CHAPTER I
In the darkness before the dawn, the sky was a vault of purple-black, hoarfrosted with the spangles of innumerable stars. The moon, in its dying quarter, was a silver scimitar dangling low on the horizon; the earth below, from this lofty eyrie, was a shadowy disc more sensed than seen.
Ramey Winters, glancing briefly from the illuminated instrument panel into the tree-spired obscurity over which he flew, felt once more, as ofttimes before during these last few weeks, the tugging hand of beauty at his heart, and a curious wonderment that Night's jet mask could so completely disguise the grim world slumbering below.
Burma by day was beautiful—but its beauty was that of the wakened Amazon, bronze-girdled and strident, riding to battle with breasts straitlaced, with soft hands gripping the sword. Steel monsters, heavy-laden, groaned endlessly up the ancient Road which sprawls from Mandalay to Bhamo and Momein, thence, over tortuous ways ripped from sheer precipice by the naked hands of a million unpaid patriots, to Tai-fu and Chunking, carrying arms and supplies to a beleaguered Dragon. Of late there were other rumblings, too. The tramp of shuttling troops, the ominous rasp of mechanized units, the hornet-tone of aircraft winging bases.
So Burma by day; a Burma not yet actively in the War but perilously close. But Burma by night—ah, that, thought Ramey Winters, was another story Burma by night ... seen from the sky. A new land: a sweet, wild land of mystery and charm ... of silver and shadow ... cool, chaste, serene! As untouched and untouchable as the brooding gods of its people. Burma—a land of stirring song and stranger story. Even up here, in these thin heights where the air should be fresh and cool, it seemed to Ramey that his nostrils scented wisps of sandalwood and musk. And beneath the persistent drone of his own motors seemed to tremble the faint, exotic pleading of native pipes.
It was a night of magic. Barrett felt it, too. Red Barrett, hard-boiled and devil-may-care as they come, Ramey's chum and co-pilot—even he felt it. He flashed his teeth at Ramey in an approving grin.
"Pretty, eh, keed?"
"Swell!" said Ramey. "Terrific! Kipling was right. Burma is the most beautiful country in the world."[1]
"Burma?" chuckled Red. "Don't look now, pal, but we ain't in Burma any more. This kite we're flying eats mileage—or didn't you know? See that hunk of silver ribbon below? Well, that ain't a ribbon; it's the Mekong River. We're over either Thailand or Indo-China, or both."
Ramey glanced down swiftly. Barrett was right. The sullen blackness below had suddenly been laced with a shining spiral of silver; the mighty Mekong, boundary-line separating Siam (now Thailand) and French Indo-China for more than 1,000 miles, coiled through the jungle like a gigantic serpent, its scales drenched with moonlight.
Winters' dreaminess vanished instantly. One look at the instrument panel and he shot into action. A tug and kick swung the old Curtis into a lifting, southward arc, following the twisting river. His words to Red Barrett were unhurried, but there was a tenseness in his voice.
"Okay. This is it, then. Keep 'em peeled, Red!"
"If I peel 'em any finer," Barrett grunted, "I won't have any eyelids. Think we'll see anything?"
"I know damn well we will. Those Japs aren't moving south for a clam-bake. They poured forty divisions into Indo-China—thanks to Vichy! Thailand is next on the hit parade; then Burma, back door to India. They want to close the Burma Road. So long as it's open, old Chiang Kai-shek will keep on giving them fits. Our job is to find out where they are concentrating their troops, so we'll be ready for them when they prance into Thailand."
Red looked hungrily at the trigger-press before him.
"If there's troops," he said hopefully, "there'll be enemy 'planes, huh, Ramey? Supposing one of them comes up to meet us? Can I—?"
"No! Definitely not!"
"But just by accident, like? I mean, if he attacked us first—"
"No, Red. Don't you see, all they're waiting for is an excuse to invade Thailand? Let us shoot down a single Jap 'plane tonight, and tomorrow their bombers will be over Bangkok. So—no shooting! Even if they fire on us."
"We-e-ell—" grumbled Barrett—"okay! But I think it's a hell of a way to fight a war. They bombed the Tetuila and sank the Panay, and all we got was: 'So sorry! Accidents will happen!' We're not even supposed to defend ourselves."
Ramey grinned at him; a lean, knowing grin.
"Don't you worry about that, pal. Your Uncle Samuel knows what he's doing. You and I were in the U.S. Army airforce till the bewhiskered old gentleman in the striped pants graciously permitted us to 'resign' and fly for China. But I notice our paychecks still bear Yankee signatures. And don't forget—there are a thousand more like us. Neutral soldiers of fortune, learning the ropes 'just in case.'
"But we've got to keep our noses clean tonight. Get all the pictures and information we can, but don't get in any scrapes—them's our orders. Well, where are we now?"
As they talked, Red had been deciding, as well as he could, their route on the scroll-map before him. Now he drew a dubious circle.
"Here, maybe. Or here. About Kiang-khan."
"Good enough. And nothing stirring yet, hey? Well, we'll keep looking for a few more minutes, then head back before dawn—Hey! Get a load of that! Campfires! A bivouac! Mark it, Red!"
The command was unnecessary. Barrett had also seen the encampment, scored it on his chart. But now, as the pair craned intently into the flame-dotted dark below, striving to guess the strength of the enemy outpost, there leaped to life that which startled both of them to awareness of a new peril. Searchbeams burst suddenly from the ground, snaring them in a dazzling web; floodlights blazed a golden square in the black jungle; there came the first, frantic coughs of anti-aircraft fire—phum-phum!—from invisible guns, and the biting snarl of hastily-revving motors. And:
"Get going!" roared Barrett. "We hit the jack-pot! It's an enemy airfield!"
Ramey needed no prodding. The first slashing finger of light had quickened into action the trained reflexes of an airman; already the small pursuit 'plane was lifting, bobbing and weaving away from the telltale beams. Now he gave it the gun; the snub-nosed Curtis flattened and streaked away like a startled swallow.
None too soon. Whatever shortcomings the Japs might have as warriors, they were speedy little devils. The Yankee fliers gained but a few minutes, a few short miles, advantage before their pursuers were in the air.
Even so, it should not have been difficult to escape in the dark. If it had only stayed dark as it should at this time of year, as it would have in any other place imaginable. But—this was the Orient, the semi-tropical topsy-turvy Land that skirts the China Seas.
Over the eastward horizon toward which they fled, an edge of ochre crept. Thin haze and hesitant; then deepening, widening, spreading, into a pearly, crepuscular veil. A cold and cheerless light against the backdrop of which their ship, both men knew, loomed as a perfect target!
Ramey gasped his dismay.
"Dawn! But—but that's impossible! It's only four o'clock. The sun shouldn't rise until—"
"False dawn!" corrected Barrett with sudden, comprehending savagery. "The famous 'dawn-before-sunrise'—that's what it is! I've read about it. It's possible anywhere, but it happens mostly in this part of the Orient. Result of flat country ... heat ... wide expanse of Pacific ... refraction. You're heading the wrong way, pal."
Ramey nodded tightly.
"I know. I headed southeast to confuse them; didn't want to tip off our base. I thought we could swing back when they gave up. But now—"
"Now what?"
"We can't turn back or they'd nab us, sure," gritted Ramey. "Our only chance is to outrun them. Maybe we can get to Singapore or—"
"On what?" queried Barrett. "Marsh-gas from passing swamps? This crate's only fueled for a thousand miles, keed. We've used half of that. And Singapore's a good nine hundred south."
"We might make Bangkok—"
"Or Australia," suggested Barrett drily, "or Hawaii? All right, chum—pull the cork. You ain't kidding me. This is the payoff, huh?"
Ramey, glancing up from the panel, met his comrade's calm, untroubled eyes levelly for a moment. In that instant, it occurred to him that Red Barrett was a hell of a fine guy. He wanted to say so, but men can't say such things. Sometimes they don't have to. He just nodded.
"I guess so, redhead."
"I won four bucks from Jimmy Larkin yesterday," said Red irrelevantly, "playing rummy. I should have collected it then." Again his eyes sought the machine-gun hopefully. "As long as we're in for it, we might just as well use up our old ammunition, huh, Ramey? We—" he hinted virtuously—"don't want to let no matériel fall into enemy hands—"
Ramey shook his head decisively.
"We won't fire on them. Not even if they fire on us first. Not even if they shoot us down. We can't risk causing the 'incident' they want. Our only chance is to outrun them, Red."
"Then we're in a hell of a pickle," Barrett told him gloomily. "Because they're faster than us. They're catching us now. Hold your hat, keed! Here it comes!"
And with his warning, it came! The first chattering snarl of machine-gun fire from the foremost of their pursuers. Lead ripped and slashed at the fleeing Curtis; above the roar of the motor shrilled the spang! of metal on metal; Ramey saw a crazy, zigzag line appear miraculously in the cowling above him, heard the thin, high, disappointed whine of ricochetting bullets. Again he tugged, kicked. His 'plane leaped, darted to the right. Red grunted.
"Whew! That was close! One more like that—"
As if his words were an omen, another burst screamed about their ears. And the lethal cacophony was doubled, now; the second of their three attackers had found the range. The little ship seemed to jerk like a live thing as fiery pellets pierced its skin. It was only a matter of minutes before one of those bullets would find a vital spot, Ramey knew. No use continuing this unequal battle. Knuckles white on the stick, he yelled to his companion:
"Okay, Red—bail out! They can't land here. Maybe we can get away on the ground. Red! Red!"
Then, as there came neither answering word nor movement, he shot a quick glance at his buddy. One look told the story. Red did not move because he could not. Limp as a bag of sodden meal, he lay slumped in his seat, eyes closed, arms dangling uselessly at his sides. And in horrible contrast to the pallor of his cheeks, his face was mottled with a spreading nastiness that matched the color of his hair!
It was at that moment a sort of madness seized Ramey Winters.
He was a soldier, aware of, and daily accepting, the hazards of his calling. He had seen death often; had several times heard whispering within inches of his own ears the sigh of the ancient scythe. It did not sicken him to see men die, nor was he afraid to die himself....
But this—this was different! This time the reaper had struck down Red Barrett, his chum, his more-than-brother. Struck him down traitorously and from behind without a chance to defend himself. Red, who had asked nothing more than to go down fighting—and had not been granted that break!
It did not even occur to Ramey that as he sat there, stunned, stricken, about him still hammered the blazing darts of enemy fire. There was welling within him a great flame, a torrential, all-consuming fire of rage that burned through his veins like vitriol. And suddenly it no longer seemed to matter that he was under orders to avoid all fights; the problem of an "international incident" was a hollow legality in which he had no concern.
If he thought at all, his thoughts were mere rationalization. Three Japanese flyers—and himself! Lost in the clouds above a wild, green jungle. Unspied upon, unseen. If none of the three were ever to return to his base, who was to report this episode? Who accuse the Thais of violating their neutrality? And did it make much difference, anyway? Everyone knew the Sons of Heaven—on some excuse or other—would march into Siam when they were ready. So—
Ramey decided. His hand found the trigger-press for which Red's fingers had yearned. A kick on the rudder ... knee to the gun ... and the tiny Curtis came up and over like a wild bird soaring. And it was no longer a startled swallow, but a killer-shrike, vengeance-bent and striking with the pent fury of boundless wrath. The butcher-bird darting on its prey.
And finding it! Before the foremost of his pursuers could analyze and parry this unexpected maneuver, Winters was upon him. In the circular machine-gun sight the Jap airplane loomed nearer, larger, more solid. Then—the gun bucked and kicked against his palms. The vision before him quivered and seemed to crumple, sheered off and away, spun giddily....
"One!" said Ramey Winters, and did not know he spoke aloud. "That's one!"
He kicked over, sensing a danger behind him, and in that one motion became attacker rather than attacked. It was a closer thing this time. His foeman's gun bore squarely upon him for a brief, unguarded moment. Ramey felt something like the jerk of a hand on his sleeve, and glancing down, saw with mild astonishment that his leather flying coat was split from wristband to elbow, spilling powdery fleece.
Then his 'plane righted itself, his own gun answered and—it was a most amazing thing! Before his eyes the enemy ship blossomed into a crimson bloom with burgeoning petals of black! A flower which suddenly burst asunder and spiraled to earth in a host of flaming motes.
And that, he thought grimly, was two! The third—?
Swiftly he scanned the ever-lightening skies, but he could not locate the missing 'plane. For a breathless moment he feared that in the melee it had escaped; then the voice of his old Combat Instructor at Kelly Field seemed to whisper an old, almost forgotten warning:
"If you can't see it, look out! It's on your tail!"
Once more, and this time with frantic haste, he shot the ship into a climb, a wingover turn. But not before a hot hail, punching on metal behind him like the vibrant tattoo of pounding rivets, rasped a song of death in his ears. Then he was on a level with his enemy—and driving headlong at him!
For a yearlong moment it seemed inevitable they must crash head on, collide and destroy each other and go hurtling to earth locked in flaming, loveless embrace! But not for an instant did Ramey's finger relax its pressure on the trigger. And when scant yards separated their whirling propellers, his bullets found their mark. The enemy pilot suddenly collapsed in his seat; his body, pitching forward, was a dead weight on the stick. And with a shuddering groan, the last Jap fighter nosed earthward in a streaking dive!
It was a moment of triumph. But Ramey Winters never found time to savor that victory. For even as he pulled back on the stick to lift himself clear of the falling 'plane, the stick went dead in his hands! From somewhere deep within the entrails of the gallant little Curtis came the grinding clash of metals. At the last moment, a dying foeman had evened the score. Ramey's motors spluttered and died, and the thin song of wind lashing the fuselage was the only audible sound in an awful silence as the ship, like a dancing leaf, glided earthward out of control.
There was but one thing to do. Ramey plucked at the buckle of his safety belt, prepared to go overside. And Red? Well—it was an airman's burial. A moment of flame, then an unmarked grave in the jungle. Ramey glanced once more at his chum. "So long, Red," he whispered. "See you again, pal—"
Then he gasped. For Red's lips had fallen open, and a bubble of bloody spittle was leaking from one corner of his mouth—but this tiny spume pulsated faintly! Breathing! He was still alive!
And—it was no longer possible for Ramey to take to his 'chute. Somehow, somehow! he must get this crippled ship to earth. He stared down wildly. Trees ... trees ... an endless tangle of foliage towering high, bayonet-tipped. But—Ramey trembled with sudden, feverish eagerness—over there a patch of lighter green! And something that looked like gray walls, a manmade building! A cleared field. If he could—
Once more and desperately he wrestled with the unresponsive stick. No good! The rudders, then? If the aileron wires were undamaged he might be able to control, to some extent, the direction of their glide. Ease the brutal shock of landing.
But now the ground was a vast, blunt bulwark rushing up to meet them. Like an organist treading the pedals of his instrument, Ramey played the only controls he had. Composing out of urgency and stress a symphony which, when the ultimate note was scored, must be either a paean or a dirge!
And the ship responded. Weakly, true! But its nose lifted a trifle, the ailerons caught and gripped the air, the drifting leaf spun lazily toward the clearing. Earth looming larger, and the indistinguishable whole of the jungle sharpened to single trees and tangled groves of bamboo and liana. Gray of swamp water and brown of soil; sudden pink of a frightened flamingo racing for leafy covert. Almost down, now ... and the wind howling through the motionless propeller like a taunting fiend. His own voice, strange in his ears, calling senseless encouragement to his unhearing companion:
"All right, Red! Hold tight, boy! In a minute—"
Then one wheel touched the ground, bounced; the ship reeled shuddering forward. Clear of the trees, but careening wildly, drunkenly, across a furrowed field. Rocking, swaying madly.
Then—the crash! The moment of slashing pain ... the dancing light ... the numb despair. Then nothing....