Between The Hunters And The Hunted

by Steven Wilson

Genres: Thrillers

Synopsis

From Steven Wilson, whose gripping debut, Voyage of the Gray Wolves, was hailed as "a taut, suspenseful, engaging, and frightening saltwater thriller"* comes a story of the world at war, of two countries bound together by hope--and the common foe that could destroy that hope in one devastating strike. . . In the early days of World War II, Great Britain is fighting for its life. With the Nazi Luftwaffe and U-boat wolfpacks bearing down, they've never needed America more. In secret, Winston Churchill travels by sea to Newfoundland to meet with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. When the Nazis learn of the meeting, they deploy their greatest weapon--the Sea Lion, a juggernaut even more dangerous than the sunken Bismark. Its sole mission--track and destroy Churchill's convoy. But in the prime minister's protective Naval cordon is the HMS Firedancer, commanded by Captain George Hardy. A veteran of too many hard-fought battles, Hardy struggles to balance duty and honor against the destruction he has wrought in the service of his country. But his most daunting task is still to come. Now, in the merciless North Atlantic, the pride of the Nazi fleet will confront the defiant might of the Allies--with the fate of the war lying in the hands of the victor. . . "A gripping, superbly told story of war at sea." --Peter Sasgen, author of War Plan Red

Release date: August 15, 2012

Publisher: Pinnacle Books

Print pages: 448

Sample

Warm Springs, Georgia, 3 July 1941

Louis Hoffman walked up the slight grassy knoll leading to the large swimming pool, removing his sweat-drenched jacket and undoing his tie. He’d already unbuttoned his vest and taken off his battered hat, but it was still too damned hot for a civilized man to be out in this uncivilized country. His suit, which always looked as if he slept in it, was as limp as the damp hair that plastered the back of his neck.

Hoffman was irritated, which was a natural state of affairs for the diminutive aid to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He was hot and he was disgusted that he’d had to travel from Washington down to this godforsaken country because Franklin told him to come to Warm Springs as quickly as he could because it was “important.” Everything with Franklin was important because Franklin made everything important, and when anyone around the president exhibited the least bit of consternation over the endless barrage of edicts, Franklin would flash that patented smile of his and airily wave off any concerns.

That is, to anyone but Hoffman. Louis Hoffman was the only one who ever told the president, “Franklin, you’re full of shit,” and could get away with it. Hoffman was granted that privilege because he and Roosevelt were ambitious, brilliant, and implacable. They shared one other similarity: physically they were broken men, but neither accepted that as a detriment to achievement.

Hoffman didn’t like to travel and he didn’t like to leave Washington and he had a rotten cold anyway. Most people made the mistake of considering him inconsequential, a disgusting gnome who had somehow insinuated his way into the patrician Roosevelt’s good graces. They were mistaken. “I don’t like you very much, Mr. Hoffman,” Eleanor Roosevelt had said to him in her very cool and cultured voice, making it seem as if it were his fault, “but Franklin thinks well of you and I suppose that I shall have to be satisfied with that.”

Franklin thinks well of me, Hoffman snorted as he reached a cluster of wooden deck chairs scattered around the pool. Nobody, including me, knows what Franklin is thinking. I take what he tells me on faith because I have to and Franklin takes what I tell him on faith because there are too many two-faced sons of bitches fluttering around him who wouldn’t tell him the truth if it meant their lives. A coughing spasm overtook Hoffman and he quickly pulled a stained handkerchief from his back pocket and pressed it over his mouth. He could taste the phlegm as it shot out of his lungs and filled the handkerchief, and he felt his chest burning with the eruption. He would be weak after the attack, he knew that, and short-tempered, others knew that all too well, but he would be able to breathe better. For a while.

“Louis!”

Hoffman looked up to see a strange shape floating on the pool, distorted by the rays of the sun flashing across the water. He held his hand up to cut down the glare. It was the torso of a man. The man was waving at him.

“Louis,” Franklin Delano Roosevelt called again in that famous vibrant voice that never seemed to lack confidence or calm authority. “Good of you to come.”

Hoffman jammed the handkerchief in his back pocket and dropped heavily into a deck chair. “You ordered me to,” he said, curtly. He watched as Roosevelt maneuvered the floating chair through the water, his powerful shoulders, arms, and chest, white against the blue water, driving him closer. Hoffman knew that the president’s legs, crippled by polio, dangled uselessly below the surface.

Roosevelt’s chair, a unique cork and canvas and web device, bumped up against the edge of the pool. The president stuck out his big hand and beamed. “Good to see you, Louis.”

Hoffman pulled a cigarette from a pack and lit it. “I hate this fucking place.” He stuck the cigarette in Roosevelt’s ebony holder and handed it to the president.

Roosevelt threw his head back and laughed heartily. “We do need to get you out of Washington more often, my old friend.”

“How about Times Square and Second Avenue?” Hoffman said, lighting a cigarette for himself. “Where’s a guy get a drink around here?”

“Ring the bell, Louis,” Roosevelt said, pointing to a small bell on a table next to the chair. “When Charles comes, order whatever you like. I’ll have iced tea, lots of lemon, unsweetened.” He pushed himself away from the edge of the pool and clamped the holder in his teeth at a jaunty angle. “I’ve got two more laps and then we’ll talk. Go to the lodge and get refreshed. I’ll meet you in an hour. In your room is a folder with the latest dispatches from England.” He was almost shouting as he neared the center of the pool. “No improvements, I’m afraid, but we’ll talk about that later. Oh, and, Louis?”

Hoffman looked up.

“Try not to be unpleasant to the staff, will you? They don’t understand you the way I do.”

It was two hours before the president was wheeled into his tiny office. By that time Hoffman had showered, changed, drunk three scotch-and-waters, smoked a dozen cigarettes, and read the cables in the folder. His disposition hadn’t improved.

A servant took Hoffman to Roosevelt’s office. The president, dressed in lightweight slacks, a knit shirt, and canvas deck shoes, motioned Hoffman to a chair next to him.

“Louis,” the president began thoughtfully, sliding a cigarette into a holder, “we’ve a problem.”

“Is this a one-drink problem or a two-drink problem ?” Hoffman asked.

“Hear me out and you can decide for yourself.” Roosevelt moved the wheelchair closer to Hoffman. “I don’t think England can last much longer on her own. Adolph is too strong. The British rescued the bulk of their army at Dunkerque but left their supplies on the beach. No tanks, artillery, or trucks. They might as well be a nineteenth-century army. Mr. Hitler’s U-boats are starving her. Her convoys see fifty or sixty percent losses. Whatever is getting through is not enough. We have given her fifty old destroyers and whatever else we can spare short of going to war ourselves.” He examined the end of the glowing cigarette. “I’m afraid, and I mention this only to you of course, that Great Britain is dying.”

“Franklin,” Hoffman said irritably, “you’re giving me a laundry list of headlines over the past six months. I know this, and you know that I know this, and we’ve talked about all of it until the cows come home. Now if you’re preparing me for something, just say it.”

“Britain needs more help than we’ve given her to date.”

“Yeah,” Hoffman said, tossing the folder onto Roosevelt’s desk. “I think they need a miracle, Franklin. You’ve done all you could do without declaring war on Germany. And that is a bird that isn’t going to fly right now. You just don’t have the support. Every time I turn on the radio some idiot from the American First Party is giving you hell about something or other. If I had my way, I’d deport every single one of them to Germany. But there’s no other way to say it—they want your blood. You put one foot over the line, and I mean the line that says what you should do versus what we can legally do, and you’ll have a hell of a lot more time to listen to the birds singing on that godforsaken island.”

“I thought you liked Campobello, Louis.”

“Franklin, the last time I was up there I saw a fucking rabbit. Look. Your hands are tied. You’d better be careful about more aid to Britain.”

Hoffman watched Roosevelt ponder the comment: it was a signal for Hoffman to continue speaking. The president was absorbing what he heard, calculating, analyzing, and occasionally, his dreamy eyes never leaving the ceiling, he would ask a question. But now he wanted to hear how Hoffman saw things.

“Franklin, I’m on your side and you know it. A lot of people see Britain as a lost cause,” Hoffman said. “They say that we don’t have any reason to be in a war that’s three thousand miles away. Hell, some of your strongest supporters have gone on record saying that if push comes to shove, they can still do business with Hitler. The almighty dollar is dictating how a lot of people think. Forget the immorality of Nazi Germany and the pure evil of that son of a bitch Hitler; a majority of Americans are convinced that this isn’t our fight. You could have a hundred Fireside Chats about garden hoses and Lend/Lease and not make a goddamned difference. The way I see it, the only things keeping Britain from toppling over are Winston Churchill and the Royal Navy. Their army’s shot, their air force is too small, and they have the most tasteless food I’ve ever eaten.”

Hoffman seldom smiled and most people said that he had the perpetual look of a man who sniffed something pungent. But now, if someone took the time to look beyond the scowl and deep into the sensitive eyes that yielded every emotion the man felt, they would see real concern. “This may be the greatest struggle of good against evil in the history of mankind. I’m not certain that evil won’t triumph,” he added, allowing an uncharacteristic note of alarm into his statement.

“You know, Louis,” Roosevelt said, watching a cloud of smoke curl overhead, “if you aren’t careful, people might believe that you really are a cynic.”

“It’s worse than that, Franklin. I’m a Republican.” Hoffman downed his drink and made himself another. “You know, the time will come when you’ll want those fifty destroyers back. Obsolete or not.”

Roosevelt pulled the spent cigarette from its holder and crushed it in the ashtray. “We can build more, Louis. Britain can’t. She’s expending her blood. The very least we can do is provide her with arms.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t order me down here to talk about the least we can do, did you, Franklin? You’ve got something going on in that upper-crust head of yours.”

“How’s your drink, Louis? Does it need to be freshened up?”

“My drink’s fine, Franklin. Now cut the bullshit and tell me what you have on your mind.”

“I’ve been speaking with Winston for some time. Cable and telephone. I’ve gotten to know him well enough. I feel that I have a sense of what Winston is like, in essence, who he is. A fellow likes to know about the members of his team, don’t you know? Especially before the big game.”

“Yeah. Me and my pals said the same thing about stickball,” Hoffman said wryly. “Just after the cops ran us off.”

Roosevelt turned grave, one of the few times that Hoffman had seen him like this. “When we go to war, Louis—when and not if, because I fully believe it will come and much sooner than anyone anticipates—I have to be absolutely sure of the other fellow on the team. Absolutely.”

“You need an eyeball-to-eyeball meeting. Some place that you can sit down and get to business. Very private. Very isolated.”

“Yes. There is far too much at stake here. If we align ourselves with Britain in a shooting war and she is not able to survive, that would leave the United States in a most unfortunate position.”

“Speaking politically, it would be the end of your career.”

“Is it fair to bring politics up in the context of this very crucial question?”

“You’re an elected official, Franklin. In office you can affect changes. Out of office you’re just a has-been. You’ve been able to accomplish a great deal as president of the United States. I’d hate to see you lose that if Britain goes down the toilet.”

“As would I, old friend.”

Hoffman suddenly realized why he had been called to Georgia. “You’ve already set this thing up,” he said.

“Yes, I have, Louis,” Roosevelt replied evenly.

Hoffman exploded, “Without telling me about it? Where the hell do I fit in this escapade, Franklin? You couldn’t trust me, is that it?”

“Of course I trust you, Louis. I’ve always trusted you.”

“You sure have a funny way of showing it, Franklin. Special adviser to the president, my ass. When do I advise you about this one? When the whole thing’s over? What have you got up your sleeve this time, Franklin? Another New Deal but this time it’s for the British?”

Roosevelt reached across the small desk, picked up the telephone, and dialed a number. “Hello, Marie? Fine, thank you. Is there any chance that we might have lamb for supper tonight? Splendid. Yes. Fix it any way you like, I trust your judgment implicitly. Thank you,” he said and hung up the telephone.

“You son of a bitch,” Hoffman muttered.

“Mama would be very disappointed to hear you describe her son in such terms, Louis.”

“Why’d you leave me out of this, Franklin? If you already had everything figured out and a meeting planned, why did you even call me down here in the first place?”

“I called you down here,” Roosevelt said, carefully inserting a cigarette into a holder, “because I need your help. Yes. The meeting is scheduled, planned, and will take place. From it, I hope that England and the United States can develop a treaty, a charter of some sort to address this crisis. I have every confidence that we can.”

“I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop,” Hoffman said.

“I didn’t tell you anything about the meeting or the circumstances surrounding it because I need an absolutely fresh set of eyes on this. I need someone unburdened by preconceived ideas or notions to be my devil’s advocate.”

“Terrific,” Hoffman said. “I’m a Jew and you just made me the Antichrist.”

Roosevelt smiled. “Louis, you’re not much of a Jew.”

“Yeah,” Hoffman said wryly. “This is definitely a two-drink problem.” He rubbed his forehead with a bony hand. He looked up quickly, the thought jumping out at him. “Why, you tricky bastard. You’re sending me to England.”

“Yes, I am, Louis,” Roosevelt said. “Talk to Winston. Get a sense of what he wants. What kind of man he is. I can’t go, for obvious reasons. Any visit by the president of the United States or his official envoy would have diplomatic and political consequences that, at present, I do not wish to encounter. So you must go as my unofficial envoy. You’re going on holiday.”

Hoffman grimaced. “I haven’t had a ‘holiday’ since I was eight years old, and if you think that the newspapers aren’t going to pick up on this, you’re nuts.”

“Let them. They’ll see through your holiday as nothing more than a ruse, but they won’t have any idea for the real reason for your visit.”

“You remember I don’t like boats, Franklin?” Hoffman said sourly. “I get seasick.”

Roosevelt smiled broadly. “Of course I know that, Louis. That’s why you’re taking the Clipper. She leaves Miami tomorrow afternoon. Simply relax and watch the Atlantic glide by thousands of feet below you.” Hoffman was about to protest when Roosevelt added, “Would you like those two drinks simultaneously or sequentially?”

“Just put them in a goddamned glass,” Hoffman said. “I’ll do the rest.”

Over the Kattegat, between Denmark and Sweden, 11 July 1941

N-for-Nancy, a Lockheed Hudson MK IV reconnaissance plane, plummeted three hundred feet in the turbulent, iron-gray skies.

“Jesus Christ, Bunny!” bomb-aimer/navigator Peter Madsen shouted. “Hang on to it!”

Pilot Sergeant Douglas “Bunny” Walker pulled back on the yoke and clawed for the handle next to him that would drop his seat. He knew that in the storm he was certain to be bounced about, regardless of the seat belt, and smash his head on the roof. His hand clamped on the lever and pumped it down. Satisfied that his head was safe, he gripped the yoke attached to the steering column, trying to control the wild yawing and pitching of the aircraft. He drove his feet into the rudder pedals and yanked back on the yoke, fighting the full force of the gale. He felt the tension of the hydraulically assisted control cables through the pedals as they pulled the rudders to the right or left. That was really what flying was about—feeling your airplane: how she responded to the controls, whether she was sloppy or crisp or sluggish. But against this tempest was a pure muscle job—just keep the damned thing from flipping over or going into a stall.

The two 1,050-horsepower Pratt and Whitney Wasp engines barely gave N-for-Nancy enough power to maintain headway in the storm. It was always dirty weather over this miserable stretch of water—ice, sleet, snow, and rain, or a combination of anything always seemed to drive up from somewhere to batter N-for-Nancy so that the crew climbed out of the twin-tailed aircraft with bruised bodies and numbed senses. It was a contest of mind and skill between Bunny and the storm, and the prize was the ugly little Hudson and the four frightened men within her. All of this for a few pictures.

Bunny clamped his oxygen mask close to his mouth so that he could be heard on the intercom above the roar of the wind. “Johnny? See anything?”

Gunner Johnny Thompson, in the Boulton-Paul dorsal turret at the rear of the aircraft, said, “Lightning, Bunny. Very impressive.”

Suddenly a great burst of air slapped the plane and threw it toward the earth. N-for-Nancy fell through the hole in the sky and Bunny struggled to bring it back to altitude. Continuous sheets of ice and rain beat against the windshield so that he was flying virtually blind. His arms ached from fighting the Hudson and he began to curse both the aircraft and the storm softly. “How much farther, Peter? My bloody arms are falling off.”

“Weather Ops said we should have had this for only thirty minutes or so and then clear sailing.”

“Weather Ops is wrong again,” Bunny said. “I’ve been at it for close to an hour.” He could hear things tumbling around inside the aircraft and he was glad that they weren’t carrying anything more than a bomb bay load of cameras. That’s all that they ever carried and frankly, he was getting sick and tired of it. Some genius had pulled them out of Royal Air Force rotation and handed them over to Royal Navy Coastal Command, so all that they did now was run about this disgusting straight and take thousands of pictures. He watched the sky through the maddeningly slow windshield wipers, searching for the slightest hint of clearing. The thick film of rainwater covering the windshield obscured the sky. The wipers should have taken care of it, but they were never designed for gales like this. Bunny was flying deaf, dumb, and blind, he decided, like those little monkeys he had seen at a carnival in Bournemouth. Hear no evil, speak no evil . . . The yoke tried to jerk itself out of his hands and it became a personal contest again—no longer the plane or the storm, just Bunny Douglas and that bloody yoke that threatened to break his wrists and twist his fingers off—taking a perverse pleasure in revealing that it was no longer an inanimate object; it was alive. See no evil, Bunny thought, completing the triad. N-for-Nancy yawed sharply and Bunny kicked the rudder to bring it back on course.

For God’s sake, Bunny thought, get a grip on yourself. It was fatigue, he knew. When your body gets tired and your mind loses its ability to function, your thoughts wander, float really, and reality and common sense simply disappear.

He felt the yoke begin to relax. They were coming out of the storm. He quickly pumped the seat up so that he could see clearly over the nose of the Hudson. The fourth member of their crew, Radio Operator Prentice Newman, was at his side.

“Wasn’t that a ride, Skipper?” Newman said in a voice that Bunny knew all too well. A man sometimes forced nonchalance into his voice to hide the fear that ate at him.

“Would you like to go back, Prentice?”

“Skipper, no!” Prentice Newman never called Douglas Bunny like the other members of the crew. “It just doesn’t seem right,” he had said.

“Bunny,” Peter called. “I see sunshine ahead. Time to go upstairs?”

“Right you are, Peter. Angels twenty in ten.” Bunny turned to Prentice and jerked his thumb toward the rear of the aircraft. “Go roost now. Things are going to get busy.”

The camouflaged Hudson slipped out of the remaining clouds and began climbing to twenty-thousand feet, as Bunny adjusted the flaps. N-for-Nancy had been lucky. The storm had been poised on the edge of Leka Island and had hidden the plane’s approach from the Germans. Now all that remained was to make three flights over the island, cameras rolling, and run for home. That was all there was to it. Simple as that.

“Keep your eyes open, chaps,” Bunny said. He knew Peter was prone in his bomb-aimer’s position, tracking the approach, ready to open the bomb bay doors and squeeze the tit to start the cameras rolling. He felt the vibration of the Boulton Paul turret revolving to search the skies. It mounted twin 7.7-mm machine guns and Johnny was a fine shot, but the guns were too light and their range was too limited. And the German fighters that flew up to kill them were too fast. N-for-Nancy had to get in and out before the fighters appeared as tiny, lethal specks in the sky.

“Flack’s up,” Bunny said, watching the powdery brown flowers appear in the distance. They were searching for the Hudson, a few odd shots seemingly cast into the sky as if the German antiaircraft crews were going through the motions. But these shots were more than perfunctory—they were exploratory. When the crews found the altitude and range, more little brown flowers would follow, and creep closer to the aircraft. “How are you, Peter? Ready to go?”

“Straight on, Bunny. Just a few seconds more.”

Bunny Walker looked at his watch. They had eighteen minutes from the time that they sighted the target to the arrival of the fighters. Three passes and then they were out.

“Doors open!” Peter said. Bunny heard the soft hum of the door motors. “One, two . . . three. Shoot,” the bomb-aimer said, and Bunny knew that a dozen cameras were rapidly snapping images of Leka Island.

Suddenly flak exploded a hundred yards to the left of the aircraft. More bursts followed just behind and to the right. Bunny heard shrapnel strike N-for-Nancy. It was the sound of hail falling on a tin roof and on a summer’s day at home would have been nothing more than comforting. But it was not hail and there was nothing comforting about the shrapnel punching holes in N-for-Nancy’s thin aluminum skin. There was vengeance in the dark flowers as they tracked N-for-Nancy across the sky. Bunny felt his beloved plane shudder and the tempo of the flak increased.

“Anyone hit?” he asked.

“Been practicing, haven’t they?” Johnny said.

“I think those chaps mean to kill us, Skipper,” Prentice said. It was a joke but his voice was a little too high pitched and strained, and it quivered noticeably.

“Bring us around, will you, Bunny?” Peter said. “Ready for another run. Stay away from those bloody brown flowers. They make me nervous.”

“Right,” Bunny said. “Here we go.” He had eased the Hudson into a sharp bank when the port engine began to shudder. Bunny felt himself go cold as his eyes shot to the engine. He saw a thin black stream trailing along the upper edge of the wing through his window. He searched the instrument panel for the port engine oil-pressure gauge. The pressure was dropping rapidly—they were leaking oil from the oil tank bay. He quickly switched off the engine and feathered the Hamilton Standard propeller. “We’ve lost the port engine,” he said.

“What?” Peter said. Bunny heard the fear in his voice. He had every reason to be afraid. At best N-for-Nancy could get 177 miles an hour. On two engines. Now she had one. When the fighters showed up it would be a slaughter.

“We’re going home, chaps,” Bunny said. “Close it up. Peter, get ready to throw out everything not nailed down. Prentice, tell base what’s happened and then help Peter. Stay away from the rear door once you’ve popped it off. I don’t want either one of you going out. Lie on the deck, one passes to another who chucks it out the door. Johnny, you’re our eyes.”

“Yes, Bunny.”

“Don’t fail us.”

“No, Bunny.”

Pilot Sergeant Douglas Walker reached inside his flight suit and squeezed the tiny stuffed rabbit that he kept there, three times. It was a ritual before each flight: three squeezes and everything would come out splendidly. Now he felt his hand trembling inside his suit and he realized just how frightened he was. They were hundreds of miles behind enemy lines in a damaged aircraft barely capable of keeping itself in the air. Still, it would do no good to let the other fellows know how afraid he was. He pushed the rabbit deeper into his suit and zipped it closed.

“Peter? You mustn’t forget to throw those devilish cameras out, will you? Bit of irony there.”

“The cameras, Bunny?”

“Every last one of the bastards.”

“What a splendid idea.”

“Bunny!” Johnny said. “Five o’clock. Three aircraft.”

“How far out, Johnny?”

“Ten miles.”

They would be on the Hudson IV in minutes and then the damaged aircraft would be doomed. Johnny could keep them at bay for a moment or two; he was a game shot with a good eye. But the end would be the same: the ME 109s would line up and come in fast and it would be three hawks on a very plump pigeon with an injured wing. N-for-Nancy had no place to go—nowhere to hide.

The storm!

It hung in front of him, a great gray wall of boiling clouds, and wind and rain that provided the only shelter they could hope for. If they could reach it they could escape the German fighters. But if they reached it, they had to survive its fury. They had half the power that they needed in a storm that could tear them apart. But what choice did they have?

Bunny began to ease the yoke down, diving to build up speed.

“Johnny? Can you keep them away from us until I reach those clouds?”

“I’ll try, Bunny, but don’t take too long, will you? They look angry to me.”

Bunny kept the Hudson’s nose pointed toward the ominous mountain of clouds before them. Bolts of lightning flashed across the face of the dark mass illuminating fissures, valleys, and peaks so dense that they might have been solid. More lightning glowed deeply within the body of the storm as it hungrily anticipated the arrival of the damaged aircraft. The clouds seethed across the sky with violence, promising an endless wave of assaults should N-for-Nancy survive the first encounter.

N-for-Nancy was behaving sluggishly with just one engine turning. There was more than that. She was a fine ship, one of the first to come over from Lockheed in the States, but she was past her prime and she wanted nothing more than quiet duty along the English coast, looking for downed bomber crews or scouting for E-boats. Even with everything thrown out that could be and Bunny’s right hand nursing the throttles to the starboard engine up for more power, she had reached her limit.

The twin 7.7-mm spat a burst and two dark streaks flashed by Bunny, one on either side of the Hudson. Their roar startled him. This would be no contest.

“Peter, Prentice! Get to the beam guns. Keep those bloody bastards off us,” Bunny said. He glanced at the clouds. God, were they moving away? Trying to elude him? Playing a devilish game of keep-away now, when he needed them to stay alive?

“Here they come,” Johnny called. “Nine o’clock. Six o’clock high.”

Bunny heard the hammering of the Hudson’s guns and felt the vibration run through the fuselage. Suddenly he felt the unmistakable tremor of bullets striking N-for-Nancy, sharp blows from the 20mm cannons aboard the German fighters. The starboard window exploded and cold air rushed in with the force of a hurricane. They’d be chewed up. Fuselage, engines, controls, flaps, elevators, wings . . . men.

Bunny’s hands were numb and his eyes were watering from the frigid air blasting into the cabin. He looked over the nose of N-for-Nancy, searching for the best place to enter the storm. They were running out of time. Too far to go. The clouds were too far away. He needed the port engine; without it they had no chance.

Bunny reached down and flipped the magneto on the port engine, adjusted the fuel mixture, and pressed the starter. She’d been leaking oil all along. There might not be any left in the oil tank bay. But there might be enough left in the engine—just enough to turn her over. Just enough to keep her going. Just enough to get them to the clouds.

He felt cannon shells slam into the plane and heard the sound of metal being wrenched apart. The Hudson shuddered under the impact of the shells as they punched holes in N-for-Nancy’s body. But his eyes were on the port engine. He adjusted the throttle and switched the starter again.

He saw the propeller turn slightly, stop, and turn. The engine was kicking over. It turned again and suddenly blasted to life with a growl and a cloud of black smoke. He eased the throttles up and felt N-for-Nancy respond.

“Port’s on,” he said and he heard the crew cheer.

“That’s lovely news,” Peter said calmly. “Now would you kindly get us the hell out of here?”

Bunny pushed the yoke well forward and the Hudson dropped like a brick, gathering speed as she approached the clouds. The German fighters realized what the Hudson had planned and dove on her viciously, tearing into her with cannon and machine-gun fire. Bits of metal and fabric skin flew off the plane—flesh from a wounded animal fleeing for its life. N-for-Nancy’s crew fired