El Alamein Jack Murray (booksvooks TXT) 📖

‘Halts Maul,’ shouted Manning into his radio with a grin.

‘Tallyho,’ came the reply in a distinctly German accent.

They were around 1,000 feet below the Spitfires and they formed a protective circle. The Spitfires began to fan out, then, one after another, started to dive. The numbers were very much in favour of the Allies. Manning could only count eight Messerschmidts. Seeing the attack coming, one of the enemy BF 109’s peeled away and seemed to fall behind the others. Manning wondered if it was running scared. Then he saw it describe the most extraordinary arc and accelerate. Within seconds it had hit one of the Spitfires. This could only be Marseille.

Manning didn’t have time to think about this anymore. The sky was now a mass of dogfights. It looked like the Spitfires outnumbered the Messerschmidts almost two to one. But this advantage was not telling. One of the Germans was running amok within the Spitfire ‘lines’.

Sweat poured down Manning’s face. Then the sickening realisation hit him. A German fighter was on his tail. He pushed forward on his stick then executed a half roll. Within seconds he now had the Messerschmidt in his sights. He kicked his rudder left to allow him a right angle attack and turned the gun-button to fire. A four second burst followed. The tracers from the eight guns hit their mark. Smoke began to pour from the stricken German fighter. It began to spiral downwards. Then it was out of view and out of Manning’s mind.

He peeled away relieved to have bested the German in this encounter. His mind turned to the small matter of helping his squadron. It was bedlam and they were having the worst of it. And it was not hard to guess why. One man flew with urgency and venom. For all the reports of his conduct when the fighting stopped, there was no question that Marseille was a killer.

The British had lost over half of the squadron at a cost of only a couple of the Messerschmidts. Battle smoke, thick with death, filled the sky. A BF 109 appeared in Manning’s sights. It had just hit a Spitfire. The tail was on fire.

‘Red Leader here, Red Two, you’re on fire. Eject.’

There was no response. The plane turned sharply and went into a headlong descent. Manning felt his heart lurch. There would be no more singing from Thompson. Manning turned hunter once more.

The Messerschmitt was unaware of Manning. This gave the Spitfire vital seconds to dive towards him. He closed to within 150 yards. It was practically impossible to miss. Manning let go a three second burst with full deflection and spun away as he saw a jet of red flame coming from the engine of the fighter.

He climbed up steeply, his eyes sinking to the back of his skull. At this point it was every man for himself. The battle was spread out over miles of sky. As his eyes searched for a friend or foe, he felt his plane shudder.

The plane had been hit.

In a split second he realised two things. The bullets had not hit anything of consequence: he still had control of the aircraft. However, he was in the sights of the enemy. Manning swore out loud but also acted instinctively. He thrust the stick forward and then kicked the rudder right. He heard another burst of gunfire. It missed.

Fear gripped Manning as he looked around wildly to see where the attack was coming from. Then he realised he was underneath him. He didn’t panic. He spun left in anticipation of his enemy firing at him but the man he was up against was more calculating. He’d held off until he was certain.

For one glorious moment he thought he was clear of his assailant. The sky around him seemed clear. Perhaps he’d broken off the encounter because ammunition or fuel was low. All of his senses were on highest alert, however. It had been a close call. Up ahead he saw a lone fighter. He saw the yellow tip before he saw the swastika. It was travelling relatively slowly seemingly unaware of Manning’s approach.

Closing in, he lined up the aircraft in his sights. Four hundred feet away, three hundred then all of a sudden the BF 109 swung viciously upwards. Within a matter seconds it had arced tightly. Manning knew what would happen next. They’d talked about Marseille’s technique often yet here he was about to fall victim to it. The high deflection firing from short range, immediate, instinctive and probably executed without the aid of gun sights. Manning was already opening his hood when the plane ran into the bullets and the engine burst into flame. The control stick was wrenched from his other hand.

Moments later Manning was out of the plane and falling from the sky. Remarkably he was uninjured. The plane was in a tailspin and he chased it down through the air. He felt for the rip cord of his parachute and tugged. The speed of his descent was immediately arrested. He was falling faster than he would have liked. In truth he didn’t know what to expect. The ground was coming towards him quickly. He braced himself for the inevitable impact and tried to remember to roll.

He hit the ground with a thud and a grunt. His roll mitigated the impact, but the wind had been knocked out of him. He lay there for several minutes and stared up at the sky. It was blue. This was hardly news, but it told him that he’d strayed quite some distance from the dogfight. The question was, where exactly was he? He could hear plainly the sound of fighting, muffled explosions, the crack of guns. None of this gave him a clue as to which side of the divide he’d fallen. The sky was empty.

He hoisted himself up and scanned the horizon. Ribbons of black smoke floated gently upwards. A number of planes had certainly bought it. He wondered how many of them