Feather Duster

By Dennis Beck

A Quick, Dirty Thriller

England. 1943. Sgt. Rosenberg, a 19-year-old ball turret gunner with a bad attitude, is assigned to find out who murdered Captain Dust, the heroic B-17 pilot of *Feather Duster*.

Rosie, a crazy kid who boogie-woogies, hits people who deserve it when they're not looking, and can be talked into doing wild things with women, is helped in his investigations by Doc, his new pal at the base hospital, and Major Merritt, the wildly popular squadron commander who becomes Tonto to his Lone Ranger. Rosie finds himself entangled in a tale of betrayal and suspicion, enemies everywhere, and murder at 20,000 feet in the war-torn skies of World War II Europe.

In this accelerated, fiercely authentic tale, the reader is taken on a wild ride both on the ground and in the air.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dennis Beck
• Release date: Jul 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9781466138322

Dennis Beck

Dennis Beck lives in Fort Worth, Texas. He's written articles for a variety of publications, including World War II, Black Belt, Great Battles, and Experiments in Words. A Navy veteran, he's got a rich background in World War II aviation history. His book reviews and features have appeared in nearly two dozen newspapers around the country, including the Dallas Morning News, Milwaukee Journal, Kansas City Star, Oakland Tribune, Denver Post, Detroit News, Baltimore Sun, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Newsday, and many others.A t'ai chi enthusiast, Mr. Beck teaches the Chinese form of exercise and self-defense at Texas Christian University and elsewhere in Fort Worth. His t'ai chi website is http://ambress.com/taichi/index.htm. He also loves swing dancing and doesn’t feel right unless he boogie-woogies at least once a week.

Book preview

FEATHER DUSTER

A Quick, Dirty Thriller

by

Dennis Beck

Smashwords edition

Copyright 2011 by Dennis Beck

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

CHAPTER ONE

Unbelievable noise assaulted him. B-17s stood lined up on either side of the airfield, all engines roaring.

The jeep he was in careened down the center of the runway, almost tipping over. And screeched to a halt in front of the lead bomber.

Handcuffed in front, he was half-dragged, half-carried from the jeep by the MPs and thrown inside.

An angry-looking sergeant yelled into his intercom, The insubordinate bastard is aboard, colonel.

At once the bomber began to roll forward.

The sergeant pulled out a pistol and pointed it at him. Rosie smiled and sat down. The sergeant didn’t smile back.

He felt the bomber gather speed, bump and sway, then faster, and finally there was a smooth moment when they had left the earth. After several long minutes the bomber leveled off. The sergeant went forward, leaving him alone.

The two door gunners, looking like something out of a Flash Gordon serial, came back and started setting up their 50-caliber machine guns.

Rosie yelled, Where are we going?

No one even looked at him.

The sergeant came back, grabbed his arm, and dragged him forward. He went between the waist gunners, around the ball turret, and through the radio compartment. He didn’t feel an ounce of friendliness.

It wasn’t easy getting through the bomb bay. The handcuffs made it hard to keep his balance. Squirming around the top turret, he stood looking at the backs of the pilot and co-pilot.

The pilot, an old guy in his thirties, turned and shouted, Who the hell are you?

Rosie hollered back, Sergeant Rosenberg, sir!

The older guy, a colonel, gestured for the co-pilot to get out of his seat. With a mean-looking gloved finger he ordered Rosie to take his place.

Rosie had never sat in a B-17’s co-pilot seat. Once he got strapped in, the view was wild. The pure blue sky dazzled him. All around were B-17s, bobbing up and down. Below was England, incredibly green.

Rosie put on the headset.

Now the colonel’s voice was quiet. And deadly. Why you?

Rosie shrugged.

Headquarters sends a prisoner from the stockade to investigate the death of a damned hero? You wanna tell me why?

Colonel, I think you should ask—

On the intercom one of the waist gunners asked, Can we test-fire our weapons, sir?

The colonel acknowledged. The B-17 vibrated, distantly.

Rosie asked where they were going.

A milk run, son. Just to the French coast and back. Nothing’s gonna happen.

They rode quite awhile without talking. The colonel was busy talking to the crew and to other bombers. Rosie thought he could see the enemy coast up ahead.

Ball turret?

Rosie nodded. Nine missions, he said. Ten, counting this one.

The colonel said this one wouldn’t count. He wasn’t officially on board.

The colonel looked at him more closely. Jesus! How old are you?

Rosie answered he was almost nineteen.

You look like you’re about twelve.

We’re over France, a voice in the intercom said.

Rosie looked out and down. The damned place looked like enemies lived there.

You some kind of whiz-kid cop or something?

Rosie said he was just a ball turret gunner. Nothing else.

Somebody at headquarters thinks otherwise, the colonel snarled. He looked like he had a bad taste in his mouth.

Somewhere underneath them was an explosion. Then another. Off to his right he could see flak blossoming like black flowers in the sky.

A much closer burst rocked the ship. A voice on the intercom began shouting incoherently.

Do something, the colonel said.

Rosie got out of his seat and went back.

He found the co-pilot on the floor below the top turret. The body was limp and Rosie saw right away what had happened.

The young lieutenant’s head had been blown off. Rosie looked around but couldn’t find the head. The amount of blood everywhere was surprising. There was a big hole in the floor where the shell had come in. Maybe the head had rolled out through there.

On the intercom there were reports of enemy fighters. Rosie went looking for a gun to fire.

The colonel ordered him back into the cockpit.

When he got there he saw that the colonel had been hit too. His right leg was covered in blood.

Rosie jumped back in the co-pilot’s seat and grabbed the controls. The B-17 lurched violently to the right, and then the nose started coming up.

The handcuffs didn’t help.

He heard screams on the intercom and what sounded like bad language.

The colonel knocked his hands away from the controls. At least two people he’d never seen dragged him out of his seat. Someone else rushed in to bandage the colonel’s leg.

The flak stopped. After awhile the colonel waved him forward.

Rosie noticed an odd thing. The colonel would glare at you with only one eye. The other appeared normal.

Rosie said, Maybe it would help if you briefed me. You know, before you get killed or something.

The colonel glared at him with that one eye.

Rosie wondered if it was always the same eye.

The colonel grabbed him by the arm and pulled him close, speaking right into his ear. Capt. Dust, the colonel said. A war hero. He just got the DFC. His men loved him.

Somebody didn’t love him, sir.

That’s the son-of-a-bitch headquarters wants you to find. I’m assigning you to Dust’s former crew. Somebody knows something even though the bastards say they don’t.

A Messerschmitt flashed past them head on, so close Rosie’s heart stopped. He ducked. Too late, the colonel also ducked.

Whew, they both said.

Sometime later the group dropped its bombs and turned back for England.

Before kicking Rosie out of the co-pilot’s seat, the colonel told him he had two days to complete his investigation.

Rosie protested but was told some of the brass was coming for Dust’s funeral and the colonel wanted an answer by then.

What about the handcuffs? Rosie asked.

He was told to report to a Major Jarmon, who was the only other person on the base who knew why he was here. Major Jarmon would help him in his investigation.

This turned out to be an exaggeration.

When they landed the MPs were waiting. They removed his handcuffs but dragged him to a B-17 parked off in a corner of the airfield.

Standing by the nose was a short, fat major. What the major was really upset about were the cowboy boots Rosie was wearing. The colonel hadn’t noticed.

You’re out of uniform! the major yelled.

Rosie explained he was from Texas.

Jarmon proceeded to give him a long lecture on the proper wearing of an Air Corps uniform.

During this Rosie noticed the artwork on the nose of the plane. He saw a long-legged little maid. Leaning forward. With a smile and a feather duster.

The MPs were bored too and they didn’t protest when he wandered over under the nose to admire the artistry. One of them wandered over with him.

Jarmon chased after him, still lecturing.

Rosie bolted, the MPs in hot pursuit.

On his second orbit around the landing gear, he ducked under the nose and literally ran into the major. Who fell with him in a heap of arms and legs.

Jarmon screamed, Now we’ve got you, you insubordinate son-of-a-bitch!

Rosie wondered if he was getting a bad reputation.

As Rosie was getting to his feet the MPs grabbed him. On Jarmon’s sputtered orders, they took him to the back of the B-17 and tossed him inside, where it was nice and quiet.

For a change.

He went forward past the waist gunners position, taking time to scan the floor for anything unusual. The body was where he’d expected it to be.

Upright in the pilot’s seat, with blood all over the back of his head and flight jacket, sat the late Capt. Dust.

Rosie checked the condition of the blood. Seemed about right if the incident took place when Major Jarmon said it did. Carefully examining the back of the pilot’s head, he found two things: 1) what was almost certainly the entry wound, and 2) extensive powder burns.

Unlikely, he thought, to have been caused by the Luftwaffe.

Rosie examined the entry wound. Leaning forward, he studied the victim’s face.

Dust still wore his goggles and on the inside on the right there seemed to be a reflection. Pulling the goggle away on that side, Rosie felt something small and metallic drop into his palm. By its weight it felt like a .38 slug. He slipped it in his pocket. Leaned forward and examined the damaged eye where the bullet had come out.

Are you done? Jarmon yelled from outside the plane.

Rosie stuck his head through the pilot’s window and asked, He was alive when the plane landed?

Jarmon spoke very clearly, as if to a child. They landed after a special night mission. The crew left Capt. Dust here, and when he didn’t show up at the briefing the navigator and co-pilot came back. They found him like that.

Jarmon paused. Then asked, Why are you conducting this investigation?

Rosie tried to sound official. I can’t divulge that information. He ducked back inside, looked around for several minutes, and went back through the bomber.

Once outside he went up to Major Jarmon and whispered, Military secret.

Jarmon huffed and puffed but handed him his 201 file. Report to Maj. Merritt, your new squadron commander. You’ll find him down on the flight line, sergeant.

Jarmon stood at attention, waiting for a salute.

Instead, Rosie ran away. No one chased him. It took him the better part of an hour to even find the flight line.

Almost lunchtime, he realized.

Because it was December and England, everything looked like it was under water. Trees. Buildings. People. The same gray color.

The airbase even had a jail—it was a place he hoped to avoid.

As he wound his way south past the mess hall he passed rows of maintenance buildings, aircrew barracks, administrative buildings, and supply shacks. It was behind one of those supply shacks he opened his file.

He found the report that said he was a screw-up and a troublemaker. Tore it out. Wadded it up. Stepped behind a tree and urinated on it. With a sigh.

He left it