by Todd Kelsey
Chapter Two
I am the Tempest, the Reaper of Skies, a Dark Wall of Death rolling across Europe. I am the Onslaught, the Anschluss, the lightning-fast Blitzkrieg striking down all who would oppose the Fatherland, knocking down countries like puppets before their Master. I am a creature of Europe’s own making, forced to rise like a Phoenix from the ashes of the Treaty of Versailles. Ah, what sweet victory, to fly the Swastika over Versailles, to shine its shadow over the very railcar where the cowardly agreement was signed, to break like a tidal wave of steel on the rest of France and roll ever onwards, relentless to the coast, driving the English like dogs across the Atlantic Ocean, back to their hiding place on the tiny weak Island of Britain, cringing in fear at the legions who are loyal to the Fuhrer.
I am the flint-eyed masterpiece of engineering, the preying falcon tamed to a savage hunting pitch, twisting into the screaming arc of a dive bomber strafing, scattering soldiers and refugees like insects along their broken roads, unleashing a hail of fire and smoke to deliver death from above for those who deserve it, punishing a rebellious Continent. My overwhelming numbers are the crescendo of a thousand factories, churning out a waterfall of unending glory to darken the skies. I am the strength of a nation renewed, the ice cold Conqueror, the iron will and honor of the Luftwaffe. I return silently to the perch on my master’s arm and eagerly await the next chance to fly.
Ernst Grunen sat at his writing desk on a cold dreary morning in wooden barracks, lamenting that officers in the Luftwaffe rated no better than foot soldiers on this particular piece of ground, which had been so hastily taken that there were no proper quarters as of yet.
He took off his spectacles and marveled, half-dazed at the speed of their victory, as day merged into day and hour into hour, to the point where between morning briefings and coming back from the skies, he knew not and cared not where he was or where they were going. Supporting the advance, swatting away the half-hearted resistance from surprised and devastated neighbor nations, Ernst Grunen suppressed his personal views like most pilots in the Luftwaffe, placing complete faith in their commanders and giving utterly complete obedience.
He sipped at a glass of wine taken in Poland, and Ernst could not help but revel in the ample food and drink supplied to pilots and taken along the way, and why should Poland not open up her hoarded wealth after the Allies had impoverished Germany for so long, with their merciless reparations? Ernst tried to forget growing up half-starved in the wake of the First World War, with the shame of defeat, and then a rising anger and confidence in his countrymen, which became a wildfire, unstoppable, even as the Great Depression swept the world and made things worse, when a loaf of bread had cost a million Deutschmarks!
He looked out the window at the muddy fields, at the hastily improvised community of war, hundreds of kilometers away from the area he had grown up in, but a constant reminder of the people of Lubeck. The industrious digging, the repair, the finely trimmed mustaches, the shine of buttons, the unbending, unwavering schedule of efficiency, like an old village clock, striking on the hour.
“Ernst!” cried Rudolf Jodl, from outside the door, with loud knocking. “Ernst! Come and have some wine. Trinken und Tanzen mit hubsche madchen! Some of the finest maidens from the area. Ernst!” and the obnoxious knocking.
“No thank you Herr Jodl” Ernst replied, grimacing, and slightly uneasy. “I’ve got a letter I need to write!” he said, as if he had to justify taking a break from the incessant celebration of victory in between campaigns and raids and reconnaissance.
As he picked up the fountain pen again, he felt the anxiety rise up as well, thinking about some of the things he had seen in the air and on the way, some of the things less honorable than others. “War is hell” he muttered, and began to write.
Cousin Rudy,
I can’t be sure exactly when this letter will even get to you, but so that you can witness the admirable efficiency of the German Empire, I will write 3 copies, and send them at different times, through different routes, and all three will come to you. What’s more, you will be impressed with my continued mastery of the military, knowing exactly what I can say and what I can’t – who could dare to cross out anything that I, cousin of General Rommel, would say?!
Yes, there is of course some jesting, but can you deny me my moment of glory? I still remember visiting America, and I’m sure you remember how small and skinny I was, and how hungry and shy. Yet we played at being soldiers, even as the generation who fought in the Great War kept quiet and sent us off into the woods, shaking their heads, wanting to deny us the glory they had.
I am glad to hear reports, sensible voices in the United States, even Ambassador Kennedy, who patiently reiterate the realistic course for America – a negotiated peace of course. We are clearly in charge of Europe, our forces are unstoppable, and all the resources of every country we take under our wing are at our disposal. We have no quarrel with America, and of course you see that it’s best that we leave each other alone. Europe’s affairs are Europe’s alone!
Ernst smiled, imagining himself as a diplomat, careful to tow the party line, and wondering what Cousin Rudy might read between the lines. He also wondered if he was even aware himself of what was between the lines.
You’ll be interested to know that my plane has been behaving perfectly. I’ve taken fire on many occasions, but no major panels have been breached, the engine has remained true, and all is in Ordnung – in order. What a thrill to be flying again, eh? I’m glad to hear that you have learned how to fly as well, and how well I remember going with you to the County Fair, to see the old Sopwith Camel Biplane flying there. I certainly have you to thank me for my career direction.
Best to be brief with these wartime communications. I trust all is well, write to me care of Luftwaffe Headquarters in Berlin.
Yours, Ernst
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A month and an ocean away from Ernst, Rudy Mitchell unfolded the letter from his cousin, not sure what to expect, but yearning to join the coming battle as fervently as anything he’d ever wished for. He sat in the small farmhouse in Iowa, thanking the heavens that his father had good enough sense and good enough fortune to allow the family to get a plane, so Rudy could build up hours. He held the letter, imagining the surroundings that Cousin Ernst must be in – was it the chaos of war, or some fine European chateau? He cursed himself inwardly for being drawn to the allure of being a warrior, the amoral gravity of battle, and felt the beginnings of the anguish he would feel if he flew against his cousin.
“But I still want to fight, by god,” he pounded his fist unconsciously into his leg, raising a frown from his mother, who was busy shucking corn. She pursed her lips and shook her head, and kept almost as quiet as when Amos Josiah Mitchell had gone off seeking glory in World War One, only to come back the shell of himself, and only just coming back to himself the days.
“Calamity just rearing its ugly head again” she muttered.
Rudy looked up, imagining his mother’s thoughts. He shook his head slowly at the smug words of his cousin, and felt green envy at the thought of flying an actual warplane. The currents in his mind and heart were like the racing mixture of air and fuel in the cylinders of an engine: fuel on the one hand, wanting to take action, to fly, to be in the skies – air on the other hand – a sense of anger at Hitler’s total disregard of decency and freedom.
“Mom, you know I’m not looking for glory – but how can America just sit by and watch, while Hitler gains air superiority over all Europe?”
“I don’t know about air superiority, young master Mitchell” she fixed him with an eye, “but I do know your father has taken 20 years to heal from wounds that were only in his mind.”
She continued to shuck corn, not angry, not even fatalistic – just a solid as the hills. And inside, she hoped America would not enter a European war again.
Rudy sighed, set down the letter, and immediately felt restless.
“I’m going to take up Bessie, I think sh
e needs some tweaking” Rudy said, glad to finally think of something he could do. He grabbed his oily gloves, his goggles, and a leather jacket, and scooted out the door before his mom could say anything.
He looked up at the bright blue sky, breathed in the summer air, and nearly burst with the desire to fly, thankful that the wind wasn’t too strong and that the clouds were not the kind that spelled trouble.
Rudy’s dog Hank loped after him, sensing something that was up, and barked a few times, but kept his distance from the biplane, as Rudy wheeled it out from the barn. Rudy must think he is a bird, thought Hank, wishing he was courageous enough to be loyal enough to go anywhere with his master. Anywhere but the sky, Hank thought, as he suddenly caught scent of a cat somewhere nearby and ran off to investigate.
Rudy felt like he was due for a dose of danger that day, something in his bones told him it was time to practice gliding, and run the engine completely dry of fuel. The fields down below were streaming by, he kept a good height, and put the plane through its places, wondering at how a concoction of fabric and wood could be called an aircraft, how fabric could have carried a generation of fighter pilots into the air. He imagined that the plane was metal, that he was flying a Spitfire, which he had read about in the newspaper.
In the midst of his reverie, the engine started to splutter, and he looked down, knowing the farmland and patches by sight, wondering who he would have to inconvenience today, whose ego he would have to soothe if he crushed some vegetables or lettuce or scared some cows. He scanned the horizon quickly, looking for a good plain piece of land, calculated the distance, eeked out the last remaining sputters of strength in the engine, and crossed himself with one hand while the other held the controls, feeling himself like a bird. A very heavy bird at that.
I don’t think a Spitfire could glide as far as I can.
Rudy banked the plane into a long sweeping arc, as the first glints of sunset reached up into the sky on the western horizon, hailing his landing with plumes of orange and blue and the hint of red. He guided the plane down towards George Montgomery’s clover field, reasonably flat and near a road, and he smiled at the thought that George’s daughter Bessie might just be home.
Now that certainly would be pleasant.
Muddy, oily, smoky and comfortably tired, Rudy climbed out onto the field, and patted the plane that he had named after George’s daughter.
“Thank you, Bessie, for bringing me home safely” he said, tracing his hand along the airframe, inspecting it in the fading light, thinking about things that were worth dying for, people who were worth protecting, people who were worth coming home to.
He knew without knowing that he would have to join the war in England sooner than later. It was in his blood, he could feel it.
He sighed, regretting the day he’d have to say goodbye, and everything that he’d have to leave in his wake. But he told himself, “There’s nothing wrong with hope!” and so he chose to hope that he’d return someday, and walk these same familiar roads, which he knew like the back of his hand, home to Bessie.
