Part 9 (1/2)
They flew five hours and picked up the riding lights of a plane. One of Horst's men had a marine telescope, through which he peered for some time.
”The Haven s.h.i.+p!” he said.
Horst said, ”Get set, boys! It won't take long to finish this!”
Chapter VIII. BAT BRAWL.
THE Haven plane was sleek from the tapered cowling of its air-cooled motor to the trailing edge of its stabilizer fins. It had been built in a European factory. Tex Haven flew it himself and complained frequently.
”Blasted foreign s.h.i.+p,” he grumbled. ”I keep thinkin' about havin' to land it. Landin' speed is d.a.m.n near a hundred miles an hour.”
Henry Peace said, ”Why did you buy it, if you don't like it?”
”Didn't buy it. Stole it.”
Rhoda Haven explained. ”It was a personal s.h.i.+p of Senor Steel. We had to leave his country in a hurry.”
Henry Peace scratched in his thatch of red hair, which seemed to be his habitual gesture when he wanted to think.
”There's a Senor Steel who is president of the South American republic of Blanca Grande,” he remarked. ”Any relation?”
”Same.”
Small hard knots of jaw muscle gathered under each of Rhoda Haven's smooth cheeks. She suddenly looked more grim than Henry Peace had seen her before.
”He's no president!” she snapped. ”He's a dictator. A tyrant.”
Henry Peace eyed her.
”Offered a hundred thousand dollars for your head, didn't he?”
Rhoda Haven blinked. ”How did you learn that?”
Henry Peace opened his mouth to answer-and gave a wild jump. Simultaneously, there was a snarling sound, somewhat as if a big bulldog had been turned loose. The plane trembled. A respectable collection of sievelike holes appeared in the plane cabin.
Tex Haven turned around, eyed the holes, yelled, ”Looks like the ants have gone to work on us.”
”Lead ones,” Henry Peace agreed.
OLD Tex came back on the plane control stick. The little foreign plane arched up, hung in the sky by its moaning nose.
The other s.h.i.+p, the one from which the storm of machine-gun lead had come, pointed up and stood on its tail not fifty yards away. The s.h.i.+ps were probably climbing, but the illusion was that they stood still.
”That's Horst!” Tex Haven yelled.
For a split second, the planes hung motionless in easy stone-throw, but the force of their up-swoop held the occupants temporarily helpless.
Tex Haven drew his six-shooters-Henry Peace had given him back the guns-and tried to knock out one of the cabin windows so he could fight. The gla.s.s, nonshatter, would not break. Tex lowered a window.
By that time, the other plane had climbed above them, was sliding over and its cabin windows were opening, machine-gun muzzles protruding.
”Watch it!” Henry Peace yelled.
Tex Haven was ”watching it.” He stamped left rudder, rocked with the stick. The plane flipped around and dived like a hawk that had folded its wings and was making for a chicken on the ground. Pa.s.sing wind moaned, then became a siren scream.
”You running away?” Henry Peace yelled.”I ain't stackin' six-guns against machine guns,” Tex shouted. ”I tried that one time.”
Speed-shriek lifted higher and higher. The night-smeared earth came up, seeming to bloat toward them.
Henry Peace looked at the air-speed meter. The needle stood close to five hundred.
”Five hundred-great blazes!” Henry Peace squalled. ”We're goin' five hundred miles an hour. No plane ever went that fast before!”
”It's a foreign crate, so the air-speed dial is marked in kilometers, stupid,” Rhoda Haven told him.
Their plane leveled out and streaked south. The earth was about a thousand feet below.
Eastward lay the sea, a vast expanse that was like dull, frosted gla.s.s; and somewhat nearer was the coast, a succession of small, buglike islands, each with a wide, white beach on the seaward side. Below the plane, there seemed be swamp; the swamp was veined with creeks, and splotched here and there with a lake.
Henry Peace wiped his brow with first one forearm, then the other. ”I'd give a lot to be safe on the ground,” he muttered.
Tex scowled at him. ”Getting scared?”
”I always have been of planes.”
Old Tex Haven craned his neck and squinted, then began to do something which he rarely did, but which he could do well-curse. He swore steadily, none of his words particularly profane by themselves, but connectively producing a blood-curdling effect. Toward the last, he speeded up until he sounded like a tobacco auctioneer.
A single bullet hit the left wing of the plane. A moment later they saw ahead of the s.h.i.+p tiny stars that seemed to fly as if they were pursued by the craft, red sparks that raced ahead and vanished.
”Tracer bullets!” Tex growled.
Henry Peace took a look backward, said, ”Hey, that plane is catching us! It's faster than we are!”
The other s.h.i.+p overhauled them, got below them. More bullets pounded the craft. Tex banked. The other s.h.i.+p banked also. Tex came up and over in an Immelmann turn, but as the s.h.i.+p turned level at the top of the half loop, the other craft was almost beside them.
”Tarnation!” Tex growled uneasily.
The other pilot could fly.
It became evident in the course of the next two or three minutes that the other s.h.i.+p could fly rings around the foreign craft. They could not outrun them on straightaway, could not outmaneuver them in dog fight.
Henry Peace said, ”If this keeps up, we're gonna be shot to pieces!”
He started for the c.o.c.kpit.