“Contacting Liberators,” Allison drawled.
Stan looked out and saw the dull forms of the thirty ton battle cruisers of the air sliding along below. The big fellows were cutting through the night at a terrific pace considering their pay loads and their own weight. Their 4,800 horsepower hurled them on at a pace that made the Spitfires and the Defiants hustle.
Red Flight took its place high above the drifting Liberators. Below would be the Defiants and on each side the Spitfires and Hurricanes. It was a big show and would soon be on.
“St. Omer with the field at Astree Blanche as the objective,” Stan muttered to himself. This was a change in plans made after a careful study of the hunchback’s little book. It would not be so bad as flying deep into Nazi country.
“Heather Raid,” Stan muttered and grinned. The High Command was sending a great flight of bombers and fighters to blast enemy positions and they called it Heather Raid.
“Heather Raid—Heather Raid—rendezvous—zero hour.” That was the Squadron Leader. Stan watched and listened. Nothing more came in and Allison kept flying straight ahead.
They were drifting along above the clouds. There was a moon and plenty of stars. The pale light made the squadron look like a school of fishes swimming through a blue-black sea. The clouds would be fine for everyone but the Jerries. Down below the Hurricanes would be slipping in and out of the clouds, watching, taking bearings, whispering up to the giants above, telling them what they couldn’t see.
“Red Flight, go down. Yellow Flight up.” The Squadron Leader spoke tersely as though he had sighted enemy planes coming up.
Stan peeled off and went down, with Allison and O’Malley trailing into formation. They hit the clouds, punched through and saw lights winking below. They were solitary lights and revealed little. Perhaps they were ship’s lights on the channel. Then they went back up through the clouds and took a place below the Liberators. Stan glanced up at the big ships. The British had changed the name of those Consolidated B Y 3’s to Liberator. It was a proper change, Stan thought.
Suddenly a bank of cloud on the right and above was lighted with a red glow. A second later a Messerschmitt One-Ten came flaming down, tossing away parts as it spun. A broken Defiant followed it down in a wide, agonizing spiral.