[CHAPTER SIXTEEN]
Water Rats
"No bet, no bet!" Dave cried, and clenched and unclenched his free fist in his excitement. "I think, too, that bird is pulling a trick. He's going down, and he knows that none of us will follow him down, because there's nothing we could do to help. We're land planes, not seaplanes. It would be up to the rest of us to get back to the Indian in a hurry and report that he had to sit down, and where."
"But I wonder, Dave," Freddy Farmer grunted as a sudden frown creased his brows. "Look. It stands to reason that he couldn't know he was to make this exact patrol at this exact time. So it couldn't very well be that he planned to land in the water and have a waiting Jap submarine pick him up. That would be silly. He might float for days before a submarine came along to pick him up. And—well, how in the world could he plan to meet one at this spot? Maybe it is the real thing, Dave. Maybe it is a forced landing that couldn't be helped. See what I mean?"
Dave didn't make any reply. He stared hard at the Number Two plane as it spat smoke from its exhausts, and slowly lost altitude. Freddy was quite right. It could be that what he was watching was very genuine; that tough luck had dropped down out of the blue Pacific sky to smack a couple of Uncle Sam's Navy eagles. Yet he couldn't believe that was true. Something inside of him—he didn't know what—refused to let him believe that it was all open and aboveboard.
"Could be, could be," he muttered over and over again to himself as the patrol started leaving the crippled plane to its rear. "Could be, yes. But, doggone it, we're going to make sure. We've got plenty of gas, Freddy. We can find our way back to the Indian alone. I'm turning back and going down to have a good look at those guys. I have a feeling that maybe they won't actually land in the water. They may—Hey! They did! Look at them, Freddy! That pilot is swinging around toward the north and trying to put as much distance as possible between his plane and the rest of us."
"Yes, he's doing just that!" Freddy shouted in return. "And if I were force landing I'd try to glide as long as I could in the direction of possible help. But he's banking around and gliding away from the Indian's position."
"Gliding nothing!" Dave howled, and dropped the Devastator's wing and started swinging it around. "That engine of his is not cooked. He's using it just enough to keep him almost level. Hang on, Freddy! We're going to take a look at that bird, and no kidding. A close look, too. I think it will make him mad. So keep on your toes, pal. 'Most anything can happen now. And maybe it will!"
Freddy didn't say anything to that. He simply hung on hard and sat tight as Dave whipped the Devastator around and stuck the nose down. The other plane was a good ten miles away by now, and fast becoming not much more than a small smudge of black silhouetted against the blue water. Holding the plane steady, Dave took time out to twist his head around and stare back at the rest of the patrol. He wondered if the Section Leader, seeing two planes dropping out of formation, would get curious himself. But whether or not the Section Leader was curious, he made no attempt to quit his other planes and turn back also. The patrol kept on drilling southward.
Turning front again, Dave instantly picked up the other Devastator. And as he did so his heart leaped in his chest, and the blood began to pound through his veins. Smoke had stopped spewing from the engine exhaust. The plane had even stopped gliding. As a matter of fact, it was on even keel, and racing northward at full throttle not more than three or four thousand feet above the surface of the Pacific. That fact alone told Dave that after eight days and eight nights the gods of war had decided to give Freddy and him a real break. He knew, just as though a voice were shouting it in his ears, that the pilot of that Devastator thundering northward was in the pay of the Axis. And for some reason he felt equally sure that the Devastator's gunner was of the same breed.
One thing that had puzzled him ever since Colonel Welsh had told of the double murder aboard the Aircraft Carrier Indian was whether one man or two had taken part in that gruesome affair. He had believed it was two for the reason that if there had been just one man, he would have been unable to kill both of the Indian's officers before one of them jumped him, or tried to, at least. And both had been shot right between the eyes. That fact, and other bits of reasoning, had led him to believe all along—though he had not spoken of it to Freddy Farmer—that they were after two Axis spies, not just one.