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+Project Gutenberg's A Yankee Flier in Italy, by Rutherford G. Montgomery
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: A Yankee Flier in Italy
+
+Author: Rutherford G. Montgomery
+
+Illustrator: Paul Laune
+
+Release Date: May 7, 2010 [EBook #32288]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A YANKEE FLIER IN ITALY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, Roger L. Holda, Josephine Paolucci
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+https://www.pgdp.net.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+A YANKEE FLIER
+
+IN ITALY
+
+[Illustration: "WE'LL TAKE OVER NOW," STAN SNAPPED.
+
+_A Yankee Flier in Italy_]
+
+
+
+
+A YANKEE FLIER
+
+IN ITALY
+
+BY
+
+AL AVERY
+
+_ILLUSTRATED BY_
+
+PAUL LAUNE
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP
+PUBLISHERS :: NEW YORK
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1944, BY
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, INC.
+
+_All Rights Reserved_
+
+_Printed in the United States of America_
+
+[Transcriber's note: Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
+that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
+
+
+_For_
+
+AVON KIRKS
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER               PAGE
+
+I FAREWELL PARTY         1
+
+II SPECIAL TASK         13
+
+III REUNION             23
+
+IV BEACH-HEAD           38
+
+V PRISON SHIP           52
+
+VI FIRING SQUAD         75
+
+VII REST CURE           90
+
+VIII ESCAPE             98
+
+IX HOMEWARD BOUND      110
+
+X LONE EAGLE           127
+
+XI RESCUE              140
+
+XII SALERNO            162
+
+XIII NIGHT RAID        184
+
+XIV NIGHT FLIGHT       200
+
+
+
+
+A YANKEE FLIER
+
+IN ITALY
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+FAREWELL PARTY
+
+
+The party was about to break up. It had not been very successful.
+Lieutenant O'Malley had devoured only one blueberry pie. This meant he
+was feeling far from par. He sat sprawled in a big chair that once had
+belonged to a Moslem prince, his skinny legs elevated to the top of the
+mess table.
+
+"Sure, an' you fellows are skunks, beatin' it off to do a soft stretch
+in Alexandria," he growled.
+
+Lieutenant Stan Wilson, United States Army Air Corps, grinned at his
+Irish pal.
+
+"They need brains in Alexandria to tell them what to do." Stan sipped
+his coffee and continued to grin.
+
+March Allison leaned across the table. Allison was British, slight and
+neatly dressed. There was always a mocking smile lurking at the corners
+of his mouth.
+
+"I say, old fellow, you should be crowing. You are now a flight
+commander and I understand you are to rate nothing less than a major."
+
+"'Tis not the stripes I want," O'Malley muttered. "Sure, an' I'm told
+this Colonel Benson who is to be in command is a spalpeen of the worst
+sort. Niver did I care fer brass hats an' now I am to be near one all
+the time."
+
+"I understand Colonel Benson holds to a strict diet, no coffee, tobacco,
+or pie," Stan said gravely. "He expects his men to follow his example."
+
+O'Malley snorted. "Sure, an' I'll be after eatin' pie right off the top
+o' his desk."
+
+"He is said to be the best-dressed officer in the Army." Allison had his
+gaze fixed upon O'Malley's sloppy uniform. The shirt was open at the
+neck to allow O'Malley's huge Adam's apple to roll up and down, free and
+unencumbered. O'Malley's cap was wrinkled and sagging as it attempted to
+cover his shock of wild hair.
+
+"I'm a fightin' man," O'Malley said gravely. "As such I waste no time
+on trifles." His big mouth was tightly clamped shut and a frown wrinkled
+his homely face.
+
+Stan and Allison broke out laughing. Colonel Benson would have to take
+O'Malley as he was, that they well knew. They had fought side by side
+with him in the Battle of Britain, in the Far East, and now in Africa.
+O'Malley was known as the wildest pilot in the service and one of the
+best.
+
+"We better get going," Stan said as he rose to his feet. He held out a
+hand to O'Malley. "Hold off the invasion of Sicily and Italy until we
+get back, pal."
+
+"I'll be startin' it tomorrow," O'Malley said sourly.
+
+"Cheerio," Allison added as he shook hands with his pal.
+
+O'Malley watched them walk out of the mess. He had to admit, as the door
+closed after them, that his gloom was due entirely to parting with the
+two men he had fought beside for so long. Such things as colonels who
+were tough did not bother O'Malley. Having Stan and Allison walk out on
+him was the thing that hurt. It was his own fault that he was not going
+with them. He had refused to quit the front for a month or so of ease
+and rest.
+
+Gazing out through an open window, he watched a group of natives herd a
+flock of donkeys down toward the main part of the city of Bizerte. He
+certainly would kick himself if no invasion came off for a month.
+Lowering his feet from the top of the table, he strolled out into the
+sunshine. Colonel Benson was due to arrive that morning and he had
+orders to be on hand, along with other flight commanders, to meet his
+superior. O'Malley yawned. Meeting brass hats always bored him. He was
+not sure that he was going to like being one of them. O'Malley
+considered even a flight commander a brass hat.
+
+Colonel Benson was late in arriving. He was exactly three hours late and
+that made O'Malley exactly two hours late for his dinner. Dinner was a
+very important item in O'Malley's day, and he was in a very dour mood
+when an orderly called the boys in to meet the new commander.
+
+The commander's room once had been a lounge and music room. It was part
+of a huge old mansion located on an estate. An Italian political boss
+had taken it over from a native prince. O'Malley crowded in behind the
+first man entering the room. At once the man ahead of O'Malley clicked
+his heels and snapped a smart salute. O'Malley looked the colonel over,
+then dabbed at the front of his cap with a big hand.
+
+Colonel Benson was a big, rawboned man, standing six feet two inches and
+weighing two hundred and ten pounds. His red face looked as though it
+had just been scrubbed with soap and water. It had a pink and white
+smoothness under the sunburn which reddened it. The eyes of the colonel
+took away the softness of his smooth face. They were green and hard as
+agate. At the moment they were looking Lieutenant O'Malley over with a
+decidedly unfavorable glint.
+
+The other boys shoved in and lined up. There was no mistaking the
+atmosphere in the room. It fairly vibrated with military correctness.
+The colonel's uniform, his carefully parted hair, his smooth, freshly
+scraped chin, all added to the feeling of tightness.
+
+Most of the boys in the room were used to dirt and dust and bearded
+faces. They recently had come through a dusty, dirty, and bloody
+battle. During those months on the desert they had forgotten all about
+military correctness. The colonel's expression plainly indicated that he
+thought them a sloppy outfit. He remained standing as he talked, and the
+men remained at attention.
+
+"I have been sent here to teach you men some of the combat tricks
+developed recently." His eyes roved over the men and stopped upon
+O'Malley.
+
+"I am not going to insist upon strict military observance, but there are
+a few details I will insist upon." The colonel's voice was rising and
+his face was getting a bit redder.
+
+"You." He stabbed a finger toward O'Malley.
+
+"Lieutenant O'Malley," O'Malley informed him.
+
+"Lieutenant O'Malley, nothing can excuse the sloppiness of your attire.
+In the future you will give more attention to your uniform."
+
+"Yes, sor," O'Malley said and grinned.
+
+The grin made Colonel Benson rise up on his heels. He came down with a
+thud, but he said no more. His eyes moved from O'Malley.
+
+"We will soon be invading Italy." The Colonel paused to let this sink
+in. It was exactly what the boys had been expecting, and therefore they
+showed no sudden interest.
+
+"How about Sicily, sor?" O'Malley asked. He had been flying missions all
+over the proposed routes and knew something would have to be done about
+Sicily.
+
+"That will be merely a step in taking Italy, Lieutenant," the colonel
+explained. He looked about the room. There were plenty of chairs. "You
+may be at ease, gentlemen. Seat yourselves and we will proceed with our
+conference."
+
+O'Malley grunted. Dinner hour was long past and here they were settling
+down for a conference. He picked the chair nearest the door and slumped
+down into it. The colonel seated himself and launched into a lengthy and
+detailed talk upon tactics and plans. O'Malley listened for a time, then
+stretched out his legs and made himself comfortable. His mind wandered
+far from the droning voice of the colonel.
+
+An hour passed and Colonel Benson was still outlining plans and driving
+home things he felt were very important. O'Malley had not exactly been
+asleep, but he had failed to hear more than just a small part of what
+was said. Suddenly he roused himself. Colonel Benson had just made a
+remark that brought him up sharply.
+
+"Gentlemen, I will now outline the procedure we will follow in handling
+the various flights assigned to my sector. This will not take longer
+than one hour. Give me your close attention."
+
+O'Malley looked about as though seeking a way to escape. He saw an
+orderly standing at the door. Nodding to the corporal, he leaned forward
+and whispered a command. The orderly disappeared.
+
+Ten minutes later the corporal returned. He was carrying a tin plate
+with half of a blueberry pie on it.
+
+"Thank you, son," O'Malley said as he slid the pie into his lap. He
+scooped out a quarter of the pie and opened his mouth. As he bit down
+upon the pie he began to grin. He gave his attention to the colonel with
+the first real show of interest he had given during the afternoon. The
+quarter of pie disappeared quickly. O'Malley slid the remaining quarter
+into his hand and opened his mouth.
+
+"The close co-ordination between our fighter units and the low-level
+bombers will be secured by a system of code signals." Colonel Benson's
+voice snapped off suddenly. His green eyes were on O'Malley and sparks
+flashed in their depths. The other boys turned and looked at O'Malley.
+
+"You are hungry, Lieutenant O'Malley?" Colonel Benson asked coldly.
+
+"Yes, sor. 'Tis three hours an' more past dinnertime," O'Malley answered
+calmly as he shoved half of the pie into his mouth.
+
+"Stop! Stop--swilling that pie!" the colonel roared.
+
+O'Malley got rid of the pie in a simple manner. He shoved what was left
+into his mouth and munched upon it.
+
+For a full minute the colonel could not think of anything to say. But
+his face got deeper red and his eyes blazed. Finally he rapped on his
+desk and said:
+
+"Gentlemen, I will not tolerate eating during a conference. Any sort of
+eating. I will not tolerate eating pie while I am giving instructions.
+Lieutenant O'Malley, you will retire. I will consider your case later."
+
+O'Malley got to his feet. He handed the pie plate to the embarrassed
+corporal. "Thank you, sor," he drawled as he made off.
+
+The colonel snorted and went back to his lecture. O'Malley headed for
+the mess hall. The half pie had whetted his appetite. Locating a
+comfortable place near a window he ordered a big dinner, with a whole
+blueberry pie for dessert. In a leisurely manner he began devouring his
+meal.
+
+He had spent most of an hour enjoying his dinner and was ready to eat
+his pie, when the fliers began drifting in from the conference. Several
+of them headed toward O'Malley's table. O'Malley was the most famous
+pilot in their outfit. The stories about him amounted almost to legend.
+The boys admired his disregard for military usage. All of them had been
+working according to the colonel's carefully explained plans for months
+and knew them better than the colonel did. They had been bored by the
+long session but had not had the nerve to show their feelings.
+
+But none of them reached O'Malley. Colonel Benson came in and strode
+over to O'Malley's table.
+
+Nodding to O'Malley, he said, "Mind if I join you?" His voice did not
+sound so stiff outside his office.
+
+"Sure, an' I'm glad to have you," O'Malley said, but there was a gleam
+of suspicion in his eye.
+
+Colonel Benson seated himself. He watched O'Malley attack the pie. His
+interest amounted to fascination and he did not speak until O'Malley had
+finished three fourths of the pie. He ordered coffee and leaned back.
+
+"I have heard a great deal about you, Lieutenant," he began.
+
+O'Malley did not think this remark called for an answer, so he went on
+eating his pie.
+
+"I know you are an excellent pilot, though I understand you are a bit
+reckless." There was a gleam that might have been humor in the colonel's
+eye.
+
+O'Malley leaned back. He pushed the pie plate away from him and uttered
+a contented sigh.
+
+"However, I'm afraid you are not the type of man I want working beside
+me. With your permission, I will find you another assignment." The
+colonel watched O'Malley as he spoke.
+
+"What sort o' work?" O'Malley asked.
+
+"Flying a fighter plane, of course." Colonel Benson smiled.
+
+"'Twill suit me foine," O'Malley said. "I'm not likin' the idea o' bein'
+a brass hat."
+
+"I don't think you would make a very good one," the colonel said. "There
+will be no further mention of your pie-eating exhibition of this
+afternoon. You will report to operations for your new assignment."
+
+"Thank you, sor."
+
+The colonel drank his coffee and arose. O'Malley got to his feet and
+managed a snappy salute. The colonel moved off and the boys closed in to
+find out what had happened.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+SPECIAL TASK
+
+
+The sympathy of the boys in the officers' mess was wasted upon O'Malley.
+He was not impressed by the advanced rating he had missed, nor was he
+jealous of the new and shining bars and oak leaves his pals were
+wearing. He had checked in and been assigned flight leader of a flight
+of three planes whose task was special work. All that interested
+O'Malley was that he was due to head out over the Mediterranean Sea with
+the nose of his Lightning pointed toward Italy.
+
+"Sure, an' I'll have Benito captured by the time you birds go into
+action," he told the gang.
+
+O'Malley's exact duties were not very clear, nor was his crew a reality.
+No men had been assigned to him and he had no flight orders, but he had
+the assurance of the captain at operations that he would be on his way
+in a short time. If O'Malley had any suspicions as to the sort of work
+Colonel Benson had laid out for him, he did not show them. He was in
+exceptional good humor.
+
+When he was called in by Captain Marks at headquarters, he dashed to the
+operations room as fast as he could. The captain smiled as O'Malley
+sprawled into a chair.
+
+"I understand we are about to start an invasion of Italy," the captain
+began. "The details are a military secret, but it's coming and right
+away. There's some spade work to be done and you are to handle a hot
+assignment."
+
+O'Malley's big mouth spread in an eager grin.
+
+"The commander has assigned you to this job because he feels you are
+specially fitted for the work." The captain beamed, but there was a look
+in his eye that made O'Malley sit up and wipe the grin off his face.
+
+"And what may it be?" he demanded.
+
+"You are to ferry Lightnings to Malta." The captain lifted a hand as
+O'Malley came out of his chair like a cork out of a bottle of Algerian
+wine. "This is dangerous business. You may have to fight your way
+through. This will be day flying."
+
+O'Malley snorted. "Fight! Sure, an' ferryin' to Malta is no work for a
+fighter pilot. 'Tis a job for these new colleens you got in the ferry
+service."
+
+"Colonel's orders," the captain said curtly. "And the planes are to be
+landed in Malta in fighting trim. As soon as I round up a couple of men
+to work with you, I'll give you a call. Get set, because I'll need you
+any hour now."
+
+O'Malley leaned forward and there was a dark gleam in his eyes. "Did you
+say fight our way through?" he asked.
+
+"If necessary, but I understand you are a stunting fool. You shouldn't
+have to fire a shot on any trip. The planes are not to be shot up. They
+are for combat use in the invasion."
+
+O'Malley was on his feet. "Foine," he said sweetly. "'Tis a nice job,
+sor, an' I'm appreciatin' it."
+
+The captain fixed him with a suspicious eye. This ferry job had been
+tough to fill. It was vitally important and demanded experienced fighter
+pilots, but none of the men wanted it. Captain Marks had not been able
+to get a single man to accept the job. He was relieved when the colonel
+had sent over word that O'Malley would serve as flight leader. But he
+still had to locate two men to work with the Irishman. O'Malley was
+taking the whole thing too nicely. Captain Marks was worried. He knew
+O'Malley's reputation and he had picked up a few hints of how O'Malley
+had been assigned to the job.
+
+"I'll give you the names of your crew as soon as I get them lined up,"
+the captain said gruffly.
+
+"Shanghaied you mean," O'Malley said in a honeyed tone.
+
+"The colonel will locate a couple for me," the captain answered with a
+grin.
+
+O'Malley grinned back at him. "I know a couple I wish you could get hold
+of," he said. He turned around and walked out of the office.
+
+For a full five minutes O'Malley stood outside the office looking out
+toward the blue Mediterranean. There was a deep scowl on his face.
+Finally he sauntered into the mess and seated himself near a window.
+Elevating his feet, he closed his eyes and took a nap.
+
+He was awakened by an orderly. The soldier saluted smartly and said:
+
+"You are wanted at operations, sir."
+
+O'Malley got to his feet and walked into the briefing shack, which was
+a shed hastily erected outside the mess. Captain Marks was waiting for
+him. He shoved a sheaf of flight orders at O'Malley.
+
+"You are to deliver three Lightning fighters to Malta. In case you meet
+enemy planes, you are to take proper evasive measures. Is that clear?"
+
+"Yes, sor," O'Malley said and added, "If we be attacked we fight?"
+
+"Certainly, we don't want these new planes shot down."
+
+Glancing at his flight orders, O'Malley moved leisurely out to the
+flight strip designated. Three Lightnings stood there with their props
+spinning. A ground crew was just leaving them. O'Malley nodded toward
+the chief mechanic who swung down out of the cockpit.
+
+"Is this bag o' bolts ready to fly?" he asked with a grin.
+
+"She's clicking fine, sir," the sergeant answered.
+
+O'Malley glanced at his orders. The two men under him were Ted Wilks and
+Pete Liske. He wondered what they had done to call down the colonel's
+displeasure. Swinging up into the greenhouse, he palmed the hatch cover
+and got set.
+
+"Wilks and Liske," he called lazily. "This is your skipper, Mrs.
+O'Malley's son. Get your crates hot."
+
+"Temperatures check," Liske called back. His voice sounded sour.
+
+"Which one of the Auld Man's corns did you step on, Liske?" O'Malley
+asked.
+
+"Same one I did," Wilks called in.
+
+"Can the chatter and get going," snapped a voice from operations.
+"Lieutenant O'Malley, report out at once," another voice cut in.
+
+"Up to five thousand and then tuck in close to me," O'Malley ordered.
+
+"Read your flight sheets!" The voice from operations was sharp and
+snappy.
+
+O'Malley laughed. "Shove off, me hearties," he called.
+
+Wilks went zooming off and Liske followed closely. O'Malley watched
+their take-off with a critical eye. He saw at once that he had been
+given two fledglings to nurse safely through. Like an old hen, he was
+expected to see them through by proper evasive tactics. O'Malley began
+whistling a bit of an Irish tune. He'd protect those kids, just let any
+Italian or German fighter show up.
+
+Kicking down on one brake, he spun the Lightning around and sent her
+zooming off the field, hanging her on her prop at once, and surging over
+the hatch covers of his charges like a crazy angel heading for the sun.
+His boys dropped in behind him and soon had snuggled in, wing to wing,
+one on each side.
+
+"So you birds were bad boys," O'Malley called across to his men.
+
+"So what? We hear you were supposed to be a major," Liske answered
+insolently.
+
+"We didn't read the rule book careful," Wilks confessed with a laugh.
+
+"From now on you won't be after needin' a rule book," O'Malley assured
+them. He was scanning the blue sky eagerly. A pile of clouds, off to the
+east, looked promising. He swung over that way. If there was a Jerry in
+the whole area, he'd be hiding up in that cloud.
+
+The three Lightnings zoomed low under the cloud but nothing happened.
+The sky was as serene and calm as the sky over a Kansas wheat field or a
+kirk in Kerry County, Ireland. O'Malley scowled and eased back against
+the shock pad.
+
+They roared over Pantelleria Island which had been occupied by the
+British and Yanks. Sicily lay ahead and O'Malley knew evasive tactics
+called for a wide sweep to the east and south. He had already flown
+miles north in his hopeful quest of trouble. Easing down to two thousand
+feet, they swept around in a circle that carried them within sight of
+the coast of Sicily. But there was no enemy craft in sight in the air
+and very few on the water along the coast. With a sigh O'Malley
+straightened their course and headed in to Malta. They had flown a half
+circle deep into enemy territory but nothing exciting had happened.
+O'Malley was beginning to worry. If all of their ferry flights were
+going to be like this, he would have to do something about it.
+
+Picking up the radio signals from the Malta field, they slid in, spotted
+the Yank landing strip, and set down. Ground crews rushed out to take
+over. They swarmed around the Lightnings and had them moving off almost
+before their pilots were out of the cockpits. O'Malley scowled. The
+boys had no more respect for a ferry pilot than they did an M.P.
+
+O'Malley obtained his release and acceptance of the planes from a
+captain who rode out in a motorcycle. The captain seemed irritated.
+
+"Your flight time is double what it should be. Get over to Number Three
+Field and get your transportation back to Africa."
+
+"Yes, sor," O'Malley said. "We drifted a bit off course."
+
+The captain looked at him sharply. He was very busy and delays did not
+improve his ragged temper.
+
+"Don't let it happen again," he snapped.
+
+O'Malley smiled at his two fliers. "Sure, an' 'tis very ungrateful some
+people are. We risk our necks to deliver these crates an' get a sour
+welcome." He turned and walked away. The captain stood staring after
+him. He had not met a man like O'Malley before. Usually ferry pilots
+were not given to back talk.
+
+The transport was waiting. O'Malley and his pals climbed in among an
+assortment of equipment and supplies being returned to base. In a short
+time they were back at their own briefing room. Three planes were ready
+and they took off again.
+
+All day they ferried Lightnings across to Malta and not once did they
+sight enemy craft. O'Malley was wild when they checked in for the
+evening. He glared at the grinning Captain Marks.
+
+"Sure, an' something better bust loose tomorrow," he cried.
+
+"Probably will," Marks answered.
+
+O'Malley stomped away to quarters. Wilks and Liske dashed off to put in
+for an immediate transfer to more active duty. O'Malley hoped they got
+the transfer. He knew there was not much chance of him getting shifted,
+not as long as Colonel Benson was in command.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+REUNION
+
+
+Stan and Allison sat in the big Lockheed transport and looked down upon
+the shores of Africa. A coastal road wound along the beach. It was
+war-scarred and still littered with broken tanks and shattered trucks.
+This was the route Rommel had taken in his flight across Libya.
+
+"Wonder what O'Malley's doing about this time?" Stan asked. He was
+beginning to be sorry he had accepted the offer to return to Alexandria.
+O'Malley likely was leading a flight over the shores of Italy.
+
+"I'll bet he is seeing action," Allison said. "But I'm satisfied to be
+riding in peace with a pip of a vacation ahead. You're not beginning to
+get the bug to fight so soon, old man?"
+
+"No," Stan answered with a grin. "I aim to have a swell time and be
+ready for the big push into Europe."
+
+The trained ears of the two pilots caught a warning signal from one of
+the plane's radial motors. The motor complained for a few minutes, then
+coughed and conked out completely.
+
+"Looks like we might be due for a forced landing," Stan said.
+
+"That would be our luck," Allison answered. "Where are we, anyway?"
+
+"We must be near Bengazi." Stan peered down at the coast line.
+
+A few minutes later their fears were realized. The transport began
+circling for a landing. They sighted the ruins of a town and were soon
+over it. Ten minutes later they were standing on a sand dune along with
+the pilot and copilot. A group of higher-ranking officers, including a
+general, stood a little way from them.
+
+"We'll not be here very long," the pilot said, jerking his head toward
+his other passengers. "Not with the big boy along. He's on an urgent
+mission. We've already radioed for a pick-up plane."
+
+"He's hurrying in the wrong direction," Allison said.
+
+Stan walked away and down the slope a bit. One of the Navy's NATS
+amphibian freight planes was down at the dock. Stan had learned to
+respect the Navy Air Transport Service. Those boys flew freight and mail
+from the United States to every part of the world where the Yanks were
+fighting, and they flew it on schedule. This plane probably was headed
+back to Tunis or Bizerte.
+
+He passed the high officers at some little distance. The wind was
+blowing away from them and he caught the irritated voice of the general.
+
+"With this delay I'll have to go back. Action against Italy starts at
+dawn tomorrow." The wind whipped away the general's words and Stan did
+not hear any more, but what he had heard made him halt.
+
+Invasion. The boys were going in for the kill and he was heading for a
+rest in Alexandria. Turning, he walked up the hill. Allison was chatting
+with the pilot. Stan motioned to him and they strolled down the slope.
+When they were out of hearing of the crew, Stan said:
+
+"I just overheard something."
+
+Allison gave him a quick look. "Been eavesdropping?"
+
+"An ill wind brought me a word from that general. We're hitting it back
+to Bizerte."
+
+"I say, old chap, you know I'm going where I can have two hot baths a
+day. I'll have a barber shave me and I'll have breakfast served in bed.
+You run along back to Bizerte, but I'm going on to Alexandria."
+
+"The attack on Italy is set for tomorrow morning. The general is going
+back and I'm going with him. O'Malley isn't going to hog this show."
+
+Allison halted and stared at Stan. Suddenly his twisted smile pulled at
+the corners of his mouth. "If you put it that way, I guess I'm going
+back to Bizerte, too."
+
+"The general has radioed for a plane to take him back. This delay has
+upset his schedule and he won't go on. We'll go back with him. Let's
+collar the old boy."
+
+"We are under orders to report to Alexandria," Allison reminded him.
+
+"The general doesn't know what our orders are. We can worry about little
+things like that after we get back," Stan said impatiently.
+
+They walked across the slope to where the general was standing. There
+were four officers with him, three colonels and a major.
+
+"Could we have a word with you, sir?" Stan asked as he snapped a
+salute.
+
+"Certainly," General Miller said.
+
+"We have decided to return to Bizerte and wondered if you could say a
+word for us if a westbound plane stops here. This delay will upset our
+plans and we might as well go back."
+
+The general looked at Stan sharply. "What made you change your plans,
+besides this accident?"
+
+Stan grinned. He did not dare admit that he had overheard the general
+talking.
+
+"The farther we get from the base of action, the more jittery we get,"
+he replied.
+
+"You fellows have to be ordered to take leave," General Miller said and
+smiled. "Do your orders allow you such freedom of action?"
+
+"We feel that they do," Stan said.
+
+"I'm sorry I can't take you. I'm afraid I'd be called to account for
+helping you disobey orders." The general's smile had spread into a grin.
+"You will go on as you should."
+
+"Thank you, sir," Stan said. They both saluted and walked away.
+
+"Guess we're sunk," Allison said sourly. "O'Malley will certainly rub it
+in when he sees us again. He'll be right in the middle of the big
+fight."
+
+Stan was looking at the NATS amphibian and smiling. "We might be able to
+thumb a ride with the Navy."
+
+Allison looked down toward the sea. The Navy boys were getting the big
+freighter set to take off.
+
+"Worth a try, let's go down there."
+
+They hurried down to the beach. An ensign was handling the shifting of
+supplies from the flying boat to a truck. He greeted Stan and Allison in
+a friendly manner after glancing at their service stripes.
+
+"You boys are a bit off your reservation, aren't you?" he asked.
+
+"We sure are and we want to get back. How about a ride to Bizerte?"
+
+"We're not hauling passengers, but if you piled in nobody would throw
+you off. We're supposed to cooperate with the Army in every way we can."
+The ensign laughed.
+
+"Great stuff," Allison said. "I'm March Allison and he's Stan Wilson."
+
+"I'm Bert Thomas," the ensign said. "If you have bags you better get
+them aboard. We're about to shove off."
+
+"We're not taking any bags back," Stan said hurriedly. He did not want
+to risk having the general order them to go on into Alexandria. In fact,
+he did not want the general to know they were going out with the
+amphibian.
+
+"O.K. Just get aboard and find a place to sit down."
+
+Stan and Allison climbed aboard the freighter. The crew paid no
+attention to them but went on lashing cargo into place, cramming all
+sorts of odd repair parts into every corner.
+
+Ensign Thomas came aboard and took his place beside his copilot. Stan
+and Allison sat on the only two vacant seats along the arching ribs of
+the ship. They were careful not to take the space reserved for the crew.
+
+The freighter slid out into the bay and soon she was slapping the step
+of the lazy waves. A few seconds later she lifted and was off, rising
+slowly, roaring along like a gorged pelican. She did not have a machine
+gun or a cannon aboard and she was going it alone. The two fighter
+pilots, used to a bank of Brownings in front of them, felt uneasy. If a
+Heinkel or an Me 110 showed up, the old girl would be a dead duck.
+
+No enemy planes showed up, however, and the freighter bored along.
+Ahead of them the sun was settling down into the sea, filling the air
+with golden haze and making the water glow like sapphire. Just at sunset
+the freighter swung inshore and eased down over the harbor at Bizerte.
+Two fighter planes from a carrier lying offshore zoomed around her as
+she came in. She hit the water and glided in to a mooring.
+
+"Passengers ashore!" Bert Thomas called back.
+
+As they piled out Stan and Allison saluted the skipper. "Thanks a
+million," Stan said.
+
+"Right fine of you, old man," Allison chimed in.
+
+"Glad to give you a hand," Thomas said as he turned to the job of
+unloading.
+
+Stan and Allison shoved through the crowds along the docks. They were
+eager to get in touch with Colonel Benson and get back on the job.
+Everywhere they could see signs of the coming invasion attempt.
+Thousands of ships and barges and warcraft lay in the harbor or
+offshore. Men swarmed everywhere, while tanks and trucks and mobile guns
+rattled down to the water front.
+
+The boys caught a ride with an air force truck headed toward their
+field. The truck took them to within a few blocks of headquarters. When
+they hopped out, Stan said:
+
+"Here goes nothing. Wonder what the Old Man will say?"
+
+"We'll be lucky to be able to see him at all. He'll be very busy,"
+Allison drawled.
+
+Reaching headquarters they spoke to an orderly. The soldier regarded
+them closely.
+
+"Yes, Colonel Benson is in his office."
+
+"Tell him Lieutenants Wilson and Allison wish to see him." Stan gave the
+soldier a look that made him snap to attention.
+
+"I'll report, sir," he said and made off.
+
+"He acted as though we were not welcome," Allison remarked.
+
+"The Old Man probably told him to shoo all pilots away," Stan said. "Now
+we better make our story good."
+
+The orderly returned and nodded toward the fliers. "Colonel Benson will
+see you, sir," he said to Stan.
+
+They moved into the room and found Colonel Benson sitting behind his
+desk. He had a pot of coffee, a bowl of soup, and a plate of sandwiches
+before him. His green eyes lifted and swept over the two officers. They
+saluted and Stan said:
+
+"Lieutenants Wilson and Allison reporting for duty, sir."
+
+The colonel dipped up a spoon of soup and ate it. He selected a
+sandwich, lifted the lid and looked at the filling, then took a bite.
+
+"I believe you gentlemen are under orders to report to Alexandria. I
+take it you have made some changes on your own account." The colonel
+paused and waited for a reply. His face was expressionless, but his eyes
+bored into Stan and Allison.
+
+"We hoped you would allow us to join Lieutenant O'Malley's command. We
+got the idea there might be action on this front soon." Stan stood very
+straight and looked the colonel in the eye.
+
+"What gave you the idea there would be action?" the colonel asked.
+
+"We got it quite by accident," Stan answered.
+
+"I see. So you canceled the orders of the area commander and returned.
+Who brought you back?"
+
+"The Navy, sir." Allison smiled as he said it.
+
+The colonel grunted. He finished his sandwich and helped himself to more
+soup. Finally he spoke.
+
+"There will be action very soon and we do need pilots," he said blandly.
+His eyes dropped to a pad of reports. They were urgent requests from
+Wilks and Liske asking to be transferred from O'Malley's ferry flight.
+"I have two places I find very difficult to fill, and they happen to be
+in Commander O'Malley's flight. I'll assign you men to those places."
+His eyes lifted and there was a glint of hardness in them. "For the
+duration of the present action," he added grimly.
+
+"Thank you, sir," Stan said. "We will not take up more of your time."
+
+"One more thing," the colonel said. "I will cancel your leave to
+Alexandria. But your new assignment will not free you from any measures
+I decide to take later as punishment for your breach of orders. Is that
+clear?"
+
+"Yes, sir," both officers answered. They saluted and about-faced.
+
+Outside the door Stan turned to Allison. "The Old Boy isn't such a tough
+cookie after all."
+
+"Don't be so sure about that. You know I had a hunch he was spoofing us
+all the time." Allison scowled. "I'm sure he was."
+
+"You smelled a mouse?" Stan grinned.
+
+"I smelled a very dead one," Allison answered. "Let's locate O'Malley.
+He should be over in the quarters reserved for flight commanders."
+
+They barged into the quarters of the flight officers and looked around.
+O'Malley was not present but several men sat at a table playing chess.
+They moved over and stood beside the table.
+
+"We're looking for Commander O'Malley," Stan said.
+
+One of the boys looked up. He was wearing new and shiny insignia of a
+major. He grinned up at Stan and Allison, his eyes taking in their
+service stripes.
+
+"I guess you mean Flight Leader O'Malley," he said. "You should be able
+to find him over at Mess Three."
+
+"So, he's already gotten himself shifted to flight leader," Stan said,
+matching the major's grin. "How'd he manage it?"
+
+"By eating a pie while Colonel Benson was delivering a lecture on how to
+capture Italy," the major chuckled.
+
+"So he's back on the firing line. I say, that's just where he wanted to
+be," Allison said.
+
+"No, he didn't rate that well," the major explained. "The Old Man
+chucked him into a job of ferrying planes to Malta so we'd have some
+reserves in close to Sicily. Less than an hour ago O'Malley told me it
+was a quiet and peaceful job, but one he didn't like."
+
+Stan looked at Allison. "You were right, there was a mouse, a big, dead
+one." He nodded to the major. "Thanks, Major," he said.
+
+They turned away and walked out of the room. Allison laid a hand on
+Stan's arm as they turned toward the door of Mess Three.
+
+"Suppose we surprise O'Malley," he suggested.
+
+"He'll be in no mood for surprises," Stan answered. "He'll be a wild
+man. With the whole Army and Navy getting set to force a beach-head and
+him on ferry duty, he'll be red-hot."
+
+"We are to fill in on his flight. We might work it so that he wouldn't
+know until we take off. We could be a bit late in showing up." There was
+a twinkle in Allison's eyes.
+
+Stan began to grin. "I like the idea," he said. "We're stuck the same as
+he is and might as well cheer him up."
+
+They went to the operations room and located Captain Marks who regarded
+them with unbelieving eyes.
+
+"You mean to say you gave up a vacation trip to Alexandria to take this
+ferry job with that wild Irishman, O'Malley?"
+
+"Sure," Stan said with a grin. "We like ferrying. It's the sort of life
+for any ambitious officer."
+
+Captain Marks regarded them intently. "I have your assignments here, but
+I haven't seen anything of O'Malley."
+
+"Suppose you shove them at him the last thing before the flight takes
+off. We'd like to surprise him, having been a pal of his for a long
+time."
+
+The captain grinned. "It will be a surprise," he said. "I know about you
+three and I'm looking for trouble. O'Malley never looks at assignment
+or flight orders. And there will be only the three of you." His grin
+faded and he scowled at the two pilots. "We'll only lose three ships and
+I guess we can afford that."
+
+"Thanks, Captain," Stan said. "Mum's the word. We'll see you before dawn
+tomorrow morning."
+
+They moved out and did not go to Mess Three. They headed out to locate a
+spot where they could hide out until flight time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+BEACH-HEAD
+
+
+O'Malley grabbed his flight orders. He scowled at Captain Marks. For
+once the captain did not insist that he read his orders. O'Malley turned
+upon his heel and strode out of the briefing room. He was met in the
+darkness outside the office by an officer.
+
+"You will fly a course over Tunis and approach Malta from due south,
+Lieutenant. Colonel Benson's orders. You are to make as many flights as
+possible today. There will be heavy action in the straits and you are to
+avoid that area." The officer saluted and moved on into the briefing
+room.
+
+"Sure, an' I'll do me own settin' o' the course," O'Malley bellowed.
+
+He was met at his plane by his master mechanic. "You have two new men
+today, sir. I have given them a few details of your course."
+
+"An' I'll be givin' them some more," O'Malley growled as he climbed
+into the cockpit.
+
+He settled down and listened for a few minutes to the excited orders
+jamming the air. Flights were heading out, bomber squadrons were calling
+in or taking orders. O'Malley set his phones on the beam and bent
+forward.
+
+"Get ready, you birds of Ferry Flight," he called in.
+
+"All set," came back a reply in muffled tones.
+
+O'Malley wondered who the unlucky fliers were. Some poor saps who had
+gotten in bad with Benson, he guessed. He bent down and shouted to the
+sergeant.
+
+"How much ammunition have we?"
+
+"From now on the ferry ships will be fully loaded. You may run into
+trouble, sir."
+
+O'Malley pulled in his head and kicked on the power. He snapped a
+release to his mates and waited for them to get off. He had not taken
+the trouble to get their names, so he could not order them off one at a
+time. They did not seem to need any instruction. One Lightning wheeled
+around and roared away, followed closely by the other. O'Malley grunted
+his approval. The two relief men could fly.
+
+Opening up his engines, O'Malley roared after his flight. He tried to
+cut across above them but had all he could do to catch up with them. In
+the gray dawn he saw that the two new men understood how to get speed
+out of a Lockheed P-38. Finally his two men eased over and let him slide
+in between them. They closed in, snuggling dangerously close.
+
+"I'd thank ye for a bit more air," O'Malley growled.
+
+"Are we crowding you, Commander?" a high-pitched voice asked.
+
+"'Tis not crowdin' me, but I don't trust yer flyin' ability," O'Malley
+shot back.
+
+"You're a bit off course," an unusually gruff voice broke in.
+
+"Sure, an' I'm flyin' this outfit," O'Malley snapped.
+
+They were swinging east by north, which headed them for Sicily. O'Malley
+scanned the skies as light began to break. Below him the strait was
+alive with barges and transports. A British monitor wallowed on its way,
+rolling and plunging. Flight after flight of medium bombers fanned out
+at low level. High above, the fighter patrols were roaring toward
+Sicily. O'Malley scowled as he scanned the scene hopefully. Not a
+German or an Italian plane in sight. It appeared that the best O'Malley
+would get for setting his own course was a good view of the invasion
+fleet and the opening wedge of the air forces.
+
+Suddenly the shores of Sicily appeared below, and almost at once
+O'Malley was jerked out of his sour mood by a shout from one of his
+pilots.
+
+"Me 110's coming down at four o'clock!"
+
+"Protect yerselves!" O'Malley shouted eagerly. "Run fer it!"
+
+"Shall we follow your example?" came in a mocking voice.
+
+O'Malley started and his mouth popped open. He knew that voice! Then in
+came the voice of his other pilot.
+
+"We'll do as you do, Commander. Lead on!"
+
+"You spalpeens!" O'Malley bellowed. Then he broke out in a loud laugh.
+"Sure, an' the Auld Man made monkeys out of you two."
+
+There was no more time for happy reunion. Seven Messerschmitts were
+coming down after the bombers. They were not interested in the three
+Lightnings and hoped that the Yanks flying them had not noticed any
+Jerries near by. In this they were very much disappointed.
+
+Stan peeled off and banked steeply. Laying over he rolled into position
+and cut out an Me. As the Jerry flashed past his sights, he opened up
+and his Brownings sawed a wing off the fighter. He was over and the
+Jerry was gone before he was able to see what had happened to the enemy
+ship. As he came up he saw that O'Malley was celebrating. He was doing
+mad loops and dives that threatened to drive the six Me's out of the sky
+before Allison could tangle with one of them. Allison's voice came in,
+crisp and exasperated.
+
+"I say, you Irisher. Lay off and let me have a chance!"
+
+"Come on in!" O'Malley yelled back and he stalled and dived after an Me.
+
+The three ferry pilots were finishing off the Jerries when a flight of
+six Lightnings and three Airacobras slid down from upstairs and joined
+in. There was only one luckless Me left. Three had been shot down and
+two had fled. The outnumbered Jerry dived and headed for home.
+
+Allison and Stan closed in beside O'Malley. Their leader called over to
+them.
+
+"There's a big fight on down there on that beach. Looks like the boys
+needed some help to keep the Stukas away."
+
+"We're under your orders, Commander," Stan answered.
+
+"Sure, an' you birds stand trial right alongside o' me when we get
+back," O'Malley shouted back. He dived and his pals went with him.
+
+Down they went over the invasion beach-head where sky battles raged as
+German and Italian fighter bombers tried to strafe or bomb Yank and
+British landing craft.
+
+Stan leaned over and looked down. The scene below was a stirring one.
+Three battlewagons of the cruiser class lay offshore. In closer, a line
+of destroyers was blazing fire and smoke as they blasted the shore
+batteries of the enemy. A group of torpedo boats darted in and out,
+tormenting an enemy ship. Toward the shore and moving from four big
+transports came the landing barges: the personnel barges, the tank
+carriers, the mechanized armament barges. In swarms they were pouring
+toward the shore. In the air above, Yank and R.A.F. fighter pilots
+struggled to keep the dive bombers and the torpedo planes from getting
+at the ships. This was the zero hour for the boys in the barges. Either
+they established a beach-head or they failed at terrible cost.
+
+Stan forgot that he was supposed to be a ferry pilot. He spotted a Stuka
+slipping in behind a screen of smoke rising from a burning freighter.
+Nosing down, he went after the Stuka. He caught a flash of O'Malley and
+Allison going in, too. They were needed, there was no doubt about that.
+The German planes were getting through.
+
+Coming down on the bandit, Stan eased over a bit and flattened out to
+come in on the bomber's tail. The Stuka was sloping down toward one of
+the transport ships. Stan kicked his throttle on full and raised his
+nose until he had the bandit in his sights. His thumb pressed the gun
+button and he felt the terrific kick-back from his bank of guns. He saw
+the tail and a large part of the rear compartment of the Stuka wobble
+and then sheer away. Whirling crazily, smoke billowing up from its torn
+body, the Stuka went down, landing with a splash close alongside the
+transport. Stan went over the deck of the ship so low, he could see the
+grateful Navy boys waving at him.
+
+Swinging inshore, Stan knifed after a Focke-Wulf 190 which was strafing
+the barges. He sent the 190 kiting along the tops of the waves and away
+inland. Stan was hot on the tail of the Focke-Wulf. He was sure he would
+get in a burst, when suddenly a burst of flak from a ground battery
+enveloped him. He felt the steel ripping through his wings. One motor
+began to stutter badly. It was then that Stan remembered he was supposed
+to deliver his plane to Malta in good condition.
+
+Easing around, he climbed upward at a slow rate. He was looking for
+O'Malley and Allison. He spotted O'Malley by the crazy manner of his
+attack against an Me 110 which had closed in upon him. Stan grinned in
+spite of the seriousness of their predicament. Half the tail had been
+shot off O'Malley's Lightning. She was not handling very well. The Me
+had a big edge. Stan went up as fast as his one crippled motor would
+take him.
+
+The Me pitted against O'Malley had the Irishman in a spot. He had
+doubled inside O'Malley's loop and was now on his tail. Stan tried hard
+to power dive but got only feeble results. He waited grimly, expecting
+O'Malley to go down under a hail of Nazi lead. But O'Malley did not go
+down. Another Lightning came roaring down and cut the Me almost in half.
+Allison had been looking for O'Malley, too.
+
+"How about hitting it for Malta, Commander?" Stan called.
+
+"I say, old man, we better be getting out of here. The boys have
+everything under control in this sector," Allison added.
+
+"Sure, an' we're headed for home, tuck in close an' follow me," O'Malley
+called cheerfully.
+
+"We better cook up a good report," Stan said grimly.
+
+"Sure, an' we got waylaid. 'Tis something could happen to anyone flying
+ferry planes," O'Malley answered. "Wasn't that the way it happened?"
+
+"That is a bit of the truth, you know," Allison agreed.
+
+"I don't know how I'll explain the flak holes I picked up. No Jerry or
+Italian plane ever carried five-inch guns," Stan answered.
+
+"We met a enemy battleship," O'Malley said, unconcerned.
+
+Stan snorted. "The Italian Navy hasn't poked its nose out of a home
+base in over a year. We were supposed to be flying in close to Allied
+shores."
+
+"Sure, an' you're right," O'Malley answered cheerfully. "But I'll be
+thinkin' o' something, niver fear."
+
+Stan looked down and then up. They had plunged into very soupy weather
+with low clouds and some wind. His ship was not taking it very well.
+Then it began to rain.
+
+"You better be thinking of getting us in, one of my engines is about to
+conk out on me," he called across.
+
+"I'm doing foine," O'Malley said. "Hear them signals coming in? That's
+the boys on Malta giving us the old signal. We'll ride right in."
+
+They changed course, heading north. Stan began to frown. It did not seem
+right to be heading in that direction. Suddenly they sighted a field
+through the rain. O'Malley dived for the field and Stan followed with
+Allison close behind. They hit the runway in a drenching rain and rolled
+in wing to wing.
+
+Suddenly they were confronted by four trucks. The trucks rolled out and
+halted across their paths, pulling in close before them so that the
+Lightnings could not turn around. Stan stared at the trucks. They
+certainly were not Yank or British. Then he saw squads of grinning
+Italian soldiers poking machine guns over the sides of the trucks.
+Ground men began swarming out. Everyone was smiling.
+
+"You sure let them call you in," Stan shouted to O'Malley.
+
+"'Twas a dirty trick, them using our signals to call us in here,"
+O'Malley fumed.
+
+"Malta is just across the strait, I'll bet," Allison said. "I've heard
+that the Italians use this trick, but I never thought they'd fool the
+Irish." There was a mocking note in Allison's voice. "We may as well
+climb down like good little boys. They have us covered with a hundred
+machine guns."
+
+"I'm getting out very carefully," Stan said. O'Malley said nothing at
+all, but he climbed out and joined Stan and Allison.
+
+A group of Italian officers crowded around them. All were smiling and
+bowing as though welcoming the Yanks. O'Malley scowled at them, but Stan
+grinned back and Allison lifted a hand.
+
+One of the Italian officers stepped forward. He spoke good English.
+
+"You are prisoners of war, gentlemen. Come with us." He waved a hand
+toward the dim outline of a building.
+
+The three Yanks were willing to move in out of the rain. They were
+drenched to the skin. Before they had reached the place where they were
+to be questioned the rain had ceased falling, and the sun had burst
+through the clouds. O'Malley was completely disgusted.
+
+"Sure, an' I calls that a dirty trick. The weather is against us as well
+as iverything else."
+
+"Please be seated," the Italian officer said as they entered a large
+room.
+
+The three Yanks sat down and waited gloomily. Three high-ranking Italian
+officers entered. They spoke swiftly in their native tongue to the
+officer who had escorted the boys to the room. Their words were excited
+and they made many motions with their hands. O'Malley stared at them
+sourly. Finally the junior officer turned to the boys.
+
+"General Bolero wishes to ask you some questions."
+
+The general smiled as he put the questions. "We wish to know how many
+planes and how many ships you are using. Also we wish to know at what
+places your forces plan to land."
+
+Stan spoke up. He shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands wide.
+
+"No one can answer those questions but our high command. We are only
+ferry pilots as you will see if you examine the flight orders of our
+leader." He nodded toward O'Malley.
+
+The general turned and spoke quickly to the other officers in Italian.
+They looked at O'Malley and talked some more, then the general turned to
+O'Malley. Before he could speak, O'Malley cut in:
+
+"What I want to know is who's responsible for the trick that was pulled
+on us?"
+
+The general smiled and his medal-covered chest expanded at O'Malley's
+question.
+
+"I am honored that you appreciate my clever trick," he said affably.
+
+O'Malley scowled at the general. "'Tis a foul trick," he said. "I have
+been insulted an' I'll get even with you."
+
+Stan broke in to avoid O'Malley's getting into real action against the
+general.
+
+"What are you going to do with us?"
+
+"You will be flown to one of our prison camps on the mainland. You will
+be treated strictly according to International Law," the general
+answered.
+
+"How soon?" Stan asked. He was thinking the paratroopers might take over
+this airfield very soon. He knew they would be hitting the coastal
+fields in order to give the boys spots to work from that were closer to
+Italy than the African coast.
+
+"At once, at once," the general said and he seemed suddenly nervous.
+
+"We are in no hurry, old man," Allison said and grinned.
+
+"Ah, but we are in a very great hurry," put in the junior officer.
+"General Bolero is leaving at once. You will be flown out in, say,
+twenty minutes. I am so sorry there will be no time for dry clothes." He
+bowed and nodded to four soldiers armed with rifles who had appeared
+through a side door. "You will go with the guards."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+PRISON SHIP
+
+
+The three Yanks were rushed out upon the parade ground at the Italian
+base. Two squads of shouting Italian soldiers escorted them. They burst
+upon a scene of confusion and excitement. Stan looked across the grounds
+toward the runways. Suddenly he burst out laughing and poked Allison in
+the ribs.
+
+"Look! His Nibs is deserting us!"
+
+General Bolero was leading his staff toward a parked plane. For a big
+fat man he was making fast time. His cape floated out behind him and he
+had lost his jaunty cap. His officers were loaded down with brief cases,
+files, and bundles of papers. The general was a full ten paces ahead of
+them.
+
+"I'd call that a rout," Allison shouted.
+
+"I think our outfits must be closing in. We'll have to do some
+stalling," Stan shouted.
+
+O'Malley was already stalling. Four men were pushing him along, and he
+was beginning to show signs of temper. Stan tried to get close enough
+to shout a warning to him. He did not want O'Malley to start a riot at
+that moment.
+
+The Italians were evacuating the base in every sort of machine they had.
+Cars roared across the field, men pedaled by on bicycles, trucks
+lumbered past, and a whippet tank snorted as it rolled past dragging a
+field gun. Men on foot rushed in every direction.
+
+Stan stumbled and went down, managing to trip two soldiers. Instantly a
+dozen Italians were upon him, tugging at him, waving their rifles and
+shouting. O'Malley took this as a signal to go into action. He swung
+hard on the chin of an officer standing beside him. The surprised
+officer went down like a felled beef. With a yell O'Malley waded in,
+swinging at soldiers as they piled in on him. Many bloody noses and
+black eyes developed in a hurry, but O'Malley was swarmed under by the
+weight of sheer numbers. He went down yelling like a Comanche Indian and
+swinging like Joe Louis.
+
+Stan struggled to his feet and held up his hands. He realized the
+uselessness of fighting against such odds. The melee O'Malley had caused
+had drawn almost a company of Italians to the spot. Allison had managed
+to stay on his feet, but he had suffered from rough handling along with
+Stan and O'Malley. His uniform, which was wet and sagging, had been torn
+in a dozen places.
+
+"Go quietly!" an Italian officer bellowed. He had just arrived on the
+scene. "Go quietly or you will be sorry!"
+
+"We're going, call off your dogs!" Stan shouted.
+
+The officer shouted orders in Italian and soon restored a semblance of
+order. Allison called across to Stan.
+
+"Have a look above, and you'll see what all the excitement is about."
+
+Stan looked into the sky and caught his breath. The paratroopers were
+coming. Low over the hilly country a fleet of transports and gliders
+swept in from the sea. They swept along in perfect formation like giant
+birds seeking a tree to light upon. Above them fighter planes wove in
+and out, while on either side fighter-bombers roared along. It was a
+beautiful sight.
+
+Suddenly the Yank air soldiers began to pile out. The sky blossomed with
+colored parachutes until the blue was thickly dotted with them like a
+field crowded with spring flowers. They came floating down with machine
+guns and supply hassocks dangling from their chutes. On a slope above
+the field a glider nosed in. It slid to a halt and a jeep bounded out of
+its fat, rounded snout. Another glider slid in and a tank rolled out of
+it almost before it had slid to a halt. The slope above them was already
+swarming with Yanks, and machine guns were rattling.
+
+Stan looked around desperately. They were being rushed toward a big
+truck. He made one last attempt to slow down their retreat. Shaking off
+the men who held him, he ducked his head and hit the line of soldiers
+like a blocking back clearing a path for a ball carrier. Two Italians
+went down, one under a straight, stiff arm and the other from a solid
+body-block. Then a soldier clipped Stan across the head with the butt of
+his rifle. Stan went down on his face and lay still.
+
+O'Malley had started his fight again, but this time the Italians were
+not wasting precious minutes. O'Malley got a rap such as the one that
+had felled Stan. Allison went down under a pile of soldiers. Two
+minutes later the three Yanks, out cold, were dumped into the truck and
+it was rumbling away along a paved road.
+
+A few minutes later Stan groaned and opened his eyes. The truck was so
+packed with soldiers that he was forced to sit up, even though he had
+been out limp and cold. His head throbbed and felt twice its normal
+size. Turning it a little he could look out over the side of the truck.
+They were rolling along a winding road, climbing in low gear. Looking
+back Stan saw the battlefield they had just left.
+
+The Yank airborne troops had swarmed onto the airfield. Already two big
+Yank planes had landed and men were spilling out to take over the field.
+With a groan Stan looked up. Twisting his head caused pains to shoot up
+and down his neck. He saw that the paratroopers were still coming in. A
+field of white chutes filled the air, while behind them dropped the
+varicolored chutes carrying equipment and ammunition. Gliders were
+casting off their toggle hooks and swooping earthward. Equipped with
+tommy-guns, folding rifles, mortars, folding bicycles, bazookas and
+light artillery, the air soldiers swarmed down.
+
+Suddenly excited shouts from the Italians in the truck made Stan look up
+again. A fighter-bomber was roaring down toward the truck. Stan saw that
+there were three trucks in the group and that they were closely bunched,
+an ideal target for the diving Yank. Grimly he watched the hundred-pound
+egg slide free as the bomber lifted and zoomed upward. The deadly
+missile seemed to hang in the air for a moment, though it grew bigger
+and bigger every second. It appeared to be aimed straight at the last
+truck in line, which was their transport. Stan looked about for Allison
+and O'Malley.
+
+His pals were standing against the side of the truck, wedged in by
+soldiers. They both looked weak and shaken. O'Malley was almost without
+clothes. Then the bomb hit. It landed in a bank just behind the truck. A
+great upheaval of earth and rocks lifted into the air and showered over
+the truck. One rear tire exploded with a bang and the truck began to
+wobble and jolt as it swayed along.
+
+Then they broke over the top of the ridge and went careening down a
+steep slope. Five minutes later they had reached cover in an avenue of
+trees. But the Italians did not halt for repairs. They wanted to put as
+many miles as possible between them and the Yank air army before their
+gas ran out.
+
+An hour later the truck limped into another airfield which had not been
+attacked. It was tucked away in a circle of hills with wooded slopes
+reaching down to a little valley. Here they found they had overtaken
+General Bolero. He was out on the field rushing about, shouting orders
+and apparently getting ready to take off again. His staff was trailing
+him about, with their bundles and brief cases and files.
+
+Stan and his pals were rushed into a small barracks room. The junior
+officer who spoke English had charge of them, backed by a dozen guards.
+
+"We will supply you with clothing," he said, casting his eye over their
+ragged uniforms.
+
+The clothing turned out to be blue shirts and bright green dungaree
+overalls. O'Malley glared at the officer. Stan grinned as he slipped
+into his outfit.
+
+"It would save you a lot of trouble if you just turned us loose," he
+suggested.
+
+"You will not escape. You will be sent to Italy." The officer matched
+O'Malley's glare. "Sicily can never be taken. Our infallible leader
+Mussolini has said Sicily can never be taken." He waved his hands
+excitedly. "Your forces will be driven into the sea."
+
+"I'll bet you a bottle of your finest wine that half of the island is
+already taken," Stan answered.
+
+"I say, why don't you kick the Germans out and help us along?" Allison
+asked. He felt he might touch a sore spot in mentioning the Germans.
+
+The shot hit home. A flush spread over the face of the officer. "The
+Nazi dogs," he snapped. "We will deal with them after we have used them
+to help us."
+
+"Sure, an' they'll treat you like they did the Poles," O'Malley said.
+"An' it will serve you right well, you spalpeens."
+
+"We'd like to stop over here and rest a bit," Stan cut in. "We realize
+you treated us roughly because we made you a lot of trouble. We'll give
+you our parole. There'll be no more rough stuff."
+
+"You talkin' fer me?" O'Malley growled.
+
+"I am," Stan said and gave O'Malley a hard look. "We'll see that you're
+a nice, well-behaved boy."
+
+"Agreed," Allison said, catching Stan's idea that he was playing for
+time. Even if they gave their parole it would not prevent their being
+captured by the Yanks.
+
+The officer smiled knowingly. "You would like to stay here. You think
+your air troops will take over this field. No, we will not be so
+foolish. You leave for Italy in one hour." He turned and marched out,
+after giving orders to the guards.
+
+"That's that," Stan said. "But we still have a chance. He didn't accept
+our parole."
+
+"They ought to be usin' their men to fight an' not be after keepin' a
+whole company here as guards," O'Malley grumbled.
+
+"After the show you put on, they need a company," Stan snapped. "If we'd
+been good boys, they might have left us with a couple of guards."
+
+"Who started the fuss?" O'Malley demanded.
+
+"I stumbled, but that was just to slow down the procession," Stan
+answered. "I'll admit it was a mistake."
+
+"We'd better be doing some heavy thinking," Allison warned. "If we don't
+we'll spend the rest of this campaign in a prison camp."
+
+There was no time for thinking and very little chance to talk. The Yanks
+were hustled out to the runways and loaded into a shaky and battered
+Fiat 20, two-engine bomber. They were escorted by the two squads of
+guards who stood around with rifles at ready until the plane started
+down the runway.
+
+Stan was squeezed in between O'Malley and Allison. The space inside the
+bomber was very limited, for it was not intended as a passenger plane.
+Besides the pilot and copilot, two men armed with pistols sat in the
+cramped quarters. The Italians had very thoughtfully provided their
+prisoners with parachutes. One of the guards spoke English and was not
+unwilling to talk. Stan singled him out at once.
+
+"I have been in America," the guard said in a friendly fashion.
+
+"What city?" Stan asked.
+
+"New York. I stay one year."
+
+"Didn't you like it?" Stan asked with a grin.
+
+"Sure, it was much good. I come back for my brother and then there is
+war. I must stay." The soldier shook his head sadly.
+
+"After the war you'll be going back?" Stan asked.
+
+"Sure. It is a fine place to live, New York. I make plenty money, got
+friends." The soldier smiled. "I will see you then."
+
+Stan laughed. "You sure will." His eyes were on the back of the pilot's
+neck. If O'Malley reached out he could touch the man flying the plane.
+Stan bent forward, at the same time signaling O'Malley with his knee in
+short and long taps. O'Malley finally woke up and answered the Morse
+SOS. As Stan talked to the soldier he also telegraphed to O'Malley and
+later to Allison.
+
+What Stan suggested was that they get control of the two pistols. The
+friendly soldier was bending closer. Stan would offer to show him some
+pictures from America that he had in his wallet. He would get the man
+off guard and when he had a chance would grab his pistol and push him
+over into the cramped back part of the ship. O'Malley and Allison would
+have to get the other pistol.
+
+"I think I have some pictures you may recognize," Stan said. He fished
+out a wallet which the Italians had not taken from him. Opening it he
+pulled out several snapshots of planes he had piloted at one time or
+another, but he held them so that the soldier had to bend forward. The
+guard leaned over almost against Stan.
+
+Like a flash Stan's hand shot out and he had the pistol. He lunged
+forward at the same instant, planting his head in the guard's chest. The
+soldier went over his stool and landed in a cramped position in the
+narrow waist of the plane.
+
+O'Malley had leaped the instant Stan's hand shot out. Allison did a good
+imitation of an American tackle. The second guard lost his gun but put
+up a tussle. Stan wedged past the struggling men and jammed the pistol
+barrel into the neck of the pilot.
+
+"We'll take over now," he snapped.
+
+The pilot cringed forward while the copilot turned about. Stan circled
+his neck with an arm and cinched down tight. Before the copilot could
+wiggle free, O'Malley was up forward with the other pistol. The copilot
+lifted his hands. His face was white and he seemed scared.
+
+"Drag him back and tuck him away with the guards," Stan ordered.
+
+O'Malley and Allison dragged the copilot back and crowded him into the
+narrow rear compartment with the others. Allison stood guard over them,
+while O'Malley and Stan took over from the pilot. The pilot was not
+afraid of the Yanks. He did signals of distress with his wings and put
+the ship into a dive before Stan laid him out with a rap over the head.
+Sliding into the seat Stan began to fight the old Fiat to get her out of
+a spin.
+
+She was going down, twisting and shuddering in every rivet and stay.
+O'Malley finally climbed up front and grabbed the free set of controls.
+They heaved her out of her spin just in time. Their wings fanned the
+tops of a grove of trees and they had to lay over to miss the spire of a
+church.
+
+"I can handle her now," Stan called across. "I'll go up a bit and then
+you get back there and have the Italians bail out. We won't need any
+prisoners. If they kick about it, tell them we'll be setting this ship
+down on a Malta air strip. That ought to make them bail out." Stan
+grinned at O'Malley.
+
+"Sure, an' it ought to," O'Malley agreed. "No Fiat iver got to land on
+Malta under her own power. We'll be shot to kindlin' wood."
+
+"Maybe we won't go to Malta, but that's where we're headed until they
+bail out," Stan laughed.
+
+O'Malley went back and within a few minutes the Italian crew was
+unloading. O'Malley had convinced them the plane was headed for Malta
+and they wanted none of the reception they knew an Italian plane would
+get over that base.
+
+Stan watched them sail down, one after another. As the last parachute
+blossomed out, Allison and O'Malley crowded forward. Stan had swung due
+south, and was holding that course.
+
+"Suppose you see what you can do with the radio," Stan said.
+
+Allison laughed. "There isn't any radio and there isn't a gun aboard
+this ship, except our two pistols."
+
+"Fine," Stan said and opened the old Fiat up a bit more. "In that case
+we better get in before dark."
+
+"You better be after rememberin' that I'm commander o' this outfit,"
+O'Malley broke in.
+
+"All right, Commander, the ship is yours." Stan eased over a bit. With a
+grin O'Malley squeezed into the pilot's seat.
+
+"Now you can be after givin' the orders," he said. "Where in blazes are
+we?"
+
+"We're over Italy," Stan said. "I think the town we just flew over was
+Cosenza, up the coast from Reggio."
+
+"Do you be after thinkin' that's water ahead?" O'Malley asked.
+
+They looked ahead and saw a strip of water and a long beach. Stan
+frowned. "Must be the Gulf of Taranto. I guess I'm a bit mixed up."
+
+"I say, old man, we better swing around and head southwest," Allison
+said.
+
+"We could fly to Africa," O'Malley remarked.
+
+"Not on our gas supply. The Italians must be short of gas. They
+certainly didn't fill this crate up." Allison's mocking grin appeared at
+the corners of his mouth.
+
+"How much? Don't be holdin' out secrets on us," O'Malley growled.
+
+"It's only a wild guess, but I'd say about forty minutes."
+
+O'Malley gave a startled yelp and spun the ship around to a south by
+west course. "Sure, an' we're gettin' out o' here," he said.
+
+Allison slipped into the copilot's seat while Stan sat on a folding
+stool behind him. O'Malley gave all his attention to nursing speed out
+of the old ship. He got her air-speed indicator up to two hundred and
+fifty miles per hour, but the indicator needle was bent, so there was no
+sure way of knowing how fast they were going. They left the expanse of
+water behind and headed over a rugged country. Stan felt certain they
+were flying down the toe of the Italian boot.
+
+Everything was going fine when Stan spotted fighter planes above them
+and to the west. He did not say anything until the craft were near
+enough to be identified.
+
+"Nine Airacobras off your port wing at two o'clock, Commander," he
+shouted.
+
+O'Malley craned his neck and squinted, then he began to grin. "Sure, an'
+there is," he said. "It's an escort we've been needin'. Likely the boys
+will know the way home."
+
+"Certainly they will," Allison said. "And they'll know a Fiat BR 20,
+also. This crate looks like a bomber."
+
+"We better duck and go downstairs for a bit of hedge-hopping," Stan
+advised. The Airacobras had spotted the lone bomber and were peeling off
+like hounds scenting a buck.
+
+O'Malley did not need any suggestions as to what to do. He nosed the
+Fiat over and sent her down the chute in a screaming dive that
+threatened to pull the wings off her. Stan glanced at his chute harness
+to make sure everything was in order. He figured O'Malley would fold up
+the Fiat like an old accordion when he started to pull her out of the
+dive.
+
+The Airacobras rapidly overtook the bomber, even though she was
+power-diving far beyond her limit of stability. Stan saw one of the boys
+flash in on their tail.
+
+"Kite her!" he bellowed. "Stinger on your tail!"
+
+O'Malley and Allison both hauled back and the Fiat wobbled and staggered
+as she started to lift. Stan could hear her joints giving way, then she
+bounced. Lead whistled below them, while the Airacobra roared down the
+trail of its own bullets.
+
+"Close," Allison muttered.
+
+Stan squinted up and back. Two more fighters were lining up. It seemed
+plain that they were surprised at the antics of the Fiat. They had never
+seen one do stunts like that before. The two came raking in, blasting
+from longer range. Stan felt the lead rip through the Fiat's wings and
+body. One bullet plunked through close to his head, ripping a big hole,
+another exploded back in the tail compartment and half of the peninsula
+could be seen through the hole.
+
+"Sure, an' they need shootin' practice!" O'Malley bellowed as he slipped
+off on one wing, did a stall, and laid over for another dive. They were
+now close to the treetops. Another Airacobra dived in and when it zoomed
+away, they were minus one wing tip and their port engine was stuttering.
+But they were down among the treetops and O'Malley was hedge-hopping
+like a wild man. They missed an ancient castle set on a cliff. How
+O'Malley managed it he himself did not know. One wing lifted and the
+turrets of the old castle slipped under. Down they went into a little
+valley, fanning the treetops. One motor was dead and the other was not
+putting out much power.
+
+Suddenly they realized that they were being covered by flak fired from a
+field ahead of them. The barrage was fierce and concentrated. It sent
+the Yank fighters kiting up to a safer level. The boys felt sure of
+their kill anyway. The Fiat had started to billow smoke out of the tail
+compartment where an incendiary shell had lodged.
+
+"I'd rather bail out than land in this thing!" Allison shouted.
+
+O'Malley shook his head and grinned. "Not one chance, she won't lift a
+foot. Here goes for a belly landing!"
+
+They skimmed over a row of trees and headed for an open field surrounded
+by woods. The Fiat gave up the ghost halfway across the field. She just
+settled down and hit the earth in a cloud of smoke and dust. Twisting
+and turning she plowed her way toward the far tree line. Finally she
+whirled around and piled up. The dust and smoke was so thick the three
+Yanks could see nothing. Pawing and struggling they fought their way out
+of the mass of wreckage. They heard men shouting all around them.
+Bursting out of the smoke and dust, they found themselves surrounded by
+fifty or more German soldiers.
+
+For a moment the Germans were as surprised as the three Yanks. They had
+expected to rescue a crew of Italian fliers. The men before them were
+dressed in the garb of Italian civilians. An officer bellowed an order
+and the Germans charged in.
+
+There was no place to run, except out on the open field, and that would
+have been suicide because a half dozen of the Germans were armed with
+tommy-guns. The Yanks just stood waiting for the Germans to reach them.
+The officer in command of the rescue group, a tall fellow with a saber
+scar on his cheek, halted before them and regarded them critically.
+Slowly a sarcastic smile formed on his lips. He spoke to them sharply in
+Italian.
+
+Stan answered in English. "We are officers of the United States Army."
+
+The officer looked blank but another officer who had come up broke in,
+speaking clipped but perfect English.
+
+"American fliers dressed as Italian civilians." He raised his eyebrows.
+"We can thank your fighters for shooting you down. Your spy system is
+very dumb, indeed. Your fighter planes should have known better."
+
+"We were Italian prisoners of war. Our uniforms were ruined. As a matter
+of courtesy the Italians furnished us what clothing they had." Stan
+spoke stiffly. "We demand the rights of prisoners of war."
+
+"We will decide what rights you have, but I believe you will be shot as
+spies." The officer turned to his superior and spoke in rapid German.
+
+Allison had said nothing at all. O'Malley just glared at his captors,
+his big hands balled into fists. Stan moved close to him.
+
+"Keep your shirt on. We're in a tight spot," he said in a low voice.
+
+"Quiet, you!" bellowed the officer. "Do not talk to each other."
+
+The ranking officer shouted a command and three German soldiers with
+machine guns closed in behind the boys.
+
+"March!" the younger officer snapped.
+
+They marched toward the woods. The officer moved stiffly ahead. The boys
+realized that escape from two squads of Italians would have been much
+easier than escape from the three Germans. They seemed eager to use
+their deadly tommy-guns.
+
+"I understand German, you know," Allison murmured as he bumped against
+Stan. Stan moved closer to his pal and Allison went on.
+
+"The commander is very angry because they were forced to open up on our
+fighters. Now the location of their guns is known. He is also eager to
+learn something about the strength of our air forces attacking Sicily
+and heading for Italy. He hinted we would be baited on by a promise of
+being treated as prisoners of war if we talked."
+
+"We won't talk," Stan muttered. "Anyway, we don't know anything."
+
+Entering the woods they found themselves in a cleverly hidden camp. The
+boys were lodged in a barracks room with barred windows. Two other
+prisoners, both Italians, were in the room. A guard stood at the door,
+while several others paced up and down outside.
+
+"Looks snug and tight," Stan said.
+
+"Sure, an' we'll soon find out," O'Malley growled.
+
+"We'll go into a huddle and cook up something," Stan said. "We're not in
+the hands of Italians now, and I don't feel up to facing a firing
+squad."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+FIRING SQUAD
+
+
+The three Yanks seated themselves on a rough bench in their cell. The
+two Italian prisoners looked them over without interest, then went back
+to their own talk, which they were carrying on in whispers. Every once
+in a while they shot glances at the boys as though fearing they were
+trying to hear what was being said.
+
+"Suspicious chaps, what?" Allison said, amused.
+
+"Wonder what they were thrown in for?" Stan mused.
+
+"Sure, an' it matters very little. What happens to Mrs. O'Malley's boy
+is what's worryin' me," O'Malley broke in. "Ivery window is fastened as
+tight as the purse o' a Scotsman an' the door is well guarded."
+
+"They'll be coming after us very soon," Stan said. "They'll question us
+one at a time."
+
+"You'd best act as commander," O'Malley said. "I might plant a fist on
+the nose o' one o' their generals."
+
+"I say, that's a fine idea," Allison agreed. "Stan, you are in command."
+
+It was natural for them to turn to Stan. He had always been the most
+level-headed of the three in tight spots. He grinned at them.
+
+"We'll see who they pick," he answered. "But we don't talk."
+
+A few minutes later the junior officer who spoke English appeared. He
+shoved past the guard and stood at the barred door. The two Italian
+prisoners stopped talking at once. The boys did not get up from their
+bench. They returned the stare of the officer. His eyes moved over them
+and paused on Stan.
+
+"Are you in command?"
+
+"I am in command," Stan answered.
+
+"Come with me. The colonel is very reasonable. If you are not pig-headed
+you may be treated as prisoners of war."
+
+Stan got to his feet. One of the Italians had risen. He looked at Stan
+closely. Suddenly Stan turned back to his pals and bent close to them.
+In a whisper he said:
+
+"Be careful. I just got the idea those Italians may be planted in here
+to listen to what we say."
+
+"Come on, you," the officer snapped.
+
+Stan moved to the iron grating. Pulling a bunch of keys out of the side
+pocket of his tunic, the guard unlocked the door. Stan stepped out on a
+narrow walk which led to a row of doors. The officer marched stiffly at
+his side. At a glance Stan saw that the place was well guarded. Not less
+than a dozen men with rifles were spotted within sight of the guardhouse
+and of the buildings grouped around it.
+
+"You will do well to answer all questions truthfully and in detail.
+Colonel Kittle is a man of action." The officer gave decided emphasis to
+the last words.
+
+Stan did not reply. They were entering a big room with wall cabinets and
+a desk. Chairs ringed the desk on which lay various trophies and gadgets
+such as might have decorated the room of any flight lieutenant. Stan
+spotted a piece out of a Hurricane fighter. There was an American Colt
+forty-five automatic and a Russian helmet.
+
+Behind the desk sat the tall officer with the saber scar across his
+cheek. Stan sized him up as a Prussian military man of the old school.
+Now that he had a good chance to look at the colonel he saw that the man
+was hollow-eyed, his skin was drawn tightly over his cheekbones, and his
+short, cropped hair was streaked with gray. Stan snapped a salute, not
+knowing exactly why he did it.
+
+The colonel returned the salute and waved a bony hand toward a chair.
+Stan seated himself. The officer went on regarding him intently. The
+junior officer seated himself beside Stan and waited. Finally the
+colonel spoke in German. The young officer frowned, then began
+translating.
+
+"The colonel wishes to compliment you. The Americans have done very well
+in Africa."
+
+"Thanks," Stan answered warily.
+
+"He sees no reason why you should not be classed as a prisoner of war."
+The young officer's lip curled. He turned to the colonel and waited.
+
+The colonel spoke for some little time. When he stopped talking the
+young lieutenant faced Stan.
+
+"We wish to know the approximate number of fighter and bomber craft
+based upon Africa. It would be helpful if you could add information
+regarding additional troops moved in to assist in the action against
+Italy."
+
+Stan smiled. "My compliments to the colonel. Tell him I am not at
+liberty to give such information."
+
+The officer scowled. He translated and the colonel smiled back at Stan.
+
+"That will be all," the young officer snapped. It was plain the young
+officer did not like the way his commander was handling matters.
+
+Stan was marched back to his cell. The young officer hurried away. When
+he was out of hearing, Stan spoke in low tones to his pals. He now
+noticed that the Italians seemed interested and were trying to listen.
+
+"The old boy with the scar is commander. He's a Prussian officer of the
+old school and does not think much of the Nazi methods. He seems to have
+convinced himself that we are really officers and told the truth about
+our clothes."
+
+"I'll get more dope," Allison said. "I can understand their talk."
+
+A few minutes later the young officer returned and took Allison to the
+office. O'Malley and Stan sat waiting for his return. The Italians sat
+with their backs against the wall in silence. Fifteen minutes passed and
+then Allison returned. The boys went into a huddle.
+
+"The colonel is not in favor of using the third degree on us. He says he
+has reports on us from the Italians and knows we are prisoners of war.
+He said all this in German. The young lieutenant seems to be in with the
+Gestapo. I gathered that they hate each other." Allison paused and
+grinned. "The old boy told him off plenty, but the kid is stubborn. He's
+going over the head of the colonel, so we may have trouble."
+
+"Sure, an' I'll bet the colonel can get tough, just the same," O'Malley
+cut in.
+
+"Yes, he's as hard as nails but he has the old rules well trained into
+him. He'll do whatever the big shots order. Guess who the big boy in
+Italy is."
+
+"Couldn't make a stab," Stan said.
+
+"Rommel himself. He's to keep us from breaching the continent. Remember
+how Herr Goebbels has been shouting that the Allies could never break
+into the European fortress? Well Rommel is going to see that we don't
+crack through." Allison laughed softly.
+
+"Sure, an' we'll give 'em the same pastin' we gave him in Africa,"
+O'Malley growled.
+
+An hour passed and O'Malley was not called in. Supper of bread and thin
+soup arrived and with it came the Gestapo officer. He seated himself on
+a stool outside the bars and talked while the boys ate. O'Malley looked
+at the food, then turned to the officer.
+
+"'Tis not fit for a hog, this food."
+
+"That's why you are getting it," the officer said and laughed loudly.
+
+"We are entitled to decent rations," Stan said.
+
+"What does it matter about the rations? I have just talked by radio to
+headquarters. Unless you give us the information we want, you will be
+shot. I have the order with me." He leered at the boys triumphantly.
+
+"Pleasant sort of folks, you Nazis," Allison drawled.
+
+"I will attend to the execution myself, tomorrow morning. You will have
+tonight to think things over." He got to his feet and kicked aside the
+stool.
+
+Stan finished his tin of soup and stood up. He walked to the barred
+door. The guard swung around and made a menacing motion with his rifle.
+Stan grinned at him and stepped back. He was convinced the Gestapo
+officer had told the guards to shoot on the least provocation, he could
+read it in the man's eyes.
+
+"Be careful," he said as he seated himself again. "The guards have been
+told to get rid of us if they can find any excuse."
+
+"I'd as soon be shot by a guard as a firing squad," Allison said.
+
+"We might get the fellow up near the bars and get his keys," Stan said.
+
+"Good idea," O'Malley agreed. "But how?"
+
+"We'll get over near the door and start to whisper with our backs to
+him. See if we can tease him up close," Stan suggested.
+
+They moved over near the grating and began whispering. The guard stood
+watching them. He was a full ten feet from the door and did not move.
+His expressionless, beefy face showed not a flicker of interest. Finally
+the boys gave it up.
+
+"He has about as much curiosity as a turtle," Stan said sourly.
+
+"Sure, an' they may put on a guard with a brain," O'Malley said
+hopefully.
+
+They sat down and tried to think up another scheme. At midnight the
+guard was changed and they tried their trick on the new man. He was less
+interested than the first one. He turned his back on them and let them
+whisper. The boys gave it up and sat down to wait.
+
+They dozed off after a time. O'Malley stretched out on the floor and
+went to sleep. Stan and Allison remained on the bench, leaning back
+against the wall. The clatter of trucks and shouting of soldiers wakened
+them. Daylight was breaking and the camp seemed to be getting set for
+some sort of action. Presently the young officer appeared. He glared at
+the three Yanks.
+
+"Are you ready to talk?" he demanded.
+
+"No," Stan answered. The others shook their heads.
+
+"In that case I will waste no time. You will be shot within the hour."
+He turned to the Italian prisoners and spoke in German to one of them.
+His words were harsh and his attitude showed he had no respect for the
+men.
+
+One of the prisoners answered in German. His words were angry and he
+was defiant. Suddenly Allison stepped forward.
+
+"I say, old man," he addressed the officer. "I've changed my mind. There
+is some information I could give the colonel."
+
+"Come along then," the officer snapped. He shot a few words at the
+Italians as he motioned for the guard to open the door.
+
+Stan grabbed Allison's arm. "You can't do it, fellow," he said.
+
+Allison turned on him. "You may want to die and become a hero, but I'd
+rather be a live war prisoner. I say, get your hands off me."
+
+Stan started to pull Allison back. With a quick movement Allison planted
+a fist on Stan's jaw. It was a hard right cross and set Stan back on his
+heels.
+
+The officer laughed loudly. "Now you are acting quite as you should, you
+swine."
+
+"Let me get a crack at him," O'Malley howled. "The traitor!"
+
+He was blocked by the bayonet of the guard. Allison walked out of the
+cell. He paused and looked back. There was a mocking leer on his lips.
+
+"Good-by, saps," he said.
+
+Stan slumped down on the bench. O'Malley marched up and down fuming and
+ranting. Twenty minutes passed and a soldier came to the cell. He
+escorted the Italians out of the room. Stan got to his feet and walked
+to the door. He was attracted by marching feet on the gravel outside.
+
+Looking out he saw a squad of men with rifles. The squad leader halted
+them and faced them toward a wall. Their rifle butts hit the gravel and
+they stood rigid, with their backs to the cell door. Stan noticed that
+mortar had been knocked from the surface of the wall. He could see many
+splattered places and many bullet holes in that wall. Turning around he
+looked at O'Malley, who had seated himself.
+
+"The reception committee has arrived," he said calmly.
+
+O'Malley got to his feet and walked to the door. In silence they stood
+looking out at their executioners. The squad leader was looking their
+way. He seemed eager to get at the business he had to perform.
+
+Two officers appeared and halted before the squad leader. He saluted and
+the three talked briefly. The officers turned toward the guardhouse.
+They spoke to the guard and he produced his keys. The door was opened
+and one of the officers spoke in broken English.
+
+"Come now."
+
+Stan and O'Malley walked out of the room. One of the officers produced
+two strips of cloth and held them out. Stan shook his head.
+
+"No blindfold for me," he said evenly.
+
+"Get them rags away," O'Malley growled. "I'll be lookin' ye in the eye,
+ye spalpeens."
+
+Walking between the two officers, they marched out across the grounds
+toward the wall. Reaching it, they faced the men with rifles at rest.
+
+"Get it over with," Stan snapped.
+
+"Sure, an' I'll bet Allison will be sorry he isn't here," O'Malley said
+gloomily.
+
+The officers moved back and took up positions beside the firing squad.
+Suddenly a jangle of angry and excited voices broke loose from the
+direction of the colonel's quarters. A door burst open and a big fat man
+plunged out upon the parade ground.
+
+"General Bolero!" Stan gasped.
+
+It was General Bolero and he was red-faced with anger. Behind him came
+Colonel Kittle, the Gestapo officer, the two Italian prisoners, and
+Allison. The general charged across the grounds and halted before the
+two officers in charge of the firing squad. He jumped up and down and
+shouted, waving his arms wildly all the time. Colonel Kittle came up and
+halted. He snapped an order to the officers.
+
+The Gestapo officer was shouting loudly, but he was no match for the
+general, who bellowed so loudly that the medals on his chest danced up
+and down.
+
+The firing squad suddenly came to life. They shouldered their rifles,
+about-faced, and marched away. Stan and O'Malley walked over to the
+group.
+
+The general ceased shouting and looked at the two Yank airmen. He puffed
+out his cheeks and said:
+
+"A thousand apologies, gentlemen. I am ashamed. Italy is shamed. This
+could not be." He faced the colonel. "These are my prisoners, Colonel. I
+am taking them with me."
+
+Colonel Kittle saluted and nodded. The Gestapo officer whirled and raced
+away.
+
+"We will go quickly," the general said to the boys, "before the suckling
+pig receives more orders from his superiors." He bowed deeply to the
+colonel and faced about.
+
+"I have given our promise to go with him," Allison said. "It was the
+only way to save your necks."
+
+They marched away beside the general. Beyond the buildings they came to
+a big car with an army driver. General Bolero himself opened the door,
+and the boys seated themselves in the rear seat. The general climbed in
+the front seat with his driver. He sat very stiffly but every once in a
+while he sputtered like the fuse on a firecracker.
+
+The car rolled up a shady road, past many guards, and on into a wide
+highway. Stan turned to Allison.
+
+"How did you work it?" he asked.
+
+"I heard one of those Italian prisoners say he demanded to see General
+Bolero. The officer told him Bolero was in Colonel Kittle's office. I
+thought there might be a slim chance if I could get to the general, so I
+pretended to be ready to turn traitor." Allison chuckled. "You should
+have seen the general," he lowered his voice, "when I told him we were
+to be shot as spies."
+
+"He's a good egg, but for how long did you give our parole?" Stan asked.
+He was worried because a military parole is something a soldier does not
+break.
+
+"Thirty days," Allison replied. "It was the best deal I could make."
+
+"Thirty days!" Stan repeated. "Italy will be captured by that time and
+we'll miss the show."
+
+Allison grinned. "You know, I got the idea the general figured Italy
+would be out of the war by then."
+
+"'Tis the first time I iver promised to stay in jail," O'Malley said
+sadly. "But after lookin' down the barrels o' them Nazi rifles, I'm not
+kickin' on the bargain."
+
+"Yes, we'd have missed all of the show if Allison hadn't outsmarted that
+Gestapo officer," Stan agreed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+REST CURE
+
+
+General Bolero took his prisoners to a villa a few miles from Naples.
+Here they had comfortable quarters and good food. They saw little of the
+general, as he was busy attending to the fortification of the Salerno
+and Naples water fronts. When they did see him, he always spoke with
+little respect for his German allies. Stan and Allison liked the
+general, but O'Malley did not warm up to him. The Irishman had never
+liked high-ranking officers. To him they were always brass hats.
+
+The days passed slowly. The boys had a small radio and always tuned in
+the Algiers radio station for news of the Allied attack upon Sicily. The
+news of the fighting made them squirm, and for hours after listening to
+a military report of the advance of Patton and Montgomery they paced the
+floor. O'Malley was especially restless. He marked each day off on the
+calendar and planned his escape.
+
+On the twenty-seventh day the boys were seated on a shady balcony from
+which they could look down toward the city of Naples. Directly below the
+grounds of their villa were the headquarters and general assembly fields
+of the Germans. They seemed to be present in considerable strength. Stan
+sat with his feet on a railing. Allison was near the railing. O'Malley
+was sprawled out in an easy chair.
+
+"Sure, an' it will be no trick at all to get away," he said.
+
+"Before our parole is up the general will make other plans for us, you
+can bet on that," Stan answered.
+
+"I'll bet we're locked up," Allison added.
+
+"We could sneak out a bit ahead o' time," O'Malley suggested.
+
+"The general has treated us very fine, besides saving our lives. We stay
+until one minute after midnight of the thirtieth day," Stan said firmly.
+
+"I'm goin' crazy," O'Malley growled, "sittin' around here listenin' to
+air fights. There won't be a German plane left to tangle with by the
+time we get back into it." He sat up and scowled down at the German
+camp. "Besides, these Italians can't make decent pie."
+
+The boys laughed and O'Malley joined in. Behind them a curtain parted
+and four officers stepped out on the balcony. The general was paying
+them a visit and he had with him three flying officers of the Italian
+air force.
+
+The Yanks got to their feet. The general smiled in friendly fashion and
+waved a hand toward the three fliers.
+
+"I have brought three of my boys, Tony Bolero, Arno Bolero and Lorenzo
+Bolero. They are all officers of our air corps." He faced the Yanks.
+"Lieutenant Wilson, Lieutenant O'Malley, and Lieutenant Allison."
+
+The Bolero trio bowed deeply. Stan stepped forward and held out a hand.
+
+"Glad to meet you, Lorenzo," he said.
+
+The fliers shook hands while the general beamed happily upon them.
+
+"Sit down. I have much to say to you men," he said.
+
+They found chairs and pulled them up beside a table. The general seated
+himself and puffed out his cheeks as he fished a thick envelope from his
+pocket.
+
+"What I am about to say is most unusual. I have a request to make of you
+Americans. I wish you to extend your parole." He lifted a hand as
+O'Malley opened his mouth to say no. "I feel that you should do this
+after the manner in which you have been treated." He smiled at Stan.
+
+"For how long, sir?" Stan asked.
+
+"I cannot say exactly, but not for very much longer. I am leaving my
+boys here and they will be with you during the time you stay here." His
+smile faded and he suddenly looked tired and old. "I ask this for a
+personal reason. Perhaps I am selfish."
+
+"You saved our lives, sir," Allison said. "I'm giving my parole for a
+while longer."
+
+"I'll give mine, sir," Stan promised.
+
+They looked at O'Malley. "An' I'm gettin' away if I can," he declared.
+
+The general bowed. "You know, of course, that I must place you in
+custody of a guard?"
+
+"Sure," O'Malley replied. "Sure, but I'm gettin' itchy feet."
+
+The general nodded. He handed the fat envelope to his eldest son,
+Lorenzo.
+
+"You will keep this for me. Above all it must not be given to the
+Germans." He got to his feet. "Now I must be getting back to
+headquarters. I trust you have been comfortable, gentlemen?"
+
+"We have, thank you, sir," Allison said.
+
+Gravely the general shook hands with the three Yanks and with each of
+his sons. At the doorway he paused and they all gave him a snappy
+salute. After he was gone the Bolero boys were silent. They stood at the
+balcony looking down on the shady road until his car disappeared inside
+the German camp. Lorenzo turned to Stan and there was a tight smile on
+his lips.
+
+"This is a strange war for the Italians," he said.
+
+"It is," Stan agreed.
+
+The brothers shrugged their shoulders and started to chat with the Yanks
+in smooth English. They had learned the language in Great Britain.
+O'Malley sat back and said nothing. Stan and Allison carried on the
+talk. The war was not mentioned again. Allison and the brothers talked
+about schooldays in England.
+
+At last Lorenzo got to his feet. The others joined him. They all bowed.
+
+"We leave you now but will see you at dinner tonight."
+
+After they had gone, O'Malley burst out, "You sure did get tricked by
+that ol' brass hat."
+
+"I don't think so," Stan said.
+
+"I say, old man, you better change your mind. If you don't, I'll wager
+you a dinner we see action before you do." Allison was smiling.
+
+"Sure, an' you talk riddles," O'Malley snorted.
+
+"There's only one place the general can put you for safekeeping right
+now. He'll have to turn you over to the Germans. This part of the
+country has been taken over by the Nazi gang." Allison spoke slowly.
+"The general hates the Nazis. Figure it out for yourself."
+
+"An' suppose he pops up with a regiment o' soldiers to take you to a
+camp about five minutes before our parole is up?" O'Malley asked.
+
+"He could do that anyway," Stan answered. "We've waited a month. A few
+more days won't kill us. I have a feeling Allison is right."
+
+"The Italians have thrown Mussolini out, perhaps they will start
+throwing the Germans out," Allison said.
+
+"They wouldn't have a chance," O'Malley answered.
+
+"I guess you're right about that, but something's up. I'm going to wait
+and see." Stan walked to the balcony rail and seated himself.
+
+That night at dinner the Bolero brothers were quite gay. And for the
+next few days they were always around, but always friendly and polite.
+Stan wondered why they were not at the front. Italy certainly needed
+every pilot she had. He did not think that the officers had been
+detailed to watch them.
+
+The parole day came and a guard arrived in the morning. The three Yanks
+saw a squad of Italian soldiers headed by a young officer halt in the
+yard below. O'Malley sat on the rail, watching. The young officer came
+to the balcony alone.
+
+"Which one is Lieutenant O'Malley?" he asked.
+
+O'Malley grinned at him. "Sure, an' that's me. I'm glad you dropped in.
+Tell General Bolero that I am givin' my parole, though it is against me
+better judgment."
+
+The officer bowed. "I am pleased," he said. "I will report this to the
+general." He bowed again and turned on his heel.
+
+Stan looked at O'Malley. "I thought you'd get some sense into that
+shaggy head of yours."
+
+"We'll rot right here," O'Malley said with a scowl. "But the likes o'
+you has need o' someone to look out for you."
+
+"Thanks," Stan said. "You are very thoughtful."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+ESCAPE
+
+
+The three Yanks were sitting on their balcony restlessly watching the
+activity in the German camp below. They were beginning to wonder if
+General Bolero ever meant to release them from their promise. His sons
+still remained at the villa, but they never mentioned the war. Suddenly
+Lorenzo burst out on the balcony. He halted and lifted both hands
+excitedly.
+
+"Italy has surrendered!" he announced. "You are free men!"
+
+Before the Yanks could reply, Arno and Tony rushed in. They were very
+excited.
+
+"This is the hour we have waited for," Tony shouted. "Now we will drive
+out the Black Shirt Fascisti and the Germans." The younger brothers
+embraced each other and danced up and down. Lorenzo smilingly watched
+them. Slowly he turned to the three surprised Yanks. "My family--we
+have fought against the big-talking Mussolini. We belong to the society
+Free Italy."
+
+"Great!" Allison exclaimed.
+
+O'Malley was already headed for the door.
+
+"Wait!" Lorenzo shouted after him. "I must tell you some things."
+
+O'Malley halted and turned toward the door. "Sure, an' all I want is to
+get back into this fight."
+
+"I am sure you do," Lorenzo said. "And I am going to help you."
+
+"Good," Stan said.
+
+Lorenzo took a fat package from his pocket. It was the package his
+father had given him. He held it out to Stan.
+
+"Here are the locations of all German bases in Italy, the positions of
+batteries, the supply routes used, and all the military maps you will
+need. This is very important information."
+
+O'Malley was staring at the package. "Sure, an' it's of no use now with
+Italy out o' the war. We'll be headed for Germany."
+
+Lorenzo shook his head. "I'm afraid it is not so easy as that. Germany
+has as complete control of Italy as she has of any conquered country.
+The Germans will be helped by our Black Shirts, who know they will be
+treated badly if they do not stay in power." He spread his hands wide.
+"Every officer like my father will be hunted down. We will be hunted.
+Today we dress as civilians and go north to destroy Nazi rail lines and
+supply dumps."
+
+Stan took the packet. "Have you any suggestions for our getting out of
+Italy?"
+
+Lorenzo smiled. "My brothers and I will have no use for our Nardi
+fighter planes. Perhaps after the war we might be repaid with an
+Airacobra."
+
+"'Tis a foine set o' brothers ye are," O'Malley cried. "Lead me to those
+Nardi ships."
+
+"They are in a woods north of the villa. On the hunting acres of the
+Bolero estate there is a runway the Germans have not found. I will lead
+you to your planes. But we had best hurry as the Germans are taking over
+everything." He spread his hands wide and shrugged his shoulders. "You
+know how efficient the Germans are."
+
+"You will go nowhere," a harsh voice said.
+
+The boys whirled toward the wide doorway leading to the balcony. Four
+German soldiers with tommy-guns stood glaring at them. A youngster with
+an officer's insignia on his shirt spoke.
+
+"We have heard what you said. You are spies and will be dealt with
+quickly."
+
+Lorenzo was in front of Stan. He whispered, "Over the balcony rail.
+There is a large shrub to land on. Take the path leading from the
+kennels. Cross the ridge. There is no road to the field."
+
+"You, stop talking!" the German officer shouted.
+
+Stan did not hesitate. He did a backward flip. As he went over the
+railing he saw flame flash from a machine gun. He caught a glimpse of
+Lorenzo sagging forward, his hands gripping his stomach.
+
+The next instant he had plunged into a large bush which broke his fall.
+He lay beside a rock wall in a ditch. Vaguely he knew where the kennels
+were. Tony had taken him back to see the dogs one evening after dark.
+From above he could hear the officer bellowing down to the men he had
+left below. He hoped the Germans had felt so sure of their quarry that
+they had not surrounded the house.
+
+Reaching a corner he discovered a guard there. The man was looking up,
+listening to his commander's orders. Stan hit him hard in the back with
+a knee and slapped a viselike grip around his neck. The man sagged down
+without a murmur. Stan stripped off the fellows cartridge jacket and
+grabbed his tommy-gun. He was glad the Germans had equipped their hounds
+with rapid-fire guns.
+
+Leaping forward he reached the back of the house. There he halted. The
+squad cars were in the back yard, two of them. Four men stood at the
+back door listening to the shouting above. Stan saw the kennels and set
+himself to blast a path to freedom.
+
+Suddenly he heard a wild yell from above. It was O'Malley and Stan could
+tell the Irishman was seeing red. There was a fight in progress up on
+the balcony. Machine guns chattered savagely. Stan felt suddenly sick to
+his stomach. The boys were up there mixing it barehanded with four
+Germans armed with machine guns.
+
+The guards at the door whirled to leap into the house. Stan's submachine
+gun burst into flame and he swept a pathway of death across the ranks
+of the Nazis. They went down in a writhing mass, one of them rolling off
+the steps and crawling away on his hands and knees, leaving a bloody
+path behind him.
+
+Stan leaped for the back door and plunged into the house. He went
+through the spacious music room and up the wide stairway leading to the
+balcony like a charging tank, his submachine gun at his hip, his eyes
+like cold steel.
+
+Leaping through the doorway he swept the room with his gun. O'Malley and
+Allison and Tony were crowded back against the wall. O'Malley was
+bleeding profusely from a wound in his shoulder. A broken chair lay on
+the floor and beside it lay a dead German. Lorenzo lay on the floor face
+up. He was dead, but there was a smile of triumph on his lips. Arno had
+sagged down into a chair. He, too, was bleeding from a head wound.
+
+The three Germans had their backs to the door. The officer was wild with
+fury. He was shouting wildly.
+
+"If I did not have orders to bring you in so that we can force you to
+tell who your underground helpers are, I would shoot you all and leave
+you here to rot!"
+
+"Put up your hands or you'll stay here to rot!" Stan snapped.
+
+The Germans whirled about. As they turned, the two soldiers dropped
+their guns and elevated their hands. The officer came around with his
+machine gun firing. Stan opened up and cut him down. The two men began
+shouting:
+
+"_Kamrad! Kamrad!_"
+
+Stan backed them up against the wall. Before he had gotten them moved
+O'Malley and Allison had their tommy-guns. They stripped the ammunition
+from the soldiers.
+
+"Tie them up," Stan snapped. He turned about and saw that Tony and Arno
+were kneeling beside their brother.
+
+"We should go now. We cannot help him, but I shall see that he is
+mentioned in my reports as a hero in the cause of democracy," Stan said
+softly.
+
+The two brothers straightened and rose to their feet. They stood stiffly
+and saluted.
+
+"We will show you the flying field," Arno said.
+
+"We better get moving. Both squad cars made off and they'll bring back
+reinforcements. The drivers didn't happen to be armed or else they
+thought the place was garrisoned." Stan nodded toward Arno and O'Malley.
+"Plug those wounds as you go along."
+
+"I will get first aid and medicine from the cabinet in my room. I'll
+overtake you," Tony said.
+
+They moved down the wide stairway, leaving the German soldiers where
+they would be rescued. Tony dashed off while the others, led by Arno,
+hurried out of the house and across the yard to the stables. Racing
+through the spacious barns they came to the kennels. By the time they
+had passed these Tony had caught up with them.
+
+Pushing through a hidden gate in a hedge they came to a bridle path over
+which tall trees draped their branches.
+
+"I say, a beautiful spot," Allison murmured.
+
+"It has the smell of auld Ireland," O'Malley said wistfully.
+
+"We are very fond of it," Tony said.
+
+Arno was ahead, moving rapidly upward. They hurried along and caught up
+with him. From then on there was no talking; the trail wound upward
+steeply, covered by a canopy of trees. Reaching the top of the ridge
+they broke out into a forest. Arno led them to a spot where there was a
+narrow flight strip. Still they saw no planes.
+
+Crossing the strip they entered a grove of tall trees and there stood
+three, trim ships. O'Malley yelped with joy. Stan looked at the craft
+critically. They were Nardi FN 500's, obsolete in speed and fire power,
+but trim and sturdy ships just the same. Arno smiled.
+
+"We built this secret field so that we could slip in at night without
+the black-shirted Fascisti knowing where we had gone. We met often to
+plan the overthrow of Mussolini and his murderers."
+
+"You landed here at night?" Allison asked in amazement.
+
+"Certainly," Arno answered modestly.
+
+"We could use you as a fighter pilot," Stan answered. "When you get
+through blowing up bridges and trains, you'd better join us. We'll vouch
+for you."
+
+"We will do that. We like very much to fly," Tony said eagerly.
+
+"You will find the guns on the ship are serviced. The engine is 1200
+horsepower, you have two fixed guns firing through the prop and two guns
+fixed in the wings. You can get three hundred and fifty miles per hour
+out of those ships," Arno spoke proudly.
+
+"Yet they are not as good as the Messerschmitts or the Focke-Wulf," Tony
+added. "And I think you will have to fight your way home against the
+Germans."
+
+"Sure, an' we'll show them a fight," O'Malley said happily.
+
+"You have gas to reach Malta, but not much for fighting. It is best that
+you run fast for home," Arno advised.
+
+"We'll do just that," Stan said, remembering the package inside his
+shirt.
+
+Tony and Arno helped them wheel the Nardis out on the flight strip. They
+were surprised to find another ship tucked away under the trees.
+
+"Father's ship," Arno said with a catch in his voice. "But he has not
+been able to come for it."
+
+"He'll come," Allison said, but he was not so sure the general was
+alive. He knew the Germans would be ruthless in wiping out all
+anti-Fascist leaders in the territory they controlled.
+
+The boys climbed up and got into the beautifully streamlined cockpits.
+They slipped into the Italian parachutes and got set. Arno and Tony
+acted as ground crew and the engines were soon turning over smoothly.
+Stan checked his dials and made himself familiar with gun controls and
+equipment; he cracked the throttle and listened to the roaring surge of
+power. Then he throttled down and leaned out, waving an arm in a signal
+that he was leading off. O'Malley and Allison answered the signal. They
+knew it was their job to see that Stan got through with his reports and
+maps.
+
+Stan kicked the throttle open and the Nardi roared to life, leaping
+forward with surprising speed. Stan hoiked her tail with an added blast
+of prop pressure and tested her. She lifted at once. Unburdened by the
+armor plate carried by a Lightning or an Airacobra for the protection of
+the pilot and constructed of much lighter materials, she bounced off the
+ground before half of the short runway had been covered.
+
+Stan leveled off close to the tops of the trees. He wanted to make sure
+Allison and O'Malley got away, and so he did not want to stir up the
+swarm of German fighter planes on the big flying field just a few miles
+away.
+
+O'Malley came up and then Allison. They dropped into formation beside
+Stan and he set his course by compass, straight for Sicily.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+HOMEWARD BOUND
+
+
+Stan was not sure of the terrain he had to fly over. He wanted to avoid
+the German flying fields if possible, but knew there would be many
+dispersal areas and flight strips. Getting through would be largely a
+matter of luck.
+
+The formation of Nardi FN's swooped over the ridge above Bolero Villa.
+Stan was flying low and pushing the Nardi hard. He grinned as he glanced
+at the air-speed indicator. They were topping three hundred miles per
+hour.
+
+Suddenly they swept away from the hilly country and were over the German
+air base. There was nothing to be done about it but keep on going. Stan
+cast a critical eye downward and laughed softly. He took in the details
+of the carefully hidden dispersal plots, the tree-shaded oil dumps and
+the shrub-covered barracks. The picture he was fixing in his mind might
+be useful later.
+
+They had reached the center of the area when the surprised ack-ack
+gunners woke up. A half-dozen groves of trees suddenly erupted flame and
+the sky above the three streaking Nardi's was filled with smoke tracers
+and exploding steel.
+
+The Yanks went on and were away from the field before the gunners got
+their altitude spotted. Stan drew a deep breath of relief. He was glad
+that he had followed his hunch to fly low. Then he noticed O'Malley, on
+his right, zoom upward, while Allison looped off to the left. An instant
+later he spotted the reason for this maneuver. He had been so interested
+in the ground below that he had forgotten the sky. A returning flight of
+twenty Messerschmitts had spotted the Italian planes.
+
+The Me pilots evidently had received orders not to let any Italian
+planes escape to join the Allies. They were coming in low for a landing
+and that gave the Yanks a break. But there were twenty of them, and they
+were faster and more heavily armed than the Nardi ships.
+
+Stan held his course steadily, while he tried to coax a few more revs
+out of his motor. He was doing three-forty and could get no more.
+Glancing up he saw that by quick thinking O'Malley and Allison had
+gotten the edge on the Jerries. They were up above and getting set to
+come down to cover his retreat.
+
+Grimly Stan gave his attention to his course. He was hedge-hopping over
+trees and power lines. Never in his life had he seen so many power
+lines. By staying down he made it tough for a diving enemy. But these
+Jerries were veteran fliers. They had learned a few things about rhubarb
+raiders and how to handle them from the many raids staged out of England
+upon the low countries. Three of them fanned out each way, right and
+left, and came zooming around in a circle like coyotes bent upon cutting
+off the retreat of a jack rabbit.
+
+Stan watched them as they went into their circle and saw that even in
+making such a maneuver they could outfly his ship. He held his course
+and a tight smile formed on his lips. Everything depended upon his
+timing. If he handled the thing right and guessed right, he would dodge
+the cross fire of the six killers.
+
+The Me's came in in pretty formation, three to a side, staggered so as
+to lay down a terrible and enclosing wall of death. Stan's hands were
+cold upon the controls, but they were steady. His eyes took in all the
+attackers in one moving picture. He was waiting for a tip that would
+give him the break he needed. He had given up hope that O'Malley or
+Allison would be able to break through and crack the deathtrap. Fourteen
+Me's were savagely attacking them, bent upon their destruction.
+
+The Jerries gave Stan his break just before they went into the final act
+of the kill. They thought they were trapping an Italian pilot and they
+knew just how the Italian boys flew. One of the planes on the left
+lifted a little to clear the zoom of the Me under him. That was all Stan
+needed to know. The three Jerries on the left would go up, slamming lead
+across his path. Two of the Me's on the right would go down and one
+would come in straight. Stan kicked the Nardi over hard to the left,
+heading her for the tower of a high line that swung down from the hills.
+
+The Me's went into their act, guns blazing away, punching holes into the
+air. The maneuver was a beauty. The only thing wrong with it was that
+the target had shifted course suddenly, leaving them in a wild tangle
+with a lot of stunting to be done before they could close in again.
+
+But Stan's troubles were not over. His left wing raked through the top
+of a small tree less than ten feet high. The power line and the high
+steel tower were hurtling at him. He flattened out and held his breath.
+There was no time to zoom over the heavy cables; he had to go under and
+hope for the best.
+
+Stan did not see the cables or the tower go by; all he knew was that he
+was boring straight for a red-roofed building set on a knoll. He zoomed
+up and drew in a big lungful of air. Looking back, he saw that his
+hounds were still busy getting untangled. He spotted only five of them
+and guessed that one had come to grief in the circus stunting they had
+been forced to do.
+
+Looking upward he saw, far above in the blue sky, smoke trailers and
+little, darting planes. O'Malley and Allison were still up there, he
+could tell by the pattern of the fight. Then he noticed that the five
+Jerries who had been battling him started up to join the fight. He had a
+powerful urge to turn back and help his pals, though going back would be
+a suicide move.
+
+Bending forward he felt the bulky package inside his shirt and his eyes
+hardened. His job was to go ahead. O'Malley and Allison were sacrificing
+themselves so that he could go on. If he went back, he would be throwing
+away the fruits of their courage and daring.
+
+Dimly and like a miniature motion picture, the battle above and behind
+him was reflected on his rear-vision mirror. There was a lump in Stan's
+throat as he noticed that two of the planes were coming down, twisting
+and turning, trailing plumes of smoke. Before the picture faded out he
+saw one parachute blossom, a tiny white flower against the green of the
+hills and the blue of the sky.
+
+A little later he spotted the coast and the sea. A line of hilly, high
+ground slipped under his wings and he headed out toward the beaches.
+Suddenly the peaceful sky around him exploded in his face. Coastal
+batteries had spotted him. He was low, but this time the gunners were
+looking for low-flying bombers and strafing planes. They laid their flak
+and their tracers on him in a deadly hail of screaming steel. The Nardi
+bucked and turned half over as a shell burst under her belly. Ragged,
+saw-edged pieces of shell casing ripped through the wings. An exploding
+shell ripped away the whole nose and the prop. Stan felt the Nardi
+wobble. Her terrific speed hurled her on and out over the water, away
+from the pattern of shells. But she was a dead duck and Stan knew it.
+His greenhouse was mashed down close above his head. He tried the hatch
+cover and found it jammed tight. Testing the controls, he found he could
+still handle the ship in a glide.
+
+Below him he could see two destroyers lying off the shore. They were
+blasting away at the batteries he had spotted for them. In closer, two
+PT boats darted back and forth, leaving trailing plumes of white foam
+behind them.
+
+The Nardi had been flying so low that Stan had no chance to maneuver. He
+figured she would sink like a rock when she hit the water. Heaving with
+all of his strength he tried to open the hatch. The cover refused to
+budge. Green waves were reaching up for him. He smashed at the glass
+overhead and was able to push out a pane. Savagely he battered away as
+the Nardi settled down.
+
+With a twist he laid the ship over, then flattened her, heading
+straight for one of the PT boats. Now he was smashing with both hands at
+the panes over his head. The glass cut his hands and arms, but he did
+not feel the pain. He had a hole and he needed desperately to enlarge
+it.
+
+The Nardi nosed gently into the trough of a big wave, then it hit the
+wave and crumpled up. Green water surged over the cockpit into Stan's
+face. He heaved himself upward and fought to get clear. His parachute
+was off and he was half out of the cockpit, but a great force was
+sucking him down, down into the cool depths of the sea.
+
+Stan felt the Nardi hit bottom. The thought flashed through his mind
+that they were in shallow water. At a moment like this, cold, unwavering
+control of mind and body was necessary. One moment of panic meant death.
+Stan gritted his teeth and heaved hard. His waist pulled free and
+suddenly he was floating upward. His lungs were bursting with fire and
+his hands smarted, but he stroked hard and a few seconds later he burst
+out of the water, blowing and flailing. The first thing he saw was the
+PT boat. It was circling the spot where the Nardi had disappeared. Its
+skipper waved to Stan and shouted.
+
+"Keep afloat! We'll toss you a line!"
+
+"Thanks!" Stan shouted back.
+
+The line came out as the boat moved closer. Stan grabbed it. Two sailors
+hauled him aboard. He was met by a grinning young lieutenant, junior
+grade.
+
+"I sure appreciate the lift," Stan said and grinned.
+
+The skipper stared at him. "A Yank!" he exclaimed. "Where did you get
+the Eity plane?"
+
+"It was loaned to me by Italian friends," Stan replied. "I have
+important papers which need to be dried," he added.
+
+"And some dry clothes," the skipper said. "Come below."
+
+They went below and the lieutenant introduced himself. "I'm Lieutenant
+Del Ewing."
+
+"I'm Lieutenant Stan Wilson, Army Air Corps," Stan said. "I have been a
+guest of the Italians for more weeks than are good for anyone."
+
+"They outfitted you when they gave up?"
+
+"They did. A lot of them are German haters and will help us all they
+can." Stan spoke soberly. He was thinking of Lorenzo lying on the floor
+with a smile on his lips, and of General Bolero, who probably had been
+shot by now. "A lot of them have real courage," he added.
+
+Del Ewing nodded. "I've seen some of it," he said.
+
+"Now about these papers." Stan took the package out of his dripping
+shirt. The gummed wrapper fell off, exposing an oiled cloth envelope.
+That was lucky. The maps and papers were dry.
+
+Del Ewing was digging into his sea chest, laying out dry clothing and an
+oilskin coat. He spoke over his shoulder:
+
+"I can't land you until tomorrow. This is a mission that can't be
+dropped. My radio is shot and I'm here to stay until that destroyer out
+beyond turns in. If I quit my sector, a sub or a torpedo boat might
+slide in and plant a tin fish in her side."
+
+"The papers are vitally important to both Army and Navy," Stan said.
+"But tomorrow will do."
+
+After fitting Stan out with dry clothing, the skipper went on deck and
+the PT boat got under way to resume her patrol work. Stan soon began to
+wonder if the little boat had not joined battle with a German craft. She
+was hitting a nerve-shattering, plank-busting speed that tossed Stan all
+over the little room. He turned to the navigator and discovered that the
+kid was having trouble keeping from being sick all over his charts. He
+gave Stan a green-lipped smile.
+
+"The skipper is pushing her a bit fast, isn't he?" Stan asked as he
+lurched into a seat beside the navigator.
+
+"Just planing speed, sir," the boy answered.
+
+"Seems to me like a cross between a submarine and an airplane," Stan
+said. He was beginning to feel a bit sick himself.
+
+Deciding he needed fresh air, he made his way up on the deck. Clinging
+to the rail, he set his teeth while spray lashed his face and tubs of
+water hurtled at him. Stan was reminded of riding a pitching bucker
+while somebody dumped buckets of water into his face. The whole ship was
+vibrating from the powerful thrusts of the Packard engines in the stern.
+The deck bristled with light cannon, torpedo tubes, and machine guns.
+Up there in that wild smother of foam and noise there was no chance to
+talk, but Stan watched a while.
+
+The PT boat ducked and wove in and out between the destroyers and the
+shore. Shells burst around her, churning up the sea, but the gunners
+were unable to guess where the flighty PT would be at any given moment,
+so they never hit very close to her. Stan hoped they would spot a sub or
+an enemy patrol boat, but nothing showed up except other PT boats.
+
+Stan started to go below. He did not even want to think about food, but
+he did feel like resting. The skipper came forward and offered to show
+him a bunk, but before they went down he said:
+
+"You must undo your oilskin up topside; I mean, up here on the deck."
+
+"But I'll get soaked," Stan protested.
+
+"No matter, if you remain vertical for any length of time below decks
+you're done for." He grinned at Stan.
+
+Stan went below and made it into his bunk after the third try. He lay
+there with the bunk falling away from him, then slapping him hard in the
+face as it came back at him. He closed his eyes and utter exhaustion
+finally put him to sleep. His dreams were filled with writhing sea
+monsters, every one of them rushing through the water at express-train
+speed.
+
+In the morning the skipper informed him that they were heading for
+Malta, which was now the headquarters of the Allied invasion forces.
+
+"We got the radio going and asked permission. When we mentioned papers
+from General Bolero, they called us right in." Del Ewing grinned
+broadly. "We're in luck getting away from this game of tag."
+
+Stan was standing beside him on the deck and the boat was knifing along
+half out of the water. Suddenly Ewing bellowed:
+
+"Hard a port!"
+
+The helmsman spun the wheel and Stan clung to the railing with the
+breath knocked out of him. He saw a black object swish past.
+
+"Wandering mine!" Del Ewing bellowed. "Probably one of our own!"
+
+Stan drew a deep breath and grinned at the skipper. "I'll take mine in a
+plane!" he shouted.
+
+"I would, too, only I can't pass the physical examination for aviator.
+They tell me I wouldn't be able to stand the strain!" Ewing laughed
+heartily.
+
+Stan wiped salt water out of his eyes and shook his head. He had seen
+many rough-riding vehicles of war, such as tanks and jeeps, but the PT
+boat had them all bested. Any craft that was such a rough-riding brute
+that half of its seasoned crew got sick was no place for him, he assured
+himself.
+
+Toward eleven o 'clock Malta came into view, and they put into port
+through a mass of ships and flatboats and barges. A sprinkling of
+warcraft, including one British warship, filled the channel they were
+following. But that did not bother the skipper. He sent his boat in at
+planing speed which necessitated a lot of ducking and dodging.
+
+Pulling alongside a dock, the PT boat was made fast. Stan climbed over
+the side and set his feet firmly on the ground. He was glad to be off
+the deck of the speedy craft. The skipper grinned at him.
+
+"I'll get you a ride to headquarters. Your legs don't seem to be up to
+walking that far."
+
+"Thanks," Stan said. "I'd be picked up by the M.P.'s for being drunk if
+I tried to walk."
+
+The skipper secured a jeep for Stan from a Navy supply outfit. They
+shook hands and the jeep roared away at top speed. Stan leaned back and
+took the jolts. They seemed like caresses after the skipper's PT boat.
+
+News of the package he was carrying had come in ahead of Stan. A
+lieutenant was waiting for him.
+
+"This way, sir," he said and hurried away with Stan almost running to
+keep up.
+
+They entered a room where a dozen officers sat around a big table.
+Stan's guide halted and saluted.
+
+"Lieutenant Wilson, sir."
+
+A grizzled general looked up from a map. Stan stepped forward and handed
+over the package. The general took it and ripped it open at once. Stan
+stood waiting to be dismissed. He started to back away. The general
+lifted a hand.
+
+"Don't leave, Wilson. These papers are vitally important." He stopped
+talking and spread out the contents of the package. The other officers
+were leaning forward. "These are most important, most valuable," the
+general said. He shoved the papers over to a colonel.
+
+"Look them over and let me know what you think of them." He turned to
+Stan and smiled.
+
+Stan waited for whatever might be coming. The general fingered his
+close-cropped mustache and continued to smile. Suddenly he leaned
+forward and spoke.
+
+"Since receiving a message from the Navy regarding your rescue I have
+had your service record handed to me. I find it quite interesting. What
+happened to Lieutenant O'Malley and Lieutenant Allison?"
+
+Stan did not smile. "The last time I saw them they were fighting a
+ten-to-one battle with a flight of Messerschmitts, a delaying action, so
+that I could get through with these papers. We were flying Nardi
+fighters furnished us by the Italians."
+
+The general's smile faded. "You think they are lost?"
+
+"I'm going to check with operations," Stan said. "Both O'Malley and
+Allison have come back from some tough fights."
+
+The general reached for a telephone. "I'll have a check made," he said.
+
+"Has Colonel Benson been asking about us?" Stan asked and there was a
+twinkle in his eye.
+
+"I believe it will be best to transfer you to another command. We do not
+wish to approve your conduct as ferry pilots, but you certainly have
+rendered a great service." The general gave his attention to the phone.
+After fifteen long minutes of waiting and talking he cradled the
+instrument and shook his head. "No Nardi fighters have been reported
+flown in by escaped American pilots. A number have come in piloted by
+Italian officers."
+
+"Thank you, sir," Stan said. "I would like to have immediate service in
+a fighter squadron."
+
+"That will be arranged from my office. Now get into some proper clothing
+and report to Mess Nine. Hold yourself ready there to report to this
+office. We have a lot of questions to ask and we'll be ready to start
+asking them as soon as you are clothed and fed."
+
+Stan snapped a salute and about-faced. He marched out of the office, got
+the location of Mess Nine from an orderly, and headed in that
+direction.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+LONE EAGLE
+
+
+A week passed with Stan lounging around Mess Nine waiting to be assigned
+to a fighter squadron. During that time he divided his hours between the
+officers at Intelligence and the board of strategy. He rubbed elbows
+with generals, British and American and French. During those interviews
+he got an idea of the great campaign which was being planned. It helped
+to soften the ache inside him, because he had heard nothing from
+O'Malley or Allison. It also helped to keep him from getting restless.
+He knew that a great reserve of air power was being assembled to throw
+an umbrella of planes over the coming thrust, which was aimed at the
+heart of Germany, through or across Italy.
+
+The second week was well under way and everyone, except the generals,
+was beginning to complain and to cast a critical eye at the headquarters
+of General Dwight D. Eisenhower and General Harold R. L. G. Alexander.
+Stan knew enough of the plans from his meetings with the officers to
+know that the blow was coming, and that it would be a swift, savage
+thrust.
+
+One morning he received a call. It was delivered by an orderly. Stan
+opened the folded sheet and read an order from headquarters. "Report to
+Colonel Benson at once for assignment." Stan stared at the order. Benson
+had located him and demanded his return. The friendly general who had
+promised to transfer Stan was now in North Africa. Folding the report,
+Stan began packing the few things he owned. Colonel Benson's command had
+been moved up to a field close to Messina. That was some comfort. It
+meant action as soon as the main invasion broke.
+
+But Stan was uneasy. There were many nasty jobs around a fighter
+squadron to which he could be assigned as punishment for his part in the
+ferry mess. When Stan was given a low-powered observation plane to fly
+to Messina, his worst fears seemed about to be realized.
+
+The plane was a Ryan ST-3, a plane used for basic training back home and
+for odd jobs of scouting, ferrying first-aid supplies, and other
+non-combat jobs. It was sleek and fast, as light planes go, but it was
+far from a fighter.
+
+Stan sent the Ryan up and headed her north by a point or two east. The
+Ryan showed surprising speed for the size of her engine. Stan grinned as
+he gunned her. He got to thinking that after the war he would like to
+own a ship like it.
+
+Swinging in around Mount Etna's cone, he set down on the Italian field
+where Colonel Benson's boys were holding forth. A field officer took his
+papers and waved him toward a row of drab buildings.
+
+"The commander wants to see you at once." He spoke gruffly and showed no
+interest at all in Stan.
+
+Stan unloaded his gear in the briefing room and walked across to the
+colonel's headquarters. The door was open and he looked into a room
+barely large enough for a table and three chairs. Colonel Benson was
+seated at the table. He looked up and when he saw Stan he frowned.
+
+"Come in, Lieutenant Wilson," he called.
+
+Stan stepped inside, saluted, and stood waiting.
+
+"Sit down." The colonel motioned to a chair.
+
+Stan seated himself and waited. The colonel regarded him for a moment,
+then started to speak.
+
+"In all of the years I have been in service I have never read a report
+like the one handed to me. That report covers your activities as ferry
+pilot in my command." The colonel shifted some papers on his desk,
+selected one and began reading it silently.
+
+"Yes, sir," Stan said, feeling some reply was called for.
+
+"It is a continuous recital of violations of orders resulting in a great
+deal of trouble. In my opinion it deserves drastic action." His cold
+eyes stabbed into Stan.
+
+"Yes, sir," Stan answered. He did not intend to argue, not at that
+moment.
+
+"Take this report." A smile formed at the corners of the colonel's
+mouth. "The Navy gives us the numbers from three planes that saved a
+warship from being sunk off Sicily. In checking the numbers we discover
+the planes are ferry planes bound for Malta." He picked up another
+report. "Here is a memorandum from General Eisenhower citing Lieutenant
+Wilson for the delivery of vital documents from inside Italy." The
+smile faded. "And there is a line mentioning Lieutenant's O'Malley and
+Allison for covering your escape." The colonel dropped the paper and
+leaned back.
+
+"Yes, sir," was all Stan could say, but a warm glow was beginning to
+stir inside him.
+
+"And that last line is the reason for my calling for your services,
+Lieutenant. I have received a message brought in by an Italian pilot who
+managed to fly his plane over here." He shoved a piece of soiled paper
+across to Stan. "It is addressed to you."
+
+Stan caught the paper eagerly and read the scrawled lines upon it.
+
+"Shot down. Prisoners. Held in shed back of Bolero barns. Tony with us.
+One of the Bolero servants will try to smuggle this out." The note was
+signed by Allison.
+
+"They're alive!" Stan almost shouted.
+
+"They are," the colonel said dryly.
+
+"They'll be treated like spies and not prisoners of war. The Germans
+pulled that on us before," Stan said anxiously.
+
+"You three seem marked down as irregulars," the colonel said. "I now
+find myself in the position of becoming a party to your wild schemes."
+He laughed outright. "I have not reported this to headquarters. I am
+afraid O'Malley and Allison should and would be marked down as
+expendables and left to be shot by the Germans." He straightened and
+shoved the papers aside. "With a fast, light bomber, would you have a
+chance to land over there?"
+
+"I certainly would," Stan said eagerly. "The Bolero boys have a secret
+landing strip where they hid their planes when they didn't want
+Mussolini's agents to trail them. That landing strip is just above the
+place where the Germans are holding Allison and O'Malley."
+
+"In that case I'll assign you a fast bomber and an objective. You will
+drop your bomb load at another spot and make a try." His eyes were
+twinkling. "And if you should bring back Mussolini, I think you might
+get a medal."
+
+They both laughed. Stan looked at his watch. "Dusk would be the time to
+hit there. I can make it tonight."
+
+"As you like," the colonel said. "Report to me at once when you get
+back. What information you gather should clear over my desk." He
+grinned. "I am a bit of a politician, you see."
+
+Stan saluted and made off while the colonel got busy on the telephone
+getting a ship assigned to him.
+
+When Stan reported to the briefing room he found the colonel there. The
+briefing officer and his second in command gave him his locations and
+his bombing data, the weather and the wind drift. Everything was very
+much routine and like a hundred other sorties being made hourly over
+selected targets by from one to fifty planes. The colonel walked out to
+the runway with Stan.
+
+They shook hands like old pals. Stan smiled. The colonel was deadly
+serious.
+
+"Landing almost on a German flying field isn't going to be a soft
+touch," he said grimly. "Not even with your luck."
+
+Stan turned to his ship and his smile broadened. Colonel Benson had gone
+to considerable trouble in selecting a bomber. The ship that stood with
+idling props was a De Havilland Mosquito. She was humpbacked like a
+codfish. Her forward gun opening and her nose greenhouse made her look
+like a fish. They furnished eyes and mouth. She was a plywood job,
+light, but the fastest bomber in the world.
+
+He waved a hand to the colonel and climbed up. None of the ground men
+seemed interested in his lack of crew or light bomb load. In the swelter
+and rush of round-the-clock operations the boys followed orders and
+rushed each job out, knowing that another ship had to be on the line as
+soon as one craft cleared a spot.
+
+Stan leaned back against the shock pad and checked his dials. He cracked
+the throttle a bit more and his powerful radials roared with surging
+power. The Mosquito shuddered and trembled against her chocks.
+
+"Ready, Flight Fifty-four?"
+
+"Ready," Stan called back.
+
+"Lane Three, Flight Fifty-four." The voice from the control tower
+snapped off.
+
+Stan eased up and signaled the men below. The chocks were jerked loose
+and Stan gunned the ship. She leaped forward with a snap that would have
+done credit to any fighter craft. Darting down the runway she hoiked her
+tail and was off before she had covered a fourth of the alloted space.
+Upward she roared like a streak. The boys on the ground grinned. The
+Mosquito got off so fast she was out of sight before any spotter could
+pick her up.
+
+Easing around in a wide circle, Stan put her nose into the wind and let
+her have her head. He settled himself to the job ahead, his pulses
+beating in tune with the roar of the slip stream of air piling up and
+rolling off the leading edges of his wings. A good ship, the De
+Havilland. She was the craft used to make regular flights between
+England and Malta. Too fast for interception, the Mosquitoes streaked
+right across Hitler's Germany or across France, running supplies daily
+through enemy-guarded skies.
+
+The coast of Italy showed clearly ahead. Slipping in over Reggio Stan
+picked a rail line and checked with his eye. No need for a bombardier
+here. He lined up on the track and then spotted a short string of cars.
+The train was standing still and smoke lifted from its locomotive. Stan
+suspected some other Yank had spotted it and laid a stick of bombs on
+the track, blocking it.
+
+Stan knew he should cut loose his bombs and be on his way. But the feel
+of the Mosquito made him eager to try her out. This was an ideal target
+for the fast-flying bomber. If he went down he would be sure to stir up
+German fighter planes. The temptation was great. Stan nosed over and
+sent the Mosquito roaring down the chute. He lined up on the freight
+train as he went.
+
+The landscape wavered up at him. The train seemed to be twisting and
+turning like a snake trying to wiggle away, though he knew it was not
+moving. The wind ahead of his diving wings piled up and banked like
+invisible snow, making the plane shudder and shake. Stan grinned. Only
+the Lockheed Lightning could fly a dive fast enough to bank up air like
+snow; that was what he had always thought, but the diving Mosquito was
+doing it. Stan began to wonder if a ship made of plywood could take the
+strain of a pull-out after such a dive.
+
+He released his stick of bombs and the Mosquito bounced like a golf ball
+before the cutting edge of a driver. Up she went and Stan set himself
+against the "high G's" he had to expect. First, as he started up, there
+was a blurring of vision, then a graying, and then a momentary blackout.
+Instantly the graying appeared before his eyes again, then the blurring,
+and a moment later clear vision. Stan whistled softly.
+
+"Some ship!" he muttered. "She makes anything I ever flew except the
+old Lightnings look slow."
+
+Three Messerschmitts knifed down from a cloud, but the Mosquito was on
+her way under full throttle and leaving the toe of the Italian boot at a
+space-devouring pace. The Me pilots saw what they had picked up and slid
+off in disgust.
+
+The Mosquito went up so fast that Stan could not see the results of his
+attack upon the train. Heading east he caught sight of the bay of
+Taranto, then turned north. Flying on the east rim of a mountain ridge
+he bored along.
+
+Checking the miles off as best he could, Stan turned west when he
+thought he was opposite Naples. He zoomed up higher and higher until he
+spotted the city on the coast, then he eased around and ducked back and
+up into a layer of clouds. Darkness had not settled, but he figured he
+could slide in back of the ridge above the Bolero villa and spot the
+hidden landing strip.
+
+Easing down he clipped along the tops of the trees. Three Focke-Wulf 190
+fighters spotted him and he made off, leaving them to wander above the
+hill country. Returning, he zoomed along the ridge. Back and forth he
+slid but failed to locate the strip. Again he was spotted and had to run
+for it. The next time he came back he flew along the top of the ridge,
+which caused no less than a dozen Jerry fighters to take after him. But
+he spotted the hidden strip before he made off.
+
+Dusk was beginning to settle when he came back. This time he had to land
+regardless of the fighter planes. He came in straight for the strip,
+flying so low he was below the trees in many spots. He was surprised to
+find that there was a natural avenue which allowed him to slide in under
+fair cover. The Bolero boys had selected their secret field well. One Me
+darted over to have a look, but did not dive down. Stan set himself and
+cut his engines. He was coming in now, either for a landing or a crash.
+Topping a row of small trees he let the Mosquito settle toward the
+grassy lane below.
+
+The wheels of the ship tipped the grass, then settled down solidly. Stan
+applied his brakes and eased into a smooth and even landing. As he
+rolled in, he spotted the big trees with overhanging branches where the
+Nardi fighters had been parked. Gunning the Mosquito a bit he slid
+under cover just as three Me's roared past looking for him. They went on
+to the east, but came back to crisscross the ridge. Stan smiled. The
+German pilots seemed puzzled over the way a bomber had vanished into
+thin air.
+
+Swinging the Mosquito around under her own power he set her in position
+for a quick take-off, then began getting out his pack of rations and the
+light machine gun he had brought with him. He was eager to work his way
+down the bridle path before darkness settled completely.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+RESCUE
+
+
+Stan kept under cover until he located the bridle path leading over the
+ridge. The Me's were still combing the ridge above, but the woods and
+the meadows were full of long shadows which made spotting a camouflaged
+object impossible.
+
+Moving down the path Stan kept a sharp watch for guards. The pathway was
+really a tunnel under the trees. Overlapping branches formed a natural
+roof. This cover made the path almost pitch-dark. But Stan moved
+swiftly. He wanted enough light to spot the prison where the boys were
+being held.
+
+Reaching the opening in the hedge he discovered that someone had moved
+the branches of the hedge row so that they entwined over the opening
+hiding it. Standing behind the hedge he listened. Judging by the sounds,
+there was plenty of activity in the camp, and Stan could see lights
+shining through the wall of leaves. A motorcycle roared and a truck
+motor joined it. Men's voices could be heard clearly.
+
+Moving along the hedge Stan peered over it. He could see into the wide
+yard of the villa and also into the yards around the barns. Every
+building was lighted up and the place swarmed with Germans. Stan had
+never seen so many German officers in a single spot before. Groups of
+them sat around outdoor tables in the back yard of the villa. They were
+eating and drinking wine from the Bolero cellars. There was a lot of
+shouting and laughter.
+
+Stan turned to the barns. He moved along them until he could see the
+back yard of the big barn. Here there were a number of smaller sheds and
+barns as well as the kennels. All of them were lighted and so were the
+yards around them. Guards marched back and forth in front of the kennels
+and before three of the sheds. Stan was certain he had located the
+prisons, but there was no way of telling which one contained his pals.
+One thing was certain, the Germans felt safe here at Bolero Villa. They
+probably figured Allied bombers would think the place was Italian and
+leave it alone. The many trees hid the trucks, cars, and German
+soldiers from view. Stan grinned. When he got back, the bomber boys
+would know where to drop a stick of bombs.
+
+This condition made it easy for Stan to observe because the guards
+figured their only job was to keep the prisoners from escaping. They
+were not worried about an attack. Moving around behind the kennels Stan
+found darkness. He managed to wiggle up to the back wall. There were no
+windows in the back of the shed. He checked the other guarded sheds and
+found no windows in the rear of them. Moving back to the hedge he
+crouched there watching the three buildings.
+
+The only way to get into any of those buildings was through the doors or
+one of the front windows. The windows were open and not barred, but at
+least a dozen guards patrolled the grounds. They were scattered out,
+making a blitz machine-gun attack difficult. By the time Stan had
+blasted the guards out of the way he would have several hundred officers
+and men attacking from the grounds below.
+
+A soldier approached one of the guards, spoke to him, then entered one
+of the buildings, a shed between the kennels and the third barn. A
+light flashed on and Stan could see men inside the building. They were
+packed in, standing close together, those he could see through the
+window. All of them were Italian soldiers.
+
+After a bit the soldier came out with an Italian officer walking ahead
+of him. They went directly to the grounds below. Stan eased along the
+hedge until he was opposite the kennels. Here he halted and parted the
+branches of the hedge. He listened intently. The prisoners in the
+kennels were talking but their voices were very low. One of them laughed
+and the guard at the door shouted an order in German. With the butt of
+his rifle he hammered against the sill. There was silence inside and
+then a voice called out:
+
+"Get away from that door, ye dirty spalpeen! Yer disturbin' the pleasure
+o' gentlemen!"
+
+Stan almost shouted. That was the voice of O'Malley. The guard beat
+harder upon the sill of the door and shouted louder. Stan heard Allison
+warning O'Malley to keep his mouth shut. Silence settled inside the
+building.
+
+Pulling out his sheath knife Stan began cutting a hole in the hedge. The
+hedge had been carefully tended by the Bolero gardener. The limbs of
+the shrubs had been entwined and laced together, making the hedge almost
+a solid wall. Stan cut away a large hole, leaving only a few branches
+over the inside to hide his work. Getting down he crawled into the
+opening.
+
+The guard was standing facing the spot where Stan was crouching. A
+floodlight in the yard made the whole place as light as day. Stan
+watched the other guards as they moved about. Under a tree at the
+entrance to the yard a heavy machine gun had been planted. A crew of
+three men manned the gun. It was set to cover the three jails and the
+whole yard.
+
+The situation looked hopeless. With so much light an attack could not be
+engineered. Suddenly Stan's lips pulled into a straight line. He had a
+bright thought. The yards and grounds had never been lighted up so
+completely by the Bolero family. That meant the Germans had strung a lot
+of wire. If he could locate the main line and cut it, he could plunge
+the place in darkness long enough to break into the shed where his pals
+were being held.
+
+After studying the yard and the lighting, Stan decided the wires came in
+from the big barn. Working his way around the sheds he came to a spot
+where a wide and well-lighted roadway separated them from the big barn.
+Four Germans guarded the road and they were well spaced. Again he was
+blocked.
+
+Then he noticed that a set of heavy wires came down from somewhere in
+the darkness to the corner of the big barn. They swung in from high
+above his head. Stan grinned. The electricity for the whole villa came
+in from behind the barns. It was like General Bolero to have unsightly
+power poles at the back of his estate. Stan turned and headed into the
+woods. He was looking for a power line pole.
+
+The job of locating a pole among a forest of trees was not easy, but
+Stan had the general location from the run of the lines. After a few
+minutes of hunting he located the pole and got set to climb it. He
+stacked his things at the base of the pole. He would have to slide down
+in a hurry and dash to the attack. He hoped there would be plenty of
+confusion. He also hoped the lead-in wires were insulated. The line was
+at least 220-volt, because there were three wires leading to the barn.
+
+Climbing up the pole Stan came to a transformer. Gingerly he tested one
+of the wires with the hard rubber handle of his knife. Nothing happened,
+so he started sawing away. He was not shorted by any part of the
+transformer or any wire he might be touching in the darkness. The wire
+was thick and heavy but it was copper and his sharp knife bit into it.
+With a tug Stan severed the heavy wire and felt it go twisting away into
+the darkness, which had suddenly become very black because all of the
+lights in and around the villa had snapped off.
+
+Stan almost fell down the pole. He heard shouting and bellowing from the
+yard. Shots were fired and flashlights began to stab back and forth.
+Stan grabbed his machine gun and leaped into the road leading to the
+small barns. Suddenly the machine gun under the tree opened up. The
+Germans knew a prison delivery attempt was on. Stan halted and pulled a
+grenade from the sack slung over his shoulder. Jerking the pin, he
+tossed it just as he had often tossed a forward pass in a football game.
+
+A sharp roar and a flash of fire told him the grenade had gone off, and
+the sudden ceasing of the staccato voice of the machine gun told him he
+had scored a hit. He did not have time to look as he charged toward the
+kennels. He ran into a German and knocked the soldier down with the
+barrel of his machine gun. Reaching the door he came to grips with three
+Germans. They had an electric lantern and they spotted him closing in,
+but not quick enough. Stan's tommy-gun blasted them off the wide stone
+flagging before the door.
+
+"Hi, Allison! O'Malley!" Stan hit the door with his shoulder in a
+leaping dive. He went crashing into the room with the door draped around
+him.
+
+"Stan!" O'Malley roared from the darkness.
+
+"Here! Get close to me and follow me!" Stan shouted as he staggered to
+his feet.
+
+Outside, the flaming and the sound of Stan's tommy-gun had given away
+his location. Rifles and pistols began blasting away. Bullets splintered
+the front of the building.
+
+"Get down low!" Allison called.
+
+A dozen men had rushed out of the kennels, carrying Stan with them. He
+heard a man groan and go down as a bullet hit him.
+
+"Here!" he bellowed.
+
+O'Malley and Allison located him. They knew just about where he was
+headed. Wiggling along on their hands and knees, the three fliers moved
+to the hole in the hedge.
+
+They slid through and, paused. "Where's Tony and Arno?" Stan asked.
+
+"In the shed next to ours," Allison answered. "They were captured the
+day we were shot down."
+
+"Sure, an' if you'll wait I'll go beat down the door," O'Malley
+whispered.
+
+"We'll all go," Stan answered. "We'll batter open both prisons."
+
+The three, keeping close together, circled and charged into the mass of
+milling Germans. They were not spotted because there was little light.
+Flashlight beams stabbed here and there, but none of the fingers of
+light found the three Yanks. They actually shouldered their way to
+within a few yards of the first door.
+
+"I'll take this one, you and O'Malley take the other. I'll clear the way
+with the tommy-gun," Stan hissed.
+
+He opened up with a burst of fire which scattered the Germans, then
+charged the door. O'Malley and Allison smashed the other door. Stan
+heard the shouts of the prisoners as they piled out. He backed away as
+men lunged out of the building he had opened. Stan thanked his luck
+that the doors had been built out of light plywood. He leaped aside and
+turned his submachine gun on the Germans. He swung his arc of fire
+across the yard and sent the Nazis charging for cover.
+
+Ceasing his fire he ducked for the hole in the hedge. Allison was
+already there, but O'Malley had not showed up.
+
+"Hope he hasn't gotten any crazy ideas," Stan growled.
+
+"He probably has," Allison said. "How'd you douse the lights?"
+
+"I cut the main line, but they'll locate the break and fix it in a
+hurry."
+
+Suddenly they heard O'Malley coming. He ducked through the hedge. Behind
+him came two other men. O'Malley had stayed to locate Tony and Arno.
+
+"How did you find us?" Tony asked excitedly.
+
+"Allison got someone to smuggle out a note. I have a bomber up on your
+secret field to take us off, if we can get up there," Stan answered.
+"It's so dark, I don't know whether we can locate the path."
+
+Arno laughed softly. "We will lead you and we will show you how to take
+off in the dark."
+
+"I'm glad you're along," Stan said.
+
+Arno led the way up the trail. He moved along at a fast pace. He knew
+every twist and turn in the trail. The Yanks were hard put to keep up
+with him. Tony brought up the rear, which helped to keep the party
+together.
+
+They reached the little meadow that served as a runway. Arno led them
+straight to the hidden parking ground. Here they halted under the wing
+of the Mosquito.
+
+"What you flying?" O'Malley asked.
+
+"A Mosquito bomber," Stan answered.
+
+"One o' them wood crates?" O'Malley asked. He did not try to hide his
+disgust.
+
+Stan laughed. "And I'm flying her, see? I wouldn't ride in as fast and
+tricky a ship as this Mosquito with you at the controls."
+
+"I'll bet me auld grandmother could fly as fast," O'Malley said.
+
+"The lights are on below," Arno broke in. "I hear German soldiers coming
+up the slope through the woods."
+
+"They have a big force down there," Allison said. "I'll bet they comb
+this mountainside."
+
+"We'll never be able to take off as black as it is," Stan said. "We'll
+have to wait for the first light so we can see something."
+
+"By that time the Germans will have found the ship. See the lights
+flashing in the woods below?" Tony spoke sharply.
+
+Arno laughed. "Now I will show you how we took off on black nights. Will
+your bomber lift in a hurry?"
+
+"Faster than a Nardi fighter," Stan said.
+
+"Wait. I will show you," Arno said and disappeared into the blackness.
+
+"We have done it many times," Tony said, laughing.
+
+Arno was gone only a few minutes. When he returned he explained:
+
+"First we roll the ship out from under the trees by hand if we can."
+
+"That will be easy. There is a downgrade and the Mosquito is light
+weight," Stan said.
+
+"Then we get the engines warm enough to take off." Arno paused.
+
+"That will take a little time. We may have to stand off the Germans,"
+Stan said.
+
+"When the engines are hot I will place two blue flares with a red one in
+the middle for a target. It is so easy. You head for the red flare and
+take off before you get to it."
+
+"Good work. You have the flares?" Allison asked.
+
+"We keep a supply here," Arno said. "I will place them. When you shout
+to me that the engines are ready, I will light them. Then I come running
+and we take off."
+
+"'Tis very simple," O'Malley said eagerly. "Sure, an' we better get her
+rolled out."
+
+The boys got hold of the Mosquito and rolled her out. Arno made off to
+set his flares. Before the boys piled in, Stan handed his tommy-gun to
+Allison. "You're an artist with this sort of banjo. You stay on the
+ground. If any German squads show up, you chase them back into the
+woods."
+
+"Good idea, old boy," Allison said as he took the gun.
+
+Stan went up and wound up the radial motors. They coughed and sputtered
+but finally took hold, first with a rumbling gallop that was uneven,
+then with a smoother roar. The sound of those powerful radials shook the
+night air. Stan knew their full-throated exhausts could be heard by the
+Germans.
+
+Flashes of light winked in the woods below, Stan judged that the German
+squads were not over two hundred yards down the slope. Some might be
+even farther up the hill. He tested the engines with a jerk of the
+throttle. They bogged down and sputtered, too cold to take off.
+
+Suddenly rifle fire broke out across the open meadow. The Germans were
+firing at the flaring exhaust flames from the Mosquito's engines.
+Bullets whistled past the ship. Allison opened up and the firing from
+the woods ceased. Suddenly a machine gun began to blast. Its bullets
+ripped into the ship and around it. Stan gunned the engines and they
+caught, bursting into a perfect and unbroken stream of power.
+
+On the ground Allison could tell by the sound of the engines that the
+ship was ready. He began shouting to Arno. Stan throttled down to allow
+Allison's shouts to carry.
+
+Suddenly a flare blossomed. A few minutes later another flamed. Stan
+waited impatiently for what seemed a long time. He could tell by the
+stabs of flame from the rifles across the meadow that the Germans were
+charging down upon Arno. Then the red flare burst into flame. Stan fixed
+the spot in his mind, just in case a German got to the flare and put it
+out. Allison was blistering the Germans rushing down upon Arno, but the
+distance was too great for a tommy-gun.
+
+Stan kicked the motors on, setting his brakes hard. The attackers were
+now fanned out and charging across the meadow. Allison could not halt
+them because they had spread out thinly over a wide front.
+
+"Should we leave Arno?" Tony asked. "He would want more than anything
+else that you men got away."
+
+"We're not leavin' him!" O'Malley shouted. "I'll get down an' go help
+him. He may have been hit by a bullet."
+
+"No, we won't leave him," Stan agreed grimly.
+
+Suddenly Allison climbed up. "They'll be on us in a minute!" he shouted.
+
+"Here comes the boy!" O'Malley bellowed.
+
+Arno's head appeared in the circle of light from the instrument panel.
+Allison gave him a hand, dragging him into the cockpit.
+
+Before the trap could be closed Stan gave the Mosquito her head. She
+shot away like an arrow released from a bow as her brakes eased free.
+Straight at the stabbing tongues of rifle fire she roared. The firing
+ceased as the Germans leaped frantically out of the path of the charging
+bomber.
+
+Stan held her straight for the red flare. Long before they reached it he
+hoiked her tail and bounced her off. She went up like a kite caught by a
+gale. O'Malley, sitting beside Stan, looked over and grinned.
+
+"That was sweet!" he shouted.
+
+"You haven't seen anything yet!" Stan shouted back. He leaned toward
+O'Malley, "Have Allison get the radio set working."
+
+A few minutes later Allison had established long-range communications
+with the base at Messina and was reporting in. O'Malley went back to put
+in an order for three huckleberry pies and a steak. Arno took his place.
+Stan was letting the Mosquito cruise along. He leaned toward Arno.
+
+"What about the general?"
+
+"The Germans have him. He is a prisoner at Naples," Arno said in a
+worried voice.
+
+"We'll take care of that. We're taking Naples very soon," Stan assured
+him.
+
+"I'm afraid that may not help much. The Germans are in a fury over the
+action we have taken. They will take revenge not only upon Father, but
+upon the people of Naples and of every city they have occupied." Arno
+looked straight ahead into the night.
+
+"We'll figure out something," Stan said grimly.
+
+O'Malley came forward and sat back of Stan. Stan called over his
+shoulder.
+
+"I am to deliver you fellows to Colonel Benson."
+
+"Colonel Benson!" O'Malley yelped. "Sure an' that means we'll spend the
+rest o' the war in the guardhouse!"
+
+"That's the safest place for you," Stan retorted.
+
+Allison called forward over the intercommunication phone that the
+colonel sent his regards and that he had personally ordered O'Malley's
+pies and steak for him. O'Malley listened in. He began to grin.
+
+"Sure, an' mebby the old brass hat has some feelin's after all."
+
+"Don't build up any false hopes," Stan warned.
+
+"Did he send you after us?" O'Malley demanded.
+
+"He did," Stan said.
+
+O'Malley leaned back and licked his lips. He closed his eyes so as to be
+better able to get a mental picture of the pies awaiting him.
+
+Stan eased down a bit and called to Allison for a check on their
+location and course. Everything looked fine and fair, but Stan knew that
+it was at such times that trouble usually popped.
+
+Messina was easily located as they came in at low altitude because the
+Yank and British batteries on the island were shelling the German-held
+port of Reggio across the two-mile strait. Flares were blossoming along
+the mainland, dropped by Yank fliers. Allison got in touch with their
+field and they came in. The air traffic was heavy and the field was a
+beehive of activity. No special attention was given the De Havilland
+except by the crew assigned to take her over. They came racing out to
+make her fast.
+
+The master mechanic grinned at Stan as he jumped down. "Good work, sir,"
+he said eagerly. The Mosquito was his pet and he had worried about her
+all the time she was away. After finding out where she was going he had
+been sure she would never get back.
+
+Stan smiled at him. "She's home without a scratch, and she's a great
+ship, sergeant," he said.
+
+The sergeant beamed happily. "She sure is, sir," he agreed proudly. Then
+he added, just having remembered the important message he was to deliver
+to the bomber's skipper, "Colonel Benson wishes to see your entire crew
+as soon as you land." He snapped a salute and turned to his crew.
+
+"Sure, an' I'm starved. I'm hopin' he won't give us a two-hour lecture
+on how to invade Italy," O'Malley grumbled.
+
+They hurried to the colonel's headquarters, where they found their
+commanding officer waiting for them. He beamed upon the dirty, unshaven
+group headed by Stan.
+
+"I'll only keep you a few minutes, gentlemen," he said. "Be seated."
+
+Stan saluted smartly and spoke his piece. "I'd like you to meet General
+Bolero's sons, Tony and Arno. They made it possible for us to deliver
+the papers from the general and later to escape."
+
+"What you have done is appreciated. I hope I may be able to be of
+service to you," the colonel said.
+
+"We wish to fight the Germans. We are both pilots," Arno said.
+
+"I believe that can be arranged," Colonel Benson said.
+
+He looked at Allison and O'Malley and a broad smile formed on his lips.
+
+"I have heard of the luck of the Irish. Now I am willing to add the
+British to that list. What I wanted to say is that you are requested not
+to talk about your experiences at all until you have reported to
+headquarters in Malta. After that you will be returned to my command. No
+one is going to talk me out of three fliers like you men." He looked at
+Tony and Arno. "Possibly I might be able to make it five."
+
+O'Malley seemed to feel this was a soft spot where he could safely make
+a request. He grinned at the colonel.
+
+"We have a job to do, sor, one that won't wait very long."
+
+The colonel's smile faded and he eyed O'Malley sternly. "I'm listening,"
+he said warily.
+
+"General Bolero has to be rescued from them Germans. They may decide to
+shoot him."
+
+The colonel looked suddenly very unhappy, "That is really a job I am not
+supposed to handle. After all, I am only a sector commander and not in
+charge of the war in the Mediterranean area."
+
+"It could be done aisy," O'Malley said. "I'd like to have the job."
+
+The colonel regarded O'Malley grimly. "I don't doubt but you would do
+it. However, there is some little risk. While you men are reporting to
+headquarters, Lieutenant Wilson and I will be giving the matter our
+consideration." He got to his feet. "Wilson, you see that our friends
+are outfitted. Get cleaned up and have a big feed." He nodded toward
+O'Malley. "I have set aside a supply of pie for you, Lieutenant."
+
+The party saluted and made off. O'Malley was not too happy. "If you
+sneak off alone to get the general, I'll thrash the daylights out o'
+you when I get back from seein' the brass hats," he growled.
+
+"I won't take on the whole German army alone," Stan assured him. "I'll
+see that you're in on it."
+
+"You better," O'Malley warned sourly.
+
+They found their quarters and all headed for the showers. O'Malley
+wanted to eat first but they talked him out of the idea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+SALERNO
+
+
+Events moved rapidly for Stan during the next day or so. General
+Montgomery's Eighth Army was driving up the toe of the Italian boot,
+while General Clarke's Fifth Yank army was having a tough time holding
+its bridgehead at Salerno. Stan was tickled when O'Malley and Allison
+returned. Arno and Tony came with them.
+
+Colonel Benson called the boys to his headquarters. He was a very busy
+man. He was working twenty hours a day and lines of weariness furrowed
+his face. His fighters and bombers were at last masters of the air over
+Salerno, but they got no rest after their victory. The Germans were
+entrenched in specially prepared spots on high ground overlooking the
+beaches. Artillery positions had to be blasted, and the repeated tank
+attacks had to be checked or the Fifth's landing force would be blasted
+into the sea.
+
+The boys entered the colonel's office. He nodded toward chairs. When
+they were seated, he turned to Stan.
+
+"Have you any plans for the rescue of General Bolero? We need his
+knowledge of military positions behind the German lines."
+
+Stan looked at Arno. "The plans are really Lieutenant Arno Bolero's," he
+began. "Arno and Tony are familiar with every foot of the country where
+their father is being held. He is a prisoner in a house once owned by
+Don Sachetti. The Sachetti family and the Bolero family were very close
+friends. Arno and Tony have spent many days at their home. If they can
+go with us, we will have a chance of success."
+
+"They can go. Now what is your plan?" the colonel glanced at his wrist
+watch. He was to have a conference with high officers in five minutes.
+
+"We will take one De Havilland plane. Four of us will parachute into a
+field at night. Here, again, the boys will know just where to land to
+hit a field of grain the Germans are saving for harvesting. The plane
+will return to base and come after us the next night. If we do not set
+signal flares for landing, the plane will retire and keep watch until
+forced to fly home. It will return the next night and if we do not
+signal it then, it is not to try again."
+
+Colonel Benson looked from one to the other of the boys. "I understand
+you men are accustomed to such dangerous jobs. To me it seems there is
+about one chance in a hundred of your even landing your parachute
+force."
+
+"If there was an attack on the German field south of the place about the
+time we arrive, we could get in easily," Stan suggested. "I have
+prepared a set of maps showing good targets. The Bolero house is a hotel
+for German officers."
+
+"I'll have operations chart a raid," the colonel promised. "Now I have
+to go. Lieutenant Wilson will be in command. I have given orders to have
+him supplied with what he wants." He stepped around the table and shook
+hands with the boys. "I'm leaving this show up to you fellows. Good luck
+to you." He turned and hurried out of the room.
+
+"Sure, an' that's the first time the brass hats iver turned us loose,"
+O'Malley said with a big grin.
+
+"And it will likely be the last time," Allison said with a chuckle.
+
+"We'd better be getting over to operations. Now, who's flying the
+Mosquito?" Stan looked from Allison to O'Malley.
+
+O'Malley swallowed eagerly. His Adam's apple bobbed up and down, but he
+turned to Allison. Allison grinned at him.
+
+"You fly the crate, old man. I'm one blighter who wants to get even for
+some of the slaps and kicks we got in that prison dog house."
+
+"Sure, an' I'll be after flyin' her," O'Malley said. "But only because
+I'm thinkin' ye'll be needin' the best pilot in this crew at the
+controls o' that ship."
+
+"You hate yourself, don't you?" Stan teased. "You fly her, but just
+remember, if you get into a dogfight and don't show up when we set off
+our flares, you'll get the beating of your life when we walk in." He
+grinned at O'Malley.
+
+"I'll be right there," O'Malley promised.
+
+All of the details had been worked out and gone over so many times by
+the boys that they did not need to check again. They drew the machine
+guns and grenades they needed along with flares and other equipment.
+The supply officer got blue parachutes for them from an operating unit.
+
+"Can't be spotted at night," he explained.
+
+Evening was closing in by the time they had everything set. The Mosquito
+was warmed up and ready. She was stripped down for carrier purposes and
+to enable her to handle an extra gasoline tank. The ground crews gave
+her a final once-over, waved to her crew, and backed off. Stan sat up
+front in the copilot's seat to see that O'Malley was not teased into a
+fight. Allison and the Bolero brothers manned the machine guns.
+
+O'Malley was a bit skeptical about the powers of the De Havilland, in
+spite of what Stan had told him. He gunned her and gave her her head.
+When she snapped off the ground in a manner that would have done credit
+to a Lightning, he began to grin and mumble to himself.
+
+"Just don't get any wild ideas," Stan warned. They had sighted a flight
+of Focke-Wulf 190 fighters and O'Malley was eying the Germans with a
+dangerous gleam in his eye.
+
+"If they run in on us, ye can't blame me," he said sourly.
+
+The 190 fighters tried a run at the De Havilland, but she ran away from
+them before they could begin to cut her off.
+
+"She's so fast she keeps out of trouble," O'Malley said in disgust.
+
+"That's just what she was built for. Every night her sisters keep Berlin
+awake with bombing attacks, and every night they fly materials and
+dispatches from England to Malta. This is something you've overlooked,
+Irisher." Stan chided O'Malley.
+
+"I may be after lookin' into her doings one o' these days. Spendin'
+ivery other evenin' in London wouldn't be so bad," O'Malley decided.
+
+Heading north they eased across the backbone of the peninsula which the
+Germans had not taken the trouble to occupy in any numbers. They moved
+along while darkness settled. Arno and Tony kept a close check on
+landmarks. Finally Arno called up to Stan over the phone.
+
+"We can head west again. I have located the ridge and the mountain we
+will use as a marker."
+
+O'Malley headed the Mosquito west, letting her ease down to low
+altitude. Arno called in directions.
+
+"We are coming to the divide. There we will follow the ridge north."
+
+O'Malley followed instructions. As they swept up the ridge they saw
+below them a great fire, with several smaller fires breaking out near
+by.
+
+"Colonel Benson's boys have hit the flying field," Stan observed to
+O'Malley.
+
+"Sure, an' I think they're over the Bolero place right now." O'Malley
+jerked his head to the right. At that moment Tony's voice came in over
+the intercom.
+
+"The bombers are attacking the villa." He tried not to show his
+feelings, but the boys knew how he felt. His home was being blasted.
+
+"The whole German staff for this area ought to be down there at this
+hour," Stan answered. "It's tough, but we have to do it."
+
+"I know," Tony agreed. "If the boys catch even half the staff there,
+I'll be satisfied."
+
+"Now head west again, very low," Arno ordered.
+
+O'Malley swept lower over the darkening terrain. Stan began to wonder
+how Arno was going to spot any landmarks. Hopping out into the night
+would not be so nice. There were lakes and woods and rocky ridges all
+over the country.
+
+"Into the valley a point left," Arno called. "Fly low and line up on two
+peaks with square tops which should be against the sky."
+
+O'Malley and Stan peered ahead as the Mosquito dropped into a wide
+valley.
+
+"There's yer peaks," O'Malley said. Stan spotted the markers as his pal
+spoke. Two peaks with square tops loomed against the sky ahead.
+
+"Regular gunsights," Stan said.
+
+"Get everything ready to jump," Arno called.
+
+Stan slapped O'Malley on the shoulder. "Be seein' you soon," he said as
+he slid back to help with the guns and other things they were taking
+along.
+
+He found the boys getting set. Tony was loaded and ready to jump. Arno
+was spotting his markers.
+
+"Go!" he called.
+
+Tony unloaded through the open hatch and disappeared into the blue
+blackness, followed closely by Allison. Arno nodded to Stan and Stan
+piled out. As he went down into the cool night he slid his hand to the
+rip cord. They were jumping from low altitude and there was no time for
+free falling. He pulled the cord and felt his chute open and snap him
+into suspension. A shadowy form above him and very close told him that
+Arno had wasted no time in following him out of the ship.
+
+Stan adjusted his pack and his tommy-gun for a landing. Peering down, he
+saw the field they were to land on. At first he thought Arno had missed
+and dropped them over a lake. He could dimly see what looked like
+rippling waves. Then his feet touched waving grain and he eased up on
+the cords to make his landing. A split second later he was down in a
+field of tall and ripening grain. Wadding his chute up he drew in a deep
+breath. The field reminded him of Kansas with its rich, ripe smells.
+
+A low whistle off to his right indicated one of the boys was asking for
+a location. Stan gave a bird call and listened. He got three answers and
+heard his pals working their way toward him. Twice more he gave the
+assembly signal. Then he noticed that the sky above and over toward the
+twin peaks was lighting up with streaks and points of light. Tracers
+were arcing up and over, in and out. Grimly Stan watched. Night
+fighters had tackled O'Malley. He watched the battle, following the
+action by the tracers and the bursts of cannonfire. Suddenly one of the
+planes broke into flame. Like a torch it twisted earthward.
+
+"Could have been a Messerschmitt," Arno spoke close beside Stan.
+
+"It burned up like a plywood job," Allison's voice said. He spoke in his
+usual unruffled drawl.
+
+"O'Malley never would run from a fight," Stan said grimly.
+
+"This time I think he ran," Tony cut in.
+
+Allison laughed. "You just don't know O'Malley, old man."
+
+"No matter what happened to O'Malley we have to get going. Lead on,
+Arno," Stan ordered. There was no use in going sour over what might be a
+tough battle. They had plenty of work to do.
+
+Arno led the way out of the wheat field. He located a thick woods and
+they entered it. A few minutes of walking through tangled bushes brought
+them out on a pathway.
+
+"This is the trail to the orchard," Arno whispered to Tony.
+
+"There is another trail branching off, the one we used to follow when we
+went swimming in the little lake below the hill," Tony said.
+
+"That one we must find," Arno answered as he moved on.
+
+The boys had their packs swung high on their backs. Their tommy-guns
+were held ready. If the night fighters who had jumped O'Malley had
+spotted the parachutes they would have given an alarm. Arno seemed to be
+thinking about this. He moved carefully, pausing to listen every few
+yards.
+
+Tony was bringing up the rear. He called softly to Arno. "Here is the
+trail, you passed it."
+
+They halted and went back. Arno checked the cross trail.
+
+"Yes, this is the trail," he said.
+
+He headed off to the right and they followed. Coming to the top of a
+little hill they saw lights below, dim and shaded lights, but many of
+them.
+
+"That is the house," Arno said.
+
+"How far is it?" Stan asked.
+
+"About a kilometer," Arno answered.
+
+"Less than a mile to go. What's in between?" Stan asked.
+
+"There is a settlement where the Sachetti farm workers used to live. I
+see lights down there." Arno was bending forward, peering into the
+night.
+
+"And I hear cars and trucks," Allison added. "I'll bet the Germans have
+a repair depot or an assembly point down there."
+
+"In that case the half mile between the settlement and the house will be
+filled with Germans," Tony said.
+
+"One way to find out. Lead on," Stan ordered.
+
+The little group moved slowly down the trail. After a couple of halts
+Arno paused and pulled the boys close to him.
+
+"I think it best to leave the trail. Just a little way ahead it opens
+into a roadway. There we should certainly run into outposts."
+
+"We better go on until we locate them," Stan said.
+
+"If you think that is the best way," Arno agreed.
+
+"I'll walk ahead with you," Stan said.
+
+They moved along very slowly, stopping every few feet to listen. Finally
+they heard guttural voices in the darkness ahead. Halting, they
+listened. Allison moved forward a little to try to overhear what was
+said. Soon he came back.
+
+"This is the outpost," he whispered. "Six men and two machine guns. They
+are about to change guards." He chuckled. "And they do not expect us."
+
+"Can we move around them?" Stan asked.
+
+"We could, but I think we should stay. An officer is coming out to
+inspect the guard. He's coming from Villa Sachetti." Stan could almost
+see Allison's sardonic smile. "Nice spot for a surprise party, eh?"
+
+"Swell," Stan answered. "We'll take over the post. Allison can be the
+decoy to lure the officer in close. He speaks German."
+
+"Good, very good," Arno said eagerly. "Will we use the short knives on
+them?"
+
+"No shooting if we can help it. We'll shove in close and have a look."
+Stan began moving down the pathway with Allison at his side. The party
+kept very close together so as to be able to give signals to each other
+without speaking.
+
+After edging forward a short distance they were halted by a gruff laugh
+ahead. Getting down low they peered through the starlight and spotted
+the sentries. They were grouped close together, four seated, two
+standing. The two men standing up moved off, one to the left and one to
+the right. Stan got his crew into a close huddle.
+
+"Allison and I will do our commando stuff on the two guards walking
+post. I take the one on the right, Allison the other. You boys stay
+right here. We'll be back soon." Stan spoke in a low whisper.
+
+One of the seated Germans suddenly sprang to his feet. He stood looking
+into the night toward the party of raiders. Tony started to move
+forward. Stan pulled him back. The German walked up the pathway a few
+feet and halted, listening. The boys turned their faces away and
+remained perfectly still. After a minute or so the man went back and sat
+down. Stan gave Allison a signal and they moved off the pathway. They
+left their tommy-guns and carried only their pistols, knives, and short
+lengths of rope.
+
+Stan moved silently along in a direction that would cut across the beat
+walked by the sentry. Soon he spotted his man moving at a slow walk
+along what appeared to be a pathway. Stan moved in and halted beside a
+bush. There he remained without moving a muscle. The sentry had reached
+the end of his beat and was turning back. Stan ducked his head to make
+sure no light was reflected from his face. Tensing his muscles he
+waited.
+
+The sentry seemed to be enjoying the night. He sauntered along, his
+rifle slung carelessly over his shoulder. The barrel missed Stan's head
+by inches as the man brushed past the bushes where he stood.
+Straightening, Stan leaned far forward, his arm shot out and encircled
+the man's neck. At the same time his knee came up through the bushes in
+a smashing blow. The expert application of Stan's arm and the blow in
+the spine knocked the German limp at once. He did not struggle and he
+could not cry out. Stan dragged him back into the bushes, hurriedly
+gagged and bound him.
+
+Moving swiftly back to the pathway he came upon the boys. Allison was
+already back, kneeling with Tony and Arno.
+
+"Fast work," Stan whispered softly.
+
+"He was a rotten soldier," Allison answered. "He sat down and started
+removing one boot."
+
+"We'll close in fast but without noise. I have a hunch we'll get a
+break. If two of the men should start out to check the men we disposed
+of, Allison and I will take them out. You boys take the other two. Make
+sure they don't get a chance to yell."
+
+"They will not yell," Arno promised grimly.
+
+The four raiders moved in on their hands and knees. They halted only a
+few yards from the four men. Here they waited. Finally one of the men
+got up and called. He listened, then challenged his sentries again. When
+there was no answer he caught up a rifle, snapped an order to one of the
+others, and headed off down the picket line.
+
+Instantly Allison slithered away into the night. One of the others got
+to his feet grumbling loudly. He caught his rifle up and held it at
+ready as he moved off. Stan was after him at once.
+
+Before Stan had overtaken the guard, having allowed him to get down the
+pathway a little distance, so as not to arouse the two left behind, he
+heard sounds of scuffling. Arno and Tony had not waited. They were in
+action.
+
+Stan leaped in upon the guard just as the fellow whirled around. He
+knocked up the man's gun and closed with him. The German shouted once
+before Stan could get a strangle hold upon him, then he went down,
+struggling wildly. He was a burly fellow with powerful arms and thick
+legs. Stan was not sure that he could hold the headlock he had slid down
+into a strangle grip.
+
+They flopped and thrashed around until Stan finally worked behind the
+German and put on more pressure. After that the fellow wilted in short
+order. Stan was binding and gagging him when Arno came running to help
+him.
+
+"Did we act too quickly?" he asked in great excitement.
+
+"A bit fast," Stan admitted, "but I have him now. He was a tough
+customer." Stan rolled the sentry into a clump of bushes and faced Arno.
+"How did Tony make out?"
+
+"Fine, very fine. Tony hates all Germans." Arno laughed quietly.
+
+They moved back to the guard station and found Allison and Tony there.
+One glance at the two sentries Arno and Tony had silenced told Stan they
+would not have to be bound or gagged. The boys had used their knives
+expertly.
+
+"Now about the reception committee?" Allison queried softly.
+
+"We need four helmets. I have one and there are two on the ground. Get
+one more," Stan ordered.
+
+"I have it," Allison answered. "On my head."
+
+Sure enough, Allison was wearing a German helmet. "You boys know what
+the Germans will do with us if they catch us wearing even one of their
+helmets?" Stan asked.
+
+"The firing squad," Arno answered as he slipped one on his head.
+
+"If the inspector's car has its lights on bright we'll have to get down.
+Arno and I will be out on each side as though on beat. Allison will have
+to make up a challenge that will pass."
+
+"I have their password," Allison answered. "Got it from the man who
+brought up word of the inspection. He gave it to get up to the post."
+
+"The Germans are not so smart," Tony said. "They are fools to warn their
+soldiers of a coming inspection."
+
+Allison laughed. "The man who came up was a pal of the squad. He was
+tipping them off."
+
+"There's a car coming up the road," Stan warned. "Use your tommy-guns to
+cover them, but no shooting unless we have to fight it out."
+
+He and Arno moved into the darkness, leaving Allison and Tony seated on
+the bench which had been used by the Germans.
+
+"There ought to be four of us here," Tony said.
+
+"I don't think that will make any difference," Allison said. "They'll
+think the others are out on the beat."
+
+The car came up the gentle slope slowly. It did not have its bright
+lights on. The slit in the headlight hood gave only a meager amount of
+light and did not show more than ten feet ahead of the car. Allison
+moved several paces down the road and shouted an order in German.
+
+The car halted and Allison shouted again, making his voice gruff. He got
+the password and snapped permission to advance. The car charged forward
+in a surge of speed that made Allison leap aside.
+
+From the darkness beside the road Stan had moved in. He saw that there
+were three men in the car, counting the driver. He also saw the shadowy
+form of Arno closing in on the other side. A tall officer climbed out.
+He snapped an order at Allison. Allison backed away a few steps to allow
+the other two officers to get out. Stan had moved up and Arno had a gun
+barrel shoved into the neck of the driver. Tony leaped forward with his
+gun ready.
+
+"Get your hands up!" he snapped and Allison gave the same order in
+German at the same instant.
+
+Startled grunts came from the three officers. One of them reached for
+his pistol. Allison's gun barrel came down over his head and the officer
+pitched forward. The other two elevated their hands.
+
+The boys closed in and took away the men's side arms. They helped
+themselves to caps and light topcoats and belts, then they bound and
+gagged the officers. The ranking officer, a colonel, was furious. Until
+the gag stopped his mouth he poured forth a stream of angry abuse.
+
+With the officers laid out far back in the bushes, Arno donned the
+driver's cap and jacket. They were ready for the real adventure,
+cracking the gates of the German prison camp.
+
+"You know the roads, so you take over, Arno," Stan said.
+
+"Shall we drive right through and into the front yard of the big house?"
+Arno asked.
+
+"Is there a back yard?" Stan asked.
+
+"A very spacious one, but with a high stone fence around it and only one
+gate, though it is a very wide gate," Arno answered.
+
+"There is the stone passageway to the wine cellars," Tony put in.
+
+"We don't want to be caught in any wine cellar," Allison answered.
+
+"We have to figure on fast work. The dirty work we've done here will be
+discovered within a few hours, then they'll be after us," Stan said.
+
+"I know the house and I think I know the spot where prisoners will be
+held. The Germans always take the best rooms for themselves. I think
+they will hold my father in the servants quarters at the back of the
+house. I have even decided which room he will be given. There is one
+having no running water and very little light."
+
+"We'll have a look there first," Stan said. "If we park in the back
+we'll be near to those rooms?"
+
+"Yes," Arno answered. "We can reach them through a narrow hallway
+without entering the main part of the house."
+
+"O.K., driver, move on."
+
+Arno started the car and they rolled down the road at a fast pace. Stan
+could not see the road but Arno knew every turn. They soon swung into a
+long driveway and headed toward a big stone gate with machine gunners at
+each side. Sentries armed with rifles paced back and forth across the
+opening.
+
+"Here goes!" Stan snapped. "Try your German on the boys. If you flop, we
+start shooting our way in."
+
+Arno charged up in the best German manner of driving an official car.
+The heavy machine guns on each side of the gate converged on the car and
+one of the sentries bellowed an order.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+NIGHT RAID
+
+
+Arno did not put on his brakes until he had forced the guards at the
+gate back two paces. Allison leaned out over the door, his cap pulled
+down over his eyes. He bellowed loudly in German, blurring a string of
+words together and winding up with the password from the outside post.
+He was taking a chance that that was the password for the whole area.
+
+The guards backed away, presented arms, and jerked into stiff positions
+of attention. Arno lost no time in shooting the car through the gates.
+They entered a shadowy courtyard where the light was dim. The Yank raid
+on Bolero Villa, just over the hill, had caused every post in the
+vicinity to be blacked out.
+
+"We are under the window of the room," Arno said in a low voice.
+
+"There's a guard down the wall a ways," Allison said. "I'll give you
+fellows a calling-down in German to make the guard think I'm really on
+the warpath, then we'll march right in."
+
+"Perhaps I had better try the window while you are trying the door,"
+Tony said. "You might have trouble. There will be plenty of light
+inside."
+
+Allison raised his voice and began berating the boys in German.
+"_Schwinehund!_" he bellowed and followed that up with other choice
+words of abuse. He had a bright idea and added that he was going to find
+the man who had handled the blackout. He said he could see light from
+the back hallway all the way out to the road.
+
+Instantly they heard the guard moving toward the back door.
+
+"Now's our chance," Allison whispered. "I said we could see light from
+the back hallway. We'll make them douse the lights."
+
+They headed toward the back door and stomped up the wide steps. The
+guard opened the door and they saw that the hallway was dark. Allison
+roared at the fellow and he came to a stiff salute, presenting arms.
+
+"General Bolero," Allison snapped. "We would speak to him."
+
+The boys did not understand, but they caught the general's name and had
+an idea. The guard protested but Allison thrust several papers at him.
+He had taken the papers from the officer's pocket but had no idea what
+they were. When the man started to use a pocket flashlight to read the
+papers, Allison smashed the light out of his hand, roaring at him about
+the blackout.
+
+The soldier was thoroughly cowed. He turned and started down the hallway
+with the boys close behind him. Tony had found the window barred on the
+outside and had joined the others. He nudged Stan as they halted before
+a door. It was the very room Arno had said his father would be kept in.
+
+The guard unlocked the door. As it opened, a flood of light shone over
+the men. The general's window had been boarded up, so he was allowed a
+light. He was sitting at a little table writing. Stan did not wait to
+see any more. He knew the guard was wise the moment he saw the raiders
+in the bright light. Their shoes and trousers gave them away as well as
+their faces. Stan had moved along very close to the guard. His arm went
+out in a perfect commando attack and before the guard had time to shout
+he was silenced and heaved into the room.
+
+In an instant Tony was across the room and in his father's arms. Arno
+stood beside them gripping one of the general's arms. The general looked
+over Tony's shoulder at Stan and Allison.
+
+"I am honored," he said.
+
+"Turn out the light," Stan ordered.
+
+The general shoved Tony aside and switched off the light. "You have
+taken greater chances than you should. I am hardly worth the effort."
+
+When he had ceased speaking they listened. Several men were moving down
+the hall, talking in angry voices.
+
+"That is the commandant of this post. I know his voice. He has with him
+a number of his officers," the general said in a low voice.
+
+"They'll wonder where the other guard is," Stan said. "We better jerk
+the boards off that window and get out of here."
+
+"That cannot be done," the general said. "They are planks, not boards,
+and they are spiked to the outside of the house."
+
+Allison had opened the door a crack. "They have turned on the light.
+There's five of them, and they seem excited."
+
+"How far down the hallway?" Stan asked.
+
+"At the door," Allison answered.
+
+The voice of one of the men lifted as he shouted an order. "He's calling
+in a squad of armed men from the gate," Allison said.
+
+"It seems we are trapped," Arno said grimly.
+
+"Can we go out the front way?" Stan snapped, turning to Tony.
+
+"Yes. There is a side door and a front door. But we can't get back to
+our car because of the walls around the back plaza."
+
+"Our tommy-guns and grenades are in the car," Allison said.
+
+"We'll have to chance it and move fast. Lead off." Stan reached for the
+doorknob. Opening the door a little way he looked out. The five officers
+were standing in the doorway down the hall looking out into the night.
+
+Stan stepped out, whipping his Colt from its holster as he went. "Down
+the hall!" he hissed. "Lead them, Tony. I'll cover your retreat."
+
+The raiders and the general moved out and started down the hall. They
+had taken only a few steps, when one of the officers at the door turned
+around. He let out a startled shout. The others whirled. Stan covered
+them with his Colt. The distance was a full thirty feet, good shooting
+range for the forty-five.
+
+"Get your hands up!" Stan snapped. The bore of his gun wavered over the
+stomachs of the officers and came to rest on a spot between the eyes of
+the colonel.
+
+Amazement showed on the faces of the Germans, then hatred and fury.
+
+"Fools!" the colonel grated. "You will all be shot as soon as the alarm
+is sounded."
+
+Stan was moving backward. He grinned at the colonel and made a good
+bluff. His free hand slid into the pocket of his coat. "Perhaps," he
+said loudly. "But I have a grenade here, an American-made grenade. You
+know how much damage they do. I'm going to toss it right where you are
+standing just as soon as I get to the corner."
+
+He knew at once that he had scored a hit. The Germans knew that tossing
+a grenade in just that manner was the way Rangers and Commandos worked.
+Three of the men, those in the doorway, dived out into the night where
+they began shouting. The colonel and one other officer edged toward the
+door. Stan reached the corner and made a motion to jerk his hand out of
+his pocket. The two Germans dived for the door.
+
+"Whirling, Stan raced down the hall. He was passing a door when a hand
+reached out and jerked him into a dark room or hall, he could not tell
+which. Allison's voice hissed:
+
+"Inside, we're going up on the roof." Stan heard the door slam and all
+was dark. "Tony knows how to go through a French window in this room out
+to a trellis. We climb the vines."
+
+"But the general, he's pretty heavy," Stan said.
+
+"The boys are boosting him up right now." Allison was dragging Stan
+across the room.
+
+They went through the window and saw the stars above. Dark shapes loomed
+against the wall of the house where vines climbed up to the eaves. Stan
+and Allison started up the trellis. They could hear General Bolero
+puffing and grunting as Tony and Arno helped him climb upward.
+
+Stan looked down and saw the top of the garden wall. "I'm going down
+after some grenades and a submachine gun," he hissed. Before Allison
+could stop him he had swung over the wall and was dangling in space. The
+vines ended at the wall and Stan could not see what was below. He took a
+chance and cut loose.
+
+Stan was lucky. He landed on top of a canvas-covered van. The padding
+dulled the thud of his landing. He sat up and listened. The yard below
+was filled with shouting and yelling. Boots pounded as men ran across
+the hard ground. Doors slammed and someone fired a pistol. Stan whistled
+but got no answer. Then he spotted his gang. They were crouching on the
+roof above. Stan whistled louder and saw a shape detach itself and slide
+down toward the edge of the roof. He was sure it was Allison. When the
+dark shape loomed directly above him he called up cautiously.
+
+"There's a canvas-covered van right here. Get the men and have them drop
+off on top of it."
+
+"Pretty far down, isn't it, old man?" Allison called back.
+
+"Not too far," Stan answered. "We'll get to our car and blast our way
+out of here."
+
+Allison moved back up the roof. In a minute he was back with the general
+and his sons.
+
+"General Bolero coming down first," Allison called softly.
+
+Stan moved back but got ready to help the general. A bulky form swung
+down from the roof, then fell, landing with a thud beside Stan. Stan
+helped the general to a sitting position.
+
+"Are you hurt?"
+
+"Only slightly jarred," the general assured him.
+
+The others dropped off in a hurry. They crowded around Stan. "Now to get
+to our car," Stan said.
+
+They slid off the back of the van. It was parked a yard from the wall of
+the house. Other vans stood beside it as closely as they could be packed
+in. The raiders moved along the wall, halting behind the last van. The
+car they wanted to reach was only a few feet away, but it was surrounded
+by a squad of men. Flashlight beams stabbed into the car and men talked
+excitedly.
+
+Inside the house there was a great uproar as the Germans searched for
+the missing men. Tony chuckled, then whispered:
+
+"Little Don Sachetti and I used to get spanked for sneaking through that
+window and climbing the trellis."
+
+"We had better take over that car and our guns and grenades. This is the
+best chance we'll ever have. Most of the Germans are in the house," Stan
+said.
+
+"Don Sachetti was executed yesterday. I think he would rest better if we
+tossed a few grenades through the windows of his home," the general
+said. "By all means let us proceed with the capture of the car and
+materiel."
+
+"You drive, Arno," Stan ordered. "Fan out, boys, and start shooting when
+they spot us." He turned to the general. "Sorry, sir, that we do not
+have a gun for you."
+
+"I will soon have one," the general answered grimly.
+
+The boys spread out in the darkness along the side of the last van. They
+moved forward with automatic pistols ready. Stan picked his man, a burly
+officer with a flashlight. The Germans were so intent upon the arms they
+had found that they did not see their attackers until the boys were upon
+them. The burly officer was the one who sounded the alarm. He shouted
+loudly as he shot his light over the raiders. Instantly the boys opened
+up. With pistols flaming they charged. Stan saw the general leap ahead
+and tear a rifle from the hands of a falling German.
+
+For a moment the action was furious, but the fire from the forty-fives
+was deadly and the Germans went down or leaped away. Stan located a sack
+of grenades that had been removed from the car. He took out a couple and
+tossed them over toward the big gate. The result was all that he had
+hoped it would be. A dozen armed guards had been standing at the gates
+under shaded lights, while the machine-gun crews outside were dragging
+their guns around to bring them to bear inside the yard. After the
+second grenade exploded with a roar Stan saw nothing at the gate at all
+except a pile of bricks where one of the entrance pillars had stood a
+moment before.
+
+"Good going, but Tony has been hit," Allison shouted. "Better get into
+the car!"
+
+Arno had the engine roaring while Allison and the general were sweeping
+the yard with tommy-gun fire. Tony lay on the floor of the car, shoved
+down to keep him clear of flying lead. From the shadows all around them
+bullets were whining. Stan slid in beside Arno. He could not find a
+tommy-gun, but he had the sack of grenades on his lap. Leaning out
+through the window of the car he began lobbing them at the windows of
+the big house. He hoped some of those he tossed would be incendiary
+grenades. Arno drove parallel to the house for a short distance to give
+Stan a chance with his grenades.
+
+The car swerved as they passed the door. Stan was able to plant a
+grenade into the open door and to add another before they straightened
+out for the charge at the gate. They hit the pile of loose bricks lying
+in the entrance and one tire exploded. The car wobbled and careened but
+shoved through the opening without turning over.
+
+As they smashed through, Stan saw flames leaping out of the doorway. A
+gaping hole in the wall, revealed by the fire, showed where one grenade
+had done its work. They had charged ahead only a few hundred yards and
+were not clear of the driveway when they saw ahead of them a small tank
+and two trucks. Men on foot swarmed beside the vehicle. With a roar the
+whole driveway ahead burst into action. The careening car had been
+sighted. Arno twisted the wheel and they plunged through a hedge and
+down a steep bank where the car came to halt with its radiator smashed
+against the trunk of a tree.
+
+"Get the tommy-guns and grenades," Stan snapped. "Get Tony out!"
+
+Tony was already out. "I have the wound plugged," he said in a weak
+voice. "I'll manage."
+
+"We'll help you along," Stan said. "You lead the way, Arno."
+
+"I know best how to get out of here. I was here more than Arno," Tony
+said. "I'll lead you."
+
+"Give him a hand, Arno," Stan said. "They're coming through the hedge up
+above."
+
+Allison and Stan opened up on a group of Germans breaking through the
+hedge above. Their gunfire drove the Germans back and allowed Arno and
+the general time to get Tony up the bank and into the woods.
+
+Whirling, they ran up the bank and overtook the three who were waiting
+for them.
+
+"Where to now?" Stan asked.
+
+"We have to stay in the woods and keep moving. Near the top of the
+ridge we'll find a small lake. There are a number of small huts up
+there. We can hide in one of them." Arno spoke quickly.
+
+"But they'll search every foot of the woods and every hut," Allison
+objected.
+
+"They do a very good job of hunting down escaped men," Stan agreed.
+
+"We might fool them if we hide in the Sachetti villa. They would never
+think of looking for us there," Tony said.
+
+"An excellent idea, but how can we get in without being discovered?" the
+general asked.
+
+"There's an outside air shaft leading down into the cellars. It is
+covered with vines and there is a tree growing beside it," Tony said. "I
+used to be able to slide down that shaft."
+
+"A good idea," Stan said. He was beginning to realize that Tony would
+not be able to travel very far or very fast. "Let's get going."
+
+"See, they are making a circle around the woods," Tony said.
+
+Lights were flashing above and below them. But the Germans did not seem
+to think it necessary to throw a line between the woods and the house.
+Arno and General Bolero helped Tony. Stan and Allison brought up the
+rear. They moved through the trees and across a garden thickly planted
+with shrubbery and grapevines.
+
+Behind them the woods were filled with German soldiers. The searchers
+had fanned out into the valley below and upon the hills above the villa.
+
+"Here is the shaft," Tony said as they halted in the black darkness
+under a tree.
+
+Stan could see nothing that looked like a shaft or like the roof of a
+wine cellar.
+
+"We must be careful not to disturb the vines or the bushes." Tony
+laughed softly. "Mr. Sachetti went to a great deal of trouble in hiding
+the cellar and the shaft. He said they ruined the beauty of his garden."
+Tony was pushing aside bushes as he spoke. Finally he called very
+softly. "Come now."
+
+The raiders moved under the spreading branches of the tree and from
+there they crawled under a leafy vine. They found an open shaft with a
+high metal cone over it. Tony and Arno went down first. When the general
+tried it he had trouble squeezing down the shaft. Stan was the last to
+slip through. He lowered the guns and grenades to Allison before he
+descended. Sliding down he found himself in total darkness.
+
+"Now we have to hide. The Germans will be coming down here often for
+wine." Tony spoke eagerly. "We'll hide behind the vats containing the
+new crop of grapes. The Germans will drink only the old wines. They are
+on this side."
+
+Feeling their way they located a row of huge barrels and crawled in
+behind them. Stan and Allison located themselves near the outside
+barrel.
+
+"We can hear the doors open when anyone comes down here," Tony said.
+"The hinges are rusty and will squeak loudly."
+
+"How about dressing your wound now, Tony?" General Bolero suggested. "I
+will tend to it myself."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+NIGHT FLIGHT
+
+
+The creaking hinges of the wine cellar door served as a warning signal
+to the hiding men behind the wine casks. Every time a German orderly was
+sent for wine they knew he was coming before he had even entered the
+short passageway leading into the main room. Usually the men were sent
+in pairs, sometimes three or four came. The men always had liberal
+samples of the wine before filling the decanters for the officers.
+
+The cellar was damp and smelled of rotting wood and stale wine. The
+space behind the wine casks was limited and legs developed cramps as the
+night and the next day wore on. Belts had to be tightened over empty
+stomachs, but there was no complaining. Tony regained his strength and
+with it his belief that they would escape.
+
+"We can't very well climb back out of that chute," Allison said for the
+tenth time. "We'll have to plan some other strategy. It's three P.M.
+right now and we still don't have any ideas. We have to be up at that
+wheat field by midnight."
+
+"I'll slip out into the hallway and have a look," Stan offered.
+
+"And get caught," Allison said sourly.
+
+Further talk was halted. The hinges of the door creaked dismally. Four
+men entered and turned on the small light over the row of old wine
+barrels. They talked and had a few drinks before filling the pitchers
+they carried. There was much laughing and joking. When they had gone,
+Allison translated their conversation.
+
+"We finally have some information," he said. "The Germans blame the
+Italian peasants for our disappearance. They are sure the peasants
+spirited us away and they are taking reprisals."
+
+"That is like them," General Bolero said sadly.
+
+"And here is the big news. The Germans figure we have escaped and will
+reach the British lines in the south. They expect a bombing raid upon
+this spot, similar to the one on the Bolero villa. So tonight they will
+evacuate under cover of darkness and they will put this place, wine
+cellar and all, to the torch before they go." Allison laughed.
+
+"When are they going?" Stan asked.
+
+"They plan to get out as soon as darkness comes to cover their movements
+from our air force, which seems to have taken over the sky. As soon as
+they have evacuated they will destroy the place. I gather the high
+command has ordered that every place evacuated is to be destroyed in
+revenge for Italy's quitting the war."
+
+"So. We have to get out of here by dark," General Bolero said. "And that
+we will do."
+
+"I hope so," Stan said.
+
+"We will evacuate with the Germans," the general said. "That is our only
+chance."
+
+"Right-o," Allison agreed.
+
+"So we may as well lay a few plans." The general seemed eager to get
+into action.
+
+"We could shoot our way out," Tony suggested.
+
+"We would do better to use our heads," the general said firmly.
+
+"We ought to be able to take over one of the gangs sent here to get
+wine. The German officers will want to haul away all of this fine wine
+they can possibly take with them," Stan said.
+
+"Now we're beginning to get places," Allison agreed.
+
+For the next hour they planned and talked. Tony explained the route they
+would have to take to get to the field where O'Malley was to pick them
+up. No one said anything about O'Malley's not being there at midnight.
+Their big worry was to get to the field themselves.
+
+It was well after dark, according to their watches, when things began to
+happen. An officer and a squad of soldiers entered the cellar. The
+officer barked commands at the men for a few minutes, then marched off.
+
+The raiders crowded close to Allison to learn what had been ordered.
+Allison whispered his report while the men a few feet away began rolling
+barrels from the racks.
+
+"They are taking the old wine. The new wine in these vats is to be
+poured out. The barrels are to be smashed. They have a drum of gasoline
+outside and will pour it into the cellar and set fire to it as they
+leave." Allison paused. "They have a simple method worked out for
+emptying these barrels. After the gasoline is set afire the men are to
+toss a few grenades in here to smash the barrels and make certain the
+cellar is destroyed."
+
+"We better take over right now," Stan said. "Those birds have only side
+arms. We'll slide out with our tommy-guns covering them. Each take a
+barrel and when I whistle step out."
+
+The German workmen were startled out of their wits a second or two later
+when five armed men stepped out from behind barrels and covered them
+with machine guns and a rifle. They stared at General Bolero, blinked
+their eyes wildly, and then elevated their arms toward the ceiling.
+
+"Tie them up," Stan ordered. "Take the door with Arno." He nodded to
+Allison. "If any more men come, cover them and bring them back here."
+
+Tony and the general and Stan got busy. It took a little time to bind
+and gag eight men when the bonds and gags had to be ripped from their
+clothing with trench knives. Before that was finished Allison and Arno
+added two more noncom officers who had come in to hurry up the squad.
+
+"I suggest we each roll a barrel outside," General Bolero said. "We can
+use them as something to hide behind if we meet resistance."
+
+"Good idea," Stan agreed. He turned to Tony. "Can we get out without
+charging the main gate? If we rouse the Germans, we'll be in the same
+spot we were in the first time we got loose."
+
+"I don't think so," Tony answered.
+
+The problem was solved by the appearance of an officer. He bellowed
+angrily into the cellar, then took a step or two into the dark
+passageway. That was a mistake. Allison tapped him over the head with a
+gun barrel and dragged him back.
+
+"He says the villa has been fired. There is only a few minutes to load
+up and get out." Allison laid the officer beside his men.
+
+"We won't tie him up. When he comes to he can free his men. I wouldn't
+roast even a German," Stan snapped. "Get a barrel and let's get going."
+
+The floor and the passageway sloped gently down into the cellar because
+the barrels always came in full and went out empty. The boys soon
+discovered that it took two of them to roll a heavy barrel. They managed
+to get three barrels rolling and headed for the entrance.
+
+Outside they found a big van with a driver who was dancing up and down
+shouting. Three planks sloped up into the truck. The first barrel hit
+the planking and the boys heaved it up. The driver was yelling wildly
+and he had every reason to yell. The yard was as light as day. Flames
+licked up all around the house and the smaller buildings blazed
+furiously. The heat was intense and the smoke was thick.
+
+Allison snapped an order at the driver and the fellow put a shoulder
+against the next barrel. No sooner had he leaned forward than Arno
+tapped him over the head with his pistol butt.
+
+"Get our guns and the sack of grenades and flares," Stan shouted. "Arno,
+you drive."
+
+They had two barrels in the back of the van where they could be seen. In
+a moment the guns and the grenades were in the truck along with Tony,
+the general, and Allison. Stan armed himself with a tommy-gun and rode
+up front with Arno.
+
+Out at the main gate guards were shouting and waving at the van to hurry
+up. No Germans remained in the courtyard. Arno started the van and they
+headed for the gate. The guards wanted a ride, but Arno had gotten up
+speed and did not stop. They roared down the driveway and headed out
+into the road. Foot soldiers were everywhere. Arno slipped into a line
+of trucks and they chugged along toward the settlement. They reached it
+without mishap, though a dozen officers had shouted orders at them, and
+one captain had ridden several hundred yards on their running board. The
+complete blackout necessary to make a convoy movement safe helped a lot.
+
+Reaching the settlement, they were directed to a grove of trees where
+their truck was shoved back into deep cover.
+
+Allison came forward and got in with Stan. When an officer came along
+checking their load, he explained they had wine for the officers' mess
+and suggested it be shoved deeper into the woods to keep it from being
+tapped by the soldiers. The officer cleared a pathway and led them deep
+into the timber beyond the rest of the convoy. He ordered the crew to
+report to a designated spot and then rushed off.
+
+The five raiders gathered beside the truck and broke out laughing.
+
+"So considerate of them," Arno said.
+
+"I have never known the German army to be so co-operative before," the
+general observed.
+
+"We better be on our way," Stan said.
+
+They gathered up their things and headed into the woods with Tony
+leading the way. After an hour of searching and much argument between
+him and Arno they finally located a trail and followed it.
+
+Stan and Allison began to suspect the boys were lost, when suddenly they
+came out on a knoll. Above them, silhouetted against the starlit sky,
+were the two square-topped peaks.
+
+"See," Tony said to Arno. "Now you must admit I was right."
+
+"You were, I am sorry I argued."
+
+"It's twenty minutes to twelve," Allison said anxiously. "How far is it
+to the wheat field?"
+
+"Just a ten-minute walk," Tony answered.
+
+"We'll hit it right on the minute," Stan said eagerly. "Lead on."
+
+Tony led them out of the woods and into the wheat field. They checked
+the wind and got out their flares. Arno took one, Tony another, while
+Allison took the red center marker.
+
+"Clear a space so as not to set the field of wheat on fire," Arno
+warned. "I'll show you how far to go."
+
+Stan and the general went along, carrying the guns and grenades. They
+were about in the center of the field when they heard the roar of a
+plane motor. Stan listened and then grinned. The engine was a powerful
+radial. He was certain O'Malley was at the throttle.
+
+The plane swooped around and around high above while the boys got spaces
+cleared and everything set. Arno called to the others and the flares
+blossomed out. Looking up into the sky they waited. The plane circled
+and headed in. Suddenly a barrage broke loose from a hill a half mile
+away. A German battery had heard the plane and had spotted the flares.
+The gunners were shooting at the flares and by the dirt they were
+lifting they seemed to be getting the range.
+
+"He'll be blown to bits when he lands!" Arno shouted.
+
+"We'll have to move back or get blasted ourselves," Allison called,
+breaking into a run.
+
+Shells were exploding close to them, kicking dirt over them, and the
+barrage was swinging toward them. Overhead the plane was coming in. It
+roared over their heads a few feet above the barrage.
+
+"Overshot it!" Tony yelled. "Now he'll have to try again."
+
+"And the Germans are coming!" Stan yelled. "Get set with the machine
+guns!"
+
+When a shell burst close to Allison, he stopped running. Suddenly he
+shouted, "He's fooled them! He's set down at the far edge of the field!"
+
+Sure enough, the plane had landed almost at the edge of the woods. It
+was swinging around. They all ducked and raced toward it. Stan got there
+first and was greeted by O'Malley's voice from the plane.
+
+"Sure, an' you got out the band for a welcome!"
+
+"As soon as they spot the flare of your exhausts the welcome will get
+hotter!" Stan shouted back.
+
+Loading up was only a matter of seconds, but the Germans on the hill and
+those charging down into the field had the Mosquito located and began
+pounding the lower end of the field. O'Malley headed into the barrage
+and hopped her off without getting a direct hit. They circled overhead
+and then swung south. Stan was seated across from O'Malley.
+
+"Have a nice trip?" O'Malley asked with a grin.
+
+"We did," Stan answered.
+
+"I hear there'll be a flock o' tinware waitin' for you when you get in."
+O'Malley continued to grin. "The boys are bettin' ten to one that you
+all got shot. I'll be richer than Rockefeller when I get back." He
+chuckled to himself.
+
+"Right now we could do with something to eat," Stan said as he leaned
+back and closed his eyes.
+
+"Colonel Benson has a banquet spread for you. Have Allison get on the
+radio and tell him to put it on the table, and have him order me two
+apple pies." O'Malley opened the Mosquito up another notch as he thought
+of the pies.
+
+Stan clicked on the intercom and got Allison. He felt, at the moment, as
+though he could stand a vacation, but glancing back he saw a great fire
+raging with an intensity that lighted the sky for a hundred miles. The
+Germans were destroying the historical city of Naples. There would be no
+vacation.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Yankee Flier in Italy, by
+Rutherford G. Montgomery
+
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