Night Over the Solomons (Ss) (1986)

by L'amour, Louis

  The other ships must have seen the fighter go, for they split apart at once. One flying north, the other south. With a gleam in his eyes, Turk saw it was the bomber that turned south. “We got “em,” he yelled. “This is the payoff!”

  Runnels, his face deathly pale, touched his shoulder. “Turk!” he yelled. “If you hit that bomb, we’re done for!” “Wait, and watch!”

  Madden yelled. He rolled over and went streaking after the passenger ship. His greater speed brought him up fast, and he could see the other plane fighting desperately to get away. In that passenger plane would be the men who knew, the men whose knowledge of atomic power could give the militarists of the world a terrible weapon, a weapon to bring chaos to the world. It was like shooting a sitting duck, but he had to do it. His face set and his jaw hard, he opened the Goose up and let it have everything it had left. Swiftly he overhauled the passenger plane, which dived desperately to escape. It came closer to the hills below, and Turk swung closer. He glanced at the gigantic Dome of St. Paul, coming closer now, and then he did a vertical bank, swung around and went roaring at the plane! The pilot was game. He made a desperate effort, and then the probing fingers of Turk’s tracer stabbed into his tail assembly. The ship swung off her course, lost altitude, and the pilot tried to bank away from the rounded peak of the Dome. He tried too late. With a terrific crash and a gigantic burst of flame, the passenger plane crashed belly first against the mountain side.

  For an instant the flaming wreck clung to the steep side, then it sagged, something gave way, and like a flaming arrow it plunged into the deep canyon below.

  Turk shook himself, and his face relaxed a little, then he started climbing.

  “Two down,” he said aloud, “and one to go!”

  He went into a climbing turn. Up, up, up.

  Far off to the south he could see the plane bearing the atomic bomb, a mere speck against the sky now. it was an old type plane, with a cruising speed of no more than a hundred and fifty miles per hour. With his ship he could beat that by enough. For the fiftieth time he thanked all the gods that he was lucky enough to have picked up this experimental model with its exceptional speed. He leveled off and opened the ship up.

  Runnels had moved up into the copilot’s seat.

  He glanced at Turk, but said nothing. His face was white and strained. Behind him, Turk could hear Panola breathing with deep sighs. Only Shan Bao seemed unchanged, phlegmatic.

  As the lean Manchu thrust his head lower for better vision, Turk glimpsed his hawk like yellow face and the gleam in his eye. It was such a face as the Mongol raiders of the khans must have had, the face of a hunter, the face of a fighter. There was in that face no recognition of consequences, only the desperate eagerness to close with the enemy, to fight, to win. Turk’s eyes were cold now. He knew what he had to do. That atomic bomb must go. No such power could be left in the hands of these power mad, force-minded men. It must go. If his own plane and all in it had to go, the cost would be slightly balanced against the great saving to civilization and the world of people.

  Yet that sacrifice might not be necessary. He had a plan.

  He swung his ship inland for several miles, flying a diagonal course that carried him south and west. The bomber was still holding south, intent only on putting distance between them. His Turk knew what that pilot was thinking. He was thinking of the awful force he carried with him, of what would happen if they were machine-gunned or forced to crash-land. That pilot was afraid. He wanted distance, freedom from fear.

  Yet Turk was wondering if the pilot could see what was happening. Did that other flyer guess what was in his mind? And Turk was gaining, slowly, steadily gaining, drawing up on the bomber. It was still a long way ahead. But it was over Canal Ladrillero now, and as Turk moved up to the landward, the bomber followed the canal southwest.

  Deliberately, Turk cut his speed back to one hundred and fifty. Runnels glanced at him, puzzled, but Turk held his course, and said nothing. At the last minute, the enemy pilot seemed to realize what was happening and made a desperate effort to change course, but Turk moved up, and the bomber straightened out once again.

  There was one thing to watch for. One thing that might get the bomber away. He would think of that soon, Turk realized. And that would be the instant of greatest danger.

  “Watch!” he said suddenly, “If he drops that bomb, yell! That’s only chance now.”

  Runnels jumped suddenly as the idea hit him.

  “Why! Why, you’re herding him out to sea,” he shouted. “You’re herding him out there where his bomb won’t do any damage!” “Yeah,” Madden nodded grimly, “and where he won’t have gas enough to get back.”

  “What about us?” Panola asked.

  “Us?” Turk shrugged. was I think we’ve got more gas than he has. He wasn’t expecting this.

  We had enough to fly us back to our mother ship. If we have to, we can sit down on the water and last awhile. This is a boat, you know. We could probably last long enough in this sea so that the ship could come up with us. We’ll radio as soon as we get this bomber out far enough.” They were over two hundred miles out, and still herding the bomber before Runnels let out a yell. But Turk had seen the bomber jump and had seen the bomb fall away.

  He whipped the ship over into a steep climbing turn and went away from there fast. Even so, the concussion struck them with a terrific blow, and the plane staggered, and then he looked back at the huge column of water mounting into the sky, and then the awful roar as thousands upon thousands of tons of water geysered up and tumbled back into the sea. Turk banked again, searching for the bomber. It was there, still further out to sea, and Turk turned again and started after him. “All right, Panola,” he said. “In code, call our own ship. I hope they survived the tidal wave caused by that bomb.”

  The bomber was farther out now, and they moved after him, and in a moment, Panola leaned over.

  “She’s all right. About two hundred miles north and west.” Turk turned the amphibian, keeping the bomber in view, but angling away. “He may reach land,” he said over his shoulder.

  “But if he does he’ll crash on the coast of Chile. He’ll never make it back to the Argentine!”

  Runnels leaned back and ran his finger around inside of his collar. “For awhile you had me worried,” he said grimly, “I thought you were going to tangle with that bomb!”

  Turk chuckled. “Not me, buddy! I’m saving this lily white body of mine for the one and only girl!”

  “Yeah?” Runnels was skeptical. “And you’ve got a girl in every port?” “Not me. I haven’t been in every port!”

  *

  Author’s Notes:

  Wings Over Khabarovsk

  This is the first story I wrote about Siberia, the forbidding frontier I explore in much greater detail in my novel Last of the Breed. The first person to tell me about Siberia in detail was One-Armed Sutton, the legendary adventurer who was one of several inspirations for Turk Madden.

  Sutton was a Canadian, if I recall correctly, who’d gone to Siberia to try to get his hands on some of the gold bars the White Russians had brought from the motherland. He also did some gold dredging on a river there, but I think the natives decided he was doing too well and shut him down.

  He had worked with a half dozen warlords in China before that, at different times, and built mortars for them. Somewhere along the line he lost his arm.

  He and his stories meant a lot to me.

  *

  The drone of the two radial motors broke the still white silence. As far as the eye could reach the snow-covered ridges of the Sihote Alin Mountains showed no sign of life. Turk Madden banked the Grumman and studied the broken terrain below. It was remote and lonely, this range along the Siberian coast.

  He swung his ship in a slow circle. That was odd. A half dozen fir trees had no snow on their branches.

  He leveled off and looked around, then saw what he wanted, a little park, open and snow-covered, among the trees. It was ju
st the right size, by the look of it. He’d chance the landing. He slid down over the treetops, setting the ship down with just barely enough room. Madden turned the ship before he cut the motor.

  Taking down a rifle, he kicked his feet into snowshoes and stepped out into the snow. It was almost spring in Siberia, but the air was crisp and cold. Far to the south, the roads were sodden with melting snow, and the rivers swollen with spring floods. War would be going full blast again soon.

  He was an hour getting to the spot. Even before he reached it, his eyes caught the bright gleam of metal.

  The plane had plunged into the fir trees, burying its nose in the mountainside. In passing, it had knocked the snow from the surrounding trees, and there had been no snow for several days now. That was sheer luck. Ordinarily it would have snowed, and the plane would have been lost beyond discovery in these lonely peaks.

  Not a dozen feet from the tangled wreckage of the ship he could see a dark bundle he knew instinctively was the flyer. Lutvin had been his friend.

  The boyish young Russian had been a great favorite at Khabarovsk Airport. Suddenly, Turk stopped. Erratic footprints led from the crashed plane to the fallen body. Lutvin had been alive after the crash!

  Madden rushed forward and turned the body over. His wild hope that the boy might still be alive died instantly. The snow under the body was stained with blood. Fyodor Lutvin had been machine-gunned as he ran from his fallen plane.

  Machine-gunned! But that meant-Turk Madden got up slowly, and his face was hard. He turned toward the wreckage of the plane, began a slow, pain staking examination. What he saw convinced him.

  Fyodor Lutvin had been shot down, then, after his plane had crashed, had been ruthlessly machine-gunned by his attacker.

  But why? And by whom? It was miles from any known front. The closest fighting was around Murmansk, far to the west. Only Japan, lying beyond the narrow strip of sea at Sakhalin and Hokkaido. And Japan and Russia were playing a game of mutual hands off. But Lutvin had been shot down and then killed. His killers had wanted him dead beyond question.

  There could be only one reason-because he knew something that must not be told. The fierce loyalty of the young flyer was too well known to be questioned, so he must have been slain by enemies of his country. Turk Madden began a systematic search, first of the body, then of the wreckage. He found nothing.

  Then he saw the camera. Something about it puzzled him. He studied it thoughtfully. It was smashed, yet-Then he saw. The camera was smashed, but it had been smashed after it had been taken apart-after the film had been removed. Where then, was the film?

  He found it a dozen feet away from the body, lying in the snow. The film was in a waterproof container. Studying the situation, Turk could picture the scene.

  Lutvin had photographed something. He had been pursued, shot down, but had lived through the crash.

  Scrambling from the wrecked ship with the film, he had run for shelter in the rocks. Then, as he tumbled under the hail of machine-gun fire, he had thrown the film from him. Turk Madden took the film and, picking up his rifle, started up the steep mountainside toward the park where he had left the Grumman. He was just stepping from a clump of fir when a shot rang out. The bullet smacked a tree trunk beside him and stung his face with bits of bark.

  Turk dropped to his hands and knees and slid back into the trees. Ahead of him, and above him, was a bunch of boulders. Even as he looked a puff of smoke showed from the boulders, and another shot rang out. The bullet clipped a twig over his head.

  Madden fired instantly, coolly pinking every crevice and crack in the boulders. He did not hurry. His final shot sounded, and instantly he was running through the soft snow. He made it to a huge fir a dozen feet away before the rifle above him spoke. He turned and fired again.

  Indian-fashion, he circled the clump of boulders. But when he was within sight of them, there was no one about. For a half hour he waited, then slid down. On the snow in the center of the rocks, he found two old cartridge cases. He studied them.

  “Well, I’ll be blowed! A Berdianka!” he muttered. “I didn’t think there was one outside a museum!”

  The man’s trail was plain. He wore moccasins made of fur, called unty. One of them was wrapped in a bit of rawhide, apparently. His rifle was ready, Turk fell in behind. But after a few minutes it became obvious that his attacker v anted no more of it. Outgunned, the man was making a quick retreat. After a few miles, Madden gave up and made his way slowly back to his own ship.

  The chances were the man had been sent to burn the plane, to be sure a clean job had been made of the killing. But that he was wearing unty proved him no white man, and no Jap either, but one of the native Siberian tribes.

  It was after sundown when Turk Madden slid into a long glide for the port of Khabarovsk. In his coat pocket the film was heavy. He was confident that it held the secret of Lutvin’s death.

  There was a light in Commissar Chevski’s office. Turk hesitated, then slipped off his helmet and walked across the field toward the shack.

  A dark figure rose up from the corner of the hangar, and a tall, stooped man stepped out.

  “Shan Bao!” Madden said. “Take care of the ship, will you?” The Manchu nodded, his dark eyes narrow.

  “Yes, comrade.” He hesitated. “The commissar asking for you. He seem angry.”

  “Yeah?” Madden shrugged. “Thanks. I’ll see him.” He walked on toward the shack without a backward glance. Shan Bao could be trusted with the plane. Where the tall Manchu had learned the trade, Turk could not guess, but the man was a superb plane mechanic. Since Maddens arrival from the East Indies, he had attached himself to Turk and his Grumman, and the ship was always serviced and ready.

  Turk tapped lightly on Chevski’s door, and at the word walked in. Commissar Chevski was a man with a reputation for efficiency.

  He looked up now, his yellow face crisp and cold. The skin was drawn tightly over his cheekbones, his long eyes almost as yellow as his face. He sat behind his table staring at Turk inscrutably. Twice only had Turk talked with him. Around the port the man had a reputation for fierce loyalty and driving ambition. He worked hard and worked everyone else. Comrade Madden,” he said sharply. “You were flying toward the coast today!

  Russia is at war with Germany, and planes along the coast invite trouble with Japan. I have given orders that there shall be no flying in that direction!

  “I was ordered to look for Comrade Lutvin, Madden said mildly, “so I flew over the Sihote Atlins.”

  “There was no need,” Chevski’s voice was sharp.

  “Lutvin did not fly in that direction.” , “You’re mistaken,” Turk said quietly, “I found him.”

  Chevski’s eyes narrowed slightly. He leaned forward intently. “You found Lutvin? Where?”

  “On a mountainside in the Sihote Atlins.

  His plane had crashed. He was dead. His ship had been shot down from behind, and Comrade Lutvin had been machine-gunned as he tried to escape the wreck.”

  Chevski stood up.

  “What is this nonsense?” he demanded. “Who would machine-gun a Russian flyer on duty? We have no enemies here.”

  “What about Japan?” Madden suggested. “But that need make no difference. The facts are as I say. Lutvin was shot down-then killed.”

  “You landed?” Chevski demanded. He walked around from behind his desk. He shook his head impatiently. “I am sorry, comrade. I spoke hastily. This is serious business, very serious. It means sabotage, possibly war on a new front.”

  Chevski walked back behind the table. He looked up suddenly. “Comrade Madden, I trust you will say nothing of this to anyone until I give the word.

  This is a task for the OGPU, you understand?” Madden nodded, reaching toward his pocket. “But, com-The Russian lifted a hand.

  “Enough. I am busy. You have done a good day’s work. Report to me at ten tomorrow. Good night.” He sat down abruptly and began writing vigorously.

  Turk hesitated
, thinking of the film.

  Then, shrugging, he went out and closed the door.

  Hurrying to his own quarters, he gathered his materials and developed the film. Then he sat down and began studying the pictures. For hours, he sat over them, but could find nothing. The pictures were of a stretch of Siberian coast near the mouth of the Nahtohu River. They were that, and no more. Finally, almost at daylight, he gave up and fell into bed.

  It was hours later when he awakened. For an instant he lay on his back staring upward, then glanced at his wristwatch. Nine-thirty. He would have barely time to shave and get to Chevski’s office. He rolled over and sat up. Instantly, he froze.

  The pictures, left on the table, were gone! Turk Madden sat very still. Slowly, he studied the room. Nothing had been taken except the pictures, the film, and the can in which it had been carried. He crossed the room and examined the door and window. The latter was still locked, bore no signs of having been opened. The door was as he had left it the night before. On the floor, just inside the door, was the fading print of a damp foot.

  Madden dressed hurriedly and strapped on a gun. Then he went outside. The snow was packed hard, but when he stepped to the corner he saw a footprint. The snow was melting, and already there were three dark lines of earth showing across the track under his window, three lines that might have been made by an unty with a rawhide thong around it! Suddenly, Turk glanced up. A squad of soldiers was coming toward him on the double. They halted before him, and their officer spoke sharply. “Comrade Madden! You are under arrest!”

  “Me?” Turk gasped, incredulous. “What for?”’; “Come with us. You will know in good time.”

  They took him at once to Commissar Chevski’s office. Turk was led in and stopped before Chevski’s desk. There were five other men in the room.

  Colonel Granatman sat at the table beside Chevski. In a corner sat Arseniev of the Intelligence. He looked very boyish except for his eyes. They were hard and watchful. The other two men Madden did not know. “Comrade Madden]”