The first enemy plane had pancaked, and had been blown to bits by its own bomb load. But the others?
A row of bullet holes appeared suddenly in Don's left wing surface, creeping toward the cabin. As Don zoomed, a dial on his instrument board smashed to bits.
The machine gun in the plane's after turret fired two short bursts, followed by Red Pennington's shout.
"Two of 'em, diving at us from port and starboard!" yelped the lieutenant. "They've got us bracketed--"
The sudden jerk of his safety belt cut off Red's speech, as Don threw his ship into a barrel roll. It was a desperate attempt to dodge the deadly cross-fire of the two enemy planes until he could bring his own guns to bear.
But now another ship had joined the dogfight. Michael Splendor's open seaplane, diving from ten thousand feet, unleashed a stream of bullets at the enemy.
Coming out of his roll at barely a hundred feet, Don climbed his ship in a furious effort to get back in the fight. But already the Scorpion pilots had had enough. One after another, they fluttered down like wounded birds, their wings and fuselages pierced in a hundred places.
Both managed to take the water safely, though they began to sink a moment later. Their crews plunged overboard, swimming toward the _Gatoon_.
Immediately a boat was lowered by the yacht. Glancing down Don Winslow cut his throttle.
"We'll land on the other side of the _Gatoon_, Red, and taxi in under the stern. Splendor will moor his plane near the bow until they hoist it aboard, and...."
"Wait, Don!" Red Pennington cried sharply. "Splendor's waggling his wings to signal us. He's trying to tell us something."
Don Winslow, banking in a slow turn squinted out over the sunlit ocean. Against the horizon, just over the tail of the other seaplane appeared a V-shaped group of dots.
"It's the Navy squadron we radioed for!" the young commander chuckled. "I'd forgotten all about them, Red! And, say--will those boys be peeved at having missed the fight!"
He was still grinning at the thought when he set the captured seaplane down on the bumpy water, in a cloud of spray. His expression changed, however, as the craft developed a sharp list to port, which grew steeper every second.
"Hey, Skipper!" cried Red Pennington, in alarm. "Those bullets must have made a sieve of our left pontoon. The wing's goin' to 'catch a crab'!"