by Richard Fox
Reinhard saluted Manfred, and passed over a dark-stained wooden walking stick, long enough to stretch from the ground to Manfred’s waist. The length had a screw’s twist, a cap of brass over the handle.
Manfred raised an eyebrow.
“I made it from the propeller of your fifty-eighth. You…had to leave before I could give it to you. Every commander deserves a good walking stick,” Reinhard said. “I stand relieved.” He clicked his heels and fell in with the rest of the squadron.
Manfred snapped the stick under his arm and looked each of his men in the eye. They looked as worn as ever, but Wolff’s death seemed to have given each man a new measure of resolve.
“I missed you all,” Manfred said to his men. “Even those of you I haven’t had the chance to meet in person, I thought of you each and every day I was away from the fight. Nothing changes now that I’m back. We fly and we fight.”
His head pounded as he spoke, threatening to make a liar of him before he could get back into the cockpit.
“I have good news.” Manfred turned to the barn behind him. “Savage, if you please.”
Savage and a pair of mechanics pushed the barn doors open. Murmurs of approval spread from the pilots as the Fokker Dr.I was revealed. The triple sets of wings and squat body set it apart from the Albatroses.
Manfred ran his hand along the bare fabric. “Not as pretty as what we were flying, but this plane can climb like an ape and maneuver like the devil. Brauneck, Gussman, you will fly with me tomorrow, so that I can be sure you’re brave.” The named pilots nodded and smiled.
“Savage, I need you to fix my plane immediately,” Manfred said.
“Fix it? It still smells like factory grease. What’s wrong with it, sir?” Savage said.
“It isn’t red.”
“What happened to Lothar?” Manfred asked Reinhard as they walked across the airfield. New Fokker planes were unloaded from trucks and assembled by technicians from the factory. Anthony Fokker, of the eponymous aircraft, had been very generous in his support to Manfred’s squadron once von Hoeppner approved his new plane for use.
Manfred knew Fokker would have more orders for the plane if Squadron 11 and other units adopted it quickly. When it came to helping his pilots, Manfred didn’t mind flexing his celebrity status.
“He got hit in the leg and tried to make an emergency landing. Odd, really, the wound wasn’t that deep,” Reinhard said.
“He never could handle the sight of his own blood. He once passed out between rounds of a boxing match when he saw a drop of blood fall from his nose onto his gloves,” Manfred said.
“The plane was under control, but he came over a tree line and found the empty field he wanted to land in full of soldiers. He pulled up to miss them, and clipped a telegraph line. It got ugly after that.” Reinhard opened the door to the small house that was repurposed to the squadron’s infirmary.
“See that the mechanics learn everything they can from the Fokker engineers. I don’t want a maintenance question to pop up when they’re halfway back to Berlin.” Manfred took his cap off as he entered the infirmary.
“Of course, sir.” Reinhard said, saluting. “Good to have you back.”
Manfred touched the brass cap of his walking stick to his eyebrow and found Lothar’s room.
Lothar’s right leg was suspended in the air, a cast covering from below the knee to his toes, gauze wrapped around his thigh. The left side of his face was a mass of purple and black bruises, his left eye swollen shut.
Katy sat beside him replacing a splint on Lothar’s right hand.
“You look better,” Lothar croaked.
“Lothar, I’m going to have to lie to Mother when she asks about you,” Manfred said. He pulled up a chair and sat down.
“Why? I’ll heal up and be as good looking as ever. Right, uh, Katy, is it?”
“You two have astonishingly thick heads. If your bones heal right you’ll be fine,” Katy said. She finished his splint and laid his hand over his stomach. “But your bones won’t heal if you push yourself too hard too soon,” she said, glaring at Manfred. Manfred knew that comment was meant for him as much as it was for Lothar.
“I like this one,” Lothar said.
“Katy, would you excuse us?”
She left without another word. Even in his wounded state, Manfred saw Lothar admire Katy’s figure as she walked out.
“Did you?” Lothar asked.
“Lothar, what? No. There’s a ‘von’ in your name, same as mine. Act like a gentleman.”
“How’s Mom?” Lothar shifted in his bed, wincing from a sudden pain.
“Worried sick about you. Too proud to say so, of course. She’s set herself up as the stalwart war mother for the whole of Schweidnitz. Appearances must be maintained, even in front of me.” Manfred took a small box from his pocket.
“She sent these to you,” Manfred opened the box, displaying two chocolate bonbons with powdered sugar.
Lothar smiled, his teeth were pink from blood and more than one was missing. “Maybe later.”
“As for later, you’re done flying,” Manfred said. His brother looked at him as if he’d just announced that he was defecting to the English. “I’ll arrange for your transfer once you’re well enough to travel.”
“Don’t you dare, Manfred! I am not going to leave you,” Lothar said.
“The matter is settled.” Manfred stood up and went to the door. Something silver flashed past his head and careened off the door with a clang. A bedpan bounced off Manfred’s chest and clattered to the ground.
“No! This is not settled. Come over here so I can beat the hell out of you.”
“Lothar, your injuries are—”
“Are nothing! I don’t need two legs or a pretty face to fly. Don’t…don’t send me away, please,” Lothar said.
Manfred sat at the end of the bed. “Lothar, after Wolff, Schafer, Voss, I can’t lose you too.”
“If they were lying here in front of you, would send them to some easy post with the territorial guard? Forbid them to fly?” Lothar asked.
Manfred turned his head away.
“You are my brother, but you are also my commander. Be my commander first, until this war is over. Besides, are you going to stop flying? You wouldn’t still have all those bandages if you were healed up.”
“Of course I’m not going to stop flying,” Manfred said.
“How can you expect any less from me?”
Manfred sighed; this was one battle he wouldn’t win.
“There’s no one I’d rather have in the air with me than you, Lothar.”
“It will take me a bit longer to catch up to you now, I’ve got twenty-nine. You’ll just have to go on being the famous one and I’ll be the handsome one.” Lothar shifted in his bed. “Hand me that bedpan.”
“At least it was empty when you threw it.” Manfred complied with the request. “If you give Katy a hard time, the only thing you’re going to fly is a beat-up Aviatik back and forth to headquarters.”
“Fine.”
“Lothar.”
“I said ‘fine.’” Lothar looked at the bedpan. “Do you want to be here for this?”
“I’ll check on you in the morning,” Manfred said.
He found Katy in the hallway, her arms crossed and face sour.
“Katy,” Manfred said as he walked passed her.
“I heard all of it. You can’t be serious about flying again,” she said, following him out the door.
Manfred kept his pace going as he made his way to the chateau. “I am quite serious.”
“Do you know what that thin air will do to your wound when you get up there? Your headaches are bad enough, and you want to see what happens while people are shooting at you.” She dogged his steps before grabbing his leather coat. Manfred stopped, but didn’t turn around.
“I saw the orders from General von Hoeppner. You’re to fly only when ‘absolutely necessary,’ not at the whims of your ego,” Katy said.
&n
bsp; Manfred whirled around and pointed his walking stick toward the hangars. “You see those men? They just lost one of their best friends. The English fly with more and better planes every single day. The Americans just joined the wrong side of the war, and their families are starving. The only thing I have to offer them is my example. So that, nurse Otersdorf, is why it is ‘absolutely necessary’ for me to fly.”
They stared each other down for a few seconds before Katy crossed her arms and looked to the infirmary.
“I’ll see to Lothar, then come to change your bandages,” she said. Manfred had a feeling this discussion was not over.
“Katy, my wound. If anyone asks, tell them it’s just fine. I don’t want them to worry,” Manfred said.
“I will tell them nothing, but Hoeppner gets the truth.” She walked back to the infirmary.
“Thank you,” he said after her. She kept walking.
The sound of the Fokker’s engine was hard, aggressive. The higher horsepower made hearing anything difficult, not that it mattered in the air. Manfred gave his twin Spandau machine guns a final check, then strapped himself into the cockpit. The controls were similar to the Albatroses he’d flown for years, but looking around and past the third tier of wings would take some getting used to.
Savage tapped his shoulder and gave him a thumbs-up. When Manfred returned the gesture, Savage would pull the chocks from beneath the wheels, and Manfred would be airborne seconds later.
Manfred looked over at the other Fokkers readying for combat, the new pilots readying for their first flight with their commander.
To his surprise, Manfred wasn’t ready. Try as he might, he couldn’t get his feet onto the rudder pedals or his hands on the control stick. It was as if he knew the controls were illusions, and it was useless to even try to fly.
Savage tapped Manfred’s shoulder again.
Manfred looked at his mechanic and made a small sign of a cross over his forehead. Savage tilted his head in confusion. Manfred repeated the gesture and Savage shook his head. Manfred cupped a pair of imaginary breasts on his chest and pointed back to the infirmary. Savage finally understood and ran off.
A minute later, Katy was next to Manfred. Her red hair whipped about in the propeller blast, her eyes scanning Manfred for injury.
“What is it?” she tried to yell over the engine.
Manfred tapped the side of his cheek. Katy gave him a disappointed look. He tapped it again. “For luck!” he shouted.
Katy rolled her eyes and leaned over to kiss Manfred’s cheek. Manfred turned his head at the last moment and got the peck on his lips. Katy stepped back from the cockpit and waved Manfred toward the end of the runway.
Manfred, his confidence back, gave a thumbs-up to Savage and was on his way.
Katy and Savage watched as Manfred took to the air, the rest of the flight right behind him.
“You didn’t see anything,” Katy said.
“See what, miss?”
“Good man.”
The Fokker performed as advertised, climbing to five thousand feet in a mere five minutes. Manfred led his flight to a higher altitude than he normally hunted from, both to test the new capability of the plane and to avoid the flack guns along the German lines. The brand new Fokker bore an unfortunate resemblance to the Sopwith triplanes active in this sector, and friendly antiaircraft fire was deadly all the same.
The thrum of the engine through the seat of his pants, the coffin-like tightness of the cockpit, and the opal-blue sky were welcome sensations to Manfred. Despite all the dangers, he felt as at home in the air as he did on horseback.
He looked down and caught a glimpse of a tan rudder as a plane slipped beneath a cloud. His mouth went dry as he tried to take his plane into a dive, but the stick wouldn’t move. The familiar cold burst of adrenaline hit him, but it was as if his nervous system had rewired itself since his last battle. He shivered inside his flight suit and had the intense urge to curl up into a ball. The vise around his skull returned with a caress, herald of a migraine.
He smelled dirt, dirt leading to Valley’s final resting place, and remembered the faces of the soldiers cheering his name.
His other hand grabbed the control stick and his Fokker slipped into the cloud masking his target. Emotions cleared as the cloud enveloped him. His mind was clear and focused as the cloud faded away and he found his target, a pair of Bristols.
The Fokker closed the distance quickly, with no reaction from the Bristol. From the front, it wouldn’t be easy to spot the red paint or distinguish his Fokker from the Sopwiths. He placed his thumbs over the twin Spandau machine guns and kept closing. Fifty yards and no reaction. He slowed down at twenty-five meters to keep from overrunning the Bristol.
Finally, the gunner in the rear seat stood up…and waved to Manfred.
The temptation to force the Bristol to land stayed his hand for a moment, but only a moment. He pressed the triggers and sent fifty rounds into the Bristol. The loss of Voss and Wolff erased any notions of mercy he once had. The Bristol burst into flames within seconds and corkscrewed to the earth.
Manfred watched the Bristol take two more men to their deaths. There was no elation, no sense of accomplishment. His heart was a stone, rimmed with fear from adrenaline and combat.
He remembered the second Bristol when a tracer round zipped past his face, close enough that the burning-hot round left an afterglow across his eyes. Instinct pulled his Fokker into a climb. He found the other Bristol off to his right, the gunner firing at him with his ring mounted Lewis gun.
Where was the rest of his flight? Manfred rolled his Fokker into a dive, trying to get into the threatening gun’s defilade. As he cursed the new pilots, he realized he hadn’t bothered to signal his attack to his flight before he vanished into the cloud overhead.
The gunner slammed a fresh magazine into his gun and took careful aim at Manfred. He was still turning toward the Bristol, and the gunner had him dead to rights for another five seconds, an eternity in combat.
A shadow passed over Manfred. Brauneck’s and Gussman’s Fokkers streaked overhead, their machine guns ripping with fire. Rounds tore through the Bristol, and it keeled over like a stricken ship. Gussman flew over the enemy plane. Brauneck’s red-and-blue-nosed Fokker banked and caught the Bristol as it maneuvered to the ground. He finished it off with a quick burst of gunfire. Brauneck would get the kill.
Manfred turned back to the airfield, and his wingmen joined him. Brauneck clasped his hands together and cheered for himself. Manfred gave him a nod and led them home.
The Oberursel engine of his Fokker wound down as the pain in his head increased. Each heartbeat raised the intensity of his headache by a notch. For years, he hadn’t believed in the air sickness some pilots complained of, but what little he’d eaten for breakfast threatened to return.
He climbed from the cockpit, his arms shaking as they struggled with his weight. His feet hit the ground and he crumpled to his knees.
“Everything OK, sir?” Savage asked. His voice was far away as Manfred struggled to concentrate, as if Savage was trying to talk to him from across a loud party.
“Slipped,” Manfred said.
“Sir, are we brave enough?” Brauneck said. He and Gussman walked over, their faces black from gun smoke and gas fumes. Gussman said something, but it was lost to the ringing in Manfred’s ears.
Savage tapped Manfred’s shoulder. Manfred turned around, his mechanic’s face was pale as milk. He turned back to his pilots and found them transfixed in place, jaws slack. Savage pulled at Manfred’s flight suit and got the down coat off him.
The jacket had a slash from shoulder blade to lower back, goose feathers bled out from the wound. A bullet from the second Bristol came within an inch of ending Manfred’s return to the air. He pawed at the back of the leather jacket he wore under the down coat, it was unblemished. The lucky leather jacket held true.
The ringing died away, and the familiar sounds of an airfield returned.
&nbs
p; “Have it mended by morning,” Manfred said.
The airfield started to coalesce around him. Pilots come to congratulate him on his victory, Metzger with his clipboard full of requisitions, his mechanics and the Fokker engineers, Katy stuck her head out of the infirmary.
Manfred retreated from all of them and made straight for his quarters. The pain in his head driving him away from responsibilities and accolades. He locked the door to his quarters and fell onto his bed. He tucked his knees against his chest and buried his head in his arms, counting his breaths as he waited for the pain to subside.
He closed his eyes and saw the unsuspecting Bristol fall to his guns over and over again.
The migraine took away any sense of time’s passage. It could have been minutes or hours before he heard his lock rattle, and the door open. He stayed in the fetal position as someone pulled the overboots from his feet. Gentle hands tested the bandages on his head, then pulled Manfred’s arms away from his face.
Katy looked at him, her eyes full of concern and moist with tears. She lifted Manfred’s upper body with a deft hand, and lowered his head onto her lap. Her arms wrapped around him and held him close.
He was too tired, too pained, to protest. He stayed there even after the headache subsided.
The action bell rang. Manfred heard men scrambling through the mansion to their waiting planes. Feet stomping across wood floors, shifting planks above his head.
He sat up and put his overboots back on.
“Manfred, let this one go,” Katy said.
He grabbed a spare overcoat from a rack and opened his door.
“You don’t have to do this.”
Manfred looked at her over his shoulder. “All this time together, and you still don’t understand.”
He left her there, and answered the call to fight.
Chapter 13— “Take It”
