The Military & War Collection

By L. Ron Hubbard

Triumphant tales of heroes and honor against impossible odds. Launch into the action with these gripping and gritty tales that appeared in the pages of the most popular pulp fiction magazines of the 1930s and 1940s.
This collection includes: International Book Awards Winner: On Blazing Wings, International Book Awards Finalists: The Phantom Patrol and Hostage to Death as well as Orders is Orders, While Bugles Blow!, Sabotage in the Sky, Wind-Gone-Mad, The Falcon Killer, Hell's Legionnaire and Red Death Over China.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Galaxy Press
• Release date: Jun 15, 2012
• ISBN: 9781619861909

L. Ron Hubbard

With 19 New York Times bestsellers and more than 350 million copies of his works in circulation, L. Ron Hubbard is among the most acclaimed and widely read authors of our time. As a leading light of American Pulp Fiction through the 1930s and '40s, he is further among the most influential authors of the modern age. Indeed, from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King, there is scarcely a master of imaginative tales who has not paid tribute to L. Ron Hubbard.

Book preview

Book cover image

SELECTED FICTION WORKS

BY L. RON HUBBARD

FANTASY

The Case of the Friendly Corpse

Death’s Deputy

Fear

The Ghoul

The Indigestible Triton

Slaves of Sleep & The Masters of Sleep

Typewriter in the Sky

The Ultimate Adventure

SCIENCE FICTION

Battlefield Earth

The Conquest of Space

The End Is Not Yet

Final Blackout

The Kilkenny Cats

The Kingslayer

The Mission Earth Dekalogy*

Ole Doc Methuselah

To the Stars

ADVENTURE

The Hell Job series

WESTERN

Buckskin Brigades

Empty Saddles

Guns of Mark Jardine

Hot Lead Payoff

A full list of L. Ron Hubbard’s

novellas and short stories is provided at the back.

*Dekalogy: a group of ten volumes

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Table of Contents

FOREWORD

FALCON KILLER

HELL'S LEGIONNAIRE

HOSTAGE TO DEATH

ON BLAZING WINGS

ORDERS IS ORDERS

THE PHANTOM PATROL

RED DEATH OVER CHINA

SABOTAGE IN THE SKY

WHILE BUGLES BLOW!

WIND-GONE-MAD

L. RON HUBBARD

IN THE GOLDEN AGE

OF PULP FICTION

THE STORIES FROM THE

GOLDEN AGE

FOREWORD

Stories from Pulp Fiction’s Golden Age

AND it was a golden age.

The 1930s and 1940s were a vibrant, seminal time for a gigantic audience of eager readers, probably the largest per capita audience of readers in American history. The magazine racks were chock-full of publications with ragged trims, garish cover art, cheap brown pulp paper, low cover prices—and the most excitement you could hold in your hands.

Pulp magazines, named for their rough-cut, pulpwood paper, were a vehicle for more amazing tales than Scheherazade could have told in a million and one nights. Set apart from higher-class slick magazines, printed on fancy glossy paper with quality artwork and superior production values, the pulps were for the rest of us, adventure story after adventure story for people who liked to read. Pulp fiction authors were no-holds-barred entertainers—real storytellers. They were more interested in a thrilling plot twist, a horrific villain or a white-knuckle adventure than they were in lavish prose or convoluted metaphors.

The sheer volume of tales released during this wondrous golden age remains unmatched in any other period of literary history—hundreds of thousands of published stories in over nine hundred different magazines. Some titles lasted only an issue or two; many magazines succumbed to paper shortages during World War II, while others endured for decades yet. Pulp fiction remains as a treasure trove of stories you can read, stories you can love, stories you can remember. The stories were driven by plot and character, with grand heroes, terrible villains, beautiful damsels (often in distress), diabolical plots, amazing places, breathless romances. The readers wanted to be taken beyond the mundane, to live adventures far removed from their ordinary lives—and the pulps rarely failed to deliver.

In that regard, pulp fiction stands in the tradition of all memorable literature. For as history has shown, good stories are much more than fancy prose. William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, Alexandre Dumas—many of the greatest literary figures wrote their fiction for the readers, not simply literary colleagues and academic admirers. And writers for pulp magazines were no exception. These publications reached an audience that dwarfed the circulations of today’s short story magazines. Issues of the pulps were scooped up and read by over thirty million avid readers each month.

Because pulp fiction writers were often paid no more than a cent a word, they had to become prolific or starve. They also had to write aggressively. As Richard Kyle, publisher and editor of Argosy, the first and most long-lived of the pulps, so pointedly explained: The pulp magazine writers, the best of them, worked for markets that did not write for critics or attempt to satisfy timid advertisers. Not having to answer to anyone other than their readers, they wrote about human beings on the edges of the unknown, in those new lands the future would explore. They wrote for what we would become, not for what we had already been.

Some of the more lasting names that graced the pulps include H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Robert E. Howard, Max Brand, Louis L’Amour, Elmore Leonard, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Erle Stanley Gardner, John D. MacDonald, Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein—and, of course, L. Ron Hubbard.

In a word, he was among the most prolific and popular writers of the era. He was also the most enduring—hence this series—and certainly among the most legendary. It all began only months after he first tried his hand at fiction, with L. Ron Hubbard tales appearing in Thrilling Adventures, Argosy, Five-Novels Monthly, Detective Fiction Weekly, Top-Notch, Texas Ranger, War Birds, Western Stories, even Romantic Range. He could write on any subject, in any genre, from jungle explorers to deep-sea divers, from G-men and gangsters, cowboys and flying aces to mountain climbers, hard-boiled detectives and spies. But he really began to shine when he turned his talent to science fiction and fantasy of which he authored nearly fifty novels or novelettes to forever change the shape of those genres.

Following in the tradition of such famed authors as Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Jack London and Ernest Hemingway, Ron Hubbard actually lived adventures that his own characters would have admired—as an ethnologist among primitive tribes, as prospector and engineer in hostile climes, as a captain of vessels on four oceans. He even wrote a series of articles for Argosy, called Hell Job, in which he lived and told of the most dangerous professions a man could put his hand to.

Finally, and just for good measure, he was also an accomplished photographer, artist, filmmaker, musician and educator. But he was first and foremost a writer, and that’s the L. Ron Hubbard we come to know through the pages of this volume.

This library of Stories from the Golden Age presents the best of L. Ron Hubbard’s fiction from the heyday of storytelling, the Golden Age of the pulp magazines. In these eighty volumes, readers are treated to a full banquet of 153 stories, a kaleidoscope of tales representing every imaginable genre: science fiction, fantasy, western, mystery, thriller, horror, even romance—action of all kinds and in all places.

Because the pulps themselves were printed on such inexpensive paper with high acid content, issues were not meant to endure. As the years go by, the original issues of every pulp from Argosy through Zeppelin Stories continue crumbling into brittle, brown dust. This library preserves the L. Ron Hubbard tales from that era, presented with a distinctive look that brings back the nostalgic flavor of those times.

L. Ron Hubbard’s Stories from the Golden Age has something for every taste, every reader. These tales will return you to a time when fiction was good clean entertainment and the most fun a kid could have on a rainy afternoon or the best thing an adult could enjoy after a long day at work.

Pick up a volume, and remember what reading is supposed to be all about. Remember curling up with a great story.

—Kevin J. Anderson

KEVIN J. ANDERSON is the author of more than ninety critically acclaimed works of speculative fiction, including The Saga of Seven Suns, the continuation of the Dune Chronicles with Brian Herbert, and his New York Times bestselling novelization of L. Ron Hubbard’s Ai! Pedrito!

Falcon Killer cover image

Published by

Galaxy Press, LLC

7051 Hollywood Boulevard, Suite 200

Hollywood, CA 90028

© 2008 L. Ron Hubbard Library. All Rights Reserved.

Any unauthorized copying, translation, duplication, importation or distribution, in whole or in part, by any means, including electronic copying, storage or transmission, is a violation of applicable laws.

Mission Earth is a trademark owned by L. Ron Hubbard Library and is used with permission. Battlefield Earth is a trademark owned by Author Services, Inc. and is used with permission.

Horsemen illustration from Western Story Magazine and story preview cover art fromTop Notch Magazine is © and ™ Condé Nast Publications and is used with their permission. Fantasy, Far-Flung Adventure and Science Fiction illustrations: Unknown and Astounding Science Fiction copyright © by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Reprinted with permission of Penny Publications, LLC.

ISBN 978-1-59212-557-9 ePub version

ISBN 978-1-59212-313-1 print version

ISBN 978-1-59212-278-3 audiobook version

Library of Congress Control Number: 2007903608

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Contents

THE FALCON KILLER

GLOSSARY

The Falcon Killer

The Falcon Killer

FIRST there had been a city; then there had been bright and hungry flame; now there was nothing but a corpse-gutted ruin where men moved with dazed determination to refuse the shambles all about them. Indeed, it was too much to believe that Nencheng, mightiest river port in China, could ever become a reeking rubble of broken masonry, corpse-strewn, smoke-shrouded, leveled to the earth from which it had sprung full five thousand years ago.

Nencheng had survived the hard hoofs of the Tartars, led by the Scourge of Mankind, but its death had not come from the wastes of the north. Wings in the sky had passed their shadows over the land to drop their acrid death. And then, to complete the havoc, belligerently refusing the conquerors aught, the rear guard of the Chinese army, leaving by one gate as the Japanese entered by another, had applied the torch.

Incredible as it was, men, hundreds of thousands of them, Chinese and their families, were still in this town. There was nowhere to go. This was home. Hardly rock stood upon rock, but people remained to be bayoneted, shot and worse by the overzealous vanguard of the invader, maddened by the torches which had robbed them of their prey.

But the Chinese lives hand in hand with death for all his days, and though the smoke still rolled and the ashes fell like snow upon the scrambled streets, business, as it had done for five thousand years, went on as usual.

The foreign sections had been least injured; their tall walls had held out the stampeding crowds, their flags had made them almost proof against bombs. But here the ash-snow fell just as it did in the streets; and even through the walled garden of Tsoi Yan, the acrid pall drifted.

The owner of Tsoi Yan’s wide acres was absent on prudent business in Hong Kong and, as long as he had neither dared nor cared to use them, he had left them at the disposal of his good friend Henry Thompson, adrift now in a sea of shifting battle lines.

Disconsolately, Henry Thompson pushed the ashes from his dark, heavy shoulders and, with a twinge of irritation, picked an especially large one from his drink, deciding immediately afterward that the whiskey didn’t taste very good anyhow. Nothing tasted good. The world had lost all its flavor two days past, when he had landed in the wake of the Japanese to find himself forever cut off from his fortune, to say nothing of the business which was his life.

henrythompson.jpg

Henry Thompson

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Marion

Footsteps came from the dragon-emblazoned house and then the tinkle of ice in a glass. Henry looked up and, as though a curtain had been raised from his heavy bulldog features, he beamed upon the girl who came toward him. Life could never be so bleak but what he could find a smile for his daughter Marion, she who had grown so suddenly into the image of her lovely mother, dead now fifteen years.

Refill, said Marion, taking away his glass and wiping the ashes from the table to set another drink before him.

As if there weren’t a dozen servants waiting on the bat of an eye, said Henry, with a pretense of gruffness. Want to lose face?

To wait on you is to gain it, said Marion. You’ve been sitting out here alone too long—and that is very, very bad. You’ll be cross.

He watched her as she seated herself across from him, the pale sunlight glowing in the white, light collar of her tea gown, and bethought himself suddenly that, as soon as it was fully realized everywhere that he was ruined, she would have no more such dresses—lucky to have a roof and food.

No, he said gently. I won’t be cross.

Stop thinking about Ruhur, she ordered. The game isn’t lost yet. Szui Mai had ninety thousand troops, enough and more to guard those mountain passes.

I am afraid they think as little of Szui Mai as I do, said Henry morosely. "He could hold out for twenty years, but if the least thing goes wrong—such as my not arriving—he’ll wait twenty minutes and then slope."

Something will happen sooner or later. I know it will. We’ll get permission to go through the lines—

To make certain that the Chinese armies get Ruhur oil? Henry laughed harshly. "Not so’s the Mikado will know it."

He stared into his drink and was silent. For almost half an hour neither spoke, and then Henry glanced up to see that Marion was looking into the smoky sky.

What’s up? said Henry.

I thought I heard a plane.

What of it? The Japanese won’t bomb us, now that they own the place. But in a moment he heard the engines also. He had been too long in this war not to give heed to the growl of motors overhead.

Suddenly the roar was punctuated by the chatter of a machine gun, instantly followed by the rising scream of an engine tortured by a dive. Henry stood up. The skies were pennoned by smoke, and it would be almost impossible to see these ships unless they came overhead. Nevertheless, the sound of firing in the vicinity of Nencheng had been absent for twenty-four hours, until now.

There he is! cried Marion in excitement.

Across the smudge bowl of sky lumbered a great Japanese bomber, a flying battleship evidently returning from a raid on the new Chinese lines in the northwest. But it was doing more than coming home. The four engines were racking themselves in the bedlam of full throttles. The great wings were streaking at almost three hundred miles an hour. From the stern turrets red pom-poms blazed, as Mitsubi guns yammered at an unseen attacker.

Henry stared with wonder. He had never seen Chinese planes so far inside the Japanese lines and, further, he saw no planes at all. The engine din was too great to distinguish any other motors until that shrill, vicious scream of a dive came again.

Abruptly the Chinese attacker was in view. He pulled up, stabbing scarlet nose at great gray belly and letting drive with both bow guns. Tracer was white, plainly seen from the ground, so low were the ships. Hanging on its prop like a bulldog hangs to the bull, the red ship emptied its drums full into the blaze of the Mitsubis just above.

God! cried Henry into the bedlam. "That’s nerve!"

For a moment a shredded wave of smoke blotted them from view and then, when the sky opened anew, it could be seen that the bomber was doomed. Great black gouts of smoke geysered from beneath the right wing, cut by wicked streamers of flame. The Chinese pursuit ship was high above, just starting another dive with loaded guns. The scarlet javelin streaked past the bomber’s tail and came up again, to pound swiftly through the turrets and cabin.

The bomber lurched, the fire as red now as the great suns upon its wings. Not a gun aboard her was replying when she began her dive, out of control, toward the yellow river.

The pursuit plane leveled off and came back over the gardens, evidently orienting itself for a dash back to its own lines. With a battering roar, the ground machine guns of the town began to rake the interloper.

Marion’s eyes were flashing as she cried, "Go! Get away! Please go!" She did not realize that her voice was nothing in the tumult. For the scarlet plane had nosed up into an almost vertical climb, turning slightly as it went until it was almost heading east.

From the river came the thunder of the bomber crash. From every emplacement in Nencheng came the clamor of antiaircraft fire. The heavens about the scarlet ship were sprayed black by shrapnel’s smoke.

And then, in common with the whole town, the watchers in Tsoi Yan caught their breaths in a sob of despair. The Chinese plane had come in too deep, even past the drome south of town, and now from that drome there had arisen two squadrons of Japanese pursuits, which lanced down upon their prey with greedy guns.

The scarlet ship turned to face them, charging straight at them through the smoke. The stair-step formations held, all trips down, throwing a concerted blast of lead through which nothing could live.

Even before he reached them, the pilot of the scarlet plane was riding a wingless bomb. Antiaircraft fire did for his foils, machine guns sent his prop into a thousand silver fragments. The scarlet ship stabbed earthward, out of control, painted with fire, raked still by the avenging squadrons.

Marion hid her face in her hands and Henry, with his hand on her shoulder, still stared upward. Suddenly he shouted, He’s making a jump of it!

Marion looked again. Behind the streaking ball of fire a black speck grew swiftly larger in the sky. The pilot was falling free, an atom of life in a roaring void, bracketed by every weapon in Nencheng.

He hasn’t a chute! groaned Henry.

Once more Marion was unable to look, but Henry saw the dot grow into a toy doll and then, with astonishing swiftness, into a man. Less than three hundred feet from the ground a startling thing happened. A white wake ripped out behind the pilot, to become in an instant a great canopy of cream-colored silk. The jerk of the harness almost tore the man apart, but his hands were hauling hard on the shrouds and the chute was spilling until again it was nearly free fall.

The ship crashed unseen into a battery on the outer wall. The diving planes, bethinking themselves at last that they were firing into a town their own troops occupied, pulled up and zoomed skyward. Seeing their prey no more, all guns abruptly stopped. And in that silence could be heard the whistle of wind in the shrouds of the parachute, as the pilot fought to land on the largest clearing in sight. At the last instant he let his shrouds go and was snatched from the spiked branches of a tree to plant his boot heels into the turf and swiftly spill the wind from his chute.

Working with the speed upon which his life depended, he succeeded in rolling the silk into a ball and crowding it into the broken pack. A small rock garden stood by a lake and he snatched up boulders to crowd them in, lashing it all with a quick turn of the harness. He flung the chute into the lake and then spun about, striving to locate a place of concealment for himself.

Suddenly he caught sight of the two people at the table before the house and his hand jerked to the holstered automatic at his side. Then he seemed to realize that they were white, and he staggered toward them.

When he was within ten paces he stopped again. Marion saw with a start that his smoke-grimed face was Nordic. She sensed the strain of holding himself upright. And then she saw that there was a hole in the chest of his black leather jacket, and that small, bright drops of blood were dripping from his sleeve to the grass.

I beg your pardon, he said. This was the only open space. Foolish thing to do . . . but they killed my friend two hours ago. I . . . I suppose they’ll be pounding on your gates in a moment. If you could tell me where your rear gates are, I had better be going.

Nonsense! cried Henry. After a fight like that? The whole town—the Chinese, I mean and ourselves included were cheering you! Marion! Show him into the house. Send Wong out here to wipe up that blood. You’re in the hands of friends, my boy.

An uncertain smile came to the strangely pale features of the man. And then, with a suddenness which prevented Henry from reaching him, his knees buckled and he fell limply, face downward in the grass.

Henry started toward him and then looked up to call for his boy, but every servant in the place was abruptly there. These Chinese neither wanted nor waited for any orders. With a swift glance at the gate, they picked up the unconscious pilot and, with Marion going ahead, carried him into the huge house.

Henry heard a car come to a grinding halt. He glanced around and made certain that every mark had been obliterated from the grass. He sat down and took solid hold of his drink. In a moment, the butt of a rifle thundered against the portals. Henry stayed where he was. Then a young Chinese number one boy, fat with dignity, swished his skirts along the walk. He opened the small door port with the air of one who is about to spit. The face of the Japanese officer was hot as a hound’s upon the scent, his voice loud enough to reach half a mile.

Solly, said the number one boy, unmoved. No savvy.

The officer was about to become apoplectic when he bethought himself of his interpreter. That worthy came to the gate port and volleyed in Chinese.

Solly, said the number one boy. "No savvy Shanghai dog-talk. Massee plenty busy. You come back tomollow." He closed the door port.

Instantly the rifles thundered in concert upon it, until the hinges threatened to cave. The number one boy opened the port again.

You wantchee somesing?

The officer almost lost his lungs.

Solly. No catch. And he would have shut the door again had not a resourceful private stabbed his bayonet through it to threaten the number one boy’s much-cherished paunch.

The officer had been joined by other Japanese, and every instant the street grew thicker with patrol cars, armored cars, tanks, cavalry and soldiers. Another man, evidently of higher rank, took over the door port and resorted to the only nationally understood tongue.

You catchee one piecee Chinese sky boy! shouted the linguist. You talkee talk plenty damn chop-chop! Where catch?

No catch, shrugged the number one boy, moving backward without much concern.

You bling boss! roared the officer.

That will not be necessary, said Henry. If someone will please tell me what this unseemly commotion is about, I shall be glad to offer every assistance.

Another officer, of evidently even higher rank, took over at the door port.

Very sorry. Most deeply regret such noise and dust. Excuse me. He made as much a bow as he could through the port. Ten or fifteen minutes ago a Chinese pilot landed near here, and with my most abject apologies, I must demand the regrettable liberty of searching your peerless gardens.

A pilot, you say? quoth Henry, in great surprise. Ah, I believe I did hear some sort of firing. Although this is, of course, a most irregular proceeding—perhaps you noticed the American flag over the house—I cannot do otherwise than invite you to search.

My gratefulness exceeds my poor talent of expression, bowed the officer. And when the number one boy had unbarred the gates, the colonel bowed, drew his automatic and began to bawl orders to his men, who instantly swarmed into the gardens. The other two officers gave the number one boy hard glares as they passed him but that worthy spat perilously close to their boots and they leaped nimbly.

In ten minutes, the turf was thoroughly scarred and the bushes bowed and broken. The Japanese went through the place with a microscope, leaving, literally, not one stone unturned. At last they were forced to give it up, and the colonel paused meaningly upon the steps of the house.

My most humble regrets, he said. But I should be reprimanded if I did not make a search of the entire grounds. My own wishes in the matter are as nothing, but my superiors . . .

Go ahead, said Henry.

With a gleam in his eye and a tighter hold on his pistol, the colonel barely restrained himself from going ahead of Henry. They marched, with double files of soldiers behind them, into the hall of the house and from there, back and forth, they entered every room, leaving a sentry in each, for fear their quarry might change his position in the place and thereby escape.

Henry was conscious of very moist hands. He had to steel himself to enter each new room without glancing hurriedly all around it. The polished teak floors echoed to the tread of boots. Portières were swept ruthlessly aside. Chests were opened and banged shut. Closet doors were almost ripped from their hinges. The servants’ quarters, the kitchens where the staff was startled at its work, were ransacked, down to the last pallet and flour bin. The wine cellars, the eaves, even the roof, were given an attention only possible by Japanese.

At last the colonel stood in the hall again, his dark eyes smoldering. My most humble apologies for so inconveniencing your honorable household. It is quite evident that the pilot landed elsewhere. He bowed deeply. May I offer a heartfelt sorrow for the trouble I have caused you. Thereupon he strode angrily down the walk and bawled for his troops. He ushered them through the gates and then, with a sour glance back at the house, told off a guard and detailed an armored car for a constant patrol of the walls outside. With one last glower at the smug number one boy, the officers departed. The number one boy solemnly spat on a private’s toe and slammed the gates shut.

Henry stood panting on the steps, mopping at his face. The liquor boy put a glass of whiskey in his hand and without looking at the source, Henry drained it at a gulp. Then he turned and, with some wonder himself, began to search out the pilot.

He paused between two walls which rose endlessly into a scowling sky and stretched to infinity both before and behind him. Nowhere was there a foot of cover. But if there was no cover, neither were there any Japanese sentries immediately available. For a long time he hesitated, irresolute, one blood-smeared hand covering the hole in his leather jacket. He felt badly about the jacket’s getting spoiled. Gabby had given it to him, and now Gabby was dead. Gabby had said he had won it in a crap game—but he had forgotten to take off the eighty Mex tag. Gabby had said, How the hell would I feel if you got pneumonia and left these patrols all to me, huh? And now Gabby was off on a lone patrol of his own in the void between the worlds, never to return. They’d riddled his ship and then, when he had bailed out, the bomber had followed him down, bracketing him as he floated helpless in the air. The crimson tatter which had landed hadn’t been Gabby. Gabby was probably selling Saint Pete on organizing an air force, saying maybe Bill Gaylord would be along presently, and promising that if there wasn’t a war, then, by God between them they could make one. It had been a swell jacket.

He didn’t see how he could ever reach the end of the masonry canyon. He hadn’t strength enough to hold himself up against this wall, much less walk. That’s the way with a fly, he told himself, when its wings get pulled off. It buzzes and frets and doesn’t go anyplace, and the surrounding territory must look a lot larger than this.

Well, hell, he couldn’t stand here gawping. A sentry might show up and then that would be the end of it. How he could get through the Japanese lines and back to his own he had no faintest idea. White men in the battle area were too few to go unremarked and, further, the little bow-legged gentlemen in mustard wouldn’t be apt to overlook an opportunity to fill private coffers.

It had been fun at the time, he told himself. The train had squirmed along the rails and a rising sun had been fluttering from the big private car. It had been a target no conscientious pilot could bring himself to forgo, even if he was flying pursuit with only a couple of Mills bombs. The first had gone wide, but the second had landed right between the rails, about ten feet ahead of the speeding engine. That had been lucky. What with the machine gunners on top of the private car, the sky wasn’t exactly the safest place to be. But the train had hit the spread and jumped about ten feet in the air. The steam had blotted out most of it, but the cars got all tangled up. It had been pretty easy to locate the generals. They shouldn’t have paid so much attention to their rations. Kept them from running, too. Still, when they had upended down an embankment, the loss of command for thirty hours had let the Chinese regain about two miles of ground. That had been a help. Just why the Japanese had taken so much trouble to identify him wasn’t very clear. Unlike most wars, general staffs weren’t inviolable in this one. They’d bombed where they’d thought Chiang was and they needn’t be so angry about getting some of their own dosage.

No, it wasn’t likely he could get through without being spotted. It was so very far to go, and the hole in his chest hurt like hell.

He started off, weaving unsteadily, everything blurring strangely about him. Now and then he paused to steady himself against the wall. After he had walked for a half an hour or more he looked up to see where he had gone. His heart sank within him.

Almost directly ahead of him stood a rising sun standard. It was hard to see, the way his head was pounding. He felt a weariness descend over him. It was too much trouble to run away. Two sentries with fixed bayonets were standing there staring at him. One of them grinned and turned to yell into the building.

 Bill Gaylord sank back against the wall. There wasn’t much use trying to get away now.

After a long time three officers came out. He recognized Kitsune, officially Lieutenant Shimoko but popularly Kitsune, creator of incidents. It was odd that Kitsune would be here. Kitsune was supposed to be working behind the lines in the west. Although he always resembled his namesake, the fox, Kitsune looked more than ordinarily animal. His nose came down to a long point and his whiskers stuck out on either side, and his eyes had suppressed, cruel mirth in them. His tongue lolled and he kept hitching at his collar as though he found it uncomfortable over his fur.

How do you do? said Kitsune. We’ve been waiting here for some time, trusting that you would get tired of that house sooner or later and walk out. This is a very fortunate day. You have done me a very great favor. I was recalled to trace you, and now I find that, after all, I can collect what little money was laid aside on you.

Another officer pulled Bill Gaylord’s face up a bit and looked at him critically. Are you certain this is the man, Kitsune?

Kitsune was almost purring. Of course it is.

But, protested the other, is it possible that the Falcon Killer would be foolish enough to walk right up to us here and make no effort to run away? See, he has his gun, but he does not offer to shoot.

He is wounded, said Kitsune. Maybe he heard I was here and knew there was no use trying to get away, and so decided to give himself up. He licked his chops. Gaylord commented to himself that the man’s tongue was longer than ever.

I still doubt it, said the officer. "This one they call Tzun Kai wouldn’t be likely to walk up here like this with a gun on him and all."

When thirty thousand yen are at stake, I make no errors, said Kitsune. Here! He snatched at Gaylord’s jacket and ripped it brutally from his shoulder. He tore the shirt away and then hauled Gaylord around so that the other officers could see.

Laid to view, the mark was very plain. A dragon, divided exactly in half, was tattooed into the shoulder. The part which was there showed the right division of the face spewing long blue flame straight at the beholder.

The half-dragon, said Kitsune. "The mark is unmistakable. Without any doubt whatever, it is Tzun Kai. Also without doubt, he has killed his last Japanese falcon. Please give me the money."

The money was offered for his head, said the second officer.

That’s right, said the first. Only for his head.

That is easily remedied, said Kitsune. You have the money there?

The first officer took it out of his pocket. It was all in ten-yen notes and it made a large bundle. Kitsune nodded. He turned to a sentry and grabbed his rifle. Then, leveling it he lunged to sink the chill point deep into Gaylord’s chest. Gaylord dropped to his knees. Kitsune set his foot against the pilot’s shoulder and recovered the blade. Then he whipped off Gaylord’s helmet and bent his head over. The blade of the bayonet was very dull but Kitsune sawed remorselessly. I said I would earn those thirty thousand yen, Gaylord.

You’ll never live to spend them! cried the pilot. Damn you, you’ll never live—

Please! It’s all right. You’re safe!

Distrustfully, Bill Gaylord opened his eyes. Japanese headquarters was dissolving into the nothingness from whence it had come, and in its place was appearing a small, silk-hung room. Kitsune’s fox face was unaccountably that of a very beautiful white girl. Gaylord fingered the clean, crisp pillowcase under his head. He shut his eyes tightly and then suddenly opened them—but that maneuver failed to make the vision vanish. He relaxed and regarded the girl as though perfectly willing to look at her, but quite ready to push away the disappointment of having her disappear. However, she did not turn back into a fox.

We are your friends, said Marion. Don’t be alarmed. She laid a calming hand upon his arm and smiled reassuringly at him.

Abruptly, his memory returned to him and he surged up, staring wildly all around him. Where . . . where are they?

Who?

The Japanese! I . . . I’m behind their lines. I must be! Or . . . how . . . ?

These are the gardens of Tsoi Yan. The Japanese are patrolling this place, true, but they don’t dare try to find you again. They failed once, even after they searched the house. You are safe for the moment.

Gaylord sank back on the pillow, staring at her. But . . . who are you?

Marion Thompson. We rented the place when we could not go into the back country. But you’ll hear all about that later. Right now you must rest. Dmitri took the bullet out of your chest. He says you will be all right soon—but you aren’t to worry about anything.

You can’t do this, said Gaylord. You don’t know. If the Japanese discover that you have harbored me, they won’t be stopped by any international scandal. You don’t understand the risk you are running!

If I had worried about risk, would I have watched beside you for two days? You mistake us.

But I . . . He fell silent.

billgaylord.jpg

Bill Gaylord

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Dimitri

"Yes, I know about that, too. You are the one the Chinese call Tzun Kai and there is thirty thousand yen offered for you. But you are an American and, even if you were not, the battle you fought day before yesterday would have earned you sanctuary in the home of Nencheng’s lowest coolie or richest merchant. Do not worry about leaving here. Somehow we’ll manage it."

Her voice almost reassured him and then he saw, deep in her eyes, a certain, lurking terror as though she momentarily expected an ax to fall.

This place, she went on, is an old money vault and it is not likely to be discovered, as deep as it is in the earth. I do not think the Japanese will search again. . . .

The knock on the door brought her whirling to her feet. Her hands were shaking a little as she stared at it. Who . . . who is there?

Dmitri Kamin.

She gave a small gasp of relief and unbarred the entrance. Dmitri Kamin was a tall, spare White Russian whose air was one of both hauteur and condescension. He bowed deeply and entered. When he saw that Gaylord was conscious, he bowed again to him. There was something unseen about Dmitri Kamin which made Gaylord glance about until he located the holstered automatic which lay on the table.

You are better, I see. For a little while I was slightly concerned. I have not practiced for more than twelve years. But the lung was untouched and you have youth in your favor. You are, I might add, extremely lucky to have so attentive a nurse.

Gaylord didn’t like the way he glanced at Marion and smiled. To himself, Gaylord tried to check off an unreasonable antagonism by recalling that he had had one or two unfortunate experiences with White Russians and a belief that their loyalty lay always with the most bread. It was insane to suddenly detest the fellow to whom he owed his life. He put on a pleasant air. I’m lucky to be looked after like this. When my wing came off I expected to be executed within an hour, if not killed in the crash. But then it would be useless to try to thank you.

You have only to thank me, said Dmitri, for loaning you Marion.

Instantly all Gaylord’s good resolutions went by the board. Dmitri had looked at Marion a certain way, and she had not responded with any great enthusiasm.

We had better let him rest, she said.

If you don’t mind, Marion, I should like to have a word with him. Medical matters, you know.

She looked to Gaylord and then, with a smile which said that she would be back, left the room. Instantly Dmitri underwent a change. His thin, cold face was turned full on Gaylord.

I suppose you realize that you are more than ordinarily possessed of luck, he began. "When I attended to your wound, I could not help but see the half-dragon on your shoulder and, of course, understand that you were Tzun Kai. As you might well guess, Marion and her father are my very good friends. Naturally their welfare is uppermost in my mind. Your presence in this house is suspected. Sentries are posted all about the walls, and an armored car is cruising the outer streets constantly. But, somehow, the moment you are well enough to travel, you must attempt to get clear. I doubt you will be able to reach your own lines, but that is neither here nor there. You threw yourself on the bounty of these . . . these, I might say, over-sympathetic people. Your presence will mean their ruin. Do I make myself clear?"

Well, then, said Gaylord, wishing to God he felt good enough to talk straight, your course is clear.

"My course?"

Inform on me, say that I terrorized these people into caring for me, collect the thirty-thousand-yen reward, clear everyone of any blame—

Ah! To clear them of blame now, after they opposed that first search, would be impossible. They are my friends. No, you will contrive, as soon as you can walk, to leave this place. Is that clear?

Very, said Gaylord. Why didn’t you let the knife slip and have done with it?

That would not have been very commendable, said Dmitri. There is such a thing as ‘face.’ I trust you will follow my advice at the earliest moment. He started to leave and then, at the door, paused and looked back. You will not be able to move for two or three days. Meantime, I am unable to prevent Marion from taking care of you. She is a very impressionable girl, apt to be overawed by both your condition and reputation. I trust you will remember yourself.

I don’t think I’d enjoy that, said Gaylord.

What?

Being so unsure of a woman as you are. If she doesn’t like you any better than that, why bother?

Dmitri glared but, as Gaylord had closed his eyes and seemed to have lost all interest in the proceedings, he slammed the door so hard that all the silken draperies shivered on the walls of the old vault.

Gaylord opened one eye. No wonder I didn’t like that guy. He opened the other and stared soberly at his bandaged chest and arm. He tried to raise himself on his elbow and fell back, dizzy with the effort.

I guess I’ll have to lie here and take it, he muttered.

But no, Dmitri wouldn’t sell him out. Not here. But a man like that and thirty thousand yen . . .

Say, said Gaylord to himself, "how high are the stakes in that man’s game?"

Every day, Gaylord vowed that he would follow the contemptuous White Russian’s advice. Certainly he had no right to continue to endanger the lives of these people whose hospitality exceeded their fear of Japanese reprisal. But every day he would rouse himself and attempt to put on his clothes, only to see the room begin to spin and then flounder back to the bed to lie gasping. But every day found him a little stronger, the bullet shock (which had an effect worse than the loss of blood or pain) was lessened.

And then one evening, he lay arguing with himself until he had whipped his determination into a fine froth. Who was he, to let these people further risk their lives? A pilot without a flag of his own, a bravo of the sky, condemned to die as swiftly and as harshly as he had lived.

His clothing had been washed and pressed, and some Chinese maid had hidden the bullet hole in the jacket by finely working the half face of a dragon over it in scarlet and turquoise silk. That was a dangerous thing, as bad as carrying a banner with his name on it, but he understood the worship which had gone into it, understood too the difficulty of working hard leather with such fragile silk, and so he let it remain. It was on his shoulder. It might as well lie like a medal or a convict arrow of old—there was little difference—plainly upon his breast.

He took new confidence in life when he found that he was stronger by far this day than he had been the morning before. Of course, it really didn’t matter whether he was strong or not. He had seven bullets in his automatic and it wouldn’t take a lot of strength to fire those. He’d do that. As soon as they caught him, they would find some pleasant manner to execute him. An escort of honor to the Valhalla, even if Japanese, was not unwelcome.

He smoothed out his yellow blond hair and grinned a trifle at the thought of smuggling Japanese into Valhalla.

When he had finished the last buckle of his flying boots, he approached the door, buckling his holster about him. The thick entrance gave easily to his touch. Cautiously he examined the long passageway which lay ahead, but it was empty. As silently as he could, he walked its length to find himself under a trap door. It operated upon counterbalances, so that the slightest touch of his upraised hand caused it to open all the way. This was the basement of the house, and the trap door, when he had dropped it, could not be distinguished from any other great, square paving block.

At the end of a long row of hogsheads lay another stairway, and as he approached that he saw a square of window. It was dark outside, a fact about which he had not been at all certain, but for which he was very grateful.

At the top of the steps he opened an ordinary door and found himself in the servants’ hallway. Beyond a wall he could hear the rattle of pans and the shrill, singsong chatter of the help. He could not go in that direction. Perhaps the front of the house was empty.

A long, thick rug deadened his footsteps as he crossed the main room. Through another window, all worked in birds and flowers, he saw the turret of the armored car cruising through the dusky front street. He eyed it with speculation. He could get around it, perhaps, but the foot sentries wouldn’t make quite so much noise. He put one hand on the gun holster, pausing long enough to buckle the flap open. This was, of course, madness itself. But—

Hello! said a surprised voice. Henry Thompson pushed himself out of his easy chair, in which he had been luxuriating after a good dinner.

Gaylord looked at him as a small boy caught with one hand wedged in the jam pot.

Henry squared his heavy shoulders and took a hitch on his paunch, preparing to be very severe. Where the devil do you think you’re going?

Gaylord moved a hand toward the street in an irresolute fashion and felt silly.

You must hate the hell out of living, said Henry.

I can make it through those guards.

Sure. Sure you can. And even if you did, where would you be? The army is stretched all across the north. Here, be reasonable. Sit down and have a drink.

Gaylord looked again at the street. I’ve no right to keep those Japanese around your house. If they find me here—

Suppose you let me worry about that, said Henry, shoving Gaylord into a chair out of sight of the window. Maybe I’ve got some plans of my own, huh? Maybe I want favor for favor. I’m a businessman, no softhearted nincompoop.

Henry’s growl failed to bring it off properly and Gaylord, with the tension slacking within him, laughed and took the drink.

I’m not kidding, said Henry. You’re in a spot and I’m in a spot, and I’ve got an idea that maybe we can help each other out of it. He scowled into his glass and decided to come abruptly to the point. You know Ruhur?

The mountain province? I’ve never been there but I know something of it. We . . . that is . . . the Chinese forces will probably lean on it pretty heavily for their oil supply now that they’ve lost the coast.

My lad, said Henry, "muffle the drums and hang the crêpe on that oil!"

What do you mean? said Gaylord, well aware of the critical importance of the fields.

Before these gentlemen in mustard began to parade around here, said Henry, I was supposedly the owner of those fields. I got the concession so long ago you can hardly read the order. The country is so isolated and my own holdings and power there so important that I picked its politics—to my own regret. Szui Mai is, at last report, holding the ancestral barbarian throne. You’ve heard of him?

Vaguely. Petty warlord, with the usual vices.

"Right. Szui Mai would sell his grandmother’s soul for a brass cash, if he could find any takers. He has ninety thousand troops and only three passes to hold. But he isn’t likely to either hold the passes or receive reinforcements."

Why, I should think it would be easy enough—

"Yes, it would appear so. But you’ve reckoned without our friends in the horn-rimmed spectacles. Oil is the blood of the army. As long as the Chinese can get oil from Ruhur, they’ll fight for a thousand years. No oil, no fight. Intelligence received from Inner Mongolia reports a large concentration of bombing planes and pursuit ships. They can have only one destination—Ruhur!"

Gaylord was too enrapt in the Chinese cause to fail to be greatly agitated. Doesn’t Chiang know about this?

And if he does, what can he do? He hasn’t either troops or planes, or time to get them there. Believe me, Gaylord, when I say that I am not entirely devoid of selfless interest in this. I could make some vague readjustment if the Japanese took Ruhur. I could sit here and let that treacherous little snake, Szui Mai, sell himself to the enemy from force of habit. I could keep my hands off and run less risk. But I’ve worked in this country too long to see it taken over by the invader. The Chinese are going to have that oil, and nobody but the Chinese. If the Japanese get it, Chiang will be wiped out from a base in his rear, to say nothing of being hamstrung for lack of fuel.

Yes, said Gaylord, sipping his drink, but I fail to see just how you can do anything here.

If you are with me, there is a transport ship, one of those off the now-grounded Chinese Coastwise Service. It is at a place on the river, and I have already done my bargaining there in secret. Dmitri Kamin proposed the plan and—

Ah, the White Russian, said Gaylord. You find him reliable, I suppose.

Henry stared blankly at his guest. Why . . . is there any doubt about him? He held a high position in Russia under the Czar and . . . and Marion seems rather fond of him.

Nothing meant, said Gaylord.

Well, now, don’t scare the hell out of me that way! When a man has worked for you for five years you’re liable to trust him, even though you can’t always tell in this country. Believe me, Gaylord, that fellow Kamin has worked like a slave to keep my affairs in order. I practically picked him out of the river, and there’s no doubt about his devotion. My God, man, why give me a turn like that?

Sorry, said Gaylord. You were speaking about a plane.

Yes. As I say, we are quite fortunate. It is all fueled, and in fair condition. There are no guns mounted on it, of course, but that is a chance which we must take. Dmitri got hold of it about three days ago—

Three days? Then he got the idea after I had been here quite a while. You know, I was afraid something might have happened. I did not see—I presume she is your daughter—Miss Marion after I came around and I thought perhaps—

Well . . . hesitated Henry, I must admit that he has emphasized the danger of having you in the house, and he forbade Marion to keep you any further company. But this was all for the uneasiness he felt for our safety. Then, when he realized that you might well be an asset in helping us to escape to Ruhur, his attitude toward you changed markedly. You seem antagonistic toward him.

So it was Dmitri’s idea, said Gaylord thoughtfully. And from the number of guns which were doubtlessly abandoned in town and at the drome, it would not be difficult to at least place some sort of armament on this plane—at least, not for a man of resource. I fail to see what good we can do in Ruhur with a gunless ship.

Oh, there are two pursuit planes there. Modern ones, too. But I am informed the Chinese pilots who were to man them never arrived.

Ah, I see, said Gaylord.

Damn it, man, you’ve got an infernally suspicious nature.

Not on the whole, said Gaylord. Well! It’s the only route I can take out of this mess, and if you’re willing to risk your neck, you probably know what you are doing.

You mean you think there’s something hidden in this? My friend, I assure you—

Oh, I don’t doubt you. What is the exact location of the ship?

The former seaplane terminal. It is the only one there.

All right. I shall meet you there at midnight.

Tonight? But how can you get past these guards?

Very shortly you are going to call for the officer in charge of those men out there. You are going to insist on one final search of this place. You’ll hear of nothing less than a thorough ransack because you have urgent business down the coast and wish all doubt to be removed as to your innocence of harboring me.

And you?

I shall meet you at the plane at midnight.

Henry filled up the glasses and they drank to luck. And then Henry walked out of the room and toward the gate, to demand the officer in charge.

Silent as a cat, Gaylord lowered himself into the darkness outside the window.

The seaplane hangar was dark as a tomb, and the only sound was the whispering lap of the river on the ramp. The big transport spread its wings into the infinity of darkness. A few fishing lights on the river caught reflection in the engine cowls.

Gaylord ran his hands along the fuselage until he found the door handle. With the cautious aid of matches, he examined the instrument panel. All the tank gauges showed to register Full. Gaylord got out, climbing up on top of the wing to pace its length and make as sure as he could that all was there. He pulled the canvas hoods from the engines and propellers. The metal was damp with disuse, but there was no rust. Getting down, he tested the controls and found them to be in good working order.

His wristwatch showed that it lacked less than a minute of midnight. He was certain now that his wall-scaling had been successful. This would have been the first place the troops would have searched, because it was the only available ship. But as yet . . .

Biko wo hiku! bawled a shrill voice outside the hangar. Halt! A dozen pairs of cloth-shod shoes stopped moving. A dozen rifles thudded to the concrete. A white light stabbed into the hangar and threshed restlessly, to come to rest upon the nose of the transport.

The only way out lay across that ramp. Gaylord’s hand tightened on the butt of his automatic, wildly speculating as to how much those Japanese knew.

The light turned itself back to the ramp and Gaylord quickly cat-footed up to the door on the side away from the hangar front. Silently he slipped into the plane.

The lavatory at the rear of the cabin was open. Gaylord closed the door behind him, wondering if these devils were going to make a thorough search.

Footsteps were approaching the plane. Henry’s cigar-husky voice growled, You are carrying this nonsense too far, I tell you. Isn’t it enough to make hash out of my house, without tagging me all over Nencheng.

Excuse me, please, said a Japanese officer. Very sorry to be such an amount of regrettable trouble, but must follow orders. You need a pilot, yes?

Dmitri’s cold tones answered him. If I have to tell you again that I am going to fly this plane, I shall report your stupidity to your superiors. I have their permission to fly down the coast, and I do not intend to be balked by your insolence.

Very sorry, please, said the officer. "Must search plane and make certain you fly, not Tzun Kai." He volleyed a harsh order in Japanese and, a moment later, cloth-shod feet could be heard approaching.

Soldiers climbed into the cabin, their bayoneted rifles thumping against the door as they entered. The knob of the lavatory rattled and the door swung back. A white beam played over the small room.

Gaylord, hands braced against the wall on one side, feet braced against a rack on the other and bent body pressed against the blank space over the door looked down at the light.

Kara, said the sergeant. It is empty.

When he closed the door again, Gaylord once more began breathing. The strain on his arms was such that he had difficulty in getting soundlessly to the floor again. But he found reason to grin at the routine, orderly mind of the Japanese which could not encompass a fact further than its logical portent. Men in rooms were men standing on the floor.

He could well imagine the wonder which preceded Henry’s There, you see? The plane is empty! And now we refuse to be held up a moment longer.

Excuse me, please, said the baffled Japanese.

The soldiers climbed down and presently luggage thudded into the cabin. Footsteps followed, and then there was a roar as the tow tractor engine started up. The big plane lurched as the truck under it rolled along the track. The tractor engine stopped and then the cabin door opened and closed again.

Say, you know your stuff, Dmitri, said Henry. Why didn’t you tell us you could fly. We’d have been on our way weeks ago.

I am not too certain, said Dmitri. I disliked endangering Marion with my poor piloting.

I wonder what could have happened to Gaylord? said Marion.

He’s a rat like the rest of them, snapped Dmitri. He didn’t suppose that he owed you anything for saving his life. I told you from the first that it was idiotic to harbor him. By this time he’s halfway back to his lines.

The starters ground and the engines coughed into life one by one. After a period of warming them, Dmitri throttled the ship down the track. The hull bobbed free from the truck and with a surge, the transport headed into the river current, gathering speed.

Presently the wings began to bite into the downriver wind and the hull pounded less in the waves. And then, with one last surge, the ship gladly took the air.

Gaylord entered the cabin and stood for a moment looking down at the departing lights of Nencheng, which spread in a great half-moon along the bend in the dark river.

Henry seemed to sense that somebody was behind him and turned in his seat to gape at Gaylord. Why . . . what the devil . . . I thought . . .

The Japanese are noted for their bad eyes, smiled Gaylord.

Marion beamed upon him, but before he could speak to her, Dmitri Kamin had faced about from the controls. Gaylord was startled by the look on the man’s face. Hatred was mingled with a strange satisfaction.

So, you made it! said Dmitri.

"Oh, us rats