“He handles his plane as though he were dancing,” Stew said. There was admiration in his voice.
“Of course,” said Jack. “That’s Ted for you. He was the finest dancer in our school, or our town, for that matter. He played basketball and tennis the same way, with perfect rhythm.”
“Just think what the war has done to the world,” Stew murmured. “Sets a fellow teaching a fighter plane to dance!”
Stew got off his message. He thought it hard that all this radio reporting should be one-way stuff, but of course it was necessary for the carrier to maintain radio silence, otherwise her position might be given away and she herself might be attacked.
“Why don’t the bombers come?” Stew was growing restless with the delay. Since their job was to shadow the Jap task force until the dive bombers and torpedo planes arrived, they would not be free to leave until the others put in an appearance.
“The Commander will hold the bombers and their fighter protection until all scouts are heard from,” said Jack.
“Why?” Stew was puzzled.
“Because there may be other Jap task forces lurking about the sea waiting to send their air fleets after the Black Bee. She must not be left unprotected. She—”
“Listen!” Stew broke in. To their ears came the sound of machine-gun fire.
“Ted’s in a fight. We’ve got to get out and help him!” Jack exclaimed. “Can’t let that swarm of Zeros gang up on him.” He set their plane climbing. “We’ll just get some altitude, have a look, then fly right down onto them.”
“Good stuff!” Stew agreed. “We can dive with the best of them.”
It was only after they had climbed out of their cloud on up to the one above, and out at the top of that one, to a height of five thousand feet, that Jack took time out for a downward glance. Then, what he saw all but cost him the chance of a grand fight. What’s more, much of his life might have been radically changed, had he failed to come to a decision in the next sixty seconds. Almost directly beneath them, a little to the left, an air battle raged between four Zeros and a single-seated U. S. fighter.
Jack did not need to be told that the lone fighter was the boy from his own home town, Ted. It could be none other, for the broad, sweeping circles his plane made appeared to be timed to the tune of a Strauss waltz.
At the moment they sighted Ted he was being followed by a Zero that spouted fire. The distance was too great; the shots did not take effect.
Instead of turning on his opponent, Ted swung up and under an enemy coming from above and, seeming to stand his plane on its tail, sent a burst of fire into the enemy’s engine. The Zero wavered. Something hung from it for a space of seconds, then rocketed downward.
“Shot off his motor!” Jack exulted.
Stew did not hear. His mind was still on the task before him. The rain squall was over. He spotted the two groups of enemy ships, also some small islands off to the east. With a strange sense of finality coursing through his being, he reported all this to the Black Bee’s radioman. As he listened after that, he thought he heard the low rumble of many distant planes. He could not be sure; too much was going on directly beneath them.
Continuing his magnificent circles, Ted came up behind the very Zero that seconds before had been following him. He let out a burst of fire. Smoking badly, the Zero limped into a cloud.
“Now! Now we’ve got to get down there!” Jack tilted his plane for a steep dive, then set his motor at top speed.
The two remaining Zeros were closing in on Ted. At the same time three others were swinging in on him from the left. The three were flying in formation, rather far apart.
“Get ready with your twinflex,” Jack ordered. “We’ll go right into that trio and break it up.”
Did the Japs see them coming? No matter. They came in too fast for the Japs to dodge. At just the right instant Jack pulled up short, then let out a burst of fire that cut squarely across the lead plane of the Japs.
At the same time Stew swung his twinflex gun on the second plane and let him have it for all he was worth.
What happened after that came so quickly that it remained a blur in Jack’s memory. Afterward he seemed to recall seeing two Jap planes falling, and Ted, with a damaged plane, disappearing into a cloud. At the same time something had creased his forehead. He went dizzy for an instant, then he was all right again.
“They got our radio!” Stew reported.
“She doesn’t steer right!” Jack headed her into a cloud.
“Well, that’s that,” Stew sighed. “No radio. No more work for us.”
Jack scarcely listened. He was hearing a rumble. It came from the west. “Bombers! Our bombers!” he exclaimed.
“Our work is finished!” Stew exulted.
“All but getting back. And that we can’t do.” There was an air of finality in Jack’s voice. “That Jap did plenty to this plane. Nearly got me too. Take a look at my right temple.”
Stew leaned forward, then whistled. “Burned you, all right. Bleeding a little. Wait. I’ll fix you up.”
They circled slowly in their cloud while first aid was applied.
“There are some islands off to the east,” Stew suggested.
“How far?”
“’Bout fifty miles.”
“Good! That’s our best bet.”
“Then what are we waiting for?”
“Nothing.” Jack eased his plane over toward the edge of the clouds.
“What about the Zeros?” Stew asked.
“It’s a chance we have to take,” Jack replied soberly. “This old kite won’t stay up too long. Be prepared to give them the works if they show up.”
“The works it shall be,” Stew replied grimly as he reloaded his powerful weapon.
CHAPTER V
A GOOD SHOW
The Zeros, it seemed, were engaged elsewhere. When Jack and Stew emerged from their cloud none were in sight, nor were the islands that Stew had seen.
“A rain squall has hidden the islands. They’re there, all the same,” Stew insisted.
“It’s our only chance.” In vain Jack tried to get more power from his disabled motor. It coughed, sputtered—all but died—then carried on.
Heading due east, he started to climb. He had gained a thousand feet or more when he began losing again.
“Look over your parachute,” he said to Stew. “Be sure you can get hold of our rubber raft at a second’s notice. This motor may die at any moment.”
“It’s all done,” said Stew. “All in order. Let’s have a look at your chute.” He worked over Jack’s chute and harness. “It’s okay. Be sure to pull the cord,” he joked. “That’s always a necessity, you know.”
“Sure I know,” Jack’s voice was cheerful. “I’m glad we got our job done before this thing happened.”
“The sea’s fairly smooth. We’ll get on. Some kind of a bird will light on us. They always do—booby, gull—something.”
“Sure, they light on anything that stands out above the water.” Jack set his ship climbing again. They were inside the rain squall. From not too far away came the sound of sudden battle.
“Zeros and our fighters have tangled.” Stew became tremendously excited. “Boy! This is going to be terrific! Wish we could see it!”
“Like taking in a world-series game from behind a high board fence,” Jack agreed. “But leave it to our bombers!”
“They’re sure good! They took that other carrier we discovered a week ago.”
“They’re tops, those bombers!” Jack had a great love for his ship and her men. “There never was a carrier like the Black Bee!”
The roar of bombers coming on in formation filled the air.
“They’re climbing! I can tell by the sound!” Stew exclaimed. “Boy! Just you wait!”
Stew all but stood up in his place while Jack divided his attention between the bombers and his disabled motor.
“Now!” Stew exclaimed at last. “Now they’re diving! Listen!” He held his breath, counting “One—two—three—four—five—six—seven—”
He had reached twenty when there came a roar. “Oh! Too bad! That one missed!” Hardly were the words out of his mouth when there came a second roar. “Right on the beam! Boy! Oh boy!”
Six bombers dumped their loads. “Three connected,” was Stew’s decision. “That’s a very good record.”
Then all of a sudden they emerged from the screening rain squall to find themselves over a bright, blue sea. In the center of this sea, two large cargo ships and three destroyers steamed rapidly toward the east.
“Oh!” Stew groaned. “They’ll get away! And I have a hunch they’re the most important of all.”
For a space of seconds Jack considered turning back in an effort to direct some of the bombers toward this target. “No use,” he grumbled. “We’d never make it in time.”
“Besides,” Stew’s voice went husky, “here come three of our torpedo bombers. They got my message after all! Boy! We’re some use in the world, you and I! And we’re really going to see a show.”
“A grandstand seat! No high fence this time.” Jack’s voice expressed his joy.
At sight of the torpedo planes the two cargo ships began zigzagging, while the destroyers darted in close to them.
Like catbirds after hawks, four Zeros followed the torpedo planes, but as yet were too far away to count.
“Man! Oh man!” Jack exclaimed. “Suppose those Zeros come after us!”
“Let them come!” Stew looked to the loading of his gun. “We’ll be waiting for them. We can’t run, but we still can fight.”
Two destroyers lay between the torpedo planes and the cargo ships. Their pom-pom guns began throwing up shells. The boys could see them explode in mid-air. Disregarding these, the torpedo pilots came sailing straight in, dropping rapidly as they approached their target.
Jack held his breath as one by one they passed through shellfire. That’s Dick, I imagine, he was thinking. Dick, Bert and Phil. All swell boys!
One shell, exploding beneath the second plane, lifted it into the air, but the plane came straight on.
At just the right moment, not five hundred feet from the sea, the first plane released its “tin fish.” Jack saw it hit the sea and speed away.
“Bull’s-eye!” he shouted. But the torpedo acted strangely. It leaped into the air, then dove like a playing porpoise. At last it reached the side of a cargo ship.
“Now!” Stew breathed.
But there came no sound. “Oh!” Jack exclaimed, as he saw the torpedo speed away beyond the ship. “It went right under her! What a—”
He did not finish, for suddenly a mighty explosion fairly tore the sky.
“Did you see that!” Stew exclaimed. “The second torpedo took that ship right on the beam! And did she explode! Must have been loaded with TNT.”
Jack had not seen. What he did see was a tower of black smoke and pieces of debris falling over the sea. And he saw the second ship, attacked by the last torpedo plane, meet the same fate.
All this had happened in the space of seconds, and all the time their disabled plane was chugging its way toward three small islands that stood out like green stones set in a field of blue.
“I hope they raise chickens on those islands,” said Stew.
“Chickens and no Japs,” Jack agreed. At that moment his eyes swept the sky for the Zeros. “Gone,” he murmured at last. “I guess they’ve seen enough for one day.”
After that Jack was silent for a time. He was thinking: Those ships were loaded with ammunition intended for Japs on some island. If they had gone through safely, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of our Marines and Army men might have died. We got them. A feeling of pride in a job well done, a task in which he and Stew had played a large part, coursed through his being.
“We found them. The torpedo planes destroyed them,” he said aloud. At that moment he would not have traded his job as a scout for any other in the service.
But what of the attack on the Jap carrier and her escort? Only sound could tell them the story, for the rain squall still hid that battle from their sight.
“Our radio is gone,” he said to Stew. “We’re headed for an unknown island. No one will know where we are.”
“That’s right,” Stew agreed soberly. “Even those three torpedo planes have gone to join the attack on the carrier. We’re in the sky alone.” A strange wave of loneliness swept over him. “It may be months before we know how that battle ended.” Jack nodded in the direction from which came a continuous roar of motors, machine-gun fire, bursting shells, and exploding bombs. “We’re on our own, and I don’t mean maybe!”
CHAPTER VI
PLANE WRECKED
The plane rattled, sputtered, and roared. Stew threw back the hood, climbed out to the wings to see what, if anything, might be done to keep her aloft. Then he threw back his seat to drop flat on his stomach and poke around in the fuselage. His hand touched Jack’s violin. He shoved this forward within easy reach.
“Jack can play for the birds, the lizards, and the land crabs on our island,” he said to himself with a grim laugh.
There was not much he could do. The main trouble was with the motor. It had taken a slug or two, and was beginning to smoke.
Alternately they gained and lost altitude. Each time they lost more than they had gained.
“There’s a Zero!” Stew exclaimed, righting his seat and gripping his gun.
The Zero kept poking its nose in and out of the rain squall that was moving slowly toward them.
“Scouting for their lost cargo ships,” said Jack.
The three destroyers, now robbed of their charges, were beginning to slip from sight. “Going to that other fight,” Jack thought. He and Stew were leaving the fight behind, and under the circumstances he was not sorry. It seemed less violent now. Had their comrades won or lost? Had the Jap carrier been put out of action? He did not know the answer.
His motor coughed hoarsely, then was silent. They lost altitude rapidly.
“Get ready to bail out!” he snapped.
The motor coughed, rumbled, then thundered afresh.
They climbed once more, then slowly sank.
The islands were much closer now. “We’d better head for the middle one,” Jack said. “It’s the largest. Got quite a peak in the middle of it.”
“Must be several hundred feet high,” Stew said. “There’s sure to be good, fresh water there. Natives too. There’s an island around here somewhere, they say, where the natives eat shipwrecked Chinamen, or used to.”
“Well, we’re not Chinamen!” Jack’s laugh was a bit doubtful.
“Could be they’re not choosy.” Stew’s laugh was doubtful too.
“Have to take a chance, that’s all war is after all—just one risk after another. We—”
The motor went dead again. One more struggle, one more victory.
Twice more this was repeated. The last time they were not much more than ten miles from the islands.
“That’s all she’ll do,” Jack decided. “Get ready to tumble out if we land too hard. We’re going down.”
Gripping the half-inflated lifeboat, Stew shoved back the hood, and stood there, with the wind in his eyes, as they circled downward.
The time was surprisingly short. They hit the water hard, bounced, struck again—then with a final splash, the plane almost nosed over into the sea.
Stew had the life raft ready in a twinkling—none too soon at that, for their left wing was all but torn away.
Stew was on the life raft, with paddle in hand. Jack was prepared to drop down onto the raft when he stopped suddenly.
“Wait a second,” he said, climbing into the plane again.
He came back after a while with the violin. “After what Ted did for us today,” he confided, “I couldn’t leave it.” And they paddled away toward the middle island.
“That Ted must be a real guy,” was Stew’s comment.
“You don’t know the half of it. I’ll tell you about it some time.” Jack settled back against the circular side of the raft. “Boy! Am I tired!”
“Take it easy,” Stew advised.
“We’ll have to paddle ten miles at least. A Jap plane may spot us on the way.”
“We don’t really need to paddle at all,” Stew said. “There’s a strong current running toward the islands.”
“How do you know?” Jack sat up.
“While you went back for the violin I threw a stick into the water. It started right for the island.”
“That,” said Jack, “was my whittling stick.”
“Too bad!” Stew said. “But then, there must be a million sticks on our island. Seems to be covered with trees.”
The current was not all that Stew had hoped for. It carried them along at no more than two miles an hour. And the distance was far greater than they had imagined. For several hours they were obliged to paddle beneath hot, tropical skies. Finally, when the sun had gone to rest and the moon had taken up its watch, they found themselves listening to the easy wash of the surf against the mysterious shore.
As they came close it seemed that the island’s one mountain leaned over like a vast giant for a look at them.
“Be just our luck to land close to a native village.” Stew shuddered as they neared the shadowy shores. The moon still was low.
“They might have chickens,” Jack suggested.
“I’ll be content with emergency rations,” Stew decided.
Once Stew imagined that he caught a glimpse of a flicker of light along the shore. “Cannibals,” he whispered.
“Might be worse.” Jack fingered his automatic. “Could be Japs.”
And then, a long, sweeping wave picked up their small raft with startling suddenness and they found themselves on a gravel beach. Before the next wave arrived they had dragged the raft to safety.
“That’s service!” Jack exclaimed. “Now let’s have a look.” He snapped on a small flashlight.
They discovered the beach to be very narrow. Back of it were tumbled piles of massive rocks, and behind these, a solid, stone wall.
“Look!” Stew pointed to tangled masses of logs, seaweed, and broken palms that lay on the rocks far above their heads. “Some storm to do that!”
“Yes, and another storm may do the same to us. We’d better ramble.”
To the right the beach ended abruptly in a stone wall, but to the left it broadened. Tramping over the rocks for a quarter of a mile, they came at last to a spot where the land sloped away, offering enough soil to support coconut palms and other tropical trees.
“This will do,” Jack decided.
Climbing up the slope, Stew gathered ripe coconuts from the ground. After striking off the husks, he bored holes through the eyes with his sheath knife and drank the milk.
“Um-m-m!” he breathed. “Not bad.”
When they had drained four coconuts dry, they turned their attention to other matters.
They broke open their rations and ate sparingly. They cracked a coconut and ate its meat. Then they stretched out side by side on the rubber raft, pillowed their heads against the round outside, drew a mosquito-bar canopy over themselves, and lay there looking at the stars.
“If we were on the shore of Lake Superior,” Jack sighed, “I could like this for a long time.”
“I suppose it’s great,” said Stew. “I’ve never been there.”
“Great’s the word, all right!” Jack became enthusiastic. “We used to have a regular gang, half a dozen fellows and more girls. Campfire parties, canoeing in the moonlight, sings—all that....” His voice trailed off. Then, “Patsy was up there once.”
“Who’s Patsy?” Stew asked.
“Just a girl I used to know. We grew up together.”
“Uh-huh,” Stew drawled.
“Ted took her away from me at last, or at least I think he did.”
“Our Ted?” Stew sat up. “The one who came out today to help us fight the Japs? The Ted who saved our lives? Hm-m-m! Sounds a little bit queer.”
“Yes, but we practically saved his life too. That might also seem strange. It’s that way in war. War changes a lot of things.”
“You see,” Jack said, sitting up, “Ted and I were rivals. He was what the girls call ‘smooth’. I wasn’t. You know how I am.”
“Oh sure.”
“He beat me in some things, and I beat him in others. Then he went after Patsy.”
“But you weren’t smooth?” Stew drawled.
“That’s what I said.”
“Then how come you’re pals now?”
“We’re not really, you see. Ted and I both joined the Navy air force. We went to different training bases. I never saw him again until we met on board the Black Bee. Then he dragged me off to one side and said—”
“Listen!” Stew’s voice was tense. “There’s that screaming again! It’s coming this way like the wind.”
Jack listened with all his might. How weird it was, that screech coming in out of the silence of the night. “Some witch riding a broomstick.” He laughed uncertainly.
“Some Jap trick,” Stew muttered.
“I’m not so sure,” Jack said thoughtfully. “I’ve got a brand new notion about that thing.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Makes one want to be in an air-raid shelter.”
“Well, you won’t. We haven’t even got a cave. But there’s no need really. It’s got the whole island to strike, and it must be five miles long. The law of averages gives us one chance in a million of being hit.”
At that Stew settled back.
“That law of averages is mighty comforting sometimes,” Jack went on. “Take this war. We’ve eleven million men in uniform. How many do you think will get killed?”
“Maybe a million.”
“Not half that many, I’ll bet. That gives you and me one chance out of twenty-two of getting home alive. But maybe only a quarter of a million will be killed.”
“Forget that, can’t you?” Stew begged. “Death and that infernal howl don’t go so hot together.”
By this time the screech filled the air.
Then all of a sudden it dropped to become a mere whisper. “Say! That’s funny!” Jack exclaimed softly.
“I’ll say!” Stew drew a deep breath.
The voice of the unknown rose again, but this time the sound rose and fell.
“Something like the sound of a plane circling for a landing,” Jack told himself.
Then suddenly there was no sound at all. And though he wasn’t sure, Jack thought he caught a glimpse of a dark shadow darting low over the water some distance away.
CHAPTER VII
A NIGHT’S ADVENTURES
For a full three minutes after the sound had ceased abruptly, the two boys sat in absolute silence. Stew was waiting for the sound of a violent explosion. More minutes ticked away, and still silence over their tropical isle.
“Well, I’ll be—” Stew sprang to his feet.
“We’re not the only ones on this island,” Jack said in a husky whisper.
“Why? What makes you think that?” Stew was startled.
“That thing is not a torpedo,” Jack said, speaking slowly. “Nothing of the sort. It’s an airplane.”
“But such a sound!” Stew protested. “You can’t hear the propeller or the motors either. Whoever heard of a plane that made a noise like that?”
“Who knows?” Jack’s tone was thoughtful. “Perhaps a lot of people heard of it. We don’t know everything.”
“What people? Japs?”
“Perhaps. But I doubt that. Japs are clever imitators, but they don’t invent things.”
“Oh! Then it’s all right,” Stew breathed. “If they’re white men they’re friendly to us. Perhaps they’ll take us off this island.”
“We can’t be too sure of that.” Jack pricked Stew’s bubble of hope. “They might be Nazis. Don’t forget that there were a lot of Germans in these islands before the war—promoters, prospectors, traders, spies—all sorts. Now that Japan has the Malay Peninsula and the Dutch East Indies, do you think the Germans are staying away? Not on your life! They’re right in there getting theirs. You often hear of a German blockade runner being caught trying to sneak into Germany with badly needed raw materials. Where did the cargo come from?”
“Right over there,” Stew pointed to the west. “We’ve got to be careful.”
“You bet your sweet life we have! We’ll take turns keeping watch tonight.”
“We certainly will,” Stew agreed. “All the same, before I leave this island I’m going to have a look at that squealer if it costs me a leg.”
At that same moment back on the carrier, in the Commander’s cabin, Ted Armour was saying to the Commander:
“I think, sir, that something should be done about those two boys, Jack and Stew. They did a magnificent job, sir, watching that Jap task force up to the minute our bombers arrived.”
“Magnificent!” the Commander agreed. “I shall recommend that they be given a citation.”
“But that’s not what I mean, sir.” Ted was in dead earnest. “Their plane was damaged, but they were not on fire when I last saw them. They couldn’t have had a bad crackup. My theory is that they made a try for those islands off to the east.”
“We’ll hope they made it.” The Commander was pleased; for after all, he liked Jack very much and admired the courage the young Ensign had displayed that day.
“But, sir, all the islands in this region are held by the Japs, are they not?” Ted asked.
“Yes, all of them. But they are not all occupied by Japs. The smaller, rougher islands have been passed up by them as of little or no consequence.”
“There are natives?”
“Yes, perhaps.”
“Wild natives, cannibals—”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. There have been missionaries.” The Commander tapped his desk.
“Don’t you think we should make a search for them, sir?” Ted asked.
“A search at night is impractical. Tomorrow,” the Commander’s voice dropped, “we hope to be two hundred miles from here, bent on a dangerous mission. This Jap task force we encountered today was in the nature of an accident, a fortunate accident.”
“Then nothing will be done, sir,” Ted’s voice fell.
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that. In a few days we should be passing this way again. Then we’ll look them up, if such a thing is possible.”
“A few days!” Ted exclaimed. “A lot can happen in a few days, sir!”
“Quite right, my son. But this is war. In war we must all face the consequences.” The Commander rose. “I appreciate your interest in your friends. You, yourself did splendid work today. It shall not be forgotten.”
“Oh, that!” Ted waved a hand. “Add it to Jack’s share of glory, sir.”
“In the Navy,” the Commander smiled, “there can be no reflected glory. Don’t be too greatly disturbed by the plight of your comrades,” he added. “They’re probably eating native-fried chicken at this very moment.”
“Here’s hoping.” Ted smiled uncertainly. “Many thanks, sir. Good night, sir.”
“Good night.” The interview was at an end, but for Ted the incident was not closed, nor would it be until Jack and Stew were safely back on the carrier, or known to be gone forever.
In the meantime, sitting there beneath their mosquito-bar canopy on the dark mysterious island, Jack was finishing the story he had been telling to Stew.
“Queer thing is,” he was saying, “though you might not say it was so queer, either; but when Ted found me on the carrier he dragged me off to a dark corner. He seemed pretty excited.
“What he said was, ‘Look here, Jack. We’re not from the same town—not any more, we aren’t.’
“I didn’t like that kind of talk. ‘How come?’ I demanded.
“‘Look, Jack, don’t get me wrong.’ He seemed very much in earnest. ‘I’ll do anything I can for you, just anything. But you know how we’ve always been?’
“‘Yes. Fighting.’ I said.
“‘Well, not fighting,’ he said, ‘but rivals. That was all right back there,’ he went on. ‘But here it’s different. Here we’re working for Uncle Sam. We’ve no time now for personal rivalries. It’s a mighty serious business.’
“‘It sure is, Ted,’ I told him.
“‘All right then, look.’ He grabbed my hand. ‘We’ve got just one rival in this business.’
“‘Tojo,’ I said.
“‘You’re dead right. And look,’ he gripped my hand, ‘we can’t fight Tojo and one another at the same time, so what do you say we don’t tell anybody we’re both from Pineville?’
“‘That’s okay with me,’ I said. ‘The telling part, I mean. But anyway we’re from the same old town, all the same, and that’s the next thing to coming from the same family, so if I ever see two fellows in trouble, and one’s you, I’m going to help you first.’
“‘Same here.’ He pumped my hand up and down.
“Well, what do you think of it, Stew?” Jack asked after a time.
“Strikes me you’re two grand guys,” said Stew. “But what about that girl Patsy?”
“That doesn’t matter so much any more, I guess.” Jack paused. “Of course the home folks mean a lot to a fellow when he’s out here. Patsy writes to me, quite a lot, just the home town news. Wants to know what I’m doing, and tells me what she’s doing. Half a dozen other girls do the same. It’s their patriotic duty. Mighty nice of them, but it’s just their homework, that’s all.”
“Don’t be too sure!” Stew was in dead earnest. “You just keep on writing to Patsy.”
“Oh, sure I will!” Jack laughed. “And all the rest of them. But it may be a long time between letters just now. Lie down and rest,” he suggested. “I’ll call you when I feel like changing places.”
“Don’t wait too long.” Stew stood up and yawned.
After a short walk up and down the pebbly beach Stew stretched out for a few winks of sleep. Jack gripped his automatic and patrolled the beach.
As he walked he thought of all the circumstances that had brought him to this wild spot. He had always wanted to fly. Flying toy airplanes had been his favorite occupation in grade-school days. The strange, gypsylike life his family had lived in summer, camping in some Indian cabin or roughing it on an island, with canoes, rowboats and sailboats always at hand, had prepared him for all this. After high school he had spent a winter on an island as assistant ranger. His only contact with the outside world had been by radio. For five months no boat came to the ice-locked island. Snowshoes, long inspection marches, nights in deserted cabins, wolves, moose, and snow buntings. He had loved it all.
“Now we haven’t even a radio,” he thought. It was strange how the jigsaw puzzle of his life appeared to fit together.
“I have always had my violin,” he thought. “And I still have one,” he reminded himself, with a start.
When midnight came and went with no sign of life on the island, he at last took the violin from its case and began playing “Ave Maria” softly.
“Ave Maria.” How strange it sounded there in the silent night.
He played on. For a full hour he was lost to his surroundings. The simple things he had played as a small boy came back to him. So, too, did the more difficult selections he had played with the college orchestra in his home town, and the one that had won first place for him in the state high-school contest.
“That’s all in the past,” he thought once. But he wasn’t sure. He sat on a fallen palm tree, with the violin across his knee, and dreamed of a great concert orchestra and of a funny little conductor with a shock of white hair—a very fine musician. And in that dream he saw himself playing as the soloist of the performance.
Then he took up his violin and played again. Though his strings were muted, the low melodies carried far in the still night. It was during the playing of his last piece that two figures appeared on the ledge far above him. Standing there in the moonlight, their light garments turned them into ghosts. Realizing this, perhaps, they moved back into the shadow of a great rock, but still they lingered. All unconscious of this, Jack played on. Then suddenly he was wakened from his dream by a wild shout from Stew, a cry of pain and fright.
The two figures on the rocks darted away so quickly that they loosened a stone which went tumbling down to stop with a crash a short distance from the spot where Jack sat.
“Stew! What’s up?”
“It was a Jap!” Stew exclaimed. “He tried to carve me up.”
“A Jap!” Jack laughed as he came dashing up. “There wasn’t any Jap. Couldn’t have been. I would have seen him.”
“But look! My ear is bleeding!” Stew rubbed his ear.
After a hasty glance up the rocky ridge Jack turned on his flashlight.
“Here’s your Jap,” he laughed. He pointed to a huge land crab with pincers six inches long. “He was looking for something soft.” Jack seized the crab by its back and tossed it far up on the slope.
“All the same,” Jack snapped off the light. “There was something up there on that ridge, and it wasn’t a crab.”
“Why? How do you know?” Stew’s voice was low.
“A rock came tumbling down. Thought I caught a flash of something white. I might have been mistaken.”
“We’ve got to watch our step.” Stew spoke in a solemn tone.
“We sure must,” Jack agreed.
But something more than the thought of danger was troubling Jack at this moment.
“If we don’t get off this island in a day or two,” he said gloomily, “we’re almost sure to miss the Big Show.”
“Oh, yes,” Stew breathed. “Say! That’s right!”
“And I’d about as soon be dead as to miss that.” Jack’s gloom deepened. Occasionally during his watch, when he listened in vain for the sound of a rescue plane, the thought of the “Big Show” and the part he wanted to play in it became a definite goal.
Only the night before, the ship’s commander had said to him, “We’ve got a little job to do down south of here. Then, I hope, we’re due to join the big push for the grandest show of all.”
Yes! The “Big Show”! Whispers had gone around the ship. For two whole weeks rumors had been crystallizing into facts. They would join other task forces, a dozen carriers, some big battle wagons, a hundred—perhaps two hundred—fighting ships, scores of transports and cargo ships, as well as many fast PT boats. Then all together, with the greatest fighting force the world had ever known, they would go after Mindanao.
And what was Mindanao? For the fiftieth time Jack got out a map, and flashing his pinpoint light on a spot said:
“There it is, one of the largest of the Philippine Islands.”
“MacArthur said he’d go back, and now we’re going,” Stew said soberly.
“What do you mean, ‘we’?” Jack demanded bitterly. “Looks as if we’re stuck right here.”
“I’ll be there if I have to swim!” Stew vowed.
“All right. Suppose you sit up for a while and think that one over,” Jack suggested, “while I grab three winks of sleep.”
CHAPTER VIII
A LOOK AT A MYSTERY PLANE
Jack awoke with a start. The hot tropical sun shone on his face. Despite the threat of danger, he had slept soundly.
“Huh!” He sat up suddenly to find Stew laughing at him.
“That dream of yours must have been a humdinger!” Stew exclaimed. “You were grinning from ear to ear in your sleep.”
“Quite a dream,” Jack admitted. “I was back on my uncle’s farm. It was morning. Birds were singing, and a rooster crowing.”
“He still is.” Stew chuckled.
“Who still is what?” Jack stared.
“The rooster’s still crowing. Listen.”
Jack listened, and sure enough, there came the lusty crow of a rooster.
“People!” Jack stood up. “Our island has inhabitants! Where there’s chickens there’s folks! What do you know about that? Shall we look them up?”
“Wait a minute!” said Stew in a puzzled tone. “You can’t be sure there are people on these islands. Those chickens may be wild.”
“Perhaps they are,” Jack agreed. “But that fellow who flies the howling plane must be human, so we’d better watch our step, since that means there’s someone on the island.”
“I meant native people,” Stew corrected. “Many of these small islands are deserted now. The natives went to larger islands, or the Japs have taken them off. Perhaps it’s true here.”
“Could be,” said Jack, “but if we don’t look up the natives or whoever is on this place, how’ll we eat?”
“I guess it’s emergency rations for us,” Stew replied. “But that’s not so bad. We’ve got matches for a fire and there’s powdered coffee.”
“Coffee! Boy! Lead me to it!” Jack jumped up. “If you’ll make a small fire and get the coffee ready, I’ll look around a little and see what our possibilities are.”
“And I’m going to have a look at that screamer today or know the reason why!” Stew told himself as he collected dried shreds of palm fronds, coconut shucks, and splinters of wood for a fire.