"Don't I hope a few do come up, though!" Sergeant Dilling spoke up with a broad grin. "It's so long since I had a Jerry in my sights I'm worried for fear I won't be able to recognize one of the beggars. It will be wonderful, no end, to spill one of the blighters down in a mess of flames. At least it will give me the feeling that at last I'm doing something to earn my pay."
"Well, we want to get to Moscow all in one piece," Dave said with a little laugh, "but I can't say that I'd be too mad if a couple of Messerschmitts did put in an appearance. How about the weather, Squadron Leader? Does this stuff go very far out?"
The Wellington's pilot grinned, and winked one eye.
"Far enough out," he replied. "According to the latest reports we'll have it all the way to the Norwegian coast. There it's supposed to be visibility unlimited. I certainly hope so. Don't want bad weather to keep the Jerries on the ground."
The Squadron Leader paused and glanced at his wrist watch, and then over at the engine filters climbing down out of the bomber.
"Well, I fancy its about time to get on with it, chaps," he said, and tightened the chin strap of his helmet. "In with you. And a good time for all of us. The dinners will be on me when we reach Moscow."
A couple of minutes later the five were aboard the bomber, and the Squadron Leader was running up the engines for a final instrument check. Then he spoke into his inter-com mike and received an all-set okay from each of the other four. That done with, he kicked off the wheel brakes and started to trundle the giant bomber out onto the field and down to the far end of the take-off runway. He had hardly started taxiing, however, when the Operations Officer in his tower blinked the "Stop" signal with his Aldis signal lamp, and a figure was seen to come dashing out the Depot Office. It was the Depot Adjutant, and he held a sheet of yellow paper in his hand. Dave took a look at the yellow sheet waving around in the wind, and swallowed hard. All of a sudden tiny little balls of cold lead were beginning to bounce around in the pit of his stomach. Why he should suddenly experience the strange sensation, he had no idea. However, the sight of the running Depot Adjutant, and the sheet of yellow paper he carried in his hand, seemed to strike him as a very definite reminder that this was not to be any joy flight, but rather, a deadly serious mission to be carried out on the wing.
And a moment or two later, when the Adjutant climbed aboard the bomber that Squadron Leader Freehill had braked to a halt, and came back into the bomb compartment where the Yank and Freddy were parked, the lumps of lead in Dave's stomach began to bounce around more than ever.
"For you, Captain Dawson," the Adjutant said, and held out the yellow sheet of paper. "From the Air Ministry, special code. Afraid for a moment that you'd be off before we could decode it. But here you are, anyway."
Dave took the yellow sheet of paper and held it so that he and Freddy could read it together. It had been sent by Air Vice-Marshal Leman, and its contents were not what you could call very encouraging, considering. It read: