CHAPTER THIRTEEN
MYSTERIOUS ISLAND
No familiar faces greeted _Rosy O’Grady’s_ crew at the Mau Riverairport. A new bomber command was based there. Three more forts, Barrylearned, were due to join it within the week. Until they arrived therewould be no mass raids on enemy targets.
_Rosy’s_ first job was a reconnaissance flight to the northwest. Therehad been signs of enemy concentration among the islands west of PointD’Urville. Headquarters wanted to learn what it meant.
_Rosy O’Grady_ took off with the first faint dawn light. Her bomb rackswere full. In addition, she carried a few score of four-poundincendiary bombs. She was “loaded for bear,” and eager for a fight.
At 10,000 feet, Barry Blake turned westward. As they flew along thecoast, the gunners in the top and tail turrets watched the sky for Japplanes. The pilots and the bombardier scanned air and sea ahead.Suddenly Chick Enders leaned forward on his perch in the nose, with ashout of discovery.
“What do you see now, bombardier?” Barry asked. “Some more grassskirts?”
Chick Enders ignored the gibe.
“Look at that little island, just offshore,” he said sharply. “There’sa white streak stretching north from it, like the wake of a ship.”
“It is, at that!” cried Hap Newton. “A boat of some kind must have putinto a hidden cove there.”
“That island isn’t big enough to shelter any vessel that could makesuch a wide wake,” Barry Blake declared. “Could the island itself bemoving, Chick?”
“It is!” the _Rosy’s_ bombardier yelped. “The thing is a Jap vesselcamouflaged with palm fronds. Give me a run on it, Skipper ... _now_!”
Barry’s touch on the controls did not shift. Without altering itscourse by a single point the flying fort kept straight on up the coast.
Chick groaned.
“Why did you pass up such a chance, Barry?” he asked. “We could havelaid an egg right in the middle of that floating brush heap.”
“Two reasons,” the young skipper replied. “First, there are four shipsat least in that floating island, and two or more may be cruisers.Splitting their formation would only prolong the job.... Second, I wanta better look at their scheme of camouflage before we blow it topieces.... Sergeant Babbitt, you will radio the airport what we haveseen, and say that we are about to attack.”
He swung the Fortress a few points to the left and nosed down.
“Tail gunner from pilot:” he said through the interphone. “Let me knowas soon as that fake island is out of sight.”
A few minutes later Tony Romani’s voice came through.
“Pilot from tail gunner: Floating island has dropped below the bulge ofthe coastline.... Are we going back, sir?”
“Right now, Tony!” the skipper told him.
Keeping the land mass of New Guinea between him and the Jap vessels,Barry turned his plane around. Lower and lower he took her, until_Sweet Rosy O’Grady_ was skimming only a few hundred feet above thesea. Tree tops nearly grazed her belly turret as she swept over a bluntheadland, into sight of the camouflaged ships.
“We’re going over ’em at two thousand feet, Chick,” Barry warned. “Beready to drop a whole stick of bombs on the target.”
“Look!” yelled Hap Newton. “There’s a swarm of landing barges betweenthe fake island and the shore. They’re crammed with Jap troops.”
“We’ll take care of them later,” Barry said grimly. “Here we go,bombardier.”
“Roger!” Chick’s answer came back ... and an instant later: “Bombsaway!”
Hard upon his words came the blast—a multiple explosion so terrificthat it tossed the great Fortress like a feather. Later her crew foundthat it had torn all the fabric off her ailerons and elevators.
Barry climbed his ship, and came back. There was no more “floatingisland”—only three burning Jap transports and the two broken halves ofa fourth, just settling into the waves.
A puff of smoke blossomed just beyond _Rosy O’Grady’s_ right wing-tip;another, to the left and rear. The gun crews of the stricken transportswere only now reaching their weapons. _Rosy’s_ sudden re-appearance,close at hand, had taken them entirely by surprise.
Barry Blake swung his ship shoreward and nosed down.
“We’ll risk the shell-fire,” he said briefly. “Our first job is todestroy those Japs landing on the beach. Be ready to fire all guns.”
At a thousand feet the big bomber roared between the burning ships andthe shore. Her nose and tail and belly turrets spat .50-caliber death.Beneath her the Jap soldiers in thirty landing barges fired theirrifles upward in frantic reply. Through the side gun-port Fred Marmonhosed lead at the deck of the nearest transport.
Twice more the flying fort swept back over the same course. Shells fromthe Jap ships missed her narrowly. Some of the bursting antiaircraftfragments struck her fuselage and rudder. But the Jap landing force waspractically wiped out.
Sinking barges drifted aimlessly, filled with dead men. Some of thesoldiers jumped overboard, only to die in the water. Curly Levitt withhis side-gun mowed down the one bargeful that made the beach.
After that run, Barry did not turn his ship until well beyond the rangeof Jap shell fire. At ten thousand feet he swung back. The three Japtransports were much farther apart. The nearest one was drifting andburning more fiercely than ever. The others were zig-zagging.
A sudden sheet of flame shot up from the drifting vessel. In a space ofseconds her superstructure went to pieces.
“She’s done for,” Chick Enders said. “Give me a run on the farthestone, Skipper. I’ll try to drop an egg right down her stack.”
“Hap and I will do what we can to help you,” Barry answered, “at tenthousand feet. We have those last two ships in the bag. There’s no needto risk _Rosy O’Grady_ at point-blank range.”
Chick’s first attempt was a near miss—the Jap helmsman was too good atdodging. On his run over the second transport he scored a hit. Thefive-hundred-pound bomb struck her stern, crippling her steering gear.
“Nice work, bombardier!” Barry applauded. “Now we can concentrate onthe last target.”
A shell burst from the stricken craft slammed chunks of jagged metalthrough _Rosy’s_ tail assembly. The big bomber lurched.
“Tail gunner from pilot:” Barry spoke into the phone. “Are you allright?”
“That flak missed the turret, sir,” Tony Romani answered. “But I cansee daylight through the fuselage just behind me.”
“The rudder and elevators still work,” Barry told his crew. “That’s asnear a hit as I want, though. Let’s get this job done.”
On his next run Chick Enders accomplished the nearly-impossible. Hisbomb plunged down the transport’s stack and exploded in her bowels. TheJap ship simply crumpled up and sank, like an old tin can.
The one ship left afloat was burning fiercely from stem to stern. Noboats or barges had been lowered. Those Japs who had survived theflames were now swimming in the shark-infested water.
“Here come three of our forts from Mau River!” Hap Newton cried,pointing to the east. “Boy! Will they be sore when they see what we’veleft!”
“Just a few bones on a broken platter!” Barry exulted. “We had all thecold turkey and cranberry sauce. Switch over to the radio and let’shear what they’re saying, Soapy!”
Few of the other crew’s comments were cheerful, but Barry soothed theirdisappointment.
“You might possibly find a force of Jap warships farther up the coast,sir,” he told the commanding officer, Major Browne. “My guess is thatthey were landing troops for a night attack on our airport. In thatcase they’d be expecting some naval units to come after dark and‘soften up’ the field for them with shell fire.”
“That’s good reasoning, Lieutenant Blake,” the major agreed. “We’llsearch the coast toward Point D’Urville. _Sweet Rosy O’Grady_ looks tome as if she needs a little patching before she goes hunting moretrouble.”
“_Rosy_ needs bombs, too,
” Chick Enders remarked, as they headed forhome. “She’s had a pretty good day’s hunting, even if she didn’t finishher patrol. By the way—how do you think those Japs rigged theircamouflage, Skipper?”
“With rope nets, I’d say,” Barry replied. “I noticed some of the stuffdrifting alongside the ships, after the first bombs struck them. Ithink they strung their nets over the masts and superstructures andfastened the tops of jungle trees to them. They used bushes to coverthe sides. The one thing they couldn’t hide was the ship’s wake.”
“They’d planned to have all their troops ashore a little aftersunrise,” Curly Levitt put in. “If we hadn’t come along, they wouldhave left a force here strong enough to take over our airfield andperhaps two or three more.”
Five minutes after landing, Barry Blake and his crew were making theirreport to the officer in command of the airport, Colonel Bullock.
“You men have written a great page in Fortress history today,” theofficer declared when they had finished. “Four transports and thousandsof enemy troops sent to the bottom within a few minutes! That wouldhave been a nice bag of game for a whole squadron. I have an idea thatdecorations will be coming to all of you for this feat. You’ve earned afew days’ rest, too, but I’m afraid you won’t get it.”
“We shan’t mind that, sir,” Barry said with a smile. “We like actionbetter than sitting around and fighting mosquitoes. Is there somespecial mission for us?”
Colonel Bullock’s gaze shifted to the slice of blue sky framed in thetent door.
“No, not yet,” he replied, frowning. “But the enemy is massing hisstrength for another big land, sea, and air attack. Our steady gains inthe South Pacific have cost him too much. He is due to strike back,hard.”
There was a brief silence. Glancing at his crew, Barry saw their facestighten with eagerness.
“The sooner they come the better, sir—so far as we’re concerned,” hesaid.
The colonel rose to his feet, smiling.
“That spirit will win this war for us, son,” he said. “It’s won everywar we Americans have fought. But here at Mau River we’re still shortof planes and men. I shall see to it personally that _Sweet RosyO’Grady’s_ repairs are rushed through. In a day or two we may needher—badly!”
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Barry Blake of the Flying Fortress Page 13