yes, the aircraft fuselage was lying on the ground instead of sitting on its landing gear.
Engine noise broke the silence. The soldier checked the sky, ready to run, then apparently changed his mind and resumed his slow pace toward the cockpit. Now Frank could see his eyes. Finally he stepped on the stump of the left wing and gazed through the shattered canopy at the trapped man. A grin exposed yellow, broken teeth.
The pistol in Frank’s lap exploded and the man fell backward with a look of wide-eyed astonishment.
The pistol was gone. The weapon’s recoil had been too much for his weak grasp. He waited for the soldier to rise. Every breath hurt now.
Maybe the soldier was dead.
Frank tilted his head forward and looked for the pistol. It must have gone down through the narrow gap between the seat and the right-side panel.
There was less than a half-inch clearance between the front of the seat and the forward panel.
You silly shit, Frank. You should have shot yourself!
He heard several Skyraiders sweep over with their engines at full throttle and the distant roar of twenty-three millimeters. In a moment he heard the muffled whoosh of napalm lighting off.
The radio! His emergency radio was in his vest. He got his good hand up to his vest and tugged at the zipper. He was so weak he could not move it.
Unable to keep his hand elevated he sat back and listened to the thudding of his heart. Finally he tried again. This time he managed to open the zipper and reach the radio.
Tears were flowing into his eyes from the pain. He ground his teeth together and tried to blink away the tears.
God! It hurt so much!
His breathing was shallow and rapid and every heave of his chest seemed to grind something down inside him.
Unable to lift the radio to his lips, he squeezed the mike and tried to speak. “Sandy One.” It came out a hoarse whisper, and the effort sent another flaming spear through him.
“Sandy One, are you okay? Are you out of the cockpit?”
Steeling himself, he squeezed the transmit button and lifted the radio a few inches toward his lips. “No.”
He breathed again. “I’m trapped, and I’m finished.”
“Hang tough, Frank. The Jolly Greens will be here in about half an hour. We’re going to hose the area, then we’ll get you out.
Keep the faith.” Tears coursed down Frank Allen’s cheeks. Bartlett was a terrible liar. He can’t call in the Jollys until this valley is worked over good. It could take hours.
“I can’t make it, Bob…. Help me now.”
“You’ve got to hang in there, Frank. We’ll keep them off you until the Jollys arrive.”
“I’d do it myself, Bob … but I can’t. Christ Bob … I’d do the same for you …. The exertion cost him too much. His hand fell back into his lap.
He was biting his lip now and blood from that wound mixed with the blood still trickling down from his forehead.
A low moan tore itself loose from deep inside him and escaped his lips.
Oh God! Jesus I have sinned. Ha Mary Mother of God Oh Jesus I am torn apart and you’ll died for me and I confess my sins and beg your forgiveness and Hail Mary Mother of God stop the pain …
He heard the roar of a big radial engine over his screams, and he saw the Skyraider just above the sun. He saw the sun shimmer on the prop arc, and he saw the twinkles of the muzzle flashes on the front of the wings. Then the darkness came.
TWENTY-SIX
Jake Grafton lay on the ground, curled up around the radio.
He had heard it all: the pleading and the moaning, the long rolling thunder of the twenties, an the stark, terminal silence. A man had died for him.
The distant whine of jet engines penetrated his consciousness. On they came, louder and louder. The jets flayed the jungle with a steel whip. Cannon she lashed and tore, and bombs exploded and rockets swooshed, and the crack of twenty-three-millimeter antiaircraft guns pulsated through the trees.
Occasionally the crackling of napalm reached him. Jake lost track of time as the concussions pounded around him In his soul he continued to hear the last words of the Skyraider pilot. The pitiful pleading branded him in way that nothing else had yet in his life.
He waited there in the dirt with the stench of the jungle humus seeping through his shattered nose. The antiaircraft guns fell silent as, Jake imagined, their crews died under the storm of fire and steel. Eventually even the ripsaw roar of the twenties faded as the airborne marksmen discovered they had run out of targets.
Jake turned his head and looked at Tiger Cole, who lay exactly in the same position in which Jake had found him, but that big chest still rose and fell. There was a fighting heart.
“Jake?” Tiger’s voice was a croak. The pilot got up on his good knee so the bombardier could see him. “There was nothing you could have done for that guy, Jake, except what his friend did for him.”
“You heard?”
“Yeah.”
“I was scared,” Jake confessed and buried his face in his hands. He looked at Cole again. “I wish I could’ve gone. No man should have to die alone.” Jake clutched Tiger’s arm.
Tiger spoke softly. “I know what scared is.” He paused and breathed awhile. “I could never be a pilot because I’m scared of the boat. I wouldn’t be able to pull the power back or drop the nose.” He blinked rapidly. “I’m scared now.”
“We’ll get out,” Grafton said with no conviction.
“Damn you, Grafton. God damn you! He died trying to help us.” Exhausted, he closed his eyes. When he opened them he said, “Look at that blue sky up there. You can see little pieces of it through the leaves.”
Cole’s eyes came back to Jake. “You ought to get out. I’ve come far enough. I don’t want to live in a wheelchair for forty years. I want to die here. I want you to”
“Devil,” the radio interrupted “we have three or four bad guys heading your way. They just ran across the road and apparently they’ve seen the chute.
They’ll be there before we can make a pass. Better take cover if you can.
“Roger,” Jake said softly into the mike. He coiled, dropped the radio, and searched the brush in all directions.
“Get out of here,” Tiger Cole insisted. “I’m done for. Go! Get moving!”
The revolver seemed to leap into Jake’s hand of its own volition. He scanned the trees in the direction of the road. The bombardier’s urgings resounded in his ears. He straightened up and backed away from Cole then turned and ran. He had not gone very far before he fell.
Facedown in the undergrowth, he was overwhelmed with panic. He scrambled to his feet and lunge forward. Forty yards later he fell again. This time he stayed down.
What are you doing? How will you ever live with this? The Spad driver was finished but Cole isn’t. You’re all he has to get him onto that chopper and out of here. He wants you to make it, even if it costs him his life. He’s kept the faith.
The panic left him and he felt in its place a calmness. He was certain of one thing: he would rather die than leave Tiger Cole.
He got to his feet and took out both weapons. He pulled back the slide on the automatic just enough to see the gleam of brass in the chamber, then he clicked the safety on. He placed it in his right hand with his thumb on the safety lever. He reviewed the times he had fired an automatic, remembering how quickly it could be brought into action if you slipped the safety off with your thumb as you squeezed the trigger.
He held the .357 Magnum revolver in his left hand with the hammer down. Not yet.
