by Джон Биггинс
I think that we must have fallen a good thousand metres. Then, as suddenly as it had stopped flying, the Brandenburger groaned and creaked a little then began to fly once more, straight and even in a shallow dive below the clouds. As for our Italian attacker, there was no sign of him. Toth scanned the sky above us as I picked myself up, white-faced and trembling, from the floor of the cockpit. He seemed not to be unduly bothered by our terrifying experience, and certainly showed no particular gratitude for an escape so miraculous that even I was tempted to think—for a while at least—that there might be a god after all.
As for the two men in the Italian aeroplane we shot down that morning, I can hardly think that they could have survived such a fall. I was sad afterwards for them and their families, once I had leisure to think about the morning’s events. But there: what would you? It was kill or be killed in those days before parachutes, and I suppose that the Fliegertod was at least preferable to choking with gas in some stinking dug-out or being casually blown to bits by a chance artillery shell. It is a noble and glorious thing, the Latin poet observes, to die for one’s country. But given the choice I think that I would still prefer to make the other fellow die for his.
We landed safely at Caprovizza about 0800; much to my relief, since our poor Zoska’s racked frame was creaking and sagging in a most alarming fashion as a result of the brutal strains imposed upon it by Toth’s aerobatics. From the observer’s seat alone I could count a good half-dozen snapped bracing-wires. We had come out of it alive—even contrived somehow to escape from a spin. But having had a taste of Toth’s flying I could now quite understand how Leutnant Rosenbaum had met his end over Gorz. If I had been a fraction slower about letting go of the gun and seizing the cockpit coaming when we reached the top of the loop I would now be embedded half a metre deep in some Friulian cow pasture.
I saw as we came in to land that a motor-cyclist was standing by, waiting for the camera to be unloaded so that he could collect the box of photographs for the dark-room in Haidenschaft. We taxied to a halt and Toth switched off the engine as the ground crew came running across the field towards us. The sudden silence was stunning after nearly two hours of engine drone and roaring wind. As Toth lifted up his goggles I saw that his eyes too were bloodshot from the strain placed on our circulations by our violent manoeuvres over Palmanova. We were both pale and tired from a combination of excitement, altitude, exertion and inhaling petrol fumes in the freezing cold. As I climbed down to the field I noticed that my knees were unsteady and my heart still fluttering from the after-effects of the brief dog-fight and the spin that had followed it. Franz Meyerhofer was the first to reach me, clapping me on the shoulder.
“Well Prohaska old man, back in one piece I see. Did you get your holiday snaps?”
I smiled. “Yes, thank you very much,” I said, signing the motorcyclist’s receipt for the photographs against the side of the fuselage. “Mission accomplished exactly as per orders. But that wasn’t all: Toth here shot down an Italian two-seater on the way home.” A cheer went up from the ground crew and, smiling self-deprecatingly, Toth was hoisted on to their shoulders to be carried across the field in triumph. They would have done the same to me, but the gulf between officers and rankers in the k.u.k. Armee was too great for them to feel confident about such horseplay, so I followed behind the triumphal progress.
“But what’s happened to Schraffl and Jahudka?” I asked. “Are they back yet? We saw them go into a cloud somewhere this side of Palmanova, but then the Italians came after us and we had other things to think about. I’d have expected them to have got home ahead of us.”
“Don’t worry about it: they’ve probably had an engine failure or got lost or something and landed at another field. It happens all the time. Bad pennies always turn up somehow. Anyway, you’d better go and get a bite to eat. Kraliczek’s working on his monthly returns, so he can’t see you just yet.”
“Can Toth come with us for a drink in the mess?”
Meyerhofer suddenly looked doubtful. “No, no, I think not: better not risk it. Herr Kommandant wouldn’t like it—against regulations, thin end of the wedge and all that. But Toth can entertain you in the NCOs’ mess if he wants; can’t see anything against that.” So I shook my faithful coachman’s hand in farewell and made my way to my tent.
I managed about an hour’s much-needed nap before Petrescu shook me awake, obediently reporting that Herr Kommandant Kraliczek wished to see me now. I rinsed my face hurriedly at the canvas washbasin—I was still grimy from exhaust smoke—ran a comb through my hair and set off to meet him in his office.
As I stepped up to salute and report the success of our mission I could see at first glance that Hauptmann Kraliczek was not pleased. He returned my salute in perfunctory fashion, then bade me sit down. He however remained standing; in fact stalked around the office throughout the interview with his hands behind his back, addressing his remarks to the corners of the room so that I had to keep swivelling my neck around to listen to him. His first question emerged only after some moments of evident inner struggle.
“Pray tell me, how many kilometres did you fly today, Herr Linien- schiffsleutnant?”
“Forgive me, Herr Kommandant, but I have no real idea. It’s about fifty kilometres from here to Palmanova as the crow flies, but we took a more circuitous route to get there, over Gorz, and we flew some way to west of our target so as to be able to come at it from the direction of Venice. Meanwhile, as for our return journey, I can’t say exactly where we flew since we were engaged with the enemy for part of the way.”
“So you mean to say, in other words, that you are an officer-observer, but you have no real idea of how far you flew in total? Some might consider that a grave dereliction of duty.”
“But Herr Kommandant,” I protested, “surely the precise distance we flew is of no great importance? The point is that we reached our target, carried out our mission and returned unharmed to our base, having accounted for one enemy aeroplane on the way and successfully dodged another. Exactly how much ground we covered in the process is surely quite irrelevant.”
“Not in the least, Herr Linienschiffsleutnant, not in the least. The success of this unit depends, like the success of all military operations, upon minute precison and the scrupulous maintenance of records. In future I shall require your written combat reports and attendant forms to contain a clear statement, accurate to the nearest hundred metres, of the distance flown, so that this can be compared with the stated consumption of fuel for the flight. However . . .” he turned to address his remarks to a different corner of the room, “I have to say that there are other serious matters to discuss with you concerning your verbal report of this mission, at least as it was related to me a few minutes ago by Oberleutnant Meyerhofer. It appears that you shot down an Italian aeroplane?”
“I have the honour and satisfaction to report that we did—or rather, Zugsfuhrer Toth did.”
“I see. Of what kind?”
“Herr Kommandant, I really cannot say. It was a two-seater certainly, with a rotary engine, possibly of the Nieuport family. I cannot say for sure. Certainly it was not a type that I remember from my study of the recognition handbooks. If Corps Air Intelligence want a rough sketch I am sure . . .”
“So you really have no idea what aircraft it was?” he snapped.
“Not really. All that concerned me at the time was that it was manoeuvring under our tail to try and shoot us down.”
“And have you any tangible evidence of having destroyed it? Standing orders from Fliegertruppe headquarters are that positive identification of crashed enemy aircraft and their crews is to be secured wherever possible.”
It was some time before I could answer, the breath having been taken out of me by the stark idiocy of this question; by its total incomprehension of the conditions of fighting in the air.
“I regret, Herr Kommandant, but it somehow slipped my mind in the tension of the moment to follow them down and perha
ps snatch off the pilot’s shoulder-straps as we passed. I’m afraid that having just narrowly escaped being shot down ourselves, with another enemy aeroplane closing upon us, twenty kilometres behind enemy lines, we thought it best to put our nose down and head for home without any further delay. Perhaps we could go back and get their names and addresses?”
“Spare me your facetiousness, Prohaska: I am not amused. Nor am I amused by the fact that your wanton engagement of enemy aircraft—clean outside the scope of your orders, I might add, since they made no mention of aerial combat—has led to extensive damage to yet another of this unit’s aircraft. In fact, following Oberleutnant Rieger’s writing-off of a machine the day before yesterday . . .”
“. . . Not to speak of Oberleutnant Rieger’s writing-off of himself.” “Be silent. As I was saying, following the loss of our machine just back from repair, and following Feldpilot Toth’s recent criminal mistreatment of yet another aeroplane, the effective establishment of Fliegerkompagnie 19F is now reduced from six aircraft to four: two Hansa-Brandenburg CIs and two Lloyd CIIs. And I wish to leave you in no doubt that I regard this as highly unsatisfactory. I gather from the Technical Officer that your own aeroplane, number 26.74, is likely to be under repairs for at least a fortnight, so please comprehend if you will . . .” he tapped a graph with a little ebony pointer like that used by orchestral conductors, “. . . please comprehend exactly what it is that you have done. The graph line for Effective Against Reserve Aircraft for the month of August should have gone—so. Now it will have to go here.”
“Herr Kommandant, with respect, we may have damaged an aeroplane, but we brought it home intact. And not only that but we carried out our mission successfully and destroyed an enemy aeroplane in the process. Surely that should more than make up for some minor damage to one of the unit’s aircraft? After all, this is a war we are engaged in, not a statistical exercise . . .” I stopped: this last remark had clearly brought Kraliczek to that condition which, in any normal person, would manifest itself as bellowing purple-faced apoplectic rage and flinging the inkstand at the head of his interlocutor. That is to say, he grew even paler than usual and pursed his thin lips.
“What? How dare you question the value of statistics! Perfect knowledge of what is going on will win this war for us. If it were not so then why do you imagine that at my own expense—my own expense mark you!—I have designed and had printed a series of return forms to supplement those used by the War Ministry? That, Herr Linienschiffsleutnant, is how deeply I care for the efficiency of this unit: why I slave here in this office into the small hours of each morning without even an adjutant to help me, collating information for Army Headquarters. Anyway . . .” he looked at me triumphantly over his spectacles, as if producing an argument to stop all further debate, “anyway, as regards your mission this morning, your Italian aeroplane shot down is of no consequence whatever. Flik 19F is a long-range reconnaissance and bombing unit, so there are no statistical returns emanating from here as regards enemy aircraft destroyed, and will not be until such time as I have devised an appropriate record form. The aeroplane which you say you have shot down may be claimed by you as a personal victory—unconfirmed by the way—if you wish; that is entirely your own affair. But as far as my reports are concerned no mention will be made of it. Such anomalies do not lie within my purview, I am afraid.” “Herr Kommandant, you may call it an anomaly if you wish, and there may, as you say, not yet be any suitable piece of paper on which to record it. But I feel compelled to point out that the victory took place, and that it was not mine but entirely the work of Zugsfuhrer Toth. It was his flying and marksmanship that brought the Italian down.”
He turned to look at me again, smiling a curious little self-satisfied smirk. “Ah, Herr Linienschiffsleutnant, there I am afraid that I have to correct you: the victory, if it is credited to anyone, must be credited to you as commander of the aeroplane.”
“But all the shots were fired by Feldpilot Toth, from the forward machine gun. I did not fire the rear weapon once.”
“Perhaps so; perhaps not. Altitude and the confusion of combat cause people to make mistakes. My reports after you landed were that you had fired the shots.”
“But this cannot be. I can show you if you wish.”
Kraliczek rolled up his eyes in a look of weary patience such as one reserves for dealing with tiresome and confused elderly relatives. He sighed.
“Very well, if you insist I shall accompany you to look. But I cannot take long: I am a very busy man with only two clerks to assist me and the end of the reporting month is drawing near.”
So we strode out—Kraliczek with an insufferable and quite uncharacteristic air of jauntiness—to the Brandenburger being serviced by Feldwebel Prokesch and the rest of the ground crew. They put down their work and stood to attention as we approached.
“Feldwebel,” said Kraliczek, “show us the machine guns from this aircraft.” The two weapons had been dismounted and laid out on a trestle bench for cleaning by the armourers. “Open the breech of the forward gun.” Prokesch slid the breech block back as instructed. It revealed a firing-chamber as shiny-clean as if the gun had never been fired in its entire life. “Now the observer’s weapon.” The breech slid back to disclose a barrel clogged with the characteristic greyish-black grime of the cordite residue. “There.” He turned to me, smiling. “What did I tell you? Don’t worry: an understandable mistake. You had better get to bed early tonight. As for that Italian aeroplane of yours, you had better claim it in a separate report to Army Headquarters . . .”
“With respect, Herr Kommandant, I have no wish to claim it as a victory since it was none of my doing.”
“Oh well, that’s all right then. If you don’t want to claim it then no one gets it and it didn’t happen: much the best thing if you ask me. Such miscellaneous entries make nonsense of orderly compilation. Only by ruthless excision of such statistical irrelevances can we hope to see the greater picture and achieve that organisational perfection which will bring us victory. Now, if you will excuse me, I have wasted enough time already this morning on these trifling matters. I must be getting back.”
“Herr Kommandant?”
“Yes?” He turned to look back at me.
“By your leave, I have what I think may be a useful suggestion to make.”
“And what might that be?”
“If we were to regard all the separate events of this world war as statistical irrelevances, as you call them, then perhaps we would find that the war had never happened at all. In which case we could all stop killing one another and go home.”
He thought this over for some moments, then smiled at me. “Yes, yes, Herr Linienschiffsleutnant: very amusing, most droll. Now, perhaps if you will excuse me at last? Some of us have better things to do than to waste our time composing witty epigrams. Myself, as a professional soldier, I would have considered that war was too serious a business for jokes.”
I noticed that throughout this exchange Sergeant Prokesch and the ground crewmen had been busy about their work, backs turned to us, rather than standing about with ears cocked relishing every word and storing it up to be recounted in the mess that evening. I sensed that the men were embarrassed by the scene they had just witnessed. Although they had acted under orders in swapping the barrels of the two machine guns, they doubtless felt that they had been made accomplices to a shabby piece of knavery and were correspondingly ashamed of themselves. I served in the armed forces for over half my life, and one of the things that I learnt was that a sense of honour is by no means the exclusive property of the commissioned ranks.
As for myself, I wandered back towards the mess tent in a state of some depression. In my sixteen years as a career officer of the Noble House of Austria it had been my lot to serve under some notable blockheads. But in all that time I had never met one, however tyrannical, stupid or plain incompetent he might have been, who would knowingly have told a lie or practised sleight of hand either
on a brother-officer or upon the lowliest ranker. For the first time it struck me what disaster had fallen upon Old Austria now that creatures as abject as Hauptmann Kraliczek were creeping into positions of command. As I passed the Kanzlei hut I saw Meyerhofer descending the steps. I was about to speak with him concerning my recent conversation with our commanding officer. But he spoke first.
“It’s Schraffl and Jahudka. We’ve just had a telephone call from Vertoiba. They’ve crash-landed in a field near by.”
“Are they all right? ”
“Jahudka’s dead. Schraffl’s unhurt it seems but in a bad state of nervous shock. They’re bringing him along by motor car. They should be here any minute.”
“What happened? ”
“So far as I can make out from talking to Schraffl they lost contact with you in the clouds east of Palmanova, then saw an aeroplane falling out of the sky a few minutes later. They thought that it must be you and Toth, so they gave full throttle to get back across the lines. I gather that they crossed near Gradisca at about four thousand metres to avoid the flak—and had a Nieuport single-seater drop on them out of the sun. The first burst knocked the engine out and put a bullet through Jahudka’s neck. They fell about a thousand metres with petrol pouring all over them from the fuel tank before Schraffl managed to drag Jahudka out of the pilot’s seat and pull them level again. The poor devil was already near-dead—severed artery by the sound of it—so all Schraffl could do was to glide them down into a field on our side of the lines. It was a miracle they weren’t set alight. With the propeller windmilling the magneto must have been sparking all the way down, a good ten minutes or so. The people at Vertoiba say that when they reached the wreck they found Schraffl still in the pilot’s seat, sitting up to his ankles in a pool of petrol and staring into space. A pretty impressive piece of flying though by the sound of it, bringing down a dead machine with a dying man on board and the cockpit awash with petrol. Rather him than me though, all the same. The poor sod’s had a rough enough war of it already by all accounts. He got blown up by a shell at Sanok, even before he stopped that bullet in the knee, and they say he’s never been quite the same since.” We turned. It was the sound of a motor-car horn. A large dun-coloured staff car was lurching up the trackway from the Haidenschaft road. It drew up, and the passenger door was opened for Schraffl, dazed and grey-faced, to be set down, half carried between two medical orderlies. He was still wearing the jacket of his leather flying overalls, but I saw that his breeches and puttees were saturated in blood like the garments of a butcher. They led him past us to undress him and lay him out on the folding bed in our shared tent. As they left, one of the orderlies spoke with Meyerhofer.