SALT WATER SPRAY
The Wing Commander seemed bent upon saving the Hendee Hawk for some special show. For two days no call came for Stan and O’Malley. They lounged about, with O’Malley getting as restless as a panther and twice as grouchy. They went over to see Allison and found him sitting up. He would be out in a very short time.
Stan took the opportunity to give O’Malley a course of lessons dealing with the fine points of the Hawk.
“She carries two sticks of bombs when she’s out hunting. That’s something new. They put those sticks on just to pep you up. The other day, when we were zipping through Messerschmitt bullets, I gave them a thought or two. If a cannon ball or a bullet lands just right, off goes the stick of bombs and out you go.” Stan grinned at O’Malley as he spoke.
“Sure, an’ O’Malley will fix that,” the Irishman said. “We pick a nice spot and drop them firecrackers.”
“I’m glad you suggested it. It would have been against regulations for me to say anything about it.”
“Sure, we might find a Jerry to pop them down on, but no matter, they are no fit things to be kapin’ tucked under your wings whilst you’re sky scrappin’.” O’Malley shook his head.
“We’ll try them out. This is the best dive bomber that was ever built. You nose her straight down and pull the flaps. She settles herself to a 350 mile per hour pace and when you get your sights set you cut loose. It’s a dead cinch to pot a target that way.”
“Sure,” O’Malley agreed. “Only we aren’t bomber boys.”
They left O’Malley’s room and went to the mess. Stan read the pictorial while O’Malley took a nap. The blaring of the intersquadron speaker roused them. The Irishman’s feet hit the floor and he was awake at once.
“That’s us,” he mumbled.
“It’s everybody else, but it’s not us,” Stan growled.
It seemed the Group Captain and his men gathered around the map in headquarters had forgotten all about the Hendee Hawk.
“That’s the trouble in being a one-ship flight,” O’Malley muttered. “If we had three Spitfires we’d be up there now.”
An orderly entered and ran across to Stan. “Wing Commander Farrell’s instructions for Lieutenant Wilson,” he said as he handed Stan the paper.
Stan unfolded the paper and, with O’Malley reading the order out loud over his shoulder, he scanned the paper. They were to join a flight of Hurricanes and Spitfires setting out to contact enemy planes over the channel. Orders would be broadcast later, but the action was in connection with a naval attack. Their radio call would be Red Flight.
“Sure, an’ we’re still Red Flight,” O’Malley said as he whirled and made off.
They walked back to O’Malley’s room. Over a battered desk hung a piece of the tail of a Dornier showing a swastika and on the desk lay a heavy German pistol, a grim memento of some duel with death he had won.
Surveying these enemy souvenirs, Stan grinned broadly and remarked, “If this war keeps up you’ll be able to furnish a museum.”
O’Malley shook his head disconsolately. “’Tis little enough,” he complained. “This air fighting is bad for picking up such things. Every time I down a plane it’s me bad luck that it smashes to bits and leaves nothing behind for me to remember it by.”
“The ones that smash up feel worse about it than you do,” Stan reminded him.
The Irishman turned serious for one of the few times since Stan had known him. “Faith, an’ I think of them poor devils sometimes,” he muttered. “’Tis hard for them with nothing to believe in. Fighting because they’re told to fight. Crashing to flaming death because one man orders them to. ’Tis a bad state of affairs this world is in, so help me.”
Stan nodded soberly. “The best we can do is to finish the whole show up as fast as we can. And we’d better be getting back to the mess to be ready for a call.”
O’Malley yawned and nodded agreement. “Though it’s not likely they’ll be sending us up again soon,” he muttered pessimistically. “Always coddlin’ us, that’s what they do.”
A few minutes later they were waddling out on the field. The blast of steel propellers sawed through the air as a Spitfire flight warmed up on the cab rank. Cantilever wings vibrated and hummed and figures in coveralls swarmed over and around the planes. Flight sergeants tested throttle knobs and officers dashed about.
“Looks like an extra big show,” Stan said as they moved toward the newly daubed hawk. She looked freakish in her many-colored coat of sky paint. Her motor was idling smoothly.
“Sure, an’ she’s a dainty colleen,” O’Malley purred as he waited for the sergeant to swing down.
“Remember this ship has to come back, so don’t go wild,” Stan warned. “And let me have her when we get ready to unload those sticks of T.N.T. If we crack her up and no record comes in, we won’t get any more Hawks. The brass hats over here aren’t sold on her yet.”
O’Malley was dreamily grinning at the big fighter and didn’t seem to hear him.
The Sergeant swung down and flipped a salute. “That motor is a bit of all right, sir,” he said.
“She is that,” Stan agreed.
They climbed in and got set in their cramped quarters. Seated very close together, with Stan a bit lower than O’Malley, who was at the controls, they pulled up their belts. O’Malley jerked his hatch cover shut and Stan closed his. The Irishman revved up, pinched one brake and gave the throttle a kick. The Hawk spun around with a roar. Stan noted the look of surprise on the Irishman’s face. He hoped O’Malley didn’t ground loop her before they got off.
O’Malley didn’t. He was a born flier and a lover of engines. Before they got the starter’s signal, he had the feel of the big Double-Wasp motor. He took her off with a rush and a zoom, falling easily into place between a flight of Spitfires and Hurricanes. Later a spread of Defiants joined them and still later they overtook a squadron of Hampdens moving steadily out toward the channel. The bombers were loaded heavily and making no attempt to climb up.
“Don’t ye forget we’re pickin’ a target and unloading the bombs.” O’Malley was speaking through the “intercom” telephone.
“Wait until we spot a good target. I want to see what we can do with our sticks of bombs,” Stan answered.
O’Malley began to hum a snatch of an Irish melody. He wasn’t in the least disturbed. For that matter the whole flight was slipping along as smoothly as though on parade.
Then everything changed in a flash. “Naval battle! Naval battle!” O’Malley was bellowing into his mike.
The Hampdens were moving into formation for action against something below and the fighters were peeling off and going down to see them through. Up ahead shells were bursting in the sky and the thunder of big guns rolled up to them.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!”
The big fellows weren’t tossing their shells aloft. They were lobbing them at targets below. Stan shouted to O’Malley:
“Follow the Hampdens down so we can unload!”
“Sure, an’ the quicker the better,” O’Malley bellowed back. He depressed the nose of the Hawk and they went screaming down the chute. In a moment they had a good look at the sea below.
Four cruisers and a string of light destroyers were fighting a running battle with several pocket battleships and a fleet of coastal torpedo boats. An aircraft carrier wallowed alongside the formation of cruisers.
The scene below was a wild mixture of foaming water, smoke and flame from belching guns, and the roll of thunder as the turret batteries fired. The British Navy dogs were trying to get at the pocket battleships. The carrier held her course well west of the line of destroyers. The cruisers were pouring broadsides across the lashed water, and the destroyers, like bull pups, were pounding away, holding station splendidly, trying to reach the enemy. One got a hit squarely on its foredeck and rolled half around, wallowing in the trough. A sheet of flame spurted from a gun turret and rolled over the deck. For a moment the little ship staggered on, then exploded.
“The poor fellers,” grated O’Malley.
Stan said nothing but he felt cold all over. He looked down at the carrier and saw torpedo bombers sliding off her deck like little swallows. O’Malley’s voice chopped off his thoughts.
“’Tis a pocket battle wagon we get, no less,” he almost crooned.
“Thick weather down there,” Stan warned.
The muck of anti-aircraft fire made the stratum above the sea look as though it was on fire. The smoke was stabbed by blossoming shells hurling ragged pieces of iron in every direction. There was a swarm of Messerschmitts and Stukas and Heinkels all messed up with a crisscross of darting, thrusting Hurricanes, Spitfires and Defiants. The Hampdens were not having any better luck in getting through to their objectives than were the Stukas.
“We better set the firecrackers off or we’ll miss one foin scrap,” O’Malley called.
The Hawk dropped upon the battle wagon below
He nosed the Hawk down and sent her into a screaming dive. The little boats that Stan knew were pocket battleships began to grow in size, and the muck swarmed up closer to them with Hades breaking loose around their ears. None of the Messerschmitts tried to stop them. The Jerries thought the odd plane was just another crazy fighter who didn’t know where he was going. The cockpit shuddered and the instruments on the board seemed to dance.
“Set your wing flaps!” Stan screamed. “Set your flaps!”
The Hawk began to steady as O’Malley remembered the flaps and applied them. Holding a plumb line at 350 miles per hour, she dropped upon the battle wagon below. Stan could see the deck of the ship coming up toward them as though a mighty hand were lifting it.
The wind screamed above the din of exploding shells. The gunners on board the battleship were taking notice and frantically trying to swing guns to bear upon the plummeting Hawk. Stan caught his breath and held it. This was exhilarating, almost glorious. He didn’t think about the danger of meeting a bursting shell, all he thought about was the drop and the mighty surge of power. The plane swayed and shuddered as big shells burst close to her.
Then the field of blossoming shells was above them and the deck below was big. They could see men scrambling about, their faces white blobs as they looked upward.
“Left a point,” Stan shouted as he set the bomb sight. “Now right a bit… left more.”
“Ready!” O’Malley bellowed.
“Ready! Hold her steady!”
O’Malley released the bomb selection levers, both of them.
All Stan had to do was to press the button and the sticks of bombs were off. He pressed it hard and almost instantly the ship zoomed upward as though tossed into the sky by a mortar. As they wound upward with the Wasp engine roaring Stan looked back.
Where the deck of the battleship had been there was now a great burst of smoke and flame.
“That card will make ’em watch their course, me bye!” O’Malley crowed.
Stan could not tell whether they had put the pocket battleship out or not. She shifted her course and moved more slowly, but she kept going. Now the Messerschmitts decided the crazy ship was a bomber and not a fighter. They swarmed upon her, which was exactly what the wild Irishman wanted.
Stan went to work with his guns, but he kept track of the doings of his crazy pilot. O’Malley seemed to have gone stark mad. He plunged up into the path of the oncoming fighters and his banks of Brownings opened up. Lead spattered all over the Hawk and a lot of it came through. But two Messerschmitt One-Tens went down before the flock discovered that this new ship had more wicked fire power than a Spitfire. They zoomed and dived and circled like angry hornets.
“They need a bit of educatin’,” O’Malley shouted. “An if they’ll be swarmin’ around I’ll give it to them.”
Stan didn’t answer because at that moment his hatch cover splintered into a million tiny cracks and a maze of ragged holes, the line of bullets moving across not six inches above his head.
O’Malley decided the only thing was to select a Messerschmitt and run him down. He picked one and roared after it. The ME, confident that he had superior speed, darted away. But he soon discovered this strange ship had plenty more engine than his One-Ten. He banked and shot down. O’Malley dived and was on his tail, slicing away great chunks of the Jerry’s ship.
When they came up they were well inside the enemy lines and no Royal Air Force ships were in sight, though the air was full of assorted Jerries.
“Get back on our side of the fence!” Stan shouted.
“Sure, an’ it’s nicer over here,” O’Malley called back.
But a minute later he took Stan’s advice. A Messerschmitt came up from below and a Heinkel dived from above with another ME closing in from the rear. The three fighters raked the Hawk as they closed upon her. Her Double-Wasp coughed and sputtered. She kept on running but her zip was gone and oil and air came sucking back inside her. Stan knew it was the sea for him again.
“Mind getting wet?” O’Malley called back cheerfully as he sent the Hawk down and away from the enemy.
“No, you wild man, but I do mind losing this ship,” Stan shouted back.
“She isn’t lost,” O’Malley called back.
They were sliding down and away from the big fight. Even with a crippled motor the Hawk could show her tail to a Messerschmitt. They saw the Spitfires and the Hurricanes now, battling the Jerries up above, keeping them from opening a path for the Stukas. The cruisers and the destroyers were throwing shells into the sky recklessly and at the same time pounding to pieces two floundering Nazi battleships.
“Sure, an’ it’s a fine show,” O’Malley crowed.
He had hardly finished speaking, when the Wasp backfired savagely, shook herself, then died completely.
“Now, you wild Irishman, slide her home if you can,” Stan rasped.
“An’ what do ye suppose they have carriers for?” O’Malley called back.
“This bus won’t set down on a carrier!” Stan snapped.
He looked down and saw the carrier, her deck looking about the size of a banana peeling. Stan figured the chances of landing on the carrier were about one thousand to one, but he realized that would seem like attractive odds to O’Malley.
The Irishman was circling down upon the carrier in a very businesslike manner. So much so that the crew was running about like wild men. The superstructure panel flashed signals neither Stan nor O’Malley could understand. The little men on the deck fired warning rockets and a couple of flares, and then potted at the Hawk with a pom-pom which splattered the side of the ship.
“A nice welcome to be givin’ the King’s two best recruits,” O’Malley growled.
As Stan looked down, the things that could happen to them ticked through his mind. They could run over the side and be chewed up by the screws, coming up in the wake of the carrier as foam and grease spots. They could top the bow and be smashed under by the monster plowing ahead at thirty knots. They could slap up against the superstructure island and burn there like a huge flare. Stan upped the chances. They were one in a million, not one in a thousand.
He didn’t kick or order O’Malley to bail out, which was the sane thing to do. He didn’t even think about his own chute.
The sailors were signaling again and there didn’t seem to be any welcome letters in the signals. But the deck was clear as O’Malley swung the Hawk into line and set her for the crazy attempt. The panel flipped black and white warnings frantically as they zipped in.
“The wing flaps!” Stan shouted as the idea struck him.
“Sure, an’ I’m dumb,” O’Malley came back.
He set the flaps and they nosed over dangerously, but they slowed a lot. The carrier was rolling about, trying to take her proper position, which she had deserted when she started fooling with this strange Royal Air Force plane. She was now paying no attention to the Hawk at all.
Shells from the pocket battleship sent up huge columns of water alongside. Stan squinted through a bullet hole in his hatch cover. The forward plane lift was down, leaving a neat but restricted patch of deck.
Four long, pen-shaped bombs whistled down from the sky. The sea swallowed them and a second later belched an eruption of water.
The Hawk was settling fast now and it seemed the carrier would get away from her. O’Malley cut the incidence. The Hawk lifted a bit, lunged forward and slid over the edge. Then it squashed down, hit and plunged. Stan could see the flying bridge and many staring, white faces.
O’Malley was showing a rare amount of knowledge of carrier landings. He stalled the Hawk as the deck opened under her, then clamped her down furiously. There was a thud, dull but solid. The Hawk wrenched around, screamed complainingly, then set herself at landing position.
Stan tossed his arm over his face and set himself for the crash that would tear him apart. The blow did not come. He slid his arm down, and all around the ship a ring of red-faced sailors peered at him, some of them grinning broadly. Then a cheer broke out.
O’Malley was first out of the ship. He plumped down on the deck and faced an officer who came charging from somewhere. He saluted solemnly. Standing there, with his flying suit hanging on his bony frame, his hawk face peering at the officer, he looked more like a scarecrow than one of His Majesty’s crack pilots.
“Where did this come from and what is it?” the officer demanded.
“’Tis a dive bomber, the very colleen that smacked that pocket battleship not so far back. An’ ’tis a valuable specimen as must be delivered to His Majesty’s air forces,” O’Malley said gravely.
“Go up on the bridge and report at once,” the officer said and his voice was not so harsh. He had seen the Hawk make a direct hit on the deck of the Nazi battleship.
They clumped up to the bridge, Stan edging in ahead of O’Malley. There ought to be a bit of diplomacy used and he was afraid O’Malley might not use the proper approach to the skipper. The flag officer, who had piloted them to the bridge, saluted smartly and retired. Stan faced a grizzled man of about sixty. Steel-blue eyes regarded him frostily. Then the commander smiled.
“My compliments, gentlemen,” he said. “A mighty fine effort though a bit risky.”
“Thank you, sir,” Stan answered. “This plane is a test job and we felt she was so valuable she ought to be salvaged.”
“I see, so you set that superdemon down on my deck.” He gave Stan a searching look. “Your navy training is good. How does it come that you are not with the sea forces?”
“My friend, Lieutenant O’Malley, made the landing, sir,” Stan said.
O’Malley grinned broadly at the commander. “Sure, an’ it was pure luck, the luck o’ the Irish,” he said.
“You will be cared for and your specimen plane will be landed,” the commander promised. “In fact, I watched you dive bomb that battleship and I believe the navy could use some of this type of ship. I will make a memorandum to that effect.”
As they walked down from the bridge, Stan looked at O’Malley. “I never asked you where you learned to fly,” he said. “Could it have been the Royal Navy?”
“It could have been,” O’Malley answered and closed his big mouth tight.
Stan didn’t ask any more questions. They went below and had a good meal. Later they received word from the commander that the carrier was headed across to the Norwegian coast, but they would be sent home by motor launch. The Hendee Hawk would have to wait until the naval patrol swung around their course and slipped into Portsmouth, or some other port.
“How long will the swing take?” Stan asked.
The young officer who had delivered the message shook his head. “One never knows.”
They had to be satisfied with that. No one could tell what the squadron would run into, or when their course would be changed. Nor, of course, whether the carrier would ever see port again. In the meantime all they could do was trust to luck that the Hawk would be delivered ashore somehow. They were fortunate that they were being sent back by a motor launch and wouldn’t have to accompany the squadron across to the Norwegian coast.