Dave Dawson Over Berlin
by
Robespierre Sidley Bohlen
Copyright © 2012 by Mendel Cooper
All rights reserved, but ...
See the licensing provisions.
Certain historical figures play a role in this book. All the other characters are inventions of the author, and any resemblance to real persons is more than likely a figment of the reader's imagination.
Dedicated to Horace Hackett, who convinced many a naive young idealist that ruthless scheming always trumps talent. Always.
PREFACE
Between the years 1941 and 1946, aviation and pulp writer Robert Sidney Bowen published 15 novels in the Dave Dawson series of juvenile war novels. A sixteenth book in the series, Dave Dawson Over Berlin, never saw the light of day, likely because of the decline of interest in war fiction following the end of hostilities. Still, the question remains -- did Bowen in fact write the book? And if he did, would it have been a work from a more mature, objective point of view? Would Bowen have taken the long view, putting the war in the context of contemporary politics? Would he have filled in gaping voids in the backgrounds of the lead characters and corrected a few awkward misconceptions about the messy realities of death on the battlefield?
For the sake of argument let us for a moment assume that Dave Dawson and Freddy Farmer are living and breathing mortals, with all the warts and flaws of people who have to make the best of it in the real world. Would they not then occasionally be vulnerable to the less admirable human emotions -- avarice, lust, and perhaps even naked, paralyzing fear? And would they be any the less heroic if they did? Perhaps they might even become more sympathetic, full-dimensional characters, and all the easier to identify with. True, children need cardboard heroes at a certain stage in their life, but they eventually grow up and realize that cardboard is a poor material from which to build characters . . . and character.
Listen, folks, in my formative years I stayed up nights reading those Dave Dawson adventures. My parents would sometimes find dusty, falling-apart copies at the Goodwill store and bring them home to me, and it was like giving a life-replenishing drink of cold water to a man dying of thirst. I was a lonely, socially maladroit kid and I formed many of my early ideas of what it means to be a man from the way Dave handled crises and perils. But, at some point that just wasn't enough. I needed a more fully-realized, yes, grown-up version of Dawson to guide me through my own miserable adolescence, with all its own particular crises and perils. Perhaps I should have invented one. Perhaps I am inventing one now.
R. S. Bohlen
05 November 2012
CHAPTER 1: Just Visiting
The Mosquito jinked violently amidst darkly beautiful puffs of menacing flak, but the pilot brought it back to dead level with a savage kick at the rudder pedals. "It does get rather interesting around these parts, old chap," he informed the navigator with typical English understatement. "I'm afraid the locals might not be terribly hospitable to visitors, especially ones bearing bundles from Britain."
"Just tend to business and can the color commentary, kiddo," Dave Dawson shot back. Racing at breakneck speed over the German countryside at treetop level in a plywood crate was a good way to break one's neck, and it might have given him a bad case of heartburn even under more favorable circumstances. Fortunately, his pal Freddy Farmer was as good a plane jockey as anyone could ask for and steady as a rock in a crisis. And Dave would need quite a bit longer to recover his own piloting skills after being badly hurt in the crash landing of the hush-hush Gloster E28 jet fighter prototype a few months back.
Captain Dawson had yet again been seconded to the RAF, this time at the urgent request of Major General Durward Dismay, Operations Officer for the Ninth Air Force. "Dawson, we absolutely must get the lowdown on the operational details of deep penetration bombing missions into the German heartland. Our bomber groups have been undergoing intensive training here in England, and later this year we'll be testing our doctrine of daylight precision bombing under actual combat conditions. We have to know whether it can be accomplished without unacceptable losses, and to that end we will need to benefit from the experience of our British allies."
Dave had just completed an especially difficult assignment for Colonel "Savage Sam" Sullivan of the OSI and was overdue for a long furlough, and that would have been especially welcome because of his budding relationship with a certain member of the fair sex. She happened to be a very special woman. . . .
"Dave, old boy," Freddy had remarked one fine day, "are you bliddy daft, chasing after strumpets, bauds, and barmaids? Just what is this fatal fascination with sirens and loose women?"
"Listen up, old buddy. Risking one's life in wartime makes one all too aware of how fleeting are the joys of this joyless world. Here today, gone tomorrow, as a certain philosopher, whose name I can't at the moment recall, might have said. So, tell me, why shouldn't I sample a few of life's esthetic pleasures? And those long, cold nights do get terribly lonely, as you should well know."
"If only you could meet a respectable woman for a change, you'd forget all about the floozies and doxies. Not to mention the long-legged tavern wenches that go bump in the night. Say, I've never introduced you to my charming sister, now have I, Dave?"
"No, can't say that you have, old friend. But, what makes you think she'd want to waste her time on a wayward weary warhorse, such as yours truly?"
"Come, come, Dave. We've been chums for, what, something like three years now. We've been through thick and thin, fought shoulder-to-shoulder, faced direst danger and dismal death together. In fact, we've shared sufficient adventures to fill more than a dozen volumes. So if there's any romance to be had, well, I say, let's keep it in the family."
"That has a nice ring to it, Freddy. I've certainly had my fill of dreary dalliances and murky melodrama, not to mention assorted hanky-panky, and I'm more than ready for something a bit more substantial. Given a choice, I'd rather do my womanizing with a woman worthy of a fictional hero in, say, a best-selling juvenile adventure series. In short, lead on, my friend."
They say a girl must look after herself, and I suppose that's true
enough, but this is wartime and everything has turned topsy turvy.
Things one used to be able to take for granted have been swept away
by the whirlwind of events. Freddy has been a big help, of course, but
men just can't see things from a woman's point of view. The poor dears
think we only need to be protected and sheltered, and they utterly fail
to realize that we're just as capable and brave as they are. Sometimes
even more so. That's why it isn't enough that I'm safe and sound, as
safe from the carnage of the war as is reasonably possible in these
times. I'm proud of being a Waaf (pronounced waif, with all
the connotations that implies) and I've served my time in the RAF's
Early Warning Centers as a switchboard operator and an operations room
plotter, but really the only danger I was in was from falling bombs,
the same, really, as everyone else. So, one could say I've been
doing my part to help win the war, but somehow that hasn't, well,
fulfilled me.
I've been rather anxious to meet this Dawson chap. Breaking up
with Reggie has left this gaping crater in my life, and while I'm
completely self-sufficient and all that, somehow not being part of
a twosome leaves one feeling so appallingly empty. It's not
just the physical side of it, though that's important, too, and being
a modern woman I certainly appreciate that part of it. It's
the sense of wholeness, of being able to share thoughts and
feelings with someone you're close, so very close to. It's something
one can't really explain, only feel. And some people, men mostly, I'm
afraid, can't feel it, can't share it with you, and they're terribly
diminished as human beings for that. But, I'm afraid I'm prattling
again, and Freddy so dislikes that.
"Why, hullo there, Mr. Dawson. Freddy has had many nice things to say about you over the years. To be sure, I've been just a bit curious about this dashing daredevil from the untamed prairies of the American continent who has had all manner of high adventure under strange stars and skies."
"My friends call me Dave, ma'am."
"Well then, Dave, behold one Frances Farmer, sister to Fred, a girl for all seasons and equal to most challenges. But please do call me Fannie. It's a cheerful sort of name for a cheerful sort of girl, and I'm told that in regard to certain particulars it might be somewhat descriptive." She giggled, then blushed scarlet.
Dave beheld the demoiselle. Freddy's sibling indeed, though to her credit she didn't resemble him in the slightest. If scarcely beautiful according to the prevailing style, she was winsome all the same. Tall, nearly as tall as he himself, pale-complected, violently red-haired and with a liberal sprinkling of freckles, and yes, quite amply proportioned -- classically voluptuous, to be sure -- in all the right places. Strictly speaking, the sobriquet Fanny could be said to apply in the most literal sense, as she had so obliquely hinted.
"My dear Fanny," Dave expostulated after an appropriate interval of contemplative silence, "I have beheld thee and thou hast found favor in mine eyes. And besides that, I like you, kid."
"Prithee, good sir, I am fain to fly asunder in a far-fetched fit of flabbergasted folly should we continue this mad medieval charade more than seems seemly. What say we repair to yon pub for mead and sweetmeats?"
"As milady desires. I am in sore need of repairs. This egregious excess of wanton wordplay hath aroused in me hellacious hunger. By all means, let's go chow down."
"And you say you've dabbled in the art of fine cuisine, Fanny?"
"Just so, Davy, boy. I could cook you a meal that would curl your hair and unstring your bow. If the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, then your heart shan't stand a chance if I should have occasion to feed and cosset you. Hopefully soon, eh? Oh, and have I told you about my vast compendium of recipes?"
"You wouldn't consider putting quill to paper and passing on dribs and drabs of your culinary wisdom? No doubt it would find an appreciative audience. Why, a volume titled Fanny Farmer's Cookbook couldn't help but become a raging commercial success."
Fanny sighed, shut her eyes, and reclined her head on sideways steepled hands. "At present I'm not so much concerned with selling books, Dave. Something else is troubling me."
"What? Can I be of help?"
"I'm afraid . . . afraid you are to blame for it all. You see . . . you see . . . I think I'm falling . . . falling . . . for a certain brave American aviator. But, it's quite hopeless, isn't it? The fearless warrior and the swooning, simpering stick-in-the-mud spinster. Perhaps I should just slink away in the slough of despond and and shut myself in a forlorn room in the high tower of a remote castle."
Dave shook his head slowly, then chuckled. "Getting a bit melodramatic, aren't we, my dear. Besmitten is an all too common affliction in wartime, and surely nothing a girl needs trouble her pretty little head about. And furthermore, it seems to me I might just be developing quite a fancy for a certain silly stick-in-the-mud maiden. I've always been rather fond of playing in the mud, you see."
"Well then, my mad, impetuous, mud-fancying mage, might we then continue this discussion in a forlorn room in the high tower of yon castle and see what develops?"
"And hopefully we will find a remedy for whatever ails you, my darling stick-in-the-mud Fanny."
Is this how it begins? The downhill descent to romance, as inexorable as a mudslide. First comes the longing, then intimacy and the yielding and melting together, and finally . . . marriage, family, domestic tranquility, and all that. Tempting, yes, how very tempting to yield to the yearning for warmth and companionship, and ah, stability in the midst of the ashes of a self-destructing civilization.
And yet, and yet . . . Dawson hoarded, even now, precious, bittersweet memories of one Nasha Petrovski, a battle-hardened officer in the Red Army, but no less a woman of surprisingly fierce appetites of the passions. Somehow, they had ended up in one another's arms in a situation that an author of juvenile military fiction might, for discretion's sake, choose to pretend never happened. Exchanging fervent vows of everlasting love is all too easy when Old Man Death is staring you in the face, as he well knew. And it was all the more painful when the tumult of war tore two lovers brutally asunder. How then could he in good conscience break the heart of yet another girl, much less his best buddy's sister and such an achingly lovely, lonely, trusting child?
It's not often that one gets an engraved invitation to a shindig, especially one with top brass in attendance. But this was, after all, the tenth anniversary of Adolph's accession to power, and Josef and Hermann, no less, were scheduled to give bombastic rants commemorating that. As the CO had made clear, it would be somewhat of an embarrassment for the Nazis if the ceremonies were disrupted. And that's why they were hugging the ground, hopefully below the horizon of Himmelbett air defense radar.
"Bandits at three o'clock!" Freddy yanked back on the control yoke and the plane zoomed skyward to evade the stream of fiery-red tracers flashing past the port wing. "Tarnation and blazes! Got one glued on our tail. Can't seem to shake the bustard!"
"Let's give the experimental remote-controlled dorsal turret a try, Freddy. I'll crank it round and see if I can get a sighting through the aiming scope. Good! Got 'im centered in the crosshairs! Firing! He's trailing smoke! Beautiful! Now he's turning away! Nothing like four streams of hot lead from rapid-fire .303 Brownings to discourage an uninvited guest."
"Well, I must admit it's turned out to be a rather useful plaything, Dave. I wasn't frightfully keen on having that ugly lump marring the clean lines of this bus, but those Boulton Paul technicians were terribly insistent that it could deal with just about anything the Germans could throw against us.
The Boulton Paul Defiant, a British fighter in use in the early months
of the war, relied for its armament on a electro-hydraulic dorsal
turret of quadruple .303 Browning machine guns. This was its sole
offensive weaponry, a fatal deficiency against contemporary German
fighters. As a result, the Defiant sustained heavy combat losses and
was withdrawn from its frontline fighter role in favor of the Spitfire
and Hurricane. Boulton Paul power turrets were tested on various other
aircraft, including the Mosquito, but that particular type of power
turret never caught on. In the final stages of the war, more advanced
types of remote-controlled turrets were employed with various degrees
of success in the P-61 Black Widow night fighter and the B-29 heavy
bomber, among others. The concept of a multi-gun power turret was not
inherently flawed, just the earlier Boulton Paul implementation.
"Dave! Dave! Answer! Why won't you answer?"
Dave had caught a machine-gun slug in his left thigh, and he was gritting his teeth against the pain. Couldn't let Freddy know, or he might get funny ideas about turning around and aborting the mission. As he faded in and out of consciousness, memories of the morning's briefing flashed before his eyes.
"Gentlemen, you are the pick of our best and most experienced crews, and that is why you have been selected to take part in the first daylight bombing raid on . . . on the capital city of the German Reich. Herr Goebbels, along with that strutting peacock Hermann, are scheduled (he pronounced it 'sheduled' in the typical Brit
ish manner) . . . are scheduled to give a major public performance, long-winded speeches celebrating the tenth anniversary of that odious regime. We intend to make it a memorable event by, so to speak, providing the fireworks."
Squadron Leader Arnold acknowledged the polite laughter with a subdued smile, and continued.
"We shall be flying the new Mark VI Mosquitos which, despite being constructed of materials traditionally reserved for pianos and packing crates, are considerably faster than most anything the Huns can throw at us. And we will, of course, have the element of surprise on our side. The 'Nahzees' would never dream we obtained the intelligence on their bloody big bash, much less that we would dare crash their celebration. Well then, we shall certainly do our utmost to be there with paper hats and noisemakers -- very loud noisemakers -- and with streamers flying. Let's give those fine fellows a jolly good show."
For the couple of years following its introduction in 1941, the plywood
de Havilland Mosquito was one of the fastest production aircraft in
the European theater of combat. Its streamlined design and powerful
twin engines gave it a 400+ mph top speed, so it could outrun most
contemporary fighters. Its long range and high load-carrying capacity
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