No shellfire greeted them as they made their run over the Jap airfield. Even the machine guns were silent. The grass-skirted gun-crews were fleeing through the surrounding grass and scrub like scared rabbits when the first stick of bombs whistled down.
They left the runways looking like a raw, black wound in the earth, with a thick cloud of dust hanging over it. All their bombs had struck with the accuracy of rifle bullets, five-hundred-pounders that flung the twisted steel matting high in the air.
“Get the exact position of this spot, Curly,” Barry Blake said, as he climbed into the hot blue sky. “The sons of Nippon won’t be using their little mountain playground as long as our fliers can keep an eye on it.”
“That’s right,” agreed the Rosy’s navigator. “We’ve wiped out an air base from which the Nips could have raided Queensland, Port Moresby, and any of our northeast airports with equal ease. And we’ve discovered some of their latest tricks of camouflage, thanks to Chick Enders. Headquarters will be glad to know about it.”
For the rest of the trip Rosy O’Grady’s pilots and bombardier kept their eyes peeled for suspicious looking “market gardens,” but none appeared. An hour after they crossed the height of land the ocean was again in sight. Soapy Babbitt contacted their new airport on the Mau River and received the answer to come in.
As the field came in sight, Barry noted that it was scooped out of the tropical forest, not far from the sea. A United Nations transport vessel lay just beyond the beach. It was unloading by means of lighters. In this manner the new airdromes all up and down the coast would be quickly furnished with equipment and defenses. The danger, of course, was that the Japs might send warships to shell the fields at night. They might even land troops a short march from the field itself.
All this passed through Barry’s mind as he circled for a landing. He had experienced one shelling from warships, and a worse one from air-borne artillery. No base, he decided, was safe from a sneak attack. In any war the main strategy must be to “dish it out” to the enemy in heavier quantities than he could return.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
MYSTERIOUS ISLAND