Suddenly, though not unexpectedly, the captain had told Taishi to get into action as arranged. Taishi spoke through the intercom headphones, and O'Herlihy sat down. The Japanese revved the motors and they headed up-River into the wind. It was a long takeoff, since they were carrying ten rockets, each with a hundred-pound warhead, under the wings and a torpedo under the fuselage. This was electrically driven and carried seven hundred pounds of cordite in its head.
At last, the big craft left the surface. Taishi waited until they were fifty feet up and pressed the pontoon release button. The gear and the two large pontoons fell off, and the machine picked up speed.
O'Herlihy, looking back and upward, saw the four fighter planes fall and crash, but he did not tell Taishi. The pilot was too busy turning the machine toward the left bank, keeping it at a low altitude. He flew it between two rock spires just above the topmost wooden bridges. The plan was to skim across the top of the trees and, where possible, fly between the hills. Once they got close to the mountains, they would turn downwind. Still keeping close to the treetops, they would fly along the mountains. Then they would wheel right and shoot across the hills and come down just above the bamboo complexes. And they would strike at the Not For Hire which would be broadside to them.
Taishi knew that Clemens' radar had picked them up the moment they left The River. But he hoped to elude it until he appeared suddenly from behind the hills.
The noncom had been trying to get Sam Clemens' attention for a minute. The captain, however, seemed not to hear him. He was standing up by the chair now, a burning cigar in his mouth, his eyes filmed with tears. He was murmuring, over and over, "Georges! Bill!"
Joe Miller stood near him. The titanthrop was clad in battle armor, a steel helmet with a heavy wire basket over the face, a sausage-shaped extension to guard his nose, a chain-mail shirt, fishskin leather gloves, plastic loin protection, and aluminum thigh and shin guards. In his mammoth right hand was the shaft of a double-bladed steel axe-head weighing one hundred pounds.
Joe's eyes were moist also.
"They vath nithe guyth," he rumbled.
"Captain!" the noncom said. "Radar says a big plane has taken off from the Rex!"
Sam said, "What?"
"A two-motored plane, pontoon type, has taken off. Radar reports that it's heading for the north."
Sam came to full attention then. "North? Why the hell... ? Oh! It's going to swing around and try to catch us broadside!"
He yelled at the others to get below. In a minute he had scrambled down the ladder onto the bridge. He shouted at the executive officer, John Byron.
"Did you order the Goose to take off?"
Byron said, "Yes, sir. The moment radar spotted their torpedo plane leaving! They broke the agreement!"
"Good man," Sam said. He looked out the port window. The Goose, a big twin-motored torpedo plane, was past the boat, heading into the window. Even as he caught sight of it, it lifted, water falling from the white pontoons. A minute later, the two pontoons fell, struck The River, glanced upward and ahead, then fell, were caught by the current, and drifted away.
"Battle stations!" Clemens said.
Byron punched a button. Sirens began howling, but the crowd on the decks had already started toward its posts.
"Full speed ahead!"
Detweiller, sitting in the pilot's chair, pushed his two control sticks as far as they would go. The giant electrical motors began turning; the huge paddle wheels attached to them dug into the water. The boat almost seemed to leap forward.
"That's a smart trick old John's pulled," Clemens said. "Radio the Goose and tell them to come in on the Rex's broadside."
Byron hastened to obey. Sam turned to de Marbot. The little fellow wore a coal-scuttle helmet of duraluminum, a chain-mail shirt and kilt, and leather jackboots. A leather belt held a holster in which a Mark IV pistol was couched and a scabbard in which a cutlass was sheathed.
"Tell your men to bring up the SW," he said. "On the double!"
The Frenchman punched a button which would put him on the intercom to the storage room.
"Is the enemy plane still on the radar?" he said to the operator.
"Not at the moment," Schindler replied. "It's behind the hills, too close to the mountains."
"It'll come hellbent for election right over the tops of the trees," Clemens said. "We won't have much time."
De Marbot gave a groan. Clemens looked at his pale face and said, "What is it?"
"I don't know," de Marbot said. "I heard something that sounded like an explosion! The line's dead! Nobody answers!"
Sam could feel himself turning gray. "Oh, my God! An explosion! Get down there, find out what's going on!"
Byron was by another intercom on the bulkhead. He said, "Station 25 reports an explosion in Station 26."
The Frenchman stepped into the elevator and was gone.
"Sir, there's the enemy plane!" the radar operator said. "On the port bank, just above the structures, coming in between those two rock spires."
Sam ran to the window and looked out. The sun flashed on the silver-and-blue-streaked nose of an aircraft.
"Coming like a bat out of hell!"
He gripped the ledge, forced himself to be calm, and turned. But Byron had sent word down. It wasn't needed, since the attacker was visible.
"Hold your fire until the attacker is five hundred yards distant," Byron said. "Then fire the rockets. Cannons and small arms, wait until it's within two hundred and fifty yards."
"I shouldn't have waited," Sam muttered. "I should have brought the laser out as soon as those boys took off. It could slice that plane in half before it launched the torpedo."
One more regret in a lifetime of regrets.
And just what in blue blazes happened down there?
"Here it cometh!" Joe Miller said.
The torpedo plane had dipped down past the bridges running along the edge of the hills. Now it was skimming the grass of the plains. Whoever the pilot was, he was handling his big heavy machine as if it were a one-seater fighter.
Events happened fast after that. The plane was going at least 150 miles per hour. Once it reached The River, it would have a mile to go to its target. But it would release the torpedo within six hundred feet. Closer, if the pilot was daring. The nearer the release, the less chance for the Not For Hire to evade the missile.
It would have been better if the boat were to turn prow-on and so present a smaller target. But to do this would cut the defense fire to a minimum.
Sam waited. The moment that the silvery weapon of destruction was loosed from its carrier, he would give the order to Detweiller to swing the boat around. The plane would be a lesser menace then. In any event, if it survived the hail of fire, it would be getting to hell out.
"Five hundred yards," Byron said, reading the radarscope over its operator's shoulder. He spoke into the intercom linked with the batteries. "Fire the rockets!"
Twenty silvery cone-tipped cylinders, spouting flame from their tails, sprang like cats at a feline convention after a lone mouse.
The pilot had the reflexes of a cat, too. Twelve rockets, smaller than those hurled at him, sprang from below his wings. The two flights met in three battings of an eye and went up in flame surrounded by smoke. Immediately after, the plane bored through the clouds. Now it was so close to The River that it seemed the waves would snap its bottom.
"Fire the second battery of rockets!" Byron yelled. "Fire cannons and small arms!"
Another flight of missiles arced out. The steam machine guns hosed a stream of ,80-caliber plastic bullets. The 88-millimeter cannon on the port side bellowed, spouting flame and gray clouds. The marines, stationed between the heavy platforms, fired their rifles.