Secret Honor

by W. E. B Griffin

  “It’s not a bad little airplane, Peter,” Galland said, and with an exaggerated gesture—holding up both hands at the level of his shoulders—signaled that he had let go of the stick.

  The airspeed settled down at about 600 knots, but the altimeter continued to wind rapidly.

  “Level off at six thousand,” Galland said. “And then you can play with it a little.”

  “Are we going to find any Amis or Brits up here tonight?” Peter asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Galland said. “You heard the tower. The aircraft warning status is blue. The Amis are usually long gone by this time of day—they like to land in the daylight. And the Brits usually time their night raids so they arrive home just after first light. Which is why we’re flying at this hour. The longer we can keep them from learning about the ME-262, until we get enough of them to really do some damage, the better.”

  “Understand,” Peter said.

  “If we do see a Lancaster, Peter, or anything, we will not engage. Not engage. Understand?”

  “Jawohl, Herr General.”

  “If you see something, do a one-eighty and get the hell out of there.”

  “Jawohl, Herr General.”

  The airplane was as agile in the sky as anything Peter had ever flown. He engaged in a brief mock dogfight with Karlsberg and lost sight of him in a turn. And then Karlsberg flashed past him.

  “All things considered, I’d say you’re dead,” Galland said. “But that’s not too bad for your first fifteen minutes.”

  Peter went looking for Karlsberg, spotted him, and put the ME-262 into a sharp diving turn to the left.

  What seemed like two or three minutes later, Galland spoke again: “If you don’t plan to make a dead stick landing—and these birds drop like a stone, I think I should tell you—I think you should try to find the field.”

  Peter found the fuel gauges. The needles were close to empty. He looked down at the ground. Darkness was already concealing the details of the terrain.

  Where the hell is Augsburg?

  He looked at the Radio Direction Finder, then banked the ME-262 toward the Augsburg transmitter.

  “With a little reserve, you have about fifty minutes at altitude,” Galland said. “You aren’t going to be able to strafe the King in Buckingham Palace in one of these. We just don’t have the range. But once we get these airplanes operational, I think my friend Spaatz is going to get far fewer B-17s back to England than he sends here.” General Carl Spaatz, USAAC, directed the bombing of Germany by the Eighth U.S. Air Force.

  “With those thirty-millimeters,” Peter thought out loud, “you don’t have to come in range of the guns on a B-17.”

  “And if you’re quick,” Galland said, “you can come out of the sun at them at a thousand K, and get two, maybe even three of them, and still be out of the range of their guns.”

  “Jesus!” Peter said.

  “I think I should warn you, Hansel, that the standard punishment for my pilots who bend one of these on landing is castration with a very dull knife.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Two other things: One, you have to land hot. They don’t handle well at low speeds, which means you should put the wheels down as close to the threshold of the runway as you can.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Two, you don’t get instant throttle response from a turbojet engine. It’s five to seven seconds before you get any usable power.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “You want me to shoot a touch-and-go so you can see how it’s done?”

  “Why don’t you let me try it, and take it away from me if I start to lose it?”

  “If I start to take it away from you, don’t fight me.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Jaegerhaven,” Galland called over the radio. “Two One Seven and Two Two Three for approach and landing.”

  The control tower responded with landing instructions, and all of a sudden, two parallel lines of lights showed him the runway.

  “Sometimes, if a dull knife isn’t immediately available, I use a dull saw,” Galland said.

  Peter lined up with the field, turned on final, and touched down hot but smoothly on the yellow and black stripes that marked the end of the runway. The runway lights went off before he had finished the landing roll. Tow trucks were waiting for both fighters on the taxiway, and had hooked up before the whine of the turboprops had stopped. When they reached the hangar, the doors were opening, and the moment the airplanes were inside, they began to close again. The hangar lights did not come on until the doors were fully closed.

  Ground crew appeared and put a ladder up to the cockpit. Galland got out first, and then Peter climbed down after him. Karlsberg appeared. He had removed his sheepskin trousers but was still wearing his now unbuttoned high-altitude jacket. Galland unbuttoned his jacket and somewhat awkwardly pulled off the trousers. He waited until Peter had done the same thing.

  “Karlsberg, you may say something appropriate to Major von Wachtstein for having successfully passed the appropriate flight tests qualifying him in ME-262 Series aircraft.”

  Karlsberg smiled and gave Peter a thumbs-up. Peter suspected that Galland was serious about his passing a check ride.

  And again Galland seemed to be reading his mind. “Don’t let it go to your head, Hansel,” he said. “You’ll get a good deal of further instruction before I let you go on your own. But when I go to Unser Hermann to get you transferred here, I want to tell him that you’re already qualified in these birds.” Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring—Unser Hermann, Our Hermann—was the head of the Luftwaffe.

  “Yes, Sir.”

  There was something in Galland’s tone of voice when he referred to “Unser Hermann” that gave Peter pause.

  In a moment, he knew what it was. In the early days, when Peter had flown with the Condor Legion in Spain, and in Poland, and in the defeat of France, “Unser Hermann” had been spoken of with affection and respect. Unser Hermann was one of them; he was everybody’s fond uncle; he worried about them; by taking care of the Luftwaffe, he took care of them.

  But as British and American bombers began to strike at German cities, which Göring had sworn would never happen, and as stories of his drug addiction, his erratic behavior, his homosexual advances to decorated fighter pilots invited to his Karin Hall estate, and more important, his unwillingness to stand up for the Luftwaffe, were whispered about in Luftwaffe ready rooms and officers’ clubs, “Unser Hermann” had become a more derisive appellation.

  But by captains and majors, not general officers.

  Did I really hear a sarcastic tone in Galland’s voice? Or was it just my imagination?

  A Luftwaffe Oberstleutnant marched across the hangar, the heels of his glistening boots ringing on the concrete. He came to attention in front of Galland and rendered a crisp Nazi salute. “Heil Hitler!”

  Galland and Karlsberg returned the salute, and a moment later, Peter did too.

  That’s the first time I’ve seen Galland do that.

  “Herr General, there has been an urgent teletype from Berlin about Major Wachtstein.”

  “Saying what?”

  “Herr General, the message states that Korvettenkapitän Boltitz has been delayed approximately twelve hours. He will arrive at approximately 1000 hours tomorrow morning. We are directed to ensure that Wachtstein is available to him at that time.”

  “It’s von Wachtstein, Colonel,” Galland corrected him. “Colonel Deitzer, may I present Major Freiherr Hans-Peter von Wachtstein?”

  Peter came to attention and clicked his heels.

  Colonel Deitzer offered his hand and a weak smile. “Major,” he said.

  “Major von Wachtstein has just taken, and passed, his flight examination for ME-262 aircraft,” Galland said. “Make su
re that Luftwaffe Central Records is promptly made aware of that.”

  “Jawohl, Herr General.”

  “I don’t want any administrative problems with that,” Galland said. “Make sure you have a record of their acknowledgment.”

  “Jawohl, Herr General. Herr General, Berlin requests an acknowledgment of their order regarding the major.”

  “Then telex them that I personally guarantee Major von Wachtstein will be available to the Korvettenkapitän when he arrives.”

  “Jawohl, Herr General,” he said, and turned to Peter.

  “If there’s nothing else, Colonel, I’ll be in my quarters,” Galland said.

  “Jawohl, Herr General,” Deitzer said, then raised his arm in the Nazi salute and barked, “Heil Hitler!”

  The three pilots returned the Nazi salute, and Oberstleutnant Deitzer turned on his heel and marched away.

  Galland waved his hand toward the stairway of the hangar, and the three started walking to it. “Napoleon said, ‘An army marches on its stomach,’” he said. “I have learned he was wrong. An army marches—in our case, flies—on the backs of people like Deitzer. We may not like them, and God knows they’re not warriors, but we need them. I have to keep reminding myself of that.”

  Neither Karlsberg nor Peter could think of a reply.

  When they had climbed the stairway and left the hangar, Galland pointed to the Horch. “Hello! What’s that?”

  “It’s my father’s car, sir,” Peter said.

  “I was afraid for a moment we were having another important visitor,” Galland said. “And I’m not in the mood to entertain important visitors.”

  “Grafin von Stauffenberg…Herr General—do you know Oberstleutnant von Stauffenberg?”

  Galland nodded. “I heard he really caught it bad in Africa. Blinded, wasn’t he?”

  “He has the sight of one eye, Herr General. I just saw him in hospital in Munich. His wife is going to come here and take the car to their place. I hope that’s all right.”

  “Of course it is,” Galland said. “Just give Deitzer the details. That’s my point. Those paper pushers are really useful.”

  A young sergeant was standing at attention beside a gray military Volkswagen.

  “Otto,” Galland called to him. “We’re going to ride in style with Major von Wachtstein. Follow us to my quarters.”

  “Jawohl, Herr General.”

  [TWO]

  Quarters of the General Officer Commanding

  Luftwaffe Flughafen No. 103B

  Augsburg, Germany

  2035 16 May 1943

  Hauptmann Willi Grüner was leaning against a pillar of the fence in front of the two-story masonry house provided as quarters to General Galland. He pushed himself off the wall when he saw the Horch and the Volkswagen approach. He saluted—the military, stiff-hand-to-the-brim-of-his-cap salute, not the Nazi—when he saw General Galland.

  “Why are you standing on the street, Willi?” Galland called as he got out of the car. “You should have gone in.”

  He punched Grüner affectionately on the arm, then led him through the gate in the fence and toward the house with his arm around his shoulder. Karlsberg and Peter followed. The door was opened by a young Luftwaffe soldier in a short, crisply starched white jacket. Galland led them all into a sitting room, and to a bar set against one wall. “Anybody hungry?” Galland asked.

  No one was.

  Galland went behind the bar, came up with beer and glasses, and handed them around. When they had all poured beer, he raised his. “Prosit!” he called.

  They repeated the toast and sipped at their beer.

  “I didn’t expect to see you here,” Willi Grüner said.

  “I’m the Luftwaffe representative for your father’s funeral,” Peter said. “I was ordered to meet Boltitz here.”

  “Boltitz? U-boat?” Willi asked.

  Peter remembered that was what Willi had christened Boltitz in the bar in Berlin. He nodded.

  “I don’t know what to think about U-boat,” Willi said, then went on before giving Peter a chance to reply: “Have you seen what they’re flying here?”

  “I just flew one,” Peter said. “As a matter of fact, Galland made it a check ride.”

  “And you passed it?” Willi asked in mock surprise.

  “Go fuck yourself, Willi,” Peter said.

  The room was decorated with photographs and paintings, all with a Luftwaffe connection. Peter wandered around the room, looking at them. He found one of special interest. It was a photograph of then Oberst Galland standing in front of the wing of an ME-109 with three young pilots, one of whom was Flight Sergeant Peter Wachtstein. It had been taken, he recalled, on a Polish military airfield outside Warsaw.

  Peter remembered the tall, thin Swabian standing beside him. He couldn’t remember his name, but he remembered that he had gone down into the English Channel, and that they had never been notified that he had been taken prisoner.

  The other guy, too—what the hell was his name?—had also caught it, later, in France.

  Peter examined a rather good oil painting of a Focke-Wulf Fw-190 taking off, accurate to the point that the left gear was nearly in its well, and the right still dangling down, making the sleek fighter look like a one-legged bird.

  One of the first things a new Fw-190 pilot was told was that when you went to GEAR UP, you should be prepared for the bird to veer to the right, because the gear went up unevenly.

  That triggered memories of the Fw-109 squadron he had commanded before being sent to Argentina, and he went from that to wonder somewhat bitterly how many of his men had caught it since he’d left them.

  He turned from the painting and looked around the room. There was something about it that made it seem more like an officer’s mess than a living room in a home. There was no evidence of a feminine touch, although he knew there was a Frau Generalmajor Galland and a family; he had met them—a nice lady, and nice kids—once in Paris, right after Paris had fallen, and another time in Berlin.

  I wonder where she is?

  Galland again seemed to read his mind. “For some reason, Hansel—never try to understand female reasoning—Liesel doesn’t like it here. She says she never sees me but an hour or two a day. Why she thinks that’s not better than seeing me for a day only once every other week at home, I don’t pretend to understand.”

  “And the kids?” Peter asked.

  “Whenever it can be arranged, the oldest boy spends a couple of days with me here.”

  That relationship doesn’t seem to upset him very much. Maybe he has trouble with his wife?

  It’s none of your business.

  Three other officers joined them, one at a time, during the next fifteen minutes. Two were young captains (Peter remembered one vaguely from Poland), and an old—relatively speaking; he was probably not yet thirty—Oberstleutnant who had been one of his instructors at flight school.

  Peter saw that Oberstleutnant Henderver also wore the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross around his neck. At roughly the same moment, Henderver saw Peter’s and headed for him.

  “Your face is familiar, Major.”

  “Von Wachtstein, Sir,” Peter said. “You taught me to fly the Stosser, Herr Oberstleutnant.”

  The Focke-Wulf Fw-56 “Stosser,” first flown in 1933, was a single-engine 240-hp, low-wing monoplane designed as a fighter, which after 1937 was used as an advanced flying and gunnery trainer.

  “And you’re still alive? Amazing!” Henderver said.

  “Lucky, Sir, I’d say.”

  “You’d better hope it holds,” Henderver said. “The 262 is a dangerous little bitch.”

  “I flew it this afternoon, Sir.”

  “Under the circumstances, you and the Herr General may address me by my Christian name,�
� Henderver said. “Of course, the Herr General may anyway. But somebody that I long ago taught to fly the Stosser and is still alive is obviously a special person.”

  He’s drunk, Peter realized.

  “Thank you, Sir,” Peter said. “I think it was probably the quality of your instruction.”

  “And you’re an ass-kisser, too…. What was your Christian name?”

  “Peter.”

  “I like to have my ass kissed, Peter,” Henderver said, “but only by members of the other sex.” He raised his voice: “Herr General, were you aware that I taught this splendid officer to fly the Stosser?”

  “And he’s still alive? Amazing!” Galland replied.

  “My point exactly, Herr General,” Henderver said. He turned to Peter and smiled. “Let’s have a drink.”

  Peter held up his beer glass.

  “That’s a beer,” Henderver said. “I said a drink.” He dragged Peter to the bar and reached under it and came up with a bottle of Dewar’s scotch whiskey.

  Scotch? Here in Germany? I wonder where that came from?

  Henderver poured stiff drinks in glasses and then raised his to Peter.

  “To those of us who have survived,” Henderver said. “For as long as it lasts.”

  Peter touched his glass to Henderver’s.

  He hadn’t finished the drink when he heard female voices in the foyer, and six young women came into the sitting room a minute later. They were neither quite as good-looking nor as elegant as the young women who could be found in the bars of the Adlon and am Zoo Hotels in Berlin, but they obviously were a Bavarian version of the same breed.

  There were several ways to look at them, Peter decided. The most kind was to see them simply as young women looking for eligible young men, with the three K’s as their basic ambition: Kinder, Kirche and Küchen—Children, Church, and Kitchen. According to the Nazi philosophy, these described the female function in life.

  Or else they could be considered to be young women looking for attractive young men; and, by and large, Luftwaffe pilots met that description.