Barry Blake of the Flying Fortress Read online

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE CATAMARAN

  Chick Enders and Curly Levitt pulled Barry onto their raft.

  “Great guns, Skipper!” the little bombardier exclaimed. “I never was soglad to see anything as I was to spot your headgear poking up out ofthat swell!”

  “Chick cut our line just in time,” Curly remarked, “or the ship’splunge would have spilled us into the pond, too. And, speaking ofwater, I hope we find a spring on that island when we reach it tonight.Nobody ever thought to bring along anything to drink, unless MickeyRourke has a canteen in that bundle of his.”

  “I have not!” the little gunner retorted. “Many a flier has been setadrift without water and lived to tell the tale. The small matter of adrink did not worry me. But the night before we took off from theflat-top I had a dream of floatin’ helpless on a rubber doughnut whilethe bloody Japs strafed me from the air. So I brought along awaterproofed tommy-gun, just in case me dream came true! Ye can laughat me if yez feel like it, gintlemen.”

  “Who wants to laugh?” Curly Levitt cried. “After this I’ll trade all myday dreams for one of your nightmares, Mickey.”

  “We’re the nitwits not to think of something like that!” Barry Blakeconfessed. “Did you by any chance remember to put some oil and cottonwaste in the same package? Our pistols could stand a cleaning now,before the salt water makes them useless.”

  Rourke pulled the little oilskin-wrapped container from his bundle andhanded it to Barry.

  “Here it is, sir,” he said with a grin. “I’m sorry I’m not a realsleight-of-hand artist, so I could produce a glass of ice water just aseasy.”

  Barry’s left eyelid flickered in a mysterious wink. Pulling out hiswater-soaked automatic, he handed it, butt first, to the littlesergeant.

  “You clean my gun for me, Mickey, and I’ll produce your glass ofdrinking water—though it may be minus the ice. I’m afraid neither asilk hat nor a rabbit was included in this raft’s equipment, but wehave something just as good.”

  While the others watched, open mouthed, Barry turned to a small,waterproofed case attached to the side of the raft. Opening it he drewout an object that looked like a small alcohol stove built onfuturistic lines.

  “Here’s our water supply,” he said, holding it up. “You put seawater in_there_ and a little can of fuel in _here_ and set the thing going witha match. In an hour we’ll have a quart and a pint of pure, distilledwater. Hap Newton has a gadget just like this on his raft.... What doyou think of it, Hap?”

  “It’s the only respectable still I ever saw,” the irrepressibleco-pilot answered. “How much ‘Adam’s Ale’ will it turn out before allthe fuel’s used up?”

  “About fifteen pounds,” Barry stated. “One of the officers on thecarrier told me each plane’s rafts were equipped with it. I just forgotto pass on the news. This still is a piece of regular Navy equipment,and so is the fishing tackle that goes with it.... Look!”

  Reaching into the case again he brought out a sealed, three-pound can.Under the amazed eyes of his three companions, he opened it to show acomplete fishing outfit of hooks, lines and dried bait. There was evena small steel spearhead for gaffing large fish.

  “We’ll use this right away,” the young skipper declared. “Since we’reso near to land we can afford to use some of our still’s fuel to broila tasty fish dinner. Here are three hook-and-line rigs, so it shouldn’ttake us long to catch a meal.”

  The castaways discovered all at once that they were ravenously hungry.With the tension of immediate danger gone, they went at the fishingwith the zest of youngsters. The fish were hungry, too. Within half anhour fifteen pounds of finny food lay on the bottom of the two rafts.

  The difficult job was preparing and cooking them. Barry solved theproblem by cutting the fish into fillets and broiling these on theblade of one of the raft’s aluminum oars. Two cans of fuel were usedfor that one meal.

  “We couldn’t be so wasteful, out of sight of land,” Curly Levittobserved. “We’d have to learn to eat our fish raw and like it.”

  “Which might not be so hard, after all, sir,” Mickey Rourke responded.“A sailor once told me he’d drifted for three weeks on a big raft withsix other lads, and eaten raw fish three times a day. They cut it thinand dried it in the sun, like herring. The sea water had salted italready. Me friend said it tasted fine.”

  “Your sailor friend was spinning you a salty yarn, if you ask me,” saidChick. “What did he do when the water rations gave out?”

  “Sure, that was easy!” Mickey Rourke replied. “He drank fish with hismeals and was never thirsty except when it stormed for three days andthe fish wouldn’t bite—”

  “Haw, haw, haw!” howled Hap Newton, whose raft had drifted closer. “Youbit, all right, Chick. You ought to know better than to match wits withan Irishman. So they _drank_ more fish when they got thirsty, huh!That’s the best joke I’ve heard since I was a dodo. How about it,Barry?”

  Barry Blake’s smile was not sympathetic.

  “The joke’s on you, Hap!” he chuckled. “Mickey, hand me that fish wedidn’t cook, and I’ll show Lieutenant Newton just what sort of a suckerhe is to doubt your word.”

  From the bottom of the bait can Barry took a folded square of muslinand the sharp edged spearhead. After making criss-cross cuts througheach side of the five pound fish, he pulled the diced flesh from thebones and placed them in the cloth.

  “Now hold the can under this muslin while we wring out a fresh fishcocktail, Mickey,” he directed.

  From the cloth, strongly twisted by Barry and the little sergeant, astream of watery liquid dribbled into the bait can. When no more wouldcome, Barry threw out the squeezed fish meat and put in more dicedpieces. The final result was half a cupful of fish juice.

  “It’s drinkable,” the young skipper declared after the first taste,“just as that naval officer on the flat-top told me it would be.There’s practically no salt taste, and it’s not as strong of fish asyou’d imagine. Who wants to hint that Sergeant Mickey Rourke is a liar,now?”

  Hap Newton shook his head solemnly.

  “I take it all back, gentlemen,” he said. “I’ll never doubt your wordagain, Mickey, unless I see you wink behind my back. But please don’task me to guzzle your fish cocktail while I have a perfectly good stillto make my own moonshine water. Pass me a match, Fred, and let’s getthe thing started. I want to wet my whistle before Crayle, here, wakesup and demands a fresh water bath.”

  “_Now We’ll Wring out a Fresh Fish Cocktail._”]

  While their water stills boiled, the two raft crews began paddlingtoward the island. Their progress was less than a mile an hour, butthat did not bother them. With darkness still several hours away, theydared not approach too near.

  “The moon rises early tonight,” Curly Levitt informed his friends. “Ifwe’re within two miles of land then, we should be able to see the shoreline. The cloud ceiling isn’t so thick that it will shut out all thelight.”

  As a matter of fact, the clouds thinned as evening approached. A stiffbreeze sprang up, drifting the rafts so rapidly toward land that thepaddles were no longer needed. As the last daylight faded a faint glowabove the eastern horizon told that the moon was up.

  The rafts had been tied together all afternoon, to avoid drifting toofar apart. Now, with paddles plying steadily, they were making goodheadway toward the dark line of jungle that marked the island. BarryBlake, in the leading “doughnut,” strained his ears for any sound ofbreakers that would indicate a dangerous landing place. There wasnone—only the rhythmical roaring of the surf on the smooth beach, andthe slap-slap-slap of water against the rafts’ flat bottoms.

  They were a hundred yards from the head of a little cove when theclouds thinned enough to show the moon. For five short seconds thelight was fairly clear. A scudding cloud mass dimmed it, but not beforeBarry had glimpsed a long, black shape moving out from shore.

  “Stop paddling!” the young skipper whispered. “Pass the word to Hap’sr
aft.... There’s a boat putting out from the beach—due to pass uswithin a few yards. Have your guns ready if it spots us, and keep yourheads down.”

  “Sure, I knew me little tommy-gun would come in handy, Lieutenant,”Mickey Rourke muttered. “I’ll take the oilskin bag off and be readywhen yez say, ‘Open fire!’”

  Tense moments passed. A patch of darkness blacker than the surroundingwater moved into Barry’s range of vision. Mickey had seen it, too. Hesnuggled lower in the raft, the stock of his weapon tight against hisshoulder.

  Abruptly a high-pitched, chattering voice broke out in the oncomingboat. Barry felt Sergeant Rourke stiffen beside him, waiting the wordto fire. But that word was never given. A girl’s voice spoke from thedarkness in clear American.

  “Quiet, Nanu!” it said. “That’s not a Jap boat, unless it’s upsidedown. Paddle closer and we’ll look the thing over.”

  Gusty sighs of relief went up from the bomber’s crew.

  “A girl! From the States!” they chorused.

  “So they want to look us over,” remarked Fred Marmon’s voicesententiously. “Well, _I’m a monkey’s uncle_!”

  Feminine laughter pealed in the darkness. There were two women in thestrange boat and at least one white man, to judge by the voices. Barrythought, however, that he could distinguish other figures.

  “We’re the crew of an American bomber, forced down by lack of fuel thisafternoon,” he explained. “We nearly turned a sub-machine gun on youpeople a minute ago, thinking you were Japs. If we hadn’t heard one ofthe ladies speak—”

  “That was Dora Wilcox,” another girl broke in. “She and her father hada mission station here; and I’d just come out to join my father at hiscocoanut plantation when the Japs came. We’ve been hiding from themever since. The little brutes caught and killed Reverend Wilcox onlylast week. I’m Claire Barrows, and my father is here beside me.”

  “We had a hard time persuading Miss Wilcox to come with us,” a man’svoice added. “She wanted to stay with the native converts until theythemselves urged her to leave. The Japs are due to occupy this islandin force at any time.”

  “Nanu and Kari Luva and their wives decided to escape with us in theircatamaran,” Dora Wilcox chimed in. “Why don’t you people join us? Thiscraft is really too heavy for three men and four women to paddle, andwe’re well stocked with water and food. I’m sure that Providencebrought us together—and kept you from shooting us in the dark.”

  There was no resisting the girl’s logic. Barry Blake quickly introducedhis crew by name as they lifted Crayle into the native boat. He himselfcame aboard last, carrying his precious still and fishing tackle. Thetwo rubber rafts were left to float ashore and mystify any Jap patrolthat might find them.

  Dora Wilcox, he soon discovered, was the real leader of the refugees.The four natives showed a childlike devotion to her. Even ClarkeBarrows, the middle-aged plantation owner, deferred to the girl’sopinion. Barry Blake found himself consumed with curiosity to see theface of this young person who planned like a general and thought ofeverybody else before herself.

  Dora Wilcox’s hope was to sail the entire three hundred miles toAustralia. She had brought palm fiber mats to cover the catamaranduring the day and make it appear abandoned. The mats would serve thedouble purpose of camouflage and shade. At night the sail would beraised. With a favorable wind, she told Barry, the double-dugout craftcould travel as much as eighty miles between dusk and dawn.

  The young Fortress skipper glanced up at the scudding clouds. Weather,he realized, would have a great deal to do with the success or failureof their escape. Without a keel the catamaran would make a lot ofleeway. If the wind held from the northeast, it could easily blow themashore on a Jap occupied island. The wisest plan would be to get as farto windward as they could before dawn.

  “Let us take the paddles, Miss Wilcox,” he said. “My crew will relieveyour native boys until it’s time to hoist sail. Then perhaps we canfigure out a way to beat the leeward drift.”

  “We’re at your orders from now on, Lieutenant,” the girl replied. “Noneof us is a navigator. If an American bomber crew can’t take us through,no human power could do it.”

  The seven airmen fell to work with a will and a weight of muscle thatsent the thirty-foot boat lightly over the swells. At midnight, whenthe sky cleared, they were well out of sight of land. Now for the firsttime the bomber team had a chance to see their companions’ faces.

  In the moonlight neither of the white girls looked more than eighteenor twenty years old. Claire Barrows had her father’s wide mouth andturned-up nose, and a smile that was decidedly attractive. Dora smiledless often, and her features were more finely chiseled. She wore herlong hair in braids wound about her head. Her calm, efficient,thoughtful personality could be read at a glance. Somehow she madeBarry’s pulse beat faster than any girl had done before.

  The two native couples were quite young, in their ’teens or earlytwenties. As they sat relaxed, balancing with the boat’s dip and sway,their shapely black bodies would have thrilled any sculptor. Barrycould imagine what capture by the Japs would mean to these children ofnature—slavery, degradation, living death!

  The thought made him fiercely determined to outwit the enemy, to bringall these people through the gantlet of Jap boats, planes, and shorepatrols. Thirteen persons now depended largely on him as their skipper.He must find some means of covering those three hundred miles toAustralia in a shorter time.

  “I have it!” he exclaimed aloud. “We’ll use the paddles in place of acenterboard. Is there any rope handy, Dora?”

  “Plenty,” replied the girl. “But what do you mean by using paddles fora centerboard, Lieutenant?”

  “I’ll show you,” the young skipper smiled, looking straight into hereyes. “But please leave off the handle and call me Barry, won’t you?”

  “All right,” Dora Wilcox answered, with a twinkle in her eyes. “It’seasier to say.... Oh, Nanu! Hand me that coil of rope you’re sittingon.”

  With the help of his crew, Barry tied four of the native paddles atintervals between the catamaran’s twin floats. The broad wooden blades,thrust deep in the water, acted like a keel. Now the wind pushing onthe sail would not drift the craft sidewise. Already equipped with asteering oar, the awkward-looking boat was now as manageable as acatboat.

  As the single, lanteen-type sail went up, water boiled white under thedouble bow. The catamaran was gathering speed.

  “Splendid!” cried Claire Barrows. “All we need now is a chart and acompass to set the course. Which way is Port Darwin, anyway, LieutenantNewton?”

  “I’ll be just plain ‘Hap’ to you, if you want me to live up to mynickname,” the big co-pilot retorted. “When it comes to findingdirections, Curly Levitt is the lad to consult. He carries a compass inhis head, I think!”

  “I have one in my pocket, which is a lot better,” Curly spoke up. “AndI stuffed a chart of these islands under my shirt when the plane wasforced down. With that equipment I can keep track of our course by deadreckoning. It will be pretty crude, without a log to check the knotswe’re making, but at least we won’t miss the broadside of Australia!”

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