Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1943-04-27
CHAPTER XVI. :

Then Barnum and Ries came into
place alongside him. He asked them
if they were all right. They could
hear him. but they couldn't answer.
Their radios had been shot out.
They waggled and waved an "all
okay" and the three planes circled
some more, giving Fayle and Taur-
man another chance to join up.
Fayle and Thurman kept cropping
around through the darkening night.
They couldn't find anything. Swede
kept calling them. They never
heard him because their radios had
gone, too. SWede was still calling
them when machine guns started
to chug. There was Jap biplane
with twin floats hitting at them
Lawrence, the tunnel gunner, had
his guns working good. Swede could
see the tracers flying out into the
night like cinders from an engine
stack, hitting the Jap in pelts and
ricocheting off him. That meant
real slugs were going into him.
But the Jap kept coming on. He
was a very cheeky Jap. He made a
rush low down and SWede saw him
try to come up under and threw his
tired mind into this new battle. He
swung his. plane in tight turn. The
guns were silent moment, then
started chugging again. hesitantly,
and then fell silent. The ia p was
gone. He had either been shot down
or had got swallowed up by the
night, and was cropping for them out
there somewhere, blindly and stub
bornly. The fellows kept looking for
him patiently, saying Whats that?"
and us that him?" and "Whered he
go?" and then Swede said harshly,
Lets get the hell out of here" He
was sick over Thurman and Fayle.
Fayle was adding up his gasoline
He knew he'd never get home now.
He had no radio left and without
radio he couldn't find the carrier.
He was trying to figure out how
much more time he could give his
luck to find him something to sit
down on.
Radios All Dead.
Thurman had sent the tracers
cindering up the sky and numbered
after them desperately. Then lone
Jap, on the prowl, jumped him and
Thurman wheeled over and took
bullets in the belly of his plane and
squared off, like some dying bulldog,
for the fight, but the Jap was gone.
He had pressed past his prey and
had lost him somewhere in the
night and now he, too, must have
been cropping stubbornly. The whole
night was like that, electric with a
death that CROPPED blindly for vic
tins. And when Thurman got to
where he had seen the tracers,
everybody was gone and he was
alone again.
The exhausted men flew on in
their separate ways, Swede with
Barnum and Ries, Thurman and
Fayle alone. Then the moon came
up, big fat, clustering moon, big
enough and fat and clustering
enough for tropical cruise poster,
and the while sky unrolled under it
dimpled with chubby silvered-over
clouds.
Swede's was the only radio that
had kept working and now Lawrence
said he couldn't make it 60. 1t had
been carrying on all right after the
battle, but it just wouldn't work and
he didn't know what was the matter
with it. He had tried to find out
what was wrong, but he couldn't.
The interphone was going and he
told all this to Swede in the cracked,
broken voice of man who had been
pushed past the limit and now felt
there was no longer any use.
There are nine men depending
for their lives on that radio, includ-
ing you" Sweed pointed out.
II know, know" cried Lawrence,
what do you think I've been tell
ing myself all this time, sir?"
Thurman Gets Down.
Thurman was the first to 60 into
the water He found the island of
San Cristobal and went along it low
to see if there were Japs on it. No
body shot at the plane. WELL" he
I thought, that means yes or not
or maybe. Either there are no Japs
or there are Japs and maybe they
are afraid to shoot" He passed
back the word to the crew to guard
their small arms ard lowered the
plane into the water so gently, so
expertly that nobody was hurt or
even Jared very badly
Thor Elrorohu uront IouyY, To