When the door slammed Johnson said to Felix, “Those two are always a little behind everybody else. They’ll be flying right-seat in the transports when we go to war. I suppose they know that-maybe that’s the way they want it. Not everybody wants to be a stupid hero.” He grinned at Felix and slid the cigarette pack out of his shoulder pocket.
The two pilots reappeared out of breath and still shouldering into their leather jackets and Johnson made a circular motion overhead with his cigarette. They all gathered around him.
“We’re going to stations six minutes from now. The mission is the same as it was two days ago. But this time your targets will be moving.”
One of the pilots said, “What about the drivers?”
“No drivers for Christ’s sake. The steering wheels are tied to go in something that’ll approximate a straight line and they’re tying bricks on the accelerator pedals. They’ll be moving about thirty miles an hour across the meadow. The ones you miss will crash into the trees and that’ll be a hell of a waste, won’t it. So don’t miss any.”
“How many in each cluster, sir?”
“That’ll be for you to determine when you get there.” Johnson gave them all his wicked grin. “Maybe one of them, maybe five. It’s your job to stop every one of them before it gets across the meadow.”
The four of them got out of the shuttle van and stood momentarily under the wing in the rain: Felix and Pappy Johnson and Ulyanov, who would fly as engineer this flight, and Chujoy the bombardier. Felix turned his collar up and went around the outside of the airplane: he kicked the tires, he did a visual inspection of the nacelles and control surfaces. Finally Felix nodded and Ulyanov opened the forward hatch and they chinned themselves into the bomber.
It took seven minutes to go through the preflight check-the final line inspection before starting engines. It was a chore many pilots left to their copilots but Felix wanted to know the exact condition of the plane he was going to fly. It was a habit he’d drilled into himself with racing cars: more than once he’d detected a defective tie rod or brake cylinder that way.
He handed the clipboard to Pappy Johnson and his eyes searched the crowded instrument panel once more and then he put the control yoke in his hands and planted his feet on the rudder pedals and… She’s mine.
Through the windscreen he watched the tower-barely visible in the fine rain-and finally he saw the double red flare go up: Start Engines.
“Mesh one… Mesh two…”
Pappy Johnson’s fingers sped over the toggles and buttons. Out the side screens Felix watched the oil-smoke chug from the exhausts, the props begin to turn. He swiveled his attention to the starboard side. “Mesh three… Mesh four.”
“Jigsaw Flight-go to stations.” That was the tower.
There were no runway lights. He saw Calhoun walking away dragging the chocks in the gloom; he taxied around in a tight circle and went bumping along toward the end of the runway.
He stood on the brakes and ran up each engine in turn-watching the gauges, using his ears. Inside him he felt the thrill he’d never lost in a thousand takeoffs: the Icarian desire to climb high, detached and free.
The green flare went up. He stood hard on both brakes. “Military power.”
Johnson thrust the four throttle handles forward. The rpm’s yelled at him, reaching 2700 and the plane quivered like a hound straining on a leash. Manifold pressure fifty inches… He let go the brakes and she burst forward, fishtailing a little until he steadied her.
He had to lift off within twenty-five seconds after reaching full power. The panel clock gave him eighteen seconds and the airspeed indicator gave him 75 knots; the tail wheel lifted off.
Pappy Johnson reached out and chopped the number-two throttle dead.
With the number-two prop feathered the imbalance of power wanted to slew her around to starboard and he had to stand on the left-hand rudder pedal.
Twenty-four seconds. He pushed the yoke forward. To hold her on the ground. Airspeed 80… 85… Twenty-eight seconds…
Ninety knots. He hauled back on the yoke.
She lifted off the ground and instantly he snapped, “Gear up! ”
Johnson hit the gear lever as if it were an enemy’s jaw. There was the fast whine of the gear-retraction motors and he felt the added lift when the drag of the wheels had been removed: 110 knots now and he banked to clear the phone cables.
He had 300 feet and she was climbing smoothly on three engines; he reduced to 2,600 rpm and forty inches of manifold pressure and climbed at 115 knots toward the planned cruising altitude of 4,000 feet. He cut the mixtures back, trimmed the controls, retracted the flaps and heard the flap-actuating motors grind.
After a while Johnson pressed the button on his control wheel to be heard on the intercom. Felix heard his mild voice: “Try eight thousand this time. Maybe we can bust through the soup.”
“May I have my engine back now?”
“No. We’ll fly the mission on three.”
“One experience with a teacher like you would be enough to make most pilots travel by railroad the rest of their lives.”
Johnson pushed the throat mike aside. “If I hadn’t thought you could handle it I wouldn’t have done it. Would I now?”
The plane burst through ten-tenths into brass sunlight. White cloud-tops rolled away to the horizons like a vast sea.
He set his controls to cruise at 165 knots at 8,000 feet. The other two planes caught up and took station behind him and to his right.
“Give us a course.”
Ulyanov already had it for him. Felix fed the information into the autopilot and spent the next half-minute adjusting the trim with the button until he liked the sound and feel of it.
Ulyanov said, “We’ll have to dead-reckon down to the target area.”
He checked the instruments. Head temps 210°. Airspeed okay. Artificial horizon level and steady. Pressures and rpm’s okay: in synch.
He took his hands off the controls and that was when it hit him. The cold sweat burst out all over his body.
“Jigsaw One to Jigsaw Flight. Acknowledge.”
“Jigsaw Two. I read you clear, Troop Leader.”
“Affirmative.”
“Jigsaw Three. Read you very well. What’s wrong with your engine?”
“Pappy’s amusing himself. Keep your receivers open. Eight minutes to descent. Out.”
The eight minutes went by too quickly and then he had to put the nose down and it took an effort of will. He had always competed in speed sports in which you could see what you were doing. Now he had to descend blind.
He tried to make light of it: “What if someone’s put a mountain in one of those clouds?”
“You’ve been here before.”
“Ulyanov, what’s my course?”
“Dead ahead sir.”
“You’d better be right.”
“Yes sir. I know.”
There was a crag somewhere to starboard that spired to nearly 3,000 feet. At least he hoped it was to starboard. He watched the clock. Ten seconds… five… Nose down.
The heavy plane mushed down through the weather bank and he couldn’t see a thing. Pappy Johnson said, “This stuff may be very close to the ground. You’ll have to come in right on the deck. Just be sure you keep your feet inside.”
The target zone was a meadow on top of a long ridge. At its highest point it had an elevation of 876 feet above mean sea level. The idea was to attack from exactly 1,000 feet altimeter-124 feet above the ground. In theory it made the targets easy to hit but in practice the ground turbulence made it pure hell. Cool air sank into the deeper shadows and warmer air lifted from the pale places. The aircraft bucketed and pitched like a racing car with a flat tire.
Johnson said, “You trying to scramble the eggs I ate this morning? Don’t tense up.”
“I can’t see where I’m going.”
“I know. Keep your nose down-keep on the rails.”
Felix dragged the back of his hand across his mouth.