Part 8

“No—o.” Alice spoke slowly. “I’m staying right here. There’s the dairy, you know. Jock will care for the cattle and tend to the milking. I’ll make the butter. It all goes to your mess, I suppose you know? The butter, I mean. Or didn’t you know?”

“I could have guessed,” said the young Lord. “Our butter’s been uncommonly good of late.”

“Thanks a lot.” Alice made a neat bow. “Anyway we’ve all got to carry on. I shall be quite all right here with old Jock and Flash.”

“And we’ll all welcome an opportunity to drop in for a chat now and then.” Dave added with a genuine sigh of satisfaction. “We’ll always be needing someone to listen to our tall tales or to offer us consolation when we’ve met with defeat.”

“All quite true,” said the young Lord. And he did not laugh.

Strange days followed. The R. A. F. in war time is no respecter of persons. Though the young Lord was of noble birth, he must suffer for his breach of discipline. He was grounded for five days. His battered Spitfire was taken down from the balloon cables and repaired. Armor plate was added to his seat and fitted about his motor, so the time out was not all loss.

Every day the two “cubs”, Dave and Brand went up with the Lark as their leader. Their field of patrol was narrow. Since their last battle the Jerrys seemed to avoid that little patch of the sky over England.

One day an enemy dive-bomber wandered into their “Sphere of Influence.”

Seeing the direction the bomber was taking, the Lark let out a wild whoop, barked “Tallyho!” into his receiver and then they were away. Climbing into the sun they prepared to head the intruder off.

This time neither was, in the matter of speed, a match for the Lark. There was a reason. The town for which the bomber was headed was Renton-by-the-Sea. In that small city the Lark had spent his happy boyhood days. Neither an industrial town nor a seaport, it was one of those charming little cities where tired business men and their families spend their week-ends at play.

“My home town!” the Lark roared into the receiver. “He’ll send some of the very houses I’ve known and loved for years spouting into the sky! Only he won’t.” Dave could hear his teeth crack.

And then the strange fellow’s voice boomed forth in song. “It’s a long way to Tipperary. It’s a long way to go.”

The Lark was now flying straight away from the sun. The dive-bomber’s pilot had not seen him. He was circling like a gull preparing for a sudden dive when the Lark came straight at him. Not troubling to get on his tail, the brave young defender of his home town let out a burst of fire, then went swooping past him.

An answering burst rattled against the Lark’s plane but did no harm. Banking sharply, the Lark came up beneath the bomber, stood his Spitfire on its tail, let out a second burst, then gripping his emergency lever he thundered out from under and away.

He was not a second too soon. The bomber heeled over to rocket toward the earth. It burst into flames then blew up with such force that Dave, some distance away, was set into a spin and barely escaped a crash.

Once more singing Tipperary, The Lark led the way home. After a time he broke off to shout:

“The small boys of my home town will be hunting souvenirs from that bomber for weeks to come. Oh, boy! How I wish I was a child again, just for tonight.”

When there was time off Dave enjoyed striding Brand’s bike and riding away to the Hideout. It was good to drop back into the old, quiet, nearly normal life. Alice and Cherry were there and sometimes the children. Cherry seemed to take her trip to America very quietly, as a matter of duty. She spent hours sitting by the fire asking Dave about his native land, but always in that quiet, matter-of-fact whisper of hers. The children were vastly excited about the trip and eager to be away.

At times Dave thought of the days to come when Alice would be alone with the aged veteran and the dog, Flash. The thought troubled him a little. There were, he supposed, enemy spies about. He had come into contact with one of these.

Ramsey Farm seemed to have been marked for destruction. He often asked himself why. A prisoner of war had once worked here. He had been treated with kindness and as an equal. Why should he have gone away embittered? “Twisted sort of mind, I suppose,” was his final conclusion.

Had this spy, Nicholas Schlitz brought destruction upon himself that night by the castle, or was he still prowling about? This question needed answering.

Late one afternoon he rode over to the castle. Coming upon a workman who cared for the castle grounds, he stated his problem.

“Perhaps this will answer your question,” the man said simply. He held out a metal disc. There was a name and number on the disc.

“Tom and I found it two days after the bombing,” the man said. “There was more to it than that, but I needn’t trouble you with the details. Tom and I, we figured it all out and reckoned the least said soonest mended.

“We reported this ’ere business to the proper authorities, sir,” he went on. “It’s all in order, sir. We should have turned the tag in at headquarters. You’ll be doin’ us a service if you’ll attend to that for us, sir.

“And,” he added after a moment, “you’ll put in a few words of explanation. Words come handier to you than they does to Tom and me. I’m a thinkin’ you know the details.”

“I shouldn’t wonder.” Dave spoke slowly. “Thanks a lot. I’ll feel better about Alice being over at the Hideout with only old Jock and the dog to protect her.”

“No doubt of that, sir,” the man agreed as they parted.

War, Dave thought, was strange.

_Chapter_ XXII Roll Out the Barrel

Sunday came and with it the knowledge that before dawn of the next day the good ship Queen Bess would be on her way to America. And on that ship would ride Tillie, Peggy and their escort, Cherry.

Early Sunday morning the social worker from the subway and the little red-headed Irish pianist arrived in a car before the door of the Hideout.

“All the people of our subway have read in the paper about your trip to America,” the social worker said to Cherry. “They want you to attend a farewell party.”

“But I can’t sing. Can’t even speak out loud,” Cherry whispered.

“We know that,” exclaimed the little redhead. “They know it and are sorry for you. But you can still smile.”

“Yes.” Cherry proved her answer by a happy smile.

“That’s all that matters,” exclaimed the social worker. “Then you will come?”

“Yes.” Cherry swallowed a happy lump in her throat. “I’ll come.”

“We’ll all go down in my car,” the young Lord said later in the day. “When the party is over it will be about time for you to take the train for your port.”

“And we’ll all go down to the port to see you off,” Alice added with a grand smile.

That party in the subway was like nothing that ever happened before. So happy were the people at sight of their Singing Angel that they stood on their feet and shouted for a full five minutes.

It was Sunday night, but as if they must crowd weeks of joy into one wonderful night the people took the program in their own hands and sang everything from “Roll out the Barrel” to “God Save the King” and from “I’ve got my Eyes on You” to the “Glory Song.”

Ah yes! That was a night Cherry would not soon forget. One moment they were bowing before the Old Rugged Cross, the next they were Rolling the Old Chariot along. When at the very end someone started “God be with you till we Meet Again,” many an eye was moist. But at the very middle of the song a huge man who could stand no more emotion roared out in a terrific basso:

“We’ll roll the old chariot along.” And so, with a glorious shout they once again rolled the old chariot. Then the party was at an end.

It was a jolly party that, as Big Ben struck the hour of ten, boarded the train bound for the seaport town where the Queen Bess lay at anchor. Children with their sponsors filled every compartment of the train.

When they at last reached their destination and swarmed out on the platform the children began singing:

“Roll Out the Barrel.” And no one said, “Hush, this is Sunday.” But everyone took up the song. For this was the children’s hour.

There was no singing as, after finding their compartment for them, the little group from Ramsey Farm prepared to bid goodbye to Cherry, Tillie and Peggy.

Every one of them knew that their little group was breaking up and perhaps forever. They had shared joy and sorrow. A brother, two sisters, a life-long friend, a new-found pal from across the sea and two little waifs from the slums of London, they silently shook hands in the dark, then whispered, “Goodbye-Goodbye! Goodbye! And lots of good luck!”

On the way back on the train Alice whispered to Dave, “I wish Cherry hadn’t gone.”

“Why?” Dave stared.

“I don’t know. I just wish it, that’s all.”

And so, through the blackout, the little English train carried them back to London.

Next day Alice returned to her improvised buttery and her churn. But the song that so often had enlivened her task as the dasher went up and down was silenced.

For Dave the joy of flying increased with every morn. To climb up from the earth, to greet the dawn, to lose himself in the clouds, ah! that was joy beyond compare.

“If it only weren’t war,” he whispered to himself. And yet war did give it an added tang. It was like the nipping frost in the air that greets the ice-skater or the singing of the sled runners that delights the ears of the dog-team racer. He did look forward to the day when the young Lord’s penalty should be paid and the four of them would again be in the air.

The day came and they thundered away with the break of day. On this day, however, Heinie apparently was content to stay at home. Not a speck marred the blue of that little patch of the sky over England they claimed as their own.

“We’ll meet them again,” the young Lord’s tone was confident, as at last they returned to earth.

“Wolves, weasels, skunks, and all kinds of varmints visit the same little corner of the earth time after time. So do the Jerries. That big boaster, Wick, will return. And then!” It was clear that he had not forgotten the loss of his most beloved flying mate, Fiddlin’ Johnny.

“I wonder,” Dave said thoughtfully. “Does Wick always fly his men in that V-shaped formation?”

“Always, I am told,” was the answer.

“He assumes that we want to get at him and that we’ll go for the man protecting his tail,” Dave said thoughtfully. “That gives his other men a chance to close in and clean us up. Supposing we fooled him by taking off his three men on the other line, one at a time?”

“It’s an idea,” the young Lord replied. “Perhaps we’ll try it. Yes, I think we shall—when the time comes. And it will come, never fear!”

“Alice must be lonesome with Cherry and the children gone,” Dave suggested to Brand that evening. “Let’s go over.”

“I can’t tonight,” was Brand’s reply. “The Lark is giving me a lesson on handling a Brownie. You can’t learn too much, you know, not in this man’s war.”

“Nor half enough,” Dave agreed.

Mounting Brand’s bicycle, Dave rode over the pleasing country roads to Ramsey Farm. Night was just falling. There was a glorious freshness about the night air. The war seemed far away. “As if it couldn’t touch any of us,” he thought. How wrong he could be at times.

He found Alice doing the dinner dishes. Flash was curled up by the fire. Old Jock was at the stables. Dave grabbed a drying towel and helped with the dishes. Then they sat by the cheerful fire. He spoke of his day’s work. “No luck,” he concluded. “Perhaps tomorrow. Brand and I are getting better with our planes every day. We’ll be fighters yet.”

Alice smiled.

“Tonight _they_ seemed very far away,” she said, after a moment. Her voice was low. “It’s the first time Cherry and I have been parted for long.”

He knew who she meant and was silent.

From outside came the sound of a car. It stopped. There was a hand on the latch. Mrs. Ramsey stepped into the room. A large, healthy, good-natured woman, on arriving it was her custom to shout a cheery greeting. Tonight there was nothing of that.

“You’re here, David?” she said as she took his hand. “I’m glad.” She gave Dave her heavy coat, then took a place by the fire.

“It’s a bit chilly outside tonight,” said Alice.

“Quite.” Mrs. Ramsey’s voice seemed strange.

“But still and peaceful,” Dave suggested. “As if there were no war.”

After that for a full minute there was silence.

When at last the mother spoke her voice was high-pitched and a little strained. “I don’t know how to say it,” she began. “I’m not good at such things. I’m always too blunt about my speech. ‘Out with it’, that’s been my motto.

“You must know how I feel,” she went on after a pause, “So why all the beating around the bush? A rather terrible thing has happened. The Queen Bess has been attacked and sunk.”

Dave started and stared, yet neither he nor Alice spoke a word.

“It came to me by secret message,” Mrs. Ramsey went on. “The general public doesn’t know about it yet.”

“And did—did—” Alice’s words stuck in her throat.

“We have only the most meager details,” the mother said. “It was a sea raider that did it, not a submarine. The raider came in firing a broadside. Then it vanished into the night.

“In twenty minutes the Queen Bess was gone, down by the bow. There was a sea on. Some of the lifeboats were swamped. The children were magnificent! Perfectly magnificent!” Mrs. Ramsey swallowed hard. “All of them sang ‘Roll out the Barrel’ through it all.”

“Oh—o!” Alice breathed, then hid her face.

“That’s all there is to tell.” Mrs. Ramsey rose. “I must get back. I practically ran away. There was a frightful raid last night. All our wards are full. We—we’ll hope for the best.” She was gone.

They sat there in silence by the fire for a long time, the boy and the girl, in a troubled world.

At last Dave rose to walk slowly back and forth across the well-worn floor.

It was Alice who at last spoke. “Dave. She is not gone. She’s out there somewhere. You can’t kill such a spirit as Cherry’s. You just can’t.”

“That’s right,” Dave agreed. “It can’t be done.” He meant just that. “Well,” he sighed, “I’ll be going back. Let me know about things. I—I’ll bring Brand tomorrow night if we can make it.”

“Dave, I’m sorry,” Alice said as she clasped his hand in farewell. She was thinking of him just then, he knew that. She was trying to tell him she was sorry their happy evening together had been spoiled. How sort of magnificent she was! How marvelous these English girls!

_Chapter_ XXIII Victory

When Dave told Brand and the young Lord the news of the sinking, true to their British tradition they had little to say. Next day, however, they appeared on the field prepared for the dawn patrol. Dave saw new, hard lines about their lips.

“I’d hate to be their enemy today,” he thought, as a thrill ran up his spine.

They had been cruising, four of them, the young Lord, Brand, The Lark, and Dave, for an hour when out of a very small cloud, for all the world as if it had been waiting there for days, came that same formation, five planes in a V-shape. One plane following the leader on the right and three on the left.

“Can I believe my eyes?” The Lark shouted into his speaker.

“You can.” The young Lord’s voice was low. “Not another word. No shouting, please. You all know how we planned it. I’ll take the talk man of the three on the left. You know the rest. Tallyho!”

“Tallyho,” came echoing from the others. They were away.

Since they were a thousand feet above the enemy and in the end they came swooping down from above. They were not seen until the young Lord was all but upon his victim. His was a murderous assault that could have but one ending. As if in rehearsal, The Lark slipped into the place left vacant by the young Lord as he dropped into a power-dive. The Lark’s man went down in flames. Deserting his post, the third man tried flight, but with the luck of a beginner, Brand shot downward, then climbed straight up to riddle the Messerschmitt’s motor and send it down in a cloud of yellow smoke.

As for Dave, the whole affair had gone off with such speed that he found himself in a half daze, headed straight for the side of a gleaming Messerschmitt. Then his eyes registered an astonishing fact. He was facing the boasting Wick himself, he who called himself a deadly killer. On the tail of his plane was a black blotch. Dave knew this to be fifty-six black lines, one for each victim Wick claimed. For a space of seconds Dave’s blood was turned to ice. Then, with a rush, it was like molten steel.

They were close now, dangerously close, yet each was out of range of the other. Suddenly gripping his emergency lever, giving his motor its last ounce of power, Dave banked sharply, saw the terrible Wick rise into his sight, pressed the firing button, heard for one brief second his machine-guns speak, then went into a spin. Whirling over and over and going down, down, down where the good soil of Merry England lies, he thought, “This is the end!”

He was wrong. He came out of the spin. How? He would never know.

After levelling off he looked up, then down. To the right of him a Messerschmitt was falling in flames. Even as he looked it exploded in mid-air.

Far in the distance the one remaining enemy was speeding away. Off to the left the young Lord’s line was forming. Climbing slowly, Dave at last joined that line. Then, in the Sky Over England that was once more England’s own, they cruised the blue until the young Lord gave the word and they went thundering home.

As they left their ships on the landing field the young Lord walked over to Dave, put out a hand, gripped Dave’s hard, then without a word walked away. It was enough. Dave understood and was glad.

Just at mess time that evening an old man, member of the Home Guard appeared at headquarters. Under his arm he carried a flat, paper-wrapped package.

“Thought you might like it, sir,” he said as he placed it in the young Lord’s hand.

As the others gathered around the flight leader unwrapped it, then handed it to Dave. It was the tail of a Messerschmitt. On it had been painted two letters, H. W. Below these letters were 56 long, black lines.

“This,” said Dave, “should be yours.” He gave it back to the young Lord. “All trophies belong to the leader of the flight.”

“To the entire squadron,” the young Lord replied huskily. “Come. We’ll put it up where all may see.” He placed it on the mantle. “Not that we need to boast,” he said quietly, “but that all men may know that the Sky Over England is England’s alone.”

_Chapter_ XXIV Searchers of the Sea

Next morning the squadron commander received a strange request. Young Lord Applegate walked into his quarters, saluted, then said:

“Commander, I wish to ask for a transfer.”

“A transfer?” The Commander sat forward in his chair. “Why? You are doing magnificently. Only yesterday—”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” Applegate broke in, “that has no bearing on the case. I ask for a transfer to the bomber service that patrols the sea. I was trained for that work, had a full year’s training. That should be enough.”

“But you are a born fighter.”

“Perhaps,” the young Lord admitted. “And perhaps too one may fight with a twin-motored bomber.”

“There’s seldom an opportunity on sea patrol.”

“We will make an opportunity. My men, Ramsey, Barnes and The Lark, wish to go with me. Old Jock, from Ramsey Farm, a gunner, first-class, who lost a leg in Flanders, will join us.”

“I still don’t see—”

“Commander,” the young Lord’s face was tense with emotion, “with me this is a personal matter. You’ve heard of the sinking of the Queen Bess?” The Commander nodded.

“Cherry Ramsey was on that ship. You know her, I’m sure.”

“I have met her. A charming girl. She was doing a grand piece of work. Was she lost?”

“Her name is not on the list of those rescued. But it is believed,” the young Lord’s voice rang with hope, “that one life-boat, not swamped by the storm, remains unreported.

“If I am granted a transfer to the Sea Patrol I shall ask that we be allowed to patrol that portion of the air over the Atlantic beneath which the Queen Bess was fired upon and sunk.”

“I see.” The commander’s face was thoughtful.

“That is not all.” The lines on the young Lord’s brow deepened. “I shall ask that we be allowed to carry two five-hundred pound bombs and be commissioned to search for the merciless sea raider that sank that shipload of children. It is still at large.”

The commander nodded. “She attacked a convoy last night. Gave no warning. Sank three ships, then was away.”

For a moment the commander sat staring at the wall. “It’s very irregular,” he murmured.

“This is an irregular war, not fought by rules. Fought by men. Thank God for that!” The young Lord’s chin was up.

“All right. I’ll see what I can do.” The commander stood up. “Report to me here at noon.”

The young Lord saluted, then marched away.

An hour later he was engaged in a heated argument with his good friend, Alice. “But, Alice!” his voice rose. “It’s impossible! A woman on a sea-patrol bomber! Suppose we catch up with that ruthless pirate.”

“All right.” Alice stood up sturdy and tall. “Suppose we do?”

“It won’t be a one-sided fight. That raider carries anti-aircraft guns. Death may be waiting at those crossroads of the sea.”

“Death.” Alice’s voice was low. “In this war not just young men are giving their lives for the land they love. Men and women and children are. It’s everybody’s war.

“Harm!” (She seldom used that name of other days. In her soul was written traditional homage to nobility.) “It is Cherry who is out there on those black waters. Our Cherry! Peggy and Tillie are with her. A woman’s eyes are always sharper than a man’s. Always when we were children it was my eyes, not yours, that saw the lark soaring skyward or the finches hiding in the hedges. Harman, let me go!”

“But the farm, Alice?” The young Lord was weakening.

“Surely you can spare Jeff Weeks and his wife for a few days to look after this farm.”

“A few days? Yes. But suppose it is forever?” The young Lord’s voice was low. “Alice, more important than our search for Cherry, much as we all love her, is to be our hunt for the sea-raider. And if we find it there will be no quarter! It shall be that ship or our plane. Such is war.”

“If it is to be forever?” There was a smile on the girl’s lips. “We die but once. The farm will not matter. Let me go!”

The young Lord threw up his hands. “I surrender,” he whispered hoarsely.

And so it happened that, when the transfer had been granted and the young Lord had been put in command of a sea-scouting bomber, one of the fastest in the service, and when it sailed away into the blue, it carried not five but six men. One of these “men” had short, bobbed hair, and as he stood by the one-legged, gray-haired rear gunner, he looked remarkably like a girl.

At dawn, in a bomber that made their little Spitfires seem like gulls, the young warriors rose high in air, far above the clouds, to zoom away.

When land was lost from sight the young Lord studied his compass and his chart, set a course south by west to at last drop down close to the sea.

After that, hour after hour, with eyes that burned from watching and hearts that ached with longing, they studied the dark surface of the never-ending sea.

Twice they came upon British ship convoys and dipped low to greet them. Once they thought they saw a life-boat and hope ran high. But, as they dropped low, the supposed boat submerged.

“Whale or a submarine?” the young Lord barked into his receiver.

“Whale,” was old Jock’s instant response. So they soared on.

It was only after their gasoline supply began running low that they at last rose into the blue to go zooming to a landing field in the north of Scotland.