CHAPTER SIXTEEN
_Blazing Doom_
One, two, three seconds slipped by before Dawson could move a singlemuscle. It was as though invisible hands of steel held him powerless.Only his eyes and brain seemed able to function in that short space oftime. His eyes saw the top left section of his glass hatch melt away asif by magic. His brain told him the shambles that was suddenly made ofhis instrument board and radio panel would never in all this worldpermit him to contact his Casablanca base. The golden moment hadcome--and gone.
Keeping alive was his prime concern now. The Grim Reaper was savagelystriving to cut life short for one Yank air ace!
In three seconds Dave Dawson became a flying madman. Instinct, andinstinct alone, caused him to whirl the Lockheed up, over, and down in ahalf roll. Hardly had he started the maneuver, than he kicked the shipover on wing and came around back and straight up toward the sun-filledsky. Not until he had reached the peak of his power zoom did he take somuch as a second for a look around. But now he did race his eyes aboutthe sky, and rage boiled up within him as he saw three GermanMesserschmitt 109's pulling out of furious power dives, and prop clawingaround and up in an effort to "box" him in a perfect cross fire.
"Not today!" he thundered wildly, and dropped the nose of his Lockheed."You had one swell chance, because I was too dumb a sap to think ofkeeping eyes in the back of my head. That's the only chance you'll get.You didn't make good, and now it's my turn. Hey! You there on the right!How do you like _this_ for a tasty dish?"
As he shouted the words, he touched right rudder a bit and slammed downalmost at the vertical, straight for one of the power-zoomingMesserschmitts. The German pilot must have thought that ramming was theone idea Dawson had in mind, because the Nazi plane suddenly fell overon its side and started to circle away to avoid a mid-air crash. Butramming was not Dawson's idea. No, not while he had slugs for his aerialmachine guns and shells for his air cannon. However, he waited until thelast second before he gave the Nazi aircraft everything the Lockheedhad. The almost instantaneous result indicated that it was much, muchmore than enough. One minute the Messerschmitt was curving away, and thenext it just wasn't there any more. That is to say, it was just a showerof flaming and smoking embers falling away to the sun-scorched Saharafar below.
"One!" Dawson bellowed, and cut his fire.
Yes, one! And that left two others in the sky. However, those two werecrafty veterans of the _Luftwaffe_, and they had not been wasting time.Nor had their actions been with the idea of getting away from the wild,mad flying Yank eagle. On the contrary, they had simply maneuvered toawait their time. And that time came as Dawson cut his fire and startedto wheel up out of his thunderous power dive.
As he started up, those two let fly at him. Maybe both hit the mark, ormaybe one of them missed completely. But what did it matter? The markwas hit, and the "mark" was Dawson's plane. The air all about him seemedsuddenly alive with tracer smoke, and the Lockheed Lightning acted asthough it was about to fly right out from under Dave. He was hurled backagainst the headrest with a force that filled his head with winkingstars. Then the Lockheed whipped up over on its back, dropped its noseand headed straight down like a meteor gone berserk. Thunder roared inhis ears, and before his eyes exploded and flashed all the colorcombinations in the world. In his nose was the acrid stench of smoke.
"Your turn, this time, pal!" he heard his own voice shout, as he wenthurtling downward. "No! No, it isn't, darn it! _You're_ not hit._You're_ okay! Hit the silk, you dope! Bail out! Hit the silk! If you--"
He choked off the rest, or rather fear choked off his words, as hesuddenly heard the renewed bursts of savage aerial machine-gun fire. Hisship shot to ribbons, and falling to earth in flames, yet those two Nazivultures were still pumping death at him.
"But why not?" he reasoned. "They're Nazis, aren't they? What else wouldyou expect these killing rats to do?"
Even as the thought slipped across his brain, a new one crowded close onits heels. Rather, it was a realization. The realization that there wasnot one bit of pain in his body as he struggled to free himself from theburning Lockheed. And also that no ribbons of tracer smoke were cuttingpast him. So what were the Nazis shooting at? At each other, or--
Before he could finish the question he had managed to fight his way upout of the pit, and dived headlong into sun-filled thin air. But it wasnot his own movements that stopped his unfinished thought. On thecontrary, it was the sight of a wingless Messerschmitt 109 hurtling downto its doom about three hundred yards from where his own body seemed tohang in mid air.
"Hey!" he gasped. "Did I get another one? Did I get two, and I'm justfinding out? But how the--"
And he didn't finish that question either. He didn't, because at thatexact instant the gods of war, as though angered by the fact that hestill lived, tried one last time to finish him off. At any rate, at thatexact moment a piece of his riddled Lockheed Lightning flew off.Straight and true as a ball pitcher's perfect strike it cut across theair space toward him. He actually saw it coming out of the corner of hiseye, and he tried to duck as his body slowly tumbled end over enddownward. But he didn't succeed in ducking, or he didn't duck in time.Something hit him a smashing blow on the side of his head, and theentire North African sky blew up in a thunderous roar of sound!
When consciousness returned to Dawson his first hazy impression was thathe was floating about in the middle of a great sea of black ink. But no,not everything was that black. At regular intervals a faint yellowishorange glow appeared before his eyes. But before he could get a goodlook at it the glow faded away out of sight. Instinctively he tried toget his brain to function; to get it to figure out what everything wasall about. However, for a long time he somehow just couldn't force hisbrain to make that effort. He simply lived in a world of hazy snatchesof thought, and inky darkness lighted now and then by a yellowish orangeglow.
Eventually, as though secret curtains had been pulled away inside hishead, memory came slipping back, and he began to discover and realizethings. The first realization was that he was hanging suspended inmid-air and slowly swaying this way and that. The second realization wasthat the darkness was the darkness of night. The third realization wasthat there was a dull throbbing on the left side of his head. And thefourth, and perhaps the most important realization of all, was that hewas dangling at the ends of the shroud lines of his parachute, which washopelessly fouled in the crooked and gnarled branches of a scrub tree.By throwing his head way back he could look upward and see his fouled'chute and the tree branches silhouetted against the billions of starsthat twinkled at him from high overhead. And when he looked down he sawthat rocky ground was not over three feet from the soles of his flyingboots.
That realization filled him with great joy, but it also made him gulp,and caused beads of cold sweat to break out on his forehead. Never aslong as he lived would he be able to remember that he actually hadpulled the rip-cord ring of his parachute whether or not that flying bitof Lockheed wreckage caught him on the side of the head. But he musthave done that little thing, and by the grace of God and Lady Luck hehad not been allowed to strike ground while still unconscious. To havedone so, to have hit ground without being prepared for the landingshock would unquestionably have resulted in a couple of broken ankles,if not legs. Particularly because of the rocky soil under him. However,one chance in a billion had come to pass, and his journey earthward hadbeen checked in the nick of time by the crooked and gnarled branches ofthe scrub tree.
"Or maybe it's just a dream!" he whispered hoarsely as he fumbled at thesnaps of his parachute harness. "Maybe it's just a cockeyed dream, andI'm going to wake up stone dead!"
The words he spoke, however, were just a means of letting off pent upsteam. He got the 'chute harness snaps undone, grabbed the straps withboth hands and slowly lowered himself until his feet touched solidearth. However, his body had experienced so much swaying motion that hissense of balance was all upset. And no sooner did his feet touch, andhad he let go of the harness s
traps, than he fell stumbling down ontohis hands and knees, and his brain started to spin furiously.
For the next few moments he was content to sit on the solid earth andwait for his brain to stop spinning and for fresh strength to flow backinto his body. Then finally he slowly arose and peered about in thedarkness. Just where he had come to earth he hadn't the faintest idea,but it seemed a good guess that he must be somewhere in the region ofthat weird group of shrub-covered hills that marked the spot where hehad seen those Junkers 88's go down to land. That guess caused countlesslittle fears to start pecking at his brain. How close to that secretbase was he? How come he had been left hanging unconscious on hisparachute shroud lines for the rest of the day? Where was Freddy Farmer?Had Freddy really been trailing those bombers, too? Had he reported thelocation to Casablanca base? Or was his radio truly dead, and didCasablanca base still not know the truth? What time was it, anyway? Hadhe been unconscious for just a few hours? Or had it been for a day and anight, and had Goering's Snoopers already roared out from their hiddenbase to do their devilish dirty work?
Those and countless other soul-tantalizing questions whipped and spunthrough his head as he searched about him in the gloom. Suddenly hespotted the yellowish-orange glow once again. He judged it to be perhapsa mile away, but he was unable to see the base of the glow because of arise in the ground. After one good look, though, he knew that it wasflame. Rather, a column of flame-tinted smoke that rose upward into thenight sky. Having seen that same sort of sight at night in other partsof the world, he was pretty sure that the yellowish-orange glow was fromthe burning wreckage of a plane.
"Mine, or that Nazi I nailed?" he asked himself the question aloud."Or--Hey! I remember, now! _Two_ Nazis went down, and I know darn wellthat I only got one of them. I--"
He stopped short, caught his breath and held it as though not daring tolet himself speak.
"Freddy?" the whisper finally came out from between his stiff lips. "Wasit Freddy who piled down and nailed that second Nazi? But--But whatthen? Where did he go? What did he do? I know he didn't have fuel to getback to Casablanca, but if _only_ his radio worked, and he was able totell them the story! Please, dear God, let Freddy have made good whereI--I failed."
For a long minute he stood there motionless as though waiting for theanswer to his question to come drifting down through the night air.Suddenly his hand flew to his holstered service gun, and he whirledaround and down in a crouch. Behind him, he had heard the crackling snapof dry twigs, followed by the rattle of loose stones hitting together,and the faint thud of something falling to the ground.
With his finger crooked about the trigger, and his heart trying toslam-bang its way out through his ribs, he waited for more sound. Andwhen it came to him, he didn't know whether to shout with insane joy, orto break into crazy laughter. He didn't know which to do because thesound he heard was a human voice; a hoarse whispering voice that wasfilled with seething anger. A voice that said:
"Blast, and eternally blast this confounded darkness!"
For five full seconds Dawson was utterly unable to unhinge his frozentongue. The one-in-a-billion miracle left him completely speechless. Itseemed to knock everything out of his head and make all so unreal andfantastic as to be absolutely impossible as an actuality.
"Freddy! Freddy Farmer!" the words finally forced their way past hislips. "Freddy! Can you hear me? Over here, Freddy! Over here!"
As his voice died away to an echo, a tingling moment of silence settledover everything. Then once again he heard Freddy Farmer's voice, like aghost voice from out out of the past.
"Dave, Dave! Keep talking, old chap! I'll follow the sound of yourvoice. Dave, old thing, are you all right? Don't move, Dave! Just keeptalking! I'll follow the sound of your voice!"
"I'm okay, Freddy!" Dawson replied as hot tears of inexpressible joystung his eyes. "And, pal, this is the biggest moment of all, past,present, and future. I'm over this way, kid. I can hear you now. Overhere, Freddy! Gosh, oh gosh! Am I glad to--"
He never finished the sentence because at that moment a darker shadowthan the night suddenly materialized at his side, and in the nextinstant the two air aces were hugging and thumping each other andmumbling a lot of things that neither of them heard, much less paidattention to. Finally, though, they ceased the greeting act and calmeddown.
"Man, Dave!" Freddy Farmer panted. "I thought I'd never reach you. Athousand times I swore I was lost and heading in the wrong direction.Phew! What absolutely unbelievable luck! I'll never forget this as longas I live. Not ever, I swear it!"
"You and me both, Freddy!" Dave echoed the statement. "But look! Youwere trailing those bombers? And it was you who nailed thatMesserschmitt right after I started down in a heap, and--But wait! Tellme this, first. Your radio was okay, wasn't it? And you notifiedCasablanca base, didn't you?"
The air came out between young Farmer's lips in a whistling gasp, and hegrabbed hold of Dawson's arm.
"Dave!" he choked out. "Dave! You mean _you_ didn't let them know?"
Dawson was unable to answer for a moment. His whole body seemed to turninto a solid chunk of ice so that he could hardly breathe. It required atremendous effort to get the words off his lips.
"No, Freddy," he said. "Just as I started to tune in Casablanca, thatMesserschmitt bunch gave me the works and shot my set into splinters.Then--then your radio _was_ out? I tried to raise you several times, butcouldn't."
"The blasted thing went haywire after I'd been in the air only fifteenminutes," the English youth replied. "I had half a mind to turn back toCasablanca, but I didn't dare for fear the Junkers might be down my way.They were. I sighted them coming in over Magador. They were hugging theclouds. I gave them a few miles and then tagged along. I tried to raiseyou, but I didn't get any answer, so I just carried on. About an hourlater I spotted you trailing a Messerschmitt. I tried to rise you again,but still no answer. Then when we got close to here I saw those threeMesserschmitts drop down on you. I was above the lot of you, so I saweverything. Man! I thought I'd die when you did nothing, and just letthem come down!"
"Dumb ape that I am," Dawson said bitterly, "I was so interested inwatching the Junkers that I didn't think to keep an eye on my tail. Iheard your call once, Freddy, though I couldn't spot you. You did getone of them, huh?"
"I got both, with a bit of luck," young Farmer said quietly. "But notbefore one of the blighters had put a bullet through my port engine'soil line. All I could do was force land. I saw your parachute open, andsaw your silk foul in a tree near here. I tried to land as close as Icould, but messed things up something terribly. A blasted awful landing.I was lucky not to have broken my confounded neck. I think I was knockedout for a spell. Fact is, I'm sure of it, because it was late afternoonwhen I collected my senses. I could see this bit of a hill where we arenow, so I started out for here. Good grief, what country! The Alps areeasier to cross than this bit of ground. When it got dark, it was justthree times as bad. But--Well, thank the Lord I finally reached you!"
Dawson said nothing. He simply groped for Freddy Farmer's hand, foundit, and pressed it hard.
"That was rotten luck for you, and just plain dumbness on my part," hefinally got out in a groan. "Those are the two reasons for our failure.Gosh! If I had a knife, I think I'd be tempted to cut my throat. When Ithink how close we came to preventing those bombers from raidingCasablanca, I--"
"But they haven't taken off yet, Dave!" Freddy cried excitedly. "It'sstill not too late, if that's what you're thinking!"
Young Farmer's words seemed to make Dawson's heart swell up and explodein his chest.
"What?" he gasped. "Haven't left yet? But it's well over the time limit,Freddy! According to schedule, the President's party should have arrivedat Casablanca early this evening, and--"
"Maybe it did, but the bombers haven't taken off!" young Farmerinterrupted. "While making my way here, I saw their hidden field fromsome high ground. That was about an hour ago. They had a few oil potflares burning, and I could see the pla
nes. All props were dead. Theyhaven't left yet, Dave. My guess is that the President's party has beendelayed a bit, and _they_ know it! And, Dave! There are more than justJunkers there, too. At least half a dozen Messerschmitt single-seaters,not counting the ones we got, and a two-seater Messerschmitt 110."
"No kidding?" Dawson breathed, and swallowed hard. "Then that checkswith the thought I had. I mean, those bombers have a fighter escort toprotect their secret base in case a stray plane or two found it--likewhat happened to us. But I think the big idea of their being here is tosail out to give the bombers a better chance to get through when the bigmoment comes. They must be 'Number Two Suicide Squad' because they'dnever get back here on the gas they carry!"
"Absolutely!" Freddy Farmer replied at once. "No doubt of it. When thebombers were sure of their target, they'd radio the Messerschmitts tocome on the jump and lend a hand. Dave, old thing, we're not all washedup yet! Don't you understand?"
"And how! I understand!" the Yank air ace said grimly, and got up ontohis feet. "Do you know the way to that secret field from here, Freddy?"
"Yes," the other replied. "But it's about two hours of blasted hardgoing. We've got to be very careful. I think the blighters have patrolsout hunting for us. I heard a few Jerry voices while I was making my wayhere. By the way, that glow over there is your aircraft still burning.Never knew a plane to burn so long."
"So that's what it is, huh?" Dawson remarked absently. Then, reachingout, he gripped Freddy Farmer's hand. "Let's go, pal," he said quietly."Don't ask me if I have any plans, because I haven't a one, yet. Butlet's get to that field and decide when we get there. One thing is inour favor, anyway. We're both still alive and kicking. If you ask me,that's plenty for a starter!"
"Quite!" Freddy Farmer echoed, tight-lipped. "We're both still alive, sowe're jolly well not licked yet!"
"Check, and triple check!" Dawson grunted. "Let's go!"