Cassada

by James Salter

  Isbell waited.

  “Who do you want to take with you?” Dunning asked. “It ought to be someone who’d get something out of going. A good gunner.”

  “Good or with good potential.”

  “There’s Godchaux, of course. Dumfries didn’t do so bad last time we were down.”

  “Not Dumfries,” Isbell said. Dunning seldom agreed to two things in a row. It was necessary to edge around like a crab, come in from the side. “Let me think about it.”

  “All right. We have to send the names in today.”

  “Give me an hour or so.”

  It was cold in the hangar. The noon wind was cutting along the roof and making a strange, blue sound. The note rose and then faded, as if there were an empty bottle and the wind blowing across it.

  “Roast chicken for lunch,” Dunning said. “Have you been over?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Better get there while there’s some left.”

  “I’ll be along.”

  Later, where the road passed the end of the runway Isbell stopped and waited at the red light while two of his planes landed, a little unsteady in the powerful wind. The Volksbus quivered, too, its flatness catching the wind. He saw the planes touch down and slow almost immediately. Finally, looking as if they’d stopped completely, they showed their sides as they turned off the runway halfway down. He heard a horn blow. Someone behind him accelerated impatiently past.

  In the barracks the next day, Dumfries sat watching as Cassada packed, tossing clothes on top of the dresser like someone expelled from school.

  “I hear you’re going to Tripoli.”

  “That’s right.”

  “How’d that happen?”

  Cassada gave a shrug. “Captain Isbell told me I was going, that’s all.”

  “What’s it for?”

  “A gunnery meet.”

  “Are you going to shoot?”

  “I don’t know. I hope so.”

  Dumfries sat flicking at a set of car keys on the table with his finger.

  “I just wonder how they made the choice,” he said.

  “Captain Wickenden put me up for it.”

  “No, really.”

  “I’m serious.”

  “He wouldn’t do that. I don’t think he’d do that.”

  “He decided to reform.”

  Dumfries continued flicking the keys, his brow puzzled.

  “Tell me the truth,” he said.

  IV

  HARLAN TURNS TO THEM, SUDDENLY POINTING . . .

  Harlan turns to them, suddenly pointing.

  “What?”

  “Look out there, Major.”

  Dunning sees nothing.

  “Where?” he says.

  Harlan waves a finger back and forth, pointing all over. Godchaux looks, then raises a hand, palm up. On the window glass points of water are appearing. Suddenly Dunning sees them and understands. It almost seems a sign. He would give the world for just one thing, to have them both on the ground. The rain is the answer. The trees are darker now. The clouds are heavier, the daylight gone from them.

  They don’t have Isbell yet. They think he might be orbiting the beacon. Dunning turns that over in his mind. Would Isbell be doing that, circling up there, waiting for nothing while his last fuel goes? No, Dunning thinks, but what else might he do? He can’t decide. If only Cadin weren’t there.

  “It’s just coming down light, Major,” Godchaux says from the doorway. “It isn’t bad.”

  “No.”

  “It might even stop.”

  Dunning doesn’t reply. Things that will never matter. White Lead is waiting for an answer, he wants to know if they have White Two yet. He wants to be steered to him.

  “Listen, never mind about White Two,” Dunning directs. “What’s your fuel?”

  “Say again, GCA.”

  “This is mobile. What’s your fuel?”

  After a moment,

  “Seven hundred pounds.”

  Seven hundred pounds. Dunning imagines they can hear that all over the base, in the other squadrons, the headquarters, the housing area. The tape is running. Up in the tower it’s all being recorded, static, squeals, voices. Everything that would be rerun again and again. Seven hundred pounds—the board would be writing it on their yellow tables, seven and two zeroes.

  “Never mind about him, White,” Dunning calls. “You’ll never find him in the weather.”

  No answer.

  “White Lead?”

  There is nothing.

  “Do you read mobile, White?”

  “Roger.”

  “Make another approach. It’s looking better down here. It’s breaking up a little.”

  Cadin takes the mike.

  “White Lead, this is Colonel Cadin. Stay cool. Never mind the weather, you can make it in.”

  “You were blocked. I couldn’t read.”

  Cadin repeats his instruction and as he finishes they hear the end of something White is saying, “. . . clear on top.”

  “Where are you, White?” he asks.

  “I’m climbing.”

  “You’re not on top?”

  “Tops are about nine thousand.”

  Dunning stands silent, trying to think. Things are running through his mind like a stream. They’re both going to bail out. He has to get them down somehow, at least one of them. Godchaux shakes his head a little, looking at the ground. Harlan is watching the rain. It’s not coming down harder, but neither is it letting up. The water shines on the roof of the Volksbus and around the runway lights. The runway will be slick. That’s the least of it. No one’s going to be using the runway, Harlan thinks. They could be parked right in the middle of it, as far as that goes. Dunning takes back the mike.

  “White,” he calls abruptly, “don’t climb any higher. That’s an order. Make another approach.”

  “I’m at forty-five hundred now,” Cassada reports.

  “Don’t climb! Do you understand? Shoot another approach.”

  “I’m at five thousand, Major.”

  He is doing the unthinkable. His heart skidding wildly in his chest, he is spending the last of his fuel, like diving, though this is the opposite, with lungs bursting and no breath left, almost none, into the rolling dark water where he must try and find someone drowned. He is casting his own chances away, from either some fierce sense of duty or the confused desire to do what Isbell would have done, or perhaps be with him in disaster, the two of them at the last.

  For a moment they are all persuaded. It’s a slim chance but somewhere up there Isbell is flying in silence. There’s at least the chance of them seeing each other, joining and trying it together one last time.

  “He don’t have the fuel,” Harlan says quietly.

  They don’t hear him or don’t want to. There’s always the last minute. You come to fields you’ve given up on, you knew you would never be able to find. At the last moment they appear magically as if summoned out of nothing. It could be like that.

  “He don’t have it to spare,” Harlan warns.

  Godchaux stands in the doorway hugging himself and looking outside. The beige felt shows under the turned-up collar of his blouse. He blows into the end of his fist to warm his fingers. He shakes his head again. His expression is calm but all this is amazing to him, unbelievable. It’s already part of lore.

  Dunning leans on the counter, staring out. The seat of his trousers is wrinkled from sitting all day, and the back of his jacket. One chance in a hundred is all, but still a chance. He brings the microphone to his mouth, ready to speak. His thumb fiddles with the button. Finally, unable to stay silent, he says,

  “Are you on top yet, White?” He presses the button in and out to make sure he’s transmitting. “White from mobile, are you on top yet?”

  Harlan says nothing. He would like to say, what’s the point of his going up? He’s headed the wrong way. You don’t get down by going up. You don’t have to go to college to figure that out. The thing that’s re
ally too bad is they can’t talk to each other. That would be nice, to hear them, Cassada and the captain, especially the next five minutes. Old Wickenden was right for once. They should of listened to him. Sometimes these regulars know what they’re talking about. It’s the law of averages.

  “Fortify White from mobile,” Dunning calls. He says it twice, then a third time, looking around at the cloud bases as he does.

  Godchaux is blowing on his fingertips.

  “Fortify White,” Dunning says urgently, “do you read? White from mobile, do you read?”

  Beneath the palms, someone was trying to start a weapons carrier. It was a full colonel, his head bent forward as he looked for the ignition switch in the dark.

  “Chance of catching a ride with you?” Isbell asked.

  “Who’s that?” the colonel said, turning.

  “Captain Isbell, Colonel.”

  “I’ll see if we have room,” he said and waved an arm at a group coming down the front steps of the club, holding on to each other and singing. “Let’s go!” he called, looking for the switch again. “Goddamn champs! Let’s go!”

  They began climbing in. Isbell waited. The colonel was touching everything on the panel, feeling for the switch. “How’s things in the old 5th?” he said to Isbell. “Bunch of hamburgers.”

  “We’re doing all right, Colonel.”

  “Oh, yeah?” He glanced up and saw Piebes, winner of the air-to-air. “Get in here, you goddamn dead-eye,” he said.

  Piebes tried. He managed to lift one leg onto the running board. He seemed to wonder about what to do next. He was wearing the colonel’s hat, grinning, the silver streaks of lightning visible in the dark.

  The colonel slapped the passenger seat beside him. “Sit down,” he said.

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Piebes said, pulling himself in. His head hit the canvas roof. Somebody picked the hat up for him.

  The colonel stiffened to find the starter with his foot and pushed down. The engine turned over a few times and caught weakly.

  “Great equipment,” he said. “Get aboard,” he told Isbell.

  The back was crowded, Isbell could see. “That’s all right, we’ll catch the bus.”

  “Make up your mind, for Christ’s sake,” the colonel said.

  The weapons carrier backed up and then roared off without headlights. Near the theater someone turned them on. As they passed some lights, the colonel could be seen bareheaded, Piebes in the hat.

  Isbell walked back to where Cassada was standing. People were still coming out of the club. There was the sound of a woman’s heels on the cement. It was too dark to see.

  “Who was that, Colonel Neal? He seemed pretty happy,” Cassada said.

  “Famous figure.”

  “Why is that?”

  “You know how old he is?” Isbell said.

  “No.”

  “Thirty-four.”

  “Is that all?”

  “He was one of the first men in his class to make bird.”

  They were alone in the darkness, beneath the stars.

  “Major Dunning’s older than that,” Cassada remarked.

  “Well, that happens, too. But he’s in line for a promotion. His record’s good.”

  “How old are you, Captain?”

  “Thirty-one,” Isbell said.

  Cassada shook his head a little.

  “It’s a long pull, isn’t it?” he said.

  “Not for everybody,” Isbell replied.

  “Colonel Neal.”

  “He’s not the only one.”

  “You’ll get a squadron next.”

  “I might. I hope so. Not here. I’ll be going home too soon. In the States, maybe.”

  “Well, let me know. I’d like to be in it,” Cassada said.

  “I’ll come looking for you.”

  The bus came rattling up, headlights quivering before it. It was filled with airmen and NCOs. Isbell stood with Cassada in the back, at the end of a line of lolling heads and the slow reveal of faces as they passed a streetlight. A sergeant was talking. “Lieutenant,” he recited, “I loaded them myself, that’s what I told him.” He had a hard, lined face. Isbell could see him as they went by the hospital.

  “You know what he says to me? He says, Bonney, that’s good enough for me. That’s good enough for me, he says. I tell you, that means something when they talk to you like that.”

  The others were listening, turned sideways in the seats or leaning from above, holding on with one hand.

  “I seen a lot of them,” Bonney said, “but I’ll tell you one thing, he’s the finest.”

  “No.”

  “The finest.”

  “The colonel is.”

  “Not as a gunner. As a officer, yeah. Not as a gunner.”

  “Every way.”

  “No, no. Hell, man, just look at the scores.”

  “The scores ain’t everything.”

  “Oh, yeah? What else is there?”

  “They ain’t everything.”

  They were going down the unlit stretch along the beach. The water was invisible, the color of the night. They rocked along like commuters, the axles squeaking. Cassada’s head was bent down as if in thought, but his eyes were open. The light struck his cheekbones. Isbell was remembering, for no reason, the day he had come around the corner of the hangar with the flying suit wet and stuck to him and unwilling to go back and change. How for a moment, before knowing anything, Isbell had thought: this one’s different.

  “Listen,” the sergeant said, “I was in Vegas close to three years. I seen them all.”

  “Oh, yeah? You remember the one took all the trophies at the meet there a couple of years back? That West Point major?”

  “Sure. I know him. He’s a real hotshot.”

  “What’s his name again?”

  “I know him,” the sergeant said. “I seen him shoot.”

  “You think Lieutenant Piebes could beat him?”

  “Hell, yes, he could.”

  “He ain’t that good.”

  “You want to know what he told me about how he learned shooting?”

  “What?”

  “I was talking to him the other day and he said, Bonney, I learnt it from flying the tow ship.”

  “From what?”

  “From flying the tow ship, he said.”

  “Hell, Bonney.”

  “No, that’s right. That’s right. It’s like a caddie learns how to play golf.” He looked around. “How do you think they learn? By watching good golfers, that’s how.”

  He was searching for someone in the dark of the bus, squinting. “Hey, Lieutenant,” he said to Isbell. Then, moving his head a little, “What is it? Captain. I’m sorry. Listen, tell them, isn’t that right, that the way to learn is to watch somebody doing it who really knows how?”

  “That’s one way.”

  “There you are,” he cried.

  “He ditn’t say it was the best way.”

  “You heard the captain. I didn’t say nothing about the best way. It don’t have to be the best way. The best way is different for everybody, right, Captain?”

  Isbell nodded.

  Coming to the officers’ area, the bus slowed down. When it stopped, Isbell and Cassada jumped off. The door groaned shut and like a battered metal curtain the side of the bus slid past them. They crossed towards their tent. Only the colonel’s was noisy. Many people were asleep, ready for departure the next day. Off for Rome or Marseilles, the first leg home.

  “What time do you plan to take off?” Cassada asked.

  “Let’s get going early. Right after breakfast.”

  “I hate to leave here,” Cassada said.

  “Maybe you picked up a thing or two.”

  “Sergeant Bonney. I don’t know how much he really knows, but he wasn’t that far off.”

  “It was a good week.”

  “This was the best thing that’s happened to me since I’ve been in the squadron.”

  Two of Pine’s pilots, Le
eman and Sparrow, had taken off early and landed at Marseilles. Their planes were being refueled when Leeman came back from the metro office. Sparrow was waiting.

  “All set? Are we ready to file?” he said.

  Leeman was thin and known as the Deacon. He shook his head.

  “Doesn’t look like we’re going anywhere today. The weather’s down.”

  It was sunny and bright outside. Sparrow put down the paper.

  “Come on,” he said, “what is it, five thousand and five?”

  “No, we’re going to be here overnight.”

  “What do they have?”

  “It’s down to minimums. We might as well go into town.”

  Sparrow lifted his cap and smoothed his hair. His legs were stretched out in front of him. “Minimums,” he said. Marseilles, though, was like that. Clear and fifteen and not another field open in Europe. Your only alternate is Marseilles—the countless times they heard that. “I’ll be damned,” he said. “Well, you know me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m ready. Call a cab.”

  “We can go into Marignane,” Leeman said. “They have a hotel there.”

  “Marignane?”

  “It’s not that far.”

  “Let’s go to Marseilles.”

  “That’s a long way.”

  “Come on, how much can it cost?”

  “It’s not that. I want to be able to get off first thing in the morning if the weather breaks up there.”

  “We can get up early.”

  “No.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake. Why go anywhere? We can stay here and curl up right under the wing. That way we won’t lose a minute.”

  “I don’t want to drive all the way into Marseilles,” Leeman told him.

  They were still there in mid-afternoon waiting to see if the weather would change. Four more planes from Tripoli had landed and the pilots had gone into town. Leeman finally gave up.

  “Let’s go out and get our clothes bags,” he said.

  Another two ships were in the traffic pattern, just breaking and turning to downwind. It was Isbell’s flight. They’d been delayed because of mechanical trouble. They landed and parked next to the planes already there.

  “Must be weather,” Isbell said to Cassada as they walked to operations.

  Leeman and Sparrow were just leaving.