Whip (18 page)

It was sheer jubilation all the way back. Not to Seven-Mile, where the Japanese might seek them out, but into Kanaga. Sixty seconds after they landed there was no sign of an airfield on the dry lake bed.

"Well, shee-yit, looka'
him
. A major, no less."

"Don't no one call him 'Boss' no more. It's
Majuh
from here on in."

"Does that mean we gotta call the little son of a bitch 'sir'?"

Whip grinned at his crews. They grinned back. General Smyth would have sent flowers if he could have managed it. Far East Air Forces was jubilant. The first strike with the 335th and its new bombers had flattened Lae. Twenty-four fighters destroyed on the ground or shot out of the air. Heavy casualties. Salamaua had lost another eight planes.

No B-25s lost. No wounded. No casualties. Just a few holes in two bombers.

Success beyond belief. And with the congratulations from the general had come another message. Whip Russel could shed his silver bars.

Lou Goodman pinned on the oak leaves. He'd carried them for two weeks, waiting for this moment.

17

"The Japanese appear to be cooperating with us. The weather is holding and apparently they feel they didn't get in enough troops with their last run down from New Britain."

Lou Goodman tapped the large map hung from rollers beneath the woven roof that served as his briefing "room." He turned back to the assembled flight crews. "We had a B-17 at high altitude in the area, and as of a few hours ago" — again the pointer tapped the map — "our little friends have put together a heavy concentration of troop barges at Wanigela. You people have been wanting a crack at just this sort of target and today you'll have your chance."

He waited for the inevitable murmuring among the men, brought it quickly to a halt.

"FEAF wants those barges torn up. They're small, which means many barges with not too many men aboard each one. Made to order for us. Now, after what you people did at Lae and Salamaua the Japanese are edgy. You can expect them to protect those barges with everything they have."

He held the pointer in both hands, bending it slightly against his protruding middle.

"Seven-Mile is laying on a harassing strike of Australian P-40s to tie up the Zeros at Lae and Salamaua, and six B-26s will go in against the fighters at Buna. Between those two strikes they ought to tie up most of the Zeros from the fields closest to us. However, you'd better expect some local cover at Wanigela sent down from Rabaul.

"Your favorite weather pundit has some good news for a change," Goodman added.

Hoots and jeers met Captain Paul Egli, who took the moment to bow ceremoniously to the crews. Finally he held up both hands. "All right, all right. What the colonel said is true. It's almost
too
good to be true. Scattered clouds at three thousand. Winds out of the northwest at twenty knots or better. That should make the surface choppy and give the Japs conniptions in handling their barges. It also means they'll have lousy gun platforms for any flak they have. The same weather pattern should hold for the rest of the day with some areas increasing to broken from scattered. But no significant changes. Colonel?"

Egli stepped aside and Goodman again faced the men. "Lieutenant Mercer in Number Two will take navigation lead on this mission. Any questions?"

They had them but not to be voiced then. Men looked around to find Ronald Gall and saw the lieutenant was as surprised as the rest of them. What the hell did the colonel mean by making Mercer lead nav? Shit, Gall was prime crew for Major Russel's airplane and —

Gall saw the colonel motioning him over for a private talk. He stood stiffly, puzzled and still uncomfortable. "I'm taking your place today, Lieutenant."

"Is, uh, anything wrong, sir?"

Goodman shook his head. "Hell, no, son. It's just that my job calls for me to go along on a few of these soirees and you happen to have the best seat in the house." Goodman studied the youngster before him. "You seem to be taking this personally, Lieutenant."

"Begging the colonel's pardon, I sure am."

"You don't like being left behind?"

"Hell… sorry, sir, but… but, goddamnit, Colonel,
that's my crew
."

Goodman rubbed his chin, tried to hide his disbelief and pleasure. "Care to ride in the back, Ron?"

The grin was his answer. "Sure, sir. Leski and Coombs need someone to baby-sit them, anyway. And besides, we're going after those barges, right? What the hell can I shoot at with a gun that points only straight up? Thanks, Colonel. I just wouldn't feel right being left on the ground."

Goodman nodded. "See you aboard. Dismissed."

It was another first-light takeoff. The high winds left something to be desired, but the B-25s were well below maximum gross weight and the runway left them breathing space in getting off the ground. They formed up well south of the field in a long, wide turn.

Thirteen planes were flying today. FEAF wanted every gun aimed at those barges.

The only thing that went right were the targets. If Egli could have found a place to skulk away he would have taken it. The forecast of scattered clouds fell apart within thirty miles of takeoff, although to Lou Goodman, watching directly ahead of the B-25 in which he was riding, looking between the shoulders of Whip and Bartimo, it was a rare moment of beauty. They were threading their way through broken clouds and unexpected towering cumulus, a fantasy of brilliant sun against white cloud flanks and deep shafts of light between cloud mountains. The bomber rocked gently in the climb and war seemed to be the game of the denizens of some other, unknown planet.

Reality came back to Lou. He leaned forward to tap Whip on his arm. "We going to have problems with this weather?"

"We already got 'em," came Whip's terse reply. "Climbing out ain't no problem but if this stuff closes in beneath us we've got no way to tell the cloud deck in the target area.

And how the hell are we going to find Wanigela in this shit?"

"That's a neat question! How?"

"You waiting for me to say something smart, Colonel?"

"Yeah."

"Keep waiting."

But the clouds didn't pack in solid beneath them. Almost, but not quite. They had eight-tenths cloud coverage or better between their formation and the sea. Twenty percent, often only 10 percent, of the water surface was visible. Not the best way to go to war.

"There's a good question waiting around to be answered, sir," Alex offered to Goodman.

"The Zeros. Will they be waiting for us above the clouds, or, below?"

Goodman looked at him in surprise as a thought came to him. "That could be the answer."

They shared the thought together. "Of course," Whip said slowly. "If the cloud deck is real low they'll —"

"Probably split their cover," Goodman finished for him. "Keep some people on top and the rest below."

"Which means that if they can fly down there —" began Whip.

"We can fly down there," finished Alex.

"I suggest," Whip said slowly, peering ahead, "that we stay awake. We've got to look for two things. Zeros, and a hole to go through in a hurry."

They cruised unusually high for their mission, at just over eight thousand feet, skimming the cloud battlements, silvered motes hurrying along the tumultuous growth beneath them. It didn't seem possible they'd have a chance to make their mission before the clouds —

Corporal Bruce Coombs saw them first. "Major, we got company," he called in from the top turret. "I make out at least a dozen fighters, two o'clock high. Looks like they're orbiting a target area, sir."

They looked up and slightly to their right. "Well, they did us a favor," Whip said. "Those barges have got to be somewhere beneath them."

"Major, Gall here in the back. That hole we just passed. I made out some pretty good wakes on the water."

The three men up front looked at one another. Wakes they could see from eight thousand feet? That would have to be the biggest damned barge ever built. And no one made them that big.

Whip made a sudden decision. He rolled the airplane into a steep left bank, the squadron following as if the move was rehearsed. "If we can keep that thunderhead between us and those Zeros," he told Alex and Lou Goodman, "there's every chance we can go downstairs without that top cover seeing us." Whip had debated breaking radio silence but their unknown presence could prove an enormous advantage. He'd trust to his well-disciplined troops coming through with him.

He came back on the power, far back, and the B-25 eased into a steep glide. Whip kept the bank steep, pulling the plug for a rapid descent. He fed in trim to ease off on the stick forces and let the bomber ride her way down at two thousand feet a minute. The lower they went the less chance that top escort of fighters would have to see them. They were taking a gamble by working downstairs through heavy cloud, flying eyeball on glimpses of the sea. And that ceiling between the ocean and the cloud bottoms had better give them some maneuvering room, or it would be flying out of here on the gauges. He was still wound up with the report of ship wakes. That meant something big down there.

They'd screwed up on the weather for this show. Could Intelligence also have been so far off the mark they didn't even
know
of some big stuff mixing in with those barges?

At fifteen hundred feet he brought in power, easing the rate of descent, the world a mixture of flashing sunlight and sudden shadows and grays and pale glowing as they streaked from open sky into and through clouds, an eye-stabbing flicker of movement and —

The altimeter was just unwinding through eight hundred feet when they broke through.

Whip held the formation tight up against the flattened cloud layers just above them.

They'd be tough to spot and they still had to find what they were after. They curved around the edge of a local but sharp rainshower.

"There." Alex pointed. "The whole bloody lot of them. And it's a hell of a lot more than barges, I would say!"

"You would, would you?" Whip grinned at him.

Radio silence meant nothing now. Those people on those ships could hear them coming from miles off. But seconds were precious. Whip brought his radio to life. "All right, troops, the curtain's going up. We have barges, at least three destroyers for cover and two troopships, it looks like, out there waiting for us. Ten o'clock my position right now.

Anybody see any fighters out there?"

Someone had caught a glimpse of a shaft of sunlight off metal. Jim Whitson in Number Six. "Six to Leader. About a dozen of 'em. Two o'clock and they're turning toward us.

Take them a bit to make it here."

"We'll race 'em," Whip answered. "Last one in is a rotten egg. Okay, troops. Two through Six stay with me. Jordan, you take the rest of the people and go after those troopships and barges. We'll keep the tin cans busy. Break,
now
."

Time slowed, the world dragged. Propellers went into flat pitch, shrilling their thunder.

Throttles followed. Full power. Guns charged. Belts cinched just a bit tighter. Eyes searching out the Zeros, increasing in size, coming after them with all the power
they
had. A race to the targets. Whip and five other planes would take a crack at the destroyers. With their heavy flak guns they could chew up a low-level strike like this.

They had to be stopped, fast.

"Two through Six, fan out. Take 'em line abreast to my right."

Five B-25s eased into a long wing-to-wing line. Thousands of Japanese soldiers looked up, wondering, frightened, at one wave of six bombers howling toward the warships. And another wave of seven coming directly at them.

The opening run was a classic maneuver straight out of the textbook Whip still had in writing.

The long-range guns of the destroyers opened fire first. But they hadn't expected the attack, not with the weather, with the Zeros on top of and beneath the clouds to give them plenty of warning. In those precious few seconds it required to turn and track and depress and aim, the B-25s were on their runs. The initial fire from the destroyers was light and sporadic. It didn't stay that way long. The Japanese were good, their shipborne flak had always been deadly, and the trick was to get in there
fast
.

Fascinated, almost hypnotized, Lou Goodman stared ahead between the two pilots as a Japanese warship swelled impossibly in size, its side ablaze with twinkling lights.

There was a tremendous explosion. A huge orange flash erupted into being just before Goodman's eyes, and the whole B-25 bomber shook violently from the blow. My
God,
we've been hit .
. .
we haven't even reached them and we've been hit. Jesus; Whip, Alex
—

Goodman stared in wide-eyed disbelief. The flaming blast was still there, the terrible shaking and banging was continuing, and Whip flew as if nothing had happened. It was only when Goodman looked beyond that flashing, stabbing light that he understood.

The deafening explosion, the continuing terrible glare, the hammering and vibrating…

was all from the fourteen machine guns firing
. Their own weapons — so violent in their life that to someone who had not experienced the awesome fury at the moment of firing, it seemed they had been dealt a mortal blow.

His focus went beyond the dazzling orange. He braced himself against the pounding that swept through the bomber. The first burst of fire from twelve machine guns had ripped the entire side of the destroyer's deck. Two gun platforms disappeared in a blurred slow-motion explosion. Metal crumpled like paper, bodies were torn to chunks, guns went flying.

Whip walked rudder, skidding just a bit. The twelve machine guns screamed their fury across the deck from right to left. Men exposed, behind gun tubs, behind railings, behind thin armor plate, were chewed and mangled along with steel. The deck of the warship was a horrendous center of howling wasps with death in every sting.

To their right, Psycho in Two was doing the same. He wiped out the gun positions along the center to the stern. Whip was low, holding her steady, the bays were open, and he triggered two 500-pounders.