Less than five hundred feet of air space separated the underneath side of his wings from the ground. He clamped the camera trigger lever tight against the stick, held the plane steady, and stared at the ground. It was then he saw why the expanse of swamp ground had sort of changed appearance during his dive earthward. Now he could tell that it wasn't swamp ground below him. True, perhaps there was swamp ground underneath, but on top was a covering of perfect camouflage. A camouflage covering that completely hid the swamp ground, and which seemed to be suspended above it at a height of several feet.
"Hangars?" Dave choked out the chance guess. "They've drained that swamp, and those are underground hangars down there?"
He didn't have the chance to even guess at an answer to that one. He didn't because at that precise instant came Freddy Farmer's wild cry of alarm in the earphones.
"Dave! Dave! Up above you! The whole blasted Luftwaffe!"
He jerked back his head, looked upward, and a startled shout burst from his lips. The sky above him was literally black with Nazi swastika marked wings. He didn't even try to guess how many planes there were up there. In fact, he didn't even think of guessing. His brain for the moment was too stunned to function. His heart was a cold lump of ice that zoomed upward to clog in his throat. He sat staring frozen eyed at the horde of Nazi wings that came swooping down toward him like a blanket of doom.
[CHAPTER TEN]
Doomed Wings
"Dave, Dave, snap out of it! We're trapped, but let's give the beggars a go for their money. Dave! Wake up!"
Freddy Farmer's screams in the earphone seemed to touch a hidden spring in Dave and release him from his dumbfounded trance. He let out a wild yell, kicked his Spitfire over on wingtip and went whanging around and over to where Farmer and Barker were closing in together. Instinct, and instinct alone had caused him to make the maneuver. The instinct of life preservation.
Individually not one of them stood a chance against the mass of Messerschmitt One-Nines, and One-Tens, cutting down through the air. Individually they would be picked off like helpless clay pigeons. Together as a fighting trio, a fighting unit, they stood some chance of meeting with a little success. That all three would break through that almost solid wall of war wings, and escape back to England, was something that could not possibly happen, miracles or no miracles.