Микки Спиллейн: Together We Kill

Banana was a World War II Liberty ship named Leona. It was scheduled to sail for the Panama Canal where it would be blown up. It was to be quite a coup. In this day of the airlift and almost overnight reconstruction, the damage wouldn’t be enough to impair our military or economic might. But that wasn’t the intent of Banana. It was a propaganda program the Reds had set up that would work against us. With all the unrest in Central America, the Leona would blow and the Commies would say that it was a deliberate United States action to give us a chance to move directly into South American countries to “protect” them — thus offsetting a true people’s movement against capitalistic governments. To back them up would be proof that the Panama Canal was an almost outdated project in these modern days of transportation, not even large enough to take modern carriers or battlewagons.

The cold war would become hot. The Reds had a live excuse of their own to move in militarily and the shooting would start. With the Red propaganda machine rolling, who would be on our side? Great!

Tuck’s voice suddenly cut off. He had died.

I hung up and explained it to Sharon. I watched her pale. “It’s too late, isn’t it, señor? ”

“Not now, not after all that’s happened,” I said. “It’s never too late, Sharon.” I looked up the number George Clinton gave me. I got the watchman at Cable-Hurley Supplies Company and he gave me Felix Ramsey’s home number.

Ramsey didn’t like me dragging him out of the sack, but when I mentioned Slim Upgate he was ready to do anything. I nailed it fast. I wanted two 500-pound demolition bombs to swing under the Mustang and I wanted them installed right away. He stuttered a little when I told him, but he said he’d have a truck out at the field in an hour.

I had one more call to make. This one was the big one. I got the man named Jones after three tries and told him to listen carefully and not bother tracing the call. I told him Smith was dead and so was the guy who killed him. I told him where they were. I also told him there was only one way the thing could be handled, and it was my way. If our government stepped in there would be hell to pay and the propaganda bit would go right on, but modified a little. The Reds would play up the attempt but capitalize on the fact that when they blew the whistle on the plot it was their men who were killed performing a public service and the U.S. who tried to destroy the evidence of it. It was all very neat and covered from every angle.

Calmly, Jones said, “Then how will it be done?”

“I’ll do it. They’ll never come back to me, brother.”

“And you want what from me?”

“Get the reports from the planes patrolling the hurricane area. One of them might have spotted that ship. Can do?”

“Will do. How do I reach you?”

“I’ll call you from another phone,” I said and hung up.

The men were waiting by the Mustang with a truck. It didn’t take long to swing the two bombs under the wing or to hook them up. When they were ready, the guys simply looked at me curiously and drove away.

I made the call to Jones. He had the information at hand, but his voice sounded shaky. He started, “Listen, Fallon...”

“No time, friend, this is it. When it’s over I’ll explain. Not now. What about that ship?”

“She was spotted. In fact, the planes directed her through the best section of the blow.” He gave me the last coordinates and I wrote them down. “I know what you’re planning, baby. You got me on a hook and I can’t say a thing.”

“Don’t try.”

She was waiting for me by the plane, her eyes shiny with tears. “You think you can do this thing?”

“I’m going to try like hell, baby.”

“Then take my love with you, señor. ” She reached up, her arms going around my neck and her mouth was a volcanic thing of sweetness and fire that said everything at once, promising everything, and I remembered what she did to save my life and felt a wild hunger for the woman she was, full and glossy, vibrant with a love she was giving to me.

When I took my mouth away from hers I said, “I’ll be back, Sharon,” then I climbed in the old 11–51 and went through the starting procedure.

The tower didn’t want to clear me, but I never gave him a chance to tell me so. I headed into the wind and eased the throttle forward and fought the side gusts until I was off the ground. Then I climbed to 30,000 feet, over the storm picked up my heading, held everything at max cruise and waited. The moon above made the rolling clouds of Ingrid look like grey snowbanks that gave way to the 60-mile width of the hurricane’s eye before narrowing across its southeast quarter. Then I passed it.

I found the Leona ten miles off her course estimate. To make sure, I swept in low with my landing lights on, wheels and flaps down. There was her name plastered across the stern in fading white paint. I got the gear retracted before the first bursts of gunfire winked at me from the decks. I picked up altitude and circled the ship below.

Two chances, that was all I had.

I made the first pass from the stern, dumping her over from 15,000 feet and releasing my bomb at 2000. Behind me came a shuddering whump, and when I looked back I could see the yellow glow of the burst and the lurch of the ship as she caught the near miss. There were lights on the deck now and in their beams I could see the ant-like figures of men running. A spot flicked on and tried to catch me, but there wasn’t much chance of that. If they knew what they were carrying they’d be worrying about saving themselves, not killing me.

I took the Mustang up again and got set for another pass. I started to make a 180-degree turn into the run when I felt a sudden lightening of the ship, a quick uplift on the left wing and the insides wanted to drain out of me. Down below, the other bomb tore harmlessly into open water a half mile from the Leona.

It was too late after all.

For one second I thought of a suicide run, but I didn’t have the guts for it. In helpless anger I circled over the Leona, cursing that battered old hulk and wishing I still had the six .50s mounted that could at least tear some holes in her, damning the idiots that mounted the bomb, but mainly damning myself for not having checked everything out.

I took one last look below. This time there was something different. The ship had stopped. It had heeled over sharply to port and was low in the water. I took another chance and went in again with the gear down and the lights on. I saw what had happened.

The first bird had been a near miss, all right, but those rusted plates of the ship’s bottom were too old to take the concussion. They had folded and I had won. Damn it, we had won!

I eased the stick over and got out of there, getting on a return heading. But I couldn’t help looking back. I was far and high enough away to see it safely when it went off. No big flash. No mushroom cloud. The Leona must have been underwater when it happened. Just a beautiful, diffused glow that changed colors in a soft pattern that rippled out gently and just as gently receded.

Ingrid came into sight again, her eye and front quarter reaching out for Florida. I beat her in and taxied up to the hangar where Sharon was still waiting, the wind whipping the dress tight around her legs. The tower was trying hard to get me to get under cover and the lights of a truck were coming toward me. I waved the truck off, motioned that I was going up again and the guy yelled something unintelligible and swung around.

As he did, the motor coughed twice and began to run rough until I idled it at higher RPM’s. The old trouble was back again, despite Charlie’s work. I wouldn’t be able to shut down and re-start now without getting into it — and I wanted to get the hell out of there.