddy Farmer were up front with Freehill bythen, and they all saw the small group of high Soviet military officialswho were waiting for the Wellington to taxi in.
"Either of you chaps the President of the U.S. in disguise?" theSquadron Leader asked with a chuckle. "Quite a reception committee hereto greet you. That tall, dark chap on the left is none other thanColonel General Vladimir, in case you don't know."
"I didn't," Dave grunted.
"Nor did I," Freddy Farmer echoed.
"Well, as the Yanks would put it," the Squadron Leader said, "Stalin andVladimir are the two chaps who really make the Soviet tick. Vladimir hasmore titles, and is in charge of more things, than you could shake astick at. That he is here to meet you two chaps must mean that you arevery important lads in this war business."
"That lets me out," Dawson grinned. "Of course, maybe the Russians havesuddenly decided to learn to drink tea, and that's why Farmer is makingthis trip. I wouldn't know. My job is simply to trail him around andsee that he doesn't get into trouble. You know, internationalcomplications?"
"Rot!" Freddy snorted. "Why not tell the Squadron Leader the truth? Tellhim that the Russians are simply anxious to see a crazy, balmy Yank whosomehow manages to keep on missing Nazi bullets. And that I'm along toprevent the Russians from putting you in a museum!"
"Well, I was wondering about your secret," Freehill laughed. "Now Iknow, definitely. Anyway, I fancy we'll be parting company soon. But allkind of luck, chaps. And if you happen to be going back by this way, Iwish you'd let me know. I'll put in the request to pilot the returntrip. Didn't get half the Jerries we could have, if the Russian chapshadn't shown up, you know. Maybe we can do better next time, what?"
"Well, we can try," Dawson said absently, and stared at the group ofRussian officials who were now walking out toward the taxiing bomber.
"Yes, quite!" Freddy Farmer also murmured absently. "A very nice bomberteam we make. Quite!"