Chapter 10 Jungle Juice; Valiant Old Sea Fighter; Pathfinder; Non-combatants....

JUNGLE JUICE

THINGS were tough all right.

There we were, after two and a half years in the Middle East-and a bare five weeks back in dear old Aussie-dumped in this God-forsaken spot they call New Guinea. The heat was terrific; the flies and mosquitoes never stopped strafing us; and to make things worse, we had nothing to do.

They told us that our stay in Australia had been cut short because we were urgently needed to push the Nip back over the range. Then they shipped us up here, and left us hanging around Moresby for weeks-nothing to do, nowhere to go, and, to cap it all, nothing to drink-except water.

Not that we had anything against water, actually. Water has many uses-such as mixing concrete, running under bridges, and washing clothes. But, as a beverage-ugh! When we thought of the beautiful, cool, foamy beer we had left behind in Sydney, we cursed all wars long and fervently.

Then a whisper got around amongst the boys.

Who the pioneer was, no one seemed to know exactly. But previous form and performance pointed to old Whisky Bill as being the great benefactor of mankind. Anyhow, whoever the discoverer was, it quickly became known that the Fuzzies had a drink-brewed, apparently, from death adders, red-backed spiders and high-octane aero, fuel-which they called "kava". Business with the "black" marketeers became brisk, and numerous and terrific were the headaches that resulted. Each morning saw a long queue of "alcoholic remorse" cases at the R.A.P. and the Army's stocks of aspirin were sadly depleted.

Naturally, the powers-that-be soon caught on. Kava was declared a prohibited beverage.

"Pretty tough," commented Spike. "Over in the desert we were allowed to drink arrack, cognac, alicante - any sort of hooch we could get. And, here in this damned hole where a bloke needs grog to keep him from going Troppo, they tell us we mustn't drink native liquors. Who'd want the lousy stuff if we were put on to the job we came up here to do? Anyhow, they can go to hell for mine-I'll drink whenever I can get it."

Spike found a few sympathizers amongst the more hardened booze artists. But most of us, knowing we had a job ahead of us and that fitness would be our best asset, gave in with a good grace and resigned ourselves to an indefinite drought.

A few days later, just at dusk, four shadowy figures slunk past the cookhouse and disappeared into the scrub. Although the light was tricky it did not need a Sherlock Holmes to recognize Spike and his boon companions, Bluey, Sailor, and Whisky Bill. Nor did it need very keen powers of deduction to make an accurate guess at the business afoot. The quartet made their way warily through the thick growth until they reached the pre-arranged spot where, for a consideration, the local Al Capone had promised to deliver the goods. A few minutes' scratching among the dead leaves at the foot of a large mango-tree revealed four quart bottles of "steam".

With contented sighs the four Diggers settled down for a little steady drinking. But scarcely had the first cork been drawn than Bluey leaned forward in a tense attitude.

"Quiet, fellers," he whispered hoarsely. "I think I can hear some cow following us."

All four strained their ears.

"You're right," ejaculated Spike. "There's someone coming all right."

"Yes," agreed Whisky, "and listen, if that's not the O.C.'s voice I'm a fuzzy wuzzy. Scram! "

Hastily shoving the cork back in the opened bottle, and covering the four quarts again with leaves, they departed for a safer spot. The well known voice of the major could be heard telling someone, apparently another officer, that he knew some of the men were still getting supplies of kava and that he intended making example of anyone he could catch.

The lads lay low until the voice and the footsteps receded, then cautiously made their way back to their "private bar". With a sigh of relief, Sailor hurried to recover the grog, and get down to business. His mates were startled by an unearthly howl from the direction of the mango-tree.

"What's up? Snake?" yelled Bluey.

"The flamin' blanky so-and-so! " roared Sailor. "He's found our plant! The grog's gone! "

A frenzied scratching amongst the dead leaves and sticks soon proved that Sailor's statement was true. For a space of perhaps five minutes, the air turned blue. Many and varied were the threats uttered against the major, the brig, and even General Blamey himself. But they were futile.

"And here's me with a thirst that would ruin a brewery," moaned Spike. "What's to be done now?"

"Go down to the village and see if we can get some more. I've still got a few quid left. Come on, boys." And Whisky Bill led the way out on to the road.

But Al Capone could not be located. After a couple of hours of vain wandering, the boys returned to camp, hot, tired, and still extremely thirsty. They strolled along to where a group of fellows were lounging outside a tent yarning.

Champ had the floor and was apparently "big-noting" himself regarding his prosperous pre-war days.

Now, Champ was known to be stone motherless broke. He had lost all the cash he possessed - and all he had been able to borrow at the swy game a few night before. Yet, here he was, obviously drunk, smelling of kava, and with a suspicious-looking bulge under his shirt.

"What do you think of that?" asked Spike with a meaning glance at Champ. "Looks a bit suspicious to me."

"Just what I was thinking, too," agreed Sailor. "He's the cow that got down on our grog all right. I've a good mind-"

"Hold on a minute." Whisky was plainly puzzled, but was inclined to be fair-minded about it. "Champ couldn't have taken our grog. Why, we were back there only a few minutes after the O.C. left, so what chance did Champ have of finding it?"

"No; that's right. He didn't have much chance. Just the same, I'm a bit suspicious. Where did he get the dough to buy grog?"

"Pull your head in, mate," said Bluey. "We can't 'do him over' unless we're pretty sure it's our grog he's been drinking. Let's join the party."

All four rolled cigarettes and relaxed with the rest of the crowd. Champ had just finished telling the boys of the time he was travelling for a big whisky firm; of the big money he'd earned, and the good times he'd had. "That was about three years before the war," he concluded.

"And what were you doing when you joined up," asked Curly curiously.

"Well," replied Champ in a rather thick voice - the grog was beginning to tell on him, "I wasn't really doing anything just at the time. On holidays, as a matter of fact. I'd just finished a long run on the radio and vaudeville circuit."

"Radio and vaudeville?" Curly's voice sounded incredulous. "Why, I never knew you could sing."

"Sing~ Who said anything about singing; My line was mimics. I can imitate any bird, animal, or human to the life."

"Did you say human?" asked Spike.

"Why, yes--"

No one could really be sure who hit him first: but none of them missed.

L. F. PORTER, SECOND A.I.F.

A VALIANT OLD SEA-FIGHTER

MOORED in a backwater of Sydney Harbour, not far from Cockatoo dockyard and the noise and bustle attending the birth of a new battle-class destroyer, Australia's oldest cruiser lies dying. Salt-streaked, the fire gone from her vitals, H.M.A.S. Adelaide, once a proud unit of our embryo fleet, awaits the end.

She has been stripped of all her fittings, guns plucked by giant cranes, echoing mess decks - where once straw-hatted sailors rolled their tobacco priques - stretch empty and are dappled by reflections playing through her portholes from the quiet water.

But she was not always derelict.

The scene was Cockatoo Island, the year 1917. Gay streamers fluttered from cranes and derricks and ladies with wide-brimmed hats and vivid parasols stepped daintily among rails and winches and barrels of tar. The centre of attraction was a long, slim hull supported by chocks along its length. From its keel, armoured sides reared in steel-hardened strength to the decks which tapered sternwards in steely symmetry.

The scientific skill of scores of Australian workmen went to the building of H.M.A.S. Adelaide and the turbines waiting for her innards were the first built in Australia.

At her bows a lady stood beside a bottle of champagne. Though she may not have realized it, she was the successor of a long line of priestesses who had once named Phoenician ships, bathing them in the red blood of human sacrifice. Nowadays the christening ceremony follows the same lines, the wine doing duty for its prototype.

The bottle swung, the hull hesitated, then amid cheers and hooting of sirens Adelaide slipped at increasing speed into the water that was to know her for so long.

Tugs towed her under cranes in the fitting out basin and there men swarmed over her upper-structure, fitting bridges and guns, guard-rails and boats, until her ugly bareness changed to the stern beauty of the fighting ship.

Her first commanding officer was Captain J. B. Stevenson, C.M.G.

After the usual working-up period of gunnery trials and seamanship evolutions, when her hull had suppled into elasticity, there followed the interesting life of a warship in peacetime. She cruised all over the South Seas. Lotus isles of the tropics knew her; she shivered in low latitudes and her Jack for'ard and white ensign aft made her Australia's seagoing ambassador. It was she who, when natives on Malaita in the Solomons were playing up, landed an armed platoon and brought the miscreant chiefs back to justice.

In 1938 she was altered to bum oil. War was imminent and she was further modified to meet its threat. She lost a funnel, and gained a battery of quick-firing 4-inchers; A.A. close range armament was also increased.

The old ship, staunch as the day she was launched (dockyard workmen today marvel at the strength of her construction) was ready when war broke out.

Soon afterwards she was patrolling off Noumea. The population of New Caledonia were mainly Free French, opposed to the Vichyites, who, however, manned the harbour batteries.

The gunners hastily scanned their lane's Fighting Ships when a 3-funnelled warship appeared outside. The only Australian warships of that distinction were cruisers Australia and Canberra-and these mounted eight 8-inch guns! So without further ado the island surrendered to Adelaide's hand-worked 6-inchers.

Always a good gunnery ship, she was to prove that her guns' age in no way affected their accuracy. In October 1942, the German supply ship Ramses left Japan to run our Indian Ocean blockade with a cargo of urgently needed rubber for Hitler. Adelaide was on patrol there and on 28 November her masthead lookout sighted far ahead two thin masts, like pencils, jutting above the horizon.

Down through the voice-pipes that ran like nerves through her length sped the magic formula: "Enemy in sight! "

Engine-room bells clanged urgently and the sea under her counter bubbled and tossed, then churned until it was like a cauldron of boiling milk. She shook with eagerness to close the range. A hundred feet above decks the foremast shook out its battle ensign in the 20-knot wind of her passage.

This was their first chance to fire an angry shot and guns' crews standing round their open breeches, yellow shells in their arms, stared hopefully at the increasing bulk of the enemy ship ahead.

Then came the order: "Load, load, load."

An instant later the old ship welded so faithfully years before seemed to sob with rage. She jerked under the recoil and before the first broadside landed another was in the air. Around the fleeing German waterspouts stood suddenly upon the sea, with here and there the brief, ugly red of a hit.

She had the range and held it. Soon Ramses was aflame from end to end, and her crew abandoned ship. Closing to pick up survivors, Adelaide's gunners lining the rails were amazed to see a 6-inch gun floating towards them. A line grappled round the breech disclosed it to be made of wood; Ramses had carried dummies to intimidate small war-craft.

Followed a monotonous round of convoy work, including an escort job in support of Australian troops landing on Ambon. That was her last sea-going role. Brought home to Sydney, she was moored and used as a submarine depot ship. Now, years after, her usefulness over, she awaits the end.

The old ship warrants a glance from all sailors, old or young, who pass on their way to their modem war-craft. Rusty, denuded, dirty canvas flapping dismally over the holes where her guns used to be, she still retains an aura of prideful dignity - engendered, perhaps, in the minds of those who knew her by the feelings which every sailor has for his old ship.

She is not wholly naked. Her wardroom furniture still remains. Of beautifully carved maple, tables and cupboards will probably be presented to the City of Adelaide.

These things are all they've left her. Yet even in death she will be heroic, for as the first oxy-acetylene lamp bites into her structure, handled perhaps by a son of the man who had driven home the first rivet in her keel long before, that craftsman will see, as in a vision, the new brave ship that will grow from the memory of the valiant old sea-fighter.

J. E. MACDONNELL, R.A.N.

THE PATHFINDER

IT was one of those slow, green afternoons that came up one behind the other in Kent around June 1943. Over the strip a biscuit sun hosed its warmth into the world and around the skyline a group of fat, white clouds sat lazily with their elbows on their knees, too lazy to chase after the sun. The air tasted of oak and freesias and even the mechanics working on the Lancasters took time to breathe of the ripe, good air.

Flying-Officer Eddie Llewelyn watched the mechanics from a distance. His long back raked up the trunk of an oak that might have been planted in Cromwell's war and a cigarette drooped from his careless lips. He smoked the cigarette without taking his hands from his trouser pockets, which was evidence enough that he was an Australian. On his uniform, under some D.F.C.-coloured fruit-salad, he wore a pathfinder's badge. His gum-green eyes travelled along the line of kites until they rested on A-for-Able.

To Eddie, A-for-Able was as much his property as the scar under his chin, which is not surprising since Eddie and A-for-Able together had pushed aside the night-sky over Europe upwards of twenty-five times.

Yet as he looked at her now, "I wonder," said his thoughts, "who'll be flying you after tonight, baby."

For tonight was Eddie Llewelyn's last bash. Tomorrow he was being posted to a ferry squadron which, since the ferry squadron was booked to fly eight Lancs to Australia, was something that didn't exactly make Eddie fall down and weep.

He finished his cigarette and allowed it to fall from his lips to the turf under his feet. Then, with a sort of whimsical glance at the kite, he turned and walked towards the officers' mess. He walked to the bar and got himself a gin, well-watered.

A group of men were laying bets around a dartboard at one end of the mess and, with a loose grin playing along his lips, he moved towards them.

Someone said: "Hey, Eddie, lay off that stuff. You've got to take us in there tonight."

His grin took itself along into a short, easy laugh. "Don't worry, chum, I got my own special reason for making it quick, good and safe tonight."

Mike Wilson, Eddie's gunner, stopped before he threw a dart.

"Don't rub it in, Eddie." He threw his dart and turned to the others. "Did you hear about Eddie landing the ferry job?"

An unprintable chorus blew up from the group and Eddie took it on the chin. They had all heard about it. Eddie waited until he could get his voice through.

"Anyone got anyone I can look up in Sydney?" he asked.

"You?" Mike said. "Listen, chum, I wouldn't trust you as far as I could see you." He grinned. "Seriously though, kid," he continued, "you had the break coming."

Eddie changed the subject. Walking to a window, he asked: "Anyone got any clues about tonight?"

"Well," a flight-lieutenant put in --it could be Hamburg."

Eddie coughed: "Hamb . . . Hamburg?"

"That's pretty good gen," the flight-lieutenant said.

"Sweet sin," Eddie laughed. "No!"

He kept on laughing for about a minute. Mike Wilson crossed to the window with a quizzical expression on his face.

"What's so funny, Eddie?"

"Funny?" Eddie looked at him. "Nothing. Well that is, nothing yet. But if it's a special place in Hamburg, then everything. Wait till briefing. "

At briefing, the flight-lieutenant's information proved to be the g.g. It was Hamburg all right and no mean bash at that. Eddie was going in as pathfinder with their own squadron and two others behind him. But the thing that made Eddie fight to keep the laughter inside him while the Intelligence officer was talking, was the fact that their target would be Stuccart Steelworks. When he and the crew of A-for-Able climbed into the jeep outside Briefing he let the laughter go.

"Hell," Mike said, "here we go again! Come on, Eddie, unload. What's the Joke"

"My old man."

"What's your old man got to do with anything? "

"Well," Eddie said, "he's got ten thousand lovely quid in Stuccart Steel. He's had the shares since pre-war."

"What!" That was the navigator.

"Hell," said Mike. "You mean we'll be sitting up there watching ten grand of your old man's money go . . ."

Eddie was shaking his head. He couldn't say anything through his laughter.

"Well," the co-pilot said, "from where I sit that doesn't seem so funny. If it was my old man's dough and I was the pathfinder I'd take a side-turning over Berlin."

"Well I guess orders are orders. Even if it was my own dough instead of my dad's I'd have to bash it."

"Yeah," Mike said. "Say Eddie, don't you like your old man?"

Did you say

]fig

Eddie stopped laughing long enough to reply.

"Sure I do. Only he's so tight with his dough. If he was a ghost he wouldn't give you a fright. Maybe this'll cure him. He could have let go the shares just pre-war but he thought he'd be smart. Anyway, someone's going to bomb Stuccart sometime so why shouldn't it be me. I can take him a direct eye-witness report. Anyway, he'll get by without that ten thou." He faced Mike. "You gotta laugh."

So he did. All the way to A-for-Able.

It was before the moon and overhead a million summer stars gushed across the sky like yellow soda. They left the jeep and scrambled into the aircraft. Eddie would be first to take off. The three squadrons were to rendezvous somewhere over France and follow him in. The co-pilot climbed in alongside Eddie and they checked the controls.

As he waited for the duty pilot to come in, Eddie pictured his father's face when he saw him next time-and that wouldn't be long now. There was nothing wrong with the old man, he thought, except that he was always worrying about that "rainy day". As if he need care. He didn't know how much his father had cleared when he sold all that cattle country back in 1930 but he knew it was certainly a pile. Yes, he could picture his father's face when he told him that he had watched three squadrons blasting his ten thousand quid into nothing. Wealthy or not, that represented a lot of money in anybody's language.

The voice of the duty pilot cracked through his head-phones and his thoughts died. The mechanics stood back from the wing and clasped their fists together the way prize fighters do when they've got a decision and Eddie thumbed them.

Soon then it was the lone, great machine screaming down the runway - then it was the low dark hills and the Channel, star-plastered. It was the steady, big thump of her motors like a little bit of the war beating at the doors of Heaven. It was the coastline, dim and far below, France and the border and three hours' flying time. It was Germany down there and Eddie taking over from the co-pilot again and the snap of voices in his ear-phones. It was Mike, the gunner: "Won't be long now,

Eddie. Ten grand! Boy, maybe we should, say a little prayer or something?"

But Eddie wasn't grinning now. He felt tight in the chest and he knew it had nothing to do with his old man's money.

"Kill the corn," he bit back. "You'll be saying prayers if anything gets on our =X'

The navigator cut in. 'Ten minutes, Eddie."

"Okay. Flares, roger"'

"Roger."

"Six minutes."

Six minutes and the ack-ack started. Eddie took her to 8ooo. Usually when he came in on target he was ice-cold and nerveless but tonight he seemed sprung and he knew through his gloves that his hands were sweating plenty. This was his last bash. This was The One. He felt as though he were waiting for something and wondered what it was.

"Bandits at six o'clock!"

Like clockwork, he banked and rolled.

"Nice going, Eddie!" That was Mike.

"Three minutes." That was the navigator.

Three minutes! This was it! He heard the rear gun chewing up lead. Mike was the best tail man in the business. He kept telling himself that. He put her nose at the earth and let her go in a straight lone., line through the barrage of ack-ack. At 1200 feet he pulled her out and shouted: "Okay. Flares!"

"Flares! ... Roger! "

Out they went like bubbles of hot, golden soap bursting apart, lighting up the low humps of Stuccart factories, one after the other, as the kite beat through space at 400 Plus nothing.

And he was out of it.

Climbing to 8ooo and levelling off, he could see the three squadrons now, dark shadows below, shooting over in threes like hungry hounds of the sky, sending them down, 500 pounds a time, to crump redly in the factory area. He saw the fires and the spreading of the fires and he knew the Huns could wipe another steelworks off their industrial map. He felt as though he were breathing for the first time for a long while.

"There it goes," Mike called. "What a show! Ten grand a seat."

And Eddie laughed again. Just as he laughed ten days later when he brought in a brand new Lancaster over the gracious blue of Sydney Harbour, circled Mascot drome, put her nose earthward and came in clean.

His father did not know he was coming. It was impossible for him to analyse his feelings as the R.A.A.F. utility hummed towards town; there were too many of them. This was the place where he was born. This was where he'd drunk his first pink gin, taken his first girl to the pictures for the first time; this was ... home. He felt the hot picks driving behind his eyes as he checked in at R.T.O. and grabbed a taxi.

"Home," he said.

"You don't say~" said the taxi-driver.

He grinned. "Pittwater."

"Okay."

It was a big place with tall, oblong windows facing a stretch of lawn, built on a slope looking down at the sea. He knew it so well. He had seen it in his mind so often in so many parts of the sky. As the cab moved through the trees he waited to see the green stretch of vacant lawn and ... and what Eddie Llewelyn saw he just didn't believe. There just wasn't any lawn any more. At least there was plenty of green grass, but now it was two tennis courts and a midget golf course with slick coloured seats and small, trim tables under the trees, loaded with drinks and biscuits and stuff. In the mild winter sunlight, there were people playing on the courts and near the courts some guys sitting in wheel chairs and leaning on crutches. And, as the cab stopped, an elderly man with white, untidy hair and wearing an open-necked shirt over brown slacks came towards the cab. Like someone in some crazy dream, Eddie climbed from the cab and got ready to say, "I'm sorry, sir. But I used to live here and

"Eddie! "

But no! No, it just couldn't be. Where was that grouchy expression? Where was the tired gouty walk he remembered~ Where was

"Son!"

"Dad! "

He saw his father swallow hard and he saw his father's eyes go very bright and he felt his father's hands on his shoulders. Whatever was said between them was unintelligible. After a while, Eddie heard his own voice- speaking: "Yes, I ... I thought I'd surprise ou. dad. I got a ferry Job."

"This is ... too good to believe. son." His father was talking slowly, searching for words to cover his emotion and Eddie knew that something had changed about his father. "Y'know, for a minute I thought it was that last Scotch."

His father had never looked so healthy before, and so relaxed. And Scotch. That used to be a luxury.

"But ... but come inside, my boy."

He followed his father through the wide entrance into the library. The windows opened on to the courts. Eddie could not keep the questions inside any longer.

"Dad." He waved a hand. "Dad, what is all this? All those people? The courts and everything? "

His father laughed, easier now.

"I was saving that as a surprise, son. They've opened a military hospital up the way a piece. I decided the lawn was going to waste so I put down a few courts and a couple of other things. This goes on most every day now. The patients and nurses enjoy it a lot."

"But dad, that ... that must have cost a packet?"

His father laughed again.

"Well, we're not exactly broke, kid."

For Eddie that was too much. He sat down. He remembered all that laughing about the ten grand. He decided to get it off his chest right away.

"Dad," he said, very slowly, "talking about money. Remember that ten thousand you've got in Stuccart Steel?"

The laugh steered itself into a broad, white smile.

"You're wrong there, son. I haven't got any money in Stuccart Steel."

"You haven't?

"No."

"But ...

"You have."

"I ?"

"Yes. I made it over to you about six months back."

The room was spinning round and round. Eddie closed his eyes. He could see the bombers following him in. He could see the fire on the ground. Ten grand! His own ten grand!

"Dad," he choked, "you said something about Scotch . . ."

DICK WORDLEY, R.A.A.F.

NON-COMBATANTS

LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER Bailey, R.A.N., climbed from the launch to the deck of the little cargo steamer anchored just off shore. No one saluted him as he stepped aboard. Indeed, in the organized bustle of preparing for sea his arrival appeared to pass completely unnoticed. Seamen moved about the lower deck lowering and stowing cargo gear, hosing down and securing the hatch covers. On the fo'c'sle head the mate was supervising the business of heaving up anchor while up on the bridge a stout, florid-faced old man rested both elbows on the dodger and watched the proceedings with a detached, almost fatherly interest as he puffed leisurely at his pipe.

"Better come up here, commander," the old fellow called. "Bring your gear with you."

Dodging under a swinging boom the naval man made his way aft and climbed to the bridge. Addressing the broad back he said:

"Good afternoon, captain. My name's Bailey. I'm making the trip south with you, as far as Buna."

Captain Simms swung slowly round. He was dressed in a khaki shirt and a pair of grey flannel trousers held up by white braces. His feet were thrust into a pair of ancient leather slippers and a battered felt hat covered his thatch of stiff white hair. Here, in a world of uniformed youth only a few miles from the actual front line, this white-haired old man seemed strangely out of place.

Below a pair of bushy white eyebrows his blue eyes smiled a greeting.

"Glad to have you with us, commander," he said. "You're our only passenger this trip. Make yourself at home while we get under way."

During the next few minutes the naval man watched the proceedings with interest. For him it was an entirely new experience. As a professional seaman, brought up in the Navy, he'd put in a good many years afloat in destroyers, cruisers and battleships. He had travelled as a passenger in big liners but he'd never sailed in a small cargo ship.

There was no naval discipline here, no distinguishing badges of rank, and yet this quiet, queerly dressed old man got his ship to sea without fuss or shouting of orders. He gave the necessary commands quietly and they were executed promptly, for this man and his entire crew were professional seamen carrying out their ordinary peacetime jobs under the trying conditions of war. Beyond increasing the dangers of their trade and carrying them into strange ports the war had made little difference to their way of living. As Captain Simms remarked to his passenger:

"We're non-combatants, peaceful citizens. You people supply us with guns and gunners, you order us around and tell us where we've got to go but you don't make a hell of a lot of difference to our lives. It's our job to deliver cargoes and keep out of trouble."

The naval man smiled and said, "Not always easy on this coast, I should think, captain."

"No," Captain Simms admitted. "Still, we've been pretty lucky. No casualties up to date."

"What happens if your gunners get knocked out?"

"Oh, most of the crew can handle the guns. Mr. Morgan, my first mate, puts 'em through their paces whenever he gets a chance. He's a bit of an enthusiast on gunnery and it helps to keep the hands occupied."

By the time they cleared the port of Finschhafen and shaped a course for Buna Lieutenant-Commander Bailey had formed a genuine admiration for Captain Simms. He liked the look of young Jimmy Browning, the second mate, a tall alert young man. A pity he's not in the Navy, he reflected. He's our type and he's wasted here.

Jimmy Browning did not consider himself wasted in his present job. It was his life and he hoped to command a liner some day.

At sundown Mr. Morgan, the first mate, came up and relieved the watch. He was a plain-featured stockily-built man in his early forties, a rough uneducated sailor who had been at sea since he was fifteen years of age. By hard study and painstaking attention to detail he had passed his Board of Trade examinations and risen from the fo'c'sle to his present position. Since his ship had been sent to the combat zone he had learned something of gunnery, for in his painstaking way he reasoned, "You never know when it might come in handy." In his working rig of khaki shirt and shorts Mr. Morgan looked hard and muscular. His hands were broad and calloused -the hands of a worker-and the muscles stood out on the calves of his legs and along his tanned forearms.

"She's going south-twelve-west," Jimmy Browning reported. "It's dashed warm this evening, isn't it~"

Mr. Morgan nodded. Conversation was not his strong point. "It's always hot on this flamin' coast," he agreed after a while.

Lieutenant-Commander Bailey glanced at the mate's muscular figure and turned to Captain Simms with a grin. "The non-combatant with a taste for gunnery, I take it," he remarked.

Jimmy leaned over the dodger and lit a cigarette. The bridge was the coolest place on the ship this evening and he was loath to leave it for the clammy heat of his cabin.

The sun slid below the mountains on the New Guinea coast leaving a vivid afterglow that tinged the calm surface of the sea with yellow, and, except for a small purple cloud that rested on a mountain top, the sky was clear. The gunner of the watch was making a casual survey of the sky while he leisurely wiped the breech mechanism of one of the guns with an oily rag.

On the fo'c'sle head a seaman was taking in his washing while several others sat listening to a greaser's rendering of "Rose Marie" on a mouth organ. He played well and the notes drifting up to the bridge sounded sweetly soothing. The wet decks, clean and freshly scrubbed after the day's cargo work, glistened in the evening light and everything was peaceful; a tidy little ship plodding slowly over the surface of a calm, peaceful sea.

The gunner put away his rag and picked up his field glasses. He did it slowly and casually more as something to fill in the time than as a necessary duty. There was no need to hurry, no need to use the glasses at all. He focused them on two specks high up and away out towards the land, two tiny specks - black against the yellow of the sky. Planes. Nothing unusual about that. He'd seen scores of them in the last two days, had seldom been our of sight of them. But they were all ours. They certainly must be giving the Nips a plastering.

Mr. Morgan saw the planes too. He lifted the binoculars hanging from the strap round his neck and focused them on the two specks. He did it as a matter of routine. The planes were too high up and too far away to identify and in any case he never could tell one plane from another. Ships were different. He could recognize any ship as soon as he saw her, but to him all planes looked alike.

It was his movement that drew Captain Simms's attention. Quite casually the Old Man reached for the ship's glasses in their pocket on the rail. He had just lifted them out when the naval man grabbed his arm. Bailey had spotted the planes just as Morgan did and was watching them intently.

"Good God, skipper!" he jerked out. "They're not ours! They're heading straight over this way."

Captain Simms did not wait to question the statement. He stepped back and jerked the whistle cord several times.

"Whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop," went the siren.

The group on the fo'c'sle head broke up and the men scuttled aft like startled rabbits. The gunners came racing up the ladders; the two mates dived into the wheelhouse and emerged with tin hats. The naval man had taken the ship's glasses and was studying the still minute planes.

"What do you make of them, commander?" Captain Simms asked.

"I can't make anything of 'em yet, skipper, but I don't like the look of 'em. Our planes wouldn't be heading out this way. It's not on their course to anywhere ... I say, you haven't got a spare tin hat, have you?"

"In the wheelhouse," the Old Man said. "Take mine. I never use 'em. Can't stand the feel of 'em."

The atmosphere had changed from one of peace and indolence to a tenseness that could be felt. The naval man was adjusting the chinstrap of his tin hat and scowling upwards at the planes. Gunners were fidgeting nervously with the handgrips of their guns, Jimmy's eyes kept switching from the planes to the gunners, and Morgan, for some unknown reason, was tightening up his belt.

Only the Old Man, still smoking his pipe, seemed unaffected.

"They're Japs! " Morgan shouted suddenly. "Hear 'em! "

Above the throbbing of the ship's engines the men on the bridge caught the faint pulsating drone that characterized the Jap planes. They were high, too high for positive identification and still well out of range of the ship's fight armament.

"They're Japs all right," the naval man agreed but his voice was drowned by the stammer of guns as each gunner tested his gun with a few rounds. The crash of gunfire broke into that tense atmosphere with a suddenness that jarred keyed-up nerves. Bailey ducked slightly and quickly straightened himself. Jimmy jumped and crashed against a steel stanchion, knocking his tin hat to the deck. He bent, blushing furiously, to pick it up and Morgan laughed, a hollow foolish laugh with no mirth in it.

The tracers from the ship's guns leaped upwards, glowed red against the pale yellow sky and faded long before they reached the planes.

Someone ran up the bridge ladder with a clatter of heavy boots, paused for a moment, and then hurled himself flat on deck near the

WERE 1948

port gun just as the first stick of bombs shrieked down.

The Old Man roared, "Hard a'port!" And then, "Down everyone!"

There was no need for the second order. With the exception of Captain Simms standing by the telegraph, and the helmsman in the armour-plated wheelhouse behind him, everyone had thrown himself flat on deck at the first faint whistle of bombs.

Why the first plane had released his bombs from that height was a mystery to all of them.

Except by a sheer fluke he could not hope to score a hit or even do any damage. The only satisfaction he could get was the certain knowledge that he had seared every man on board. Not till long afterwards did the men on the bridge realize the cunning of the whole attack.

As it screams down, a bomb that will land several hundred yards away sounds as if it is hurtling straight for the back of your own unprotected neck. Jimmy afterwards remembered hunching his shoulders as some sort of a protection. The bombs landed harmlessly far out to starboard and astern.

But the Old Man was watching the second plane. Even before the bombs exploded he saw him coming, swooping downwards in a screaming dive.

He yelled, "Hard a'starb'd! Watch that second plane, gunners!"

Straight for the ship he came, hurtling down through endless streams of fiery tracers, the scream of his dive now drowned by the hammering, clattering roar of the four guns blazing at this ever-growing target. Not until it seemed as if he must crash on the ship did he pull out of the dive.

He banked and roared upwards almost at the same instant as his bombs exploded. They landed somewhere for'ard; it was impossible to see where for the violence of the explosions flung the ship over, almost on her beam ends, and hurled up great fountains of water that deluged the men on the bridge. Streams of empty shell cases clattered noisily down the sloping decks, sliding men grabbed wildly for some support and, while the gunners were still struggling to regain their balance, the first plane came roaring back.

He was low enough this time and still diving, thundering straight for the ship with guns blazing. Bullets whipped up the water ahead, spattered along the decks, clanged noisily against the wheelhouse and funnel casing; and then, with a whim*ng snarl, the plane roared over the masthead and was gone before a single gun had been trained on it. Someone, it must have been the gunner on the starb'd -5o-yelled, "The Oerlikon's out! Stan's hit!"

Mr. Morgan jumped to his feet. He shouted "Come on Jimmy!" and raced aft to where the Oerlikon gunner was hanging limply in the supporting belt. He dragged the gunner free, let him fall with a thud on deck and sprang over him to the gun. Jimmy unhooked the belt and passed it quickly round the mate's back.

"Watch out astern! Astern! " he yelled as he snapped the belt shut.

With his shoulders pressed against the curved shoulder pieces and his back supported by the heavy belt, Mr. Morgan swung the gun around. The second plane was banking steeply and coming back at them from astern.

"Fire ahead of him! Fire ahead of him!" Jimmy screamed.

"Mind your own business." The mate's voice

was drowned as the gun burst into a roar and scattered tracers all over the sky.

The plane had straightened out now and was coming straight for them, but the tracers were flying everywhere. Jimmy glanced agonizedly from the wild shooting to the gunner alongside him. Mr. Morgan had braced his elbows on the supporting belt now and had the bucking gun under control. He
shuddered and shook with the rapid vibrations of it until it seemed as if his head must snap off. The heavy jaw muscles were tensed, standing white against the tan of his face, as he strove to control the mechanical monster to which he was strapped.

The bullets were striking the water ahead of the plane now, kicking up a fairly concentrated line of spray. Smaller tracers from the other guns behind them were flitting past, too, but they were all too high-too high. Jimmy strove by sheer will-power to wish them down to that roaring target.

It was the Oerlikon that got the Jap. There was not the slightest doubt of that. The other three guns combined had not the explosive hitting power of this gun. Straight into the Oerlikon's stream of tracers he flew, his own guns blazing back as he came.

Bullets zipped along the deck, spanged and snarled with the whining buzz of ricochets; a cannon shell exploded against the funnel but Jimmy heard none of them. He saw the Oerlikon's shells exploding on the Jap's port engine and on the leading edge of his wing just before the whole wing crumpled up and the plane swerved and crashed head on into the sea.

He yelled, "Got him! Got the --!" but the hot gun muzzle swung round, almost knocking him off his feet, and a voice was yelling louder still, "Ammo, you fool! More ammo! Put another drum on. Where's the other plane?"

But the other plane had had enough. He was well away now, climbing rapidly and disappearing into the darkening sky.

"He's gone! He's chucked it in! Cripes, Jack, we got the other bloke! You beaut! You little beaut! " Jimmy was excitedly thumping Mr. Morgan on the back and pointing io the tail fin of the slowly sinking plane.

The "little beaut" undid the supporting belt and irritably knocked Jimmy's hand aside.

"Cut out the back thumping," he snapped.

"You're as rough on a bloke as that flamin' gun." And then, catching the infection himself, he brought a hand down with a thud on Jimmy's shoulder. "Whacko, Jimmy!" he yelled. "Are we any good?"

For a moment the two men stood staring at the spot where the plane had disappeared. Then the older man pulled himself together and bent down over the body of the gunner. The man lay just where the mate had dropped him and it needed no close examination to see that he was dead. A heavy calibre bullet or small shell had gone clean through his chest, striking downwards and leaving a wound that was not nice to look at. Jimmy looked from the dead man to the pool of blood and shuddered. Much of it was trampled all round the gun platform, his own doing, too, he saw, glancing down at his shoes.

Mr. Morgan stood un and grabbed him. roughly by the arm. "Come on," he said. "Let's get back to the bridge. We can't do anything here. He's dead."

Captain Simms and a seaman were bending over Lieutenant-Commander Bailey when they got there. The naval man was sitting with his back to the -whe4ouse helping with the bandaging of his own leg. One leg of his trousers had been hacked off with a knife and there was quite a lot of blood about. The wounded man was grinning how-, ever and he waved cheerfully to the two mates.

"Nice work," he called. "Congratulations. For a pair of non-combatants that was a darned good show. Nice shooting, mister mate. Nice shooting."

"STANDBY" (R. S. PORTEOUS), MERCHANT NAVY